Bible Commentaries

D. CHRIST MANIFESTS HIS ROYAL DIGNITY BY PRESENTING, IN SEVEN PARABLES, THE FOUDING AND DEVELOPMENT OF HIS KINGDOM THROUGH ALL ITS PHASES, FROM ITS BEGINNING TO ITS END

Matthew 13:1-51

(Parallels: Mark 4:1-20; Mark 4:30-34; Luke 8:4-15; Luke 13:18-21.)

Contents:—The parable of the sower; or, first parable concerning the kingdom of heaven: Its institution by the Word. The teaching of Jesus concerning parables.—Second parable: the tares among the wheat; or, the seed of the Spirit and the heresies.—Third parable: the grain of mustard-seed; or, the spread of the Church.—Fourth parable: the woman and the leaven; or, the Christianization and evangelization of the world.—Fifth parable: the treasure hid in the field; or, invisible salvation hid within the visible Church.—Sixth parable: the pearl of great price; or, Christianity as the highest spiritual good in the world.—Seventh parable: the net full of fishes; or, the judgment which ushers in the manifestation of the kingdom of heaven.

EXEGETICAL NOTES ON THE WHOLE SECTION

[Literature on the Parables.—Unger: De parabolarum Jesu nature, interpretations, usu. Lips, 1828. F. G. Lisco: The Parables of Jesus, Berlin, 1831. and later. Arndt: The Parables of Jesus Christ (16 Meditations), Magdeb, 1842. E. Griswell: Exposition of the Parables and of other parts of the Gospels, Lond, 1839, vols6 Richard Chenevix Trench (now archbishop of Dublin): Notes on the Parables of our Lord, 9th ed, Lond, 1863 (a former edition reprinted in New York). A very useful and deservedly popular book. Special introductory essays on the Parable by Dr. Lange in Herzog’s Encycl, sub Gleichniss vol v, p 182 sqq, and another in Schneider’s Deutsche Zei schrift für christl. Wissenschaft, etc, for1856; by Card. Wiseman in his Misc. Essays; by Dr. Gerhart in the “Mercersburg Review,” etc. Among the commentators of the Gospels. Olshausen and Stier (Words of Jesus) are especially rich on the Parables. For older works on the Parables and the exposition of particular Parables, see Danz and Winer in their Manuals of Theol. Liter, sub verbo Purabel; Heubner: Comment, on Matthew, p181; and Trench: Notes, etc, pp494,495 (6th Lond. ed.).—P. S.]

1. The Evangelist Matthew combines the seven parables of the Lord concerning the development of the kingdom of heaven into a connected series, and at first sight creates the impression that they were uttered on the same day. But we must remember, that on that day Jesus had already been engaged in another great work, and that Matthew himself intimates at least two distinct pauses between the different parables (comp. Mark 4:10). But according to Mark ( Matthew 4:1 seq.; comp. Matthew 13:35 and Matthew 8:18 seq.), three of these parables—that of the sower, that of the grain of mustard-seed, and between them the beautiful parable concerning the natural growth of the seed—had been taught by Jesus at an earlier period, viz, on the day when He passed over to Gadara and calmed the storm. Luke records the parable of the sower together with the calming of the storm at sea somewhat later ( Luke 8:5 seq.; 22seq.; comp. Matthew 8:23 seq.). Hence we must not look here for a strict chronological succession, while from the definite notices of Mark we infer that some of these parables had been uttered at an earlier period. But Matthew had good internal reasons for the pragmatic unity of his narrative. Foremost among these is the motive which induced the Lord to choose the parabolical form of teaching. This motive, which had appeared at an earlier stage of this history, became a distinct and avowed principle of action when the enmity of the Pharisees and of the people broke forth in an undisguised manner, and forced Him to come out with the full doctrine concerning the kingdom of God; while at the same time, on account of the spiritual decay of the people, it could be set forth only in the form of parables. Another motive which helped to determine the arrangement adopted by Matthew, was the close internal affinity of these seven parables, although we cannot, with Meyer, regard it as necessarily implying chronological succession. The greater part of them were, no doubt, delivered on one and the same day; and it is quite possible that Jesus, for the sake of their connection, again repeated on this occasion the parables which He had previously spoken.

2. The omission of the particle δέ serves to give additional force to the expression in ver1. For, in this case we have not merely a historical continuation; the term implies that on that day the Lord fully adopted the parabolic mode of teaching

DOCTRINAL AND ETHICAL IDEAS ON THE PARABLES

1. The Parables of Christ.—As parables were one of the forms in which the Lord conveyed His doctrine, they should, in the first place, be studied in connection with His other methods of teaching. The first and most direct of these was the simple declaration or preaching of the gospel, which accompanied the facts of the gospel—such as the proclamation of the kingdom of God, of forgiveness of sins, the call to discipleship, the bestowal of a new name, or of power and authority, special promises, special injunctions, etc. When addressed to a sympathetic audience, this declaration of the gospel was delivered in a regular, didactic manner, in the form of maxims, or gnomes—as, for example, the Sermon on the Mount. The use of Proverbs, gnomes, or sententious maxims (παροιμία, proverbium, מָשָל, which, however, may also denote a parable), was a favorite mode of teaching among the Jews, after the example of Solomon in the Book of Proverbs. The proverb is a short, epigrammatic, pointed sentence, frequently figurative and concrete, occasionally paradoxical and hyperbolical, at other times poetical, but always vivid and sharply outlined, so as to present in a transparent and significant form a deep, rich, and pregnant idea, which shines in the light of truth and burns in the fire of personal application—bright and brilliant like a true gem. But in dealing with individuals, the Saviour made use of the didactic dialogue (instead of the formal declaration), which in the presence of His intimate disciples assumed the form of the most direct address, at once instructing the mind and moving the heart. So especially in the parting discourses of the Saviour as recorded by St. John. When, on the other hand, those before Him were either strangers to His word or prejudiced against it, the heavenly Teacher made use of similitudes or parables. Under special circumstances, these were extended into parabolical discourses,—i. e, discourses which assumed the form of parables, or parables to which the interpretation was added. Lastly, when confronted by enemies and accusers, Christ adopted the method of questioning (disputation), following it up by a warning, or by what would serve to silence an opponent—the ultimate mode of dealing with such persons being either open rebuke, or else solemn testimony. Finally, His silence also should be ranked among the forms of His teaching—viewing, as we do, each of them not merely as a speech, but as a fact.

The object of the parables, therefore, was to present the truth, more especially the doctrine of Christ concerning the kingdom of heaven, as in all its phases in direct opposition to the popular prejudices of the Jews, yet in a manner adapted to the weak understanding of a people ruled by these errors.

The use of parables for conveying instruction was very common among Eastern nations generally, and more particularly among the Jews (see Judges 9:1; 2 Samuel 12:1; Isaiah 5:1; Unger, de Parabolarum Jesu natura, interpretatione, usu, Lips1828). The parable is a species of figurative speech, מָשָׁל (which, however, comprises with the full parable also the parabolic sentence and the gnome). Unger defines a Parable as “collatio, per narratiunculam fictam, sed veri similem, serio illustrans rem sublimiorem.” Meyer regards it as “the narrative of a fictitious but common and natural occurrence, for the purpose of embodying and illustrating some doctrine.” But in treating of the parables of Scripture, it is not sufficient to enumerate only these outward characteristics, more especially us in the Gospel of John the outward and visible order of things is throughout employed at the transparent symbol of the invisible world, or of the kingdom of heaven. This mode of teaching itself must have had some special meaning and object, and convey some evangelical truth. The parable is a distinct outward reflection of spiritual life, under the form of a scene taken from real and everyday life, which, besides its primary object of embodying some particular lesson, also conveys the general truth, that spiritual life is capable of being symbolized and reflected.¹ The real, though figurative, relations subsisting between the outer and the inner, the lower and the higher life, suggest the elements from which the didactic and poetic parables were constructed, which in turn were either extended into parabolic discourses (or gave rise to them), or else summed up in parabolic expressions. To illustrate this, we submit the following Table:—

(1) Constituent Elements of Parables; or Parables in the narrowest sense.

2. The Second, Third, and Fourth Parables, and Interpretation of the Second Parable. Matthew 13:24-43

24 Another parable put he forth unto them,¹³ saying, The kingdom of heaven is likened unto a man which [who] sowed¹⁴ good seed in his field: 25But while men slept, his enemy 26 came and sowed [over]¹⁵ tares¹⁶ among the wheat, and went his way. But when the blade was sprung up, and brought forth fruit,¹⁷ then appeared the tares also 27 So the servants of the householder came and said unto him, sir, didst not thou [thou not] 28sow good seed in thy field? from whence then hath it tares?¹⁸ He said unto them, An enemy hath done this. The servants said unto him, Wilt thou then that we go and gather them up? 29But he said, Nay; lest while ye gather up the tares, ye root up also the wheat with them 30 Let both grow together until the harvest: and in the time of harvest I will say to the reapers, Gather ye together first the tares, and bind them in bundles to burn them: but gather the wheat into my barn.

31 Another parable put he forth unto them, saying, The kingdom of heaven is like to a grain of mustard seed, which a man took, and sowed in his field: 32Which indeed is the least of all seeds: but when it is grown, it is the greatest among herbs [greater than the herbs],¹⁹ and becometh a tree, so that the birds of the air come and lodge in the branches thereof.

33 Another parable spake he unto them; The kingdom of heaven is like unto leaven, which a woman took, and hid in three measures of meal, till the whole was leavened.

34 All these things spake Jesus unto the multitude in parables; and without a parable spake he not [he spake nothing]²⁰ unto them: 35That it might be fulfilled which was spoken by the prophet,²¹ saying, I will open my mouth in parables; I will utter things which have been kept secret from the foundation of the world.

36 Then Jesus [he]²² sent the multitude away, and went into the house: and his disciples came unto him, saying, Declare unto us the parable of the tares of the field 37 He answered and said unto them,²³

38 He that soweth the good seed is the Son of man; The field is the world; the good seed [these, οὗτοι] are the children of the kingdom; but the tares are the children of 39 the wicked one; The enemy that sowed them is the devil; the harvest is the end of the world; and the reapers are the²⁴ angels 40 As therefore the tares are gathered and burned in the fire; so shall it be in the end of this [the]²⁵ world 41 The Son of man shall send forth his angels, and they shall gather out of his kingdom all things that offend, and them which [that] do iniquity; 42And shall cast them into a [the] furnace of fire: there shall be wailing and gnashing of teeth 43 Then shall the righteous shine forth²⁶ as the sun in the kingdom of their Father. Who hath ears to hear, let him hear.

EXEGETICAL AND CRITICAL

Matthew 13:24. The kingdom of heaven is likened, or made like, ὡμοιώθη.—A delineation of the trials to which the kingdom of heaven was exposed from its first introduction into the world, and unavoidable connection with it. Hence the sower, who is the chief figure in the parable, cannot prevent the enemy from sowing tares among the wheat. The same expression is also used, Matthew 18:23. The representation of the kingdom of heaven by “a certain man” recurs again in Matthew 13:45, and in Matthew 20:1. It is an entire mistake to interpret the passage as implying that the kingdom of heaven was “at the time not yet founded.”

