Matthew 21:1-11

This passage occurs for Palm Sunday, year A, most recently March 29, 2026.
 
Summary:  When I first wrote this blog post, there had been a large earthquake in Japan; hence the word "εσεισθη" (shook, akin to seismic) caught my attention.  The events of Holy Week shake the city.  They still shake our world today, perhaps even causing a fair amount of disruption, if not sadly violence, in our world.  Call it good, call it bad, but the events of Holy Week make every person ask the haunting question:  "Who is this man?"

Key Words:
απεστειλεν ("sent" in 21:1 and 3; aorist form of αποστελλω)  This is a well known verb to Greek students.  I find the particular use interesting -- Jesus sends the disciples to get a donkey.  A reminder that often times, our "missional" or "apostolic" calling can be very mundane, but serve a tremendously amazing purpose.

συνεταξεν ("commanded" in 21:6; aorist form of συντασσω)  Ah, the "syntax" of discipleship.  This would mean obedience to particular commands.  Okay, its Holy Week.  I am not going on a diatribe, but it is worth noting, especially for us Lutherans, that the disciples display here the syntax of discipleship:  hearing specific tasks and doing them.  Or to put it another way, the proper syntax of discipleship is "hearing, being sent and then obeying..."

οχλος vs πολις ("crowd" in 21:8 and 11 and "city" in 21:10).  The events of Holy Week force each of us, whether disciple, distant follower or outsider, to confront the question facing the whole city:  "Who is this?"  Also, the same crowds that cheer him now will vote for his death...

ὠσαννα ("Hosanna" in 21:9).  Here is the "NET" commentary:  Hosanna, literally in Hebrew, "O Lord, save" in the quotation from Ps 118:25-26 was probably by this time a familiar liturgical expression of praise, on the order of "Hail to the king," although both the underlying Aramaic and Hebrew expressions meant "O Lord, save us." In words familiar to every Jew, the author is indicating that at this point every messianic expectation is now at the point of realization. It is clear from the words of the psalm shouted by the crowd that Jesus is being proclaimed as messianic king. See E. Lohse, TDNT 9:682-84.

εσεισθη  ("shake" in 21:10; aorist form of σειω)  This word comes into English as "seismic."  The events of Holy Week shake the city and their aftershocks still continue to reverberate around the world two millennia later.

Grammar/translation:
Often times participles are stacked near other participles and verbs, which can make them seem more difficult to translate.  Here are two examples: 
21:1  λυσαντες αγαγετε μοι
The verbs (and pronoun!) should be fairly familiar:  "loose/free", "lead", "me"
Let's translate this rather methodically.  First, let's do the non-participle parts:
"[participle] lead to me"
Now, let's go back and add in the participle, in this case, some form of "free."  The first thing to do is NOT worry about person, gender or any of that, but simply stick the verb in with an "ing"
"Freeing, lead to me"
Okay, now we need to check out the tense and voice.  In this case it is active voice, so we don't have to fix anything.  Tense wise, it is aorist.  An aorist participle occurs before the other verb.  So, we get:
"Freed, lead to me"
Yuck.  Let's put this back in the "under the circumstances" machine:
Under the circumstances of having freed, lead to me."
What makes this hard is that you don't have an object.  Let's add one in for clarity:
"UtC of having freed the donkey, lead it to me."
Now we simplify:
"After you freed/untied the donkey, lead it to me."
Next one is 21:9
ευλογημενος Ὁ ερχομενος εν ονοματι κυριου
Again, translate what you know here:
"[participle] the [participle] in the name of the Lord.
[Technical point:  In Hebrew, you don't have articles in expressions like "name of the Lord"  It is just assumed that it is all definitive:  "the Name of the Lord."  The Greek translators just left them out but we ain't talking about any Lord, here, but YHWH!  Which leads always to the question of, how do you translate this name?  Simply LORD using all caps??]
In this case, the second participle: ερχομενος is a lot easier.  It is a substantive:  You simply put in the "The one(s) that/which do X" formula.  You get:  "The one who comes"  What makes this a little tricky is the "μεν" in the middle of the participle which might make you think this is passive, but no, this is simply a deponent verb! 
But the first one...ευλογημενος...tricky.
Stick in the word+ing
"blessing the one who comes in the name of the Lord."
Now we check tense and voice.  Voice is passive, so we have to reverse the language:  "Blessed be" or "blessed is."  The tense is perfect which means the action, having occurred in the past, still has an implication for today.
"Blessed and still is blessed the one who comes in the name of the Lord."

Matthew 21:33-46

This passage occurs in the Revised Common Lectionary, Year A; Most recently October 8, 2023.

Summary
The meaning of the parable is clear:  Ancient Israel rejected prophets of old; they will reject and kill Jesus.  Somehow God will rebuild on the rejected Jesus.  How do we find a Gospel message relevant for people's lives?  While there is some interesting stuff in verse 34 about sending and bearing fruit, I sense myself drawn to verse 42 and the proclamation that God will rebuild on the rejected stone.  This verse points toward the faithfulness of God, who rebuilds on Christ.  I think we can apply this to people's lives: even through we again and again reject God's commands and even love in our lives, God rebuilds us on Christ.

