Third section the judgment upon the church itself second picture of judgment

Footnotes:

1]Comp. on this intricate question Winer: Realwörterbuch, sub Pascha; De Wette. and Meyer: on John 12:1; John 13:1; John 18:28, and the other disputed passages; Bleek: Beitrüge zur Evangelien-Kritik, p107; Wieseler: Chronologische Synopse, p339; Ebrard: Kritik der Evang. Geschichte; Weizel.: Die christliche Paschafeier der ersten Jahrhunderts; Lange: Leben Jesu, i. p187; ii. p1166, and Geschichte des Apot,. Zeitalters, i. p71.—[Also Gust. Seyffarth: Chronologia Sacra. Untersuchungen über das Geburtsjahr des herrn, Leipz1846, pp, 119–148; and among English works, E. Greswell: Dissertations upon the Principles and Arrangement of an Harmony of the Gospels, 2d ed. Oxf1837, 4vols.; vol. iii. p 133 sqq.; Alford: Com. on Matthew 26:17-19 (p248 sqq.); Robinson: Harmony, etc.; Sam. L Andrews: The Life of our Lord upon the Earth, New York, 1863, pp425–460. Of English writers Andrews, Robinson, and Wordsworth agree with Dr. Lange’s view that Christ ate the regular Jewish Passover on Thursday evening, at the close of the 14 th of Nisan, and was crucified on Friday the 15 th, the first day of the feast; while Greswell, Alford, Ellicott, and others, side with the opposite view according to which Christ instituted the holy communion (either in connection with the real, or a merely anticipatory passover, or a πάσχα μνημονευτικόν, as distinct from the πάσχα θύσιμον, or an ordinary meal—for their views differ in these details) on the 13 th of Nisan (Thursday evening), and died on the 14 th (Friday afternoon) when the paschal lamb, of which He was the type, was slain and the Jewish Passover proper began. Seyffarth agrees with the latter as to the date of the month, but differs from both parties and from the entire tradition of the Christian Church as to the day of the week, by putting the crucifixion on a Thursday instead of Friday, and by extending the Saviour’s rest in the grave to the full extent of three days and three nights till Sunday morning. (See below, p457.) The chronological difficult) concerning the true date of Christ’s death and the true character of His last Supper divides the Greek and Latin Church, but was not made an article of faith in either. The Greek writers generally hold that Christ, as the true Paschal Lamb, was slain at the hour appointed for the sacrifice of the Passover (the 14 th of Nisan), and hence the Greek Church uses leavened bread in the Eucharist. The Latin Church, using unleavened bread in the Eucharist, assumes that Christ Himself used it at the institution of this ordinance, and that He ate therefore the true Paschal Supper on the first day of unleavened bread, i.e., the 14 th of Nisan, and died on the day following. In this whole controversy it should be constantly kept in mind that the Jewish day commenced six hours before the Julian day, and run from sunset to sunset, or from six o’clock in the evening till six o’clock in the evening, and that the day when Christ instituted the holy communion, embraces the whole history of the passion, crucifixion, and burial.—P. S.]

2][This is the interpretation of W. Bäumlein, the latest commentator on the fourth Gospel. He explains the πρὸ τῆς ἑορτῆς τοῦ πασχα unmittelbar vor dem Paschafeste, i.e, immediately before the Passover. Compare such expressions as πρὸ δείπνου, πρὸ ἡμέρας. Ewald, however (Commentar, p343), explains: “am Tage vor dem Pascha-feste, i.e., a day before the Passover (the 14 th of Nisan).—P. S.]

3][Comp. the same argument more fully stated by Andrews: Life of our Lord, p446—P. S.]

4][Lightfoot, ad John 18:28, makes the same remark.—P. S.]

5][The German original reads here and afterward φάγειν (infin. from ἔφαγον, used as aor. ii. of ἐσθίω); but the Edinb. trsl. ought not to have copied such an obvious typographical error.—P. S.]

