← Back to the beginning of The Designations of Our Lord in Luke and Their Implications
Note: Teacher is in 3¹² employed as an address to John the Baptist; and the Jewish Rabbis in the temple are called Teachers’ in 2⁴⁶. ⁷ When Wellhausen on 5⁴,⁵ says “Ἐπιστάτα (and κύριε) is used in Luke by the disciples; διδάσκαλε by others,” he is thus substantially right. Cf. Plummer on 5 where the meaning of the word is discussed.
‘(oéxodeomoryc), although the term occurs in parables with reference to Him (13²⁵ 14²¹).
The prevailing form of address to Jesus in Luke is, however, the ordinary Greek honorific ‘Lord’ (κύριε), used, however, obviously as an honorific of especially high connotation. It is put upon the lips, indeed, of outsiders, suitors for mercy (5¹² 7⁶ 18⁴¹ 19⁸) and possibly others (9⁵⁹,⁶¹ 13²³); and our Lord’s own remark to the effect that some called Him Lord, Lord,’ who did not do the things He said (6⁴⁶) shows that it might be insincerely used of Him. But this very _ passage also indicates that to address Him as ‘ Lord _was to acknowledge His authority and involved subjection to His commandments, and accordingly the term is represented as employed chiefly by His professed followers (5⁸ 10¹⁷,⁴⁰ 11¹ 12⁴¹ 17³⁷ 22³³,³⁸,⁴⁹). Something of its high implication, when so used, may be caught from ⁸ in comparison with 5⁵. When our Lord, having used Simon’s boat for a pulpit, commanded him to let down his nets for a draught, Simon responded with the respectful address which implied that he recognized Jesus as his Superior Officer (ἐπιστάτης), “ Master, we toiled all night, and took nothing: but at Thy word I will let down the nets.” But when he saw the resultant miraculous draught, he fell at Jesus’ knees and said: Depart from me; for I am a sinful man, O Lord “—using now the higher honorific, Lord ( κύριε ). Obviously the address
Lord on the lips of Jesus’ followers was charged with very high significance, and this is borne out in its entire use.
Such a constant mode of address as ‘ Lord by His followers, naturally would beget the habit of speaking enn ek Tess among ihemselves ag the ian Lord; and we con feel no surprise therefore that Jesus, in giving them instructions how to reply to possible objections to their taking the ass He sent them for as He was about to enter Jerusalem, placed this designation on their lips. “Say,” He said, “the Lord hath need of him “(19³¹); and accordingly they said (v. 34), The Lord hath need lof him (cf. 12³⁶,⁴,⁴³ wey “This instructions recorded by all the Synoptists, and the usage which it involves of the term Lord of Jesus as an appellative designation might very well, therefore, have been illustrated in the narratives of them all. The copious designatory employment of the title ‘ Lord of Christ, however, is characteristic of Luke.4 It is placed on the lips of the disciples themselves in this designatory form at 24³⁴, and it occurs in two passages in the opening chapters of the Gospel—in the elevated language of the angelic announcement in the combination, Christ the Lord or the anointed Lord (2¹¹), and in the response of Elisabeth (1⁴⁵) in which she expresses her wondering awe that the mother of her Lord” should come to her. Obviously in such usages the term connotes a very high dignity, certainly Messianic at the least. It is also employed of Himself by our Lord in the question He is recorded by all the Synoptists as putting to the scribes as to the significance of David’s prediction of the Messiah as his Lord (20⁴¹ )—again, obviously with a high connotation. But the particularly significant fact in this connection is its current employment by Luke himself as an alternative narrative designation to the simple Jesus’ (7¹³,¹⁹ 10¹,³⁹,⁴¹ 1 1³⁹ ia⁴² 32¹⁵ 50⁵,⁶ 180 y⁸ 99⁶¹,⁶¹). Tt does not seem cagy to detect any special significance in the interchange of these designations; the reason for the passage from one to the other seems either purely literary or at least obscure. The meaning of the appearance of this narrative employment of the term in Luke seems, therefore, to be merely that in the usage of Luke in his own person there emerges a reflection of a usage evidently common among the disciples of Jesus from the beginning, but not chancing to be copiously illustrated in the personal literary manner of Mark and Matthew: the usage, namely, of currently speaking of Jesus as tithe Lord.
This implies, naturally, that Jesus stood to His disciples for whatever the title ‘ Lord meant to them. There is involved in it certainly the recognition of His Messianic dignity, and there is included, therefore, the recognition mn Him of all that they saw in His Messianic dignity. So far, we suppose, we may be sure that, as has been suggested,’ He was thought of as Lord in contrast to the earthly potentates who were claiming lordship of men, and especially in contrast with the emperor in Rome, the Lord by way of eminence in all men’s minds.5 To Jesus, rather than to the emperor, was allegiance due. But we must not forget that the allegiance expressed to Jesus rested on a spiritual basis, while, perhaps, it is going too far to suppose that the divine claims of the imperial monarch were held clearly in mind.6 The simplest thing to say is that the term ‘ Lord was applied to Jesus by Luke obviously with the deepest reverence and obviously as the expression of that reverence.
