Category: Matthew Chapter 21

The parable contained in these verses was spoken with special reference to the Jews. They are the husbandmen here described: their sins are set before us here as in a picture. Of this there can be no doubt: it is written that “He spake of them.”

But we must not flatter ourselves that this parable contains nothing for the Gentiles. There are lessons laid down for us, as well as for the Jews. Let us see what they are.

We see in the first place what distinguishing privileges God is pleased to bestow on some nations.

These verses contain a conversation between our Lord Jesus Christ and the chief priests and elders of the people. Those bitter enemies of all righteousness saw the sensation which the public entry into Jerusalem, and the cleansing of the temple, had produced. At once they came about our Lord, like bees, and endeavoured to find occasion for an accusation against Him.

Let us observe in the first place how ready the enemies of truth are to question the authority of all who do more good than themselves. The chief priests had not a word to say about our Lord’s teaching: they made no charge against the lives or conduct of Himself or His followers. The point on which they fastened is His commission: “By what authority doest Thou these things? And who gave Thee this authority?”

We have in these verses an account of two remarkable events in our Lord’s history. In both, there was something eminently figurative and typical. Each was an emblem of spiritual things. Beneath the surface of each, lies lessons of solemn instruction.

The first event that demands our attention, is our Lord’s visit to the temple. He found His Father’s house in a state which truly shadowed forth the general condition of the whole Jewish church–everything out of order, and out of course. He found the courts of that holy building disgracefully profaned by worldly transactions. Trading, and buying, and selling, were actually going on within its walls. There stood dealers ready to supply the Jew who came from distant countries, with any sacrifice he wanted. There sat the money-changer, ready to change his foreign money for the current coin of the land. Bulls, and sheep, and goats, and pigeons, were there exposed for sale, as if the place had been a market. The jingling of money might have been heard there, as if these holy courts had been a bank or an exchange.

These verses contain a very remarkable passage in our Lord Jesus Christ’s life. They describe His public entry into Jerusalem when He came there for the last time, before He was crucified.

There is something peculiarly striking in this incident in our Lord’s history. The narrative reads like the account of some royal conqueror’s return to his own city: “A very great multitude” accompanies Him in a kind of triumphal procession. Loud cries and expressions of praise are heard around him: “All the city was moved.” The whole transaction is singularly at variance with the past tenor of our Lord’s life; it is curiously unlike the ways of Him who did not “cry nor strive” nor let His voice be heard “in the streets” — who withdrew Himself from the multitude on other occasions, and sometimes said to those He healed, “See thou say nothing to any man.” (Mark 1:44) And yet the whole transaction admits of explanation. The reasons of this public entry are not hard to find out. Let us see what they were.