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Daily Scripture Readings |
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Wednesday (June 30, 2010)* |
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Daily Office Lectionary, The Book of Common Prayer, the Episcopal Church in the U.S.A., 1979; cf. The Revised Common Lectionary (RCL), Abingdon Press, 1992 |
Daily Lectionary, Book of Common Worship, the Presbyterian Church in the U.S.A., 1993 |
Daily Lectionary, Book of Worship Inter-Lutheran Commission on Worship, c. 1978 (2002 printing) ‡ |
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http://www.satucket.com/lectionary/index.htm http://www.pcusa.org/lectionary |
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‡ Daily Lectionary, Evangelical Lutheran Worship, ELCA, 2006. In the Evangelical Lutheran Worship book of 2006, the Daily Lectionary (pp. 1121-1153) is revised to correlate with the Sunday Lectionary (the Revised Common Lectionary) on the three year cycle: Year A, Year B (now current), Year C. “The readings are chosen so that the days leading up to Sunday (Thursday through Saturday) prepare for the Sunday readings. The days flowing out from Sunday (Monday through Wednesday) reflect upon the Sunday readings” (p. 1121). |
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Unless otherwise indicated, the scripture texts quoted are from The New Revised Standard Version (Nashville, TN: Thomas Nelson Publishers), 1989. |
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Wednesday AM Psalm 119:145-176 PM Psalm 128, 129, 130 Num. 22:41-23:12 Rom. 7:13-25 Matt. 21:33-46 Eucharistic Readings: Psalm 50:7-15 Amos 5:14-15,21-24; Matthew 8:28-34 |
Wednesday Morning: Psalms 65; 147:1-11 Num. 22:41-23:12 Rom. 7:13-25 Matt. 21:33-46 Evening: Psalms 125; 91 |
Wednesday Morning Pss.: 15, 147:1-12 Num. 11:24-33 (34-35) Rom. 1:28-2:11 Matt. 18:1-9 Evening Pss.: 48, 4 |
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Year C Daily Readings Psalm 140 Jeremiah 23:16-22 Matthew 10:16-25 |
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* Wednesday in the week of the Fifth Sunday after Pentecost, references for the week of the Sunday closest to June 29, Year Two |
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For the Lutheran Readings for today, and comments on them, see the Episcopal Readings in the file for June 16, 2010, two weeks ago. These traditions differ in relating readings to the weeks following Pentecost.
Episcopal and Presbyterian Readings:
Numbers 22:41-23:12
Balaam's First Oracle
41 On the next day Balak took Balaam and brought him up to Bamoth-baal; and from there he could see part of the people of Israel. 23 1 Then Balaam said to Balak, "Build me seven altars here, and prepare seven bulls and seven rams for me." 2 Balak did as Balaam had said; and Balak and Balaam offered a bull and a ram on each altar. 3 Then Balaam said to Balak, "Stay here beside your burnt offerings while I go aside. Perhaps the LORD will come to meet me. Whatever he shows me I will tell you." And he went to a bare height.
4 Then God met Balaam; and Balaam said to him, "I have arranged the seven altars, and have offered a bull and a ram on each altar." 5 The LORD put a word in Balaam's mouth, and said, "Return to Balak, and this is what you must say." 6 So he returned to Balak, who was standing beside his burnt offerings with all the officials of Moab. 7 Then Balaam uttered his oracle, saying:
"Balak has brought me from Aram,
the king of Moab from the eastern mountains:
'Come, curse Jacob for me;
Come, denounce Israel!'
8 How can I curse whom God has not cursed?
How can I denounce those whom the LORD has not denounced?
9 For from the top of the crags I see him,
from the hills I behold him;
Here is a people living alone,
and not reckoning itself among the nations!
10 Who can count the dust of Jacob,
or number the dust-cloud of Israel?
Let me die the death of the upright,
and let my end be like his!"
11 Then Balak said to Balaam, "What have you done to me? I brought you to curse my enemies, but now you have done nothing but bless them." 12 He answered, "Must I not take care to say what the LORD puts into my mouth?" (Numbers 22:41-23:12, NRSV)
The following comments are based on those of July 2, 2008 (Wednesday in the week of the Sunday closest to June 29, Year Two), when comments were repeated with editing and supplement from July 5, 2006 (Wednesday in the week of the Sunday closest to June 29, Year Two), when comments were repeated with some revision from June 30, 2004, in an email sent June 28, 2004, for June 28-July 4.