The full height of this reverence may be suggested to us by certain passages in which the term Lord occurs in citations from the Old Testament, where its reference is to Jehovah, though in the citations it seems to be applied to Jesus. Like the other Synoptists, Luke cites, for instance, from Isaiah the promise of a voice crying in the wilderness, Make ye ready the way of the Lord, make His paths straight” (3⁴), and applies it to the coming of John the Baptist whom he represents as preparing the way for Jesus’ manifestation. As in the case of the other evangelists, the inference lies close that by the Lord here Luke means Jesus, (whose coming he thus identifies with the advent of ( Jehovah and whose person he seems to identify with Jehovah.7 On the other hand, in passages like: 1¹⁷,⁷⁶, although the language is similar, it seems more natural to understand the term Lord as referring to God Himself, and to conceive the speaker to be thinking of the coming of Jehovah to redemption in Jesus without necessary identification of the person of Jesus with Jehovah.¹³ The mere circumstance, however, that the reader is led to pause over such passages and to consider whether they may not intend by their ‘ Lord ‘who is Jehovah—to identify the person of Jesus with Jehovah, is significant. We should never lose from sight the outstanding fact that to men familiar with the LXX and the usage of Lord as the personal name of the Deity there illustrated, the term Lord was charged with associations of deity, so that a habit of speaking of Jesus as the Lord, by way of eminence, such as is illustrated by Luke and certainly was current from the beginning of the Christian proclamation (19³¹), was apt to carry with it implications of deity which, if not rebuked or in some way guarded against, must be considered as receiving the sanction of Jesus Himself.
The leading designations of Jesus in Luke, as in the other Synoptists, however, are, broadly speaking, Messianic. In other words, it is distinc- . tively as the Messiah that Luke sets forth Jesus and represents Him as having concerved of Himself and as having been revered by His followers. We find in Luke, as in the other, Synoptists, to be sure, traces of a widespread recognition of Him as a prophet (7¹⁶,³⁹ ⁸,¹⁹). His followers set their hopes upon Him in that office (24¹⁹); and indeed with no uncertainty He Himself assumed the réle of a prophet (4²⁴ 13³³,³⁴). But no more in Luke than in the other Synoptists is this particularly emphasized, and in Luke, too, the prophetic character is, no doubt, conceived as part of the Messianic functionas indeed the collocation of His prophetic calling and His redemption of Israel in the thought of the disciples going to Emmaus not obscurely suggests (24¹⁹,²¹ ct. also 7¹⁶).8
Luke also records from the mouth of the angel announcing the birth of Jesus the new designation of ‘ Saviour —if we can call a designation new which is so plainly adumbrated in a passage like Mt 1¹ (cf. also Lk 19¹⁰).9 But this is so little un-Messianic that it is not only connected with the Messianic prophecies by adjacent references (1⁴⁷, cf. 2³⁰ 3⁶), but is expressly defined as Messianic in the annunciation itself: “a Saviour, which is Christ the Lord” (2¹¹). Like Mt 1²¹, this passage clearly indicates that to the circle in which Jesus moved His coming as the Messiah was connected with the great series of prophecies which promised the advent of Jehovah for the redemption of His people, as truly as with those which predicted the coming of the Davidic King. The terms, “a Saviour, which is Christ the Lord,” are, indeed, an express combination of the two lines of prophecy, and import that the Child who was born in the city of David was both the promised Redeemer of Israel and the Anointed King that was to come. Question may arise, indeed, as to how we are to construe these collocated designations. Some10 would wish us to take each separately, with an indefinite article to each: “There is born to you a Saviour, who is an Anointed One, a Lord.” Others¹⁷ suggest that at least ‘ Messiah and Lord be kept separate: ‘ There is born to you a Deliverer, who is Messiah, Lord.” In either of these constructions we have three separate designations which so far explain one another: this Child is at once a Saviour, the promised Messiah, and Sovereign Lord of men and angels—for it is an angel who speaks these words. The essential meaning cannot be far from this in any case.¹⁸ Even if we should read ‘ who is Messiah, the Lord,” or even who is an anointed Lord,¹⁹ we have got but little away from this general sense: in either case what is said is that the Saviour is the promised Messiah and therefore entitled to our obedience as our Lord. Nor is much more said if we give the phrase the utmost definiteness possible, and translate, ‘ There is born to you this day in the city of David that Deliverer who is the Messiah, the Lord,’²⁰—as, on the whole, we think we ought to read it, in the light of the distinction made between the two designations ‘ Messiah and Lord in such a passage as Acts 2³⁶, where Peter declares to the house of Israel “that God has made Jesus both Lord and Christ.’ A The precise distinction intended to be signalized between ‘ Christ and Lord is, no doubt, difficult to trace: perhaps there lies in it a testimony to the wider content of the idea of Messiahship than that of mere sovereign power; perhaps a testimony to a higher connotation of the term Lord than that of mere Messianic dignity. In any event there is here a declaration that in this Child born in the city of David, the functions of Redemption, Messiahship and Supreme Lordship are united.
