[Sect. 45. Christ's baptism, might be said to have seen (eds) the similitude of God. And as for hearing the voice of God, it was no impossible thing, the whole nation having heard God speak at Sinai. However, it was not this which our Lord had now in his eye, but the voice of God uttered at his baptism, which many of the Jews to whom he spake may have heard, and which the rest may have been informed of by witnesses, whose testimony they could not disbelieve. John v. 38. Kes Toy MoyOD AUTY 8X EXETE μSYOVTA SV UMIY Yet ye have not his word remaining in you; so the translation should run, the sense being this, Though God spake to you from heaven concerning me at my baptism, and in order to impress you the deeper with what he said, shewed you his face, yet you are not duly affected with what he said, neither do you entertain it in your minds as you ought to do.

Οτι οι απιςειλεν εκείνος, τέτω

vues & WigEVETS, For you do not believe on him whom he hath sent. In this passage, therefore, there is a plain allusion to the descent of the Spirit on our Lord at his baptism, and to the voice from heaven, which with a thundering noise sounding through the sky, declared him with great majesty, to be God's beloved Son, in whom he was well-pleased. But because the Jews were exceedingly averse to acknowledge Jesus for their Messiah, notwithstanding the evidences of his mission were so unexceptionable, he desired them, for farther proof, to search their own Scriptures, and particularly the writings of the prophets, which, said he, is certainly your duty, because these writings, as you justly sup pose, contain the knowledge of eternal life, and therefore the knowledge of Messiah. And I can with confidence refer you to them, knowing that they confirm my pretensions in the most ample manner, the characters of the Messiah pointed out by them, being all fulfilled in my person. 39. Search the Scrip* tures, for in them ye think ye have eternal life, and they are they which testify of me. 40. And (na, but) ye will not come to me that ye might have life. Moreover, he insinuated that the proofs of his mission were as full and clear as possible, being supported by the actions of his life, which in all points agreed with his doctrine. For in no instance whatever did he seek the applause of men, or affect secular power; but was always innocent and humble, though he knew these qualities rendered him little in

the

Ver. 39. Search the Scriptures.] Le Clerc, L'Enfant, Vitringa, Raphehus, &c. contend, that ερευνατε Ye search the Scripis in the present tense. tures, because in them ye think ye have eternal life, the directions of heaven for obtaining it; now are they which testify of me. 40. Yet ye will not come to me that ge might have life. The common translation however is fully as agreeable to the scope of the passage; for having told them that they would find abundant proofs of his mission in the Scriptures, he observed that their want of faith was not owing to any deficiency in the proofs of his mission, but to the wickedness and obstinacy of their own disposi

43. I am If another This their infi

the eyes of persons void of the love of God, who expected to see their Messiah adorned with great secular glory. 41. I receive not honour from men. 42. But I know you that ye have not the love of God in you. This humility of spirit, and conformity of life with his doctrine, as well as the other evidences of his mission, our Lord justly termed a coming to the Jews in his Father's name, or agreeably to his will, signified anciently in the Scriptures of the prophets. Nevertheless, because such a Messiah was by no means the object of their expectation, they would not receive him. Whereas, if any other person came to them in his own name, that is, without a commission from God, they would joyfully embrace him, provided he assumed the majesty of a king, and promised temporal bounties to his followers. Of this infatuation the Jews gave many proofs during their wars with the Romans, and a little before the destruction of Jerusalem. For then many impostors arose, pretending to be Messiah, and promising them deliverance, by which they drew away great multitudes, as their own historian Josephus informs us. come in my Father's name, and ye receive me not. shall come in his own name, him ye will receive. delity was owing in a great measure to their pride. They who had all along preached glorious things concerning the empire and grandeur of the Messiah, would not ascribe that august character to a mere teacher, who was destitute even of the ordinary advantages of birth, fortune, and erudition; because it would have been such a confession of ignorance and unskilfulness in the Scriptures, as must have exposed them to the contempt of those whom they had misled, (see John vii. 49, 52.) 44. How can ye believe which receive honcur one of another, and seek not the honour that cometh from God only? How can such persons as you believe in me, whose character and station are entirely different from what you have all along told the people the Scriptures teach concerning Messiah? This confession of your own ignorance is not to be expected from you, who in all your actions seek the praise of men, Matth. xxiii. 5. and not the praise of God, which is the only true praise, and is to be obtained by a steady regard to truth and virtue, in opposition to all earthly passions whatever. To conclude, he told them they were not to imagine that in réjecting him they sinned against no person but him, and that he alone would accuse them to the Father for their infidelity. Moses, through whose law they trusted to have salvation, was likewise dishonoured by it, in as much as he wrote of him under the names of the Seed of Abraham, Shilch, and a Prophet like to himself, whom God would raise up unto them from among their brethren, and whom he commanded them to hear. Wherefore, seeing they refused to believe on him, Moses would accuse them as guilty of disbelieving his writings. 48. Do not think that I (only)

