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Parable of the dragnet

A story about fishing and judgement.
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While the Bible mentions several types of fishing nets, the one Jesus referred to in Matthew 13:47–50 was a dragnet. The dragnet was the largest type of net used in antiquity and required multiple boats and a large shore-based crew to operate. – Slide 1
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Commercial fishermen typically used dragnets that could be up to 1,330 feet (400 meters) long and 26 feet (8 meters) tall. These nets were made of linen thread. – Slide 2
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The top edge was fitted with cork or wooden floats to keep the net at the surface, while the bottom edge was weighted with lead sinkers or stones so that it rested on the lakebed. – Slide 3
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Using a dragnet was a team effort. One end of the net was secured to the shore while a boat rowed out in a wide semicircle, letting the net drop into the water before returning to another point along the beach. The crew on the shore would slowly haul the net in with long ropes. <br/>Further out two boats could be used to encircle the fish with the net and then the boats could be brought to shore. – Slide 4
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The net functioned as a moving wall, sweeping along the lake bottom and dragging every living creature in its path toward the shore, where the catch was immediately sorted. – Slide 5
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When the crew hauled the dragnet onto the beach, a careful sorting process began. More than twenty species of fish inhabit the Sea of Galilee.  While some are inedible or considered ritually impure, a dragnet gathers every kind of fish without distinction. – Slide 6
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In the parable Jesus describes the fishermen as sitting down and putting the good fish in baskets but throwing the bad fish away. In the first century, whether a fish was classified as ‘good’ or ‘bad’ depended on the cultural and religious laws of the people who caught it. Because Jewish communities dominated the local fishing industry, the primary standard for sorting fish was biblical dietary law. – Slide 7
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According to Leviticus 11:9, people could eat anything from the water that possessed both fins and scales. – Slide 8
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The most desirable species of fish in the Sea of Galilee was musht (Tilapia, or ‘St. Peter’s Fish’). – Slide 9
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These fish were sorted into baskets, kept alive in jars of water, or packed in salt for quick transport to markets in Magdala and Jerusalem. – Slide 10
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The most notable ‘bad’ fish in the Sea of Galilee was the North African catfish (Clarias gariepinus). Catfish were plentiful in the lake and could grow up to three feet long. – Slide 11
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Jewish fishermen could not eat these fish or sell them at the local kosher market because they had smooth, scaleless skin. When caught in massive dragnets, such catfish were discarded and left to decay on the beach, or occasionally sold cheaply to Roman soldiers or to pagan communities living in the nearby Decapolis cities. – Slide 12
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Freshwater eels occasionally made their way into the nets. Like catfish, eels lack true visible scales and were therefore prohibited. Fish that had died in the net hours before retrieval and had begun to decompose, as well as those partially eaten by predators such as birds or larger fish, were considered ritually unclean and unsafe to eat. <br/>Jesus said, ‘This is how it will be at the end of the age. The angels will come and separate the wicked from the righteous and throw them into the blazing furnace, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.’ – Slide 13
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