(3) He "sanctified water to the mystical washing away of sin." See the Baptismal Office;

(4) He gave to His Church for all time a striking revelation of the Divine Nature, the Son submitting in all lowliness to every requirement of the Law, the Father approving by a voice from heaven, the Spirit descending and abiding upon the Son. "I ad Jordanem et videbis Trinitatem." S. Aug.

ÉK Tŵν оúρaνwν, out of the heavens.

(Rev. Vers.)

ἀγαπητός. Comp. the words of the Angel to Abraham λάβε τὸν υἱόν σου τὸν ἀγαπητόν (Gen. xxii. 2), and Mark xii. 6 ἔτι ἕνα εἶχεν υἱὸν dyannτóv. In the Gospels the word is always used in reference to Christ as the beloved Son of God. "Ayaπnrós, Unicus, qui amorem Patris non cum alio partitur." Bengel. Here it is closely related to μovoyevns, Comp. John i. 14-18, iii. 16-18, in which Gospel it is not found. Comp. Hom. Od. 11. 365 μoûvos ¿wv åyatnтós, and Od. Iv. 817, Il. vi. 401 where аîs ȧyаπηròs without μoûvos designates an only son. "The mission of the Son is the revelation of the Father's love; for as He is the μovoyevns, the Father's love is perfectly represented in Him, (See 1 John iv. 9), Lightfoot on Col. i. 13.

év σol eúdóknσa, in Te complacui, Vulg., in Thee I am well pleased. Evdokeiv, a late word not found in Attic writers, is used in three constructions: (i) with an infinitive="to be pleased" "to resolve," Rom. xv. 26, εὐδόκησαν γὰρ Μακεδονία καὶ ̓Αχαία.... ποιήσασθαι, Gal. i. 15, ὅτε δὲ εὐδόκησεν ὁ Θεος......ἀποκαλύψαι; (ii) with an accusative="to be pleased with, to take delight in" Matt. xii. 18 (NB), ò ảɣaπηтòS ÖV εὐδόκησεν ἡ ψυχή μου; Heb. x. 6, ὁλοκαυτώματα οὐκ εὐδόκησας ; Χ. 8, θυσίαν......οὐκ ἠθέλησας οὐδὲ εὐδόκησας, (iii) with eis and accusative 2 Pet. i. 17, eis öv éyw evdóknoa; ore and a dative="to be pleased in," to "have one's pleasure fully satisfied in;" 2 Cor. xii. 10, diò εὐδοκῶ ἐν ἀσθενείαις ; 1 Cor. x. 5, οὐκ ἐν τοῖς πλείοσιν, αὐτῶν εὐδόκησεν o Oéos. "Ev, in maxime notat objectum, deinde etiam causam. Objectum bene placiti paterni est Filius per sese, et in Filio omnes et omnia." Bengel.

12, 13. THE TEMPTATION. Matt. iv. 1-11. Luke iv. 1--13.

12. Kal evlús. See above, v. 10. The object of the Saviour's first Advent was "to destroy the works of the devil" (1 John iii. 8). His very first work, therefore, was to enter on a conflict with the great Enemy of mankind.

ékẞádλa, driveth Him forth. This is a stronger word than that employed by St Matthew, who says ȧvnxon (Matt. iv. 1) or by St Luke, who says ἤγετο ἐν τῷ Πνεύματι (Luke iv. 1). It denotes the Divine impulse of the Holy Ghost, which constrained Him to go forth to the encounter, and hints at a rapid translation, such as that by which Prophets (comp. 1 Kings xviii. 12; 2 Kings ii. 16; Ezek. viii. 3), and Evangelists (Comp. Acts viii. 39) were caught up and carried to a

distance. The words employed by all the Synoptists are too expressive to describe a dream, they clearly point to an actual scene.

Els Tηv nov. Either the wilderness of Judæa, or the lonely desert mountains east of the Jordan. The traditional site is the mountain Quarantania, "a high and precipitous wall of rock, twelve or fifteen hundred feet above the plain west of the Jordan near Jericho." The side facing the plain is as perpendicular and apparently as high as the Rock of Gibraltar, and upon the summit are still visible the ruins of an ancient convent. Midway below are caverns hewn in the perpendicular rock, where hermits formerly retired to fast and pray in imitation of the "Forty Days." Robinson's Palestine, 1. 567; Thomson's Land and Book, 617; Tristram, pp. 208, 209.

13. Telpalóμevos. St Mark compresses the history by omitting the various forms of the Temptation. Peculiar to his account are (i) the use of "Satan" instead of the Devil; (ii) the statement that our Lord was "with the wild beasts." The Evil One seems to have been permitted to tempt Him during the whole of the forty days, but at the end of that period to have assailed Him with increased intensity through every avenue that would allure, as afterwards in Gethsemane through every channel that could terrify and appal (Luke iv. 13).