Matthew 13:25. While men slept;—i.e, at night, when evil-disposed persons would try to injure the property of their neighbors. Hence, the application of this clause to the negligence of Christian teachers, who were appointed to watch and guard the field (Chrysostom, Augustine), is incorrect.²⁷ Still less does it refer to the sleep of sin (Calovius). Nor is it, on the other hand, merely a rhetorical figure (Meyer). It alludes to the weakness of men, through which the enemy succeeds in mixing up errors with saving truth, without this being perceived. Or perhaps it may denote, that professors of religion too frequently seek exclusively their personal comfort, without seriously reflecting upon, or being zealous for, the truth of the doctrines propounded.

Matthew 13:25. Tares [lit.: darnel].—The weed growing among wheat, ζιζάνιον, lolium temulentum, darnel. The only species of grass which in Eastern countries springs up wild among oats or wheat (Virg.: “infelix lolium,” Georg. i154). At the first it looks like wheat, but its fruit is black, not yellow, and its effects are intoxicating and otherwise detrimental. If allowed to grow till the harvest, it is extremely difficult to separate it from the wheat; and, accordingly, it happens not unfrequently that it becomes mixed up with the flour. The Talmudists regarded it as a degenerate wheat. See the Art. in the Encycls. [St. Jerome, who resided long in Palestine, speaks in loc. of the striking similitude between triticum and zizania, wheat, and bastard wheat. Dr. Hackett (Illustrations of Scripture, p130) collected some specimens of this deceitful weed, and found, on showing them to friends, that they invariably mistook them for some species of grain, such as wheat or barley. Hence the rabbinical name, bastard (i.e, bastard wheat).—P. S.]

[The sowing of tares among wheat is a kind of injury frequently practised to this day in the East, from malice and revenge. Roberts (Biblical Illustrations, p541, as quoted by Trench) relates of India “See that lurking villain watching for the time when his neighbor shall plough his field; he carefully marks the period when the work has been finished, and goes in the night following, and casts in what the natives call pandinellu, i.e, pig-paddy; this, being of rapid growth, springs up before the good seed, and scatters itself before the other can be reaped, so that the poor owner of the field will be for years before he can get rid of the troublesome weed.” Trench (Notes on the Parables, p83, 9th Lond. ed.) relates a similar trick of malice from Ireland, where he knew an outgoing tenant, who, in spite of his ejection, sowed wild oats in the fields of the proprietor, which ripened and seeded themselves before the crops, so that it became next to impossible to get rid of them. Dr. Alford, too, in loc, 4th ed, mentions that a field be longing to him in Leicestershire, England, was maliciously sown with charlock, and that heavy damages were obtained by the tenant against the offender.—P. S.]

And went his way.—The devil or his emissaries sow the seed and go their way; those who afterward hold the errors which they have sown, entertertaining them rather in consequence of their natural darkness and folly than of set hostile purpose. [Trench: “The mischief done, the enemy ‘went his way,’ and thus the work did not evidently and at once appear to be his. How often in the Church the beginnings of evil have been scarcely discernible; how often has that which bore the worst fruit in the end, appeared at first like a higher form of good!”—P. S.]

Matthew 13:26. Then appeared the tares also;—i.e, it became then possible to distinguish them. The most fascinating error is seen in its true character whenever its poisonous fruit appears.

Matthew 13:29. Lest ye root up also the wheat.—Gerlach: “Our Lord allows both to grow together, not because His servants might be apt to mistake the tares for the wheat,—which would scarcely be the case if they knew anything of the matter, and which, at all events, would not apply to the reapers ( Matthew 13:30),—but because, however different the plants in themselves, their roots are so closely intertwined in the earth.” This remark is very important; but some other elements must also be taken into account, such as the excitement and haste of these servants—they are not angels, as the reapers spoken of in Matthew 13:30; and, lastly, that the difference between wheat and tares is not so distinct as at the time of the harvest.—The same commentator refers this verse exclusively to excesses of ecclesiastical discipline, for the purpose of excluding all unbelievers and hypocrites, and constituting a perfectly pure Church. He denies all allusion to the punishment of death for heresy, since the Lord spoke of the Church, and not of the secular power. But the Church here alluded to is the Church in the world, and tainted more or less with secularism.

Matthew 13:30. In the time of the harvest, ἐνκαιρῷ, etc.—At the right and proper time, and hence in the time of the harvest.

Matthew 13:31. A grain of mustard-seed.—The mustard-plant, τὸσίναπι (sinapis orientalis, in Chaldee חַרְדֵּל),—a shrub bearing pods, which grows wild,²⁸ but in Eastern countries and in the south of Europe is cultivated for its seed. Three kinds of mustard were known, the black and the white being most in repute. The Jews grew mustard in their gardens. Its round seed-corns (4–6 in a pod) were proverbially characterized by them as the smallest thing (Buxtorf, Lex. Talm. 822); “which, indeed, holds true so far as the various kinds of seed-corn used in Jewish husbandry are concerned, though scientific botany knows still smaller seeds” (Winer). In hot climes the mustard-plant sometimes springs up to the dimensions of a small tree. Meyer and Royle refer the expression to the mustard-tree called Salvadora Persica. (Comp. Winer, and Ewald, Jahrbücher for1849, p32.) But this view is manifestly inapt, as it would destroy not only the popular character, but also the point of the parable. We cannot believe that the Lord would introduce a tree growing in Persia into a picture drawn from common life in Judea.²⁹ Besides, nobody would deem it strange that a tree should grow up to its proper dimensions; but that the small shrub which had sprung from the least of all seeds should spread into a tree, and that the birds of the air should seek a lodgment in its branches, might well form ground of surprise, and serve as the basis of this parable. Heubner: Think of the mustard-seed of Eastern countries, not that of Europe, which grows to the height of from nine to fifteen yards.

Which a man [handling it] took; λαβών.—Meyer: “Circumstantiality and pictorialness of detail.” In our opinion, it alludes to the fact, that a man was obliged cautiously and carefully to take up the seed, lest he should lose hold of it. So small as scarcely to admit of being handled.

Matthew 13:32. Lodge in the branches thereof.—Not merely, nestle or seek shelter, but lodge and remain, κατασκηνοῦν.

Matthew 13:33. Unto leaven; ζύμη.—Referring to the unperceived power and efficacy of the gospel, pervading, transforming, and renewing the mind, heart, and life. Starke: “The term leaven is used in other passages ( Matthew 16:11; 1 Corinthians 5:6-7) in the sense of evil. Accordingly, some commentators understand it as also referring in this parable to the corruptions which have crept into the Church, and ultimately perverted it; and the woman as alluding to the Papacy and the Romish clergy ( Revelation 2:20; Revelation 17:1), who, with their leaven of false doctrine, have leavened the three estates of Christendom (the three measures of meal). However, the gospel may also, in many respects, be likened unto leaven; as, for example, with reference to its pervading influence ( Hebrews 4:12), to its rapid spread ( Luke 12:49), to its rendering the bread palatable and wholesome, etc. According to Macarius, the parable before us alludes to both these elements” (the leaven of original sin, and its counter-agent, the leaven of grace and salvation).—Rieger (Betracht. über d. N. T. i.) better: “In other passages of Scripture the term leaven is used as a figure of insidious and fatal corruption, finding its way into the Church. But manifestly this cannot be the case in the present instance. The passage does not read: The kingdom of heaven is like unto three measures of meal, with which leaven became mixed up; but, The kingdom of heaven is like unto leaven—showing that the leaven, which in itself is not noxious and evil, but, on the contrary, highly useful and wholesome, serves here as a figure of the secret but all-pervading and subduing power of the gospel. In point of fact, the same idea recurs in Hebrews 4:2, where we read of the word being mixed with faith in them that hear it.” To these remarks we add: 1. It were contrary to the rules of hermeneutics to treat an allegorical figure like a dogmatic statement. Thus in different passages the lion is used as a figure of Satan, but also of Christ; the serpent as a figure of the enemy, but also of the wisdom needful to the Apostles; birds as a figure of believing trustfulness, but also of the devil catching away the word2. All the parables in this section bear upon the development of the kingdom of heaven. Hence, if Starke’s supposition were correct, the parable under consideration would be quite out of its place in this context3. It is impossible to conceive that the kingdom of heaven could be leavened by evil as by a power stronger than itself, and thus be hopelessly destroyed4. Leaven may indeed be employed as a figure of sin and evil in the sense of being stronger than individual Christians, when left in their own strength to combat with error, etc. ( Matthew 16:6; 1 Corinthians 5:6-7), but not in that of being more powerful than the kingdom of heaven5. Leaven as such is nowhere in the Bible a figure of evil, but a neutral figure of an all-pervading, contagious power. Mark also Leviticus 23:11 : “They shall be baken with leaven; they are the first-fruits unto the Lord.”

Three measures.—Σάτον, סְאָה, a hollow measure used for dry substances; according to Josephus, equal to1½ Roman measures. The expression, three measures, is not accidental, but intended to denote the large quantity which the leaven has to pervade. Three is the symbolical number for spiritual things. The Spirit of Christ pervades and transforms our spirits in an unseen and spiritual manner. “The Fathers interpreted the number three allegorically.” Theod. of Mopsuest. referred it to the Jews, the Samaritans, and the Greeks.³⁰ This, however, is, strictly speaking, not an allegorical interpretation; comp. Acts 1:8. Olshausen approves of a reference of the number three to the sanctification of the three powers of human nature [body, soul, and spirit] by the gospel. Similarly it might be applied to the three grand forms in our Christian world—individuals (catechumens), Church and State, and the physical Cosmos. The main point, however, is to remember that the whole domain of mind, heart, and life, in all their bearings, is to be pervaded and transformed by the Spirit of God.

Matthew 13:34. He spake nothing (οὐδέν) unto them;—i.e, to the people concerning the kingdom of heaven, especially at that particular period. Hence also the use of the imperfect. Meyer.

Matthew 13:35. By the prophet.—A free quotation of Psalm 78:2. Meyer reminds us that in 2 Chronicles 29:30 Asaph is designated a “seer,” or prophet.

Matthew 13:38. The good seed are the children of the kingdom; but the tares are the children of the wicked one.—Fritzsche: fruges ex semine enatœ. As in the explanation of the first parable, so here also the seed is identified with the souls in which it was sown. Our life becomes identified with the spiritual seed, and principles assume, so to speak, a bodily shape in individuals. Such a concrete mode of presenting this truth is all the more suitable in this place, since our Lord is further developing and applying this parable.—The children of the wicked (literally here the tares) are sown by the wicked—of course, in a moral sense, not according to the substance of their human nature, just as the sons of the kingdom are specifically “the seed” sown by the Saviour in the moral and religious sense. These men have become what they are by the principles which they have embraced. This appears from the expression in Matthew 13:41 : “They shall gather out of His kingdom πάντα τὰσκάν δαλα καὶ τοὺς ποιοῦν τας τὴν ἀνομίαν.” The scandala are offences in respect of doctrine, heresies, and seductive principles; the anomists are those who represent or embrace these principles (among whom Christ also included the representatives of Jewish traditionalism).

