Matthew Chapter Eight
A Series of Miracles, 8:1-9:35
A Leper Cleansed, 1-4. (Mark 1:40-45; Luke 5:12-16)
1. great multitudes.—The great multitudes that now followed Jesus are mentioned not only to show his popularity at this time, but also to emphasize the fact that the miracles about to be described were performed in the presence of many witnesses.
2. and worshiped him.—The Greek word rendered worship (προσκυνέω) is used both for the mere obeisance paid to a man of superior rank, and the supreme homage paid to God. Here it is used in the lower sense; for the leper, being a Jew, and having no adequate conception of the divinity of Jesus, would not pay to him the homage due to God.
if thou wilt.—Convinced by the previous miracles which he had either witnessed or heard of, that Jesus could make him clean, the only question in the man's mind was, Will he do it? hence the words, "If thou wilt, thou canst."
3. and touched him.—The touch of a leper rendered a person legally unclean, and put him to the inconvenience of a legal cleansing. That Jesus touched this man in healing him was therefore an additional proof of his compassion.
4. tell no man.—This is the first mention of a prohibition which we will meet with frequently as we proceed with Matthew's narrative. It is accounted for by the necessity of guarding against such undue excitement among the people as might have provoked an interference from the military authorities, and such as would have rendered the people incapable of calm thought in reference to the teachings of Jesus. (Comp. Mark 1:45.) Sometimes, as occasion required, he reversed his course, and commanded men to go and tell what he had done for them. (See Mark 5:19, 20.)
For other remarks on this miracle, see the parallel in Mark 1:44.
Healing a Centurion's Servant, 5-13. (Luke 8:1-10)
5. a centurion.—An officer of the Roman army, called a centurion from centum, a hundred, because he commanded one hundred men. This centurion was a foreigner (10), and was probably connected with a garrison which kept the town of Capernaum.
8. I am not worthy.—The centurion knew that it was considered unlawful for a Jew to go into the house of a Gentile, and that this was on account of the sanctity which they desired to maintain. Whatever he may have thought of this as regards the Pharisees, he attributed to Jesus so high a degree of sanctity that he thought the doctrine certainly true in reference to him.
9. under authority.—There is peculiar force in the expression under authority. If the centurion, who was under authority to his superior officers, could still say to those under him, "Go," and "Come," much more could Jesus, who appeared to be under no authority, command the powers of life and death to go and come at his bidding. The man reasoned well.
10. so great faith.—The greatness of his faith was shown partly in his belief that Jesus could heal the servant by a word without going into the house; but chiefly in his lofty conception of the dignity of Jesus as compared with himself. Men of no faith regard Jesus and his religion as unworthy of them; faith reverses the scales of judgment, and the greater one's faith in Jesus, the less his comparative estimate of himself—he goes down as Jesus goes up.
he marveled.—Jesus had all the feelings which are common to men, and consequently he was capable, like other men, of being astonished. If this seems to conflict with any theory concerning his nature, we should remember that it is one of the facts to be considered in forming our theory. The cause of astonishment was not merely the greatness of the man's faith, but that it was such faith as he had not found, "no, not in Israel." That an Israelite, educated under the law and the prophets, and prepared for the Lord by the preaching of John, should have ready faith in Jesus, was to be expected; but this man, with the greatest faith yet exhibited, was a Gentile, reared in hereditary heathenism. The remark of Jesus was a severe rebuke to the Jews. We may observe, incidentally, that the surprise of Jesus is inconsistent with the theory that he had himself, by a direct operation of the Spirit, wrought this great faith in the centurion; if he had he could not have marveled.
11. from the east and west.—This verse contains a prediction of the conversion of the Gentiles, and was very naturally suggested by the great faith of the Gentile centurion.
12. children of the kingdom.—The Jews were "children of the kingdom" in the sense that they were children and heirs of those to whom the kingdom was originally promised. To them it was first offered, and it was because they rejected it that they were to be "cast out into outer darkness." No doubt this prediction of Jesus was quite unwelcome to his hearers.
outer darkness.—The kingdom of heaven in which many Gentiles were to sit down with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob (verse 11), must be the kingdom in its final state of glory; for these patriarchs lived too soon to sit down in the earthly kingdom. The outer darkness, then, which is contrasted with it, and into which those are to be cast out who are not admitted into the kingdom, must represent the final punishment of the wicked. Weeping and gnashing of teeth are expressive of sorrow and of anguish.
