Discovery BoxMatthew 9:17 
Context9:17 And no one pours new wine into old wineskins; 1 otherwise the skins burst and the wine is spilled out and the skins are destroyed. Instead they put new wine into new wineskins 2 and both are preserved.”
Matthew 13:52
Context13:52 Then he said to them, “Therefore every expert in the law 3 who has been trained for the kingdom of heaven is like the owner of a house who brings out of his treasure what is new and old.”
1 sn Wineskins were bags made of skin or leather, used for storing wine in NT times. As the new wine fermented and expanded, it would stretch the new wineskins. Putting new (unfermented) wine in old wineskins, which had already been stretched, would result in the bursting of the wineskins.
2 sn The meaning of the saying new wine into new wineskins is that the presence and teaching of Jesus was something new and signaled the passing of the old. It could not be confined within the old religion of Judaism, but involved the inauguration and consummation of the kingdom of God.
3 tn Or “every scribe.” See the note on the phrase “experts in the law” in 2:4. It is possible that the term translated “expert in the law” (traditionally, “scribe”) here is a self-description used by the author, Matthew, to represent his role in conveying the traditions about Jesus to his intended audience. See David E. Orton, The Understanding Scribe [JSNTSup].