(only) will accuse you to the Father; there is one that acouses you, even Moses, in whom ye trust. 46. For had ye believed Moses, ye would have believed me, for he wrote of me: had you believed the writings of Moses, which are daily read in your synagogues, you would have believed me; for these writings describe me, not by types and figures only, but by particular and direct prophecies. See Gen. xii. 3. xxii. 18. xlix. 10. Deut. xviii. 15. 47. But if ye believe not his writings, how shall ye believe my words? Since you do not believe the testimony of your own lawgiver, I have no reason to be surprized that you do not credit me upon my own testimony. Thus Jesus asserted his own personal dignity, as the Son of God, and Judge of the world; at the same time he proposed the evidences of his mission from God, with such strength of reason, perspicuity and brevity, as nothing can equal.

XLVI. After the second Passover the disciples pluck the ears of corn on the Sabbath, in some field nigh to Jerusalem. Mat, xii. 1,-8. Mark ii. 23,-28. Luke vi. 1,-5.

UPON the first second-day Sabbath, that is, the ordinary Sabbath happening in the passover week, probably the very Sabbath that was honoured with the cure of the paralytic who lay in Bethesda, Jesus and his disciples passed through the corn fields near Jerusalem, attended by some of the Pharisees, whose curio ́sity prompted them to mix with the crowd on this occasion, in expectation of seeing more miracles. These no doubt they proposed to examine with the greatest accuracy, as well as to watch Jesus while he performed them, that they might detect whatever, as they vainly imagined, was false in them. Or if no miracle was performed, they hoped to find him behaving on the Sabbath, in a manner inconsistent with the holy character which he assumed. Accordingly, they first found fault with his disciples; for on seeing them pluck the ears of corn, and eat as they walked, they reproved them, and complained of them to their Master; not for having taken what they had no right to, the law authorising them to do this, Deut. xxiii. 25. but for having broken the Sabbath by servile work, such as they supposed plucking and rubbing the ears to be. Luke vi. 1. And it came to pass on *the second Sabbath after the first, that he went through

* Ver. 1. The second sabbath after the first.] Commentators are greatly at a loss to understand what Luke means by the second sabbath after the first, σαββατο δευτερόπρωτω. Some think the proper translation of his words are, "the first second-day sabbath, understanding thereby the ordinary sabbath which happened in the passover week, and assigning the following reason of its The law enjoined, that on the second day of the passover week, they should offer the sheaf of the first-fruits, Lev. xxiii. 10, 11. But in case of a backward season, they placed an intercalary month between the

name.

last

through the corn fields: (Matt. At that time Jesus went on the Sabbath day through the corn. Mark, And it came to pass that he went through the corn fields on the Sabbath day,) and his disciples plucked the ears of corn, and did eat, rubbing them in their hands. 2. And certain of the Pharisees said unto them, Why do ye that which is not lawful to do on the Sabbath days? The Phari