6][Comp. the remarks of Andrews l. c. p447 sqq.. who urges that John in six out of the nine times in which he uses the word πάσχα, applies it to the feast generally; that Hebrews, writing last of all the Evangelists, speaks of Jewish rites indefinitely as of things now superseded: that therefore the term, to eat the Passover, might very well be used by him in a more general sense with reference to the sacrifices which followed the paschal supper on the 14 th of Nisan. The most recent commentary on John’s Gospel, by W. Brumlein, Stuttgart, 1863, p166, arrives at the same conclusion with Wieseler, that πάσχα here means the חֲגִ־גָה or feast offering, i.e., the voluntary sacrifices of sheep or bullock which the Jews offered on the festivals.—P. S.]

7][The term: παρασκευή, preparation, occurs six times in the Gospels ( Matthew 27:62; Mark 15:42; Luke 23:54; John 19:14; John 19:31; John 19:42), and in all these cases it means προσάββατον, “the day before the Sabbath,” as Mark 15:42 expressly explains it. So the Germans call Saturday Sennabend, the Sunday-eve. Hence it is equivalent to Friday, and so rendered in Syriac. The Jews observed Friday afternoon from3 o’clock as the time for preparation for the Sabbath which commenced at sunset (Joseph. Antiq. xvi6, 2). The only difficulty is with John 19:14 : “it was the preparation of the Passover,” which Dr Lange should have mentioned before John 19:31, as an argument urged by the friends of the opposite view, inasmuch as it seems to place the trial and crucifixion before the beginning of the Passover. But we have no clear proof that there was a special preparation day for a feast (a Passover eve) as well as for the weekly sabbath; Bochart, Hieroz. p567: Sacri scriptores aliam Parasceven seu Præparationem non norunt, quam Sabbuti. And, then, if παρασκευτή became the usual term for Friday, the phrase must mean the Friday of the Passover, i.e., the paschal week, according to the wider usage of πάσχα in John. Campbell translates: “Now it was the preparation of the paschal Sabbath;” Norton: “The preparation day of the paschal week.” As the 14 th of Nisan was universally regarded as the beginning of the Passover, it is very unlikely that John should have gone out of his way to give it the came of the preparation for the Passover in the sense of Passover eve. Tholuck and Wieseler quote from Ignatius ad Phil. c18, the expression: σάββατον τοῦ πάσχα, and from Socrates, Ilist. Eccl. 5:22: σάββατον τῆς ἑορτῆς. Bäumlein in loc.: “Esist der Rüsttag der Paschazeit; denn wie wir gesehen haben, τὸ πάσχα bezeichnet bei Johannes die ganzs Paschafestzeit. Johannes wollte hervorheben, an welchem Wochentage der Paschazeit Jesus gekreusigt ward, wie nachher hereorgehoben wird, duss die Auferstehung aufden ersten Tug der Woche, also den dritten Tag nach der Kreuzigung fiel.” To this we may add the higher reason that John wished to expose the awful inconsistency and crime of the Jews in putting the Saviour to death on the very day when they should have prepared themselves for the service of God in His temple on the coming sabbath doubly sacred by its connection with the great Passover.—P. S.]

8][It may be added that the Jews attempted several limes to seize Jesus on sabbaths or festival days, Luke 4:26; Luke 4:29 (on a sabbath); John 7:30; John 7:32 (in the midst of the feast of tabernacles, τῆς ἑορῆς μεσούσης, Matthew 26:14); 7:37, 44, 45 (on the last day if the feast); 10:22, 39 (at the feast of the dedication).—P. S.]

9][The church fathers have the tradition that Christ died on the viii Cal. Apriles, i.e, on the 25 th of March, three days after the vernal equinox. The most definite testimony is that of Tertullian, which may be turned, however, against the view of Dr. Lange: “Quœ passio facta est sub Tiberio Cœsare, Consulibus Rubellio Gemino et Fusio Gemino, mense Martio, temporibus Paschœ, die viii. Calend. Aprilium, die primo asumorum [this seems to be the 14th of Nisan, as in Matthew 26:17 and parallels], quo agnum ut occiderent ad vesperum, a Moyse fuerat præceptum.’ Adv Judges 8. De Bapt. c19.—P. S.]

