Matthew 22:3–46

³He sent his servantsⁿ to those who had been invited to the banquet to tell them to come, but they refused to come.

⁴“Then he sent some more servants^o and said, ‘Tell those who have been invited that I have prepared my dinner: My oxen and fattened cattle have been butchered, and everything is ready. Come to the wedding banquet.’

⁵“But they paid no attention and went off—one to his field, another to his business. ⁶The rest seized his servants, mistreated them and killed them. ⁷The king was enraged. He sent his army and destroyed those murderers^p and burned their city.

⁸“Then he said to his servants, ‘The wedding banquet is ready, but those I invited did not deserve to come. ⁹So go to the street corners^q and invite to the banquet anyone you find.’ ¹⁰So the servants went out into the streets and gathered all the people they could find, the bad as well as the good,^r and the wedding hall was filled with guests.

¹¹“But when the king came in to see the guests, he noticed a man there who was not wearing wedding clothes. ¹²He asked, ‘How did you get in here without wedding clothes, friend^s?’ The man was speechless.

¹³“Then the king told the attendants, ‘Tie him hand and foot, and throw him outside, into the darkness, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.’^t

¹⁴“For many are invited, but few are chosen.”^u

Paying the Imperial Tax to Caesar

22:15–22pp—Mk 12:13–17; Lk 20:20–26

¹⁵Then the Pharisees went out and laid plans to trap him in his words. ¹⁶They sent their disciples to him along with the Herodians.^v “Teacher,” they said, “we know that you are a man of integrity and that you teach the way of God in accordance with the truth. You aren’t swayed by others, because you pay no attention to who they are. ¹⁷Tell us then, what is your opinion? Is it right to pay the imperial tax^aw to Caesar or not?”

¹⁸But Jesus, knowing their evil intent, said, “You hypocrites, why are you trying to trap me? ¹⁹Show me the coin used for paying the tax.” They brought him a denarius, ²⁰and he asked them, “Whose image is this? And whose inscription?”

²¹“Caesar’s,” they replied.

Then he said to them, “So give back to Caesar what is Caesar’s,^x and to God what is God’s.”

²²When they heard this, they were amazed. So they left him and went away.^y

Marriage at the Resurrection

22:23–33pp—Mk 12:18–27; Lk 20:27–40

²³That same day the Sadducees,^z who say there is no resurrection,^a came to him with a question. ²⁴“Teacher,” they said, “Moses told us that if a man dies without having children, his brother must marry the widow and raise up offspring for him.^{b 25}Now there were seven brothers among us. The first one married and died, and since he had no children, he left his wife to his brother. ²⁶The same thing happened to the second and third brother, right on down to the seventh. ²⁷Finally, the woman died. ²⁸Now then, at the resurrection, whose wife will she be of the seven, since all of them were married to her?”

²⁹Jesus replied, “You are in error because you do not know the Scriptures^c or the power of God. ³⁰At the resurrection people will neither marry nor be given in marriage;^d they will be like the angels in heaven. ³¹But about the resurrection of the dead—have you not read what God said to you, ³²‘I am the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob’^b?^e He is not the God of the dead but of the living.”

³³When the crowds heard this, they were astonished at his teaching.^f

The Greatest Commandment

22:34–40pp—Mk 12:28–31

³⁴Hearing that Jesus had silenced the Sadducees,^g the Pharisees got together. ³⁵One of them, an expert in the law,^h tested him with this question: ³⁶“Teacher, which is the greatest commandment in the Law?”

³⁷Jesus replied: “ ‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’^{ci 38}This is the first and greatest commandment. ³⁹And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’^{dj 40}All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.”^k

Whose Son Is the Messiah?

22:41–46pp—Mk 12:35–37; Lk 20:41–44

⁴¹While the Pharisees were gathered together, Jesus asked them, ⁴²“What do you think about the Messiah? Whose son is he?”

“The son of David,”^l they replied.

⁴³He said to them, “How is it then that David, speaking by the Spirit, calls him ‘Lord’? For he says,

⁴⁴“ ‘The Lord said to my Lord:

“Sit at my right hand

until I put your enemies

under your feet.” ’^em

⁴⁵If then David calls him ‘Lord,’ how can he be his son?” ⁴⁶No one could say a word in reply, and from that day on no one dared to ask him any more questions.ⁿ