Matthew 3

CHAPTER III

III

Christ’s Forerunner and Anointing, Chapter 3

Christ’s Forerunner and His Work, 3:1–12

The reason that Matthew proceeds from the childhood of Jesus to John the Baptist and the opening of Jesus’ ministry is the fact that the intervening time offered nothing for Matthew’s purpose: to present Jesus to Jewish readers as the Messiah. All that this span of years affords is covered by the brief record in Luke 2:41–52. No tradition regarding this period was in existence. In spite of all his searching Luke found nothing to report save the incident that occurred when Jesus was twelve years old, and, much like Matthew, he at once passes on to the work of the Baptist.

Matthew 3:1

1 Now in these days conies forward John the Baptist, acting as a herald in the wilderness of Judea, saying, Be repenting! for the kingdom of the heavens has come near. The critics find some strange things in the phrase “in those days,” which need not be refuted here. Matthew writes in Old Testament style (Exod. 2:11) and by “those” connects our thoughts with his previous narratives and their remarkable character. The view that Matthew copied the phrase from Mark 1:9 is answered by the difference in the connections. Matthew is content with this broad reference, whereas. Luke specifies the time as being the fifteenth year of the reign of Tiberius, thus when Jesus was about twenty-nine years old.

The historical present παραγίνεται (R. 868) lends a touch of vividness: “comes forth,” tritt auf, in order to begin his great work. Matthew’s interest is centered in the preaching and the work of the Baptist, so he omits the details regarding his parentage and his early days. This “John” (“Yahweh has been gracious”) is identified by his usual appellation, “the Baptist,” even Josephus, writing, “John, called the Baptizer.”

His work of baptizing is already brought out in his name and is then mentioned in its proper connection in v. 6. While baptizing was distinctive of John and thus gave him the added name, his work in general was that of a prophet, more specifically of a herald, sent by God to the nation. That is why Matthew at once adds κηρύσσων, “acting as a κῆρυξ or a herald,” as one who with a loud voice announces what his superior has ordered him to announce. When we translate this Greek word “preaching,” the original meaning of the verb must be retained. Preaching, in the Biblical sense, is merely to announce clearly and distinctly exactly what God orders us to announce in his Word. We dare not change that message by alteration, by omission, or by addition.

The preacher is not to utter his own eloquent wisdom but is to confine himself to the foolishness and the skandalon of the gospel. The announcement the Baptist was to make was quite specific and limited as we shall see; and he attempted no more than this. “In the wilderness of Judea” only in a general way indicates the locality of the Baptist’s activity, in this respect resembling the opening phrase “in those days.” From v. 6 we see that the valley of the Jordan is referred to and specifically its lower end which borders on Judea. The Fourth Gospel states that the Baptist’s first work was done “in Bethabara beyond Jordan” (i.e., “in Bethany,” the correct reading.) The most probable site is the northern ford near Succoth, the same by which Jacob crossed over from Mahanaim. This region is called desert because it has never been inhabited, except later by ascetics like the Essenes and the hermits who sought seclusion there. With the feminine adjective τῇἐρήμῳ supply χώρᾳ, “the desert place.”

John worked in obedience to an immediate call from God; in this respect he was like the prophets of old; compare Luke 3:2, “the word of God came” to him. His preaching and his work were divinely directed by immediate revelation. Moreover, John was born as a member of the Jewish tribe to whom priestly functions belonged, and thus no Jew questioned his authority to perform such functions, i.e., to teach and to administer religious rites. He did not choose this desert country on his own accord but was directed by God. The Ghor or ravine through which the Jordan flows is dense with wild growth but because of the excessive heat unfit for ordinary habitation; and the adjacent upland, whether level or rugged, is also undesirable “wilderness.” This wild region was chosen for the Baptist’s work by God because it symbolized and pictured the spiritual state of the nation now being called to repentance in such an unusual and dramatic way. It called to mind the desert wanderings of Israel for forty years when their unbelief had shut them out of the promised land for so long a time.

Matthew 3:2

2 Matthew presents only the essentials which the Baptist announced. In μετανοεῖτε, “be repenting,” we are introduced to one of the most important words in the New Testament, the Hebrew nicham, “repent by changing the mind,” and schub, “to turn” or to be converted. Μετανοεῖν originally means: “to perceive or see afterward” (μετά), i.e., when it is too late; “to change one’s mind” and thus “to regret” and “to repent.” The Scriptural use of the term added a spiritual depth that is far beyond the thought of secular writers. The word at once signified that religious change of the heart which turns from sin and guilt to cleansing and forgiveness by God’s grace. The linguistic difference between μετανοεῖν and its synonym ἐπιστρέφειν is that the former looks both backward toward the regretted sin and forward to the accepted pardon, while the latter looks rather to the grace received. The present tense, “be repenting,” indicates a state or condition, one befitting the day of the Messiah, thus a life lived in repentance. The assertion that on the Baptist’s lips the call to repent meant less than it later signified on the lips of the apostles, in particular that it did not include faith in the Messiah, is answered by John 1:8: “The same came for a witness to the Light, that all men through him might believe”; by Luke 3:18, where the Baptist’s preaching is called εὐαγγελίζεσθαι, “to preach the gospel”; and by the fruits of this repentance, which are such as only faith in the Redeemer and forgiveness of sins can produce.

The Baptist has been regarded as belonging to the Old Testament prophets. But Mark 1:1, etc., characterizes his work as belonging to the ἀρχὴτοῦεὐαγγελίου, “the beginning of the gospel of Jesus Christ.” In the Smalcald Articles Luther calls the Baptist “the fiery angel St. John, the true preacher of repentance,” Concordia Triglotta, 487, 30. At times “repentance” and “to repent” are used with reference to contrition alone, and again with reference to contrition plus faith, i.e., conversion in its entirety. For the latter use compare Mark 1:15; Acts 20:21; Luke 24:46, 47, where the wider sense of the term is indicated; and for the former, Luke 13:5; 15:7; and our present passage, where the narrower sense is in place. The latter is well described in Concordia Triglotta, 259, 29 and 35.

The reason for repentance is: “for the kingdom of the heavens has come near,” the perfect tense ἤγγικεν (ἐγγίζω) is durative-punctiliar (R. 895): has been drawing near and is thus now at hand. Matthew alone writes ἡβασιλείατῶνοὐρανῶν, and he does so at least 32 times; the others write ἡβασιλείατοῦΘεοῦ, which is found only a few times in Matthew’s Gospel. The distinction is merely formal; one and the same kingdom is referred to. Both genitives may be considered genitives of possession: the kingdom which belongs to the heavens, belongs to God. But it is difficult to keep the qualitative idea out of the former: the kingdom whose very nature is that of heaven; and the subjective idea out of the latter: the kingdom that God rules. The plural “of the heavens” is a translation of the Hebrew schamayim, a usage that is natural for Matthew.

It is used both in the Greek and in the English besides the singular: “the heavens”—“heaven.” There is no need to bring in the seven heavens to explain this plural. We may very well think of Daniel 2:44, and 7:14, to gain a proper conception of what the Baptist had in mind.

This grand Biblical concept cannot be defined by generalizing from conditions obtaining in the kingdoms of the earth. These are only imperfect shadows of God’s kingdom. God makes his own kingdom, and only where he is with his power and his grace his kingdom is found; earthly kingdoms, which are many and various, make their kings, often also unmake them, and their kings are nothing apart from what their kingdoms may make them. So also we are not really subjects in God’s kingdom but partakers of it, i.e., of God’s rule and kingship; earthly kingdoms have only subjects. In God’s kingdom we already now bear the title “kings unto God,” and eventually the kingdom, raised to the nth degree, shall consist of nothing but kings in glorious array, each with his crown, and Christ thus “the King of kings,” a kingdom made up entirely of kings with no subjects at all.

This divine kingdom goes back to the beginning and rules the world and shall so rule until the consummation at the end of time. All that is in the world, even every hostile force, is subservient to the plans of God. The children and sons of God, as heirs of the kingdom, in whom God’s grace is displayed, constitute the kingdom in its specific sense. The kingdom is in them. This kingdom is divided by the coming of Christ, the King, in the flesh to effect the redemption of grace by which this specific kingdom is really established among men. Hence we have the kingdom before Christ, looking toward his coming, and the kingdom after Christ, looking back to his coming—the promise and the fulfillment to be followed by the consummation—the kingdom as it was in Israel, as it now is in the Christian Church, the Una Sancta in all the world, and as it will be at the end forever.

With this understanding of the kingdom, that where the King is and rules with his power and his grace there the kingdom is to be found, we see what the Baptist means when he says, “the kingdom has come near.” Jesus was approaching, and by the revelation of himself with power and grace as the Messiah and by the completion of his redemptive work he would stand forth as the King of salvation from heaven and would by faith enter into the hearts of men, making them partakers of his kingdom. Thus γάρ is justified. Since the kingdom is so near in Christ, the King, all men should long to receive this kingdom. The one and only way to do this is to repent, to turn from sin, self-righteousness, and worldly security by the power of grace in the Baptist’s Word and Sacrament to the King and his kingdom with its pardon, peace, and joy.

