CHAPTER 3 VER. 1. _Now in the fifteenth year of the reign of Tiberius Cæsar, Pontius Pilate being governor of Judæa, and Herod being tetrarch of Galilee, and his brother Philip tetrarch of Ituræa and of the region of Trachonitis, and Lysanias the tetrarch of Abilene_,... [ Continue Reading ]
_Annas and Caiaphas being the high priests, the word of God came unto John the son of Zacharias in the wilderness_. S. Luke passes from the twelfth year of Christ to His thirtieth, when, after the manner of the Hebrews, He began to discharge His Office of Teacher and Redeemer and to preach publicly... [ Continue Reading ]
_And he came into all the country about Jordan, preaching the baptism of repentance_ (_i.e._, stirring them up to do penance) _for the remission of sins_ to be obtained in the baptism of Christ. John was preaching penance, that by it they might dispose themselves for the reception of pardon and grac... [ Continue Reading ]
_As it is written in the book of the words of Isaias the prophet, saying, The voice of one crying in the wilderness, Prepare ye the way of the Lord, make His paths straight_.... [ Continue Reading ]
_Every valley shall be filled, and every mountain and hill shall be bought low; and the crooked shall be made straight, and the rough ways shall be made smooth_. S. Gregory (_Hom._ xx. _In Evangelia_), S. Augustine, S. Chrysostom, Bede, and others interpret these words as meaning, Every one that exa... [ Continue Reading ]
_He answereth and saith unto them, He that hath two coats, let him impart to him that hath none; and he that hath meat, let him do likewise_. A synecdoche; he signifies every kind of alms-deed by one which is the more common and necessary; clothing and feeding the poor. " _Two_ " supposing one coat... [ Continue Reading ]
_Then came also publicans to be baptized, and said unto him, Master, what shall we do_? to save our souls. Here is fulfilled the saying of Christ "Publicans and harlots shall be before you (0 Scribes) in the kingdom of God," Matthew 21:31. For the sinners, being called to account by John, felt deep... [ Continue Reading ]
_And he said unto them, exact no more than that which is appointed you_ in the exaction of taxes. In the Greek it is _πζάσσετε_, which can be translated both make and exact, but in this place is more clearly rendered exact as the Syriac and the Greek render it. So Jansenius, Maldonatus, Francis Luca... [ Continue Reading ]
_And the soldiers likewise demanded of him, saying, And what shall we do? And he said unto them, Do violence to no man, neither accuse any falsely; and be content with your wages_. Soldiers who were serving some of them under Herod Antipas against Aretas, the king of the Arabs, some under the prefec... [ Continue Reading ]
_And as the people were in expectation_ (in the Greek _πζοσδοκου̃ντες_, suspecting, expecting, as Vatablus renders it when the people were hoping, or were in suspense with hope, desire, and expectation), _and all men mused in their hearts of John, whether he were the Christ, or not_ the Messiah prom... [ Continue Reading ]
_John answered, saying unto them all, I indeed baptize you with water, but one mightier than I cometh_, namely the Messias. The rest which Luke here adds has been explained on Matthew 3:11. Morally, Origen says, "Preachers are here warned not to allow themselves to be too much praised or honoured... [ Continue Reading ]
_And Jesus Himself began to be about thirty years old_. "Beginning" refers not to "thirty years," for then "about" would be redundant, but to the public preaching of Jesus, for which He was sent by the Father. Having been declared in His baptism the Messiah, the Teacher, Lawgiver, and Saviour of the... [ Continue Reading ]
_Which was the son of Janna_ Janneus, the second Hyrcanus, if we are to believe Annius and Philo, who was the last leader of the Jews of the line of David, and was of the stock of the Asmonæi, or Maccabees; Josephus mentions him in bk. xii. ch. iv. and v., and Eusebius in his Chronicle. For Christ w... [ Continue Reading ]
_Which was the son of Nathan, which was the son of David._ Some think that this Nathan was the prophet who reprehended David for his adultery with Bathsheba (2 Kings 12:1.) So think Origen, N. de Lyra, Burgensis, Albertus Magnus, and also S. Augustine (bk. lxxxviii q. lxi). But S. Augustine (Retract... [ Continue Reading ]
_Which was the son of God_ as handiwork, not as son; for God, even as a potter, formed and fashioned Adam the first man out of the earth. And hence the Arabic version renders " _who was from God_," whereas, in other cases, it renders, for "who was," "son." S. Luke, then, brings the genealogy of Chri... [ Continue Reading ]