Today’s reading, the third of six on Balaam and Balak, includes the first of four oracles of Balaam (23:7-10). The others, according to Bernhard W. Anderson are (2) 23:18-24, (3) 24:3-9, (4) 24:15-19 (NOAB, 2nd ed., 1994, on Num. 22:41-24:25). For the setting of the first oracle, Balak brings Balaam to a site with a view. “On the next day Balak took Balaam and brought him up to Bamoth-baal (lfaBA tOm8BA, bāmôth ba‘al); and from there he could see part of the people of Israel” (Num. 22:41). The word tOmBA (bāmôth) is the plural form of hmABA (bāmāh), which, according to William L. Holladay, can mean “mountain ridge, height,” often “(cultic high place . . . associated with pagan worship and cultic prostitution” (A Concise Hebrew and Aramaic Lexicon of the Old Testament, 1971, 10th corrected impression, 1988, s.v. hmABA, bāmāh). “Of “Bamoth-baal,” Jo Ann Hackett says “Pisgah (23:14), and Peor (23:28) are in the hills above the eastern Jordan Valley, see 21:19-20; Deut. 3:27; 34:1; Josh. 13:17-20” (The HarperCollins Study Bible, rev. ed., 2006, on Num. 22:41). Rabbi J. H. Hertz says, “Bamoth-baal [is] either the name of a place or, more probably, some local sanctuary of Baal” (The Pentateuch and Haftorahs, second ed., 1981, on Num. 22:41).
Upon arriving at Bamoth-baal, Balaam directs Barak to “build me seven altars here, and prepare seven bulls and seven rams for me” (Num. 23:1). According to the Rabbi, “the altar had to be erected by the person for whom the divining was done” (ibid., on 23:1). Balak follows this instruction; they “offered a bull and a ram on each altar” (v. 2). This, says Anderson, was “in the manner of “Babylonian diviners” who “resorted to this kind of sacrificial ceremony to obtain an omen” (op. cit., on Num. 23:1-6). Balaam leaves Balak with the sacrifices. “Then Balaam said to Balak, 'Stay here beside your burnt offerings while I go aside. Perhaps the LORD will come to meet me. Whatever he shows me I will tell you.’ And he went to a bare height” (v. 3). According to Rabbi Hertz, “Balak had to remain by the burnt-offering, while the diviner did his work” (op. cit., on v. 3). “I will go,” says the Rabbi (citing JPS 1917, for NRSV “I go aside”). “To perform the divination ceremonies” (ibid.). Of “to a bare height,” he adds “Or ‘alone’ (Onkelos). The Heb. Ypw [špy] has also been taken as an abbreviation of the three words ΄y yp lvxw [še’ôl pî Y[HWH]], ‘to inquire of the mouth of the LORD’ ” (ibid.).
“Then,” says the narrator, “God met Balaam; and Balaam said to him, ‘I have arranged the seven altars and have offered a bull and a ram on each altar” (v. 4). “The LORD,” he continues, “put a word (rbADA, dāvār) in Balaam’s mouth, and said, ‘Return to Balak, and this is what you must say’ ” (v. 5). At this point we are not told what Balaam “must say,” but it is evident from the oracle itself (vv. 7-10, cf. v. 12). Hackett refers to 22:8, adding, “the word is the following oracle, vv. 7-10” (op. cit., on 23:5). So Balaam “returned to Balak, who was standing beside his burnt offerings with all the officials of Moab” (v. 6).
Balaam does not curse, but rather blesses Israel: “Who can count the dust of Jacob, / or number (with rpasA ym9U, ûmî sāfar, for MT rP!s4m9U, ûmispār) the dust-cloud of Israel? / Let me die the death of the upright, / and let my end be like his!” (vv. 7-10 NRSV, cf. NJPS 1985, 1999, NRSV, NKJV and, with past tense verbs, JPS 1917). For the emendation, based on several ancient versions, which uses “number,” the verb, rather than “number,” the noun, see the apparatus in Biblia Hebraica Stuttgartensia (BHS, 1969, 1977); the older translation follows the Hebrew Massoretic Text (MT), “and the number of the fourth part of Israel” (Num. 23:10b AV/KJV). Nili S. Fox notes the use of emendation (“conjecture”) here, and explains. “This English translation assumes a textual error, that the single Heb word ‘umispar’ (‘and the number of’) should be read as two words ‘umiy safar’ (‘[who can] number’). The parallelism of the verse supports this emendation” (The Jewish Study Bible, p. 331 on Num. 23:10; cf the NJPS text note c, ‘Lit. “and the number of” ’). According to David P. Wright, “the poetic oracle he recites is a blessing, not a curse. The meaning of this oracle is clear; some of the later oracles are poorly preserved and extremely unclear” (NOAB, 3rd ed., augmented, 2007, on Num. 23:7-10).