13. as thou hast believed.—The centurion believed that Jesus could heal his servant by speaking the word without going into the house, and as he believed it came to pass; he returned into the house and found the servant well.
Cures at Peter's House, 8:14-17.
(Mark 1:29-34; Luke 4:38-41)
14. Peter's house,—Peter's home was originally in Bethsaida, which was a suburb of Capernaum, and it may still have been there at this time. (See John 1:45, and note on Mark 1:29.)
his wife's mother.—The text shows that Peter was a married man and keeping house, and that his mother-in-law was living with him. His brother Andrew also lived in the same house. What provision was made for his family when he left all to follow Jesus, we are not informed; but at a late period of apostolic history, he was still "leading about a sister wife." (1 Cor. 9:5.)
15. the fever left her.—The fever was so high that the patient was prostrated and bedfast; yet at the touch of Jesus "she arose and ministered to them," being instantly restored to both health and strength. It was impossible for the witnesses to doubt that the cure was miraculous.
16. When the even was come.—See note on Mark 1:32.
possessed with devils.—Properly, with demons. There is only one devil, and he is never designated in the Greek by the word (δαιμων) here translated devils. This term was applied by the Greeks to their inferior deities, some of whom were the offspring of the gods, and some the deified spirits of dead men. On this account Paul says that "The things which the Gentiles sacrifice, they sacrifice unto demons and not to God." (1 Cor. 10:20.) He also said to the Athenians, "I perceive that you are (δεισιδαιμονεστέρους) very much given to demon-worship." (Acts 17:22.) Some of the same Athenians had just concluded that Paul was himself a proclaimer of foreign demons (ξένων δαιμονιων), because he spoke of Jesus and the resurrection—that is, of Jesus as one who had died and risen again. (Acts 17:18.) Governed by the same conception, Festus, when he learned that the dispute between Paul and the Jews was about "one Jesus who was dead and whom Paul affirmed to be alive," concluded that it was a question about their (δεισιδαιμονίας) demon-worship. (Acts 25:19.) In the Jewish usage of the term it is applied exclusively to the departed spirits of wicked men. (See Josephus, Wars, B. VIII. ch. vi. § 3.) This usage was adopted by Jesus and the apostles, and consequently all that is said of demons in the New Testament agrees with it. In what way these wicked spirits gained possession of men; under what condition of mind or body a person was exposed to the possession; what degree of natural consciousness was still retained by the demoniac; and at what periods of history this strange phenomenon began and ended, are questions which remain as yet unanswered. That the phenomenon was, however, as it is represented on the sacred page, an actual possession of a person's faculties and powers by a foreign spirit, and not the mere effect of disease superstitiously regarded an demon-possession, is proved by the manner in which Jesus dealt with the demons, and by the superior intelligence which the demons displayed. (See the notes on 27:18; Mark 5:15-18; 7:32.) Similar diseases of the body, and mental aberrations similar to those produced by the demons, occurred then from natural causes, as they occur now; but all such examples are distinguished from demon-possession by the absence of marks of intelligence and will in the causes of the affliction.
17. took our infirmities.—Took away our infirmities and "bore our sicknesses," by healing them. The connection (16) shows that this is the meaning. This is not a literal quotation from Isaiah (Isa. 53:4), but it expresses, without exhausting the prophet's meaning. The prophet referred, not merely to the cure of bodily and mental diseases by Jesus, but also and chiefly to the final sufferings of Jesus by which our spiritual maladies may be healed.
Stilling the Tempest, 18-27.
(Mark 4:35-41; Luke 8:22-25; 9:57-62.)
18. saw great multitudes.—When the multitudes about Jesus became too great he withdrew from them for the same reason which led him to forbid certain persons to speak of his cures. (Comp. verse 4.) To cross the lake was an easy method of escape, and it was frequently adopted.
19, 20. I will follow thee.—The scribe who proposed this was a disciple (comp. 21), but not one of those whom Jesus had commanded to forsake all and follow him. He seems to have desired to go as a guest, but Jesus gently declines his company by telling him that, unlike the beasts and the birds, he has no place of shelter, and can not, therefore, entertain his friends. We thus incidentally learn that Jesus was now without a home, and that for food and lodging he was dependent on the hospitality of the people. We find him frequently eating by invitation in the houses of his enemies, but sleeping in those of his friends.