Matthew 3:3

3 For this is the one spoken of through Isaiah, the prophet, saying,

A voice of one shouting in the desert,

Make ready the way of the Lord,

Make straight his paths!

“For” explains the presence of the Baptist at this time and his message concerning the kingdom and his call to repentance. God sent him with this message and call in fulfillment of the prophecy spoken by God “through Isaiah, the prophet,” some 700 years earlier. “The voice” spoken of in Isa. 40:3–5 is not only a type of the Baptist. Matthew says that it is more; so does the Baptist himself in John 1:19–24, “I am the voice of one crying in the wilderness,” etc.; so does Jesus in Matt. 11:10, “This is he of whom it is written,” etc. The restoration of their homeland to the Jews after the Babylonian captivity was only a minor part of God’s grace to them; the fullest measure of that grace did not appear until the Messiah came, and with that full measure Isaiah comforted his people long in advance of the arrival of the blessed day. That day had now at last come. Οὗτος takes up all that Matthew says about the Baptist in the two verses preceding. The passive ὁῥηθείς points to Yahweh as the speaker, and διά to the prophet as the human instrument he used. Here is the Biblical doctrine of divine inspiration in a nutshell: see the exposition of 1:22.

Matthew’s quotation agrees with both the Hebrew and the LXX, except that in the former the parallelism of the poetic lines requires that we construe, “in the wilderness prepare,” while Matthew has, “one shouting in the desert” or wilderness. Since both the voice and the preparation are found in the desert, the difference is immaterial. The poetic lines are highly dramatic, they are like a tableau: “Voice of a crier!” qol qore’ (status constructus); the two words in the Hebrew, as well as in Matthew, are like an exclamation. Delitzsch writes: “The person disappears in the glory of his calling, receding before the contents of his cry. The cry sounds like the long drawn-out trumpet blast of a herald.” In the same dramatic way we are placed out “in the wilderness.” When commentators on Isaiah explain the imagery here used as being derived from the Lord’s coming to Egypt through the Arabian (southern) desert to bring his people into Canaan, they do what is unnecessary; for there was also a great stretch of desert between Babylon, where Israel was held in exile, and their homeland, Palestine. This desert, however, is used figuratively by Isaiah; it denotes the hindrances and obstacles which separate the people from Jehovah.

Hence a road must be prepared through them on which Jehovah may come to his people to deliver them. Though Babylon is inhabited, it is a heathen land and is thus pictured as a desert or wilderness in which Jehovah’s people were lost. All this was symbolized by the Baptist who was ordered to shout in the literal wilderness near the Jordan.

Once the moral and the spiritual import of the prophet’s imagery is perceived, the shouting of the voice, namely the Baptist’s call to prepare the Lord’s way, will also be understood. The wilderness with its obstructions is found in the hearts of the people; here the Lord’s way is to be prepared. In Isa. 40:3, 4 mountains and hills are to be levelled, etc. To make a way through them is a task that is utterly beyond human power. That is exactly the impression to be made on the readers and hearers. Strictly speaking, only the Lord himself can construct a way through such obstacles.

When, nevertheless, he orders us to build this way, the obvious sense is that we can do it only by the power of grace which the Lord himself bestows. That is why the Baptist cried, “Repent!” Impenitence raises the mountains of obstruction; repentance opens the way for the Lord. And true repentance is wrought by the Lord’s own law and gospel in which his power and grace are active. “Make ready the way of the Lord!” Luther writes: “Such preparation is spiritual, it consists in the deep conviction and confession that you are unfit, a sinner, poor, damned, and miserable with all the works you are able to do. Where this conviction is wrought, the heart will be opened for the Lord’s entrance with his forgiveness and gifts.”

Matthew 3:4

4 The man thus described with his message and with his prophetic connection is now presented in his personal appearance and mode of life. Now this John had his garment of camel’s hair, and a leather girdle around his waist; and his nourishment was locusts and wild honey. We must regard αὐτός as being merely demonstrative: “this John” (R. 686), pointing to all that has already been said about him; and not as being intensive: “John himself,” since no contrast is apparent. Living and working in the wilderness, he dressed and ate accordingly. The two imperfect tenses picture the man. His very appearance was a stern sermon.

It was a call to all those who made food and drink, house and raiment their chief concern in life to turn from such vanity and to provide far more essential things. He was a living illustration of how little man really needs here below—something we are prone to forget. And by drawing people out into the wilderness John made them share a bit of his own austere life. Men left their mansions, offices, shops, their usual round of life, and for a time at least gave their thoughts to higher things. Yet we need not overdraw as artists do when they picture the Baptist clothed in a camel’s skin; he had an ἔνδυμα, a long, loose garment, woven, as the ἀπό phrase shows, out of “camel’s hair,” and thus coarse and rough in texture like the garments of the very poor. With this rough robe there naturally went a girdle to hold it at the waist, ὀσφύς, for which Greek word we use the plural “loins.” The girdle kept the robe from flapping open and made it possible to tuck it up when walking.

Made of leather, it, too, was cheap. We may take it that this enduma was John’s only garment. No sandals are mentioned.

From Zech. 13:4 we see that “a rough garment” or “a garment of hair” was the customary dress of a prophet and was used even by false prophets in order to deceive. In 2 Kings 1:8 King Ahaziah recognizes Elijah when this prophet is described to him as “an hairy man and girt with a girdle of leather about his loins.” Since Elijah prefigured the Baptist in his stern preaching of repentance (Mal. 4:5; Matt. 11:4; Mark 9:11, 12; Luke 1:17), this similarity of dress cannot be accidental. In this very wilderness Elijah made his last appearance.

Four varieties of locusts were allowed as food, Lev. 11:22. They are still eaten by the poor and in times of famine, being abundant in the spring and often coming in great swarms. The wings and the legs were torn off, the bodies were dried, or roasted, or ground up and baked, seasoned with salt, and could be kept for some time. Palestine was famed for its wild bees and honey, which are found especially in the wilder regions. The adjective ἄγριον with μέλι prevents us from thinking of some sweet substance prepared by men, or of sweet exudations from leaves. The abundant natural wild honey is referred to.

The Baptist’s mode of life marks him as a Nazarite (Luke 1:15), and until the time of his preaching he must have lived like a hermit (Luke 1:80). In this respect he was the antithesis of Jesus (Matt. 11:18).

Matthew 3:5

5 To the preaching, the prophecy, and the person Matthew adds the actual work. Then there kept going out to him Jerusalem and all Judea and the surrounding country of the Jordan and were being baptized by him in the river Jordan, confessing their sins. “Then” means when the Baptist came forward (v. 1) to execute his divinely appointed task. One crowd after another arrived in the desert from the proud capital Jerusalem, the very center of Jewish life. No wonder others followed from everywhere in Judea and the Jordan region, including Transjordania. Matthew stops with mention of this; he might have added Galilee, where Jesus spoke 11:7, etc., concerning the Baptist (compare also the first disciples of the Baptist who came from Galilee). The two imperfects, ἐξεπορεύετο and ἐβαπτίζοντο, are used in descriptive narrative, compared by R. 883 to a “moving-picture show.” The feminine adjective ἡπερίχωρος is due to the noun γῆ that must be supplied.

Matthew 3:6

6 Matthew’s ἐβαπτίζοντο says absolutely nothing regarding the mode of baptism which the Baptist employed. Nothing regarding the mode can be obtained from the added preposition ἐν, “in the river Jordan,” for which Mark 1:9 uses εἰς, with no difference in meaning, R. 525. This ἐν is locative (R. 524), stating where the baptism took place; it denotes place (R. 586) and nothing more. The readiness with which the multitudes submitted to baptism is explained by the fact that purificatory rites by the application of water were not new nor strange to the Jews; and these rites were not administered by immersion, Lev. 14:7, 27; Num. 8:7; 19:13; Heb. 9:13; also Exod. 19:10; Lev. 15, entire chapter; 16:26; 28; 17:15; 22:6: Deut. 23:10. These were washings, rinsings, and bathings and not immersions. The Jews expected that, when the Messiah came, he would use a purificatory rite such as this; see the question on this point put to the Baptist by the Pharisees in John 1:25.

Instead, therefore, of seeking to explain Matthew’s verb “were being baptized” by some later fixed practice obtaining in the Christian Church at the time when Matthew wrote, the Christian practice must be explained by the purificatory rites used by the Jews since the days of Moses. Since none of these were immersions, immersion was not the mode of either the Baptist’s or Jesus’ baptism.

The verb βαπτίζω, as all lexicons agree, refers to any mode of applying water. It is linguistically unwarranted ranted to restrict it to one mode to the exclusion of all other modes, and that a mode for which Jewish practice furnishes no evidence. How could immersions be administered on the desert journey and in a city like Jerusalem, where water was never abundant? But did not the Baptist labor near the river Jordan? If his baptism was administered by immersion, then, since the estimated number he baptized during the brief period of a little over a year in which he labored was between 200, 000 and 500, 000, he must have lived an aquatic life. We have no evidence that he used his disciples as his assistants when baptizing.

Moreover, he also baptized at Ænon (John 3:23), the very name of which means “Springs.” The πολλὰὕδατα, literally “many waters,” rivulets flowing from these springs, made the place suitable for his work, not by furnishing water for immersions, but by providing water for drinking, a great necessity where many people were gathered. Of course, he could use these “waters” also to pour or to sprinkle when baptizing.

