;)0. — [To say to the mountains,., to the hills, lic] The expressions
of this verse are figurative and parabolical. Thej signify the
. intense misery and distress, and the desperate helplessness of all
who would be found inside Jerusalem during its siege. See Isai.
ii. 19. Heb. x. 8. Rev. vi. 16.
Some have seen a reference in the words to the caverns and excavations in the rocks under Jerusalem, in which many of the Jews took refuge when the city was taken.
:U. — [A green tree., .the dry."] The common opinion of all the best commentators is, that our Lord here contrasts Himself and the Jewish nation. " If the Romans practice sucli cruelties on me, who am a gi-een tree, and the very source of life, what will they do one day to your nation, which is like a barren, withered
. tiimk, dead in trespasses and sins?"
Bengel maintains that the " green tree " here represents the young, strong, and healthy, — and the " dry tree," the old, feeble, and barren. In support of this view he quotes a passage from Josephus, describing how the Romans, after Jenisalem was taken, slew the old and feeble Jews, but shut up in confinement those who were vigourous and serviceable. In this opinion, however, Bengel stands almost alone.
^\2. — [Malefactors led with him.'] This, let it be noted, was a literal fulfilment of Isaiah's prophecy, that Messiah was to be '* num- bered with the transgressors." (Isai. liii. 12.)
33. — [TJie place which is called Calvary.] The reason why this place was so called is not known with certainty, and has given rise to many conjectures.
Origen, TertuUian, Athanasius, Epiphaniiis, Augustine, Cyril, and others, according to Cornelius a Lapide, hold the absiurd opinion, that Calvary was the place where Adam was buried.
Jerome, Beda, Jansenius, and others, hold that Calvary was a place where criminals were executed, and sometimes beheaded, and where sculls and bones of dead men were consequently lying about.
Some have thought that Calvary was a bare, rocky hill, not unlike a scull in shape and appearance, and that hence arose its name.
Let it be noted, that at the time when our Lord was crucified. Calvary was outside the walls of Jerusalem. It was meet and right that our Lord, as the great sacrifice for sin, should suffer without the gate. (Heb. xiii. 12.) At the present day, the place commonly supposed to have been Calvary is within the walls of Jerusalem.
The common opinion that Calvary was a mount or hill is, at any rate, destitute of any foundation in Scripture. All the four