“He dug deep and laid the foundation on the rock”
Luke 6:47–49
Figure of speechSettledJesus
He is like a man building a house, who dug down deep and laid his foundation on the rock. When the flood came, the torrent crashed against that house but could not shake it, because it was well built. (Luke 6:47–49 BSB)
What it sounds like today
The same house-on-rock parable.
The cultural key
Matthew's builders choose sites: bedrock versus the sandy wadi floor, a Palestinian landscape choice invisible in fair weather. Luke's builder is defined by labor: he 'dug deep' through soil to bedrock and laid a foundation, and the threat is a river in flood, a scene any Mediterranean reader knew. Matthew's fool picked the wrong place; Luke's fool skipped the work ('without a foundation'). Luke has translated geography into effort.
Recovered meaning
Two frames on one warning. Matthew: both lives look identical until the storm exposes what they stand on. Luke: the difference was the digging, the unglamorous depth-work of actually doing the words, and the flood finds out who did it.
Parallels: Matthew 7:24–27