Ll7K£y CHAP. IV. VKK. 1 — 13. 113
[That it may be made bread.] Let it be noted that the first temptation contained an appeal to a fleshly appetite, like the temptation in £den. Adam and £Ye were tempted to eat un- lawniUy, and 8o also was our Lord.
4. — [It is written.] This text, we should mark, as well as the two others quoted by oiu* Lord in reply to the devil, were taken from the Pentateuch. All three texts were from one book, Deuterono- my, — and two from one chapter, the sixth.
[By every word.] The meaning here is not strictly '* by every spoken or written word,'* but by every thing which God is pleased to create, or command, or appoint, for man's sustenance, just as quails wera commanded to come, and manna appointed to fall m>m heaven, to feed Israel. The Greek word translated " word," is in three places translated ** thing. " (Luke i. 37 ; ii. 15, 19.) 5. — [AU the kingdoms of the world.] This expression must probably be taken with large qualification, unless we take " the world " in the limited sense of Palestine and the adj acent countries. From no single mountain could all the kingdoms of the world be literally seen at once. If our Lord did really see them, it must have been by means of a vision made to pass before His eyes. This however seems very improbable.
[A moment of time.] Lightfoot Quotes a Babbinical definition of a moment. The Kabbins consider it to be " the 58,888th part of an hour."
0. — [This power wiU I give Thee.] Let it be noted, that as the devil promised liberally to Eve, " Ye shall be as Gods," so he promised liberally to our Lord. But as his promise to Eve was a lie, so his promise to our Lord was a deception. He promised that which he had no power to give. He is undoubtedly called "prince of this world," but he has no power to give dominion over it without God's permission.
7. — [Worship me.] The marginal reading seems to give the sense of the word more fully, — " fall down before me," that is, ** fall down and worship."
8. — [Get thee behind ww, Satan.] These are precisely the words, let it be noted, which our Lord addressed to Simon Peter, when Peter would fain have dissuaded Him fi*om the cross. (Matt. xvi. 2H.) It may be observed, while remarking on this expression, that the temptation which St. Luke relates second, is related by St. Matthew as occuring last. It seems probable that the order of St. Matthew is that in which the several temptations occurred, and the expression of our Lord to Satan appears strong internal evidence of this.
For what reason St. Luke departs from the order observed by St. Matthew we do not know. Spanheim, in his Dubia Evangelica, discusses the question, but throws little light on it.
114 EXFOSrrOBT thodghtb.
9j~^Pinnacls of the temple.'] This is sapposed to haye been a turret, or high part of the temple-buildiDg, overhangiiig a deep Tslley. Josephus descnhes the place, and says, that "if any looked dowD, his eyes would grow dizzy, not being able to reach to so yast a depth."
10. — [It is written.] Let it be carefully noted, that the deyil can quoto Scripture, when it suits his purpose. There is no good thing which may not be abused.
[To keep thee.] From the earliest ages the comment has been made on these words, that Satan omitted the important expres- sion which follows them, " In all thy ways ; " and that the omission was intentional in order to favour lus misapplication of the text. Perhaps more has been made of the omission than is quite warrantable. The quotations from the Old Testament in the New, even when made by holy and good men, are not always so full as we should have expected. At any rate, it is a strikmg fact that our Lord does not notice the misquotation, but simply quotes in reply another text.
Leighton's remarks on this point are worth reading. " Our Saviour teaches us that our better way, either with perverse men, in asserting their errors, or with Satan in his assaulting us with misalleged scripture, is not so much to subtilize about the place or words abused. It may be so cunningly done some- times, that we cannot well find it out ; but this downright sure way beate off the sophistry with another place, clearly and plainly carrying that truth which he opposes and we adhere to. Though thou canst not clear the sense of an obscure text, thou shalt always find a sufficient guard in another that is clearer."
13. — [He departed from him.] Two things should always be re- membered in reading the histoir of our Lord's temptetion.
For one thing, we have a clear proof of the personality of Satan. If the devil be not a person, judging from the whole history of the passage, there is no meaning in words. He " speaxs," he " tekes," he " shews," he offers to " give," he " brings," he "sets," he "departs." These expressions can only be used about a person.
For another thing, we see the folly of labouring to make out, as some commentators do, the person who was present at each act in our Lord's history, and supplied the four Gospel writers with the materials which they used in composing their narratives. Who, we may well ask, was present when all this temptation took place? From what source did Matthew and Luke obtain their information? — ^There is but one answer to these questions. They got it, like everything else which they wrote, n-om the inspiration of God. The theory that they were dependent on the reporte of human witnesses in any part of their writings, is utterly unsatisfactory, and in the history of our Lord's temptation, entirely breaks down.
LXTKBi CHAP. IV. VER. 14 — ^22. 116