and asked him, "What authority have you for acting in this way? Who gave you authority to act in this way?"

Now they argued to themselves, "[What are we to say?] If we say, 'From heaven,' he will ask, 'Then why did you not believe him.'

but they took and flogged him and sent him off with nothing.

Once more he sent them another servant; him they knocked on the head and insulted.

He sent another, but they killed him. And so they treated many others; some they flogged and some they killed.

He had still one left, a beloved son; he sent him to them last, saying, 'They will respect my son.'

But these vinedressers said to themselves, 'Here is the heir; come on, let us kill him, and the inheritance will be our own.'

So they took and killed him, and threw him outside the vineyard.

Then they tried to get hold of him, but they were afraid of the multitude. They knew he had meant the parable for them. So they left him and went away.

But they sent some of the Pharisees and Herodians to him for the purpose of catching him with a question.

They came up and said to him, "Teacher, we know you are sincere and fearless; you do not court human favour, you teach the Way of God honestly. Is it right to pay taxes to Caesar or not?

Sadducees, men who hold there is no resurrection, also came up and put a question to him.

As for the dead being raised, have you not read in the book of Moses, at the passage on the Bush, how God said to him, I am the God of Abraham and the God of Isaac and the God of Jacob?

Then a scribe came up, who had listened to the discussion. Knowing Jesus had given them an apt answer, he put this question to him, "What is the chief of all the commands?"

The scribe said to him, "Right, teacher! You have truly said, He is One, and there is none else but Him.

Also, to love him with the whole heart, with the whole understanding, and with the whole strength, and to love one's neighbour as oneself ??that is far more than all holocausts and sacrifices."

Jesus noted his intelligent answer and said to him, "You are not far off the Realm of God." After that no one ventured to put any more questions to him.

David here calls him Lord. Then how can he be his son?" Now the mass of the people listened with delight to him.

As he went out of the temple one of his disciples said to him, "Look, teacher, what a size these stones and buildings are!"

Jesus said to him, "You see these great buildings? Not a stone shall be left on another, without being torn down."

And as he sat on the Hill of Olives opposite the temple, Peter and James and John and Andrew asked him in private,

The passover and the festival of unleavened bread fell two days later; so the high priests and scribes were trying how to get hold of him by craft and have him put to death.

Then Judas Iscariot, one of the twelve, went to the high priests to betray him to them.

They were delighted to hear it, and promised to pay him for it. Meantime he sought a good opportunity for betraying him.

On the first day of unleavened bread (the day when the paschal lamb was sacrificed) his disciples said to him, "Where do you want us to go and prepare for you to eat the passover?"

So he despatched two of his disciples, telling them, "Go into the city and you will meet a man carrying a water-jar; follow him,

They got distressed at this, and said to him one after another, "Surely it is not me?" "Surely it is not me?"

The Son of man goes the road that the scripture has described for him, but woe to the man by whom the Son of man is betrayed! Better that man had never been born!"

Peter said to him, "Though all are disconcerted, I will not be."

Jesus said to him, "I tell you truly, to-day you will disown me three times, this very night, before the cock crows twice."

But he took Peter and James and John along with him; and as he began to feel appalled and agitated,

Then he went forward a little and fell to the earth, praying that the hour might pass away from him, if possible.

then he returned and found them once more asleep, for their eyes were heavy. They did not know what to say to him.

Now his betrayer had given them a signal; he said, "Whoever I kiss, that is the man. Seize him and get him safely away."

So when he arrived he at once went up to him and said, "Rabbi [rabbi]," and kissed him.

Then they laid hands on him and seized him,

Then they left him and fled, all of them;

one young man did follow him, with only a linen sheet thrown round his body, but when the [young] men seized him

he fled away naked, leaving the sheet behind him.

They took Jesus away to the high priest, and all the high priests and scribes and elders met there with him.

Peter followed him at a distance till he got inside the courtyard of the high priest, where he sat down with the attendants to warm himself at the fire.

Now the high priests and the whole of the Sanhedrin tried to secure evidence against Jesus, in order to have him put to death; but they could find none,

for while many bore false witness against him their evidence did not agree.

Some got up and bore false witness against him, saying,

"We heard him say, 'I will destroy this temple made by hands, and in three days I will build another temple not made by hands.'"

He said nothing and made no answer. Again the high priest put a question to him. "Are you the Christ?" he said, "the Son of the Blessed?"

You have heard his blasphemy for yourselves. What is your mind?" They condemned him, all of them, to the doom of death;

and some of them started to spit on him and to blindfold him and buffet him, asking him, "Prophesy." The attendants treated him to cuffs and slaps.

and when she noticed Peter warming himself she looked at him and said, "You were with Jesus of Nazaret too."

Again the maidservant who had noticed him began to tell the bystanders, "That fellow is one of them."

At that moment the cock crowed for the second time. Then Peter remembered how Jesus had told him, "Before the cock crows twice you will disown me thrice;" and he burst into tears.