Almost immediately afterward we are told that it had been revealed to Simeon that “ he should not see death before he had seen the Lord’s Christ” (2²⁶)—an Old Testament expression (Psi2²,) of. Lk o²⁰, Acts 4²⁶) here applied to the infant Jesus, who is by it identified as the promised Messiah.²¹ Accordingly in announcing the birth of this Child, who is thus so emphatically presented as the Messiah, the angel is represented as describing Him as the Son of the Most High God,’ to whom should be given the throne of His father David, for an everlasting dominion (1³²); and as explaining the Divine Sonship of this Holy Child11 as due to, or rather as evidenced by, His supernatural birth (1³⁵). The latter of these two declarations is clearly the explanation of the former. The angel had promised Mary that she should bring forth a son who should rightly bear the great name of the ‘ Son of the Most High God,” and he now explains that this Holy Son of hers shall be a supernatural product, and should by His supernatural advent be witnessed as rightly bearing the name of Son of God.’ That the title Son of God bears in it a Messianic implication is clear from the functions ascribed in verses 33, 34 to the child so designated, but that this Messiah was conceived as something more than human appears to be implied in the connection of His claim upon the title of ‘ Son of God with the supernaturalness of His birth. Perhaps it is not reading too much into the passage to say that His preéxistence and heavenly descent are asserted,—certainly His heavenly, or supernatural, origin is asserted. This Sen is not merely to be attended with supernatural assistance and so to exhibit supernatural gifts: He is of supernatural origin, and therefore so far of supernatural nature. Already in the opening chapters of his Gospel, devoted to an account of the birth and infancy of Jesus, therefore, Luke makes it plain that the Jesus whose history he is to recount was first of all the Messiah of God, and as
The Designations in Luke I11 such was of supernatural origin and therefore holy, was to establish the throne of David in perpetuity, and was to be recognized as Lord of men and angels.
In accordance with these declarations, recorded in the opening of the Gospel, Luke tells us that the evil spirits knew Jesus to be the Christ and greeted Him by the title Son of God (4⁴¹), and records Peter’s great confession in the form of “Thou art the Christ of God” (9²⁰), and Jesus’ ready acceptance of it, as also His acquiescence in the ascription of the title of Messiah, Christ, to Him by His enemies (the Chest,” 22⁶⁷, of. 23³⁹; Cheist a King, 23²). Such an ascription of the title ‘ Christ to Him by His enemies (22⁶⁷ 23²⁻⁵,³⁹) is the best of all proofs that it was commonly employed of Him by His followers. But the significant fact for us is that in accepting it at their hands Jesus claims it for Himself (22⁶⁷ 23²). We are not surprised, therefore, to find Him using it of Himself when, after His resurrection, He expounded from Scripture to His followers the doctrine of the Suffering Messiah and applied it to Himself (24²⁶⁴⁶), even as He had at an earlier point expounded to the scribes (20⁴¹) the doctrine of the Reigning Messiah with an equally clear application of it to Himself. He who was David’s Lord as truly as his Son was to enter upon His Lordship only through suffering, a suffering which should lay the basis of a preachment in His name of repentance and remission of sins (24⁴⁶). Here again is the Saviour, who is the Messiah, the Lord: and the Gospel ends much on the same note on which it began.
The royal dignity of this ‘ Anointed King (23²) is of course dwelt upon in Luke as in the other Synoptics. But the precise term ‘ King is not of frequent occurrence. His disciples as He entered Jerusalem on the ass’s colt acclaimed Him as “ the King that cometh in the name of the Lord” (19³⁸), and when the Pharisees appealed to Him to rebuke them therefor—employing the simple formula of respect, ‘ Teacher,” in addressing Him and thereby repudiating His Messianic claim by the contrast of this address with the title of King ‘Jesus was so far from yielding to their request that He declared that if His disciples held their peace the very stones would cry out and recognize Him as the Messianic sovereign (cf. Lk 3⁸ Mt 3⁹). Similarly, when the Jews accused Him to Pilate as representing Himself to be Christ, a King (23²),12 and “that governor accordingly demanded of Him whether He was ‘ the King of the Jews,” our Lord was so far from denying the ascription that He expressly accepted the designation (23³), and thus brought it about that He was mocked on the cross by this title, and had it set over His head (23³⁷,³⁸). The equivalent title Son of David also is recorded as having been given Him by an applicant for His mercy as a recognition of His authority to heal (18³⁸,³⁹, cf. 1³,⁶⁹), and by no means repudiated when (20⁴¹ seq.) Jesus explained that He was something much more than David’s son.
