The Gospel According to Luke

And all the tax-gatherers and the sinners were coming nigh to him, to hear him,

and the Pharisees and the scribes were murmuring, saying -- This one doth receive sinners, and doth eat with them.'

And he spake unto them this simile, saying,

'What man of you having a hundred sheep, and having lost one out of them, doth not leave behind the ninety-nine in the wilderness, and go on after the lost one, till he may find it?

and having found, he doth lay [it] on his shoulders rejoicing,

and having come to the house, he doth call together the friends and the neighbours, saying to them, Rejoice with me, because I found my sheep -- the lost one.

'I say to you, that so joy shall be in the heaven over one sinner reforming, rather than over ninety-nine righteous men, who have no need of reformation.

'Or what woman having ten drachms, if she may lose one drachm, doth not light a lamp, and sweep the house, and seek carefully till that she may find?

and having found, she doth call together the female friends and the neighbours, saying, Rejoice with me, for I found the drachm that I lost.

'So I say to you, joy doth come before the messengers of God over one sinner reforming.'

And he said, 'A certain man had two sons,

and the younger of them said to the father, Father, give me the portion of the substance falling to [me], and he divided to them the living.

'And not many days after, having gathered all together, the younger son went abroad to a far country, and there he scattered his substance, living riotously;

and he having spent all, there came a mighty famine on that country, and himself began to be in want;

and having gone on, he joined himself to one of the citizens of that country, and he sent him to the fields to feed swine,

and he was desirous to fill his belly from the husks that the swine were eating, and no one was giving to him.

'And having come to himself, he said, How many hirelings of my father have a superabundance of bread, and I here with hunger am perishing!

having risen, I will go on unto my father, and will say to him, Father, I did sin -- to the heaven, and before thee,