Beginning
The parable of the wedding feast
22 Jesus spoke to them once again in parables.
2 “The kingdom of heaven,” he said, “is like a king who made a wedding feast for his son. 3 He sent his slaves to call the invited guests to the wedding, and they didn’t want to come.
4 “Again he sent other slaves, with these instructions: ‘Say to the guests, Look! I’ve got my dinner ready; my bulls and fatted calves have been killed; everything is prepared. Come to the wedding!’
5 “But they didn’t take any notice. They went off, one to his own farm, another to see to his business. 6 The others laid hands on his slaves, abused them and killed them. 7 (The king was angry, and sent his soldiers to destroy those murderers and burn down their city.) 8 Then he said to his slaves, ‘The wedding is ready, but the guests didn’t deserve it. 9 So go to the roads leading out of town, and invite everyone you find to the wedding.’ 10 The slaves went off into the streets and rounded up everyone they found, bad and good alike. And the wedding was filled with partygoers.
11 “But when the king came in to look at the guests, he saw there a man who wasn’t wearing a wedding suit.
12 “ ‘My friend,’ he said to him, ‘how did you get in here without a wedding suit?’ And he was speechless. 13 Then the king said to the servants, ‘Tie him up, hands and feet, and throw him into the darkness outside, where people weep and grind their teeth.’
14 “Many are called, you see, but few are chosen.”
Paying taxes to Caesar
15 Then the Pharisees went and plotted how they might trap him into saying the wrong thing. 16 They sent their followers to him, with the Herodians.
“Teacher,” they said, “we know that you are truthful, and that you teach God’s way truthfully. You don’t care what anyone thinks about you, because you don’t try to flatter people or favor them. 17 So tell us what you think. Is it lawful to pay tribute to Caesar, or not?”
18 Jesus knew their evil intentions.
“Why are you trying to trick me, you hypocrites?” he said. 19 “Show me the tribute coin.” They brought him a dinar.
20 “This . . . image,” said Jesus, “and this . . . inscription. Who do they belong to?”
21 “Caesar,” they said.
“Well then,” said Jesus, “you’d better give Caesar back what belongs to Caesar! And—give God what belongs to God!”
22 When they heard that they were astonished. They left him and went away.
The question of the resurrection
23 The same day some Sadducees came to him. (The Sadducees deny the resurrection.) Their question was this.
24 “Teacher,” they began, “Moses said, ‘If a man dies without children, his brother should marry his widow and raise up seed for his brother.’ 25 Well now, there were seven brothers living among us. The first got married, and then died, and since he didn’t have children he left his wife to his brother. 26 The same thing happened with the second and the third, and so on with all seven. 27 Last of all the woman died. 28 So: in the resurrection, whose wife will she be, of all the seven? All of them had married her, after all.”
29 This was Jesus’ answer to them: “You are quite mistaken,” he said, “because you don’t know your Bibles or God’s power. 30 In the resurrection, you see, people don’t marry or get married off; they are like angels in heaven. 31 But as for the resurrection of the dead, did you never read what was said to you by God, in these words: 32 ‘I am the God of Abraham, and the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob’? He isn’t God of the dead, but of the living.”
33 The crowds heard this, and they were astonished at his teaching.
The Great Commandment, and David’s Master
34 When the Pharisees heard that Jesus had silenced the Sadducees, they got together in a group. 35 One of them, a lawyer, put him on the spot with this question.
36 “Teacher,” he said, “which is the most important commandment in the law?”
37 “You must love the Lord your God,” replied Jesus, “with all your heart, with all your life, and with all your mind. 38 This is the first commandment, and it’s the one that really matters. 39 The second is similar, and it’s this: You must love your neighbor as yourself. 40 The entire law hangs on these two commandments—and that goes for the prophets, too.”
41 While the Pharisees were gathered there, Jesus asked them, 42 “What’s your view of the Messiah? Whose son is he?”
“David’s,” they said to him.
43 “Why then,” said Jesus, “does David (speaking by the spirit) call him ‘Master,’ when he says,
44 The Master says to my master,
sit here at my right hand,
until I place your enemies
down beneath your feet.
45 “If David calls him ‘Master,’ how can he be his son?”
