Online Resource Library
Commentary Index | Return to PrayerRequest.com | DownloadJohn Bengel Commentary - Matthew 17:3 - 17:3
(Show All Books | Show All Chapters)
This Chapter Verse Commentaries:
Mat 17:3. Ὤφθησαν, appeared) sc. with their bodies.-Μωσῆς καὶ Ἡλίας, Moses and Elias) The departure of each of them from this world had been singular: each of them was remarkable for revelations vouchsafed to him on Mount Sinai and Horeb. Both of them are mentioned together in Mal 4:4-5. It is probable that Moses was raised to life immediately on his death and burial, so that he was not dead whilst Elias was living in heaven: he certainly, after his decease, entered the land of promise, in which this holy mountain was situated. And yet Christ, not Moses, is the ἀπαρχὴ, the primitiæ, the first-fruits. The resuscitation of Moses does not confer life upon others; that of Christ does. This appearance, however, of Moses alive from the dead, is full of mystery. Who will venture to assert that he had already obtained immortality (ἀθανασία), and did not receive any advancement in bliss (βελτίωσις) after the resurrection of Christ?[779] Oh, how many things there are in the world of glory above our comprehension! If this appearance of Moses and Elias were not mentioned in the canonical Scriptures, although attested by other sufficient witnesses, who would not consider it as a fable?-μετʼ Αὐτοῦ συλλαλοῦντες, conversing with Him) There is no pleonasm.[780] Each of them conversed with Jesus. A conversation of the highest importance (colloquium maximum). Moses stood at the end of the first dispensation,[781] Elias, in the middle of the middle dispensation; Jesus, on the threshold of the last. They bear witness to the true Messiah, and to Him only.-ΜΕΤʼ ΑὐΤΟῦ, with Him) They conversed with Him only, not with the three apostles.
[779] On the first day of the month Adar, according to Josephus, B. IV. Ant., at the end, Moses died (comp. Deu 34:8; Jos 1:11; Jos 4:19). Beng. had mentioned this in Harm. Ev., Ed. i. on this passage, and had noticed that Christ’s transfiguration had taken place at the same time of year, in the presence of Moses; subjoining a caution, that though this remark might not seem to have much weight, yet it was possible it might be of use to some hereafter. Shortly after, some one appealed to the transfiguration of Christ as having occurred in the month of September, as a ground of expecting the coming of Moses and Elias in the month of September A.D. 1737: an error which this observation of Beng., however minute and overstrained it may seem to some, might have served to refute. See Harm. Ev. Ed. ii., pp. 375, 376.-E. B.
[780] See explanation of technical terms in Appendix.-(I. B.)
[781] At the end of the first dispensation, viz. the patriarchal; though Moses also stood at the beginning of the second, viz. that of the law. In this latter point of view, as Moses stands at the beginning of the law as its representative, so Elias at the beginning of the prophets, and the Lord Jesus at the beginning of the Gospel, at once its representative and embodiment.-ED.