Matthew 13:15

“For this people’s heart is waxed gross, etc.,] Or fat, become stupid and sottish, and without understanding; and so incapable of taking in the true sense and meaning of what they saw with their eyes, and heard with their ears; for they had their outward senses of hearing and seeing, and yet their intellectual powers were stupefied. And their ears are dull of hearing, and their eyes they have closed; which is expressive of the blindness and hardness, which were partly brought upon themselves by their own wilfulness and obstinacy, against such clear evidence as arose from the doctrine and miracles of Christ; and partly from the righteous judgment of God, giving them up, for their perverseness,…”

“Christ, in these verses, gives a “reason” why he used this manner of instruction. See also Mark 4:10-12; Luke 8:9-10. Matthew 13:11 The mysteries of the kingdom - The word “mystery,” in the Bible, properly means a thing that is “concealed,” or that “has been concealed.” It does not mean that the thing was “incomprehensible,” or even difficult to be understood. The thing might be “plain” enough if revealed, but it means simply that it “had” not been before made known. Thus the “mysteries of the kingdom” do not mean any doctrines incomprehensible in themselves considered, but simply doctrines about the preaching of the gospel and the establishment of the new kingdom of the Messiah, which “had…”

“heart: Psa 119:70 ears: Zac 7:11; Joh 8:43, Joh 8:44; Act 7:57; Ti2 4:4; Heb 5:11 their eyes: Isa 29:10-12, Isa 44:20; Th2 2:10, Th2 2:11 and should be: Act 3:19; Ti2 2:25, Ti2 2:26; Heb 6:4-6 and I: Isa 57:18; Jer 3:22, Jer 17:14, Jer 33:6; Hos 14:4; Mal 4:2; Mar 4:12; Rev 22:2 Matthew 13:16”