The weeds and thorns that suffocated the seed are shown here to be the same enticements to power and self-sovereignty that motivated the Maccabean rebellion to initially dismantle Greek rule, but also fight against the Romans. This may have been a reference to the Pharisees, who initially worked with the Romans, but then became enmired in internal Judean politics. There are several examples of other areas rebelling against Rome when the conditions were right, so this was also a generalized complaint about barbarians in general.
Finally, we come to the faithful and true Romans who return what they are given a hundredfold and bear fruit on demand (!?). These seeds landed on “good soil”: good people = good Romans. People who cannot or will not accept Roman civilization are not good people. And we’re even trying to make the argument that their evil isn’t just a moral failure but a procedural one. The people are the soil.
The subtext here is for the Roman citizen reading this story: do what you’re told and you will be productive. The myth being that the empire was smoothly run under the watchful eye of Caesar.
Now that we’ve been schooled on the art of metaphor, let’s recap the primary obstacles to Roman civilization:
- Satan = nationalist rebellion
- rocky ground = battlefields and battle areas are places where such affliction occurs
- thorny ground = traitors, usurpers, and rebels
And the goal is to find or create:
- good earth = reliable, honorable Romans