46 Nobody was able to answer him a single word. From that day on nobody dared ask him anything any more.
Warnings against scribes and Pharisees
23 Then Jesus spoke to the crowds and to his disciples: 2 “The scribes and Pharisees,” he said, “sit on the seat of Moses. 3 So you must do whatever they tell you, and keep it, but don’t do the things they do. You see, they talk but they don’t do. 4 They tie up heavy bundles which are difficult to carry, and they dump them on people’s shoulders—but they themselves aren’t prepared to lift a little finger to move them!
5 “Everything they do is for show, to be seen by people. Yes, they make their prayer-boxes large and their prayer-tassels long, 6 and they love the chief places at dinners, the main seats in the synagogues, 7 the greetings in the market-places, and having people call them ‘Rabbi.’
8 “You mustn’t be called ‘Rabbi.’ You have one teacher, and you are all one family. 9 And you shouldn’t call anyone ‘father’ on earth, because you have one father, in heaven. 10 Nor should you be called ‘teacher,’ because you have one teacher, the Messiah.
11 “The greatest among you should be your servant. 12 People who make themselves great will be humbled; and people who humble themselves will become great.”
Condemnation of scribes and Pharisees (1)
13 “Woe betide you, scribes and Pharisees, you hypocrites!” Jesus continued. “You slam the door of heaven’s kingdom in people’s faces. You don’t go in yourselves, and when other people try to enter, you stop them.
15 “Woe betide you, scribes and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You cross sea and land to make one single Gentile take up Jewish practices, and when that happens you make the convert twice as much a child of Gehenna as you are yourselves.
16 “Woe betide you, you blind guides! This is what you say: ‘If anyone swears by the Temple, it’s nothing; but if anyone swears by the gold in the Temple, the oath is valid.’ 17 How crazy and blind can you get! Which is greater, the gold, or the Temple that makes the gold sacred? 18 And you say, ‘If anyone swears by the altar, it’s nothing; but if anyone swears by the gift on it, the oath is valid.’ 19 How blind you are! Which is greater, the gift, or the altar that makes the gift sacred? 20 So whoever swears by the altar swears by it and by everything on it. 21 And whoever swears by the Temple swears by it and by the one who lives in it. 22 And whoever swears by heaven swears by the throne of God and by the one who sits on it.”
Condemnation of scribes and Pharisees (2)
23 “Woe betide you, scribes and Pharisees, you hypocrites!” Jesus went on. “You tithe mint and dill and cumin, and you omit the serious matters of the law like justice, mercy and loyalty. You should have done these, without neglecting the others. 24 You’re blind guides! You filter out a gnat, but you gulp down a camel!
25 “Woe betide you, scribes and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You scrub the outside of the cup and the dish, but the inside is full of extortion and moral flabbiness. 26 You blind Pharisee, first make the inside of the cup clean, and then the outside will be clean as well.
27 “Woe betide you, scribes and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You’re like whitewashed graves, which look fine on the outside, but inside they are full of dead people’s bones and uncleanness of every kind. 28 That’s like you: on the outside you appear to be virtuous and law-abiding, but inside you are full of hypocrisy and lawlessness.
29 “Woe betide you, scribes and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You build the tombs of the prophets, and you decorate the memorials of the righteous, 30 and you say, ‘If we’d lived in the days of our ancestors, we wouldn’t have gone along with them in killing the prophets.’ 31 So you testify against yourselves that you are the children of the people who murdered the prophets! 32 Well then, go ahead: complete the work your ancestors began! 33 You snakes, you nest of vipers, how can you escape the judgment of Gehenna?”
Judgment on Jerusalem and its leaders
34 “Because of all this,” Jesus concluded, “I’m sending you prophets, wise men and scribes. Some of them you will kill and crucify. Some of them you will whip in your synagogues. You’ll chase them from town to town. 35 That’s how all the righteous blood that’s been shed on earth, from the blood of righteous Abel to the blood of Zechariah son of Barachiah—you murdered him between sanctuary and altar—all that blood will come upon you. 36 I’m telling you the solemn truth: it will all come on this generation.
37 “Jerusalem, Jerusalem, killing the prophets and stoning those who are sent to you! How often have I longed to gather up your children, the way a hen gathers up her brood under her wings, and you didn’t want me to! 38 Now, see here: your house has been abandoned by God; it’s a ruin. 39 Yes, I tell you: you won’t see me again from now on until you say, ‘God’s blessing on the coming one, the one who comes in the Lord’s own name!’ ”
Scripture quotations from The New Testament for Everyone are copyright © Nicholas Thomas Wright 2011, 2018, 2019.