Matthew Chapter 3 verse 9 Holy Bible

Pulpit Commentary

Pulpit CommentaryVerse 9. - And. An additional warning against any false feeling of security based on natural privileges. As this feeling was common to all Jews, the reference to the larger audience (ver. 7, note) was probably begun here. Think not to say. Not do not think, consider, with a view to saying; but do not think it right to say, do not be of opinion you may say (Luke 3:8, "Begin not to say ). St. Luke deprecates the commencement of such an utterance in their heart; S t. Matthew denies its justice. Within yourselves; cf. Esther 4:13 (Hebrew). We have Abraham to our father. As it was recognized on all hands that the promise of blessing was made to Abraham and his seed, it is no wonder that many Jews presumed upon their descent from him, "sup, posing,", as Justin Martyr says ('Trypho,' § 140.), that the everlasting kingdom will assuredly be given to those who are of the seed of Abraham according to the flesh, although they be sinners and unbelieving and disobedient towards God." In later times, when the doctrine of merit was more fully established, God could be represented as saying to Abraham, "If thy children were like dead bodies without sinews or bones, thy merit would avail for them" ('Ber. Rabb.,' on Genesis 10:5:11. § 44, middle). In John's words, on the contrary, we have the germ of the doctrine afterwards Brought out by St. Paul (e.g. Galatians 3:9, 29), that not natural descent, but spiritual relationship by faith, leads to inheriting the promises. The argument in John 8:39, etc., is closely akin to that presented here. In both passages the Jews lay stress on their origin from Abraham; in both the answer is that morally they are sprung from a very different source (supra, ver. 7, note). But in John 8. the Jews are thinking chiefly of their present state, of not being as sinful as Jesus makes them out to be, while here they are thinking more of the future, that they have no need to take trouble, because promises for the future belong to them. Hence, perhaps, the exact expression (contrast John 8:33), "We have Abraham as father," which brings out the protecting influence of Abraham as still available. For I say unto you (λέγω γὰρ ὑμῖν). The solemnity of the phrase (Matthew 6:25, 29; Matthew 8:11; Matthew 11:9) lies in the self-consciousness which it implies. The absence of the ἐγώ shows that the speaker has no desire to bring out his own personality (contrast Matthew 5:22, etc.), but the message only. That God. Not "the LORD," because (1) the thought is of power rather than of covenant relationship; (2) he is about to speak of others than members of the covenant nation. Is able of these stones. These; apodeictic (Matthew 4:3). Some have thought that by these stones John directly means certain Gentiles who were standing near; but it is much mere likely that he points to the literal stones at his feet, and with strong hyperbole says that he who once raised up offspring as the stars for multitude from persons as good as dead (Romans 4:19), and who had originally made man of the dust of the earth, can (δύναται), with both physical power and moral right, raise out of the very rawest material a new Israel (cf. Romans 4:17; 1 Corinthians 1:28, "the things that are not"). Raise up. The verb employed (ἐγείρω) is, as it seems, not used in the LXX. with reference to natural generation, but ἀνίστημι (cf. Genesis 38:8, ἐξανίστημι; Genesis 4:25; Genesis 19:32; cf. also Matthew 22:24). It is, however, very suitable here, for while ἀνίστημι regards future worth, ἐγείρω specially contrasts a later with an earlier state (e.g. sleep) - in this case the nature of children with the insensibility of stones. Children. The new Israel would possess, not merely Abraham's privileges, but his nature and character (τέκνα), in which you to whom I now speak are so deficient.

Ellicott's Commentary

Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers(9) We have Abraham to (better, as) our father.--The boast seems to have been common, as in John 8:33-39, and was connected with the belief that this alone, or taken together with the confession of the creed of Israel "the Lord our God is one Lord" (Deuteronomy 6:4), would be enough to ensure for every Jew an admission into Paradise. The "bosom" of Abraham was wide enough to receive all his children. "We have Abraham as our father" was to the Jew all and more than all that "civis Romanus sum" was to the Romans.Of these stones.--The words were obviously dramatised by gesture, pointing to the pebbles on the banks of the Jordan. In their spiritual application, they are remarkable as containing the germs of all the teaching of our Lord, and of St. Paul, and of St. John, as to the calling of the Gentiles, and the universality of God's kingdom.