NARRATOR: When the chief priests and elders of the people asked Jesus by whose authority he was teaching in the temple, he spoke to them in parables.
JESUS: Listen to another parable. There was a landowner who planted a vineyard, put a hedge around it, dug out a winepress in it, and built a watchtower. Then he leased the vineyard to tenant farmers and went to another country. When harvest time came, he sent his slaves to the tenants to collect his share of the grapes. The tenants seized the slaves, beat one, killed another, and stoned a third. The landowner sent other slaves, more than before. The tenants treated them the same way. Finally the landowner sent his son to them.
LANDOWNER: They will respect my son.
JESUS: But when they saw the son, the tenants said to one another —
TENANTS: Here is the heir. Let us kill him; then we will have his inheritance!
JESUS: With that the tenants seized the son, dragged him outside the vineyard, and killed him. When the Lord of the vineyard comes, what will he do to those tenants?
CHIEF PRIESTS: He will put that wicked crowd to a miserable death.
ELDERS: And lease his vineyard out to others who will see to it that he has grapes at harvest time.
JESUS: Have you never read in the scriptures: “The stone which the builders rejected has become the cornerstone. This was God’s doing. It is amazing in our eyes”? For this reason, I tell you, the kingdom of God will be taken away from you and given to a people that will yield a rich harvest.