ÚTTÒ TOû σATAνâ, et temptabatur a Satana, Vulg. The imperfect implies the continuance of the temptation. The Hebrew word "Satan," of which diáßolos is a Greek rendering, is "one who meets or "opposes, an adversary." It occurs several times in the Synoptists, but only once in St John xiii. 27, εἰσῆλθεν εἰς ἐκεῖνον ὁ σατανᾶς.

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μETÀ TŵV Onplwv. These in our Lord's time might include the bear, the panther, the wolf, the hyena, possibly the lion. "The implied thought is partly that their presence added to the terrors of the Temptation, partly that in His being protected from them, unhurt by them as Adam in Paradise, was the fulfilment of the promise in the very Psalm which furnished the Tempter with his chief weapon, that the true child of God should trample underfoot "the lion and adder," the "young lion and the dragon" (Ps. xci. 13; Luke x. 19)."

οἱ ἄγγελοι. St Matthew records the ministry of Angels at the close as to a Heavenly Prince (Matt. iv. 11). St Mark records a ministry of the same celestial visitants apparently throughout the trial.

Sinkóvovv from diakovéw strictly means "to serve at table," to "minister food." Ministrabant illi, Vulg. Comp. Matt. xx. 28; Luke iv. 39; Acts vi. 2.

14, 15. BEGINNING OF OUR LORD'S MINISTRY.

Matt. iv. (12), 17. Luke iv. 14, 15.

Between the events just described and those on which the Evangelist now enters, must be placed several recorded chiefly by St John; viz., (1) the testimony of the Baptist to Christ as the Lamb of God (John i.

3

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ρασαν ἀρώματα, ἵνα ἐλθοῦσαι ἀλείψωσιν αὐτόν. 3 καὶ λίαν πρωὶ τῇ μιᾷ τῶν σαββάτων ἔρχονται ἐπὶ τὸ μνημεῖον, ἀνατείλαντος τοῦ ἡλίου. * καὶ ἔλεγον πρὸς ἑαυτάς, Τίς αποκυλίσει ἡμῖν τὸν λίθον ἐκ τῆς θύρας τοῦ μνημείου ; 4 καὶ ἀναβλέψασαι θεωροῦσιν ὅτι ἀνακεκύλισται ὁ λίθος· ἦν γὰρ μέγας σφόδρα. 5 καὶ εἰσελθοῦσαι εἰς τὸ μνημεῖον εἶδον νεανίσκον καθήμενον ἐν τοῖς δεξιοῖς περιβεβλημένον στολὴν λευκήν, καὶ ἐξεθαμβήθησαν. * ὁ δὲ λέγει αὐταῖς, Μὴ ἐκθαμβεῖσθε. Ἰησοῦν ζητεῖτε τὸν Ναζαρηνὸν τὸν ἐσταυρωμένον· ἠγέρθη, οὐκ ἔστιν ὧδε· ἴδε ὁ τόπος ὅπου ἔθηκαν αὐτόν. * ἀλλὰ ὑπάγετε εἴπατε τοῖς μαθηταῖς αὐτοῦ καὶ τῷ Πέτρῳ ὅτι Προάγει ὑμᾶς εἰς τὴν Γαλιλαίαν· ἐκεῖ αὐτὸν ὄψεσθε, καθὼς εἶπεν ὑμῖν. ° καὶ ἐξελθοῦσαι ἔφυγον ἀπὸ τοῦ μνημείου· εἶχεν γὰρ αὐτὰς τρόμος καὶ ἔκστασις, καὶ οὐδενὶ οὐδὲν εἶπον· ἐφοβοῦντο γάρ.

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• Αναστὰς δὲ πρωΐ πρώτῃ σαββάτου ἐφάνη πρῶτον Μαρίᾳ τῇ Μαγδαληνῇ, ἀφ ̓ ἧς ἐκβεβλήκει ἑπτὰ δαιμόνια. 10 ἐκείνη πορευθεῖσα ἀπήγγειλεν τοῖς μετ ̓ αὐτοῦ γενομένοις, πενθοῦσιν καὶ κλαίουσιν. 11 κἀκεῖνοι ἀκούσαντες ὅτι ζῇ καὶ ἐθεάθη ὑπ' αὐτῆς ἠπίστησαν.

12 Μετὰ δὲ ταῦτα δυσὶν ἐξ αὐτῶν περιπατοῦσιν ἐφανερώθη ἐν ἑτέρα μορφῇ, πορευομένοις εἰς ἀγρόν. 13 κἀκεῖνοι ἀπελθόντες ἀπήγγειλαν τοῖς λοιποῖς· οὐδὲ ἐκείνοις ἐπίστευσαν.