Yet the idea prevails that the Baptist immersed. This is plainly traditionalism. It is well illustrated in the case of Zahn, who admits that there are no indications of the mode of baptism in Matthew’s words and yet, when he tries to imagine how the Baptist baptized, speaks of a Vollbad. Some refer to the baptism of Jewish proselytes, but they fail of proof regarding two points. This rite is not mentioned until the second century, and no one can show that it was practiced at the time of the Baptist; still more vital, no evidence is at hand that the baptism of proselytes was more than a washing, it was like similar Jewish rites. We may add that nowhere does it appear that the Baptist thought that he was making proselytes of the Jews whom he baptized.

John “preached (and what he preached he, of course, practiced) the baptism of repentance unto remission of sins,” Mark 1:4; Luke 3:3. This cannot refer to a future forgiveness, but as surely as the repentance led to the baptism, so surely the baptism bestowed the forgiveness then and there. The similar expression found in Acts 2:38, “to be baptized for the remission of sins,” certainly refers to forgiveness bestowed by baptism. When Jesus speaks to Nicodemus about being born again by baptism he refers to the sacrament of the Baptist. To be born again of water and the Spirit defines the nature of this baptism as containing the Spirit and as working regeneration. None of Christ’s apostles received a baptism that differed from that of the Baptist, yet 1 Pet. 3:21 states that baptism “saves.” Acts 19:1–7 reports that certain believers who had received John’s baptism were rebaptized by Paul.

But these people did not even know that there was a Holy Spirit. The Baptist himself could not have baptized them; this must have been done by some former disciple of the Baptist who refused to follow Christ, and whose baptisms were thus no real baptisms. We today regard no baptism as real and valid that has been administered apart from the Trinity, which includes the Holy Spirit.

The Baptist’s sacrament merged into that of Jesus (John 3:26; 4:1, 2). In essence and in efficacy both were the same. The Baptist’s was on the level of the revelation given at that time; that of Jesus on the level of his completed work. That of the Baptist made followers of the Christ about to come; that of Jesus followers of the Christ who had come. Both bestowed forgiveness: the one the forgiveness about to be wrought, the other the forgiveness that had been wrought. Thus the baptism of John was preparatory for Israel alone, Christ’s permanent for all nations. And only in this way the one made ready for and then gave way to the other.

Those who translate ἐβαπτίζοντο “got themselves baptized,” and do this because “the Aramaic verb is active,” base their view on an Aramaic Matthew which no one has seen. Since ὑπό regularly names the agent after the passive, Matthew’s Greek verb is passive. The effort to make it active has a purpose behind it, namely that “the rite was not intended to have any definite effects on the new recruits” (note this designation); “baptism was not something that was done to them, it was something that they did; they professed themselves to be fit and proper members of the new order.” This inverts Matthew’s statement. Baptism is no mere profession. In the case of every baptism of a repentant Jew forgiveness was bestowed by this sacrament. Therefore Matthew adds, “they were being baptized, confessing their sins.” True repentance always leads to confession.

All that the present participle says is that the confession of sins accompanied the baptism. And the claim is specious that, if the confession was a requisite for the baptism, we should have the aorist participle. Since the main verb is durative, the added participle would also be durative; for both forms here used intend to describe customary actions. The Baptist preached repentance, and then all who were moved to repentance confessed and were baptized, and this went on from day to day.

Matthew 3:7

7 It v. 7–12 Matthew furnishes us a sample of the preaching of the Baptist. It displays the full power of his preaching, striking the conscience of his hearers with fullest force. Matthew’s sample, however, consists of an address made on a special occasion to a special set of people. Now when he saw many Pharisees and Sadducees coming to his baptism he said to them: Offsprings of vipers, who did warn you to flee from the coming wrath? Do, therefore, fruit worthy of repentance. And think not to say in yourselves, As father we have Abraham; for I say to you, that God is able of these stones to raise up children for Abraham.

The aorist ἰδών points to a day when the Baptist saw a crowd of Pharisees and Sadducees coming to be baptized. They must have come together from Jerusalem. The Baptist’s work was at its height as we see from the fact that it drew so many of this type of men from the very capital itself. It should not be denied that they intended to be baptized, for ἐπί expresses aim or purpose (R. 602), and the Baptist’s entire address has this their intention as its basis. Comparing John 1:19, etc., and v. 24, etc., we may conclude that the scene here described by Matthew occurred first, and some time later the two delegations of which John writes arrived to demand an official answer from the Baptist concerning himself and his work.

The Pharisees formed the Jewish sect or party which laid the utmost stress on the strictest outward observance of the law, including the rabbinical traditions and regulations which professed to build a formidable protecting hedge about the law. They were utterly self-righteous, and cultivated a hollow formalism that was ostentatious to a degree, especially in observing ceremonies, fastings, almsgiving, long prayers, tithes, etc. Christ portrays them as thorough hypocrites. The Sadducees rejected the rabbinical traditions, also the doctrine of the resurrection, of the angels and of spirits, of immortality and the judgment to come. They were freethinkers and skeptics, with a corresponding laxness in morals, yet included in their number many of the richest and most influential Jews such as the family of the high priest. While in general they were in opposition to the Pharisees, the Sadducees occasionally joined with them when their interests coincided. See Josephus, Antiquities, 18, 1–4.

The two nouns have but one Greek article, which shows that the Baptist regarded them as constituting one class, addressing the same words to both parties. He treats them as insincere, hypocritical, impenitent persons and as such unfit to be baptized. “When he saw them coming for his baptism” means that after the Baptist had concluded his preaching and was ready to baptize the penitent sinners, he saw these Pharisees and Sadducees coming with the others in order to receive the sacrament. Then it was that the Baptist stopped them. When imagining the scene, the writer’s personal opinion is that the Baptist baptized the thousands who made confession by dipping a branch of hyssop, or some other branch, into the water and thereby sprinkling one convenient group after another. Very likely these Pharisees and Sadducees did not mix with the common people, whom we know they despised, but came forward as a separate group, the common people respectfully making way for them and not attempting to join their group. This leaves the natural question as to why these haughty people wished to be baptized.

The only answer that can be given is drawn from the general situation: the movement that had assumed immense proportions; the fear that, unless they joined it, they would lose their influence; the desire to grasp the leadership in this new movement. A change of heart failed to enter into the step these Pharisees and Sadducees resolved to take. From Luke 3:7, etc., we see that others also failed to repent, for the Baptist’s words were addressed not only to these two leading classes but “to the multitudes.”

The situation thus is dramatic in the highest degree. The very address is like a blow in the face. These proud sons of Abraham, these honored leaders of the nation the Baptist addresses as “offsprings of vipers,” exposing in one expression the great and fatal sin that marked their character. The form γεννήματα designates living creatures (from γεννάω), while γενήματα (from γίνομαι) refers to fruits of the earth, R. 213. The ἔχιδνα, “viper,” is a small, very poisonous serpent, such as the one that fastened its deadly fangs in Paul’s hand at Melita, Acts 28:3. The Baptist does not say “viper” but “offsprings of vipers,” for others had preceded them, and they had entered into the sin of their fathers.

What trait of character the figure of the viper means to express is evident: deadly hypocrisy, base treachery, and the fatal deceptions which they practiced and in which they lived (Matt. 12:2, 24; 15:2; 16:1; 22:15). Their original progenitor is the serpent which deceived Eve; hence Christ called them “the children of the wicked one,” 13:38; John 8:44; Acts 13:10. When it comes to dealing with these deadly sins no words are minced by the Baptist or by Jesus or by the apostles. The conscience is struck with a directness that almost takes away the breath.

The stunning address opens a dismaying question: “Who did warn you to try to flee from the coming wrath?” Somebody, John says, secretly and in an underhanded way (ὑποδείκνυμι) whispered this to them and did it in order to deceive them. John leaves this somebody unnamed, since only the devil prompts a man to try to flee from God’s wrath by mere outwardly religious acts. Note the aorist φυγεῖν. The devil suggested that these hypocrites could actually escape God’s wrath by a hypocritical religious act. By means of this tense John exposes the devil’s trick, who makes these men think that they will really escape when by such actions as theirs they will only run the more directly into the coming wrath. By this exposure of the devil’s trick John truly warns these men, not by underhanded whispers, but by open words. There are two points in John’s question: first, that nobody can escape by insincere, outward use of the means of grace; secondly, that the way of escape is still open, even for hypocrites such as the Pharisees and the Sadducees, if by God’s grace they allow themselves to be turned from hypocrisy to true, sincere repentance and the honest use of the divine means of grace.

The “wrath” of God, while it is an anthropopathic expression, is no figure of speech but a terrible reality; it is mentioned over 300 times in the Old Testament and many times in the New. It is the necessary reaction of God’s holiness and righteousness to sin as the persistent rejection of his love and his grace. It is always active, not merely at the end of the world but in constant acts of judgment from day to day, although these are now often withheld by God’s long-suffering. “The coming wrath,” ἡμέλλουσαὀργή, is a pregnant expression for the final manifestation of God’s wrath at the end of the world (see v. 12). The connection of this wrath, in point of punishment and judgment, with the coming of the Messiah may be seen in Zeph, 1:15 (dies irae, dies illa); 2:2; Mal. 3:2, etc., 18; 4:1, 5. When the Jews thought that the Messianic wrath would be turned upon the Gentiles alone, in particular upon their Roman oppressors, they were sadly mistaken.