In the midst of the designations we have somewhat rapidly adduced, clustering around the central title Christ,” there is one which we should not pass over unnoticed because it has not met us heretofore. The mocking Jews, scofling at Jesus as He hung on the cross, are represented as flinging in His face His claim to be the Christ of God, His Chosen (23³⁵). The same designation occurs in the account of the transfiguration, where the voice from heaven is represented by Luke as declaring of Jesus, This is my Son, my Chosen” (9³⁵). No doubt the Greek is not quite the same in each instance: 0 ἐκλεκτός of the one is replaced by 0 ἐκλελεγμένος in the other.13 But doubtless the underlying Messianic title is the same in both instances. It is rooted in Isaiah 42¹, “” Behold my servant whom I uphold; my chosen in whom my soul delighteth,” etc. (where the parallel terms are 6 παῖς and 6 ἐκλεκτός), and emerges into view even in pre-Christian Jewish usage (Enoch 40⁵ 45³ 53⁶ 39⁹ etc.).²⁵ The conception seems to be not essentially different from a designation which has already met us in Mark (1²⁴) and which occurs also in the parallel passage of Luke (4³⁴), but elsewhere in the New Testament only at Jno 6⁶⁹— the Holy One of God.” For it does not seem likely that this epithet, in the first instance at least, refers to the moral purity of the Messiah,²⁶ but rather probable that it designates Him as One whom God has “separated out, equipped and dedicated to His service,”14 in a word as the Consecrated One.” In this understanding of it, it stands in close relation to the epithet, ‘ the Elect One,” and unites with it in emphasizing the unique loftiness of the Messianic office. At the same time it seems difficult to believe that there is no implication of moral purity, or perhaps we would better say moral exaltation, in the epithet, as used whether by Peter (Jno 6⁶⁹) or by the demoniacs (Mk 1²⁴, Lk 4³⁴), although this reference may be secondary. It is scarcely conceivable that the demons could recognize a mere official-standing on sight (Mk 3¹¹), while the contrast between the moral perfection or exalted nature of
Jesus and their uncleanness may be presumed to have obtruded itself upon their consciousness, whenever they were brought into His presence.²⁸ Along with these titles we must note also that Luke, too, makes use of the title ‘ the Beloved,” though only at the baptism of our Lord (3²²), replacing it at the transfiguration by the Chosen One (9³⁵), and thus exhibiting the essential synonymy of the two.15
It may be profitable to recall at this point that the epithet holy is applied to our Lord also at the annunciation of His birth by the angel, when it was explained that it was the circumstance that His birth was not according to nature, but due to the coming down upon Mary of the Holy Ghost and the overshadowing of her by the power of the Most High, which justified the Holy Thing which was being begotten in being called the Son of God (1³⁵). The epithet is not elsewhere applied to Jesus in this Gospel, except in 2²³, where the precept of the law is quoted in reference to Him, that “every male that openeth the womb shall be called holy to the Lord “—where it is obviously the K conception of consecration which is prominent. In the present passage, however, it seems equally plain that it is not the notion of being set apart for God so much yas that of being in Himself worthy of reverence and calling out veneration which is prominent. He who is thus supernaturally born is “holy” in the sense that He brings with Him something of the superhuman character belonging to His origin, and is thus not set apart among men, but is by nature distinguished from men—shall we not say, ‘ separate from sinners’ 7³⁰ Nevertheless, the title Son of God as applied to our Lord in Luke is closely connected with His Messianic office: though, of course, it is not limited to that office in its implications. It occurs in this precise form but seldom. Besides the declaration of the announcing angel that He shall be called the Son of the Most High (1³²)—evidently with a Messianic connotation, as the subsequent context shows, but by no means equally evidently with none but a human connotation, as also the subsequent context assures us (1³),—it occurs only in the narrative of the Temptation, on the lips of Satan (4³,⁹),16 and elsewhere on the lips of evil spirits (4⁴¹, 8²⁸ Son of the Most High God’) who knew He was the Christ, and in the mouth of His judges when they adjured Him to tell whether He were ‘ the Christ,” and on His answering that they should from thenceforth see Him, the Son of Man,’ seated at the right hand of God, demanded afresh, “Art thou, then, the Son of God?? (22⁷⁰).17 It seems clear, indeed, from these passages that the title Son of God was conceived as a Messianic title, and so far as the synonym of the simple Christ’; but it is difficult not to gather from them also that it gave expression t’s a higher Messianic conception than was conveyed by the simple Christ.” The brief conversation recorded as taking place between our Lord and His judges seems to have, in fact, the precise purport that in accepting the designation of the Christ He does so in such a manner as to pour into it a higher content than His judges were willing to accord to it —a higher content which they felt was more appropriately expressed by another title,—the ‘ Son of God.’ Whence it seems to follow that Son of God,’ while a current Messianic designation, was a Messianic designation charged with a higher connotation than merely that of the Messianic King—a conclusion we have already drawn from 1³²,³⁵.18
Note: Knowling, The Testimony of St. Paul to Christ, 1905, p. 314, thinks the epithet here means frankly “sinlessness” (cf. Plummer in loc.). Perhaps, however, while this implication of ‘ holiness” cannot be excluded, it is going too far to find it prominent here.
