“And they caught him, and beat him, and sent him away empty.”
But they seized him, beat him and sent him away empty-handed — the first servant is seized, beaten, and sent away without fruit. The sequence of rejection escalates through the parable: beat (first servant), wound in the head (second), killed (third and subsequent). The escalating violence against the owner's representatives mirrors the escalating rejection of the prophets throughout Israel's history.
Church Fathers on Mark 12:3
After the Lord had closed the mouths of His tempters by a wise question, He next shews their wickedness in a parable.
God the Father is called a man by a human conception. The vineyard is the house of Israel; the hedge is the guardianship of Angels; the winefat is the law, the tower is the temple, and the husbandmen, the priests.
Or else, the hedge is the wall of the city, the winefat is the altar, or those winefats, by which three psalms receive their name.
Read all 22 entries in the readerCatena Aurea · St. Thomas Aquinas, tr. J. H. Newman · public domain
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