Matthew 3:8

8 Over against the false way, suggested by the devil, which deceives men into thinking they have escaped when they have not, the Baptist sets the one and only true way: οὖν, purely illative, R. 1192. The expression “do fruit” is one of the many in the Scriptures in which figure and interpretation are combined: the fruit consists of acts that are done; and the aorist imperative demands actual doing, R. 835. The verb ποιεῖν is a Greek rendering of the Hebrew ‘asah, schaffen, produce by work and effort. Luke, as well as Matthew, uses it repeatedly in connection with “fruit.” Thus what is here called fruit is termed “works meet for repentance” in Acts 26:20; and Luke 3:8 has the plural “fruits,” dividing what may be viewed as a whole into its component parts, the various acts which show a changed heart. The genitive “of repentance” cannot be appositional because it depends on the adjective “worthy”; hence repentance cannot itself be the fruit. Examples of this fruit the Baptist himself mentions to certain classes of people in Luke 3:11–14. “Fruit” indicates an organic connection between the works and the repentance, just as a tree brings the fruit peculiar to its nature.

The adjective ἄξιος, “of equal weight,” requires works of a type and character that is sufficient to show the actual presence of repentance in the heart. The latter is invisible; hence we judge its presence by the former, which are visible. We dare judge in no other way. We often note a superficial repentance; it brings fruit different from that demanded by the Baptist, namely a passing regret, a few tears, perhaps, a transient emotion, a few sighs, an excuse or two, a wish to be different, a resolve to change by our own efforts, a brief outward betterment, and the like. The Baptist demands the repentance which is true conversion, wrought by God himself through the very preaching of the Baptist, and thus easily and clearly attested by the resultant life. These Pharisees could not remain Pharisees, nor these Sadducees, Sadducees.

Though baptized a hundred times, they could not escape the coming wrath. The Baptist is not demanding something peculiar and extravagant from these upper-class Jews; he merely insists that his original requirement be met without deception or evasion. What he said to these men was intended for the ears of all who were there and heard him.

Matthew 3:9

9 Matthew chose to record this address of the Baptist because it especially brought out so strikingly the Baptist’s spiritual conception of the kingdom, and this in direct opposition to the prevalent external and false conception of the Jews, especially of the upper classes. In this connection, compare what Christ said regarding Abraham in John 8:33, etc. “And think not to say in yourselves, As father we have Abraham.” The ingressive aorist μὴδόξητε (R. 834) is the subjunctive in a negative command, hence peremptory: “Do not start to think when I tell you this.” “In yourselves” is added because these hypocritical Jews would be inclined secretly to cherish this thought. The predicate object “as father” is placed first, and the direct object “Abraham” last, making both emphatic. The old Jewish conviction was that all the physical descendants of Abraham, through Jacob, were safe from God’s wrath because of their father Abraham; they were sure that this connection with Abraham guaranteed to them all the blessings of the Messianic kingdom to the exclusion of the Gentile world. See how Jesus shatters this conviction in John 8:39, 40. The rich man in hell also had Abraham for his “father” and heard from him the word “son,” but it availed him nothing.

“For I say unto you” meets this false Jewish assumption squarely by giving the reason that the Jews should not hold this false thought. In “I say to you” the full authority of the Baptist confronts these Jews; he speaks as God’s own prophet. He tells them the decisive truth “that God is able of these stones to raise up children unto Abraham,” i.e., to fill the places these Jews leave vacant by being false children of Abraham. The figure has tremendous force: to turn common, lifeless stones, such as were lying there in the wilderness, into true spiritual children of Abraham! The figure describes most drastically the creative power of God’s grace. If these Jews turn their hearts into flinty stones by resisting God’s converting grace, God will by that same grace turn other men, whom these Jews regard as nothing but dead, useless stones, into truly repentant sinners.

But the contrast is not merely between men and stones, replacing impenitent men by such as seem to us incapable of spiritual impressions. If this were all, then the thought might be a contrast only between Jews, the proud upper class as represented in the Pharisees and the Sadducees, and the despised lowest class, open sinners, harlots, publicans, etc. But the contrast is between the Jews of any and of all classes as descendants of Abraham and common stones that have no descent at all. These stones represent Gentiles. The Baptist is not using an abstract comparison, he is uttering prophecy. Matthew reports this prophecy for his specific purpose.

His Gospel is written for Jews, all of whom need the Baptist’s word. From chapter two onward, the record of the Gentile magi, through the pertinent parts of the Gospel and finally its significant conclusion this thought of the repentance and conversion of the Gentiles recurs. See, for instance, 8:10–12.

Matthew 3:10

10 As the kingdom with its call to repentance is at hand, so of necessity also the judgment of wrath upon the impenitent. Everything about this kingdom is spiritual, wholly unlike the formalism of the work-righteous Pharisees, or the rationalistic worldliness of the skeptic Sadducees. Repentance saves, impenitence damns. And already the ax lies at the root of the trees. Therefore, every tree not doing excellent fruit is hewn out and is thrown into fire. Time is pressing, judgment is fast drawing near.

How true the Baptist’s words are we see from the destruction of Jerusalem forty years later. Jesus repeated the Baptist’s warnings in the parable of the barren fig tree, in the call to “walk while ye have the light” (John 12:35), and in other passages; see also Isa. 55:6; Mal. 4:5. This is, indeed, operating with fear as a religious motive. After love and grace fail to appeal, the threat and the terror of judgment alone are left. Because man still has a conscience, the terrores conscientiae, which the law intends to produce, will have their rightful place, no matter what rationalistic minds may predicate of God and of his law.

The figure of “doing fruit” is expanded in the most telling way. In addition to the fruit we have the tree, the root, the ax, the hewing out, and the consuming fire. “Already” is placed first and is the more emphatic because of its distant position from the verb, R. 418, 423. Judgment is ready to descend. The article in the expression “the ax” points to the one divine judgment, pictured as an ax, together with fire, to match “the trees.” This plural refers to all the impenitent Jews. The present tenses are timeless, picturing the thought as such, as is done in general propositions. This is true especially of the verbs “is hewn out” and “is thrown.” The ax lies “at the root,” πρός, facing it with dire intent.

While κεῖται is present, its root is perfect and has the sense of completion; it does not express linear action but condition or state. The ax “lies,” having been placed at the root, R. 881. As an instrument it connotes the hand that shall swing the ax. The figure is overdrawn when it is thought to mean that the ax is already being swung by the hand, and its blade is about to cut into the root. The ax merely lies; the trees designated for being felled have already been selected, and the ax has already been deposited beneath them. Only one ax, yet many trees.

The figure is of necessity strained since one and the same judgment strikes many individuals. Hence also the singular “root” is used for all the trees. In the divine imagery we often find that the figure seems to exert itself to convey the full reality; human pictures are too weak to convey all that should be conveyed. So the reality at times protrudes through the figure. When the divine speakers use the figures they always have the full reality in mind and are never, like other speakers or writers, fettered by mere figures.

“To the root,” not to the twigs, or to the branches. Not even a stump will be left; judgment will be complete. The plural “trees” is dissolved into the singular “every tree,” which yet omits none; πᾶν without the article following = “every.” Judgment is discriminatingly just: none but the fruitless, yet every one of these. The characterization μὴποιοῦνκαρπὸνκαλόν takes up the thought of v. 8, the present participle characterizing the tree as one whose nature it is not to “do” anything in the way of “excellent fruit,” bringing only καρπὸνκακόν, good-for-nothing fruit. Repentance is here again not viewed as good fruit but as belonging to the tree and marking its nature. Only by the inward change of repentance (contrition and faith, v. 2), through grace and the Word is a man made a good tree, and being such, the “excellent fruit” follows as a matter of course, evidencing the spiritual nature of the tree at whose root no ax will ever lie.

The verb ἐκκόπτεται = “is hewn out” from among the good trees, hewn at the very root. And then it “is thrown into fire,” the phrase being placed forward for the sake of emphasis. The very timelessness of these present tenses lends them additional power. This is what is done. When it is done makes no difference. Keep your mind on these terrible acts while the day of grace still lasts.

The Scriptures frequently speak of fire when describing the judgment. Mal. 4:1, “The day cometh, that shall burn as an oven”; the branches cut from the Vine are burned, John 15:6; the tares are gathered and burned, Matt. 13:40. All God’s judgments are like fire, especially the final one; for the wicked shall go “into hell, into the fire that never shall be quenched.” Mark 9:43, “into everlasting fire,” “into hell fire,” Matt. 18:8, 9. The Sadducees of all ages have tried to quench this fire by making sport of it, thereby preparing themselves the more for it and hastening its coming to themselves.

