Finish the week [of the wedding feast] for Leah; then we will give you Rachel also, and in return you shall work for me for seven more years.”

“Can a virgin forget [to wear] her ornaments,
Or a bride her attire [that identifies her as a married woman]?
Yet My people have forgotten Me
Days without number.

The fire [of war] devoured His young men,
And His [bereaved] virgins had no wedding songs.

And Jesus replied to them, “Can the guests of the bridegroom mourn while the bridegroom is with them? The days will come when the bridegroom is taken away from them, and then they will fast.

and say ‘We piped the flute for you [playing wedding], and you did not dance; we wailed sad dirges [playing funeral], and you did not mourn and cry aloud.’

“The kingdom of heaven may be compared to a king who gave a wedding feast for his son.

And he sent his servants to call those who had [previously] been invited to the wedding feast, but they refused to come.

Then he sent out some other servants, saying, ‘Tell those who have been invited, “Look, I have prepared my dinner; my oxen and fattened calves are butchered and everything is ready; come to the wedding feast.”’

Then he said to his servants, ‘The wedding [feast] is ready, but those who were invited were not worthy.

So go to the main highways that lead out of the city, and invite to the wedding feast as many as you find.’

Those servants went out into the streets and gathered together all the people they could find, both bad and good; so the wedding hall was filled with dinner guests [sitting at the banquet table].

“But when the king came in to see the dinner guests, he saw a man there who was not dressed [appropriately] in wedding clothes,

and he said, ‘Friend, how did you come in here without wearing the wedding clothes [that were provided for you]?’ And the man was speechless and without excuse.

Jesus answered, “The attendants of the bridegroom cannot fast while the bridegroom is [still] with them, can they? As long as they have the bridegroom with them, they cannot fast.

Jesus said to them, “Can you make the wedding guests of the bridegroom fast while he is with them?

They are like children sitting in the market place and calling to one another, and saying, ‘We played the flute for you [pretending to be at a wedding], and you did not dance; we sang a dirge [pretending to be at a funeral], and you did not weep [so nothing we did appealed to you].’

“Go forth, O daughters of Zion,
And gaze on King Solomon wearing the crown
With which his mother [Bathsheba] has crowned him
On the day of his wedding,
On the day of his gladness of heart.”

Be like men who are waiting for their master when he returns from the wedding feast, so that when he comes and knocks they may immediately open the door for him.

(The Chorus)
“We have a little sister
And she has no breasts.
What shall we do for our sister
On the day when she is spoken for [in marriage]?

On the third day there was a wedding at Cana of Galilee, and the mother of Jesus was there;

and both Jesus and His disciples were invited to the wedding.