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Matthew 21

1When they drew near to Jerusalem and came to Bethphage at the Mount of Olives, Jesus sent two disciples, 2saying to them, “Go into the village opposite you, and immediately you will find a donkey tied there and a colt with her. Untie them and bring them to me. 3If anyone says anything to you, you will say, ‘The Lord needs them,’ and he will send them immediately.” 4This happened so that what was spoken through the prophet might be fulfilled:

5“Say to daughter Zion, ‘Look, your king is coming to you, gentle and mounted on a donkey, and on a colt, the offspring of a beast of burden.’”

6The disciples went and did just as Jesus had instructed them. 7They brought the donkey and the colt and put cloaks on them, and he sat on them. 8Most of the crowd spread their own cloaks on the road, while others cut branches from the trees and spread them on the road. 9The crowds going ahead of him and those following were crying out, “Hosanna to the Son of David! Blessed is the one who comes in the name of the Lord! Hosanna in the highest!” 10When he entered Jerusalem, the whole city was shaken, saying, “Who is this?” 11The crowds were saying, “This is the prophet Jesus, from Nazareth in Galilee.”

12Jesus entered the temple and drove out all who were selling and buying in the temple. He overturned the money changers' tables and the seats of those selling doves, 13and said to them, “It is written, ‘My house will be called a house of prayer,’ but you are making it a den of robbers.” 14Blind and lame people approached him in the temple, and he healed them. 15But when the chief priests and scribes saw the wonderful things he did and the children crying out in the temple, “Hosanna to the Son of David,” they were indignant 16and said to him, “Do you hear what these are saying?” Jesus said to them, “Yes. Have you never read, ‘From the mouth of infants and nursing babies you prepared praise’?” 17He left them, went out of the city to Bethany, and spent the night there.

18Early in the morning, as he was returning to the city, he was hungry. 19Seeing a fig tree beside the road, he went to it and found nothing on it except leaves. He said to it, “May fruit never grow from you again.” And the fig tree withered immediately. 20When the disciples saw this, they marveled, saying, “How did the fig tree wither immediately?” 21Jesus answered them, “Truly I tell you, if you have faith and do not doubt, you will not only do what happened to the fig tree, but even if you say to this mountain, ‘Be lifted up and thrown into the sea,’ it will happen. 22And everything you ask in prayer, believing, you will receive.”

23When he entered the temple, the chief priests and elders of the people approached him as he was teaching and said, “By what authority are you doing these things? And who gave you this authority?” 24Jesus answered them, “I too will ask you one question. If you answer me, I too will tell you by what authority I do these things. 25Where was John's baptism from—from heaven or from people?” They discussed it among themselves, saying, “If we say, ‘From heaven,’ he will say to us, ‘Then why did you not believe him?’ 26But if we say, ‘From people,’ we fear the crowd, for they all regard John as a prophet.” 27They answered Jesus, “We do not know.” He too said to them, “Neither will I tell you by what authority I do these things.

28“But what do you think? A man had two children. He approached the first and said, ‘Child, go work in the vineyard today.’ 29He answered, ‘I do not want to,’ but afterward he changed his mind and went. 30He approached the second and said the same thing. He answered, ‘I will, sir,’ but did not go. 31Which of the two did the father's will?” They said, “The first.” Jesus said to them, “Truly I tell you that the tax collectors and prostitutes are going ahead of you into the kingdom of God. 32For John came to you in the way of righteousness, and you did not believe him, but the tax collectors and prostitutes believed him. Yet even when you saw this, you did not afterward change your minds and believe him.

33“Listen to another parable. There was a householder who planted a vineyard, put a fence around it, dug a winepress in it, and built a tower. He leased it to tenant farmers and went away. 34When the season for fruit drew near, he sent his slaves to the tenants to receive his fruit. 35The tenants seized his slaves, beat one, killed another, and stoned another. 36Again he sent other slaves, more than the first, and they did the same to them. 37Finally he sent his son to them, saying, ‘They will respect my son.’ 38But when the tenants saw the son, they said among themselves, ‘This is the heir. Come, let us kill him and have his inheritance.’ 39They seized him, threw him out of the vineyard, and killed him. 40So when the master of the vineyard comes, what will he do to those tenants?” 41They said to him, “He will bring those evil people to an evil end, and lease the vineyard to other tenants who will give him the fruit in its seasons.” 42Jesus said to them, “Have you never read in the Scriptures:

‘The stone the builders rejected has become the cornerstone. This came from the Lord, and it is marvelous in our eyes’?

43“Because of this I tell you that the kingdom of God will be taken from you and given to a people producing its fruit. 44Whoever falls on this stone will be shattered, and whoever it falls on, it will crush.” 45When the chief priests and Pharisees heard his parables, they knew he was speaking about them. 46They sought to seize him, but feared the crowds, because they regarded him as a prophet.

Translation notes 7

21:3–7 — Daughter Zion and the animals. “Daughter Zion” personifies the city and its people as a woman. The quotation recalls Zechariah 9:9. Matthew explicitly names both a donkey and her colt. In verse 7 the second “them” may refer to the cloaks; the Greek does not explain how Jesus rode. The wording is not reduced to one animal to match another account. In verse 3 the final “he” most naturally refers to the person releasing the animals, though a promise that the Lord will send them is another possible reading.

21:8–9 — Crowd and Hosanna. “Most of the crowd” can also be understood as “a very large crowd.” Hosanna comes from a plea to save and functions here as acclamation. The blessing recalls Psalm 118:26.

21:12–16 — Temple and praise. “Temple” here denotes the temple precincts. “Den of robbers” is a hideout image, not simply a claim about prices. The quotations recall Isaiah 56:7, Jeremiah 7:11, and Psalm 8:2. The base says “are making,” not “made.”

21:19–22 — The fig tree. Matthew says the withering happened immediately. The statement about believing prayer retains its breadth; the translation neither adds qualifications nor converts it into a promise of a particular modern outcome.

21:28–32 — Two children; changed minds. Traditionally called the two sons, the characters are called “children” by the Greek noun here. The base has the first refuse and later go, and the second agree but not go; other textual forms change the order and the answer. The same verb for changing one's mind, with regret implied, occurs in verses 29 and 32. “Kingdom of God” is Matthew's wording here, not “kingdom of heaven.”

21:33–43 — Fruit and the stone. The vineyard recalls Isaiah 5, and the rejected stone quotation is Psalm 118:22–23. “His fruit” refers to the produce owed the owner. “Cornerstone” translates literally “head of the corner”; the precise architectural image is debated. The “people” receiving the kingdom are characterized by producing its fruit, not given an ethnic label in the verse.

21:44 — Falling and crushing. This verse is present in SBLGNT and retained without brackets. Some witnesses omit it. The two destructive actions are kept; the verse is not treated as part of the bracketed-addition policy.