Jamieson, Fausset & Brown

“He saith unto them, Moses--as a civil lawgiver. because of--or "having respect to." the hardness of your hearts--looking to your low moral state, and your inability to endure the strictness of the original law. suffered you to put away your wives--tolerated…”

“His disciples say unto him, If the case of the man be so with his wife, it is not good to marry--that is, "In this view of marriage, surely it must prove a snare rather than a blessing, and had better be avoided altogether."”

“But he said unto them, All men cannot receive this saying, save they to whom it is given--that is, "That the unmarried state is better, is a saying not for everyone, and indeed only for such as it is divinely intended for." But who are these? they would natura…”

“For the kingdom of heaven is like unto a man that is an householder, &c.--The figure of a vineyard, to represent the rearing of souls for heaven, the culture required and provided for that purpose, and the care and pains which God takes in that whole matter, i…”

“And he went out about the third hour--about nine o'clock, or after a fourth of the working day had expired: the day of twelve hours was reckoned from six to six. and saw others standing idle in the market place--unemployed.”

“But when the first came, they supposed that they should have received more--This is that calculating, mercenary spirit which had peeped out--though perhaps very slightly--in Peter's question (Mt 19:27), and which this parable was designed once for all to put…”

“But that cannot be the meaning of it here; the "called" being emphatically distinguished from the "chosen." It can only mean here the "invited." And so the sense is, Many receive the invitations of the Gospel whom God has never "chosen to salvation through san…”

“If we shall say, From heaven; he will say unto us, Why did ye not then believe him?--"Why did ye not believe the testimony which he bore to Me, as the promised and expected Messiah?" for that was the burden of John's whole testimony.”

“But if we shall say, Of men; we fear the people--rather, "the multitude." In Luke (Lu 20:6) it is, "all the people will stone us"--"stone us to death." for all hold John as a prophet--Crooked, cringing hypocrites!”

“And they answered Jesus, and said, We cannot tell--Evidently their difficulty was, how to answer, so as neither to shake their determination to reject the claims of Christ nor damage their reputation with the people.”

“He answered and said, I will not--TRENCH notices the rudeness of this answer, and the total absence of any attempt to excuse such disobedience, both characteristic; representing careless, reckless sinners resisting God to His face.”

“And he came to the second, and said likewise. And he answered and said, I go, sir--"I, sir." The emphatic "I," here, denotes the self-righteous complacency which says, "God, I thank thee that I am not as other men" (Lu 18:11). and went not--He did not "after…”

“Jesus saith unto them, Verily I say unto you, That the publicans and the harlots go--or, "are going"; even now entering, while ye hold back. into the kingdom of God before you--The publicans and the harlots were the first son, who, when told to work in the Lo…”

“Of the harlots, then, the same may be taken for granted, though the fact is not expressly recorded. These outcasts gladly believed the testimony of John to the coming Saviour, and so hastened to Jesus when He came.”

“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.”

“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…”

“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 un…”

“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 r…”

“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).”

“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 gr…”

“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 b…”

“The last was a parable of the Old Testament history; and Christ is rather the last and greatest of the line of its prophets and teachers than the founder of a new kingdom. In that, God appears demanding something from men; in this, a parable of grace, God appe…”

“And the remnant took his servants, and entreated them spitefully--insulted them. and slew them--These are two different classes of unbelievers: the one simply indifferent; the other absolutely hostile--the one, contemptuous scorners; the other, bitter persecu…”

“Jerusalem, once "the city of the Great King" (Ps 48:2), and even up almost to this time (Mt 5:35); but now it is "their city"--just as our Lord, a day or two after this, said of the temple, where God had so long dwelt, "Behold your house is left unto you d…”

“The wedding is ready, but they which were bidden were not worthy--for how should those be deemed worthy to sit down at His table who had affronted Him by their treatment of His gracious invitation?”