Matthew 3:11

11 To the word regarding the impending judgment the Baptist adds the word concerning the still present grace (v. 11) and closes by combining the final outcome of both (v. 12). The connection is confused by some when they misunderstand the final phrase in v. 11 and take “fire” in this phrase to denote judgment. I on my part am baptizing you in water for repentance; but the one coming after me is stronger than I, whose sandals I am not fit to carry. He shall baptize you in connection with the Holy Spirit and fire. Here John performs his main function, to point to “the Coming One,” ὁἐρχόμενος (11:3; Luke 7:19), a well-known designation for the Messiah, derived from Old Testament statements such as Gen. 49:10, “until Shiloh come.” It is notable that, like Jesus, the Baptist avoids the title “Messiah,” evidently because of the political tinge the Jews had come to connect with this term. Against all such political and allied ideas the spiritual character of the Baptist’s work contended.

He mentions “the One Coming” as though he has referred to him quite often in his preaching. For this Coming One he is endeavoring to make all his auditors ready. The other thought here indicated is that no one shall for a moment think that the Baptist himself is the Messiah. This comes out very clearly in Luke 3:15, etc., where the words of our verse and the following one are repeated with the preamble: “And as the people were in expectation, and all men mused in their hearts of John, whether he were the Christ, or not; John answered, saying to all, I indeed baptize you,” etc. The Baptist again denied this expectation in John 1:26, 27.

First the tremendous difference existing between the two persons is made prominent. John is a prophet, divinely commissioned, and made such an impression on the people that they thought he might himself be the Messiah. But John tells them, “the One Coming after me is stronger than I.” The phrase ὀπίσωμου, really, “behind me,” is to be understood temporally, “after me.” John says: “I am only his humble forerunner. If you think I am great, he who will be here presently is infinitely greater.” How much greater is strikingly brought out: “whose sandals I am not fit to carry.” It was the humblest slave’s task to remove and to carry away his master’s sandals; in Luke 3:16 note: “the latchet of whose shoes I am not worthy to unloose.” Mark and Luke add the detail of the untying, Matthew mentions only the carrying away. How great, then, is this Coming One if this prophet of God is not fit to carry his sandals which only his feet have touched? The answer is: the Coming One is God’s own Son.

John’s words are not self-abasement, no Oriental extravagance; as a prophet filled with the Spirit he speaks absolute truth. Note that ἰσχυρότερος, from the noun ἰσχύς, refers to the personal possession of power. John implies that he, too, is ἰσχυρός, “strong,” the divine strength of the Word having been given to him. This is not false humility. Who, then, could be stronger? Only he who is himself “the Word” (the Logos).

With this difference between the persons corresponds the difference of their work. John makes this plain by another comparison. Since he is appointed to baptize he places beside his baptizing that act of the Coming One which can also be called a baptizing. John baptizes with the ordinary sacrament which employs water; God’s Son will crown his great redemptive work by baptizing in connection with the Holy Spirit and fire. A divinely appointed man may use water in the sacrament; only the Son of God can pour out the Holy Spirit, and even he only after completing his redemptive work and then ascending to heaven.

When John describes his own strength he says, “I on my part (emphatic ἐγώ) am baptizing you with water for repentance.” This was the power put into his hands by God. It marked him as the forerunner of Christ. We have no right to stress εἰςμετάνοιαν so as to make repentance only the result of baptism, as something that only followed baptism as its aim and purpose. This is contrary to the durative imperative μετανοεῖτε in v. 2, “be repenting,” i.e., live in repentance. “For repentance” refers to the repentance manifested by all those who came to be baptized by John.

The expression ἐνὕδατι does not mean, “with water only,” so that John’s baptism becomes nothing but a symbolical sprinkling with water or an immersion in water. To claim that, because Jesus baptized with the Holy Ghost, John’s baptism was devoid of the Holy Ghost, is to draw an untenable conclusion. As the Holy Ghost wrought all spiritual effects throughout the Old Testament, so he wrought in both John’s preaching and in his baptism and in all gospel preaching until the day of Pentecost, from which day onward his presence, power, and gifts flow out in wholly unrestrained measure and over all the earth. The distinction is not: before Pentecost no Spirit; after Pentecost the Spirit. If this were true, no soul could have been saved before Pentecost. The distinction is: before the actually completed work of redemption the limited preparatory work of the Spirit; after that the superabounding fullness of the Spirit. The idea that even our present baptism is only water, a mere sign and symbol without the Spirit, only a confessional act and work of obedience on our part; and that the only baptism that gives us the Spirit is the so-called “Baptism of the Spirit” by which the Spirit is thought to seize a man suddenly without the use of divine means (converting him by this seizure and later suddenly and totally sanctifying him), is a fanatical view which casts aspersions upon the very means of grace by which the Spirit does come to us and substitutes for these means human emotions, imaginings, and dreams by which the Spirit never comes.

The Coming One, John says, “shall baptize you with the Holy Ghost and fire.” Here we have Jesus’ own commentary: “John truly baptized with water; but ye shall be baptized with the Holy Ghost not many days hence,” Acts 1:5. And v. 8: “Ye shall receive power, after that the Holy Ghost is come upon you,” etc. Also Peter reports how the Holy Spirit fell upon Cornelius and the Gentiles with him “as on us at the beginning,” i.e., Pentecost. He adds: “Then remembered I the word of the Lord, how that he said, John indeed baptized with water, but ye shall be baptized with the Holy Ghost,” Acts 11:16. The miraculous outpouring of the Holy Ghost at the time of Pentecost is the supreme work and thus the final great mark of the Messiah. None but the Son who had gone to the Father (John 16:7) after completing redemption could thus send the Comforter.

This Mightier One, who was to show his might by thus miraculously sending the Spirit, was also miraculously pointed out to the Baptist and by no less a sign than the descent of the Spirit upon him “in a bodily shape like a dove,” Luke 3:22. Compare John 1:32–34.

It ought to be evident that in the parallel phrases ἐνὕδατι and ἐνΠνεύματι the preposition must have the same meaning. One may admire the courage of those who, after taking “in water” in the sense of immersion in water, do not shrink from letting “in Spirit and fire” likewise mean immersion in Spirit and fire. But no immersion took place on Pentecost, and ἐν does not suggest this idea. R. 586 regards ἐνὕδατι as locative; but this cannot be its force in the parallel phrase. Others prefer the instrumental idea, usually expressed by “with”; but the Spirit is not an instrument or a means such as water and fire. The ἐν has its ordinary meaning, “in connection with.” John baptized “in connection with water” as everybody saw; Christ would perform a baptizing “in connection with the Holy Spirit and fire” as everybody would also see. The nature of the two connections indicated by ἐν lies in the nouns that follow.

One ἐν combines the Spirit and fire: ἐνΠνεύματιἉγίῳκαὶπυρί, and thus regards them as one concept which is also placed over against the one water. Even where this is recognized, it is nearly always misapplied; for “in the Holy Spirit” is referred to a work of grace (not, however, Pentecost, but a peculiar immediate bestowal) and, separated from this by the interval of the whole New Testament era, “in fire” is regarded as the final work of judgment. The reason for this is the fact that in v. 10 “fire” is used figuratively in connection with judgment. This view inserts a second “in” which is not there. This view misunderstands v. 11, which speaks only of grace and leaves the reference to judgment to v. 12. This view overlooks the fact that judgment is never conceived as a baptism with fire or with another element; baptism and baptizing always imply cleansing and not destruction.

This view assumes that “fire” is always a symbol of judgment and destruction. But see the refiner’s fire in Mal. 3:2, 3, fire as an image of purification in Zech. 13:9; Isa. 6:6, 7; 1 Pet. 1:7, and the “spirit of burning” taking away filth in Isa. 4:4. Pentecost, the fulfillment of John’s prophecy, has the two combined in the clearest manner: the Spirit and cloven tongues of fire as the visible manifestation of the Spirit. Thus the church, too, has never had the least trouble with this fire. She sings:

“Come as the fire and purge our hearts Like sacrificial flame.”

Reed.

“Come, Holy Spirit, from above With Thy celestial fire; Come and with flames of zeal and love Our hearts and tongues inspire.”

Cotterill.

“And each believing soul inspire With Thine own pure and holy fire.”

Luther, translated by Massie.

Finally note the contrast between fire and water: the latter in the case of John, the former in the case of Christ; but both in grace.

Matthew 3:12

12 It is one of the features of Old Testament prophecy that it views the two comings of the Messiah, that for the purpose of redemption and that for the purpose of final judgment, without regard to the great interval existing between them. The prophets see the future, but without the perspective of time. The Baptist does the same: the Coming One pours out the Spirit with all his grace (v. 11) and also separates the grain from the chaff. The great length of time lying between these two occurrences remains unrevealed. To assume that these prophecies are to have no interval, i.e., that the final judgment would soon follow Pentecost, is to misunderstand the prophecies, all of which intend to hide from us the time of the end, as they do to this day. Understanding this feature, we see why the Baptist joins the description of the Messiah’s final work to that of Pentecost by a mere relative clause: Whose winnowing shovel is in his hand, and he will thoroughly clean his threshing floor; and he will collect his grain into the garner, but the chaff he will burn up with fire unquenchable.