Balak is outraged and says. “What have you done to me? I brought you to curse my enemies, but now you have done nothing but bless them” (v. 11). According to Fox, “Balak’s fear that the Israelite multitude will be triumphant (22:3) is confirmed already in Balaam’s first oracle” (op. cit., on v. 10.). Balaam's answer, “Must I not take care to say what the LORD puts into my mouth?” echoes his instructions from the LORD” (v. 12; cf. 22:20, 35), and sounds a little like Peter before the Council, centuries later. “We cannot keep from speaking about what we have seen and heard” (Acts 4:20). One might wonder about Balaam’s intentions here, but clearly, he cannot falsify the LORD’s word to him.
Romans 7:13-25
13 Did what is good, then, bring death to me? By no means! It was sin, working death in me through what is good, in order that sin might be shown to be sin, and through the commandment might become sinful beyond measure.
The Inner Conflict
14 For we know that the law is spiritual; but I am of the flesh, sold into slavery under sin. 15 I do not understand my own actions. For I do not do what I want, but I do the very thing I hate. 16 Now if I do what I do not want, I agree that the law is good. 17 But in fact it is no longer I that do it, but sin that dwells within me. 18 For I know that nothing good dwells within me, that is, in my flesh. I can will what is right, but I cannot do it. 19 For I do not do the good I want, but the evil I do not want is what I do. 20 Now if I do what I do not want, it is no longer I that do it, but sin that dwells within me.
21 So I find it to be a law that when I want to do what is good, evil lies close at hand. 22 For I delight in the law of God in my inmost self, 23 but I see in my members another law at war with the law of my mind, making me captive to the law of sin that dwells in my members. 24 Wretched man that I am! Who will rescue me from this body of death? 25 Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord!
So then, with my mind I am a slave to the law of God, but with my flesh I am a slave to the law of sin. (Romans 7:13-25, NRSV)
The following comments are repeated here from March 24, 2009 (Tuesday in the week of the Fourth Sunday of Lent, Year One), when comments were repeated from July 2, 2008 (Wednesday in the week of the Sunday closest to June 29, Year Two), when comments were repeated from March 20, 2007 (Tuesday in the week of the Fourth Sunday of Lent, Year One), when comments were repeated from July 5, 2006 (Wednesday in the week of the Sunday closest to June 29, Year Two), when they were combined with supplement from June 30, 2004 in an email sent June 28, 2004, for June 28-July 4, and from March 8, 2005 (Tuesday of the week of the Fourth Sunday of Lent, Year One). To keep comments in context, some of the following reviews issues from yesterday’s reading.
Paul describes a dilemma. He knows the good and wants to do it; but he lacks the ability to do it. He is captive to the power of sin. “For I delight in the law of God in my inmost self, but I see in my members another law at war with the law of my mind, making me captive to the law of sin that dwells in my members. Wretched man that I am! Who will rescue me from this body of death? Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord!” (vv. 22-25). There has been a long tradition of interpreters who have debated whether Paul is relating his own experience here or whether his reference to himself is a literary device for describing a certain aspect of human experience. The debate also considers whether the experience described is non-Christian (pre-Christian), that is, pre-conversion, or the experience of Christian believers. Within the latter, a distinction is sometimes made between the experience of a mature Christian with a “deeper life,” and that of a “carnal Christian” such as Paul describes in 1 Corinthians:
And so, brothers and sisters, I could not speak to you as spiritual people (pneumatikoiv, pneumatikoi), but rather as people of the flesh (savrkinoi, sarkinoi, ‘carnal’ AV/KJV), as infants in Christ. I fed you with milk, not solid food, for you were not ready for solid food. Even now you are still not ready, for you are still of the flesh (sarkikoiv, sarkikoi, ‘carnal’ AV/KJV). For as long as there is jealousy and quarreling among you, are you not of the flesh (sarkikoiv, sarkikoi, ‘carnal’ AV/KJV), and behaving according to human inclinations? For when one says, “I belong to Paul,” and another, “I belong to Apollos,” are you not merely human? (1 Cor. 3:1-4, NRSV)
In yesterday’s reading Paul presented the analogy of a woman “bound by the law to her husband” who is “discharged from the law concerning the husband” when he dies” (Rom. 7:2). He compares the Christian who has died with Christ (6:8) to the woman now free from the law of her husband. The analogy moves on. We, having “died to the law through the body of Christ . . . [now] belong to another, to him who has been raised from the dead in order that we may bear fruit for God” (v. 4). “While we were living in the flesh,” says Paul, “our sinful passions, aroused by the law, were at work in our members to bear fruit for death” (v. 5). “But now,” he says, “we are discharged from the law, dead to that which held us captive, so that we are slaves not under the old written code but in the new life of the Spirit” (v. 6).
