no doubt revealed to the evangelist, who records their "reasoning among themselves," by inspiration, as they were not likely to make it publicly known; unless, indeed, we may suppose some one of the council, more favourable to the claims of Christ, as Nicodemus, might report it. They said, "If we shall say, From heaven," that is, from God, because used in that sense by the Jews, as sometimes by us, "he will say, Why did ye not then believe him," and become his disciples, instead of slighting and persecuting him? 'But if we shall say, Of men," a merely human and self-instituted ministry, "we fear the people; for all hold John as a prophet;" which indeed was so strong a persuasion among them, that they considered the defeat of Herod's army, in his war with Aretas, king of Arabia, to be a signal judgment of God upon him on account of the murder of the Baptist. Betwixt a decision which would have condemned themselves, and one which would have exasperated the people, and lessened their credit with them, they were held so firmly, that their only way of escape was to confess their ignorance of the matter; which only brought them into a difficulty more seriously fatal to their pretensions, because it was a confession that they were unable to judge between true and false prophets, divine and self-constituted messengers,

the power of which they arrogated to the Sanhedrim. Hence, when they replied, We cannot tell, our Lord rejoins, Neither tell I you by what authority I do these things; that is, Since you have confessed your inability to discriminate the marks of a true and a false prophet in the case of John, it follows that you are unfit to decide every similar case; and I refuse to put myself upon your judgment."

Verse 28. A certain man had two sons, &c.-This parable was designed to reprove the hypocrisy of the scribes and Pharisees, for professing to pay a ready obedience to the commands of God, and yet rejecting the ministry of John. Although they declined to say whether John's ministry was from God or not, our Lord determines the case, and charges them with a sinful opposition to his authorized mission.

Verse 29. I will not, but afterwards he repented, &c.—These represented, according to our Lord's own explanation, verse 32, "the publicans and the harlots," that is, notorious sinners, who had openly and rebelliously contemned the divine authority; but afterwards believed John's doctrine, listened to his warnings, and turned with a penitent mind to God; of which class of persons it would appear that considerable numbers were recovered by John's ministry.

Verse 30. I go, sir, and went not

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k

Eyo kupie, the ellipsis being supplied by απερχομαι. This prompt but hypocritical assent, followed by disobedience, represented the criminal dissimulation of the Pharisees, who, pretending to pay the most perfect regard to every injunction of God, held the publicans and other common sinners in the utmost contempt, and yet neither received the testimony of John at first, nor, even after they had seen the mighty effects produced in the reformation of the greatest sinners, afterwards repented, and acknowledged his mission.

Verse 31. They say unto him, The first. In this kind of interlocutory argument he to whom the question was proposed was bound to answer, although he might see that his reply would only give occasion to his antagonist to turn the conclusion against himself. The debate was in public; and silence on the part of the Pharisees, who had introduced it, would have been a confession that they were refuted: they were impelled therefore to make answer to our Lord's questions, although at every step his remarks pressed with heavier weight upon them.

The publicans and harlots go into the kingdom of God before yon.—The teλwvai, and the Toprai, stand for openly careless, or immoral persons in general; and as these were most powerfully and speedily brought to repentance by John, so our Lord declares that the same effect would follow under his dispensation of religion: they would enter the kingdom of God before the self-righteous and deluded formalists. Verse 32. In the way of righteousness.—

X

Enjoining it even to severity, and strictly practising it himself; and ye who make great professions of sanctity and selfdenial, and respect to them wherever found, did not receive him as a prophet. This is the point of the reproof: they boasted of strict righteousness, conformity to all the institutions of God; and in this way John came to them, this was the character of his ministry, which they, however, proudly spurned, and thereby declared their hypocrisy.

Some apply this parable of the two sons to the Gentiles and Jews; the former of whom, though for ages openly disobedient to the commands of God, to the law written upon their hearts, or handed down by tradition, promptly embraced the gospel; while the Jews, who, at least ever since the return from the captivity, had paid all outward respect to the worship and revelations of God, yet wholly rejected the gospel, which stood upon the same kind of evidence as their law and prophets. Still this application is only inferential and secondary; for our Lord himself explains the parable of the two classes of men among the Jews who are mentioned. It, however, frequently happens, in Christian communities, that they who are the most complaisant as to truth, are the farthest from the kingdom of God; and that the openly rebellious wills of the wicked are suddenly and effectually turned to God by the power of his grace, and that they deal more honestly with their spiritual dangers, and accept with greater readiness the free salvation of Christ.

was a stone of stumbling, and rock of offence;" first, to all the Jews who rejected a suffering Messiah, and by consequence, his sacrificial death; and then to all others who equally spurned Christ crucified as the only ground of their hope of salvation. Thus they were broken, so wounded as to sustain great injury, yet not but that they might repent and find mercy; for their case is not represented as absolutely fatal, until the stone at the head of the corner should fall upon them. This signifies a judicial wielding of Christ's power and supreme authority against all such as rejected him, though after much long-suffering and delay. With respect to the Jews as a nation, this took place after the gospel in its perfected form, with all the additional attestations of Christ's resurrection and ascension, and the effusion of the Holy Spirit upon the apostles, had been for many years proclaimed among them, and pressed upon their acceptance. But they continued to full upon or stumble at the foundation, and still more grievously to wound and injure themselves; until at last Christ turned against them the weight of his power as the Judge, and utterly destroyed their city and nation. Thus also it shall be with every individual who rejects Christ as a Saviour: he

a Luke xiv. 16; Rev. xix. 9.

too must meet him in his glory as Judge, and in "the hour of death, and in the day of judgment," shall awfully realize the truth of the words, "On whomsoever this stone shall fall, it will grind him to powder." Evveλao@ai, and λuay, are of different degrees of force: the former signifies to bruise; the latter, to disperse, as chaff, from Akuos, a winnowing van ; and hence is used figuratively for utter destruction, or a dashing in pieces.

Verse 46. They feared the multitude.— This shows that not only the people who came up with our Lord from Jericho, but vast numbers who were now collecting from all parts to celebrate the passover at Jerusalem, admitted his claims as a prophet, and would have been excited to tumult by any open attempt to apprehend him. This rendered it necessary for his enemies to proceed with circumspection and subtlety; and therefore St. Luke adds, "They watched him, and sent forth spies, which should feign themselves just men, that they might take hold of his words, that so they might deliver him unto the power and authority of the governor."

CHAPTER XXII. Verse 1. And Jesus answered, &c.-It has been before remarked that this formula does not always signi