21, 22. another of the disciples.—This man was doubtless one of the twelve, and it has been conjectured with a good degree of probability that he was James or John, Zebedee being the father who was to be buried. Comp. 20:20, where Salome is called "the mother of Zebedee's children," instead of Zebedee's wife, implying that Zebedee was no longer living. In the answer of Jesus there is a play on the term dead. It was a man physically dead who was to be buried: but those who were to bury him were dead in another sense, in a sense in which the disciple was not dead; that is, they were dead to Jesus. Under ordinary circumstances it is proper for a disciple not only to assist in paying respect to the dead, but to be foremost in it; but the call on this disciple came into direct conflict with the command of Jesus, "Follow me;" and he was taught that even the most solemn and tender duties of social life must give way to a command of Jesus. The case is an extreme one, and on this account the lesson it teaches has greater emphasis. It should be noted, as partly illustrative of the case, that to assist at a funeral made a man unclean, and that not less than seven days were requisite for his purification. This would require a considerable delay on the part of the disciple. (See Num. 19:11-22.)
We have in this incident a striking exhibition of the extremes which met in Jesus. Here is authority as exacting as that of an eastern autocrat, combined with poverty as extreme as that of an eastern beggar. The poverty is confessed without a blush, and the authority is asserted without an apology. In any other than the Son of God these two extremes could not have met without the most ludicrous absurdity.
23, 24. he was asleep.—The deep sleep into which Jesus fell during the short voyage, a sleep so profound that the noise of the terrific storm and the rolling of the vessel failed to awake him, is accounted for by the fatigue and the nervous exhaustion consequent on his preaching to the great multitude. He was the only one asleep on the vessel.
25, 26. O ye of little faith.—The terror of the disciples would have been excusable but for the presence of Jesus. With him in the vessel it argued weakness of faith, because the many miracles which he had wrought should have convinced them that he had power over the winds and the waves. Notice, here, that fear and faith stand in opposition to each other.
27. the men marveled.—Their astonishment when Jesus calmed the tempest by his word is another evidence of weak faith. Had they realized the fullness of his divine power, they would have been surprised at nothing he did. It is well, however, that he adapted himself to the weakness of human faith, by working so great a variety of miracles as to leave even the weakest disciple no room to doubt that with him all things are possible.
Demons Cast Out, 28-34.
(Mark 5:1-20; Luke 8:26-40)
For comments on this miracle see the notes on Mark 5:1-20, where all the details here given are repeated, and others of importance are added.
The New Testament Commentary: Vol. I - Matthew and Mark.
A Leper Cleansed, 1-4. (Mark 1:40-45; Luke 5:12-16)
1. great multitudes.—The great multitudes that now followed Jesus are mentioned not only to show his popularity at this time, but also to emphasize the fact that the miracles about to be described were performed in the presence of many witnesses.
2. and worshiped him.—The Greek word rendered worship (προσκυνέω) is used both for the mere obeisance paid to a man of superior rank, and the supreme homage paid to God. Here it is used in the lower sense; for the leper, being a Jew, and having no adequate conception of the divinity of Jesus, would not pay to him the homage due to God.
if thou wilt.—Convinced by the previous miracles which he had either witnessed or heard of, that Jesus could make him clean, the only question in the man's mind was, Will he do it? hence the words, "If thou wilt, thou canst."
3. and touched him.—The touch of a leper rendered a person legally unclean, and put him to the inconvenience of a legal cleansing. That Jesus touched this man in healing him was therefore an additional proof of his compassion.
4. tell no man.—This is the first mention of a prohibition which we will meet with frequently as we proceed with Matthew's narrative. It is accounted for by the necessity of guarding against such undue excitement among the people as might have provoked an interference from the military authorities, and such as would have rendered the people incapable of calm thought in reference to the teachings of Jesus. (Comp. Mark 1:45.) Sometimes, as occasion required, he reversed his course, and commanded men to go and tell what he had done for them. (See Mark 5:19, 20.)
For other remarks on this miracle, see the parallel in Mark 1:44.
Healing a Centurion's Servant, 5-13. (Luke 8:1-10)
5. a centurion.—An officer of the Roman army, called a centurion from centum, a hundred, because he commanded one hundred men. This centurion was a foreigner (10), and was probably connected with a garrison which kept the town of Capernaum.
8. I am not worthy.—The centurion knew that it was considered unlawful for a Jew to go into the house of a Gentile, and that this was on account of the sanctity which they desired to maintain. Whatever he may have thought of this as regards the Pharisees, he attributed to Jesus so high a degree of sanctity that he thought the doctrine certainly true in reference to him.
9. under authority.—There is peculiar force in the expression under authority. If the centurion, who was under authority to his superior officers, could still say to those under him, "Go," and "Come," much more could Jesus, who appeared to be under no authority, command the powers of life and death to go and come at his bidding. The man reasoned well.
