Then Jesus sent the multitude away,.... That his disciples might have the opportunity of conversing with him alone, about the sense of the parables he had delivered; and that he might instruct them by some others hereafter mentioned.
And went into the house: left the ship in which he had been preaching to the multitude, came on shore, and returned to the house he came out of, Matthew 13:1
and his disciples came to him; and being alone, make an humble request to him,
saying, declare unto us the parable of the tares of the field: by which they mean, not a rehearsal of it, but an explication of the sense and meaning of it: they ask nothing about the parables of the mustard seed and leaven, either because they better understood them; or because there were some things very remarkable and striking in this, which made them very desirous to be particularly informed of the several parts of it, and their meaning.