10][Ebrard held originally the other view, that Christ died on the 14 th of Nisan, and was rather suddenly converted to the opposite side by Wieseler (Chronol. Synopse, Hamburg, 1848, pp333–390), but then he again returned to his first view in consequence of the clear, calm, and thorough investigation of Bleek (Beiträge zur Exangelien-Kritik, Berlin, 1846, pp107–156). Comp. Ebrard: Dan Evangelium Johannis, p 42 sqq, where he defends Wieseler’s view, and his Wissen schafhiche Kritik der Evang. Geschiehte, 2d ed1850, p506 sqq, where he returns is to his first view with the honest confession: “The plausible and acute arguments of Wieseler have since been so thoroughly refuted by Bleek that no false pride of consistency can prevent me from returning openly to my original opinion as expressed in the first edition of this work.”—P. S.]

11][All omitted in the Edinb. trsl.—P. S.]

Verses 1-5

*[All omitted in the Edinb. trsl.—P. S.]

FIRST SECTION

THE CERTITUDE OF CHRIST, AND THE INCERTITUDE OF HIS ENEMIES. THE DIVINE COUNSEL: AT THE FEAST OF THE PASSOVER

26:1–5

( Mark 14:1-2; Luke 22:1-2)

1And it came to pass, when Jesus had finished all these sayings, he said unto his disciples, 2Ye know that after two days is the feast of the passover [comes the passover, τάπάσχα γίνεται], 3and the Son of man is betrayed [delivered up]^[FN12] to be crucified. Then assembled together the chief priests, and the scribes,^[FN13] and the elders of the people, unto 4 the palace [in the court, αὺλή]^[FN14] of the high priest, who was called Caiaphas, And consulted [together, συ νεβουλεύσαντο] that they might take Jesus by subtilty [craft, δόλω], and kill him [put him to death]. 5But they said, Not on the feast day [at the feast, ἐν τῇ ἑορτῇ],^[FN15] lest there be an uproar [tumult, θόρυβος] among the people.

EXEGETICAL AND CRITICAL

Matthew 26:1. Had ended all these sayings.—With these savings [ch14,25] the Lord completed His historical prophetic office. He now foreannounces the fulfilment of His priestly office. He has marked out the figure of His future, the Son of Man in His majesty and glory. This assurance is the basis on which He stands at the commencement of His sufferings and deepest humiliation, and the basis on which He seeks to place His disciples.

Matthew 26:2. After two days.—[Day after to-mor-row, on Thursday.] See the introductory remarks on the chronology of the history of the Passion.

The Passover.—פֶּסַח, Aram. פַּסְחָא; according to Exodus 12:13, from פִּסַח, to pass over, to spare, with allusion to the sparing of the first-born of Israel when the first-born of Egypt were slain by the destroying angel: thus, the passing over (of the destroying angel).^[FN16] This passing over has a threefold meaning: 1. The deliverance of the people out of Egypt through the judgment upon the Egyptians—the typical redemption; 2. the spiritual offering up of the Israelite first-born with the Egyptian, expressed by the blood of the lamb sprinkled on the doorposts—the typical death of Christ; 3. the actual sparing of the Israelite first-born in connection with that sacrifice—the raising up of the new life of Christ out of the sacrificial death. Accordingly, the Passover is a feast of thank-offering, a peace-offering, a sacrifice of salvation, which rests upon the basis of a sacrifice devoted to curse (the death of the Egyptian first-born), and of a propitiatory sacrifice (the sacrifice of the Israelite first-born in the blood of the lamb). The feast of deliverance is the seal and sacrament of salvation, the festival of new life and redemption, won out of the judgment of death. The type has thus its threefold relation to Christ. As Christ in His life was the true burnt-offering, so in His death He was: 1. The sacrifice of curse cherem ( Galatians 3:13), through the blindness of the world and the judgment of God, in order to the awakening and spiritual judgment of the world; 2. the sin-offering, chattah ( 2 Corinthians 5:21), for the reconciliation of the world; 3. the thank-offering in the new life, in the infinite fulness of life which He obtained in death. In all these senses He was the true and real Passover ( 1 Corinthians 5:7); and Easter, but especially the holy Supper, is the New Testament paschal foast, the feast of salvation, grounded upon propitiation through the condemnation of sin. And, inasmuch as with the deliverance from Egypt was connected separation from the leaven of Egyptian idolatry, and disciplinary wandering through the desert, the Passover is at the same time the feast of unleavened bread (הַג הִמִּצּדת). This view of the feast has two main points: 1. Separation from the leaven, the spiritual fellowship of Egypt ( Matthew 16:6; 1 Corinthians 5:7); 2. wandering through all the tests and discipline of privation in the wilderness ( Deuteronomy 16:3). With this twofold religious significance of the feast, there was, in process of time, connected the festival of spring-time and the beginning of harvest, or the first-fruits. (Some modern archæologists have without cause reversed the order, and made the natural feast the basis of the churchly or spiritual. Compare Winer, sub Pascha.) The Passover was the first of the three great feasts of Israel, and was celebrated in the first month of the year, Abib or Nisan, about the time of full moon—from the 14 th to the 21 st of Nisan—and in the central sanctuary. Concerning its rites, see below.