Matthew 13:40. At the end of the world, or rather, of this Æon.—2Esra7:43: Dies judicii erit finis temporis hujus et initium temporis futurœ immortalitatis, in quo transivit corruptela.

Matthew 13:41. Out of His kingdom,—clearly showing that the συντέλεια must be regarded as an interval of time, and hence indicating that there is a period intervening between the reappearing of Christ and the first resurrection connected with it, and the last resurrection, or that transformation of the present Æon, which marks the close of the final judgment; Revelation 20, compared with 1 Corinthians 15:23. Meyer: “The separation of which the Lord speaks, is that of the good and the evil (individuals), and only thereby a separation of good and evil (things).” But in the text the σκάνδαλα are mentioned before the ποιοῦντες, who are here identified with these σκάνδαλα. Similarly also the righteous are identified with that heavenly brightness which now shines forth in them.

Matthew 13:42. A furnace of fire.—Not Sheol, or Hades, but Gehenna, or Hell, Revelation 20:15; Matthew 25:41; the place of punishment and Æon of those who are subject to the second death. [Trench: Fearful words indeed! and the image, if it be an image, borrowed from the most dreadful and painful form of death in use among men. David, alas! made the children of Ammon taste the dreadfulness of it. It was in use among the Chaldeans, Jeremiah 29:22; Daniel 3:6. Antiochus resorted to it in the time of the Maccabees, 2 Maccabees 7; 1 Corinthians 13:3. In modern times, Chardin makes mention of penal furnaces in Persia.—P. S.]

Matthew 13:43. Then shall the righteous shine forth, ἐκλάμψουσιν.—Then the brightness of their δόξσ shall visibly break forth; Daniel 12:3; Romans 8; and other passages.

DOCTRINAL AND ETHICAL

1. The Parable of the Tares among the wheat.—The basis of this parable is the natural tendency of the ground to produce noxious weeds, thorns, and briers, or to degenerate. Hence the parable is intended to represent the obstacles with which the kingdom of heaven meets, and which it has to overcome. As in the natural earth tares and weeds rapidly spread, till they threaten to destroy the precious grain, so the seed of natural corruption in the heart and life threatens to choke that of the kingdom of heaven. The parable embodies three leading ideas. In opposition to the heavenly sower we see His adversary similarly employed; by the side of the good seed which Christ scatters we have that of the tares and the weeds of the devil; while the noxious plants, as they spring up, threaten to choke or to spoil the precious fruit. In other words, the kingdom of God is opposed by another kingdom—that of conscious malice, of which Satan, the adversary of Christ, is the head. His seed are the σκάνδαλα, or spiritually seductive principles, here represented by the tares, which look like the wheat, just as heresies resemble the truth. This seed he scatters at night; i.e, the enterprise, dictated by the malice of the enemy, succeeds through the weakness and folly of man. Protected by the darkness of night, the noxious weed, scattered all through the wheat, springs up, and, resembling the good fruit, grows up luxuriantly, till it threatens to choke the wheat, or to spoil it by foreign and dangerous admixture. In passing, we have already hinted that the picture of men sleeping may refer to the contrast between the religious comforts and enjoyments indulged in by the Church, and the watchfulness of schools on behalf of purity of doctrine.

2. Movement on the part of the servants.—This constitutes the second great feature of the parable. Their proposals arose partly from indignation against the enemy, partly from an impatient zeal for outward appearance of purity—from pride in the field, and partly from apprehension for the good seed. They were desirous of removing the tares. The Lord prohibited it, lest they should also root up the wheat. These considerations have been matter of the utmost importance in the history of the Church of Christ. It is well known that Novatianism on the one hand, and the papal hierarchy on the other, have addressed themselves to this work of uprooting, despite the prohibition of the Lord, and that the Romish Church has at last ended by condemning to the flames only the best wheat. But from this passage we learn that, according to the ordinance of the Lord, the Old Testament punishment denounced upon false prophets and blasphemers does not apply to the New economy.³¹ It is contrary to the mind and will of Christ to pronounce a ban, in the sense of denouncing final judgment upon men, by way of removing them and their errors from the Church. This toleration must not, however, be regarded as implying that evil and sin are to escape all punishment in the Church: it only implies that we are to remember and strictly to observe the distinction between the sowing and the reaping time. But within the limits here indicated, it is our duty to correct all current mistakes, James 5:19; to refute every error and heresy, 1 Timothy 4:1-6; and either to remove from the Church anti-christian doctrine and practical offences, with all who are chargeable therewith, or else to induce such persons to leave the Church by refusing to own and acknowledge them, Matthew 18:15; 1 Corinthians 5; 2John Matthew 13:10.

But all these arrangements are only intended by way of discipline during the course of the development of the New Testament economy—in hope, not as a punitive economy of judgment. It is scarcely necessary to add, that they bear no reference whatever to the civil administration of justice ( Romans 13:4).

[Dr. Lange might also have referred to the famous Donatist controversy in the African Church during the fourth and fifth centuries, whose chief exegetical battle-ground was this parable of the tares. The Catholics, represented by St. Augustine, claimed the whole parable, and especially the warning in Matthew 13:29-30, against the disciplinarian rigorism and ecclesiastical purism of the Donatists; while the Donatists tried to escape the force of the parable by insisting that the field here spoken of is not the Church but the world, Matthew 13:38. The parable, they said, has no bearing on our controversy, which is not whether ungodly men should be endured in the world (which we all allow), but whether they should be tolerated in the Church (which we deny). The Catholics replied that the mixture of good and bad men in the world is beyond dispute and known to all; that the Saviour speaks here of the kingdom of heaven, or the Church which is catholic and intended to spread over the whole world. Trench speaks at length on this important disciplinarian controversy in his Notes, p 84 sqq, and defends throughout the Augustinian view (as does Wordsworth); but there was an element of truth in the puritanic zeal of the Donatists and kindred sects in their protest against a latitudinarian, secularized state-churchism. Comp. the forthcoming second volume of my History of Ancient Christianity, ch. vi. §§ 69–71.—P. S.]

3. Until the harvest.—A final and complete separation shall certainly be made. But it requires the heavenly clearness, purity, calmness, and decidedness of angels properly to accomplish this process.—“Then shall the righteous shine forth.” This shining forth is brought about by the deliverance of the Church from the burden of its former connection with evil, by its complete redemption ( Luke 21:28), and by the change and entire transformation now taking place in everything around,—thus combining at the same time inward blessedness with outward, glorious manifestation of spiritual life, in all its fulness and perfectness.

4. The enemy that sowed them is the devil.—This passage has rightly been adduced as one of the strongest proofs that Christ propounded the doctrine concerning the devil as of His own Revelation, and not from accommodation to popular prejudices. For, (1) Our Lord speaks of the devil not in the parable, but in His explanation of its figurative meaning, which, of course, must be taken in its literal and proper sense; (2) He speaks of him not in presence of the people, but within the circle of His intimate disciples; (3) He refers to the devil as the personal founder and centre of the kingdom of darkness, and as opposed to the person of the Son of man, the centre and founder of the kingdom of light. Other passages show that, on many occasions, Jesus of His own accord bore witness to this doctrine (comp. Matthew 4; John 8:44, etc.).

[Trench, Notes, p. Matthew 89: “We behold Satan here not as he works beyond the limits of the Church, deceiving the world, but in his far deeper skill and malignity, as he at once mimics and counterworks the work of Christ: in the words of Chrysostom: ‘after the prophets, the false prophets; after the Apostles, the false apostles; after Christ, Antichrist.’ Most worthy of notice is the plainness with which the doctrine concerning Satan and his agency, his active hostility to the blessedness of man, of which there is so little in the Old Testament, comes out in the New; as in the last parable, and again in this. As the lights become brighter, the shadows become deeper; not till the mighty power of good had been revealed, were we suffered to know how mighty was the power of evil; and even here it is in each case only to the innermost circles of disciples that the explanation concerning Satan is given.” Bengel (Gnom. on Ephesians 6:12) makes a similar remark: “Quo apertius quisque Scripturœ liber de œconomia et gloria Christi agit, eo apertius rursum de regno contrario tenebrarum.”—P. S.]

5.The furnace of fire, into which the wicked are to be cast at the manifestation of the new Æon, is probably intended as a counterpart to the fiery furnace to which, during the best period of the old Æon, the faithful had so often been consigned ( Daniel 3). If from the one furnace a hymn of praise and thanksgiving rose to heaven, from the other resounds the wailing of anguish and pain, and the gnashing of teeth in rage and malice; comp. Revelation 9:2. The fiery torments which the righteous underwent afforded a view of heaven as in and among men; those which the wicked endure bring out the inward hell existing in the bosom of humanity. Similarly the “outer darkness,” where there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth ( Matthew 8:12, etc.), forms an antithesis to the sacred darkness in which Jehovah dwelleth, Exodus 20:21, amidst the praises of Israel, Psalm 22:3; and to the darkness of trials and sorrows which the Lord lightens up, Isaiah 58:10. All these contrasts point to the fact, that it is the wicked who make hell what it is. The autos da fe of the Middle Ages were only a horrible caricature and anticipation of that fiery judgment.

6. Then the righteous shall shine forth as the sun. With the separation at the judgment, the Christian life, subjectively and objectively considered, appears in its full heavenly glory. [Trench: “As fire was the element of the dark and cruel kingdom of hell, so is light of the pure heavenly kingdom. Then, when the dark, hindering element has been removed, shall this element of light, which was before struggling with and obstructed by it, come forth in its full brightness. Colossians 3:4; Romans 8:18; Proverbs 25:4-5. A glory shall be revealed in the saints: not merely brought to them and added from without; but rather a glory which they before had, but which did not before evidently appear, shall burst forth and show itself openly, as once in the days of His flesh, at the moment of transfiguration, did the hidden glory of our Lord. That shall be the day of ‘the manifestation of the sons of God.’ ”—P. S.]

7. The Grain of Mustard-seed.—The first two parables were intended (just as Mark 4:26-29) to delineate the succession of events in the development of the kingdom of heaven; that of the grain of mustard-seed bears reference principally to its extension in space, not in time, while at the same time it depicts the conquering power of the gospel. At first it seems as if the hostile principle had now wholly disappeared. The grain of mustard-seed—so small and despised in the outward appearance of Him who bore the form of a servant, or rather, in that of His disciples—shoots up, and the smallest of seeds grows into a high bush, so as even to resemble a tree. But in consequence of this very growth, the birds of the air mistake the bush for a tree, and seek to make a lodgment in its branches. This was verified in the ecclesiastical establishment which Constantine founded, in the mediæval Church, and indeed applies to the visible Church generally. Not only sweet songsters, but even birds of prey, seek to build their nests on this heavenly tree.