sees

last month Adar, and the first month Abib, answering to our March, and caled it Veadar, or the second Adar. From the second day of the passover week, on which the first sheaf was offered with prayers for a blessing en the beginning harvest, they counted seven weeks to Pentecost, (Lev. xxiii, 16.) called for that reason the feist of weeks (Deut. xvi. to.).and the feast of harvest (Exod. xxii. 16.) The day on which they offered the first barley-sheaf, and from which they counted the seven weeks of harvest, to the feast of Pentecost, being the second day of the passover week, it is supposed that the ordinary sabbaths happening in these weeks, carried in their name a memorial of the term from whence they were computed. Thus the first of them was called autor devregorgwrov the first second day sabb tb, or the first sabbath after the second day of unleavened bread; the second, cabbarov deurigodavregov, the second second-day sabbath; the third, rebarov deursgorgitov, the third second-day sabbath, and so of the rest till the seventh. Had the abettors of this interpretation, viz. Jos. Scaliger, Isaac Casaubon, Lightfoot, Lamy, Whitby, Doddridge, &c produced any other instance of the words aboaren deuregorgaro, having the meaning they affix to it, an end would have been put to all disputes about the matter,But for want of this, Grotius. Woltzogenius, Brennius, Dodwel, &c. have adopted another explication equally unsupported; for they can produce no passage of ancient writing, in which σαββατον πρωτοπρωτον δευτεροπρω 40%, TRITONEWTO¥, &c. signify the first, second, third, &c. prime, chief, or high sabbaths, sabbaths observed with uncommon solemnity, and of which they suppose there were three in the year; one at the Passover, inother ar Pentecost, and a third at the feast of Tabernacles. According to Grotius, therefore, the first second-day sabbath (rañoxrov divrigongorov) was that which happened at Pentecost. But his opinion is plainly confuted by the circumstances of the history. Pentecost, being the feast of harvest, was solemnized after the harvest was wholly over, for which reason there could be no fields unreaped then, where the disciples could pluck the ears in passing. Cleopenburgh, Sam. Petit, Le Moine, Reland, and others, are of opinion, that as the civil year of the Jews began with the month Tizri, its first sabbath might be called not only the first sabbath of the year, but the first chief sabbath, to distinguish it from the sabbath preceding the new moon of Nisan, which they think was called sabbatum secundo primum, the second chief sabbath, because the ecclesiastical year began with that month, Exod xii. 2.-Epiphanius, Beza, Sir Isaac Newton on prophecy, pag. 154. have advanced another interpretation of the passage. They say that this σαββατου θα τον δευτεροπρωτον was the second holy convocation in the passover week, that is to say, the last day of the feast, the first holy convocation being the day after the passover solemnity itself. Luther, Surenhusius, Wolf, &c. think it was the first holy convocation, called the great sabbath, (John xix. 31) on account of the extraordinary solemnity with which it was observed. Mr Doddridge supports Scaliger's opinion, and confutes The law of those of Epiphanius and Luther by the following argument. the sanctification of the two holy convocations, with which the feast of unleavened bread began and ended, allowed such servile work to be done

on

1

risees on seeing the disciples do what they supposed a profanation of the Sabbath, thought themselves warranted to rebuke them publicly. And because the offence was great, they represented it to their Master, that he likewise might reprove them for it: or if he did not, that he might appear to all as one who encouraged his disciples to break the Sabbath, or at least who had neglected to impress them with a due reverence for that holy day. Mark ii. 24. And the Pharisees said unto him, Behold, why do they (Matt. thy disciples) on 'the Sabbath day that which is not lawful? This accusation, therefore, though it seemed to be levelled immediately against the disciples, was really intended against Jesus himself. But he easily repelled it, by putting the Pharisees in mind of David, who, though a prophet as well as a king, in a case of necessity ate the sacred shew-bread contrary to the law, Lev. xxiv. 9. and of the priests in the temple, who killed the sacrifices on the Sabbath day; and by desiring them to consider a passage in Hosea, where God declares that he has greater pleasure in mercy than in sacrifice; and by explaining unto them the end of the Sabbath itself, which was instituted for the benefit, and not for the detriment of mankind. He began with David's action in the matter of the shew-bread, which the high-priest himself was accessary to, which the Scriptures record with no mark of disapprobation, and which it seems the doctors never had condemned, and for that reason was a proper vindication of the disciples in the like circumstances. Mark ii. 25. And he said unto them, have ye never read (Luke, so much as this) what David did, when he had need and was an hungred, he, and they that were with him? 26. How he went into the house of God in the days of Abiathar the high-priest,

and

on them as was necessary for preparing victuals, Exod. xii. 16. Wherefore, had the disciples been blamed for plucking the ears on any of these days, the nature of their sanctification affording an easy vindication of that action, Jesus would not have failed to urge it.-Upon the whole, though the opinion first mentioned seems most agreeable to truth, it may be observed that according to all the interpretations of the passage, this first second day sabbath, on which the disciples plucked the ears of corn, happened near some pssover; for the most unfavourable supposition, namely, that which Grotius has offered, makes it the sabbath of Pentecost, which was but fifty days after the Passover.

Ver. 26. In the days of Abiathar the high priest.] In the history, the priest from whom David received the shew-bread is called Ahimelech ; and it is generally agreed that he was the high priest, because Doeg accused him of inquiring of the Lord for David, (1 Sam. xxii. 10.) a thing which none but the high priest having on the ephod, could do. If that be true, Ahimelech must have been the high priest, because he himself confessed that he had often inquired of the Lord formerly without blame, ver. 15. Accordingly Josephus calls him the high priest several times.

But to make this matter easy, Hammond supposes that Aliadaços, the phrase in Mark, should be translated, before the days of Abiathar, as