For 2023, I have added a tangent on institutional vs servant church leadership.

Key Words in verse 34 -- which sets up the whole thing
ηγγισεν (from εγγιζω, meaning "approach", 21:34)  This word, meaning "approach" or "come near", appears at turning points in the Gospel:
3:2  John Baptizes Jesus (John the Baptist say the Kingdom of Heaven is approaching/near)
4:17 Jesus begins ministry (Jesus says the KoH is approaching/near)
10:7 Jesus sends disciples (He instructs them to proclaim KoH is approaching/near)
21:1 Jesus is approaching/near Jerusalem
26:45/46  Jesus is betrayed (The hour is near/approaching)

Broad point:  Each time the Kingdom of Heaven is approaching, there is movement of Jesus and arguably a movement of the Spirit.  

Specific point:  The Lord of the Vineyard is doing something new when he sent his prophets and now when he is sending Jesus.

καιρος (kairos, meaning "season", 21:34; 41)  This word means 'season' or 'ideal time.'  In this case, it describes the harvest season.  A reminder that in Jesus there is the fullness of time!

απεστειλεν (from αποστελλω, meaning "send", 21:34)  I am amazed at how many times in Jesus' parables in Matthew we have (the character representing) God sending out people.  I think we often think of this as a concept in John's Gospels, but it is really crucial to Jesus' ministry.  We are sent out, certainly if and when the Kingdom of Heaven is approaching!  This word is important because it reminds us that the Kingdom of Heaven, while principally about the movement of Jesus into this world and toward the cross (see discussion on ηγγισεν), involves our movement too.

καρπος ("fruit", 21:34)  Again, we find a word that appears throughout scripture to describe the impact of the Spirit and the Kingdom of Heaven in our life:  We bear fruit.  In this case, workers are sent to gather the fruit.  What a beautiful image of ministry -- gathering the fruit that God has already created.  As the word αυτου ("of him") remind us, the fruit belongs to God.

Other interesting words

οικοδεσποτης  (literally, oikos - despot, meaning "owner of the land", 21:33)  This is a fun word in Greek.  It is built on two smaller words that we can recognize: oikos and despot!  It is interesting that Jesus would refer to God as an οικοδεσποτης, which was unlikely a favorable comparison for working-class listeners.  It is a reminder that first, these are parables and not allegories; second, it all belongs to God.

αμπελωνα ("vineyard", 21:33)  Jesus tells three vineyard parables, almost right in a row.  This seems clearly the one built the most on Isaiah 5, in which the vineyard owner builds a tower, as this vineyard owner does here as well.  It is a sermon series by Jesus :-)  It shows us how good stories and metaphors work, they continue to unfold in new ways.  It reminds us of Jesus' creative genius to somehow use old wine skins!

υστερον (meaning "last," 21:37)  The word here for "last" is used 4 times in Matthew 21 and 22; and also in Matt 25 and 26, but rarely ever appears elsewhere in the NT...Matthew is starting to emphasize the final nature of things and of his Gospel.

εντραπησονται  (future passive of εντρεπω, "respect", 21:37)  The word for "respect" means more like embarrass...in short, they will be embarrassed enough to show respect.  In the rest of the New Testament, it is always used within a context of shame rather than respect.  Perhaps this is a reminder that respect within an honor/shame culture has a different meaning; perhaps it is a reminder that Jesus ends up shaming the pharisees and religious leaders.  Ironically their attempts at shaming Jesus (killing him outside of Jerusalem) only lead to his glory!

οικοδομεω (meaning "build" "erect" or even "rebuild", 21:33 and 21:42)  The word here for builder is the same as in vs. 33. God built something.  People messed it up.  God will rebuild.  God is always at work revising the mistakes of our bad construction, relaying the foundation of our lives on Christ that we may bear fruit!

εθνει (ethnos, meaning "gentiles", 21:43)  The word for "people" here is "Gentiles."  Interestingly, Paul will talk about how he has a harvest of Gentiles in Romans 1:13, a case where Scripture is fulfilling itself!

Institution vs Servant Church

In verse 45, the religious leaders recognize this parable is directed at them.  As tenants of the vineyard, they have killed the servants sent by God.  I see this parable as a reminder of the way in which the institution of the church has again and again chewed up prophets and the servants of God.  In this way the parable serves as a judgment on institutional Christianity as well and the ways in which we devour prophets among us.  Those who come with a servants heart, beware!  However, in the end of the parable, Jesus says that there will be new tenants.  There will always be an institutional church...that always abused the pure in heart and always needs reformation. 

Church history reveals this too -- where the small and forgotten folks on the margins get forgotten, if not excluded.  They form a movement.  Which becomes a church.  Which gets too institutional.  Which then needs reform...or more likely kicks out the people that will grow the next generation of the church.