Lange Commentary - Luke 9:7 - 9:9

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Lange Commentary - Luke 9:7 - 9:9


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This Chapter Verse Commentaries:

b. The Alarm Of Herod (Luk_9:7-9)

7Now Herod the tetrarch heard of all that was done by him [om., by him, V. O.]: and he was perplexed, because that it was said of [by] some, that John was risen from 8the dead; And of [by] some, that Elias [Elijah] had appeared; and of [by] others, that one of the old prophets was risen again. 9And Herod said, John have I beheaded; but who is this, of whom I hear such things? And he desired to see him.

EXEGETICAL AND CRITICAL

Luk_9:7. Now Herod the tetrarch.—Comp. Mat_14:1-12; Mar_6:16-29. Matthew and Mark have united the account of Herod’s trouble of conscience with that of the beheading of John. Luke, who had already, Luk_3:19-20, related the imprisonment of the Baptist, intimates here, with only a word, its end; on the other hand, his Gospel is, in its turn, particularly rich in traits of importance for the psychology of Herod, which at the same time depict to us the ever-deepening degeneracy of the tyrant in a moral respect. Comp. Luk_13:31-33; Luk_23:6-12.

All that was done.—As well by the Lord Himself as by His messengers, who in these very days were in His name casting out devils. The terror of Herod becomes more comprehensible if we consider that the beheading of the Baptist had taken place in the same period, and that therefore his conscience had had as yet no time to go to sleep. Although John, during his life, did no miracles, Joh_10:41, yet it might be very easily imagined that he, if after his death he had once again returned to life, was equipped with miraculous powers. Elijah might be thought of, as he had not died; one of the old prophets finally, since the return of some of them in the days of the Messiah was expected.

Luk_9:9. John have I beheaded.—Not so much the language of a terrified conscience (Meyer) as rather a painful uncertainty. Scarcely has he known how to relieve himself of John, than he already hears of another, to whom they now again ascribe in addition a so astonishing and miraculous energy. What must he now think of this one, or fear from him? Just because he does not know, he desires to see Him himself, as also afterwards to kill Him, Luk_13:31. In Luke it is the expression of uneasy uncertainty, in Matthew and Mark the fixed idea of an awakened conscience, that comes especially into view. One moment the one, another the other, feeling might be the predominant one.

DOCTRINAL AND ETHICAL

1. The terror of Herod at the report of Jesus is an indirect argument for the reality and multiplicity of His miracles, and has so far an apologetical worth. A Herod is not a man to allow himself so quickly to be perplexed by an insignificant or ungrounded rumor.

2. In the person and activity of the Saviour there is this peculiarity, that those with whom the moral and religious perceptions are wholly blunted and choked, do not know what to make of Him. They are terrified by the very sound of His footsteps, but they themselves scarcely know why.

3. Conceptions whose reality the understanding cannot earnestly believe may yet be terrifying to the conscience. Herod undoubtedly scoffs at the Pharisees’ ideas of immortality, and yet he trembles at spectres.

HOMILETICAL AND PRACTICAL

The fame of the Saviour makes its way everywhere.—The gospel a savor of death unto death.—The might and the impotency of the conscience. The might: 1. It faithfully reminds of the evil committed, 2. judges it righteously, 3. chastises it rigorously. Its impotency; it is not in condition: 1. To undo the past, 2. to make the present endurable, 3. to make the future hopeful.—The influence of the awakened conscience on the conceptions of the understanding.—The unworthy desire to see Jesus. (For the opposite, see Joh_12:20-22.)

Starke:—Truth makes its way more easily to ordinary hearers than to great lords.—There have been many mistaken opinions concerning Christ spread abroad, but faithful teachers must be skilled to refute the same.—The evil conscience is fearful, and takes fright at a shaken leaf, Job_15:20.—Comp. two admirable sermons of A. Monod, upon the beheading of John the Baptist, in the second collection of his Sermons.

Footnotes:

Luk_9:1.—Rec.: ὑð ̓ áὐôïῦ . Om. B., C.1, D., L., [Cod. Sin.].