[Alford: “This parable, like most others respecting the kingdom of God, has a double reference—general and individual. (1) In the general sense, the insignificant beginnings of the Kingdom are set forth: the little babe cast in the manger at Bethlehem; the Man of sorrows with no place to lay His head; the crucified One; or again the hundred and twenty names who were the seed of the Church after the Lord had ascended; then we have the Kingdom of God waxing onward and spreading its branches here and there, and different nations coming into it. ‘He must increase,’ said the great Forerunner. We must beware, however, of imagining that the outward Church-form is this kingdom. It has rather reversed the parable, and is the worldly power waxed to a great tree, and the Churches taking refuge under the shadow of it. It may be, where not corrupted by error and superstition, subservient to the growth of the heavenly plant: but is not itself that plant. It is at best no more than (to change the figure) the scaffolding to aid the building, not the building itself. (2) The individual application of the parable points to the small beginnings of divine grace; a word, a thought, a passing sentence, may prove to be the little seed which eventually fills and shadows the whole heart and being, and calls ‘all thoughts, all passions, all delights,’ to come and shelter under it.”—P. S.]

8. The Leaven.—Heubner: “If the former parable presents the extensive power of Christianity, this exhibits its intensive, dynamic force.” See also the list furnished by that author (p199) of works on the effects of Christianity, and the works of writers on Apologetics, Missions, etc. The woman is an apt figure of the Church.³² Leaven, a substance kindred and yet quite opposed to meal,—having the power of transforming and preserving it, and of converting it into bread, thus representing the divine in its relation to, and influence upon, our natural life. One of the main points in the parable is the “hiding,” or the mixing of the leaven in the three measures of meal. This refers to the great visible Church,³³ in which the living gospel seems, as it were, hidden and lost. It appears as if the gospel were engulfed in the world; but under the regenerating power of Christianity it will at last be seen that the whole world shall be included in the Church. Here, then, the transformation of human nature, of society, of institutions, of customs, in short, of the whole Cosmos—or the gradual “regeneration” ( Matthew 19:28)—forms the principal point in view.³⁴ But this Christianization of the whole world is not incompatible with the development of Antichrist in the world, nor with the unbelief and the hardening of individual sinners. Nay, this very dedication of life as a whole, in consequence of which the Church will at last possess and claim everything, only becomes a judgment, unless it be made ours by personal regeneration, just as unbelief transforms the most glorious truths into the most awful and the most dangerous errors, 2 Thessalonians 2.

[Alford: “The two parables are intimately related. That was of the inherent, self-developing power of the kingdom of heaven as a seed containing in itself the principle of expansion; this, of the power which it possesses of penetrating and assimilating a foreign mass, till all be taken up into it. And the comparison is not only to the power but to the effect of leaven also, which has its good as well as its bad side, and for that good is used: viz, to make wholesome and fit for use that which would otherwise be heavy and insalubrious. Another striking point of comparison is in the fact that leaven, as used ordinarily, is a piece of the leavened loaf put amongst the now dough—(τὸ ζυμωθὲν ἄπαξ ζνμη γίνεται τῷ λοιπῷ πάλιν. Chrys. Hom. xlvi. p484 A)—just as the kingdom of heaven is the renewal of humanity by the righteous Man Christ Jesus.—The parable, like the last, has its general and its individual application: (1) In the penetrating of the whole mass of humanity, by degrees, by the influence of the Spirit of God, so strikingly witnessed in the earlier ages by the dropping of heathen customs and worship;—in modern times more gradually and secretly advancing, but still to be plainly seen in the various abandonments of criminal and unholy practices (as e.g. in our own time of slavery and duelling, and the increasing abhorrence of war among Christian men), and without doubt in the end to be signally and universally manifested. But this effect again is not to be traced in the establishment or history of Song of Solomon -called Churches, but in the hidden advancement, without observation, of that deep leavening power which works irrespective of human forms and systems. (2) In the transforming power of the ‘new leaven’ on the whole being of individuals. ‘In fact the Parable does nothing less than set forth to us the mystery of regeneration, both in its first Acts, which can be but once, as the leaven is but once hidden; and also in the consequent (subsequent?) renewal by the Holy Spirit, which, as the ulterior working of the leaven, is continual and progressive.’ (Trench, p97.) Some have contended for this as the sole application of the parable; but not, I think, rightly.—As to whether the γυνή has any especial meaning (though I am more and more convinced that such considerations are not always to be passed by as nugatory), it will hardly be of much consequence here to inquire, seeing that γυναῖκες σιτοποιοί would be everywhere a matter of course.”—P. S.]

9. That it might be fulfilled which was spoken by the prophet (not as a verbal, but as a typical prophecy).—Asaph was a seer, and the Psalm here quoted was prophetic, tracing in a series of historical pictures the disobedience and the hardening of Israel; the divine judgments, and the subsequent compassion and mercy of God. This prophecy was fulfilled in the parables of Christ, so far as concerned both their form and their matter. In reference to their form, Christ unfolded in them all the mysteries of the kingdom of God; in reference to their matter, the first parables bear chiefly on the hardening of the people, while the subsequent parables exhibit His infinite and glorious compassion.

HOMILETICAL AND PRACTICAL

A. The Parable of the Tares, Matthew 13:24-30, and interpretation of the same in Matthew 13:36-43.—The tares among the wheat in the field of Christ: 1. What is their character? (outwardly they resemble the wheat, but in reality they are quite different and opposed.) 2. How did they come among the wheat? (through the malice of the devil and the weakness of man.) 3. What are the dangers accruing from their presence? (they injure the wheat by robbing it of its beauty and strength; and, indirectly, through the imprudent zeal of the servants, they even endanger its existence.) 4. Still they are made to subserve a good purpose (teaching us to watch, to discern, to live, and to spare life, and to wait in humility and patience). 5. They assuredly shall be separated in the day of harvest (judged by their own fruit, by the sentence of Christ, by the angels of heaven, by fire).—And he went his way (cowardice, malice, calculation).—How the seed of the evil one frequently assumes the appearance of human nature, and even of the divine life.—Mark! it is not the wheat among the tares, but the tares among the wheat (in answer to the charges of ancient and modern Novatianism against the Church).—An enemy hath done this.—Impatience of the servants in the kingdom of God: 1. Its higher and nobler motives; 2. marks of its carnal and sinful origin.—Spurious zeal (fanaticism) the worst enemy we have to meet in the Church.—Satan accomplishes more by calling forth false zeal in the disciples than even by sowing tares.—Has the Church of Christ always obeyed this injunction of the Master?—Let both grow together: 1. Absolutely and unconditionally; yet, 2. within how narrow limits!—How the tares and the wheat mutually protect each other till the time of harvest.—How the godly and the ungodly serve and assist each other in the kingdom of God.—Freedom of religion must be connected with religion of freedom.—A proper religious toleration, at the same time a proper discipline, in the spirit of the gospel.—Let us seek to distinguish the visible and the invisible Church, but not to separate them upon earth.—The whole world is the field of Christ.—As the seed in our hearts, so are we.—Final judgment upon the offences in the kingdom of God, and the glorious manifestation of the Church of Christ.

Starke:—Osiander: God spares the wicked for the sake of the godly who live among them.—Chrysostomus: Fortem diabolum facit nostra negligentia, non illius potentia.—When the watchmen sleep, the devil is awake, Acts 20:29-30; Nova Bibl. Tub.—Quesnel: Let faithful ministers be careful to point out the tares.—Cramer: The devil is the cause of all the evil in the world, John 8:44.—It is not every kind of zeal for the glory of God which deserves commendation.—Zeisius: The good seed must not be neglected on account of the tares: one sincere and earnest Christian is worth far more in the sight of God than a thousand hypocrites and sinners.—It is impossible to transform the tares into wheat; but the grace of God may, through the earnest zeal of the disciples, convert the ungodly into humble followers of Jesus.—The ungodly despise Christians, but they are indebted to them for preservation and immunity from judgments, Genesis 18:26.—Canstein: If we would understand the mysteries of the kingdom of God, let us in retirement seek enlightenment from the Lord.—The Church is the husbandry of God.

Heubner:—The enemy goeth his way.—How the evil one succeeds in craftily concealing his presence!—Along with the spread and extension of good, evil also increaseth.—The will of the Master is, Nay!—The long-suffering and patience of God puts them to shame, and worketh patience in them.—Here Christ bears witness to that divine toleration which He manifests in the government of His Church.—Reasons of this prohibition: 1. The servants might commit a mistake (confound the wheat with the tares)—some may have the root of the thing in them; 2. they might root up the wheat along with the tares (since good and evil are often very closely intertwined): 3. the godly are to be tried; 4. the wicked may yet be saved.—They are bound in bundles: indicating their fellowship in misery.—The real and internal dignity of God’s people does not yet appear.

Dräseke:—The enemy comes when people are asleep.—What a strange mixture in the kingdom of heaven!—Bachmann: The mixture of the godly and of sinners in the Church of Christ.—Reinhard: On the view which Christ Himself entertained of His kingdom upon earth.

B. The Parable of the Grain of Mustard-seed.—The kingdom of heaven under the figure of a grain of mustard-seed: 1. The least of all seeds (poverty and humility of Christ; His Apostles, publicans and fishermen; His message, reconciliation through a crucified and risen Saviour). 2. The greatest among herbs (the Church universal and a universal religion): a. The richest and best among herbs (the planting of the Lord); b. appearing to be a tree (so strong as to be able to bear even that worldly spirits should lodge in its branches).—Christianity, as reflecting both the humility and the majesty of its Founder (at first so small in its outward appearance, that men could scarcely seize it; then so large, as to comprehend all: thus, both in history and in the life of the individual Christian).—The contrast between the infinite smallness of the seed and the greatness of the herb, an evidence of the intensity of the principle of growth in the plant.—Christianity twice misunderstood and twice glorified: at first in its smallness, and then in its vast extent.—The commencement of all the works of God small in the eyes of the world: commencement of creation (the light), of humanity (the first pair), of the covenant-people (Isaac, the younger of the two brothers), of the Church (the confession of fishermen), of the new life (faith).—Contrast between the commencement of Christianity and that of the kingdoms of this world.

Starke:—Marginal note of Luther: There is not anywhere a word more despised than the gospel; yet there is none more powerful, since it justifies those who believe in it, which neither the law nor works could do.—This passage may be applied either to the gospel or to the Church.—Canstein: This is the work and wisdom of God, that He makes something of things which are not, and mighty things of those which are weak, while He humbleth and abaseth the things which are high and great, 1 Corinthians 1:26-27.—Zeisius: The weakest faith will grow and extend, and comprehend more than heaven and earth, even Christ Himself, with all that He is, and all that He hath, Ephesians 3:17; 1 Peter 5:10.—Majus: No human power is able to obstruct or prevent the extension of the Church.