10. so great faith.—The greatness of his faith was shown partly in his belief that Jesus could heal the servant by a word without going into the house; but chiefly in his lofty conception of the dignity of Jesus as compared with himself. Men of no faith regard Jesus and his religion as unworthy of them; faith reverses the scales of judgment, and the greater one's faith in Jesus, the less his comparative estimate of himself—he goes down as Jesus goes up.
he marveled.—Jesus had all the feelings which are common to men, and consequently he was capable, like other men, of being astonished. If this seems to conflict with any theory concerning his nature, we should remember that it is one of the facts to be considered in forming our theory. The cause of astonishment was not merely the greatness of the man's faith, but that it was such faith as he had not found, "no, not in Israel." That an Israelite, educated under the law and the prophets, and prepared for the Lord by the preaching of John, should have ready faith in Jesus, was to be expected; but this man, with the greatest faith yet exhibited, was a Gentile, reared in hereditary heathenism. The remark of Jesus was a severe rebuke to the Jews. We may observe, incidentally, that the surprise of Jesus is inconsistent with the theory that he had himself, by a direct operation of the Spirit, wrought this great faith in the centurion; if he had he could not have marveled.
11. from the east and west.—This verse contains a prediction of the conversion of the Gentiles, and was very naturally suggested by the great faith of the Gentile centurion.
12. children of the kingdom.—The Jews were "children of the kingdom" in the sense that they were children and heirs of those to whom the kingdom was originally promised. To them it was first offered, and it was because they rejected it that they were to be "cast out into outer darkness." No doubt this prediction of Jesus was quite unwelcome to his hearers.
outer darkness.—The kingdom of heaven in which many Gentiles were to sit down with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob (verse 11), must be the kingdom in its final state of glory; for these patriarchs lived too soon to sit down in the earthly kingdom. The outer darkness, then, which is contrasted with it, and into which those are to be cast out who are not admitted into the kingdom, must represent the final punishment of the wicked. Weeping and gnashing of teeth are expressive of sorrow and of anguish.
13. as thou hast believed.—The centurion believed that Jesus could heal his servant by speaking the word without going into the house, and as he believed it came to pass; he returned into the house and found the servant well.
Cures at Peter's House, 8:14-17.
(Mark 1:29-34; Luke 4:38-41)
14. Peter's house,—Peter's home was originally in Bethsaida, which was a suburb of Capernaum, and it may still have been there at this time. (See John 1:45, and note on Mark 1:29.)
his wife's mother.—The text shows that Peter was a married man and keeping house, and that his mother-in-law was living with him. His brother Andrew also lived in the same house. What provision was made for his family when he left all to follow Jesus, we are not informed; but at a late period of apostolic history, he was still "leading about a sister wife." (1 Cor. 9:5.)
15. the fever left her.—The fever was so high that the patient was prostrated and bedfast; yet at the touch of Jesus "she arose and ministered to them," being instantly restored to both health and strength. It was impossible for the witnesses to doubt that the cure was miraculous.
16. When the even was come.—See note on Mark 1:32.
possessed with devils.—Properly, with demons. There is only one devil, and he is never designated in the Greek by the word (δαιμων) here translated devils. This term was applied by the Greeks to their inferior deities, some of whom were the offspring of the gods, and some the deified spirits of dead men. On this account Paul says that "The things which the Gentiles sacrifice, they sacrifice unto demons and not to God." (1 Cor. 10:20.) He also said to the Athenians, "I perceive that you are (δεισιδαιμονεστέρους) very much given to demon-worship." (Acts 17:22.) Some of the same Athenians had just concluded that Paul was himself a proclaimer of foreign demons (ξένων δαιμονιων), because he spoke of Jesus and the resurrection—that is, of Jesus as one who had died and risen again. (Acts 17:18.) Governed by the same conception, Festus, when he learned that the dispute between Paul and the Jews was about "one Jesus who was dead and whom Paul affirmed to be alive," concluded that it was a question about their (δεισιδαιμονίας) demon-worship. (Acts 25:19.) In the Jewish usage of the term it is applied exclusively to the departed spirits of wicked men. (See Josephus, Wars, B. VIII. ch. vi. § 3.) This usage was adopted by Jesus and the apostles, and consequently all that is said of demons in the New Testament agrees with it. In what way these wicked spirits gained possession of men; under what condition of mind or body a person was exposed to the possession; what degree of natural consciousness was still retained by the demoniac; and at what periods of history this strange phenomenon began and ended, are questions which remain as yet unanswered. That the phenomenon was, however, as it is represented on the sacred page, an actual possession of a person's faculties and powers by a foreign spirit, and not the mere effect of disease superstitiously regarded an demon-possession, is proved by the manner in which Jesus dealt with the demons, and by the superior intelligence which the demons displayed. (See the notes on 27:18; Mark 5:15-18; 7:32.) Similar diseases of the body, and mental aberrations similar to those produced by the demons, occurred then from natural causes, as they occur now; but all such examples are distinguished from demon-possession by the absence of marks of intelligence and will in the causes of the affliction.