And the Son of Man is delivered up to be crucified.—The predictions of the crucifixion generally are here taken for granted: the prophecy here specifically lies in the definition of the date.

Matthew 26:3. Then assembled together.—To the clear prospect and certitude of the Lord concerning the period of His death, is characteristically opposed the perfect uncertainty of the Sanhedrin concerning it, and the decree, which circumstances soon rendered vain, “not on the feast-day.”

In the court [in der Halle],—Not the palace of the high-priest itself, but the atrium, or court enclosed by its buildings. The common place of meeting for the Sanhedrin was called Gazith, and joined, according to the Talmud, the south side of the temple. Lightfoot, p459.^[FN17]

Who was called Caiaphas.—“Probably equivalent to בַּיְפָּא, depressio.” This was a standing surname, which passed into a proper name. He was originally called Joseph (Joseph. Antiq. xviii:2, 2). [Some ancient fathers confounded him with Josephus the Jewish historian, and supposed that he was secretly converted to Christianity.—P. S.] Caiaphas was one of those high-priests who marked the desecration of the institution by party spirit and the influence of foreign power. The Procurator Valerius Gratus bad given him the office, and he lost its dignity through Vitellius (Joseph. Antiq. xviii2, 2; 4, 3). He was the Song of Solomon -in-law of Annas. The evangelical history paints his character in his deeds.

Matthew 26:4. By craft, δόλω.—The impression which the spiritual victories gained over them in the temple by Jesus had made upon the people, and also upon themselves, is here very plainly marked.

Not at the feast.—The people were, in their congregation at the feast (often to the amount of two millions), generally inclined to insurrection (Joseph. Antiq. xvii9, 3; 20:5, 3); and a tumult on behalf of Jesus was all the more to be provided against, because He had so many dependents among the people, especially among the bold and quarrelsome mountaineers from Galilee. The decree was presently invalidated—not through the first offer of Judas (Meyer), which had already been made, and had led them to settle the form of betrayal and His sudden surprise—but through the later appearance of the traitor, when he came from the supper in the night, and announced to them the favorable opportunity of seizing Christ in the garden. Bengel: Sic consilium divinum successit. Their counsel was fulfilled only so far as the taking the Lord by craft. It was a vain imagination that such a person as Jesus was, could be surreptitiously and without noise removed out of the way.