This raises a question, that Paul must emphatically deny with his formula of abhorrence. “What then should we say? That the law is sin? By no means! (mh; gevnoito, mē genoito)” (v. 7a). On the one hand, “Yet if it had not been for the law,” says Paul, I would not have known sin” (v. 7b). He explains. “I would not have known what it is to covet if the law had not said, ‘You shall not covet’ ” (v. 7c). As noted yesterday, when Paul says, “But sin, seizing an opportunity in the commandment [i.e., the commandment not to covet], produced in me all kinds of covetousness. Apart from the law sin lies dead” (v. 8), he is referring, according to Neil Elliott, to “Covetousness, or ‘desire,’ [that] was regarded by Paul’s contemporaries as the root of all evil (see Jas. 1:15; 4 Macc. 2:4-6; Philo, De spec. leg. 4.84-94), even the source of Adam’s sin (Philo, Leg. all. 3.115)” (NOAB, 3rd ed., augmented, 2007, on Rom. 7:8).
John Wesley distinguishes “sins” (Rom. 7:5), “Our sins which were by the law--Accidentally occasioned, or irritated thereby,” from “sin–My inbred corruption” (v. 8) . This sin “Taking occasion by the commandment–Forbidding, but not subduing it, was only fretted, and wrought in me so much the more all manner of evil desire. For while I was without the knowledge of the law, sin was dead–Neither so apparent, nor so active; nor was I under the least apprehensions of any danger from it” (Explanatory Notes, on the Internet Web site, Wesley Center Online, at http://wesley.nnu.edu/john_wesley/notes/romans.htm#Chapter+VII, accessed again June 30, 2010; one may need to copy and paste the URL in a browser).
Wesley interprets verse 9 as follows:
And I was once alive without the law–Without the close application of it. I had much life, wisdom, virtue, strength: so I thought. But when the commandment–That is, the law, a part put for the whole; but this expression particularly intimates its compulsive force, which restrains, enjoins, urges, forbids, threatens. Came–In its spiritual meaning, to my heart, with the power of God. Sin revived, and I died–My inbred sin took fire, and all my virtue and strength died away; and I then saw myself to be dead in sin, and liable to death eternal.
Wilber T. Dayton, who agrees with Wesley that Paul is not describing the experience of a believing Christian who has died with Christ (6:6, 8) and has been raised with him to “newness of life” (6:4), nevertheless comments (on 7:8-11) as follows:
The vicious actor was not law but sin. The Apostle speaks in the first person, testifying that this was his own experience under the law as he looks back upon it. But he universalizes it. Our experience with law has been as tragic as his. “It is the experience of the unregenerate, but seen through regenerate eyes, interpreted in a regenerate mind’ [citing J. Denney]. Sin (singular with the article in Greek) is pictured as a power dwelling in man of which he may not as yet be aware. It “receives occasion” by coming face to face with something that appeals to desire, avails itself of the commandment that prohibits the act, and works in us all manner of coveting [again citing J. Denney]. (The Wesley Bible Commentary,(1965, vol V [?], p. 49).
So why did God give the law, which causes sin’s open rebellion? According to Dayton, it was a temporary expedient. It “gave sin the occasion to reveal itself in its hideous, destructive nature” (ibid., p. 50). Dayton sees the rest of the chapter as describing how sin “resists and overcomes each of the three major aspects of personality. It is sin in spite of knowledge (vv. 13-17), sin in spite of choice (vv. 18-20), and sin in spite of the feeling that supports a moral idealism (vv. 21-25)” (ibid.).
In this analogy, sin (personified) is helpless without the law. “I was once alive apart from the law, but when the commandment came, sin revived and I died, and the very commandment that promised life proved to be death to me” (vv. 9-10). “For sin, seizing an opportunity in the commandment, deceived me and through it killed me” (v. 11). Elliott sees in the words, “sin . . . deceived me,” an echo of Genesis 3:13 (op. cit., on v. 11). But one cannot blame God’s law for his or her own sin, though the law provides a certain awareness. Paul insists that “the law is holy, and the commandment is holy and just and good” (v. 12).