Lisco:—Small the beginning, gradual the progress, but great and glorious the issue.—Nations shall flock into the Church of Christ, where they will find safety, salvation, peace, and true happiness.—Heubner: The great things of God have always had a small beginning (to outward appearance).—When commencing, in humble confidence on the Lord, what seemeth a small work, always remember that it may grow into a mighty blessing to those who are near, and to those who are afar off. This, indeed, is the proper way of triumphing: a small beginning and a mighty ending. The opposite is a lamentable failure.

C. The Parable of the Leaven.—Christianity the hidden power of regeneration both in the world and in the life of believers.—The Church under the figure of the woman hiding the leaven among the meal: 1. The woman; 2. the leaven; 3. the three measures of meal; 4. the hiding of the leaven among them; 5. the result.—The life from God in its progressive victory over the natural life of the world.—The more fully the leaven is hid, and the more completely it seems to have disappeared, the more rapidly and powerfully does it penetrate and leaven the whole mass.—The work of regeneration: 1. On what it depends (leaven stronger than meal); 2. its process (hidden, gradual, all-subduing); 3. the result (all the measures of meal leavened, the divine life penetrating everywhere and everything).—The regeneration of humanity does not necessarily imply that of every individual.—The higher society as a whole is elevated by Christianity, the lower may the individual sink.—The transformation of the heart must correspond to that of the world.

Starke:—The eye of the Lord is not only upon important affairs of state, but also upon our common and humble employments.—Hedinger: Not only vices, but also good examples are infectious.—If the word of God is to appear in all its power and efficacy it must be mixed with faith in the heart.

Lisco:—Man remains man, but he becomes partaker of the divine nature, 2 Peter 1:3-4; and hence an entirely changed being.—This power works invisibly, gradually, effectively, and irresistibly, till the whole nature of man, from its principle to its individual faculties, is penetrated, transformed, subdued, and assimilated, and until every foreign and ungodly element is expelled.—Indissoluble communion between what is leavened and the leaven: between believers and Christ.

Heubner: The all-penetrating power of the gospel and of its economy, especially of the blood of reconciliation in the death of Jesus.—Even avowed enemies of Christianity have been obliged partly to own the power of the gospel.—Where the leaven of Christianity is wanting, the whole mass will become corrupt.—Each Christian should operate as leaven upon all around.

D. Fulfilment of the prophecy ( Matthew 13:34-35).—Christ the revelation.—Christ the revealer of all secrets: 1. Of those of God; 2. of humanity; 3. of the history of the kingdom of God; 4. of the kingdom of heaven.—The parables of Christ revealed secrets of God.—Even the parabolic form used by Christ, partly for concealing the truth, became a new revelation.

Starke:—Osiander: Whenever we see natural things, let us elevate our minds to heavenly realities.—Quesnel: The mysteries which from all eternity had been hid in God, and which from the beginning of the world had been presented in types and prophecies, were at last revealed by Christ, and are more and more fulfilled in and by Him, Romans 16:25.

Footnotes

3. The Fifth, Sixth, and Seventh Parables, and Parabolical Close of this Section. Matthew 13:44-52

44 Again,³⁵ the kingdom of heaven is like unto [a] treasure hid in a [the, τῷ] field; the which when a man hath found, he hideth [which a man found, and concealed;], and for joy thereof [he] goeth and selleth all that he hath, and buyeth that field.

45 Again, the kingdom of heaven is like unto a merchantman [merchant],³⁶ seeking 46 goodly pearls: Who [And],³⁷ when he had found one pearl of great price, [he] went and sold all that he had, and bought it.

47 Again, the kingdom of heaven is like unto a net [draw-net], that was cast into the sea, and gathered [gathering together, συναγαγούσῃ] of every kind: 48Which, when it was full, they drew to [the] shore, and sat down, and gathered the good into vessels but cast the bad away 49 So shall it be at the end of the world: the angels shall come50[go] forth, and sever [separate] the wicked from among the just, And shall cast them into the furnace of fire: there shall be wailing and gnashing of teeth.

51 Jesus saith unto them,³⁸ Have ye understood all these things? They say unto him, Yea, Lord.³⁹ 52Then said he unto them, Therefore every scribe which Isaiah 40 instructed unto [in] the kingdom of heaven,⁴¹ is like unto a man that is a householder [to a householder], which [who] bringeth forth out of his treasure things new and old.

EXEGETICAL AND CRITICAL

Matthew 13:44. Again, the kingdom of heaven is like to a treasure.—Tischendorf, following Codd. B, D, etc, omits πάλιν, again. But Meyer with good reason defends it. The omission appears to have originated in a stylistic correction. But a consideration of the parables in their connection will convince us that this particle is necessary.—After a general introduction about the parables, the first of them is at once introduced in the form of a simple narrative. This parable is then succeeded by the following well-marked parallelism:—

THIRD SECTION

Christ Manifests Himself as the High Priest in his Sufferings; Being Rejected—(a.) By his own City Nazareth

Matthew 13:53-58 ( Mark 6:1-6; Luke 4:14-30)

53 And it came to pass, that⁴⁵ when Jesus had finished these parables [of the kingdom of heaven], he departed thence 54 And when he was come [having come, ἐλθών] into his own country,⁴⁶ he taught them in their synagogue, insomuch [so] that they were astonished, and said, Whence hath this man this Wisdom of Solomon, and these mighty works [the miracles]?⁴⁷55Is not this the carpenter’s son? is not his mother called Mary? and his brethren56[brothers],⁴⁸ James, and Joses [Joseph],⁴⁹ and Simon, and Judas? And his sisters, are they not all with us? Whence then hath this man all these things? 57And they were offended in [at] him. But Jesus said unto them, A prophet is not without honour, save in his own country, and in his own house 58 And he did not many mighty works [miracles] there because of their unbelief.

EXEGETICAL AND CRITICAL

According to Schleiermacher and many others, the passage before us is identical with Luke 4:16. But this view is controverted by Wieseler, Ewald, and Meyer. The opinion of Schleiermacher is, however, supported by the fact, that in both passages the people of Nazareth are described as putting the question: Is not this the carpenter’s Song of Solomon, or the son of Joseph? and that in both cases the Saviour replies that a prophet is not without honor, etc. But the chronological arrangement seems to be rightly given by Luke, as his narrative fully accounts for the removal of Jesus to Capernaum. Matthew indeed furnishes different details as to the time and circumstances of this occurrence ( Matthew 13:53-54). But we would suggest as probable, that the Lord may, after His controversy with the Pharisees, have retired for a time with His disciples into the mountains and to Nazareth. This may explain the introduction of this narrative. When recording the stay at Nazareth, Matthew, in his usual pragmatic method, also relates some events which had formerly taken place there. At the same time, it will be observed that the Evangelist only states the great outlines of this conflict of Jesus with His fellow-citizens, without repeating the details connected with it.

Matthew 13:54. His own city.—On the situation of Nazareth, and the meaning of the word, comp. the Exegetical Notes on Matthew 2:23.

Whence hath this man?—τούτψ. By way of contempt, as if they were inquiring what schools He had attended while in their city.

Matthew 13:55. The carpenter’s son.—The word τέκτων (artifex), faber lignarius in the widest sense (carpenter, wright, etc.).

[The occupation of a carpenter was always regarded as an honorable and respectable employment; hence this question was not a question of contempt, but of surprise. The Nazarenes regarded Jesus not as their inferior, but themselves as His equals, and doubted only His claim to superiority, which was forced upon

them by His wisdom and miracles. It is the same natural surprise which is always felt if an old acquaintance meets his former humble associates with a distinguished rank or reputation as a scholar, or artist, or statesman, or merchant-prince.—P. S.]

A prophet.—A fact of experience—exculpatory in its general bearing, but condemnatory in its special application in this instance.

Matthew 13:58. He did not many miracles.—Mark: “He could there do no mighty works;” i. e, He found them not prepared to receive, and therefore would not as He could not. The latter expression indicates not a want of power, but the moral limits which Himself imposed on the exercise of His power. However, it also implies that we are not to regard these displays of Christ’s power as merely the manifestations of absolute might.

Matthew 13:55-57. The brothers of Jesus.

Matthew 13:55. James, Joses,¹ Simon, Judas ( Mark 6:3).

Mark 15:40. James the Less, Joses, their mother Mary.

John 19:25. (Mary the wife of Cleophas.) The Apostles.

Matthew 10:3. James (the son of Alphæus or Cleophas).

Simon Zelotes.

Lebbeus (Thaddeus) (or Judas, the brother of James. Luke 6:16).

Acts 1:13. James, the son of Alphæus.

Simon Zelotes.

Judas, the brother of James.

From the above we conclude:

(1) That three brothers of the Lord bore the names of James, Simon, andJudas;

That three Apostles also bore the names of James, Simon, and Judas:

(2) That James, the brother of the Lord, had a brother called Joses [Joseph];

That the Apostle James, the son of Alphæus, had a brother called Joses:

(3) That the father of the Apostle James the Less bore the name of Alphæus;

That the father of Joses, the son of Mary, bore the name of Alphæus:

(4) That the Apostle Judas had a brother called James;

That Judas, the brother of Jesus, had a brother called James:

(5) That the wife of Clopas or Cleophas was called Mary, and that she was the mother of James and Joses.

(6) Hence that

Cleophas was the father of James and Joses;

Cleophas was the father of the Apostle James;

Cleophas was the father of Judas, the brother of James.

(7) Besides, we have Simon, Brother of the Lord; Brother of James (brother of the Lord); Apostle of the Lord.

Manifestly, then, the brothers of the Lord and the Apostles whom we have just named are identical. The relationship existing between them was probably as follows: Clopas (Cleophas), or Alphæus, was a brother of Joseph, the foster-father of Jesus (Eusebius, Matthew 3:11). It is a mistake to suppose that Mary the wife of Cleophas was the sister of the mother of the Lord.² Alphæus probably died early [?], and Joseph [the poor carpenter?] adopted his family [of at least six children? and this, when their mother was still living, John 19:25?—P. S.]; so that the cousins of Jesus became His adopted brothers, and in the eye of the law were treated as His brothers. Probably they were older than Jesus, and hence appear to have interfered on several occasions with His work. Although at an early period they were in the faith, some time elapsed before they attained to full obedience. Besides these sons, Alphæus seems also to have left daughters [?].

The idea that the Apostles James the Less and Judas were different from the brothers of the Lord, originated among the Judæo-Christian sect of the Ebionites. The oldest Catholic tradition, on the contrary, has always regarded them as identical (Hegesippus, Clement of Alexandria, Origen).³ For further particulars, see my article Jakobus in Herzog’s Real Encyclop. [vol. vi, p406 sqq. Comp. also Alford on Matthew 13:55; Dr. Mill: On the Brethren of our Lord (quoted by Alford and Wordsworth, as defending the cousin-theory), and Sam. S. Andrews: The Life of our Lord, N. Y, 1863, p 104 sqq.—P. S.]