[Comp. Wordsworth: “Observe Christ’s power over His enemies in His death. Oftentimes when they endeavored to take Him, He escaped from them ( John 10:39). But at the time when they had desired not to take Him, viz, at the Passover (comp. Luke 22:6), then He willed to be taken, and they, though unwilling, took Him; and so they fulfilled the prophecies in killing Him who is the true Passover, and in proving Him to be the Christ. (Comp. Leo, Serm. 58; Theophylact in Marc. 14:2.)” Dr. Lange, Meyer, Wordsworth, and others, assume that the priests intended to crucify the Lord after the feast of the Passover, when the crowds of strangers, sometimes amounting to two millions, should have left, but were frustrated in their design by the favorable opportunity soon offered. Ewald, on the contrary (Geschichte Christus’, p410), supposes that they intended to crucify Him before the feast, and actually did Song of Solomon, viz, on the 14 th of Nisan. There is no doubt that the words μὴἐντῇἑορτῇ, not at the feast! admit of both views. But in the latter case we would involve the Synoptists in self-contradiction; and then the time was already so far advanced, that the people, whose tumult they feared, must have already been at Jerusalem when the Sanhedrin resolved to crucify Christ. In any case their words in Matthew 26:5 imply that they had no religious scruples against a public execution on the feast, but were restrained only by motives of policy and expediency. Probably such executions did take place sometimes on high festivals—as religious Acts, and as a warning to the people. The law nowhere expressly prohibits them. Hegesippus relates in Euseb. Hist. Ecclesiastes 2:23, that James the Just, the brother of the Lord, was stoned and killed on the day of the Passover. See above, p456. Consequently this verse cannot be pressed as an argument against the view that Christ died on the 15 th of Nisan, as is done by Bleek and others who advocate the 14 th as the day of the crucifixion.—P. S.]

DOCTRINAL AND ETHICAL

1. Jesus in divine assurance ready for death, familiar with the time of His death; while His murderers themselves know not whither they are proceeding.

2. Jesus the real Passover, or Paschal Lamb. See above.

3. The Sanhedrin, in its decree: “Not on the feast” is the type of the policy of a sinful world, which is violently moved by the powers of hell, and urged whither they will more impetuously than itself desires.

4. In the way of obedience, Jesus came to the feast of the Passover. He was separated from the temple, but not from His people and His religious obligations and customs. As an Israelite, He must keep the feast in Jerusalem; although this feast should result in His own death. And this very fact makes it an untenable notion, that Jesus kept the Passover a day earlier than was the custom. He would then have arbitrarily altered and belied at the end the legal propriety of His whole life. His submission to the law brought Him to His death. Concerning the high-priestly office of Christ, compare dogmatical treatises.

HOMILETICAL AND PRACTICAL

Christ, in the full anticipation of His judicial glory, is prepared for His death: 1. He is notwithstanding ready for death; 2. He is on that account ready for death.—The divine assurance of the Lord, in contrast with the perfect and helpless uncertainty of His enemies: 1. The fact itself: (a) He as the sacrifice knows the day of His death, which the murderers themselves do not yet know; (b) He marks out a definite day, which they by their decree in council reject2. The explanation of the fact: (a) Christ is perfectly familiar with the spirit of Scripture (the meaning of the ancient Passover)—with the government of His Father (He knows the machinations of the powers of evil to which His enemies are given over); (b) His enemies suppose in their despotic counsels that they are above events, while they have become the helpless instruments of hell, (c) hell itself knows not all things, and knows wrongly all that it knows; it is decreed by God that it shall be now condemned.—What is it that the Lord lays most stress upon when He announces His passion? 1. Not that He should be nailed to the cross; but, 2. that He should be betrayed.—Perfect faithfulness mourning over consummate treachery in the deepest grief.—The sufferings of Christ the consummation of all Joseph’s sufferings: to be betrayed and sold by His brethren.—The uncounselled confusion of the High Council—The mixing up of politics with the Church must ruin both.—The last sittings of the Jewish ruling Council in the Church, according to Matthew 1. A council without counsel^[FN18] devoted to subtilty ( Matthew 26:5); 2. a shameless council, devoted to lying and calumniation ( Matthew 27:1); 3. a profligate council, devoted to hypocrisy ( Matthew 26:7); 4. a blind council, devoted to bribery ( Matthew 28:12).—The greatest of all insurrections (against the Lord’s Anointed) must always be in dread of the phantom of insurrection: 1. They lift themselves up against the Lord; and, 2. brand the possible uprising for His defence as rebellion.—The shallow farce of hierarchical pride condemned: 1. They think they can triumphantly trifle,—(a) with circumstances; (b) with men; (c) with sin2. They become a spectacle of judgment,—(a) through unforeseen accident; (b) through the spirits of hell (working in the soul of Judas); (c) through the sacred supervision of God.—The counsel of the wicked set at nought: 1. It half succeeds (they take the Lord with subtilty); 2. it seemed to have succeeded beyond expectation (the people made an insurrection in their favor at the feast); 3. but it was absolutely put to shame (the crucifixion of Christ at this feast was the end of all their feasts).—The warning thought, that the obduracy of the Jews reached its climax precisely at the feasts, when Jesus came to them—The question, whether Christ should die at the feast? The enemies say: “Not at the feast;” the Lord says: “On the feast-day, and no other.”^[FN19] The corruption of the Jewish feasts, out of which the great Christian feasts have sprung: Good Friday, Easter, Ascension Day, and Whitsuntide.—The counsel of God, that Christ should die at the feast of the PassoMatthew26:1. The appointment: (a) in the holiest place of the earth; (b) at the highest feast; (c) in the midst of an assembly which represented the whole of mankind; (d) thus with perfect publicity2. The reason: (a) for the realization of all the symbols, especially the Passover; (b) to establish that the feast of the typical deliverance was changed into the feast of the real redemption; (c) for a manifestation of the judgment of the world, and of the reconciliation of the world, in the greatest assembly of Jews and Gentiles.—God can make sacrifices of His own, but He does not give them up to secret murder.—They might crucify Him openly before all the world; but secretly do away with Him they could not.—The blood of the saints does not sink silently into the ground; it publicly flows, and preaches aloud.