As we come to today’s reading, Paul raises another question, only to emphatically deny it with his abhorrence formula. “Did what is good, then, bring death to me? By no means! (mh; gevnoito, mē genoito)” (v. 13a). “It was sin,” says Paul, “working death in me through what is good, in order that sin might be shown to be sin, and through the commandment might become sinful beyond measure” (v. 13b). At this point, it seems, we move backward. We were “discharged from the law” (v. 6), but now, says Paul, though knowing “that the law is spiritual . . . I am of the flesh (savrkinoV, sarkinos, ‘carnal’ AV/KJV), sold into slavery unto sin” (v. 14). Wesley reviews in summary:
I am carnal - St. Paul, having compared together the past and present state of believers, that "in the flesh," Rom 7:5, and that "in the spirit," Rom 7:6, in answering two objections, (Is then the law sin? Rom 7:7, and, Is the law death? Rom 7:13,) interweaves the whole process of a man reasoning, groaning, striving, and escaping from the legal to the evangelical state. This he does from Rom 7:7, to the end of this chapter. Sold under sin– Totally enslaved; slaves bought with money were absolutely at their master's disposal.
Paul elaborates the situation of this “carnal” person. “I do not understand my own actions. For I do not do what I want, but I do the very thing I hate” (v. 15). There is a positive value here, for “if I do what I do not want, I agree that the law is good” (v. 16). According to Elliott, the words “I do not do what I want” are “not Paul’s view of Christian existence (see 12:1-2), but an illustration of the point made in 2:15: The law declares God’s valid judgment on all human conduct” (op. cit., on vv. 15-16). Wesley comments: “It is good–This single word implies all the three that were used before, Rom. 7:12, ‘holy, just, and good’ ” (on v. 16). Paul continues the slavery analogy with a further inference. “But in fact it is no longer I that do it, but sin that dwells within me” (v. 17). “It is no more I that can properly be said to do it, but rather sin that dwelleth in me–That makes, as it were, another person, and tyrannizes over me” (on v. 17).
The person so described has, as it were, a divided personality. “For I know that nothing good dwells within me, that is, in my flesh. I can will what is right, but I cannot do it” (v. 18). He (or she) can know and want what is right, but cannot find it in himself (or herself) to do it. “For I do not do the good I want,” says Paul, “but the evil I do not want is what I do” (v. 19). And Paul repeats himself, this time with emphasis on his choices. “Now if I do what I do not want, it is no longer I that do it, but sin that dwells within me” (v.20, cf. v. 17).
Paul describes further the moral dilemma of this person whose personality–whose soul, it seems–is severely divided. “So I find it to be a law that when I want to do what is good, evil lies close at hand. For I delight in the law of God in my inmost self, but I see in my members another law at war with the law of my mind, making me captive to the law of sin that dwells in my members” (vv. 21-23). We are reminded of the words of James, who describes “the doubter [as] being double-minded (divyucoV, dipsychos) and unstable in every way, [who] must not expect to receive anything from the Lord” (Jas. 1:8). Dayton describes this situation:
The search for some ray of hope goes on. Is there no feeling for law? If so, may one not hope that it will reinforce knowledge and choice until there is a. breakthrough to freedom and victory? Let us watch the battle, for it is your battle and mine, apart from grace. At least there is the divided self. Not all is evil. The generalization is twofold. I would do good. But evil is present (v. 21). We can go a step further and claim a real admiration for a good standard of behavior. I actually take delight in [more literally, “rejoice along with”] the law of God after the inward man (v. 22). Here is a feeling that should certainly launch my good intentions on a successful venture. But no, there is also a different law in my members (the parts of me). It draws up in battle array, makes its assault on the law of my mind, bringing me into captivity under the law of sin that dwells in me. Trying as hard as I am to be good, he says in effect, it is all but inconceivable that I fail so miserably–and all right within the citadel of my own personality. (op. cit., p. 51)
In describing the situation, Paul agonizes. “Wretched (talaivpwroV, talaipōros) man that I am! Who will rescue me from this body of death?” (v. 24). The word “wretched” (talaivpwroV, talaipōros) is an “antonym of makavrioV [makarios, the adjective “blessed” used in the Beatitudes, Mt. 5:3-11] miserable, wretched, distressed” (Bauer-Danker-Arndt-Gingrich [BDAG], A Greek-English Lexicon of the New Testament and other Early Christian Literature, 3rd ed., 2000, s.v. talaivpwroV, talaipōros). But this plight is not the norm for Christian living. In answer to the question, “Who will rescue me from this body of death?” (v. 24), Paul, in anticipation of the triumph of grace in chapter 8, says, “Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord!” (v. 25a). But before moving on to the brighter picture presented in chapter 8, Paul summarizes the situation described in chapter 7. “So then, with my mind I am a slave to the law of God, but with my flesh I am a slave to the law of sin” (v. 25b).
