Luke 7:8

καὶ γὰρ ἐγώ. ‘For indeed I.’ This assigns the reason why he made the request. He was but a subordinate himself, “under authority” of his chiliarch and other officers, and yet he had soldiers under him as well as a servant, who at a word executed his orders. He inferred that Jesus, who had the power of healing at a distance, had at His command thousands of the “Heavenly Army” (Luke 2:13; Matthew 26:53) who would

“at His bidding speed,

And post o’er land and ocean without rest.”

ἄνθρωπος. ‘A person.’ The humility of this centurion is very remarkable in a Gentile officer. He does not even call himself ἀνήρ. Ὑπὸ ἐξουσίας τασσόμενος means literally ‘who is being ranked under authority.’ The centurion was under the tribunus militum (χιλίαρχος, Acts 21:32). The present τασσόμενος (which is not to be taken with εἰμί, but is a separate epithet) represents the constant, daily submission to duty, and is far more graphic than τεταγμένος would have been. That would have expressed the permanent position.