From the figure of the trees, and the fruit they bear the Baptist passes to the allied figure of the grain and the chaff and all the imagery connected with these. The idea of the Coming One is retained. The idea of a mere man, though he be as great as the Baptist, doing what is here described is unimaginable. The deity of the Messiah looms behind the two works described (v. 11 and 12); both demand that the Messiah be the Son of God and nothing less.

The work is divided into two natural parts: 1) separation as in 25:32; 2) disposal of the separated parts: in 25:34, “Come,” etc., and in 25:41, “Depart,” etc. This separation begins already in this life. The grain and the chaff, believers and unbelievers, are utterly distinct from each other. And so we see “the congregation of the saints” (Ps. 89:5; 149:1) drawing together, on the one hand, and “the congregation of evildoers” (Ps. 26:5), on the other, and blessed is he who keeps away from the latter (Ps. 1:1). But in this life, even in the organization of the church (v. 7), this separation is not fully effected, nor can it be made fully visible to men as long as we live in a world in which “it doth not yet appear what we shall be: but we know that, when he shall appear, we shall be like him; for we shall see him as he is,” 1 John 3:2.

The word “fan” denotes a large wooden shovel designed for tossing up grain after it is threshed out on a smooth, elevated “threshing floor” and the loose straw has been raked away. The remaining mass of mingled “grain” and “chaff,” when tossed up, is separated by the wind, the heavy grain falling in a heap, the loose, light chaff being blown to one side. Nor shall the two ever be again mixed—their separation is now final. “Whose winnowing shovel is in his hand” pictures the mighty Messiah as being ready at any moment to begin this task of separation. In Luke 3:17, where this word is also recorded, two infinitives follow, both effective aorists. Matthew uses future tenses. A fine distinction results: Matthew simply records the future facts concerning the grain and concerning the chaff; Luke inserts the idea of divine purpose regarding the grain and omits this regarding the chaff, stating only the fact concerning it.

The form διακαθαριεῖ is future, and διά in the verb is perfective: will clean “clear through,” “throughly” (A. V.), an old form for “thoroughly.” To clean the threshing floor means to remove all the straw and chaff and to leave a great heap of grain. Both wheat and barley are called σῖτος, “grain.” Both were extensively grown in Palestine, where, as in Syria, the old way of threshing may still be seen.

After the separation has been effected and the threshing floor completely cleaned as stated, both the grain and the refuse find disposal. The former is collected in the ἀποθήκη (ἀπό and τίθημι), the place for “putting it away,” the granary or storehouse. It is valuable and treasured accordingly. In fact, the one great object of tilling the field was to obtain this grain. The “chaff” is just waste; hence the Messiah “will burn it up,” κατακαύσει, the κατά again being perfective but with the thought of “down”: burn it completely. This alone would be sufficient.

But this might be understood as denoting annihilation of the wicked. The Baptist shuts out this idea by adding: “with fire unquenchable.” The remarkable thing is that the final adjective “unquenchable” departs from the figure and adds the reality after the manner of Biblical allegory (on which see Trench, Parables, p. 9). As noted in v. 10, the figure is too weak to bring out all that ought to be stated, so the reality is added. If the wicked were to be annihilated, the fire would burn itself out; instead, it will never be quenched, its burning will go on eternally, as an eternal punishment for the wicked. Many views have been advanced to show that “eternal” as applied to the fate of the wicked in the Scriptures signifies only a long age of time; but then “eternal” as referring to the blessedness of the saints in heaven would also have to be a blessedness that finally ends. “Unquenchable” answers such views. It shuts out both annihilation and final restitution.

Speculations as to the nature of this unquenchable fire are valueless. God will provide a fire that is fully adequate; and those who burn in it will not in the least question its peculiar nature.

The imagery of the Baptist is wholly transparent, especially to Jews who know this imagery from the Old Testament. Only the godly who repent and accept the Coming One in faith are “grain,” true children of the kingdom, true children of Abraham. Only they will enter heaven. All the rest are chaff which the wind blows away, Ps. 1:4. How valueless is chaff compared with grain? Who ever planted a field in order to garner nothing but chaff? All the proud works of men—what do they make of men when the judgment comes? Light as chaff will all those be who bring nothing else on that great day. Christ alone, held to by faith, makes us grain.

Christ’s Baptism and Anointing, 3:13–17

Matthew 3:13

13 Matthew’s account is much fuller than Mark’s and Luke’s. Mark is often praised for introducing touches and details into his account; and here we notice this feature also in Matthew’s Gospel. We shall note similar instances as they occur. In each of the preceding chapters two closely related sections are presented: in the first the genealogy and the birth, in the second the magi and the murder of the innocents. So in this third chapter we have the Baptist and Jesus’ baptism. Then comes forward Jesus from Galilee to the Jordan unto John to be baptized by him. “Then” points to the time just described when the Baptist was at the full height of his activity.

The verb παραγίνεται is identical with that used in v. 1 concerning the Baptist, and it is used in the same sense. As the Baptist stepped out of retirement into his great public mission, so Jesus now does the same. He leaves Galilee (Nazareth) where he had lived all these years and appears at the Jordan. “To John,” with πρός‚ denotes contact and communication with John. The infinitive with τοῦ regularly denotes purpose: Jesus came to be baptized by John. There seems to be a good deal of misunderstanding regarding this act of Jesus, further explanation of which the evangelists withhold. We may say only that, since his Messianic calling was clear to Jesus already at the age of twelve, it certainly was now fully clear to him.

That implies that he certainly also understood the mission of his forerunner John. The hour had come and Jesus acts.

Matthew 3:14

14 The implication of the infinitive is that Jesus requested John to baptize him. But John would have hindered him, saying, I have need to be baptized by thee, and comest thou to me? Διακωλύω, used only here in the New Testament, is a choice term: “to hinder earnestly.” The conative imperfect indicates action begun but interrupted: attempted to hinder. This was not opposition but reluctance due to scruples. The question in John’s words must not be overlooked. John’s treatment of Jesus is the very opposite of that accorded the Pharisees and the Sadducees (v. 7). These he refused to baptize on account of their sins and their impenitence, Jesus he refuses to baptize because of his sinlessness and because of his own sinfulness. He who towered above the Pharisees and the Sadducees bows in deepest humility before Jesus.

“I have need to be baptized of thee, and comest thou to me?” voices John’s surprise and perplexity. We see that he knows a good deal about Jesus. He himself, indeed, tells us, “I knew him not,” John 1:31, 33; but this implies only that at first the divine assurance had not been given him that Jesus was the Messiah and by no means excludes the thought that on other grounds he felt sure that Jesus was the Messiah. God had promised to reveal the Messiah to John in a special manner, and until this revelation came, however certain John felt about the person who would be designated thus he could not with absolute and divine certainty declare, “This is he.” John was a kinsman of Jesus. It is altogether likely that from his own parents he had heard the wonderful story of Jesus’ conception and birth and the subsequent events. The lives of the two, however, differed widely.

John spent the years of his youth at Juttah, far south in Judah, near Hebron; Jesus grew up in the carpenter’s shop in Galilee. We do not know whether the two ever saw each other until they met here at the Jordan. All the more remarkable is the word of John by which he makes a complete exception of Jesus.

The surprise lies in the comparison which John makes between Jesus and himself. By saying that Jesus has no need of being baptized by him, God’s prophet though he was, John virtually declares that Jesus is no sinner, for John’s baptism was for sinners only. By saying that he has need of being baptized by Jesus, John confesses his own sinfulness and places himself in the same class with the sinful people whom he baptized daily. By acknowledging the right of Jesus to baptize, yea, to baptize even him whom God had commissioned to baptize the Jewish people as he was now doing, John places Jesus, not on the same plane with himself, a prophet divinely sent, but far above himself, in an office far above his own. “I have need to be baptized by thee” is often taken to mean, “baptized with the Holy Spirit.” But this rests on the misunderstanding that John’s baptism was only a water rite, a mere symbol, while that of Jesus would be, not the miracle of Pentecost, but a sudden seizure by the Spirit, such as it is assumed still takes place.

Matthew 3:15

15 But answering, Jesus said to him, Permit it now; for thus it is proper for us to fulfill all righteousness. Then he permitted him. This is the first recorded word of Jesus since he spoke to his mother when he was twelve years old. The formula: “answering, he said,” the participle being added pleonastically, or the use of two finite verbs: “he answered and said,” always marks the importance of the statement thus introduced. The passive forms are used in the active sense. A serene, certain, comprehensive mastery pervades this word of Jesus.

The scruples of John are allayed. He who was sent to lead the people as the first great prophet of the New Testament is here himself led. In fact, he here proves himself to be a true prophet, for he recognizes and obeys his heavenly Master when that Master comes to him. “Permit it now,” lasse es, ἄφες (second aorist from ἀφίημι), is idiomatic. We perceive the majesty of this word when we note that by it Jesus fully concurs in what John has just said concerning their relative purity and greatness. The sense is: “It is even as thou sayest, John; yet this is the very reason why you may permit what I ask.” The “now” implies that at another time, instead of John serving Jesus, John may well expect and ask to be served by Jesus.

Another thought lies in ἄφεςἄρτι: the baptism of Jesus is not such that Jesus could say, “I have need to be baptized by thee,” as John rightly and truly says this concerning himself. All Jesus can say is, “Permit it now.” The exceptional character of the baptism requested is thus implied in Jesus’ case. The word “now” refers to this moment when Jesus is about to assume his office. Sufficient reason for the baptism of Jesus exists only “now” and could not exist at any other time in his life or in connection with his work.

