Online Resource Library
Commentary Index | Return to PrayerRequest.com | DownloadHeinrich Meyer Commentary - Luke 15:12 - 15:13
(Show All Books | Show All Chapters)
This Chapter Verse Commentaries:
Luk_15:12-13. Ὁ νεώτερος ] νεώτερον δὲ ὀνομάζει τὸν ἁμαρτωλὸν ὡς νηπιόφρονα καὶ εὐεξαπάτητον , Euthymius Zigabenus.
τὸ ἐπιβάλλου μέτος ] the portion falling to my share, that which belongs to me, Herod. iv. 115; Dem. 312. 2, 317. 1; Diod. Sic. xiv. 17; Polyb. xviii. 24. 1, vi. 34. 1, and elsewhere. See also Wetstein and Kypke, I. p. 289. According to the Hebrew law of inheritance, there fell to the younger son only half as much as the first-born received (Deu_21:17; Michaelis, Mos. R. § 79; Saalschütz, p. 820 f.). The son asks that this his future portion of inheritance be given to him in advance. The father grants “non quod oportebat, sed quod licebat facere,” Maldonatus. An agreement, according to an approximate estimate, must be presupposed. But the granting of his request is a necessary part of the parable, on account of human freedom. “Discedentes a se non prohibet, redeuntes amplectitur,” Maldonatus.
διεῖλεν αὐτοῖς ] to both the sons, in such wise, however, as to reserve to himself until his death the right of usufruct over the portion of the eldest, and the latter remained in his service, Luk_15:29-31.
τὸν βίον ] Mar_12:44; Luk_8:43 : that whereon the family lived, i.e. nothing else than their means. Hesiod. Op. 230. 575; Herod. i. 31, viii. 51, and frequently. Paulus (comp. Michaelis) makes, without reason, a distinction between this and οὐσία , which, according to him, is the whole means, saying that the father, however, divided merely his stock of provisions, not his capital. See, on the other hand, Luk_15:31.
Luk_15:13. μετʼ οὐ πολλ . ἡμέρ .] The greediness for unlimited pleasure urged him to haste.
ἅπαντα ] what, namely, he had received as his portion of the inheritance, partly in natura, partly in money in settlement of what could not be taken with him.
ἀσώτως ] recklessly, Dem. 1025. 19; Josephus, Antt. xii. 4. 8. Comp. on Eph_5:18. The sinful nature is developed from an independence which, under the influence of sinful longing, shakes itself loose from God (comp. Psa_73:27) by the satisfaction of immoral pleasure.