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Mat_12:18. Isa_40:1 ff., a very free rendering of the original Hebrew text, yet not without some reminiscences of the LXX. For the òÆáÆø éÀäÉåÈä , which the LXX. ( Ἰακὼβ ὁ παῖς μου ) and modern expositors interpret as applying to Israel as a nation, or the ideal Israel of the prophets, see, besides, the commentaries on Isaiah; Drechsler and Delitzsch in Rudelbach’s Zeitschr. 1852, 2, p. 258 ff.; Tholuck, d. Propheten u. ihre Weissag. p. 158 ff.; Kleinert in the Stud. u. Krit. 1862, p. 699 ff.; F. Philippi in the Mecklenb. Zeitschr. 1864, 5, and 6. Matthew understands it as referring to the Messiah. Similarly the Chaldee paraphrasts and Kimchi, in which they are justified by the Messianic idea, as fulfilled in Christ, running through the whole passage. See Act_3:13; Act_3:26; Act_4:27; Act_4:30; Hengstenberg, Christol. II. p. 216 ff., compared with Kleinert, l.c.
εἰς ὅν ] in regard to whom. Direction of the approbation. Comp. 2Pe_1:17. The aorists, as in Mat_3:17.
θήσω τὸ πνεῦμα ] i.e. I will make Him the possessor and the bearer of my Holy Spirit, by whose power He is to work, Isa_11:2; Isa_61:1; Mat_3:16; Act_4:27.
κρίσιν ] not: quod fieri par est (Fritzsche); not: justice and righteousness (Bleek); the good cause (Schegg); or the cause of God (Baumgarten-Crusius); not: recta cultus divini ratio (Gerhard); nor: doctrina divina (Kuinoel),—which interpretations have been given in view of the îùÑôè of the original (where it denotes the right, i.e. what is right and matter of duty in the true theocracy. Comp. Ewald on Isaiah, l.c.; Hengstenberg, p. 233; and see in general, Gesenius, Thes. III. p. 1464). But in the New Testament κρίσις has no other meaning but that of final sentence, judgment (also in Mat_23:23); and this, in fact, is the sense in which the Hebrew was understood by the LXX. Matthew’s Greek expression is doubtless to be understood no less in the sense of a judicial sentence, i.e. the Messianic judgment, for which the Messiah is preparing the way through His whole ministry, and which is to be consummated at the last day.
τοῖς ἔθνεσιν ] not: the nations, generally, but the heathen. Similarly also in Mat_12:21. The point of fulfilment in the prediction here quoted lies simply in its serving to describe, as it does in Mat_12:19 f., the unostentatious, meek, and gentle nature of Christ’s ministry (Mat_12:16), so that it is unnecessary to look to what precedes in order to find something corresponding to τοῖς ἔθνεσι (some finding it in the multitudes that followed Jesus). Jesus did not preach to the heathen till He did it through the apostles, Eph_2:17, a matter altogether beyond the scope of the present passage. It should be observed generally, and especially in the case of somewhat lengthened quotations from the Old Testament, that it is not intended that every detail is to find its corresponding fulfilment, but that such fulfilment is to be looked for only in connection with that which the connection shows to be the main subject under consideration.