1 Once he was praying in a certain place, and when he had finished, one of his disciples said to him, "Lord, teach us to pray, just as John taught his disciples."
2 And he said to them, "When you pray, say: Our Father who is in heaven, hallowed be your name. Your kingdom come. Your will be done, as in heaven, so also on earth.
3 Give us each day our daily bread.
4 And forgive us our sins, for we too forgive everyone who owes us. And do not lead us into temptation, but rescue us from evil."
5 He also said to them, "Suppose one of you has a friend, and you go to him at midnight and say to him, 'Friend, lend me three loaves of bread,
6 because a friend of mine on a journey has come to me, and I have nothing to put in front of him.'
7 And from inside he answers, 'Do not bother me. The door has already been locked, and my children and I are in bed. I cannot get up and give you anything.'
8 I tell you, even if he will not get up and give him anything because he is his friend, yet because of his shameless persistence he will get up and give him whatever he needs.
9 "So I tell you: ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and the door will be opened to you.
10 For everyone who asks receives; the one who seeks finds; and to the one who knocks, the door will be opened.
11 Which father among you, if his son asks for bread, will hand him a stone? Or if he asks for a fish, will hand him a snake in place of a fish?
12 Or if he asks for an egg, will hand him a scorpion?
13 So if you, evil as you are, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will the Father who is from heaven give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him!"
14 He was driving out a demon that was mute. When the demon had gone out, the mute man spoke, and the crowds were amazed.
15 But some of them said, "It is by Beelzebub, the ruler of the demons, that he drives out demons."
16 Others, to test him, kept demanding from him a sign from heaven.
17 But he knew what they were thinking and said to them, "Any kingdom divided against itself is laid waste, and house falls upon house.
18 And if Satan too is divided against himself, how will his kingdom stand? I ask, since you say that I drive out demons by Beelzebub.
19 Now if I drive out demons by Beelzebub, by whom do your sons drive them out? So they will be your judges.
20 But if it is by the finger of God that I drive out demons, then the kingdom of God has come upon you.
21 When a strong man, fully armed, keeps watch over his own palace, his possessions are safe.
22 But when someone stronger than he attacks and overpowers him, he strips him of the armor he relied on and hands out his plunder.
23 Whoever is not with me is against me, and whoever does not gather with me scatters.
24 "When the unclean spirit goes out of a person, it wanders through dry places looking for rest, and when it finds none, it says, 'I will go back to my house that I left.'
25 On arriving, it finds the house swept clean and set in order.
26 Then it goes off and brings along seven other spirits more evil than itself, and they go in and settle there; and that person ends up worse off than at first."
27 As he was saying these things, a woman in the crowd called out to him, "Blessed is the womb that carried you and the breasts you nursed at!"
28 But he replied, "Rather, blessed are those who hear the word of God and keep it."
29 As the crowds were growing larger, he began to say, "This generation is an evil generation. It looks for a sign, yet no sign will be given to it except the sign of Jonah the prophet.
30 For just as Jonah became a sign to the people of Nineveh, so will the Son of Man be to this generation.
31 The queen of the South will rise at the judgment with the men of this generation and condemn them, because she came from the ends of the earth to listen to Solomon's wisdom; and look, more than Solomon is here.
32 The men of Nineveh will rise up at the judgment with this generation and condemn it, because they repented at Jonah's preaching; and look, more than Jonah is here.
33 "No one lights a lamp and puts it in a cellar or under a basket; he puts it on the lampstand, so that those who come in may see the light.
34 The eye is the lamp of the body. When your eye is single, your whole body is full of light too; but when it is bad, your body is full of darkness too.
35 So watch out that the light in you is not darkness.
36 If your whole body, then, is full of light, with no part of it in darkness, it will be wholly full of light, as when a lamp shines on you with its brightness."
37 While he was speaking, a Pharisee invited him to have a meal at his house, so he went in and reclined at the table.
38 The Pharisee was surprised to see that he did not wash first before the meal.
39 But the Lord said to him, "You Pharisees clean the outside of the cup and the platter, but inside you are full of greed and wickedness.
40 Foolish people! Did not the one who made the outside also make the inside?
41 Instead, give as alms what is inside, and then everything is clean for you.
42 "But woe to you Pharisees! You give a tenth of mint and rue and every garden herb, yet you neglect justice and the love of God. These you should have practiced, without neglecting the others.
43 Woe to you Pharisees! You love the front seats in the synagogues and being greeted in the marketplaces.
44 Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! You are like graves that are not seen, which people walk over without knowing it."
45 One of the experts in the law answered him, "Teacher, in saying this you are insulting us too."
46 He said, "Woe to you experts in the law as well! You weigh people down with burdens that are hard to carry, while you yourselves will not touch those burdens with a single finger.
47 Woe to you! You build tombs for the prophets, and it was your fathers who killed them.
48 So you bear witness and give your approval to what your fathers did: they killed them, and you build their tombs.
49 That is why the wisdom of God also said, 'I will send them prophets and apostles; some of them they will kill and some they will persecute,'
50 so that this generation may be charged with the blood of all the prophets shed since the foundation of the world,
51 from the blood of Abel to the blood of Zechariah, who was killed between the altar and the sanctuary. Yes, I tell you, this generation will be charged with it.
52 Woe to you experts in the law! You have taken away the key of knowledge. You did not go in yourselves, and you blocked those who were going in."
53 As he was saying these things to them, the scribes and Pharisees began to turn fiercely against him and to draw him out on many subjects,
54 watching for him and trying to seize on something he might say, in order to accuse him.