The higher connotation of Sonship to God is, however, in Luke, as in the other Synoptists, most clearly expressed by the undefined term ‘Son.’ Luke, as well as the others, records the divine proclamation of the Sonship of Jesus from heaven, on the occasion as well of His baptism as of His transfiguration: Thou art my Son, the Beloved; in thee I am well pleased” (3²², “This is my Son, the Chosen” (9³⁵): and gives us the parable in which Jesus, with evident reference to Himself (20¹³,¹⁴), talks of the wicked husbandmen, to whom, after they had evil-entreated his servants, the lord of the vineyard sent in the end his ‘ beloved son who was the heir. Luke also records a number of those pregnant sayings in which Jesus appeals to God as in a unique sense His ‘ Father’: and he begins this series of pregnant sayings at so early a period as to make it clear to us that it represents a unique filial consciousness coeval with the dawn of our Lord’s intelligence. Already in His earliest youth He could speak of being ‘ in His Father’s house”’ as His natural place of abode (2⁴⁹),19 even as in later life He lived in constant communion with the Father (10²¹,²¹,²²,²⁷ o 43⁴,⁴⁶) and equally naturally spoke of the kingdom His Father had appointed Him” (22²⁹), and at the end spoke of His readiness to send forth the promise of His Father (24⁴⁹). The glory He expecicd to enter, it is to be observed, was no less His own than His Father’s glory (22²⁹). But above all, Luke records for us that remarkable passage (10¹,²) in which our Lord declares the perfect mutual knowledge which exists between the Father and ‘ Son,’ by virtue of which the Son is constituted the sole adequate revealer of the Father ‘—that Son to whom all things were declared by His ‘ Father’: on the basis of which He announces that the things seen and heard in Him are the things which prophets and kings have desired to see and hear and have not. The phraseology in which Luke repeats this great saying difters slightly from that found in Matthew. But the two evangelists agree in all that is essential. In both it is unlimitedly “all things”’ that are said to have been delivered by the ‘ Father to the ‘ Son,’ so that God is affirmed to hold back nothing, but to share all that He has with the
Son.’ In both the intimate knowledge of the Father and Son of each other is afirmed to be alike complete, exhaustive and unbrokenly continuous. In both the ‘ Son is represented to be the sole source of knowledge of God. But in Luke it is said, not that the Father and Son know each other, but that each knows “ what the other is,” that is to say, all that each is. It would be difficult to frame a statement which could more sharply assert the essential deity of the fon,
Our Lord’s own favorite designation of Himself is, however, in Luke as in the other Synoptists, ‘ the Son of Man’; and as in the other Synop-tists this designation is in Luke exclusively a self-designation of Jesus’ own. For obviously when the angel at the empty tomb is represented as saying, “ Remember how He spake unto you when He was yet in Galilee, saying that the Son of Man must be delivered up into the hands of sinful men, and be crucified and the third day rise again” (24⁷),—this is not an instance of the employment of this title by another than Jesus, but only another attribution of it to Jesus. The title occurs in Luke about twenty-five times,³⁷ and in the same collocations and with the same import as in the other Synoptists. If we attempt, therefore, to derive from the substance of the passages in which it is employed a notion of the conception which was attached to it, we arrive at the same conclusion as in the case of the other Synoptists. In Luke, the purpose of the coming of the Son of Man is declared in the form, ‘ The Son of Man came to seek and to save that which was lost” (19¹⁰). Accordingly human destiny is connected absolutely with the relations of men to Him. Those are blessed whom men hate and ostracise and reproach, casting out their name as evil, if it be for the Son of Man’s’ sake (6²²). For everyone who shall confess Him before men, him shall the Son of Man confess before the angels of God (12⁸); and on the other hand every one who denies the ‘ Son of Man in the presence of men shall be denied in the presence of the angels of God (12⁹), and whosoever shall be ashamed of the Son of Man and of His words, of him shall the Son of Man be ashamed when He comes in His own glory and that of the Father and of the holy angels (9⁶). That nevertheless blasphemy against the Son of Man may be forgiven as blasphemy against the Spirit may not (12¹⁰), doubtless belongs to the humility of His earthly life before He has come in His glory. For in this life He comports Himself like other men, eating and drinking (7³⁴), passing a hard and suffering existence (9⁵⁸), and so fulfilling the Scriptures (18³¹ seq.). Meanwhile, however, He exercises even on earth the authority to regulate religious observances (6⁵) and to forgive sins (5²⁴). In other words, the sufferings He endures (9⁴⁴ 22⁴⁸) are not the result of fate or chance, and do not belong to Him by right, but are voluntarily undertaken as part of His mission (18³¹,²35²⁵ 947⁷). They issue in death indeed (9²² 18³³ 22²² 24⁷), but after death comes resurrection (9²² 11³⁰ 18³³ 24⁷); and after resurrection, in its own good time, a return in His appropriate glory (22⁶⁹ 9²⁶ 52⁴⁰ 17²²,²⁴ 18⁸ 210²⁷ 22⁶⁹). The humiliation over, at once the ‘ Son of Man is seated at the right hand of the power of God (22⁶⁹), and when He comes again He will come “in a cloud with great power and glory” (21²⁷),—a glory described as “” His own glory, and the glory of His Father and of the holy angels” (9²⁶). The suddenness of this coming is adverted to (12⁴⁰ 17²²⁻²⁴,²⁶,³⁰) and the main fact emphasized, that it is in point of significance the day of judgment, when the destinies of men shall be finally assigned them by the ‘ Son of Man (21³⁶ 12⁸ 9²⁶): destinies which shall be determined according to the attitude which each has occupied towards the ‘ Son of Man on earth (12⁸ ²⁶. To all His enemies it is therefore a day of vengeance (18⁸), and only as one prevails to stand before the “Son of Man can he hope to escape the dread which His coming brings to the earth (12³⁶). The picture, it will be seen, is the picture of a Redeemer and Ad-juster who comes in humiliation to save, and returns in glory to gather up the results of His work and finally to adjust the issues of the historical development of the world. Whence does He come to save? There is no plain declaration. We are left to infer it from the obvious connection of the title with the oracle of Daniel 7¹³, from the more narrative portions of the Gospel, as e. g., the opening chapters where the supernatural birth of Jesus is set forth in detail and with all its implications, and from the very clear suggestion that the whole career of the Son of Man,’ in its earthly manifestation and its subsequent glory alike, is of a piece and is the outworking of a definite plan of action held clearly in His own mind from the first and carried firmly out in every detail of His living.
Note: The emphasis is on the unlimited πάντα; cf. Hahn: “Jesus gives expression accordingly primarily to the general idea, that God has held back nothing for Himself, but has made the Son participant in all that is peculiar to Himself. These first words form the ground for what follows. The emphasis in them is not on the μοί (Weiss), nor on the 676 tod πατρός (Hofmann), but on πάντα.”
