they ought to have drawn. They willingly shut their eyes agaiust light.
How miserably mistaken the policy of the Pharisees proved to be, it is needless to say. If they had let Jesus aloue, and allowed His Gospel to be received and believed, Jerusalem, humanly speaking, might have stood to this day, and the Jews might have been more mighty and prosperous than in the days of Solomon. By not letting Jesus alone, and by killing Him, they filled up the measure of their nation's sin, and brought destruction on the temple, and scattering on the whole people.
" Take away," applied to place here, must mean " destroy." •xhus MawU xxiv. 39 : " The flood took them all away."
Some, as Heinsius and Bloomfield, think that " our place " means the chy , Jerusalem.
Some, as Ol&hausen and Alford, think that " our place "means "our country.''*
Others, as Maldonatus, Hutcheson, Poole, and Hammond, with whom I entirely agree, think "our place" means the temple. (Compare Acts vi. 13, 14.) Lainpe thinks this view is proved by Micah i. 3.
Calvin observes, how many people in his day were always banging back from helping the Protestant Reformation, from • he very same motives as these Jews, — the fear of consequences. •« We must consult public tranquillity. There are dangers in the way."
*d.—[And one of them, named Vaiaphas.'] This man, by comparing Acts v. 17, would seem to have been of the sect of the Saddu- cees. We also know that he was son-in-law to Annas, of whom Josephus specially mentions that he was a Sadducee. If this view be correct (and Guyse, Gill, Scott, and Lampe agree with me in it), it rather accounts for the contemptuous way in which he seema to speak in replying here, to the saying of the Pharisees. It is remarkable, however, to observe how Pharisees and Sadducees, who disagreed on so many points, were agreed in hating and opposing Christ. Formalists and sceptics, in all ages, make common cause against the fiospel.
[Being. ..high priest.. .same year.~] This expression shows the disorder and irregularity which prevailed iu the Jewish Church in our Lord's time. According to the l*.w of Moses, the office of high priest was tenable for life. In the last days of the Jews the office seems to have been obtainable by election, and to have been held with great variety of ternj. Caiaphas was high priest when John the Baptist began his .ministry, and Annas with him. (Luke iii. 2.) He was also high priest after the Day of Pentecost, and before the persecution of Stephen. No wonder St. Paul says, on a subsequent occasion, of Ananias, " I wist not that he was the high priest." (Acts xxiii. 2.)