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Mat_24:37-39. But ( δέ , introducing an analogous case from an early period in sacred history) as regards the ignorance as to the precise moment of its occurrence, it will be with the second coming as it was with the flood.
ἦσαν … τρώγοντες ] not for the imperfect, but to make the predicate more strongly prominent. Comp. on Mat_7:29. τρώγειν means simply to eat (Joh_6:54-58; Joh_13:18), not devouring like a beast (Beza, Grotius, Cremer), inasmuch as such an unfavourable construction is not warranted by any of the matters afterwards mentioned.
γαμοῦντες κ . ἐκγαμ .] uxores in matrimonium ducentes et filias collocantes, descriptive of a mode of life without concern, and without any foreboding of an impending catastrophe.
καὶ οὐκ ἔγνωσαν ] The “it” (see Nägelsbach, Iliad, p. 120, ed. 3) to be understood after ἔγνωσαν is the flood that is so near at hand. Fritzsche’s interpretation: “quod debebant intelligere” (namely, from seeing Noah build the ark), is arbitrary. The time within which it may be affirmed with certainty that the second advent will suddenly burst upon the world, cannot be supposed to refer to that which intervenes between the destruction of Jerusalem and the advent, a view precluded by the εὐθέως of Mat_24:29. That period of worldly unconcern comes in just before the final consummation, Mat_24:15 ff., whereupon the advent is immediately to follow (Mat_24:29-32). This last and most distressing time of all, coupled with the advent immediately following it, forms the terminus ante quem, and corresponds to the πρὸ τοῦ κατακλυσμοῦ of the Old Testament analogy.
ἐν ἡμέρᾳ ᾗ ] without repeating the preposition before ᾗ (Joh_4:54). Comp. Xen. Anab. v. 7. 17, and Kühner on the passage; Winer, p. 393 [E. T. 524 f.]; Stallbaum, ad Plat. Apol. p. 27 D. Comp. Mat_24:50.