Online Resource Library
Commentary Index | Return to PrayerRequest.com | DownloadCambridge Greek Testament for Schools and Colleges - Matthew 6:2 - 6:2
(Show All Books | Show All Chapters)
This Chapter Verse Commentaries:
2. ἐλεημοσύνη, not classical: it occurs in a poem by Callimachus of Cyrene, librarian of the famous Alexandrian library, circa 260 B.C. Elsewhere it seems to be confined to LXX. and to two writers in the N.T., St Matthew and St Luke. With Christianity the word became frequent and is found in all western languages in different forms—aumône, almosen, alms.
μὴ σαλπίσῃς. The chests for alms in the Synagogue and also in the Temple treasury were called shopharoth (trumpets) from their shape. Possibly the words of the text contain a reference to these shopharoth. Those who dropped their coins into the ‘trumpets’ with a ringing sound might be said σαλπίζειν. Schöttgen ad loc. But perhaps the expression means simply ‘avoid ostentation in almsgiving.’
οἱ ὑποκριταί. ὑποκριτὴς (1) lit. ‘one who answers,’ then from dialogues on the stage (2) ‘an actor,’ hence (3) in a sense confined to LXX. (Job 34:30; Job 36:13) and N.T. and there with one exception (Mar 7:6) to Matthew and Luke, ‘hypocrites,’ those who play a part in life, whose actions are not the true reflection of their thoughts, whose religion is external and unreal. Such men begin by deceiving others, but end in self-deception. It is against these that our Lord’s severest reproofs are delivered. ὑπόκρισις occurs in late authors (Polyb., Lucian) in the sense of ‘dissimulation,’ ‘hypocrisy.’
ἐν ταῖς ῥύμαις. ῥύμη passed from its classical force of ‘a rush,’ ‘impetus’, through the softened meaning of ‘going’, to that of a narrow lane or street, like English ‘alley’ from French aller. Polybius uses the word for the streets in a camp. In Luk 14:21 the ῥύμαι are contrasted with the πλατεῖαι or broad open spaces in an Eastern city. Schöttgen suggests that the meaning here may be the narrow ‘passages’ in a synagogue.
ἀπέχουσιν, ‘have in full.’ Their reward is now and on earth, cp. Luk 6:24, ἀπέχετε τὴν παράκλησιν. Php 4:18, ἀπέχω πάντα, and for the thought, ἀπέλαβες τὰ ἀγαθά σου ἐν τῇ ζωῇ σου, Luk 16:25.