Parables and metaphors are ubiquitous in scripture and common everyday speech. This makes compiling an exhaustive study of the subject very challenging. The most complete work I have come accross that deals with this subject is "The Parables and Metaphors of our Lord" by G. Campbell Morgan. Although that book is no longer in print, there are copies available through Amazon. The book is higly reccomended for serious students of scripture. 

My studies rely heavily on G. Campbell Morgan's work.  

The most difficult part of learning a foreign language is learning the figures of speech. Learning new words and grammar is just a process of memorization but learning to speak and understand with fluency requires learning the figures of speech, the little things that people say that can't be taken literally. 

The same is true of understand the teachings of Jesus we have to understand when he is speaking figuratively, and what he means by the figure of speech. That is the purpose of this study.

There are somethings in the Bible that are not meant to be taken litterally. Jesus is well known for using parables and metaphors in his teaching. Such figures of speech are ubiquitous in scripture and every day life. When we say to some one special, "you are the sunshine of my life" we don't plan on putting on sunblock to protect us from them. It is not litteral that they are sunshine. Sunshine here is a metaphor for the brightness that person brings to us. We say it is "raining cats and dogs" we do not mean pets are falling from the sky. Our daily speech is littered with phrases that are litterally meaningless and yet communicate IMPLIED knowledge.

So to be an effective speaker of the English one does not only need to know the words. An english speaker also needs to learn the metaphors. In the tagalog language, the language of the Philipines there is an expression that translated word for word reads: until the raven turns white. In english we don't have a metaphor that consists of those words so the words together, on their own, have little meaning in English. In Tagalog it means that something is never going to happen.