Jesus seeing this went away from them, and many followed him, and he healed them all, and charged them not to divulge what he was doing; so as to fulfill the word spoken by the prophet Isaiah, saying: Behold, my son, whom I have chosen, whom I love, and my soul is well pleased with him. I will put my spirit into him, and he will announce the judgment to the nations. He will not fight or cry out, nor will any hear his voice in the public places. He will not break the reed that is bent or quench the flax that is smoking, until he issues his judgment in triumph. And in his name the nations shall have hope.
Then there was brought to him a man possessed by a demon, blind and a deaf-mute, and he healed him, so that the deaf-mute talked and saw. Then all the multitudes were astonished and said: Is this not the son of David? But the Pharisees heard them and said: This man does not drive out demons except through Beelzebub, the prince of demons. He knew their thoughts and said to them: Every kingdom that is divided against itself is made desolate, and every city or house that is divided against itself will not stand. And if Satan drives out Satan, he is divided against himself. How then shall his kingdom stand? If through Beelzebub I drive out demons, through whom do your sons drive them out? Therefore they shall be your judges. But if I drive out demons by the spirit of God, then the Kingdom of God has come to you. Or how can one enter the house of the strong man and seize his goods, unless he first binds the strong man and then plunders his house? He who is not with me is against me, and he who does not join my meetings dispels them. Therefore, I tell you this, every sin and blasphemy shall be forgiven to men, but the blasphemy of the Spirit shall not be forgiven. And if one speaks a word against the son of man, it shall be forgiven him; but if one speaks against the Holy Spirit, it shall not be forgiven him, neither in this age nor the next. Either make the tree good and its fruit good, or make the tree bad and its fruit bad; for from the fruit the tree is known. You viper's brood, how can you say what is good when you are bad? For from what overflows the heart the mouth speaks. The good man issues good from his good storehouse, and the bad man issues bad from his bad storehouse. I tell you, every idle word men speak they shall account for on the day of judgment; for from your words you shall be justified, and from your words judgment shall be given against you.
Then some of the scribes and Pharisees answered him and said: Master, we wish to see a sign from you. He answered and said to them: A corrupt and adulterous generation asks for a sign, and no sign shall be given to it unless it be the sign of Jonah the prophet. For as Jonah was in the belly of the whale three days and three nights, so the son of man shall be in the heart of the earth three days and three nights. The men of Nineveh shall stand up on the day of judgment with this generation and condemn it; because they repented upon the proclamation of Jonah, and behold, there is more than Jonah here. The Queen of the South shall rise up on the day of judgment with this generation and condemn it; because she came from the ends of the earth to listen to the wisdom of Solomon, and behold, there is more than Solomon here. But when the unclean spirit goes out of a man, it wanders through waterless regions looking for a place to rest, and finds none. Then it says: I will return to my house that I came out from; and it comes and finds it free and swept and furnished. Then it goes and picks up seven more spirits worse than itself, and they go and settle there; and the end for that man is worse than the beginning. Thus it will be also with this evil generation.
While he was still talking with the multitudes, behold, his mother and his brothers stood outside, desiring to speak with him. And someone said to him: See, your mother and your brothers are standing outside and desire to speak with you. But he answered and said to the man who reported this: Who is my mother, and who are my brothers? And pointing his hand toward his disciples, he said: These are my mother and my brothers. For whoever does the will of my father in heaven is my brother and sister and mother.
41 On that day Jesus went out of the house and sat beside the sea; and a great multitude gathered before him, so that he went aboard a ship and sat there, and all the multitude stood on the shore. And he talked to them, speaking mostly in parables: Behold, a sower went out to sow. And as he sowed, some of the grain fell beside the way, and birds came and ate it. Some fell on stony ground where there was not much soil, and it shot up quickly because there was no depth of soil, but when the sun came up it was parched, and because it had no roots it dried away. Some fell among thorns, and the thorns grew up and stifled it. But some fell upon the good soil and bore fruit, some a hundredfold, some sixtyfold, some thirty- fold. He who has ears, let him hear. Then his disciples came to him and said: Why do you talk to them in parables? He answered them and said: Because it is given to you to understand the secrets of the Kingdom of Heaven, but to them it is not given. When a man has, he shall be given, and it will be more than he needs; but when he has not, even what he has shall be taken away from him. Therefore I talk to them in parables, because they have sight but do not see, and hearing but do not hear or understand. And for them is fulfilled the prophecy of Isaiah, saying: With your hearing you shall hear and not understand, and you shall use your sight and look but not see. For the heart of this people is stiffened, and they hear with difficulty, and they have closed their eyes; so that they may never see with their eyes, or hear with their ears and with their hearts understand and turn back, so that I can heal them.
Blessed are your eyes because they see, and your ears because they hear. Truly I tell you that many prophets and good men have longed to see what you see, and not seen it, and to hear what you hear, and not heard it. Hear, then, the parable of the sower. To every man who hears the word of the Kingdom and does not understand it, the evil one comes and seizes what has been so^n in his heart. This is the seed sown by the way. The seed sown on the stony ground is the man who hears the word and immediately accepts it with joy; but he has no root in himself, and he is a man of the moment, and when there comes affliction and persecution, because of the word, he does not stand fast. The seed sown among thorns is the man who hears the word, and concern for the world and the beguilement of riches stifle the word, and he bears no fruit. And the seed sown on the good soil is the man who hears the word and understands it, who bears fruit and makes it, one a hundredfold, one sixtyfold, and one thirtyfold.
He set before them another parable, saying: The Kingdom of Heaven is like a man who sowed good seed in his field. And while the people were asleep, his enemy came and sowed darnel in with the grain, and went away. When the plants grew and produced a crop, the darnel was seen. Then the slaves of the master came to him and said: Master, did you not sow good grain in your field? Where does the darnel come from? He said to them: A man who is my enemy did it. His slaves said: Do you wish us to go out and gather it? But he said: No, for fear that when you gather the darnel you may pull up the grain with it. Let them both grow until harvest time, and in the time of harvest I shall say to the harvesters: First gather the darnel, and bind it in sheaves for burning, but store the grain in my granary.
He set before them another parable, saying: The Kingdom of Heaven is like a grain of mustard, which a man took and sowed in his field; which is the smallest of all seeds, but when it grows, it is the largest of the greens and grows into a tree, so that the birds of the air come and nest in its branches.