Ύστερον ἀνακειμένοις αὐτοῖς τοῖς ἕνδεκα ἐφανερώθη, καὶ ὠνείδισεν τὴν ἀπιστίαν αὐτῶν καὶ σκληροκαρδίαν, ὅτι τοῖς θεασαμένοις αὐτὸν ἐγηγερμένον οὐκ ἐπίστευσαν. 15 καὶ εἶπεν αὐτοῖς, Πορευθέντες εἰς τὸν κόσμον ἅπαντα κηρύξατε τὸ εὐαγγέλιον πάσῃ τῇ κτίσει, 18 ὁ πιστεύσας καὶ βαπτισθεὶς σωθήσεται, ὁ δὲ

ἀπιστήσας κατακριθήσεται.

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σημεῖα δὲ τοῖς πιστεύ σασιν ταῦτα παρακολουθήσει· ἐν τῷ ὀνόματί μου δαιμόνια ἐκβαλοῦσιν, γλώσσαις λαλήσουσιν καιναῖς, ὄφεις ἀροῦσιν, κἂν θανάσιμόν τι πίωσιν οὐ μὴ αὐτοὺς βλάψῃ, ἐπὶ ἀρρώστους χεῖρας ἐπιθήσουσιν καὶ καλῶς ἕξουσιν.

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ὁ μὲν οὖν κύριος μετὰ τὸ λαλῆσαι αὐτοῖς ἀνε λήμφθη εἰς τὸν οὐρανὸν καὶ ἐκάθισεν ἐκ δεξιῶν τοῦ θεοῦ· 30 ἐκεῖνοι δὲ ἐξελθόντες ἐκήρυξαν πανταχοῦ, τοῦ κυρίου συνεργοῦντος καὶ τὸν λόγον βεβαιοῦντος διὰ τῶν ἐπακολουθούντων σημείων.

THE

1-8. THE PREACHING AND BAPTISM OF JOHN.

Matt. iii. 1-10. Luke iii. 1—14.

1. άpxn. St Mark commences his Gospel suddenly and concisely. He does not begin with a genealogy of our Lord like St Matthew, or with the Infancy, like St Luke, or with the doctrine of the Eternal Word, as St John. His object is to pourtray the Saviour in the fulness of His living energy, and to describe His official life and ministry. He therefore begins with His baptism, and first relates, as introductory to it, the preaching of John the Baptist.

τοῦ εὐαγγελίου. The meaning of εὐαγγέλιον (i) in Homer is reward for good news, Comp. Od. xiv. 152 and 166. Comp. Aristoph. Eq. 656 εὐαγγέλια θύειν “ to sacrifice for good news”; 667 εὐαγγέλια στεφανοῦν “το crown for good news"; (ii) in later Greek, Plut., Lucian, Appian, good tidings. The LXX. use it in the first sense in 2 Sam. iv. 10 ♣ ědei μe doûvai evayyéria, and 2 Sam. xviii. 22, where it is also = reward

for a good message, and in the third sense, as 2 Sam. xviii. 25, 4 Kings vii. 9. It was familiar to the Romans, comp. Cic. ad Att. ii. 3 "Primum ut opinor evayyeλía. Valerius absolutus est." In the N. T. it denotes good news, and always with a special significance,=the news of the actually fulfilled promise of salvation, the news of salvation, comp. Acts xiii. 32, Eph. iii. 6, vi. 19, Gal. ii. 5, 14. It occurs four times in St Matt., eight times in St Mark, but is not found in St Luke or St John's Gospel. Once it is found in the Apocalypse xiv. 6 exovтα evayyeλiov aluviov, and once in 1 St Peter iv. 17, while in the Epistles of St Paul it occurs sixty-one times, and thus to him is due its prominence in the Christian vocabulary.

υἱοῦ θεοῦ. Contrast the expression with St Matt. i. 1 vioû Aaveid vioû 'Aẞpaáμ. The first Evangelist writes for Jews, the second for Gentiles, and dwells specially upon all manifestations of the Son of God in His widest sphere of action, in His relations to Hebrews and Gentiles.

2. ἐν τῷ Ἡσαΐᾳ τῷ προφήτῃ. This is the better reading than the Ev Tоîs πроPÝTαιs of the Textus Receptus. The citation is from two prophets, (i) Mal. iii. 1, (ii) Is. xl. 3. With one exception, and that a very doubtful one as to its genuineness (ch. xv. 28), this is the only quotation from a prophet made by the Evangelist himself in this Gospel.

κατασκευάσει τὴν ὁδόν σου. The imagery is taken from the great strategical works of eastern conquerors, who were wont to send a herald before them to call the people of the countries through which they passed to prepare for their coming.

εὐθείας ποιεῖτε τὰς τρίβους αὐτοῦ. On such an occasion to make a "king's highway," valleys had to be filled, hills levelled, bye-paths straightened.

4. éyéveto 'Iwávvns, John came, who baptized in the wilderness. The Article is to be inserted here, as in Rev. Vers.