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Mat_10:5 ff. From this on to Mat_10:42 we have the instructions to the Twelve; comp. Mar_6:8 ff., and especially Luk_9:3 ff. As in the case of the Sermon on the Mount, so on this occasion also, Luke’s parallels are irregular in their connection (in ch. 9 connected with the mission of the Twelve, in ch. 10 with the mission of the Seventy). But this is only an additional reason (in answer to Sieffart, Holtzmann) why the preference as respects essential originality—a preference, however, which in no way excludes the idea of the proleptical interweaving of a few later pieces—should also in this instance be given to Matthew, inasmuch as the contents of the passage now before us are undoubtedly taken from his collection of our Lord’s sayings.
The mission itself, to which Luk_20:35 points back, and which for this very reason we should be the less inclined to regard as having taken place repeatedly (Weisse, Ewald), was intended as a preliminary experiment in the independent exercise of their calling. For how long? does not appear. Certainly not merely for one day (Wieseler), although not exactly for several months (Krafft). According to Mar_6:7, they were sent out by twos, which, judging from Luk_10:1, Mat_21:1, is to be regarded as what originally took place. As to the result, Matthew gives nothing in the shape of an historical account.
Mat_10:5. With the Gentiles ( ὁδὸν ἐθνῶν , way leading to the Gentiles, Act_2:28; Act_16:17; Kühner, II. 1, p. 286) Jesus associates the Samaritans, on account of the hostility which prevailed between the Jews and the Samaritans. The latter had become intermixed during the exile with Gentile colonists, whom Shalmaneser had sent into the country (2Ki_17:24), which caused the Jews who returned from the captivity to exclude them from any participation in their religious services. For this reason the Samaritans tried to prevent the rebuilding of the temple by bringing accusations against them before Cyrus. Upon this and upon disputed questions of a doctrinal and liturgical nature, the hatred referred to was founded. Sir_1:25 ff.; Lightfoot, p. 327 f. In accordance with the divine plan of salvation (Mat_15:24), Jesus endeavours, above all, to secure that the gospel shall be preached, in the first instance, to the Jews (Joh_4:22); so, with a view to the energies of the disciples being steadily directed to the foremost matter which would devolve upon them, He in the meantime debars them from entering the field of the Gentiles and Samaritans. This arrangement (if we except hints such as Mat_8:11, Mat_21:43, Mat_22:9, Mat_24:14) He allows to subsist till after His resurrection; then, and not till then, does He give to the ministry of the apostles that lofty character of a ministry for all men (Mat_28:19 f.; Act_1:8), such as, from the first, He must have regarded His own to have been (Mat_5:13). The fact that Jesus Himself taught in travelling through Samaria (John 4), appears to be at variance with the injunction in our passage (Strauss); but this is one of those paradoxes in the Master’s proceedings about which the disciples were not to be enlightened till some time afterwards. And what He could do, the disciples were not yet equal to, so that, in the first place, they were called upon only to undertake the lighter task.