The connective γἀρ brings the explanation: “for thus it is proper,” etc. Whereas John said, “I have need,” Jesus says only, “It is proper,” πρέπονἐστίν, it is fit and in place, the present neuter participle with the copula, a periphrastic present tense, R. 81, 1119. In the case of sinners a need exists, namely to wash away their sins. On the nature and the efficacy of John’s baptism see v. 6. In the case of Jesus, who has no sin, no such need exists. The words πρέπονἐστίν show that in the case of Jesus’ baptism there was an inner purpose that was entirely different from that obtaining in the case of the others baptized by John or of John’s own baptism, if one could have been administered to him.

What this purpose was we begin to see when we consider that, although Jesus did not need the baptism, he, nevertheless, asked for it. If he, being sinless, needed not the sacrament that washed sinners clean, why did he ask for it? Could he not have gone on in his sinlessness as heretofore and remained thus to the end? He certainly could have as far as his own person was concerned. The fact that Jesus, nevertheless, asks for the baptism and says that it is proper for him to receive it and for John to administer it (note ἡμῖν, “for us”) indicates that Jesus thinks, not of himself alone, apart from sinful men and concerned only about his own person, but as being concerned with men, as being sent to assume the great office and work of saving them. Simply as a perfectly holy person it would not have become Jesus to ask for, or John to grant him, baptism; but as the holy person sent to save all the unholy ones, now that the great work was to be begun, it, indeed, became Jesus and John to observe this baptism.

The point that made it so proper is stated: “it is proper for us to fulfill all righteousness.” “For us” = John and Jesus. The matter pertains to them alone. This, then, is neither the moral nor the ceremonial law. By associating himself with John in this matter of the baptism Jesus is thinking of their respective offices. It was proper that they should carry out whatever their respective positions required. It is thus that Jesus views his baptism.

The view that it is an act of “righteousness” only in so far as it marks the willing obedience of Jesus, God having ordered John to baptize and Jesus (though not needing the baptism) submitting to it, makes the baptism a formality and misunderstands what John’s baptism was. It was not law but gospel, not a demand to obey but a gift of grace to be received and accepted as such. By accepting John’s baptism Jesus is in no sense obeying a law, a useless law in his case; and in no sense accepting grace and pardon, since he is, indeed, sinless. Jesus is choosing baptism by John as the right way by which to enter upon his great office, and he is doing this with a fine sense of propriety including John as well as himself. He, the Sinless One, the very Son of God, chooses to put himself alongside of all the sinful ones for whom John’s sacrament was ordained. He thus connects himself with all instances of John’s baptism; for it is his mediation that makes these truly efficacious for sinners.

By thus joining himself to all these instances of John’s baptism he signifies that he is now ready to take upon himself the load of all these sinners, i.e., to assume his redemptive office.

It was thus also proper and right that Jesus should come and, as it were, offer himself voluntarily for this great office and not wait until he would be called or until it would be laid upon him. For this office, especially in so far as it involved the sacrifice upon the cross, had to be assumed voluntarily. Shortly after this baptism John calls Jesus the Lamb of God, referring directly to the sacrifice. Jesus himself calls his suffering a baptism, Luke 12:50 and elsewhere. These are rays which illuminate the character of this act when John baptized Jesus.

Luther presents the view (Erlangen edition, 19, 2, 482, etc.; 20, 457; and elsewhere) that in this baptism Jesus acted as our substitute. Loaded with the world’s sin, he buried it in the waters of Jordan. When following Luther some go so far as to say that what Christ obtained for us in his baptism is now conveyed to us by the means of grace (Word and Sacraments) as though salvation was fully secured for us by Christ’s baptism. Luther’s view strains the words by attempting to give the same significance to Christ’s baptism as is given to that of the sinners who flocked to the Jordan, Christ coming with the sins of others and having them washed away, the others having their own sins removed. This produces a double removal of the same sins.

The idea that the law required of priests and of teachers that they be thirty years old and be consecrated by a religious washing and anointing can be substantiated only in the case of the Levites (Num. 4:3) and would make the whole transaction with regard to Christ, including the anointing with the Spirit, nothing but a legal ceremonial observance. It is far more than that. The modernistic view has Jesus come to John just as others did, to enroll himself among the servants of the new kingdom and to submit to the same ritual as the rest. This makes the King himself one of the servants. Some other views should be forgotten. We cull two minor thoughts that should be preserved.

One is that Jesus honored John’s baptism, which he certainly did, but only incidentally, for he uses John’s ministration for a far higher purpose. The other is that Jesus intended to sanctify the water of this sacrament which he himself would afterward send out to all the world. Concordia Triglotta, 736, 21; Mueller, Die symbolischen Buecher, 770, 14.

“Then he permitted him”—that is all; no description of the mode, no details of any kind concerning the baptismal act, not even the verb “to baptize.” Luke has only the participle βαπτισθέντος, “having been baptized”; Mark has the finite verb ἐβαπτίσθη, “and was baptized by John in the Jordan.” The Holy Spirit seems purposely to withhold a mention of the mode. If the mode were such a vital thing, we may certainly conclude that the Holy Spirit would in this most important case have indicated it for us with sufficient clearness; but he does nothing of the kind. All the ancient pictorial representations of the baptism of Jesus, as well as of other baptisms, show other modes, never immersion, Clement F. Rogers, Baptism and Christian Archæology, Oxford, Clarendon Press. This layman collected all the ancient pictorial representations, starting with the prevalent assumption that he would find immersion there presented. When he found the opposite, he changed his view.

Even the ruins of ancient baptisteries show that these were too shallow to have permitted immersion. We are not told of witnesses to Jesus’ baptism, but it would be unsafe to conclude that none were present.

Matthew 3:16

16 And having been baptized, Jesus went up immediately from the water. And lo, the heavens were opened, and he saw the Spirit of God descending as a dove and coming upon him. And lo, a voice out of the heavens, saying, This is my Son, the Beloved, in whom I was well pleased. The aorist participle preceding an aorist finite verb ordinarily denotes action prior to the verb; and only when the nature of the actions demands it, do the two express simultaneous action. The former is the case here: Jesus was baptized, and after the baptism was finished, he went up from the water, going up the riverbank. The modifiers attached to the main verb make this doubly certain: “he went up immediately from, or away from, the water.” Matthew does not say that Jesus came up out of, or from under, the water.

What he does say is that, after the baptism was finished (βαπτισθείς), whatever may have been the mode of administration, Jesus without delay (εὐθύς) walked away from the water of the river, so that his anointing with the Spirit of God did not take place, as many artists picture it, while he was being baptized or while he stood knee-deep in the water but on the bank of the river, a little distance from the water. There is no implication that Jesus was under the water. In Mark 1:9, 10 the baptism is related in one sentence, the movement away from the water in another. Matthew’s ἀπό should be considered together with Mark’s ἐκ (1:10): neither refers to the baptismal act as such; neither puts Jesus under the water; both speak of what followed the baptismal act. Jesus stepped out of the water (ἐκ) onto the bank and walked from the water (ἀπό) onto the bank. This would be the sense even if βαπτισθείς indicated immersion.

Neither of these prepositions can be used to prove that immersion was the mode employed for Jesus’ baptism.

When Matthew writes, “Immediately he walked up from the water, and lo, the heavens were opened,” the impression is made that Jesus acted intentionally. By the baptism Jesus gives himself to the work of sin-bearing; by the anointing and the voice from heaven the Father accepts him for this work. The two acts constitute a grand whole. We must not separate them although they are distinct and not to be mingled or confounded. Some are inclined to do this when they speak of the Spirit’s descent upon Jesus as though this were a feature of his baptism, which it was not. The application of this fact to our baptism, namely that in the same way, through baptism and in it, the Spirit comes to us with his regenerating grace, is incorrect. He, indeed, does so come, but upon Jesus he came, not in and through baptism, but after the baptism.

“Lo” marks the miracle. “The heavens were opened,” with its aorist, states an actual fact. This was not a mere vision and certainly not a mere impression (Eindruck) in the mind of Jesus. The evident fact should not be weakened by talking about a new relation of Jesus to the Father. The supposition regarding the occurring of something in the heart of Jesus, die innere Erregung seines Geisteslebens, though it be coupled with the outward phenomenon, like all other human speculations only obscures the facts. The views that the heavens just happend to brighten above Jesus, or that a thunderstorm brought on flashes of lightning, are rationalistic theories. Ezekiel (1:1) saw the heavens opened; Stephen likewise (Acts 7:56); compare also Rev. 4:1; Isa. 64:1. “Heaven opens itself, which hitherto was closed, and now becomes at Christ’s baptism a door and a window, so that one can see into it; and henceforth there is no difference any more between God and us; for God the Father himself is present and says, This is my beloved Son.” Luther.

