Matthew 21 :: Amplified Bible (AMP)

When they approached Jerusalem and had reached Bethphage, at the Mount of Olives, Jesus sent two disciples [ahead],

“TELL THE DAUGHTER OF ZION (the people of Jerusalem),

‘BEHOLD, YOUR KING IS COMING TO YOU,

GENTLE AND MOUNTED ON A DONKEY,

EVEN ON A COLT, THE FOAL OF A BEAST OF BURDEN.’”

Then the disciples went and did as Jesus had instructed them,

“[fn]Hosanna to the Son of David (Messiah);

BLESSED [praised, glorified] IS HE WHO COMES IN THE NAME OF THE LORD;

Hosanna in the highest [heaven]!”

When He entered Jerusalem, all the city was trembling [with excitement], saying, “Who is this?”

And Jesus entered the temple [grounds] and drove out [with force] all who were buying and selling [birds and animals for sacrifice] in the temple area, and He turned over the tables of the moneychangers [who made a profit exchanging foreign money for temple coinage] and the chairs of those who were selling doves [for sacrifice].

And the blind and the lame came to Him in [the porticoes and courts of] the temple area, and He healed them.

Now early in the morning, as Jesus was coming back to the city, He was hungry.

When the disciples saw it, they were astonished and asked, “How is it that the fig tree has withered away all at once?”

When He entered the temple area, the [fn]chief priests and elders of the people came to Him as He was teaching and said, “By what [kind of] authority are You doing these things, and who gave You this authority [to exercise this power]?”

“What do you think? There was a man who had two sons, and he came to the first and said, ‘Son, go and work in the vineyard today.’

“Listen to another parable. There was a landowner who PLANTED A VINEYARD AND PUT A WALL AROUND IT AND DUG A WINE PRESS IN IT, AND BUILT A TOWER, and rented it out to tenant farmers and went on a journey [to another country].

Jesus asked them, “Have you never read in the Scriptures:

‘THE [very] [fn]STONE WHICH THE BUILDERS REJECTED and THREW AWAY,

HAS BECOME THE CHIEF CORNERSTONE;

THIS IS THE LORD’S DOING,

AND IT IS MARVELOUS and WONDERFUL IN OUR EYES’?

“Therefore I tell you, the kingdom of God will be taken away from you and given to [another] people who will produce the fruit of it.

When the chief priests and the Pharisees heard His parables, they understood that He was talking about them.