21:33 “Listen to another parable: There was a landowner 2 who planted a vineyard. 3 He put a fence around it, dug a pit for its winepress, and built a watchtower. Then 4 he leased it to tenant farmers 5 and went on a journey.
1 tn Grk “one fig tree.”
sn The fig tree is a variation on the picture of a vine as representing the nation; see Isa 5:1-7.
2 tn The term here refers to the owner and manager of a household.
3 sn The vineyard is a figure for Israel in the OT (Isa 5:1-7). The nation and its leaders are the tenants, so the vineyard here may well refer to the promise that resides within the nation. The imagery is like that in Rom 11:11-24.
4 tn Here καί (kai) has been translated as “then” to indicate the implied sequence of events within the narrative.
5 sn The leasing of land to tenant farmers was common in this period.
6 tc A few witnesses, especially of the Western text (D 33 it sys Or Eussyr), do not contain 21:44. However, the verse is found in א B C L W Z (Θ) 0102 Ë1,13 Ï lat syc,p,h co and should be included as authentic.
tn Grk “on whomever it falls, it will crush him.”
sn This proverb basically means that the stone crushes, without regard to whether it falls on someone or someone falls on it. On the stone as a messianic image, see Isa 28:16 and Dan 2:44-45.