Commentary on a Harmony of the Evangelists Matthew Mark and Luke John Calvin
Matthew 2:1-6
MATTHEW 2:1-6
Matthew 2:1-6
1. Now when Jesus had been born in Bethlehem of Judea, 175 in the times of Herod the King, lo, Magi from the East came to Jerusalem, 2. Saying, Where is he who is born King of the Jews? for we have seen his star in the East, and have come that we may worship him. 3. And having heard these things, Herod the King was troubled, and all Jerusalem with him. 4. And having assembled all the chief priests and scribes of the people, he inquired at them where Christ should be born. 5. But they said to him, In Bethlehem of Judea: for thus it has been written by the prophet:
6. And thou, Bethlehem, in the land of Judah, art by no means the least among the princes of Judah: for out of thee shall come the leader, 176 who shall feed my people
Israel.
1. Now when Jesus had been born How it came about that Jesus was born in Bethlehem, Matthew does not say. The Spirit of God, who had appointed the Evangelists to be his clerks,177 appears purposely to have regulated their style in such a manner, that they all wrote one and the same history, with the most perfect agreement, but in different ways. It was intended, that the truth of God should more clearly and strikingly appear, when it was manifest that his witnesses did not speak by a preconcerted plan, but that each of them separately, without paying any attention to another, wrote freely and honestly what the Holy Spirit dictated.
This is a very remarkable narrative. God brought Magi from Chaldea, to come to 175"(Cite) de Judee;" — "(city) of Judea." 176"Dux;" — "Conducteur." 177"Scribas;" — "greffiers."—Clerks, not Authors in the ordinary meaning of that term, but persons who wrote to the dictation of another. This conveys the idea of what is frequently called plenary inspiration. If such a term as Clerk, or Penman, may be supposed to lower the sacred writers, it is not by a comparison of them with uninspired historians, the ablest of whom cannot, without arrogance, aspire to an equal level with those who wrote by inspiration. But when man is brought into a comparison with God, no language can express too strongly the infinite distance between the parties. The Evangelists do not ask the praise of invention, or judgment, or of anything else which would imply that the work was their own production. But they lay claim to a loftier and peculiar distinction, that they faithfully committed to writing that history which they were honored to receive from its Divine Author. Holy men of God spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost, (2 Peter 1:21.) — Ed.