Note: Cf. Plummer iz loc.: “It is impossible upon any principles of criticism to question its genuineness, or its right to be regarded as among the earliest materials made use of by the Evangelists. And it contains the whole of the Christology of the Fourth Gospel. It is like “an aérolite from the Johannine heaven (Hase, Gesch, Jesu, p. 527); and for that very reason causes perplexity to those who deny the solidarity between the Johannine heaven and the Synoptic earth.” It should be compared with the following passages: Jno 3³⁵ 6⁴⁶ 8¹⁹ 10¹⁵,³⁰ 149 16¹⁵ 17⁶,¹⁰0 and cf. further, Sanday, Fourth Gospel, p. 109; Keim Jes. of Naz., IV. 63 referred to by Plummer. Godet says strikingly that Jesus’ words here “become an echo of the joys of His eternal generation.” He means doubtless that the continuous interchange of perfect mutual knowledge here set forth is a reflection of the essential relation of Father and Son to one another.
The sense of His mission which is thus inherent in the favorite Messianic designation He applied to Him-i self finds expression also in other forms a of locution which Luke reports our Lord as employing. Thus, for ex ample, He is reported as speaking of Himself repeatedly as “” coming “with obvious pregnancy of meaning, possibly with some reference to the expectation of the Messianic coming which found embodiment in the designation of the Messiah as ‘ the One to Come,’—a designation in Luke also reported as applied to Jesus hypothetically by John the Baptist (7¹⁹,²⁰),—but certainly with its chief implication in a profound sense of His mission ([3¹⁶] 4³⁴ 5² 7¹⁹ [cf. 7³³ of John the Baptist], 19¹), and possibly with some contrast in mind with His second coming (9⁶ [12³⁶ seq.] 18⁸ 21²⁷). Without essential difference of meaning this coming is interchanged with “” being sent’—the author of the “mission” being thus more clearly indicated as God. Thus Luke varies Mark’s language (1³⁸) in recording our Lord’s declaration that “He had come forth “specifically to preach, by giving it rather: ‘ for therefore was He sent” (4⁴³)—plainly indicating that came” and was sent” alike refer to His divine mission.20 Possibly in this variation there is an allusion to the passage from Isaiah which Jesus read in the synagogue at Nazareth (cf. Lk 4¹⁸), but in any event the term is unambiguous, and is elsewhere repeated (9⁴ 10¹⁶), and from it we may at least learn that according to the representation in Luke also Jesus prosecuted His work on earth under a sense of performing step by step a task which had been given Him to do and which He had come into the world to perform.
We need call attention only in passing to the record by Luke also (5³⁴,³⁵) of Jesus’ employment of the figure of the Bridegroom with reference to Himself and His relations to God’s people, thus declared to be His Bride, as they were currently represented as the Bride of Jehovah in the Old Testament. In this remarkable saying, preserved in all three of the Synoptics and assigned by all of them to the earlier portion of His ministry, we have evidence not only that Jesus regarded His ministry as a mission He had come to perform, and already knew that it involved His death, but that He conceived this mission as Messianic and the Messiahship as a divine function, so that His coming was the coming of Jehovah, the faithful husband of His people (Hos 2¹⁹).21.
Note: A0oy of Mark incorrectly of His divine Mission.” But perhaps Weiss dces not know the true meaning of the expression in Mark as well as Luke did!
The general impression left on the mind by this series of designations is that Luke was less interested in the preéxistence of our Lord than in His divine quality and the divine nature of His mission. To him Jesus was the authoritative Teacher, the God-appointed Messiah, the heaven-sent Redeemer from sin and divine Founder of the Kingdom of righteousness, the Judge of all the earth, Lord of men and angels, and God’s own Son, between whom and the Father there persists unbroken and perfect communion. If there is scarcely as full a witness to these things in his general narrative as meets us in Matthew, there is an air thrown over the whole of settled conviction which is very striking; and the reader carries away with him the impression that the engrossment of the evangelist with his narrative represses much more testimony to the divine dignity of the Messiah than actually finds expression in his pages.
