hem his son,
saying, They will reverence my son. But when the husbandmen saw the son,
they said among themselves, This is the heir; come, let us kill him, and
let us seize on his inheritance. And they caught him, and cast him out
of the vineyard, and slew him. When the lord therefore of the vineyard
cometh, what will he do unto those husbandmen? They say unto him, He
will miserably destroy those wicked men, and will let out his vineyard
unto other husbandmen, which shall render him the fruits in their
seasons."[1094]

Again the Jews were compelled to make answer to the great question with
which the parable dealt, and again by their answer they pronounced
judgment upon themselves. The vineyard, broadly speaking, was the human
family, but more specifically the covenant people, Israel; the soil was
good and capable of yielding in rich abundance; the vines were choice
and had been set out with care; and the whole vineyard was amply
protected with a hedge, and suitably furnished with winepress and
tower.[1095] The husbandmen could be none other than the priests and
teachers of Israel, including the ecclesiastical leaders who were then
and there present in an official capacity. The Lord of the vineyard had
sent among the people prophets authorized to speak in His name; and
these the wicked tenants had rejected, maltreated, and, in many
instances, cruelly slain.[1096] In the more detailed reports of the
parable we read that when the first servant came, the cruel husbandmen
"beat him and sent him away empty"; the next they wounded "in the head,
and sent him away shamefully handled"; another they murdered and all who
came later were brutally mistreated, and some of them were killed. Those
wicked men had used the vineyard of their Lord for personal gain, and
had rendered no part of the vintage to the lawful Owner. When the Lord
sent other messengers, "more than the first," or in other words, greater
than the earlier ones, the most recent example being John the Baptist,
the husbandmen rejected them with evil determination more pronounced
than ever. At last the Son had come in person; His authority they feared
as that of the lawful heir, and with malignity almost beyond belief,
they determined to kill Him that they might perpetuate their unworthy
possession of the vineyard and thenceforward hold it as their own.

Jesus carried the story without break from the criminal past to the yet
more tragic and awful future, then but three da