Jan Massijs (1509-1575) is the son of the famous Flemish painter Quinten Massijs (1456/66-1530). Jan, born in Antwerp in 1509, was first an apprentice and later a painter in his father’s studio and kept it going after the latter’s death after 1530. In a studio it was customary that favourite motifs of the master were copied by the assistants with a view to selling multiple copies. This picture also attests to this process: We know of several variants of it, which is why it is assumed that the painting goes back to a lost work by Quinten Massijs. 
The versions of the painting are not all identical. While most of them only show a rosary on the table, here there is an open book with white pages. The man in green holding spectacles seems to be explaining something to the other man or perhaps reading something aloud to him from the book. As the hands of the man in the foreground are folded, it seems reasonable to assume the context is religious – perhaps reading from the Bible.