⁴⁵ One of the experts in the law answered him, “Teacher, when you say these things, you insult us, too.” ⁴⁶ And he said, “Woe also to you experts in the law! For you load people with burdens hard to bear, and you yourselves do not lift a finger to ease them.^{(A) 47} Woe to you! For you build the tombs of the prophets whom your ancestors killed.^{(B) 48} So you are witnesses and approve of the deeds of your ancestors, for they killed them, and you build their tombs. ⁴⁹ For this reason the Wisdom of God said, ‘I will send them prophets and apostles, some of whom they will kill and persecute,’^{(C) 50} so that this generation may be charged with the blood of all the prophets shed since the foundation of the world, ⁵¹ from the blood of Abel to the blood of Zechariah, who perished between the altar and the sanctuary. Yes, I tell you, it will be charged against this generation.^{(D) 52} Woe to you experts in the law! For you have taken away the key of knowledge; you did not enter yourselves, and you hindered those who were entering.”^(E)

The Parable of the Widow and the Unjust Judge

18 Then Jesus^[a] told them a parable about their need to pray always and not to lose heart. ² He said, “In a certain city there was a judge who neither feared God nor had respect for people. ³ In that city there was a widow who kept coming to him and saying, ‘Grant me justice against my accuser.’ ⁴ For a while he refused, but later he said to himself, ‘Though I have no fear of God and no respect for anyone, ⁵ yet because this widow keeps bothering me, I will grant her justice, so that she may not wear me out by continually coming.’ ”^{[b] 6} And the Lord said, “Listen to what the unjust judge says. ⁷ And will not God grant justice to his chosen ones who cry to him day and night? Will he delay long in helping them? ⁸ I tell you, he will quickly grant justice to them. And yet, when the Son of Man comes, will he find faith on earth?”