Luke 4:1-15

And Jesus being full of the Holy Ghost returned from Jordan, and was led by the Spirit into the wilderness,

For the exposition, see the notes at Matthew 4:1, and Mark 1:35.

As observed on Matthew 4:13, the prevalent opinion has always been that our Lord paid two visits to Nazareth: the first being that recorded here; the second that recorded in Matthew 13:54-40, and Mark 6:1. This is maintained on the following grounds: First, The most natural sense of the words in Matthew 4:13, "And leaving Nazareth, He came down and dwelt in Capernaum," is that He then paid a visit to it, though the particulars of it are not given. In this case the visit recorded in Luke 13:54-58 must be a second visit. Next the visit recorded in Luke bears on its face to have been made at the outset of our Lord's ministry, if not the verse opening of it; whereas that recorded in Matthew 8:1 and in Mark 6:1 is evidently one paid at a somewhat advanced period of His ministry. Further, at the visit recorded by Luke, our Lord appears have performed no miracles; whereas it is expressly said that at the visit recorded in Mark He did work some miracles. Once more it is alleged of the wonder expressed by the Nazarenes at our Lord's teaching, that the language is noticeably different in Luke and in Mark. In reply to this, we observe: First, that as none of the Evangelists record more than one pubic visit to Nazareth, so we have shown in our exposition of Matthew 4:13, that it is not necessary to infer from that verse that our Lord actually visited Nazareth at that time.

Thus are we left free to decide the question-of one or two visits-on internal evidence alone. Secondly, the unparalleled violence with which the Nazarenes treated our Lord, at the visit recorded by Luke, suits far better with a somewhat advanced period of His ministry than with the very opening scene of it, or any very near its commencement. Thirdly, the visit, accordingly, recorded by Luke, though it reads at first like the opening scene of our Lord's ministry, gives evidence, on closer inspection, of its having occurred at a somewhat advanced period. The challenge which they would be ready to throw out to Him, and which He here meets, was that He ought to work among His Nazarene townsmen as wonderful miracles as had made His stay at capture so illustrious. Does not this prove not only that His ministry did not begin at Nazareth, but that He had stayed so long away from it afar His public ministry began, that the Nazarenes were irritated at the slight thus put upon them, and would be ready to insinuate that He was afraid to face them? Fourthly, supposing our Lord to have framed His own procedure according to the instructions which He gave to His disciples - "Give not that which is holy unto the dogs, neither cast ye your pearls before swine;" and "When they persecute you in one city, flee ye into another" (Matthew 7:6; Matthew 10:23) - it is in the last degree improbable that He would again expose Himself to those who had, at a former visit, rushed upon Him and thrush Him out of their city, and attempted to hurl Him down a precipice to kill Him; and though, if recorded, it is of course to be believed, the evidence of the fact would require to be much clearer than we think it is to warrant the conclusion that He actually did so.

Fifthly, if our Lord did pay a second public visit to Nazareth, we might expect, in the record of it, some allusion to the first; or, if that be not necessary, it is surely reasonable to suppose that the impression made upon the Nazarenes, and the observations that fell from them would differ somewhat at least from those produced by the first visit. But, instead of this, not only do we find the impression produced upon them by the visit recorded by Matthew (Matthew 13:1) and by Mark (Mark 6:1), to be just what might have been expected from such a people on hearing Him for the first time; but we find their remarks to be identical with those recorded by Luke as made at his visit. Who can readily believe this of two distinct visits? Can anything be more unnatural than to suppose that after these Nazarenes had attempted the life of our Lord, and been disappointed of their object at one visit, they should at a subsequent one express their surprise at His teaching precisely in the terms they had before employed, and just as if they had never heard him before? As for the attempts to show that the questions are not put so strongly in Matthew and Mark, as they are in Luke (see Birks' "Horae Evangelicae"), it is astonishing to us that this should be urged-so devoid of all plausibility does it appear. The one argument of real force in favour of two visits is, that at the visit recorded by Mark (which is the same as that of Matthew) our Lord is expressly said to have performed miracles, while it would seem that at that of Luke He performed none. But the very way in which Mark records those miracles suggests its own explanation: "He could there do no mighty work" [ dunamin (G1411)], or, "He could there do no miracle, except that He laid His hands noon a few sick folk, and healed them" (Mark 6:5) - suggesting that the unbelief of the Nazarenes tied up His hands, so to speak, from any display of His miraculous power. But as that unbelief evidently refers to what was displayed in public, so the inability is clearly an inability, in the face of that unbelief, to give any manifestation in the synagogue, or in public, of His miraculous power, as He did in the synagogue of Capernaum and elsewhere. Hence, His "laying His hands on a few sick folk," being expressly recorded as exceptional, had been done in private, and in all likelihood before His public appearance in the synagogue had kindled the popular rage, and made at impossible. If this be correct, the demand of the Nazarenes for miracles and our Lord's refusal of them, as recorded by Luke, is quite consistent with the statement of what He performed as given in Mark. A striking confirmation of the conclusion we have formed on this question will be found in the exposition of John 4:43, and Remark I at the close of that section.