‘We played wedding songs, and you didn’t dance, so we played funeral songs, and you didn’t mourn.’
Parallel translations
- WEB and say, ‘We played the flute for you, and you didn’t dance. We mourned for you, and you didn’t lament.’
- KJV And saying, We have piped unto you, and ye have not danced; we have mourned unto you, and ye have not lamented.
- BSB ‘We played the flute for you, and you did not dance; we sang a dirge, and you did not mourn.’
- NKJV and saying: ‘We played the flute for you, And you did not dance; We mourned to you, And you did not lament.’
- NASB and say, ‘We played the flute for you, and you did not dance; we sang a song of mourning, and you did not mourn.’
Scripture taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
Scripture quotations taken from the (NASB®) New American Standard Bible®, Copyright © 1960, 1971, 1977, 1995, 2020 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission. All rights reserved. lockman.org
Scripture quotations are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996, 2004, 2015 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.
Quick answer
The fickle generation responds to neither joyful nor mournful summons. No approach satisfies hearts determined to refuse.
Overview
Completing the parable, Jesus pictures children complaining that others would neither dance to flutes nor mourn at dirges. The point is that this generation rejected both John's solemn call to repentance and Jesus' joyful proclamation of grace. Unbelief is exposed as willful, finding excuses against every form of God's appeal.
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 9
- Isa 28:9–13Whom will he teach knowledge? To whom will he explain the message? Those who are weaned from the milk, and drawn from the breasts?
- Isa 30:29You will have a song, as in the night when a holy feast is kept; and gladness of heart, as when one goes with a flute to come to Yahweh’s mountain, to Israel’s Rock.
- Jer 9:17–20Yahweh of Armies says, “Consider, and call for the mourning women, that they may come; and send for the skillful women, that they may come.
- Jer 31:4I will build you again, and you will be built, O virgin of Israel. You will again be adorned with your tambourines, and will go out in the dances of those who make merry.
- Matt 9:15Jesus said to them, “Can the friends of the bridegroom mourn, as long as the bridegroom is with them? But the days will come when the bridegroom will be taken away from them, and then they will fast.
- Matt 9:23When Jesus came into the ruler’s house, and saw the flute players, and the crowd in noisy disorder,
- Luke 15:25“Now his elder son was in the field. As he came near to the house, he heard music and dancing.
- 1 Cor 9:19–23For though I was free from all, I brought myself under bondage to all, that I might gain the more.
- 1 Kgs 1:40All the people came up after him, and the people piped with pipes, and rejoiced with great joy, so that the earth shook with their sound.
Themes, concepts, people & topics
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Christ at the center
Matthew presents Jesus as the promised King — son of David, son of Abraham — the new Moses and true Israel in whom every prophecy reaches 'that it might be fulfilled.'
How Matthew 11:17 points to him is part of the one story that runs through all Scripture — meet Jesus at the heart of the web, or follow a trail that traces him from Genesis to Revelation.
Original language
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