[Note on the Brothers of Jesus.—After a renewed investigation of this difficult exegetical and historical problem, I beg leave to differ from the cousin-theory, even in the modified form so plausibly defended by Dr. Lange here and elsewhere. I shall present as clearly and concisely as I can the principal exegetical data in the case, on which the right conclusion must be based. For a fuller treatment I refer to my monograph on James (Berlin, 1842), where the whole subject is discussed exegetically and historically, with special reference to James the brother of the Lord and his relation to James the Less. (Compare also my History of the Apostolic Church p378, and the notes in previous parts of this Commentary, on Matthew 1:25; Matthew 12:46-47; Matthew 13:55 above.)

1. The brothers of Jesus, four in number, and bearing the names Jacob or James, Joseph (or Joses), Simon, and Jude, are mentioned with or without their names, fourteen or fifteen times in the N. T. (not ten times, as Alford in loc. says), twice in connection with sisters (whose number and names are not recorded), viz, twelve times in the Gospels, Matthew 12:46-47; Matthew 13:55-56 (ἀδελφοί and ἀδελφοί); Mark 3:31-32; Mark 6:3 (here the sisters are likewise introduced); Luke 8:19-20; John 7:3; John 7:5; John 7:10;—once in the Acts 1:14;—and once by St. Paul, 1 Corinthians 9:5, to which must be added Galatians 1:19, where James of Jerusalem is called “the brother of the Lord .” Besides, the Saviour Himself speaks several times of His brothers (brethren), but apparently in a wider sense of the term, Matthew 12:48-50; Mark 3:33-35; Matthew 28:10; John 20:17.

In the former fourteen or fifteen passages it is agreed on all hands that the term brothers must be taken more or less literally of natural affinity, and not metaphorically or spiritually, in which sense all Christians are brethren. The question is only, whether the term means brothers proper, or cousins, according to a somewhat wider usage of the Hebrew אָח.

2. The exegetical or grammatical (though not perhaps the dogmatical) a priori presumption is undoubtedly in favor of the usual meaning of the word, the more so since no parallel case of a wider meaning of ἀδελφός (except the well-known and always apparent metaphorical, which is out of the question in our case), can be quoted from the New Testament. Even the Hebrew אָח is used only twice in a wider sense, and then only extended to nephew (not to cousin), viz, Genesis 13:8; Genesis 14:16; of Abraham and Lot, who was his brother’s son ( Genesis 11:27, 31), and Genesis 29:12; Genesis 29:15, of Laban and Jacob his sister’s son (comp. Matthew 13:13). Here there can be no mistake. The cases are therefore not strictly parallel with ours.

3. There is no mention anywhere of cousins or kinsmen of Jesus according to the flesh; and yet the term ἀνεψιός, consobrinus, cousin, is well known to the N. T. vocabulary (compare Colossians 4:10, where Mark is called a cousin of Barnabas); so also the more exact term υἱὸς τῆς ἀδελφῆς, sister’s son (comp. Acts 23:26, of Paul’s cousin in Jerusalem); and the more general term συγγενής, kinsman, relative, occurs not less than eleven times ( Mark 6:4; Luke 1:36; Luke 1:58; Luke 2:44; Luke 14:12; Luke 21:16; John 18:26; Acts 10:24; Romans 9:3; Romans 16:7; Romans 16:11; Romans 16:21).

Now, if the brothers of Jesus were merely His cousins (either sons of a sister of Mary, as is generally assumed, or of a brother of Joseph, as Dr. Lange maintains), the question may well be asked: Why did the sacred historians not in a single instance call them by their right name, ἀνεψιοί, or υἱοὶ τῆς ἀδελφῆς τῆς Μαρίας, or τοῦ ἀδελφοῦ τοῦ Ἰωσήφ, or at least more generally συγγενεῖς?⁴ By doing this they would have at once prevented all future confusion among commentators: while by uniformly using the term ἀδελφοί, without the least intimation of a wider meaning, they certainly suggest to every unbiased reader the impression that real brothers are intended.

4. In all the passages where brothers and sisters of Jesus are mentioned, except in John 7 (where they are represented in conflict with the Lord), and 1 Corinthians9 (which was written probably after the death of Mary), they appear in close connection with Him and His mother Mary as being under her care and direction, and as forming one family. This is certainly surprising and unaccountable, if they were cousins. Why do they never appear in connection with their own supposed mother, Mary the wife of Clopas (or Alphæus), who was living all the time, and stood under the cross ( Matthew 27:56; John 19:25), and at the sepulchre ( Matthew 27:61)?

Lange calls to his aid the double hypothesis of an early death of Clopas (whom he assumes to have been the brother of Joseph⁵), and the adoption of his children by the parents of Jesus, so that they became legally His brothers and sisters. But this adoption, if true, could not destroy their relation to their natural mother, Mary, who was still living, and one of the most faithful female followers of Christ. Besides, both the assumption of the early death of Clopas and the adoption of his children by Joseph, is without the shadow of either exegetical or traditionary evidence, and is made extremely improbable by the fact of the poverty of the holy family, who could not in justice to themselves and to their own Son adopt at least half a dozen children at once (four sons and two or more daughters), especially when their own mother was still living at the time. We would have to assume that the mother likewise, after the death of her husband, lived with the holy family. But would she have given up in this case, or under any circumstances, the claim and title to, and the maternal care of, her own children? Certainly not. The more we esteem this devoted disciple, who attended the Saviour to the cross and the sepulchre ( Matthew 27:56; Matthew 27:61; John 19:25), the less we can think her capable of such an unmotherly and unwomanly act.

5. There is no intimation anywhere in the New Testament, either by direct assertion or by implication (unless it be the disputed passage on James, in Galatians 1:19), that the brothers of Christ, or any of them, were of the number of the twelve Apostles. This is a mere inference from certain facts and combinations, which we shall consider afterward, viz, the identity of three names, James, Simon and Judas, who occur among the brothers of Christ and among the Apostles, and the fact that a certain Mary, supposed to be an aunt of Jesus, was the mother of James and Joses (but she is never called the mother of James, Joseph, Simon, and Jude), and with the fact of the eminent, Apostle-like position of James, the brother of the Lord, in the church at Jerusalem.

6. On the contrary, the brothers of Jesus are mentioned after the Apostles, and thus distinguished from them. In Acts 1:13-14, Luke first enumerates the eleven by name, and then adds: “These all [the Apostles] continued with one accord in prayer and supplication, with the women, and Mary the mother of Jesus, and with His brethren.” Here they seem to form a distinct class with their mother, next to the Apostles. So also 1 Corinthians 9:5 : οἱ λοιποὶ ἀπόστολοι καὶ οἱ ἀδελφοὶ τοῦ Κυρίου. Such distinct mention of the brothers after the Apostles was not justified if three of the four, as is assumed by the cousin theory, were themselves Apostles; consequently, only one remained to make a separate class. The narrative, Matthew 12:46-50, likewise implies that the brothers of Jesus who stood without, seeking to speak with Him, were distinct from the disciples ( Matthew 13:69), who always surrounded Him.

7. More than this: before the resurrection of Christ, His brothers are represented in the Gospel of John, in Matthew 7:3-10, long after the call of the Apostles, as unbelievers, who endeavored to embarrass the Saviour and to throw difficulties in His way. This makes it morally impossible to identify them with the Apostles. Even if only one or two of the four had been among the twelve at that time, John could not have made the unqualified remark: “Neither did His brethren (brothers) believe in Him” ( Matthew 7:5); for faith is the very first condition of the apostolate. Nor would Christ in this case have said to them: “My time has not yet come; but your time is always ready; the world cannot hate you; but Me it hateth” ( Matthew 13:6-7); nor would He have separated from them in His journey to Jerusalem. It will not do here to weaken the force of πιστεύειν, and to reduce their unbelief to a mere temporary wavering and uncertainty. The case of Peter, Matthew 16:23, and that of Thomas, John 20:25, are by no means parallel. The whole attitude of the brothers of Christ, as viewed by Christ and described by John, is entirely inconsistent with that of an apostle. It is an attitude not of enemies, it is true, but of doubtful, dissatisfied friends, who assume an air of superiority, and presume to suggest to Him a worldly and ambitious policy. After the resurrection they are expressly mentioned among the believers, but as a distinct class with Mary, next to the Apostles.

All these considerations strongly urge the conclusion that the brothers of Christ were real brothers, according to the flesh, i. e, either later sons of Mary and Joseph, or sons of Joseph by a former marriage (more of this below), unless there are very serious difficulties in the way, which make this conclusion either critically, or morally, or religiously impossible.

Let us now approach these difficulties.

8. There are serious but no insurmountable objections to the conclusion just stated.

(a) The first objection is the identity in name of three of these brothers with three of the Apostles, viz, James, Simon, and Jude.⁶ But it should be remembered that these were among the most common Jewish names. Josephus mentions no less than twenty-one Simons, seventeen Joses’s, and sixteen Judes. Why could there not be two or three persons of the same name in the apostolic Church? We have at all events two James’s, two Simons, and two Judes among the twelve Apostles. This difficulty is more than counterbalanced by the opposite difficulty of two sisters with the same name.

(b) The second objection, likewise of a critical and exegetical character, is derived from Galatians 1:19 : “But other of the Apostles saw I none, save (εἰ μή) James, the Lord’s brother.” Here James, who was one of the brothers of Jesus, seems to be included among the Apostles, and this must have been James of Alphæus, or James the Less.⁷ But the passage bears the exactly opposite interpretation, if after εἰ μή we supply simply: εῖδον, and not εῖδον τὸν ἀπόστολον, viz.: “I saw none other of the Apostles (besides Peter, Matthew 13:18), but only (I saw) James, the Lord’s brother.” This interpretation is very old,⁸ and is defended by some of the highest grammatical authorities of our age.⁹ I think with Meyer ¹⁰ that James is here distinguished from the twelve to whom Peter belonged, and yet at the same time mentioned with the Apostles in a wider sense of the term. In other words, he is represented as a man who, on account of his close natural relationship to Christ, and of his weight of character and piety, enjoyed an apostolic dignity and authority among the strict Jewish Christians. He was the acknowledged head and leader of this branch and the first bishop of Jerusalem, where he permanently resided and died, while the apostles proper were not fixed in a particular diocese, but traveling missionaries, with the whole world for their field of labor. That this was precisely the position of James is evident from various passages in the Acts, in the epistle to the Galatians, from Josephus, Hegesippus, and the traditions of the Eastern Church.”¹¹

(c) The third objection is of a moral character, and derived from the consideration that Christ on the cross could not have commended His mother to the care of John if she had other sons ( John 19:26-27). “But why,” we may ask with Andrews,¹² “if James and Judas were Apostles and His cousins, sons of her sister and long inmates of her family, and it was a question of kinship, did He not commend her to their care? “The difficulty then remains, and must be solved on other grounds. The brothers of Jesus at that time, as appears from John 7, were not yet full believers in Christ, although they must have been converted soon after the resurrection ( Acts 1:14). Moreover, John was the most intimate bosom friend of the Saviour, and could better sympathize with Mary, and comfort her in this peculiar trial than any human being. If the modern interpretation of John 19:25 be correct, as it probably is, Salome (not Mary, wife of Clopas) was a sister of Christ’s mother, consequently John His cousin. But we would not urge this as an additional reason of the commendation, which must be based on a deeper spiritual affinity and sympathy.