Matthew 21:33-46
The Parable of the Wicked Tenants (Mk 12.1-12; Lk 20.9-19)
33 "Listen to another parable. There was a landowner who planted a vineyard, put a fence around it, dug a wine press in it, and built a watchtower. Then he leased it to tenants and went to another country. 34 When the harvest time had come, he sent his slaves to the tenants to collect his produce. 35 But the tenants seized his slaves and beat one, killed another, and stoned another. 36 Again he sent other slaves, more than the first; and they treated them in the same way. 37 Finally he sent his son to them, saying, 'They will respect my son.' 38 But when the tenants saw the son, they said to themselves, 'This is the heir; come, let us kill him and get his inheritance.' 39 So they seized him, threw him out of the vineyard, and killed him. 40 Now when the owner of the vineyard comes, what will he do to those tenants?" 41 They said to him, "He will put those wretches to a miserable death, and lease the vineyard to other tenants who will give him the produce at the harvest time."
42 Jesus said to them, "Have you never read in the scriptures:
'The stone that the builders rejected
has become the cornerstone;
this was the Lord's doing,
and it is amazing in our eyes'?
43 Therefore I tell you, the kingdom of God will be taken away from you and given to a people that produces the fruits of the kingdom. 44 The one who falls on this stone will be broken to pieces; and it will crush anyone on whom it falls."
45 When the chief priests and the Pharisees heard his parables, they realized that he was speaking about them. 46 They wanted to arrest him, but they feared the crowds, because they regarded him as a prophet. (Matthew 21:33-46, NRSV)
The following comments are repeated here from December 3, 2009 (Thursday in the week of the First Sunday of Advent, Year Two), when comments were repeated from July 2, 2008 (Wednesday in the week of the Sunday closest to June 29, Year Two), when comments were repeated from December 6, 2007 (Thursday in the week of the First Sunday of Advent, Year Two), when comments were repeated from July 5, 2006 (Wednesday in the week of the Sunday closest to June 29, Year Two), when they were combined and revised from an E-mail message sent December 3, 2003, for December 4, 2003, from June 30, 2004 in an email sent June 28, 2004, for June 28-July 4, and from December 1, 2005 (Thursday in the week of the First Sunday of Advent, Year Two). The combined comments are repeated again here:
For recent comments on Mark’s version of this reading, see the Archive for March 31, 2010 (Wednesday of Holy Week, Year Two). For recent comments on Luke’s version, see the Archive for June 15, 2009 (Monday in the week of the Sunday closest to June 15, Year One).
The Parable of the Wicked Tenants has common features in Matthew, Mark and Luke. It is clearly meant as an indictment of the Jewish leaders, not only for bad stewardship in their responsibility of caring for God’s vineyard, that is, Israel; but also, and especially, for killing the landowner’s (God’s) son (i.e. Jesus) (Mt. 21:38-39; Mk. 12:7-8; Lk. 20:14, 15). The indictment amounts to, if not charging these leaders with open and flagrant rebellion, at least implying putsch, an attempted coup d’état, an insurrection. The irony is that they were supposedly the religious leaders, and likely felt that Jesus was promoting a religious insurrection.
But some features of the parable as presented by Matthew and Mark clearly echo Isaiah’s song “for my beloved” [namely the LORD], “my love-song concerning his vineyard” (Isa. 5:1, cf. vv. 1-7). This Song of the LORD’s Vineyard is presented in a table with a column for the song parallel to columns for the Parable of the Wicked Tenants as presented in Matthew, Mark and Luke. See the separate file Wicked Tenants. Jesus says, “there was a landowner who planted a vineyard, put a fence around it, dug a wine press in it, and built a watchtower. Then he leased it to tenants and went to another country” (Mt. 21:33; cf. Mk. 12:1; Lk. 20:9). The versions of Matthew and Mark share terms used in the Song of the Vineyard, most of which are lacking in Luke, perhaps because this particular connection with the Hebrew Bible and/or Isaiah’s Song is less important to him. All use the term vineyard, of course (Isa. 5:1; Mt. 21:33; Mk. 12:1; Lk. 20:9 and frequently throughout the song/parable). But Luke has no reference to the wine vat or wine press, to the watchtower (Isa. 5:2; Mt. 21:33; Mk. 12:1), or to the hedge and wall or fence (Isa. 5:5; Mt. 21:33b; Mk. 12:1b). In Isaiah’s song, the LORD was looking for “grapes,” Myb9n!f3, ( ‘ănāvîm), but found “wild grapes,” Myw9xuB4, (be’ushîm, literally, “stinking things”), not “grapes” with a modifier, “wild,” but a completely different word (Isa. 5:2). Isaiah interprets these words in verse 7. The LORD expected “justice,” FPAw4m9 (mišpāt), but instead got “bloodshed,” HPAW4m9 (miśpāch)–spit it out, miśpāch, to get the effect of the word-play and God’s disappointment. He expected “righteousness,” hqADAc4 (tsedāqāh), but got “a cry,” hqAfAc4 (tse‘āqāh)!” Note the rhyme, but the gutteral sound f (’) which replaces the letter D (d) makes the latter term take more effort (for me, at least) to pronounce. This “bloodshed” and “outcry” are echoed in Jesus’ parable by the blood of killing the landowner’s son.
