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Commentary Index | Return to PrayerRequest.comJamieson Fausset Brown Commentary - Matthew 23:39 - 23:39
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For I say unto you - and these were His last words to the impenitent nation, see on Mar 13:1, opening remarks.
Ye shall not see me henceforth - What? Does Jesus mean that He was Himself the Lord of the temple, and that it became “deserted” when He finally left it? It is even so. Now is thy fate sealed, O Jerusalem, for the glory is departed from thee! That glory, once visible in the holy of holies, over the mercy seat, when on the day of atonement the blood of typical expiation was sprinkled on it and in front of it - called by the Jews the Shekinah, or the Dwelling, as being the visible pavilion of Jehovah - that glory, which Isaiah (Isa 6:1-13) saw in vision, the beloved disciple says was the glory of Christ (Joh 12:41). Though it was never visible in the second temple, Haggai foretold that “the glory of that latter house should be greater than of the former” (Hag 2:9) because “the Lord whom they sought was suddenly to come to His temple” (Mal 3:1), not in a mere bright cloud, but enshrined in living humanity! Yet brief as well as “sudden” was the manifestation to be: for the words He was now uttering were to be His Very Last within its precincts.
till ye shall say, Blessed is he that cometh in the name of the Lord - that is, till those “Hosannas to the Son of David” with which the multitude had welcomed Him into the city - instead of “sore displeasing the chief priests and scribes” (Mat 21:15) - should break forth from the whole nation, as their glad acclaim to their once pierced, but now acknowledged, Messiah. That such a time will come is clear from Zec 12:10; Rom 11:26; 2Co 3:15, 2Co 3:16, etc. In what sense they shall then “see Him” may be gathered from Zec 2:10-13; Eze 37:23-28; Eze 39:28, Eze 39:29, etc.