The additional αὐτῷ is textually questionable, nor would it add to the sense the thought that what occurred pertained to Jesus. The heavens did not remain open, and it is an insertion into the text to say that now a new, mysterious intercourse was opened between Jesus and the heavenly world. We are not told what became visible when the heavens were suddenly opened as we are told in the case of Ezekiel and of Stephen. Yet we may well say that the heavenly glory was visible and that John and any others present beheld its radiance. Matthew, however, focuses everything upon Jesus.

The subject of εἶδεν, “he saw,” is the same as that of ἀνέβη, “he walked up,” namely Jesus. John 1:32, 33 makes it certain that John, too, saw the Spirit’s descent upon Jesus; in fact, his seeing this was the divinely appointed proof for him that Jesus was, indeed, the Messiah. Matthew’s concern is not with John but with Jesus. What he saw is graphically described (more fully than by Mark): “the Spirit of God descending as a dove and coming upon him.” ΠνεῦμαΘεοῦ, without the articles, seems to be the correct reading; with these proper nouns the articles may or may not be used; the sense would be the same. When we see from John 1:29–34 with what clarity the Baptist spoke of what his eyes, too, saw here beside the Jordan, the mistake of those appears who deny that the Old Testament revealed the Trinity to the Jews or revealed the Trinity only dimly and imperfectly. All of the Baptist’s hearers understood him.

Later on the Jews object only to the claim that the man Jesus should call himself God’s Son; they never once raise the issue that God is only one person and not three. It is specious to raise the question as to how fully the Baptist and the Jews themselves grasped the reality of the three divine Persons and then to rate their knowledge as low as possible.

Because of his very nature the Spirit is invisible, but God never had difficulty when he wished to appear to the fathers. Why the Spirit chose the form of a dove has often been asked. Luther thinks that it was done because of the Spirit’s friendliness, because it is without wrath and bitterness, the Spirit desiring to show that he has no anger towards us but is ready to help us to become godly and to be saved. Others point to purity, innocence, and meekness as being symbolized by the dove. Gen. 1:2 is the only place in which a somewhat analogous expression occurs concerning the Spirit. We may content ourselves by saying that the dovelike form intended to convey the idea of the graciousness of the Spirit.

The two present participles καταβαῖνον and ἐρχόμενον picture how the dovelike form came down upon Jesus, and ἐπʼ αὐτόν is elucidated by John 1:32, 33: he “remained upon him,” did not return whence he came. The Spirit was a permanent gift to Jesus. As his conception “of the Spirit,” so this coming of the Spirit was a gift. It pertained to the human nature of Jesus. In his deity the Son was of the identical essence with both the Father and the Spirit, nor could the Spirit be given to him. But in his human nature, which he had assumed in order by it to work out our redemption, he could receive the Spirit as a gift; and he did receive the Spirit when the great work was now to begin.

The coming down of the Spirit upon Jesus is the anointing prophesied in Ps. 45:7: “God, thy God, hath anointed thee with the oil of gladness above thy fellows.” Isa. 61:1: “The Spirit of the Lord God is upon me; because the Lord hath anointed me to preach,” etc. (Luke 4:18). See also Acts 10:38: “God anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Ghost and with power.” The prophets received some of the gifts of the Spirit; Jesus, lifted far above them, with an infinitely greater task to perform, received the Spirit as such. What power thus filled him we see when he is now led up of the Spirit to be tempted, Matt. 4:1, and when he returns in the power of the Spirit into Galilee to teach there in his wonderful way and to work miracles. Luther writes: “Here he begins rightly to be Christ,” namely the Anointed One, “and was thus inaugurated into his entire Messianic office as our Prophet, High Priest, and King.”

Rationalism thinks that a common dove fluttered over Jesus. Some resort to figurative interpretations or assume a twofold vision, namely that what Jesus and the Baptist beheld in the spirit was also symbolized for their eyes and their ears, so that they thought they actually saw and heard. But the shepherds actually saw and heard the angels, so Jesus and John saw and heard what occurred when the Spirit came down and the Father spoke from above.

Matthew 3:17

17 A second “lo” calls attention to the next manifestation: “a voice out of the heavens,” ἐκ with the strict idea “from within,” i.e., the opened heavens, R. 597. The nominative stands alone, needing no verb. The words spoken by this voice reveal that it is the Father’s. This voice and what it declares are as real to the ears as is the form of a dove to the eyes. The fact that the Baptist, too, heard it, he evidences when in John 1:34 he says of Jesus, “this is the Son of God.”

Mark and Luke record the words as being addressed to Jesus, “Thou art my Son, the Beloved,” etc., which we regard as the actual form in which they were spoken. Matthew writes, “This is my Son, the Beloved,” etc., and intends the words for us. While being addressed to Jesus, they are also intended for all others as we plainly see from John 1:34. Some make a distinction between “my beloved Son” as referring to the eternal Godhead of the Son before the incarnation, and “in whom I was well pleased” as referring to Christ in his flesh: but the reason for this is too obscure. Οὗτος refers to the God-man as he stood on the riverbank. In what sense this voice intended ὁυἱόςμου to be understood cannot be in doubt after the preceding chapters in Matthew, to say nothing of all the rest of the Scriptures. This Son is the Second Person of the Godhead.

Those who deny the deity of this Son must settle their accounts with the Father. “My Son, the Beloved,” ὁἀγαπητός, adds the verbal adjective, which, like most verbals, has a passive meaning: the Father loves him. The verb ἀγαπᾶν denotes the highest type of love, that which is coupled with full comprehension and understanding and is accompanied with corresponding purpose. When it is used, as here, regarding one who is worthy of that love, ἀγαπᾶν includes the completest and highest manifestations of this love; this is impossible when the sinful world, enemies, and unworthy persons are the objects. The verb φιλεῖν expresses the love of affection, and while it is also fitting when it is referred to the relation existing between the Father and the Son, it expresses far less.

Unless we see the God-man in Jesus we shall fail to see why God should here call from heaven that this is his Son, the Beloved. This announcement has to do with the work on which Jesus is entering. It predicates far more than that the Son ἄσαρκος is the Son and as such from eternity the Beloved. That fact would evidently need no announcement, nor would it be connected with this baptism by such an announcement. The announcement deals with the Son ἔνσαρκος, with the Son as incarnate in Jesus, and with him as now entering on his Messianic work. It thus proclaims who Jesus really is: “my Son,” and voices the Father’s love for him as he now proceeds to do the Father’s will in this great work.

Some regard ἀγαπητός as equivalent to μονογενής, “the Only-begotten,” and assert that this is the fixed meaning of the term. The evidence adduced, however, amounts only to this that an only son was at times also called “the beloved” (son), thus in Gen. 22:2, 12, 16, which is the chief proof offered. The main objection to this interpretation lies in the sense attributed to μονογενής, namely that in John 1:14, 18; 3:16, 18; 1 John 4:9 this term refers only to the human birth of Jesus, that thus only he was “the Only-begotten,” and not to the generatio aeterna of the Son in his divine nature. From all eternity the Son was the Only-begotten; and when that Son came of his own volition to carry out his Father’s redemptive will, the Father called him “the Beloved.”

And to this the Father added: “in whom I was well pleased.” This clause is not an exposition of “the Beloved,” saying only about the same thing. Our versions convey this idea by disregarding the aorist tense εὐδόκησα, by translating, “in whom I am well pleased.” This tense “was pleased” becomes clear when we understand that the verb εὐδοκεῖν, when it is employed regarding persons, often has an intensive sense and is equal to ἐκλέγεσθαι and αἱρετίζειν, “to select or choose for oneself.” The good pleasure expresses itself in the choice. See C.-K., 253. Thus “in whom I was well pleased” really says, “I was well pleased in choosing him.” The clause goes back to the moment when God selected his Son for the redemptive work, and when that Son accepted that work. The aorist is historical and nothing more. The mighty fact of the heavenly selection of the Son who now stands incarnate at the Jordan is thus announced. That is why the Spirit is now sent upon him.

The eternal Son is the Father’s Elect for the great task. This Son, now incarnate and now presenting himself for the task, is thus the Beloved. Upon the human nature of this Elect and Beloved One the Spirit himself is bestowed for the great task. All this Jesus knew without the Father’s words. All this is announced for the Baptist and for all of us to know. And thus in what transpires here at the Jordan we have one of the clearest and completest revelations of the Trinity: the Father speaking from heaven—the Son standing incarnate at the Jordan—the Spirit as a dove descending out of heaven.

Yet here, too, we have this revelation only in a limited degree, only in so far as these three divine Persons are engaged in our redemption and salvation. The deeper mysteries of the Holy Trinity remain hidden from us. God, as it were, is compelled to reveal so much in order that we may know how our salvation is wrought. Even so much of the Trinity is beyond mortal comprehension. Its revelation has only the one purpose indicated and was never intended to answer the curious questions which rationalistic intellects (not hearts) may raise. The church has called this the economic Trinity, the revelation concerned with the economy of our salvation.

R. A Grammar of the Greek New Testament in the Light of Historical Research, by A. T. Robertson, fourth edition.

Concordia Triglotta Triglot Concordia. The Symbolical Books of the Ev. Lutheran Church.

C.-K. Biblisch-theologisches Woerterbuch der Neutestamentlichen Graezitaet von Dr. Hermann Cremer, zehnte, etc., Auflage, herausgegeben von D. Dr. Julius Koegel.