As he continues the parable, Jesus says that at harvest time, the owner “sent his slaves to the tenants to collect his produce” (Mt. 21:34; cf. Mk. 12:2 and Lk. 20:10a in which one slave is sent). According to J. Andrew Overman, “tenants would contract to give the owner an agreed-upon portion of the crop, keeping for themselves what was left” (NOAB, 3rd ed., augmented, 2007, on Mt. 21:33). But these tenants don’t meet the terms of their contract. They “seized his slaves and beat one, killed another, and stoned another” (Mt. 21:35; cf. Mk.12:3 and Lk. 20:10, where the tenants “beat [the slave] and sent him away empty-handed”). Again, says Jesus, the “landowner” (Mt. 21:33; just the “man” Mk. 12:1; Lk. 20:9) “sent other slaves, more than the first; and they treated them in the same way” (Mt. 21:36). Mark says of the second slave sent, “this one, they beat over the head and insulted” (Mk. 12:4), cf. “that one also they beat and insulted and sent away empty-handed” (Lk. 20:11). At this point in the story, Mark and Luke include the sending of a third slave who, according to Mark was “killed” before the sending of “many others, some [of whom] they beat, and others they killed” (Mk. 12:5; cf. the one whom “they wounded and threw out,” Lk. 20:12). Note that the first sending in Matthew was of plural “slaves” (Mt. 21:34).
But the parable comes to its main point in the sending of the son, meaning, of course, the Son. “Finally he sent his son to them, saying, ‘They will respect my son’ ” (Mt. 21:37; cf. Mk. 12:6; Lk. 20:13). But far from showing respect for the owner’s son, “when the tenants saw the son, they said to themselves, ‘This is the heir (klhronovmoV, klēronomos); come, let us kill him and get his inheritance (klhronomiva, klēronomia).’ So they seized him, threw him out of the vineyard, and killed him” (Mt. 21:38-39; cf. Mk. 12:7-8; Lk. 20:14-15a). One might suppose that the tenants’ expectation of getting the inheritance in these circumstances, if not totally unrealistic, was in any case the height of chutzpah (“brazenness, gall. [Yiddish],” The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language, 1969, s.v. “chutzpah”), But ironically, the parable points to the replacement of the Jewish leaders with the risen Christ and the Christian Church. The tenants, rather than gaining the “inheritance,” receive the inevitable punishment. “Now when the owner of the vineyard comes,” asks Jesus, “what will he do to those tenants?” (Mt. 21:40; cf. Mk. 12:9a; Lk. 20:15b). In the words of the Jewish leaders, who, for Matthew, pronounce their own sentence, “He [the landowner] will put those wretches to a miserable death, and lease the vineyard to other tenants who will give him the produce at the harvest time” (Mt. 21:41). In Mark and Luke, Jesus himself says, “He will come and destroy the tenants and give the vineyard to others” (Mk. 12:9b; Lk. 20:16). Killing the son, as noted, is a thinly veiled reference to the killing of prophets (cf. 23:29-30), they kill the son who was sent next, an anticipation of the crucifixion. According to Krister Stendahl, this “parable” has been called “an allegory rather than a parable" (Peake's Commentary on the Bible, 1962, reprinted 1972, sec. 690 k, p. 791, on Mt. 21:33-46). “The details and not only the total thrust of it have significance for the understanding: the owner of the vineyard is God, the vineyard is Israel (allusions to Isa. 5:1-7), the workers are the leaders of the nation.” Stendahl sees here a sharper criticism of Jesus' Jewish opponents than is found in the parallel accounts (Mk. 12:1-12; Lk. 20:9-19). “But the outcome of the story is one degree sharper than what has been found in Mt. so far: the Jewish nation has forfeited its elect status as a nation and the Kingdom will be given over to a new ‘nation’, i.e. the church (only Mt.)” (ibid., cf. Mt. 21:43).