(d) The fourth objection is religious and dogmatical, arising from the pious or superstitious belief in the perpetual virginity of Mary, and the apparent impropriety of the birth of any later descendants of the house of David after the birth of the Messiah. The perpetual virginity of the mother of our Saviour is an article of faith in the Greek and Roman Church; it is taught also in a few of the older Protestant symbols,¹³ and held to this day by many evangelical divines. Bishop Pearson says that the Church of God in all ages has maintained that Mary continued in the same virginity,¹⁴ Olshausen takes the same view, and Lange, though the latter only as far as offspring is concerned. Dr. Jos. Addison Alexander, a Presbyterian, who will not be accused of any sympathy with Romanism, says with apparent approbation: “Multitudes of Protestant divines and others, independently of all creeds and confessions, have believed, or rather felt, that the selection of a woman to be the mother of the Lord, carries with it as a necessary implication that no others could sustain the same relation to her; and that the selection of a virgin still more necessarily implied that she was to continue so; for if there be nothing in the birth of younger children inconsistent with her maternal relation to the Saviour, why should there be any such repugnance in the birth of older children likewise? … The same feeling which revolts from one hypothesis in some, revolts from both hypotheses in both.”¹⁵

A doctrine or feeling so old and widely spread must be treated with proper regard and delicacy. But it should be observed:

In the first place, that these doctrinal objections hold only against the view that the brothers of Christ were younger children of Mary, not against the other alternative left, that they were older children of Joseph by a former marriage.

Secondly, the virginity of Mary can be made an article of faith only as far as it is connected with the mystery of the supernatural conception and the absolute freedom of Christ from hereditary as well as actual sin. But neither His nor her honor require the perpetual virginity after His birth, unless there be something impure and unholy in the marriage relation itself. The latter we cannot admit, since God instituted marriage in the state of innocence in Paradise, and St. Paul compares it to the most sacred relation existing, the union of Christ with His Church.

Thirdly, the Apostles and Evangelists, who are certainly much safer guides in all matters of faith and religious feeling than even fathers and reformers, seem to have had no such feeling of repugnance to a real marriage between Joseph and Mary, since they not only frequently mention brothers and sisters of Christ, without any intimation of an unusual or indefinite sense of the word, but Matthew and Luke ( Matthew 2:7) call Christ the first-born son of Mary, and Matthew moreover says ( Matthew 1:25), that Joseph knew not Mary, i. e, did not cohabit with her as man and wife, till she had brought forth her first-born son. I admit that neither πρωτότοκος nor ἕως οὗ are conclusive in favor of subsequent cohabitation and offspring, but they naturally look that way, especially in a retrospective historical narrative, and in connection with the subsequent frequent mention of the brothers and sisters of Christ by the same writers. At all events, we are warranted to say that those terms could not have been used by the Evangelists if they had regarded legitimate cohabitation as essentially profane, or in any way degrading to Joseph and His mother. The Old Testament, it is well known, nowhere sustains the ascetic Romish views on the superior merits of celibacy, and represents children as the greatest blessing, and sterility as a curse or misfortune.

Finally, it may be regarded as another proof of the true and full humanity and the condescending love of our Saviour, if He shared the common trials of family life in all its forms, and moved a brother among brothers and sisters, that “He might be touched with a feeling of our infirmities.” This last consideration, however, has its full weight if we adopt Dr. Lange’s modification of the cousin-hypothesis, viz, the formal adoption of Christ’s cousins into the holy family.

9. It remains to be seen whether the cousin-theory is more free from difficulties. This theory is comparatively late and cannot be traced beyond the time of Jerome in the fourth century,¹⁶ but has since been adopted by the whole Latin Church, and by the older Protestant divines, who, however, paid very little critical attention to this question.¹⁷ Jerome’s view did not obtain credit and currency without an undue weight of dogmatical considerations connected with the perpetual virginity of Mary and the superior sanctity of celibacy (as is very evident from Jerome’s violent work against Helvidius). It has moreover to contend with all the facts presented under No1–7, which are as many arguments against it. And finally it has to call to its aid two assumptions, which are at least very doubtful, and give the theory an intricate and complicated character. These assumptions are:

(a) That Mary, the mother of James and Joses ( Matthew 27:56; Mark 15:40), was a sister of the Virgin Mary, and that consequently her children were cousins of Jesus. But who ever heard of two sisters bearing the same name without any additional one by which to distinguish them? Then, the only passage on which the alleged relationship of the two Marys is based, John 19:25, admits of a different and more probable explanation, by which the term “His mother’s sister” is applied to Salome,¹⁸ who stood certainly under the cross (see Matthew 27:56; Mark 15:40), and could not well be passed by in silence by her own Song of Solomon, St. John, while Hebrews, with his accustomed modesty and delicacy, omitted her name, and intimated her presence by bringing out her relation to Mary.

(b) That Clopas, or Cleophas, the husband of Mary, the supposed sister of the Virgin Mary, is the same with Alphæuns, the father of James, the younger Apostle of that name, who is called Ἰάκωβος ὁ τοῦ Ἀλφαίου ( Matthew 10:3; Mark 2:14; Mark 3:18; Luke 6:15; Acts 1:13). But this, though not improbable, and supported by the testimony of Papias, is at least not certain. Besides, Matthew (or Levi) was also a son of Alpbæus, Mark 2:14, and if Ἰον̓δας Ἰακάβου, and Simeon, two of the twelve, were likewise among the brothers of Christ, we would have four Apostles, of whom it is said in John 7 that they did not believe. Finally, Mary, it should be remembered, is called the mother of James and Joses only, but never the mother of Simon and Jude, the other two brothers of Jesus, and both of them supposed to have been Apostles, which Joses was not. It is nowhere intimated that she had more sons than two, or any daughters at all; and even from her two sons, one, Joses, must be exempt from being a namesake, since Joseph, and not Joses, according to the correct reading, in Matthew 13:55, is the second brother of Christ.

Dr. Lange, it is true, avoids some of these difficulties by giving up the sisterhood of the two Marys, and assuming in its place the brotherhood of Clopas, or Alphæus, and Joseph,¹⁹ as the basis of the cousinship of their sons, and calling to his aid the additional hypothesis of the early death of Alphæus and the adoption of his children into the holy family,—but all this without a shadow of exegetical proof. The absence of all allusion in the Evangelists to Mary, the real and still living mother of these children, when they are collectively mentioned, is a surprising fact, which speaks as strongly against Lange’s hypothesis as against the older and usual form of the cousin-theory.

10. We conclude, therefore, that the strict grammatical explanation of the term brothers and sisters of Christ, though not without difficulties, is still far more easy and natural than the explanation which makes them mere cousins.

But from the exegetical data of the New Testament we are still at liberty to choose between two views:

(a) The brothers of Jesus were younger children of Joseph and Mary, and hence His uterine brothers, though in fact only half-brothers, since He had no human father, and was conceived by the Holy Spirit overshadowing the Blessed Virgin. This view may be supported by the ἕως and the πρωτότοκος in Matthew 1:25 and Luke 2:7, and has been adopted by Tertullian, Helvidius, and many modern Protestant divines of Germany, as Herder, Neander, Winer, Meyer, Wieseler, Rothe, Stier, and by a few English divines, Alford (on Matthew 13:55), T. W. Farrar (in W. Smith’s Dictionary of the Bible, vol. i, p231), and, though not decidedly, by Andrews (Life of our Lord, p114). This view of the case is the most natural, and would probably be taken by a majority of commentators, if it were not from the scruples arising from the long and widely cherished doctrine of the perpetual virginity of Mary. Once clearly and fully established on the testimony of Scripture and history, this theory would give a powerful polemical weapon into the hands of Protestants, and destroy by one fatal blow one of the strongest pillars of Romish Mariology and Mariolatry, and the ascetic overestimate of the state of celibacy. But the case is by no means so clear at the present state of the controversy that we could avail ourselves of this advantage; and Protestants themselves, as already remarked, differ in their views, or feelings, or tastes, concerning the perpetual virginity of Mary.

(b) The brothers of Jesus were older sons of Joseph from a former marriage, and thus in the eyes of the law and before the world, though not by blood, brothers and sisters of Christ. This view has the doctrinal advantage of leaving the perpetual virginity of Mary untouched. It seems, moreover, to have been the oldest, and was held not only among the Ebionites, and in the pseudo-apostolical constitution, but by several early fathers, as Origen, Eusebius (who calls James of Jerusalem a “son of Joseph,” but nowhere of Mary), Gregory of Nyssa, Cyril of Alexandria, Epiphanius (who even mentions the supposed order of birth of the four sons and two daughters), Hilary, Ambrose, etc.²⁰ It is equally consistent with the Scripture data on the subject as the other alternative, and in some respects even more so. For it agrees better with the apparent difference of age between Joseph (who early disappears in the gospel history) and Mary, and especially with the patronizing and presumptuous air of the brothers of Christ, when they sought an interview with Him at a particular crisis ( Matthew 12:46), and when they boldly dared to suggest to Him a more expeditious and ostentatious Messianic policy ( John 7:3-10). This is at least more readily explained, if they were older according to the flesh; while on the other theory some of them must have been almost too young to figure so prominently in the gospel history. It is true, they are nowhere called sons of Joseph;²¹ but neither are they called sons of Mary. The reason in both cases must be found in the fact, that Christ is the great central figure in the Gospels, round which all others move. On the other hand, however, it is difficult to believe that God should have selected an old widower with at least six children, as the husband of the mother of Christ. And the old tradition on which this view rests, may itself be explained as an attempt to escape the force of scriptural statements against the cherished belief in the perpetual virginity of Mary.—P. S.]

DOCTRINAL AND ETHICAL

1. In this narrative the Evangelist sets before us the circumstances under which the sufferings of our High Priest were introduced—by successive rejections of His person and claims. This in all probability induced him to relate in this connection that Christ was rejected even in His own city. But the historian drops a veil over the particulars and circumstances of His rejection. Nazareth adjoined Matthew’s native city, and, perhaps, lay even within the district of his home.

