Under these figurative modes of speech, or parables, Jesus Christ began to trace out for their reflection a true portraiture of their ingratitude, and of the divine vengeance. By this man we are to understand God the Father, whose vineyard was the house of Israel, which he guarded by angels; the pla... [ Continue Reading ]
The first servant whom the Almighty sent was Moses; but _they sent him away empty; for, says the Psalmist, they provoked him to anger in the camp. (Psalm cv.) The second servant sent was David, whom they used reproachfully, saying: What have we to do with David? (3 Kings xii. 16.) The third was the... [ Continue Reading ]
From this it appears, that the chief priests and lawyers were not ignorant that Christ was the Messias promised in the law and the prophets, but their knowledge was afterwards blinded by their envy: for otherwise, had they known him to be true God, they would never have crucified the Lord of glory,... [ Continue Reading ]
They cast the heir, Jesus Christ, out of the vineyard, by leading him out of Jerusalem to be crucified. (Theophylactus) --- They had before cast him out by calling him a Samaritan and demoniac; (St. John, Chap. viii.) and again by refusing to receive him, and turning him over to the Gentiles. (St. J... [ Continue Reading ]
The vineyard is given to others; as it is said, they shall come from the east and the west, from the north and the south, and sit down with Abraham, Isaac and Jacob in the kingdom of God. (St. Jerome)... [ Continue Reading ]
By this question, Christ shows that they were about to fulfil this prophecy, by casting him off, planning his death, and delivering him up to the Gentiles, by which he became the corner-stone, joining the two people of the Jews and Gentiles together, and forming out of them the one city and one temp... [ Continue Reading ]
The chief priests thus shew, that what our Saviour had just said was true, by thus seeking to lay their hands on him. (Ven. Bede)... [ Continue Reading ]
The disciples of the Pharisees said this in order to induce our Saviour to answer them, "that they were not to pay tribute to Cæsar, being the people of God; an answer they confidently anticipated, and which the Herodians hearing, might immediately apprehend him, and thus remove the odium from thems... [ Continue Reading ]
_Knowing their hypocrisy. [1] The Latin word commonly signifies, cunning, but the Greek is here meant their dissimulation, or hypocrisy. (Witham)_ [BIBLIOGRAPHY] Versutiam. _Greek: ten upokrisin._... [ Continue Reading ]
Although Christ clearly establishes here the strict obligation of paying to Cæsar what belongs to Cæsar, to the confusion of his very enemies, we shall still find them bringing forward against him the charge of disloyalty, as if he forbade tribute to be paid to Cæsar. (Luke xxiii. 2.) After the exam... [ Continue Reading ]
The doctrine of the resurrection from the dead is clearly given in the book of Moses, where mention is made of the burning bush, from the midst of which God appeared to Moses: have you not read, I say, what God there said to him? As God is the God of the living, you must be in an egregious error in... [ Continue Reading ]
Literally the Lord our God is the only Lord: and this is the sense of the text in Deuteronomy vi. 4. The word in the original text, rendered by the term _Lord, is the grand name JEHOVA, which signifies properly God, considered as the supreme Being, or the author of all existence._... [ Continue Reading ]
Venerable Bede gathers from this answer of the Scribes, that it had been long disputed among the Scribes and Pharisees, which was the greatest commandment in the law; some preferring the acts of faith and love, because many of the fathers, before the law was instituted, were pleasing to God on accou... [ Continue Reading ]
Being now refuted in their discourse, they no longer interrogate him, but deliver him up to the Roman power. Thus envy may be vanquished, but with great difficulty silenced. (Ven. Bede)... [ Continue Reading ]
According to St. Matthew it was principally to the Pharisees that Christ proposed this question. See Matthew 22, 41.... [ Continue Reading ]
This interrogation of Jesus instructs us how to refute the adversaries of truth; for if any assert that Christ was but a simple and holy man, a mere descendant of the race of David, we will ask them, after the example of Jesus: If Christ be man only, and the Son of David, how does David, under the i... [ Continue Reading ]
God accepts alms, if they are corresponding to each one's abilities; and the more able a man is, the more must he bestow in charities. The widow's mite was very acceptable to God, and very meritorious to herself; because though small the offering considered in itself, it was great considering her ex... [ Continue Reading ]
_But she, of her want, [2] or indigence, out of what she wanted to subsist by, as appeareth by the Greek. (Witham)_ [BIBLIOGRAPHY] De penuria sua, _Greek: ek tes ustereseos. See the same Greek word, 1 Corinthians xvi. 17; 2 Corinthians ix. 12, and Chap. xi. 9. &c._... [ Continue Reading ]