Saying 65: The Wicked Tenants
A man leased his vineyard to farmers. He sent a servant for the produce and they beat him; he sent another and they beat him too; he sent his son, and they killed him, knowing he was the heir.
Commentary
Thomas’s version lacks the quotations from Isaiah that frame Mark’s, which several scholars read as evidence of a pre-allegorical form of the parable. Saying 66 then supplies the rejected-stone line separately.
Parallels
Mark 12:1–9; Matthew 21:33–41; Luke 20:9–16
Sayings on the same themes
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- Saying 105 Saying 105: Whoever Knows the Father and the Mother Whoever knows the father and the mother will be called the child of a prostitute.
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