2. On the fact that our Lord had no uterine brothers or sisters, comp. my Leben Jesu, Matthew 2:1, p139 sqq. To our mind, there seems nothing offensive in the idea, that Joseph and Mary lived on conjugal terms;²² but it appears to us inconceivable that the mother of Jesus should afterward have given birth to other children. Besides, the brothers of the Lord are introduced as speaking and acting like persons who claim to have more enlarged experience than Jesus, or, as we infer, as His seniors.

HOMILETICAL AND PRACTICAL

The question: “Is not this the carpenter’s son?” or prejudice.—How the people of Nazareth condemned themselves, while imagining that they judged Jesus.—How they unconsciously verified the exclamation of Nathanael: “Can any good thing come out of Nazareth?”—How every prejudice against Christianity contains the germ of its own condemnation. For, 1. it evidences a want of proper faith, (a) in the power of God, (b) in humanity, (c) in the miracles of history, (d) in the deeper recesses of our own inner life; 2. and yet even prejudice must confess that the wisdom and the works of Christ are most mysterious and inexplicable. Hence such persons readily have recourse to lying and hostile criticisms.—The offence of the people of Nazareth on account of the humble origin of the Lord, a picture of all other offences in Him1. An offence, (a) in His terrestrial state and existence; (b) in His human lowliness; (c) in His brothers and sisters with their human weaknesses2. Yet an offence which will leave us self-condemned, since it implies an admission of His wisdom and of His deeds3. A most fatal offence, since unbelief deprives us of the blessings of Christ’s wondrous works.—The saying of Christ, “A prophet is not without honor, save in his own country, and in his own home:” 1. As an extenuation; 2. as a reproof.—Jesus rejected by His own city.—The rejection of Jesus in Nazareth a prelude to His rejection by the people.—Nazareth, so poor, yet casting out the Lord of glory: 1. Nazareth in Galilee; 2. the land of Judea so poor; 3. the earth so poor.—The inmost characteristic of unbelief is, that it implies contempt of our own being and higher nature.—Whenever we read that the Lord “could not do,” or else that He “knew not,” the circumstances connected with it show that it was not from weakness or ignorance, but that His infinite power and wisdom were controlled and limited by supreme love and faithfulness.—How the King gradually merged into the High Priest.

[Matt. Henry:

Matthew 13:58. Unbelief is the great obstruction to Christ’s favor.—If mighty works are not wrought in us, it is not for want of power or grace in Christ, but for want of faith in us.—P. S.]

Starke:—Canstein: Jesus is in truth the son of the carpenter; but of that Carpenter who made heaven and earth.—Ungrounded prejudices are too often obstacles in the way of faith, John 7:40-42.—Jerome: Naturale prop modum est cives civibus in videre.—Homines familiaria con’emnere, peregrina exosculari et in admiratione ac pretio habere solent.²³

Gerlach:—Carnal men look at the outward appearance; and this state of mind repels them from the Son of God, appearing in the form of a servant.

Heubner:—Jesus does not force His love or His blessings upon us.—Pride brings its own punishment. (Of this, history furnishes ample confirmation.)

Footnotes

45 - Matthew 13:53.—[That is an unnecessary interpolation placed before when in Cranmer’s and James’s versions, or before he departed by Tyndale and the Geneva Bible, and is omitted by Wiclif, the N. T. of Rheims, also by Conant in his work on Matthew, but restored before he departed, in the revised Vers. of the Am. Bible Union.—P. S.]

46 - Matthew 13:54.—[Lange, as also de Wette, Ewald, and others, translate πατρίδα here: Vaterstadt, paternal (maternal) town, for Vaterland (Luther), fatherland. Nazareth is meant as the residence of his mother and reputed father. Euthym. Zigab.: λέγει τὴν Ναζαρὲτ, ὡς πατριδα τῆς μητρὸς αὐτοῦ καὶ τοῦ νομιζομένου πατρὸς αὐτοῦ, καὶ ὠς τραφεὶς ἐς αὐτῇ.—P. S.]

47 - Matthew 13:54.—[Αἱδυνάμεις, de Wette: die Wunder; Lange: die Wunderkräfte; Ewald: die Heilsmächte, Comp. the note on Matthew 11:20, p210. The definite article here is more emphatic than the demonstrative pronoun of the E. V.—P. S.]

48 - Matthew 13:55.—[Comp. my note on Matthew 12:46, p231.—P. S.]

49 - Matthew 13:55.—B, C, and several translations read Ἰωσήφ. So Lachmann, Tischendorf. Many uncial MSS. D, E, F, G, etc, Ἰωάννης;—K, L, etc, Ἰωσῆς. In the parallel passage of Mark the reading Joses is by far better supported than Joseph. According to Lightfoot the Talmudists write יוֹסֵי for יוֹסֵף. Perhaps the person in question was called by both names already in the apostolic age. [Dr. Lange, in his German translation, retains Joses from the received text. But Joseph is undoubtedly the true reading according to the ancient authorities, including Cod. Sinaiticus, and is adopted also by Meyer, Tregelles, Alford Conant. The reading has some bearing on the question concerning the brothers of Christ. For if Ἰωσήφ be the true reading, there remains but one brother of Christ, viz. James, of the same name with one of the two sons of Mary, the wife of Alphæus (supposed to be the same with Cleophas), Matthew 27:56 (“Mary the mother of James and Joses”); and this argues against the view defended by Dr. Lange, that the brothers of Christ were merely his cousins. See below.—P. S.]

50 - (Or rather Joseph. See the critical note above.—P. S.]

51 - Comp. Wieseler in the Studien und Kritiken for1840. p. Matthew 648: “There stood by the cross of Jesus His mother, and the sister of His mother—i. e, Salome—, Mary the wife of Cleophas, and Mary Magdalene.” John 19:25. Comp. Mark 15:40; Matthew 27:56.

52 - But it must be added, that the oldest tradition, including the most distinguished Greek and Latin fathers, as Origen, Gregory of Nyssa, Cyril of Alexandria, Epiphanius, Hilary, and Ambrose, regarded the brothers of Christ as sons of Joseph by a former marriage. See the passages in full in my book on James, p80 sqq.—P. S.]

53 - Hegesippus (ap. Euseb. H. E. Matthew 4:22) speaks of cousins of Christ, calling Simeon, the successor of James in Jerusalem: ἀνεφιὸν τοῦ Κυρίου δεύτερος.

54 - Hegesippus (in Eusebius’ H. E. iii11) asserts that Clopas was the brother of Joseph. Lange denies that Mary, the wife of Clopas, was the sister of the Virgin Mary. But Lichtenstein (Lebensgeschichte des Herrn, Erlangen, 1856, p124) assumes, that the two brothers, Joseph and Clopas, married two sisters, both named Mary. Clopas dying, Joseph took his wife and her children into his family. Schneckenburger reverses the hypothesis and assumes that Mary, after the early death of Joseph, moved to the household of her sister, the wife of Clopas.

55 - Dr. Lange, in his article Jakobus in Herzog’s Encycl, vol. vi, p412, calls this die Unhaltbarkeit einer dreinamigen Doppelgängerlinie in dem apostolischen Kreise, and afterward eine unerhörte swei- bis vierfache Doppelgängerei.

56 - So Schneckenburger on the Epistle of James, and all the commentators on Galatians who adopt the cousin-hypothesis, also Ellicott ad Galatians 1:19, who, however, does not enter into a discussion of the general question.

57 - Victorinus, in his Commentary in loc, says: “Paul disclaims James as an apostle, saying, that he saw no other apostle besides Peter, but only James.”

58 - Winer, Grammatik, 6th ed, p557 (§ 67, sub I. e); who quotes for a similar use of εἰ μή Acts 27:22 and Revelation 21:27; Fritzsche, Comment. in Matthew, p482. who translates: alium apostolum non vidi, sed vidi Jacobum; Bleek (in Studien und Kritiken for1836, p1059), and, as to the inference drawn, also Meyer and Hilgenfeld ad Galatians 1:19.

59 - In his Comment. on Galatians 1:19.

60 - This subject is fully discussed in my book on James.

61 - The Lift of our Lord upon the Earth, p115.

62 - The Articles of Smalkald, Pars. I. art. IV. (p303. ed. Hase): “Ex Maria pura, sancta, semper virgine.” The Form of Concord, p. Matthew 767: “Unde et vere θεοτόκος, Del genetrix Esther, et tamen virgo mansit.” Even Zwingli shared in this view, Comment. in Matthew 1:18; Matthew 1:25. and the Helvetic Confession speaks of Jesus as “natus ex Maria semper virgine.”

63 - Exposition of the Creed, art. III.

64 - Commentary on Matthew 13:56, pp388,384, and in the same language. Com. on Mark 6:3. Dr. Alexander does not decide one way or the other (though leaning to the cousin-theory), and thinks that the difference of taste and sensibility on this subject is likely to continue to affect the interpretation until the question has received some new and unequivocal solution.

65 - Dr. Wordsworth and others would carry the cousin-theory to Papias in the second century, and quote a fragment, ascribed to his name, on the four Marys (ap. Routh, Reliquiæ sacræ, ex Cod. MSS2397): “I. Maria, mater Domini. II. Maria, Cleophæ sive Alphæi uxor, quæ fuit mater Jacobi Episcopi et Apostoli, et Simonis, et Thadei [Judæ Jacobi], et eujusdam Joseph. III. Maria Salome, uxor Zebedei, mater Joannis evangelistæ. et Jacobi. IV. Maria Magdalena.” But this extract is evidently a part of a dictionary written by a mediæval. Papias, which still exists in MS. both at Oxford and Cambridge.—P. S.]

66 - Calvin for instance regards the question as one of idle curiosity in Matthew 1:25 : “Certe memo unquam hac de re questionem movebit nisi curiosus; nemo vero pertinaciter insistet nisi contentiosus rixator.”

67 - This explanation was brought out first clearly by Wieseler (in the Studien und Kritiken for1840. p648 sqq.), and adopted by Meyer, Lange, and Alford. But the old Syriac version already implied this interpretation by inserting a καί before Μαρία, and translating: “And there were standing near the cross of Jesus, His mother, and His mother’s sister [Salome], and Mary of Cleophas, and Mary Magdalene.”

68 - Hegesippus, in Eusebius’ H. E. iii11, comp4:29, asserts, that Clopas was the brother of Joseph, but it does not appear whether he uses the term brother strictly, or for brother-in-law.

69 - See my book on James, p80 sqq. Chrysostom may also be included in this class; at least he clearly separates the brothers of Christ from the apostles, for the reason that they were for a long time unbelievers (Hom5 in Matt.).

70 - Eusebius, however, H. E. ii1, calls James of Jerusalem a “son of Joseph.”

71 - In this point Lange differs from the view of the Greek and Latin Churches, which deny every conjugal intercourse as degrading the character of the holy Virgin.—P. S.]

72 - Comp. the proverbs: “Familiarity breeds contempt;” “Distance lends enchantment to the view;” “Es ist nicht weit her” (It is not far off).—P. S.]

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