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§20 The Last Who Are First (Matt. 20:1–34)

It is important to note the close tie between chapter 20 and the verse that precedes it. The saying about the first who will be last and the last who will be first (19:30) is repeated at the end of the first section of chapter 20 (v. 16). This Semitic device is called inclusio, and because the order is inverted it is also an example of chiasmus (for other examples compare 7:16 with 7:20, and 24:42 with 25:13). Chapter 20 also begins with the Greek conjunction gar, which emphasizes continuity.

20:1–7 / The kingdom of heaven is said to be like a landowner who went out early in the morning to hire laborers to work in his vineyard. In ancient times the working day extended from sunup until sundown (cf. Ps. 104:20–23); the grape harvest in Palestine ripened toward the end of September. Finding some workers, the owner agreed to pay them the usual day’s wage for their labor and sent them into his vineyard. About three hours later (around nine in the morning) he went out and saw others standing in the marketplace doing nothing. Some commentators picture these men as sitting around idly gossiping, but with economic conditions as they were in Palestine at that time, this would be unlikely. The owner promised these men a fair wage (whatever is right), and they went to work for him.

At noon and at three in the afternoon the owner did the same thing. Then, about an hour before sundown, he returned to the marketplace and found yet another group still without work. “Why have you spent the entire day idle?” he asked. There may have been a bit of reproach in the question, and their answer (“no one hired us”) could be a cover up for laziness.

20:8–16 / When evening came, the owner instructed his foreman to send for the workers and pay them their wages, beginning with the last ones hired. Jewish law held that a laborer should be paid on the evening of the same day he had worked, so that the poor would not go hungry (Deut. 24:14–15; cf. Lev. 19:13). The men who were hired last each received a full day’s wage, which led those who had started earlier to expect that they would receive more. But that was not the case. They also received their denarius. As they left, they began to grumble against the landowner. Those that have worked only one hour have been treated exactly like those of us who have “sweated the whole day long in the blazing sun!” (NEB).

It is instructive to note that though the workers address the owner without any title of courtesy, he responds to them with friend (although hetairos probably implies a mild reproach; cf. 22:12; 26:50). The owner has not been unjust, because the first workers had agreed on an acceptable wage. If he chooses to pay the same amount to others that is certainly his right. After all, it is his money. The AV translation of verse 15b (“Is thine eye evil, because I am good?”) is rendered well by the NIV with its Or are you envious because I am generous? (v. 15).

Jesus concludes the parable (as he began it) with the saying that the last will be first, and the first will be last. There has been a great deal of discussion among New Testament scholars regarding who is intended by the first and the last. In the context of Matthew’s presentation the latecomers would be those who did not appear to have the same claim upon the goodness of God. They were the tax collectors and other religious outcasts. Gundry adopts a different approach, holding them to be Gentiles who had entered the church only recently, whereas those who came first would be their detractors among Jewish Christians (p. 399). Yet another approach is tied in with the observation that Peter’s question in 19:27 reveals that he had not yet grasped that God rewards those who seek no reward. Following this suggestion opens the possibility that the parable is told to distinguish between two types of work: one that is based on a desire for reward and the other upon confidence that God will take care of those who leave everything to him. Note that to the second group he promises to pay “whatever is right” (v. 4), and there is no mention of pay to the others who start later. Once again the specific application of the verse is difficult because of the proverbial nature of the concluding statement. It is best to understand the parable and its application in the light of Jesus’ own setting and ministry.

20:17–19 / As Jesus was going up to Jerusalem, he took the twelve disciples aside to tell them what would happen to him there. This is now the third prediction of his passion. Once again he speaks only to the Twelve. Three important points are made. First, he will be betrayed to the chief priests and the teachers of the law. Paradidōmi (betrayed) was a technical term for “release into custody.” It refers primarily to the actions of Judas Iscariot (26:15ff.), although the passive tense may imply that God’s purpose is being carried out.

Second, though it is the religious leaders who condemn him to death, it is the Gentiles (Romans) who will execute the sentence. They will make sport of him, scourge him, and he will be crucified. Matthew is the only synoptic author who indicates the specific nature of Jesus’ death. He uses stauroō (“to crucify”), whereas the others have apokteinō (“to kill”). Crucifixion was not a Jewish form of punishment. It originated with the Phoenicians and was later passed on to other nations. It was commonly used with slaves, foreigners, and criminals of the lowest class.

It was difficult for the disciples to understand that Jesus the Messiah would be put to death. They still shared the Jewish view that Messiah would come in triumph (the parallel in Luke 18:34 says that “they did not grasp what was said”). It was even more difficult for them to understand that following his crucifixion he would be raised to life (v. 19). There is no real difference between Matthew’s on the third day and Mark’s “after three days” (ASV; Mark 10:34). Fenton notes that this entire section follows naturally after Jesus’ statement in verse 16 that the last will be first. He is “last” in the humiliating events leading to his death but “first” in the resurrection and exaltation (p. 322).

20:20–22 / The mother of Zebedee’s sons comes to Jesus with the request that her two sons (James and John) be given positions of honor in the kingdom. When Matthew 27:56 is compared with its parallel in Mark (15:40), we learn that her name is Salome. On the basis of John 19:25, it seems quite probable that she was the sister of Mary the mother of Jesus. This would make James and John cousins of Jesus and may explain why she imagined that they would receive special favor.

In Mark’s account, it is James and John who approach Jesus with the request, whereas in Matthew it is their mother. For many critics this “artificial intervention of the mother” (Beare, p. 20) is held to be Matthew’s device to protect the reputation of the disciples. Barclay says that Matthew “did not wish to show James and John guilty of worldly ambition” (vol. 2, p. 229). However, the fact that when the others hear about it they are “indignant with the two brothers” (v. 24) shows that the mother was no more than a spokeswoman. That the Gospel writers include an account that puts two leading apostles in such an unflattering light strengthens one’s confidence in the historical reliability of the narrative. Incidentally, the account shows that there were women among the followers of Jesus.