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Footnotes
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In 243³ the general transmission gives “the Lord Jesus”: but this is one of the instances in which it is scarcely possible not to follow a few “Western” witnesses in omitting a very strongly attested reading. This combination of designations occurs also in the spurious ending of Mark (16¹⁹), but not elsewhere in the Gospels. It becomes, however, quite frequent in Acts: 12¹ 43³ 7⁵⁹ 8¹⁶ yyl¹⁷20 552⁶ 56³¹ 19⁵,¹³,¹⁷ 20²¹,²⁴,³⁵ 21¹³ 28³¹, It might thus have very well been used by Luke in his Gospel also. It is common in the Epistles. ↩
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The text is not quite certain here, and there are three ways of rendering it: (1) “And he said to Jesus, Remember me”; (2) “And he said, Jesus, remember me”; (3) “And he said, Lord, remember me.” The reading ‘ Jesus’ seems the preferable one; but it is not altogether clear that anarthrous Ἰησοῦ here may not be the dative after ἔλεγεν. The uniqueness of the ascription of the simple Jesus’ as a form of address, to a speaker in the evangelist’s narrative, is, of course, favorable to taking it as a dative. In that case x)pte would be an instinctive correction of ησοῦ mistaken for a vocative; as in the other case it would be an instinctive insertion of a vocative “because Ϊησοῦ here was mistaken for the dative” (Plummer). ↩
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Streatfeild, Self-Interpretation of Jesus Christ, p. 99 note, is clearly in the wrong in supposing that the change from ἐπιστάτα of v. 5 to κύριε of v. 8 has no significance; and the occasional interchange of the terms, noted by Dalman as appealed to by Streatfeild, does not interpose an obstacle. Cf. Godet on verse 8: “Peter here employs the more religious expression, Lord, which answers to his actual feelings”; and Plummer, verse 8: “The change from ἐπιστάτα (see on verse 5) is remarkable and quite in harmony with the change of circumstances. It is the Master whose orders must be obeyed, the Lord whose holiness causes moral agony to the sinner (Dan 10¹⁶).” ↩
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Cf. Sven Herner, Die Anwendung des Wortes κύριος im N. T., pp. 12, 13: “In contrast with Matthew and Mark, Luke speaks of Jesus by the designation κύριος comparatively often. Even if 7¹⁹,³¹ τοῦ⁴¹ 223¹ 24³ be neglected as more or less uncertain in the reading, and 19³¹1 as a parallel to Mt 21³, Mk 11³, there remain nevertheless fourteen passages peculiar to Luke (7¹3 101,40 3139 1242 13¹⁵ 175⁶ 18⁶ 19⁸,³⁴ 226¹,⁶¹ 24³⁴) which speak of Jesus by the designation of Lord’: and to these may be added the expressions the mother of my Lord (143) and the Lord Christ (2¹¹).” “It may be further remarked that although one of the uncertain passages enumerated (24³) belongs to the time when Christ was, though resurrected, not yet manifested to His disciples, and one of the certain ones (24³⁴) is a word of the disciples to whom the risen Lord had manifested Himself, yet all the others fall in the time before the resurrection. Although Luke mentions Jesus, however, comparatively often by the designation Lord,’ this is nevertheless far from his current designation of Him, as the names of ‘ Jesus’ and Christ meet us 112 times.” ↩
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Cf. Dalman, Words, 330: “When the Christians called Jesus 6 κύριος, they will have meant that He is the true divine Lord in opposition to the ‘ God and Lord on the imperial throne of Rome. Luke’s frequent use of κύριος is certainly intended in this sense. The phrase Χριστὸς κύριος used in his Gospel 2¹¹ (cf. Acts 2³⁶) defines the term Χριστός in that sense for the reader.” Dalman is probably thinking of “Luke” as representing a Gentile Christian usage. It is clear, on the contrary, that his is simply an aboriginal Christian usage—possibly with slightly changing—or enlarging—content, but with no essential alteration of meaning. ↩
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On the employment of κύριος of the emperor and its significance see T. D. Woolsey in the Bibliotheca Sacra for 1861, pp. 595-608. ↩
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Cf. Sven Herner, as cited, p. 11: “With a reference to our discussion of the citation in the passages in Matthew and Mark we hold it most probable that Christ is meant, and this view is more easily maintained in the case of Luke than of Matthew because Luke comparatively frequently uses the designation Lord of Jesus.” Proceeding to discuss the parallel passage, 1⁷⁶, he decides that there Lord probably VY refers to God the Father; which appears just. It does not follow, however, that Godet’s remark may not also be accepted: “In saying the Lord Zacharias can only be thinking of the Messiah: but he could not designate Him by this name, unless, with Malachi, he recognized in ___ His coming the appearing of Jehovah (cf. 1¹⁷,⁴³ 2¹¹)”—if this can be “read of the advent of Jehovah in His Representative. ¹³ Hahn says, rightly as we think, at 1¹⁶: “Not to be understood of the Messiah (Ambr., Beda, Euthym., Beng. Cast, Bisp., Schegg, Schanz) but of God”; and at 1⁷⁶: “Not to be understood of the Messiah (Kiin.,, Ols, Bisp., Schanz), but of God”; but, we think, wrongly at 3⁴: “By the κύριος there is here, just as in the Old Test. passage, to be understood, not the Messiah (Kiin.,, Bl, Haupt) but God, for Luke wishes to say that in the Messiah God would hold His own advent.” So far as the mere language goes, that might be accepted: but the passage seems to mean otherwise (see Plummer per contra). Meyer has an excellent note on 1¹⁶,¹⁷ and decides rightly also at 1⁷⁶: whom Weiss properly follows; so also Plummer. ↩
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Cf. Meyer on 7¹⁶: “They saw in this miracle a σημείον of a great prophet, and in His appearance they saw the beginning of the Messianic deliverance (comp. 1⁶⁻⁷⁹).” On the whole subject, cf. Stanton, Jewish and Christian Messiah, 126 seq. ↩
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Cf. Plummer in loc.: “Here first in N. T. is σωτήρ used of Christ, and here only in Luke. Not in Matthew or Mark, and only once in John (4⁴²): twice in Acts (5³! 13²³); and frequently in Titus and 2 Peter.” ↩