Immediately morning came, the high priests held a consultation with the elders and scribes and all the Sanhedrin, and after binding Jesus they led him off and handed him over to Pilate.

Pilate asked him, "Are you the king of the Jews?" He replied, "Certainly."

Then the high priest brought many accusations against him,

and once more Pilate asked him, "Have you no reply to make? Look at all their charges against you."

Now at festival time he used to release for them some prisoner whom they begged from him.

So the crowd pressed up and started to ask him for his usual boon.

(For he knew the high priests had handed him over out of envy.)

But the high priests stirred up the crowd to get him to release Bar-Abbas for them instead.

Whereupon they shouted again, "Crucify him."

"Why," said Pilate, "what has he done wrong?" But they shouted more fiercely than ever, "Crucify him!"

So, as Pilate wanted to satisfy the crowd, he released Bar-Abbas for them; Jesus he handed over to be crucified, after he had scourged him.

The soldiers took him inside the courtyard (that is, the praetorium) and got all the regiment together;

then they dressed him in purple, put on his head a crown of thorns which they had plaited,

and began to salute him with, "Hail, O king of the Jews!"

They struck him on the head with a stick and spat upon him and bent their knees to him in homage.

Then, after making fun of him, they stripped off the purple, put on his own clothes, and took him away to crucify him.

and they led him to the place called Golgotha (which means the place of a skull).

They offered him wine flavoured with myrrh, but he would not take it.

Then they crucified him and distributed his clothes among themselves, drawing lots for them to decide each man's share.

It was nine in the morning when they crucified him.

They also crucified two robbers along with him, one at his right and one at his left.

Those who passed by scoffed at him, nodding at him in derision and calling, "Ha! You were to destroy the temple and build it in three days!

So, too, the high priests made fun of him to themselves with the scribes; "he saved others," they said, "but he cannot save himself!

Let 'the Christ,' 'the king of Israel' come down now from the cross! Let us see that and we will believe!" Those who were crucified with him also denounced him.

One man ran off, soaked a sponge in vinegar, and put it on the end of a stick to give him a drink, saying, "Come on, let us see if Elijah does come to take him down!"

Now when the army-captain who stood facing him saw that he expired in this way, he said, "This man was certainly a son of God."

women who had followed him when he was in Galilee and waited on him, besides a number of other women who had accompanied him to Jerusalem.

He, after buying a linen sheet, took him down and swathed him in the linen, laying him in a tomb which had been cut out of the rock and rolling a boulder up against the opening of the tomb.

And when the sabbath had passed Mary of Magdala, Mary the mother of James, and Salome bought some spices in order to go and anoint him;

Go you and tell his disciples and Peter, 'He precedes you to Galilee; you shall see him there, as he told you.'"

She went and reported it to those who had been with him, as they mourned and wept;

Afterwards he appeared at table to the eleven themselves and reproached them for their unbelief and dulness of mind, because they had not believed those who saw him risen from the dead. [But they excused themselves, saying, "This age of lawlessness and unbelief lies under the sway of Satan, who will not allow what lies under the unclean spirits to understand the truth and power of God; therefore," they said to Christ, "reveal your righteousness now." Christ answered them, "The term of years for Satan's power has now expired, but other terrors are at hand. I was delivered to death on behalf of sinners, that they might return to the truth and sin no more, that they might inherit that glory of righteousness which is spiritual and imperishable in heaven."]

it fell to him by lot, as was the custom of the priesthood, to enter the sanctuary of the Lord and burn incense,

And an angel of the Lord appeared to him, standing on the right side of the altar of incense.

When Zechariah saw him he was troubled, and fear fell on him;

but the angel said to him, "Fear not, Zechariah, your prayer has been heard; your wife Elizabeth will bear a son to you, and you must call his name John.

he will go in front of Him with the spirit and power of Elijah to turn the hearts of fathers to their children, turning the disobedient to the wisdom of the just, to make a people ready and prepared for the Lord."

He will be great, he will be called the Son of the Most High, and the Lord God will give him the throne of David his father;

his mercy is on generation after generation, for those who reverence him.

All who heard of it bore it in mind; they said, "Whatever will this child become?" For the hand of the Lord was indeed with him.

that freed from fear and from the hand of our foes we should worship him

she gave birth to her firstborn son, and as there was no room for them inside the khan she wrapped him up and laid him in a stall for cattle.

When the days for their purification in terms of the Mosaic law had elapsed, they brought him up to Jerusalem to present him to the Lord

Now there was a man in Jerusalem called Symeon, an upright and devout man, who was on the outlook for the Consolation of Israel. The holy Spirit was upon him;

indeed it had been revealed to him by the holy Spirit that he was not to see death before he had seen the Lord messiah.

By an inspiration of the Spirit he came to the temple, and when the parents of the child Jesus carried him in to perform the customary regulations of the law for him,

then Symeon took him in his arms, blessed God, and said,

His father and mother were astonished at these words about him,

Now at that very hour she came up, and she offered praise to God and spoke of him to all who were on the outlook for the redemption of Jerusalem.