The parable of the ant and the grasshopper is very popular.
Parable is a term that comes from the Latin parabŏla and has its most remote origin in a Greek word. In the field of mathematics, the parabola is the geometric space of the points on a plane that are equidistant from a fixed point and a line. This place is created from the action of a plane that is parallel to the generatrix and that dissects a circular cone.
The parabola constitutes a conical curve that is usually drawn in frequent phenomena, such as the fall of water from a fountain or the movement of a ball or ball that is propelled by a basketball player: “Manu Ginobili threw with a large parabola to avoid his defender and managed to score.”
The parable as a narrative
A parable is, on the other hand, the story of a fictional event that allows a message of moral content to be transmitted through an analogy, a comparison or a similarity. Parables are stories with a didactic intention that are based on a look at the world that is credible.
Their writing in prose, the use of metaphors, real situations and events of daily life, human characters who find themselves experiencing important moral dilemmas or the moralizing character that they print and develop are some of the main hallmarks that identify parables. , from a literary and narrative point of view.
Simple teaching method
The parable, in this way, seeks to promote notions associated with the spirit through the expression of activities that are simple and in which it does not go into too much depth. They are similar, in this sense, to fables .
An example of a parable is the story of the ant and the grasshopper . While the ant spends the entire summer gathering food to survive in the winter, the cicada dedicates itself to singing carefreely. When winter arrives, starving, the cicada goes to the ant to ask for help. There are two endings to this parable: one in which the ant gives the grasshopper some food and teaches it about the importance of foresight, and another where the ant refuses to assist the grasshopper and it ends up dying.
The Bible uses parables to transmit teachings.
The parable in the Bible
Parables are also, finally, a set of short narratives that are attributed to Jesus Christ and that promote the teaching of religious and moral content.
Among the parables that appear in the Bible , more specifically in the New Testament, one of the best known stands out: that of the prodigal son. With it, what we try to transmit is the piety and mercy of Jesus towards all those sinful people who repent of the actions they have carried out. Likewise, it also tries to promote repentance for sins committed.
Specifically, what is told in it is how a father distributes his inheritance between his two children and the youngest of them goes away from his family to spend all the capital living in a lustful way. Shortly after, he will lose the money, which will lead him to start working as a pig herder for a man. This work will help him realize the sin he has committed and he decides to return to his father, to whom he asks forgiveness for his actions and asks him to treat him like one of his day laborers.
However, the father, happy for his little one's return and admired by the repentance he shows, gives him back the role he occupied in the family before his departure.
That of the Good Samaritan is another of the most important parables in this part of the Holy Book, however, we cannot forget that in the Old Testament we also find some of these moral and religious stories such as, for example, that of the lamb.