Matthew 21:33-46
33. Hear another parable: There was a certain householder, which planted a vineyard—(See on Lu 13:6).
and hedged it round about, and digged a winepress in it, and built a tower—These details are taken, as is the basis of the parable itself, from that beautiful parable of Isa 5:1-7, in order to fix down the application and sustain it by Old Testament authority. and let it out to husbandmen—These are just the ordinary spiritual guides of the people, under whose care and culture the fruits of righteousness are expected to spring up. and went into a far country—"for a long time" (Lu 20:9), leaving the vineyard to the laws of the spiritual husbandry during the whole time of the Jewish economy. On this phraseology, see on Mr 4:26.34. And when the time of the fruit drew near, he sent his servants to the husbandmen—By these "servants" are meant the prophets and other extraordinary messengers, raised up from time to time. See on Mt 23:37.
that they might receive the fruits of it—Again see on Lu 13:6.35. And the husbandmen took his servants, and beat one—see Jer 37:15; 38:6.
and killed another—see Jer 26:20-23. and stoned another—see 2Ch 24:21. Compare with this whole verse Mt 23:37, where our Lord reiterates these charges in the most melting strain.36. Again, he sent other servants more than the first; and they did unto them likewise—see 2Ki 17:13; 2Ch 36:16, 18; Ne 9:26.
37. But last of all he sent unto them his son, saying, They will reverence my son—In Mark (Mr 12:6) this is most touchingly expressed: "Having yet therefore one son, His well-beloved, He sent Him also last unto them, saying, They will reverence My Son." Luke's version of it too (Lu 20:13) is striking: "Then said the lord of the vineyard, What shall I do? I will send My beloved Son: it may be they will reverence Him when they see Him." Who does not see that our Lord here severs Himself, by the sharpest line of demarcation, from all merely human messengers, and claims for Himself Sonship in its loftiest sense? (Compare Heb 3:3-6). The expression, "It may be they will reverence My Son," is designed to teach the almost unimaginable guilt of not reverentially welcoming God's Son.
38. But when the husbandmen saw the son, they said among themselves—Compare Ge 37:18-20; Joh 11:47-53.
This is the heir—Sublime expression this of the great truth, that God's inheritance was destined for, and in due time is to come into the possession of, His own Son in our nature (Heb 1:2). come, let us kill him, and let us seize on his inheritance—that so, from mere servants, we may become lords. This is the deep aim of the depraved heart; this is emphatically "the root of all evil."39. And they caught him, and cast him out of the vineyard—compare Heb 13:11-13 ("without the gate—without the camp"); 1Ki 21:13; Joh 19:17.
and slew him.40. When the lord therefore of the vineyard cometh—This represents "the settling time," which, in the case of the Jewish ecclesiastics, was that judicial trial of the nation and its leaders which issued in the destruction of their whole state.
what will he do unto those husbandmen?41. They say unto him, He will miserably destroy those wicked men—an emphatic alliteration not easily conveyed in English: "He will badly destroy those bad men," or "miserably destroy those miserable men," is something like it.
and will let out his vineyard unto other husbandmen, which shall render him the fruits in their seasons—If this answer was given by the Pharisees, to whom our Lord addressed the parable, they thus unwittingly pronounced their own condemnation: as did David to Nathan the prophet (2Sa 12:5-7), and Simon the Pharisee to our Lord (Lu 7:43, &c.). But if it was given, as the two other Evangelists agree in representing it, by our Lord Himself, and the explicitness of the answer would seem to favor that supposition, then we can better explain the exclamation of the Pharisees which followed it, in Luke's report (Lu 20:16) —"And when they heard it, they said, God forbid"—His whole meaning now bursting upon them.42. Jesus saith unto them. Did ye never read in the scriptures— (Ps 118:22, 23).
The stone which the builders rejected, &c.—A bright Messianic prophecy, which reappears in various forms (Isa 28:16, &c.), and was made glorious use of by Peter before the Sanhedrim (Ac 4:11). He recurs to it in his first epistle (1Pe 2:4-6).43. Therefore say I unto you, The kingdom of God—God's visible Kingdom, or Church, upon earth, which up to this time stood in the seed of Abraham.
shall be taken from you, and given to a nation bringing forth the fruits thereof—that is, the great evangelical community of the faithful, which, after the extrusion of the Jewish nation, would consist chiefly of Gentiles, until "all Israel should be saved" (Ro 11:25, 26). This vastly important statement is given by Matthew only.44. And whosoever shall fall on this stone shall be broken: but on whomsoever it shall fall, it will grind him to powder—The Kingdom of God is here a Temple, in the erection of which a certain stone, rejected as unsuitable by the spiritual builders, is, by the great Lord of the House, made the keystone of the whole. On that Stone the builders were now "falling" and being "broken" (Isa 8:15). They were sustaining great spiritual hurt; but soon that Stone should "fall upon them" and "grind them to powder" (Da 2:34, 35; Zec 12:2) —in their corporate capacity, in the tremendous destruction of Jerusalem, but personally, as unbelievers, in a more awful sense still.
45. And when the chief priests and Pharisees had heard his parables—referring to that of the Two Sons and this one of the Wicked Husbandmen.
they perceived that he spake of them.46. But when they sought to lay hands on him—which Luke (Lu 20:19) says they did "the same hour," hardly able to restrain their rage.
they feared the multitude—rather, "the multitudes." because they took him for a prophet—just as they feared to say John's baptism was of men, because the masses took him for a prophet (Mt 21:26). Miserable creatures! So, for this time, "they left Him and went their way" (Mr 12:12).