Gospel according to Matthew 20

¹ ‘Now the kingdom of heaven is like a landowner going out at daybreak to hire workers for his vineyard.

² He made an agreement with the workers for one denarius a day, and sent them to his vineyard.

³ Going out at about the third hour he saw others standing idle in the market place

⁴ and said to them, “You go to my vineyard too and I will give you a fair wage”.

⁵ So they went. At about the sixth hour and again at about the ninth hour, he went out and did the same.

⁶ Then at about the eleventh hour he went out and found more men standing round, and he said to them, “Why have you been standing here idle all day?”

⁷ “Because no one has hired us” they answered. He said to them, “You go into my vineyard too”.

⁸ In the evening, the owner of the vineyard said to his bailiff, “Call the workers and pay them their wages, starting with the last arrivals and ending with the first”.

⁹ So those who were hired at about the eleventh hour came forward and received one denarius each.

¹⁰ When the first came, they expected to get more, but they too received one denarius each.

¹¹ They took it, but grumbled at the landowner.

¹² “The men who came last” they said “have done only one hour, and you have treated them the same as us, though we have done a heavy day’s work in all the heat.”

¹³ He answered one of them and said, “My friend, I am not being unjust to you; did we not agree on one denarius?

¹⁴ Take your earnings and go. I choose to pay the last comer as much as I pay you.

¹⁵ Have I no right to do what I like with my own? Why be envious because I am generous?”

¹⁶ Thus the last will be first, and the first, last.’

¹⁷ Jesus was going up to Jerusalem, and on the way he took the Twelve to one side and said to them,

¹⁸ ‘Now we are going up to Jerusalem, and the Son of Man is about to be handed over to the chief priests and scribes. They will condemn him to death

¹⁹ and will hand him over to the pagans to be mocked and scourged and crucified; and on the third day he will rise again.’

²⁰ Then the mother of Zebedee’s sons came with her sons to make a request of him, and bowed low;

²¹ and he said to her, ‘What is it you want?’ She said to him, ‘Promise that these two sons of mine may sit one at your right hand and the other at your left in your kingdom’.

²² ‘You do not know what you are asking’ Jesus answered. ‘Can you drink the cup that I am going to drink?’ They replied, ‘We can’.

²³ ‘Very well,’ he said ‘you shall drink my cup[*a], but as for seats at my right hand and my left, these are not mine to grant; they belong to those to whom they have been allotted by my Father.’

²⁴ When the other ten heard this they were indignant with the two brothers.

²⁵ But Jesus called them to him and said, ‘You know that among the pagans the rulers lord it over them, and their great men make their authority felt.

²⁶ This is not to happen among you. No; anyone who wants to be great among you must be your servant,

²⁷ and anyone who wants to be first among you must be your slave,

²⁸ just as the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.’

²⁹ As they left Jericho a large crowd followed him.

³⁰ Now there were two blind men sitting at the side of the road. When they heard that it was Jesus who was passing by, they shouted, ‘Lord! Have pity on us, Son of David.’

³¹ And the crowd scolded them and told them to keep quiet, but they only shouted more loudly, ‘Lord! Have pity on us, Son of David.’

³² Jesus stopped, called them over and said, ‘What do you want me to do for you?’

³³ They said to him, ‘Lord, let us have our sight back’.

³⁴ Jesus felt pity for them and touched their eyes, and immediately their sight returned and they followed him.