The request for positions of honor and authority (on either side of the throne; cf. Josephus Ant. 6.235–238) assumes an earthly kingdom and reveals a misunderstanding that lingered even into the postresurrection period (cf. Acts 1:6). Jesus’ response, which is directed to the two disciples (oidate is plural), is that they don’t know what they are asking. Can they drink the cup of suffering (cf. 26:39; Isa. 51:17) that he is about to drink? James and John are certain that they can, but their desertion of Jesus in the garden (26:56) shows how unprepared they were for what would follow. Note that the AV’s “and to be baptized with the baptism that I am baptized with” is omitted. It is not in the best Greek manuscripts and can be explained as a copyist’s addition based on the parallel passage in Mark 10:38.

20:23 / Jesus’ answer (You will indeed drink from my cup) is thought by some to be a vaticinium post eventum (prophecy after the event) and indicates that both James and John were martyred by Herod the King about A.D. 44. The best tradition holds that John lived to an old age in Ephesus and died a natural death in exile on the isle of Patmos (cf. Rev. 1:9; Irenaeus, Adv. haer., 3.3.4; Eusebius, Eccl. Hist., 3.31; 4.14; 5.8). They will indeed drink from the cup of suffering, but positions of honor are for those to whom they have already been assigned by the Father. A strong element of predestination runs through Jewish thought.

20:24–28 / When the other disciples heard what James and John had done, they were indignant. It would appear that they were prompted more by jealousy than by any sense of inappropriateness on the part of the two. Jesus speaks to all of them in pointing out that, although pagan rulers lord it over their subjects, this is not the way it is to be among his followers. The secret of greatness is not the ability to tyrannize others but the willingness to become their servant. Whoever would become first must become “the willing slave of all” (NEB).

The great example of servant leadership is Jesus himself. He is the Son of Man, who did not come to be served, but to serve. To sit at his right and at his left in the kingdom (v. 21) calls for a life of service as he also served. Jesus’ final words in the paragraph are exceptionally important for the discussion about the substitutionary nature of Christ’s redemptive death. The Son of Man has come to give his life as a ransom for many.

The Greek word for ransom is lytron and is not found apart from this setting in the New Testament. Its basic meaning is money paid to buy back prisoners of war. In the LXX it is often used in a cultic sense for the payment of a debt to a deity (TDNT, vol. 4, p. 340). It is also used in the LXX figuratively in the general sense of rescue without any question of a ransom being paid to someone (Beare, p. 409). This has lead some scholars to consider this verse of limited importance for the biblical doctrine of atonement. Barclay calls attention to what “the crude hands of theology” have done with this “lovely saying” and quotes Peter Lombard (as the extreme example), who writes that “the cross was a mousetrap to catch the devil, baited with the blood of Christ” (vol. 2, pp. 234–35). Others call attention to the fact that the saying is found in an ethical setting and should therefore not be pressed for its christological significance (Beare, p. 790). After all the caveats have been registered, Jesus still declares that he came to give his life as a means of redeeming humankind. The Greek text says that he gave his life lytron anti pollōn (“a ransom in the place of many”). It would be difficult to express the substitutionary nature of Jesus’ death in clearer language. Büchsel concludes his article on the subject with the statement, “The understanding of Jesus’ death as a ransom for us is a basic element in the Church’s confession which it cannot surrender” (TDNT, vol. 4, p. 349).

20:29–34 / In both Matthew and Mark this healing takes place just before the triumphal entry into Jerusalem. Luke adds the story of Zacchaeus and the parable of the pounds, which took place as Jesus and the disciples went through Jericho. This may account for Matthew and Mark’s placing the healing after Jericho while Luke places it “as they drew near to Jericho” (Luke 18:35). Matthew tells of two blind men; Mark and Luke speak of one. Tasker suggests that two men may have received their sight, but the Petrine tradition, known only to Mark, concentrated on one who may have been known personally to Peter (p. 196). Matthew recorded a similar healing of two men in 9:27–31, which some have taken as a different narrative from the same source; but several differences exist, and the emphasis in each account is different (the men’s faith in the first, and Jesus’ compassion in the second). It is Mark who supplies the name of Bartimaeus and indicates that he was a beggar (Mark 10:46).

Those who made up the large crowd that followed Jesus out of Jericho were mostly pilgrims on their way to celebrate the Passover at Jerusalem. The size of the crowd reveals the mounting excitement about Jesus and what might happen at the sacred festival. When the two blind men heard that it was Jesus who was going by, they called out, “Have pity on us, Son of David!” Apart from this incident the title Son of David does not occur elsewhere in Mark or Luke (or ever outside the Gospels). For Matthew, it had messianic significance, and he uses it seven times. The Psalms of Solomon 17:23ff. picture the Son of David as a messianic king, and Isaiah 29:18 portrays restoration of sight as a sign of the messianic era. The healing of the blind at this particular point shows that the Son of David, even while on his way to Jerusalem to suffer and die, responds in compassion to the cry of those who need to be served.

When rebuked by the crowd, they shouted all the louder … Jesus stopped, and the blind men, in answer to his query, pleaded with him to open their eyes. Moved with compassion, Jesus touched their eyes; their sight was immediately restored, and they followed him. Tasker calls attention to an interesting textual variant in the Curetonian MS of the Old Syriac version, which adds et videamus te (“and that we may see thee”) after “that our eyes may be opened” in verse 33 (p. 196). It calls attention to the central concern of the blind men: not simply to see but to see Jesus the Messiah.