This parable has a different style from those typical of the synoptic gospels and is more of an allegory as each point symbolizes something significant. There is no build-up of a vivid little story to one main point. The Greek word which is translated 'parable' in 10:6 is different from that used for 'parable' in the synoptic gospels and simply means a saying or comparison.

 Jesus the good shepherd

New Testament passages such as Mark 6:34, 14:27, Luke 15:4-6, I Peter 2:25 and 5:1-4, and Old Testament passages such as Ezekiel 34, Psalm 23: 1-4, use the Biblical metaphor of 'shepherd' and 'sheep' when speaking of God and his people; it was a thought which came easily to the sheep-keeping people of Israel. The same idea was connected with King David, Psalm 78:70-71, and with the ideal ruler who would come and rule on behalf of God, Jeremiah 23: 1-8. In Jesus, all such prophecies found their true fulfillment.

The parable uses a typical Palestinian scene as its setting; at night the sheep were brought into a yard which was enclosed with a stone wall. The yard, called the sheepfold, had only one gate which the shepherd guarded. In the daytime the shepherd led his sheep out to the grazing pastures and kept careful watch over them; sheep-keeping was taken seriously by the sheep-farmers whose wealth was in their sheep. In the parable the shepherd refers to Jesus, the sheep to the new People of God, and the thief and the robber are identified with all false teachers and leaders, particularly with the Pharisees and the teachers of the Law in the original life situation of the parable. The thieves and robbers did not enter the sheepfold by the one gate but climbed over the wall to steal the sheep. There is a warning to all generations of Christians in this parable, to beware of false leaders and teachers.