Online Resource Library
Commentary Index | Return to PrayerRequest.com | DownloadJohn Bengel Commentary - Matthew 3:17 - 3:17
(Show All Books | Show All Chapters)
This Chapter Verse Commentaries:
Mat 3:17. φωνὴ, κ.τ.λ., a voice, etc.) A most open manifestation of God, such as those recorded in Act 2:2-3; Exo 19:4; Exo 19:9; Exo 19:16; Exo 40:34-35; Num 16:31; Num 16:42; 1Ki 8:10-11; 1Ki 18:38.-οὗτός ἐστιν, This is) St Mark and St Luke record that it was said, Σὺ εἶ,” “Thou art.” St Matthew has expressed the meaning. The words, οὗτός-εὐδόκησα,” occur again in Mat 17:5. Faith assents, declaring, “Thou art the Son of God,” as in Mat 16:16.-ὁ, the) The article introduced twice has great emphasis.-Υἱὸς, Son) See Joh 1:18; Joh 3:16-ἀγαπητὸς, beloved) This might appear to be a proper name (cf. ch. Mat 12:18), so as to produce these two predications: (1.) This is My Son; (2.) He is the Beloved, in whom I am well pleased. It is clear, however, from Luk 3:22, that Beloved is an epithet. Love is something natural, because This is the Son; good-pleasure, something, as it were, additional, because He does the things which please the Father. He is the Beloved, the only one; He shares not the Father’s love with another.-ἐν ᾧ, in whom) The preposition ἐν, in, indicates especially the object, and then also the cause of the Father’s good-pleasure. The Son is of Himself the object of the Father’s good-pleasure, and in the Son, all persons and all things. A phrase of the LXX.; cf. Gnomon on Col 2:18.-εὐδόκησα, I am well pleased) The verb εὐδοκῶ, to be well pleased, and the noun εὐδοκὶα, good-pleasure, are employed when one is pleased either by what one has, or does ones’s self, or by that which another has or does. Both parts of this notion agree with the present passage concerning the good-pleasure of the Father in the Son; for there is an eternal στοργὴ (natural affection) towards the only-begotten, a perpetual graciousness towards the Mediator, and in Him towards us, the sons of reconciliation. In ch. Mat 27:5, are added the words, Αὐτοῦ ἀκούετε,” “Hear Him;” for then He was about to speak of His passion: now they are not added; for, at the commencement of His ministry, He only taught that which the Father spake, “This is My Son.”