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E.g. Holtzmann, Weiss. ¹⁷ E.g. Meyer. ¹⁸ “In any event,” says Weiss, “it is meant that this Deliverer is an Anointed Lord, and therefore destined to be the King of Israel.” But Weiss, who wishes to read only, “a Deliverer who is an Anointed One, a Lord,” takes too low a view. ¹⁹ E.g. Paulus. ²⁰ So Hahn: “σωτήρ, not ‘a Deliverer (Paulus, Meyer, Bleek, Ewald, Weiss, Hofmann, Keil, Nosgen, Holtzmann), but the Deliverer (Luther, De Wette). The article is wanting not from inadvertence (De Wette), but because it is made superfluous by the succeeding relative clause. The sense is: the particular Deliverer, who’… This Deliverer is characterized by the Χριστὸς κύριος as the promised Messiah. We are not to explain: ‘ a Messiah, a Lord (Holtzmann); and not: one anointed to Lordship (Paulus); but the two expressions are two separate designations of the expected Messiah (cf. Acts 2³⁶) ἄριστός, the then popularly current name of the Messiah; κύριος, the designation of His Sovereign dignity.” ²¹ Hahn, “God’s chosen and appointed Messiah”; Meyer, “God’s destined and sent Messiah”; Weiss, “God’s anointed and sent Messiah.” ↩
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So (not, that which is begotten shall be called holy, the Son of God) Bengel, Bleek, Meyer, Weiss, Holtzmann, Godet, Hahn. ↩
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So Holtzmann, Weiss and others. Weiss: King Messiah,’ or more naturally, ‘ Messiah, a King (cf. on 2¹¹), so that the political significance of the Messianic title expressly explained is made to tell.” That is to say, Jesus has declared Himself to be ‘ Christ,” which is the same as to say King.’ The term Christ is employed appellatively, but so that it might easily be taken as a proper name, as it was taken (see Matthew) by Pilate. Hahn less naturally wishes to read an anointed King.” It would be more natural to take Christ as a ↩
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Cf. on these terms and on the general matter, W. C. Allen, Hastings D. C. G., 1. 308. ²⁵ Cf. Charles, Book of Enoch, p. 112; Bousset, Die Religion des Judentums, p. 249; Schiirer, Jewish People, etc., II. 2. p. 158. 28 So Keil on Lk 4³⁴. ↩
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This language is borrowed from Holtzmann, Hand-Com., p. 76: “The demon recognizes in Him the Holy One of God, i.e, Him whom God has separated out, equipped and dedicated to His service (cf. Jno 65⁹ 10³⁶—the ‘ Elect One of the Book of Enoch), whom the demoniacs (Mk 3¹¹) immediately recognize and fear as such: for the Messiah’s task is to judge and destroy the demons (the evil spirit speaks in the name of his fellows, too, us’). They divine, therefore, at once Jesus’ greatness and their own fate.” In this view it is not the moral purity “of Jesus over against their wickedness that the demons divine; but the official task of Jesus which they are aware of. Similarly Ernst Issel, Der Begriff der Heiligkeit im N. T., 1887, p. 67 seq. “In Mk 1²⁴, cf. Lk 4³⁴, we have the most original application of the notion [of holiness] to Jesus. The title the Holy One of God is clearly a well known one, on hearing which no one could be in doubt who was meant. The same evangelist [Mk], at 3¹¹, opens the way to understanding it by recording that the demons cried out Thou art the Son of God.” That, however, is the title of the theocratic King… In the title of the theocratic ruler, the eye is just as little directed by the holy to ethical perfection as in the expression Son of God. The Messiah is the Holy One of God,’ as He whom the Father has sanctified, Jno 10³⁶, that is, as He whom God has chosen and endowed for His special possession and service. There speaks for this also the designation the Chosen One,’ Lk 2335 93⁵. To this election to God’s possession and service limits itself also the designation in Lk 1³⁵… and the representation of Jesus in the Temple, Lk 22³.. J ²⁸0n the title Holy One of God see J. B. Bristow, Hastings’ D. C. G, 1. 730-31. He thinks it connects Jesus with God the Holy One; but in these passages refers particularly to Christ’s dedication to a mission. ↩
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Cf. J. A. Robinson, as cited, esp. Eph., pp. 229 seq. ↩
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Cf. Plummer in loc.: “The reference is to the relation to God rather than to the office of the Messiah. The emphatic word is υἱός.” ↩
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Cf. Plummer iz loc.: “In the allusion to Daniel 7¹³ they recognize a claim to divinity, and they translate υἱὸς 70D ἀνθρώπου into υἱὸς τοῦ θεοῦ. But it is not clear whether by the latter they mean the Messiah or something higher.” ↩
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This seems to be the truth in the view of such commentators as Godet and Hahn, as over against those who, like Weiss, insist that Son of God is “only another Messianic designation.” It is only another Messianic designation; but a Messianic designation charged with a higher Messianic conception as its content, ↩
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Cf. Plummer in loc.: “It is notable that the first recorded words of the Messiah are an expression of His Divine Sonship as man; and His question implies that they knew it, or ought to know it.” ↩
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Cf. Weiss on Lk 4⁴³: “Luke therefore already interprets the ↩
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Cf. Godet in loc, E. T., p. 276: “This remarkable saying was preserved with literal exactness in the tradition; accordingly we find it in identical words in the three Synoptists. It proves, first, that from the earliest period of His ministry Jesus regarded Himself as the Messiah; next, that He identified His coming with that of Jehovah, the husband of Israel and of mankind (Hos 219, see Gess, Christi Zeugniss, pp. 19, 20); lastly, that at that time He already foresaw and announced His violent death.” Godet adds: “It is an error, therefore, to oppose on these three points, the fourth Gospel to the other three.” ↩
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