Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit · Sermon No. 1632
Delivered on Thursday Evening, June 9, 1881
“And He came and dwelt in a city called Nazareth: that it might be fulfilled which was spoken by the Prophets, He shall be called a Nazarene.” Matthew 2:23.
WE find the Jews speaking of Paul, and they say, “We have found this man a pestilent fellow, and a mover of sedition among all the Jews throughout the world, and a ringleader of the sect of the Nazarenes”—Acts 24:5. Thus it appears that our Lord and Master is called a Nazarene and His disciples are styled “the sect of the Nazarenes,” while Christian doctrine was called, by the Jews, the heresy of the Nazarenes. Our Savior, though actually born at Bethlehem, was commonly known as Jesus of Nazareth, because Nazareth was the place where He was brought up. There He remained with His reputed father in the carpenter’s shop until the time of His showing unto the people.
This Nazareth was a place very much despised. It was a small country town and the people were rough and rustic. They were some three days distance from Jerusalem, where I suppose the Jews thought that everything that was learned and polite could be found, as we are apt to think of our own city, or of Oxford, Cambridge and other seats of learning. The people of Nazareth were the boors of Galilee, the clowns of the country. More than that, you will generally find in every nation—I was about to say in every county of our own country—some town made the butt of ridicule. I do not know that “silly Suffolk,” is any sillier than any other part of the world, but I do know that I, myself, happen to have been born in the next parish to the town of Coggeshall, in Essex, concerning which all sorts of jokes are made—so that when any stupid thing is done they call it “a Coggeshall job.”
I merely mention this because it is an illustration of what used to be said concerning Nazareth. It was a primitive place. It was situated in Galilee, which was thought to be quite boorish enough, and Nazareth was the most rustic of all. The name signifies, in rough words, “sprouts,” and the Jews, who were great at puns upon names, threw it as a jest at the people who came from that town. We Anglicize it in a more refined way by the word, “branch,” for, “Netzar,” or, “Nazareth,” signifies a branch. You will begin to understand why the Savior is said to be called by the Prophet, a Netzar, or a Nazarene, and you will guess that Matthew refers to the passage in Isaiah, in the 11th chapter at the first verse, where it is said that a rod shall come out of the stem of Jesse, and “a Netzar, a Nazarene, a Branch shall grow out of his roots.”
There is another passage in Jeremiah where we read of the man, the Branch—the Netzar—the Nazarene. And again in Isaiah, “And His name shall be called a Branch,” or Nazarene. Those are the passages, I think, to which Matthew referred when he said, “That it might be fulfilled which was spoken by the Prophets, He shall be called a Netzar, a Branch, a Nazarene.” The Hebrews made a great deal out of names—a great deal more than you and I generally do with names of places in England—and they had reason for so doing, for there was generally a meaning in the names of places. Perhaps Nazareth was called, “Branch” because trees flourished there and not much else. Or because they thought that the people were rather verdant and they, therefore, called them, “sprouts” and, “greens,” making the same use of language as the vulgar do at this day when they wish to express contempt.
That may have been the origin of the term, “Nazareth.” Certain it is that the place was the subject of the jests of the Jews of our Lord’s time, for even Nathanael, in whom was no guile—one who spoke in a simple-hearted, honest way and had no prejudices, but wished well to everybody, said—“Can there any good thing come out of Nazareth?” As if he felt that Prophets and saints were by no means likely to spring from a town so low down in the scale of progress and education. How could He of whom Moses spoke be found way down there among the country folk of Nazareth? As Nazarene was a term of contempt in the olden times, so it has continued to be. The apostate emperor, Julian, was known always to call our Lord, the Galilean. And when he died, in his agony of death, he cried, “O Galilean, You have vanquished me!” He was obliged to confess our Lord’s supremacy, though he still showed his contempt by calling Him the Galilean.
The Jews, to this day, when they feel wroth against our Christ, are known to call Him the Nazarene. Nazarene is not at all the same word as Nazarite. It is a different word in the Hebrew and you must not confuse the two. Never suppose that when you say, “He shall be called a Nazarene,” that it signifies that He was called a Nazarite. Nazarite, among the Jews, would have been a title of honor, but Nazarene is simply a name of contempt. A late traveler tells us that he had a Muslim guide through Palestine and whenever they came to a village that was very dirty, poor and inhabited by professed Christians, he always said, “These are not Muslims, they are Netza,” or, “Nazarenes,” throwing all the spite he possibly could into the word, as if he could not have uttered a more contemptuous term.