And at the season he sent to the husbandmen a servant, that he might receive from the husbandmen of the fruit of the vineyard.
3 And they caught him, and beat him, and sent him away empty.
Ver. 3. And beat him] Properly, they hild (tanned) him; but by a metonymy, a they beat him. Sic percutimus vulpem, ut pellis ei detrahatur; so men beat a fox that they may the better skin him. (Δερω proprie excorio, pellem detraho. Gerhard.)
a A figure of speech which consists in substituting for the name of a thing the name of an attribute of it or of something closely related. ŒD