But they seized the servant, beat him, and sent him away empty-handed.
Christ had formerly in parables showed how he designed to set up the gospel church; now he begins in parables to show how he would lay aside the Jewish church, which it might have been grafted into the stock of, but was built upon the ruins of. This parable we had just as we have it here, Mat 21:33. We may observe here, I.
Commenting on Mark 12:1-12
And they caught him,.... This clause is left out in the Syriac and Persic versions, though it seems proper to be retained; and denotes the rudeness and violence with which the prophets of the Lord were used by the Jewish nation: and beat him: either with their fists, or with rods, and scourges, till the skin was flayed off: and sent him away empty; without...