17. took our infirmities.—Took away our infirmities and "bore our sicknesses," by healing them. The connection (16) shows that this is the meaning. This is not a literal quotation from Isaiah (Isa. 53:4), but it expresses, without exhausting the prophet's meaning. The prophet referred, not merely to the cure of bodily and mental diseases by Jesus, but also and chiefly to the final sufferings of Jesus by which our spiritual maladies may be healed.
Stilling the Tempest, 18-27.
(Mark 4:35-41; Luke 8:22-25; 9:57-62.)
18. saw great multitudes.—When the multitudes about Jesus became too great he withdrew from them for the same reason which led him to forbid certain persons to speak of his cures. (Comp. verse 4.) To cross the lake was an easy method of escape, and it was frequently adopted.
19, 20. I will follow thee.—The scribe who proposed this was a disciple (comp. 21), but not one of those whom Jesus had commanded to forsake all and follow him. He seems to have desired to go as a guest, but Jesus gently declines his company by telling him that, unlike the beasts and the birds, he has no place of shelter, and can not, therefore, entertain his friends. We thus incidentally learn that Jesus was now without a home, and that for food and lodging he was dependent on the hospitality of the people. We find him frequently eating by invitation in the houses of his enemies, but sleeping in those of his friends.
21, 22. another of the disciples.—This man was doubtless one of the twelve, and it has been conjectured with a good degree of probability that he was James or John, Zebedee being the father who was to be buried. Comp. 20:20, where Salome is called "the mother of Zebedee's children," instead of Zebedee's wife, implying that Zebedee was no longer living. In the answer of Jesus there is a play on the term dead. It was a man physically dead who was to be buried: but those who were to bury him were dead in another sense, in a sense in which the disciple was not dead; that is, they were dead to Jesus. Under ordinary circumstances it is proper for a disciple not only to assist in paying respect to the dead, but to be foremost in it; but the call on this disciple came into direct conflict with the command of Jesus, "Follow me;" and he was taught that even the most solemn and tender duties of social life must give way to a command of Jesus. The case is an extreme one, and on this account the lesson it teaches has greater emphasis. It should be noted, as partly illustrative of the case, that to assist at a funeral made a man unclean, and that not less than seven days were requisite for his purification. This would require a considerable delay on the part of the disciple. (See Num. 19:11-22.)
We have in this incident a striking exhibition of the extremes which met in Jesus. Here is authority as exacting as that of an eastern autocrat, combined with poverty as extreme as that of an eastern beggar. The poverty is confessed without a blush, and the authority is asserted without an apology. In any other than the Son of God these two extremes could not have met without the most ludicrous absurdity.
23, 24. he was asleep.—The deep sleep into which Jesus fell during the short voyage, a sleep so profound that the noise of the terrific storm and the rolling of the vessel failed to awake him, is accounted for by the fatigue and the nervous exhaustion consequent on his preaching to the great multitude. He was the only one asleep on the vessel.
25, 26. O ye of little faith.—The terror of the disciples would have been excusable but for the presence of Jesus. With him in the vessel it argued weakness of faith, because the many miracles which he had wrought should have convinced them that he had power over the winds and the waves. Notice, here, that fear and faith stand in opposition to each other.
27. the men marveled.—Their astonishment when Jesus calmed the tempest by his word is another evidence of weak faith. Had they realized the fullness of his divine power, they would have been surprised at nothing he did. It is well, however, that he adapted himself to the weakness of human faith, by working so great a variety of miracles as to leave even the weakest disciple no room to doubt that with him all things are possible.
Demons Cast Out, 28-34.
(Mark 5:1-20; Luke 8:26-40)
For comments on this miracle see the notes on Mark 5:1-20, where all the details here given are repeated, and others of importance are added.
The New Testament Commentary: Vol. I - Matthew and Mark.