Starke:—Christ’s words inseparable from His sufferings.—Happy he who, when his death comes, can speak and hear about it with satisfaction.—Christ would suffer and die at the Passover: 1. Because the paschal lamb was a type of Himself, 1 Corinthians 5:1; 1 Corinthians 2. that His sufferings and death might the sooner be everywhere known.—Zeisius:—In the first Passover, the Israelites were brought out of the literal slavery of Egypt; in the last Passover, Christ has delivered us by His death from spiritual slavery. Titus 2:14-15.—Christ delighted to speak of His sufferings; let us delight in hearing of them, especially during Lent.—The great mass of the High Council are spoken of (Nicodemus, Joseph of Arimathea, and some others, were excepted): happy those who do not make themselves partakers of the sins committed in the fraternity of their colleagues.—Bibl. Würt.:—The worst wickedness is practised at the most holy times: men never play and debauch themselves, and rage more in iniquity, than on the feast-days; but what on other days is simple sin, on such days is ten fold.—Canstein:—The visible Church of Christ may reach such a point, that its most eminent and greatest members may not only not tolerate Christ and His truth, but even seek to destroy them.—Quesnel:—The human schemes, Genesis 50:20.—Canstein:—The ancient hypocritical serpent-subtilty ( Matthew 26:4, by subtilty), Genesis 3:16.—Zeisius:—The world can bear with Jews, Gentiles, Turks, Epicureans, but not with the honest witnesses of truth.—The Messiah was to suffer and die in the midst of a great multitude of people.—Cramer:—The counsel of the ungodly passes away, but the decree of God shall stand.—Unpriestly priests,^[FN20] who, instead of attending to devotion, are dealing in political and ofttimes diabolical schemes.

Heubner:—All these sayings ( Matthew 26:1). He had told His people and His disciples all that was needful for salvation, and had confirmed all by works and miracles: nothing now was left but to die.—He spoke of His sufferings, that His disciples might see how little chance had to do with them, but that all was after the will of His heavenly Father.—A pattern to us, that we should accustom ourselves to think and speak without fear of our final sufferings.—They thought not that He well knew all that was passing in their council.—The higher a man rises in influence and authority, the greater is his temptation to ambition, pride, love of power, and envy.—Those who are mighty in this world, its great men and rulers, are mostly indisposed to any new and better ordinance.—Fear of the people: vigor and openness are peculiar to the righteous cause.—“Not at the feast:” the feast was the wrong time, not because of any fear of God, but because of their fear of man. The decree must have cost them after all some pangs of conscience.