Within Isaiah, of course, the sad story of the vineyard which produced "stinking things" is followed later by a song about "a pleasant vineyard" (Isa. 27:2). “Israel shall blossom and put forth shoots, / and fill the whole world with fruit” (Isa. 27:6). And the implications of God's expectation of fruit bearing continue within Christianity, for example, in the True Vine passage (John, chap. 15) and in Paul's contrast between the works of the flesh and the fruit of the spirit (Gal., chap. 5). Jesus’ parable is severe criticism of the Jewish leaders, but we should remember again, that it was only a few and only some of the leaders. And Paul offers some hope for Israel (Rom., chaps. 9-11). He even goes so far as to say, “And so all Israel will be saved” (Rom. 11:26a), in a statement that he supports by quoting Isaiah 59:20-21 (in Rom. 11:26b, 27a; cf. Ps. 14; 7; Isa. 27:9). For Christians, the crucifixion has become central to our faith, but we hold that in God's plan the crucifixion was brought about by and as a remedy for the sins of us all, “for all have sinned,” not just of one group. There is absolutely no reason to make the actions of a few leaders at that time a basis for anti-Semitism or animosity toward Jews and Judaism.
In the three Synoptic Gospels, Jesus follows with reference to “the stone that the builders rejected” that “has become the cornerstone.” In Mark and Luke, the words of Jesus continue here, but since Matthew has attributed the previous answer to the opponents (21:41), he introduces the quotation about Psalm 118 as from Jesus: “Jesus said to them, ‘Have you never read in the scriptures” (v 42a). The first two lines of the quotation are identical in three Gospels, in Greek as well as in English: “The stone that the builders rejected / has become the cornerstone” (Mt. 21:42b, citing Ps. 118:22; cf. Mk. 12:10b; Lk. 20:17b). John S. Kselman, who describes Psalm 118 as a “thanksgiving for victory in battle,” refers to this verse as “a metaphor of reversal of expectations” (NOAB, 3rd ed., augmented, 2007, on Ps. 118:22). In Matthew and Mark, the citation continues: “this was the Lord’s doing, / and it is amazing in our eyes” (Mt. 21:42c = Mk. 12:11, citing Ps. 118:23). Only Matthew directly interprets the stone in terms of the Kingdom of God. “Therefore, I tell you, the kingdom of God will be taken away from you and given to a people that produces the fruits of the kingdom” (Mt. 21:43). But in Matthew and Luke, Jesus warns that “the one (Mt.)/everyone (Lk) who falls on this (Mt.)/ that (Lk) stone will be broken to pieces; and it will crush anyone on whom it falls” (Mt. 21:44; Lk. 20:18). However, the verse in Matthew, while present in good early manuscripts, is absent in others (cf Kurt Aland and others, The Greek New Testament, United Bible Societies, 3rd ed., 1975, apparatus on Mt. 21:44). In any event, Matthew’s putting the stone (v. 42) and the kingdom (v. 43) in juxtaposition reminds us of Daniel’s interpretation of Nebuchadnezzar’s dream about the stone that crushes previous kingdoms (Dan. 2:40), and symbolizes God’s “kingdom that shall never be destroyed” (v. 44; cf. v. 45). Later in Matthew, Jesus quotes Daniel by name (Mt. 24:15, cf. Dan. 9:27; 11:31; 12:11; cf. also 1 Macc. 1:54; 6:7).
The three Gospels each tell us that the opponents knew very well that Jesus was referring in the parable to them. Matthew’s Parable of the Wicked Tenants (Mt. 21:33-46) is preceded by his Parable of the Two Sons (vv. 28-32), and so he refers to “parables, plural, saying, “When the chief priests and the Pharisees heard his parables, they realized that he was speaking about them” (Mt. 21:45). In similar statements, Mark and Luke refer to “this parable”: “When they (Mk.)/the scribes and chief priests (Lk.) realized that he had told this parable against them . . .” (Mk 12:12a; Lk. 20:19a). All report that the leaders “wanted to arrest him, but they feared the crowds” (Mt. 21:46a; cf. Mk. 12:12b; Lk. 20:29b). Matthew adds the explanation that the crowds “regarded him [Jesus] as a prophet” (Mt. 21:46b).
As noted above, for the Lutheran Readings for today, and comments on them, see the Episcopal Readings in the file for June 16, 2010, two weeks ago. These traditions differ in relating readings to the weeks following Pentecost.
Ronald D. Worden, Ph.D.
rdworden@hgst.edu
deanworden@comcast.net