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Wesley's Explanatory Notes

Luke 23

Luke 23:4

Then said Pilate — After having heard his defence — I find no fault in this man — I do not find that he either asserts or attempts any thing seditious or injurious to Cesar.... [ Continue Reading ]

Luke 23:5

He stirreth up the people, beginning from Galilee — Probably they mentioned Galilee to alarm Pilate, because the Galileans were notorious for sedition and rebellion.... [ Continue Reading ]

Luke 23:11

Herod set him at nought — Probably judging him to be a fool, because he answered nothing. In a splendid robe — In royal apparel; intimating that he feared nothing from this king.... [ Continue Reading ]

Luke 23:16

I will therefore chastise him — Here Pilate began to give ground, which only encouraged them to press on. Matthew 27:15; Mark 15:6; John 18:39.... [ Continue Reading ]

Luke 23:22

He said to them the third time, Why, what evil hath he done? — As Peter, a disciple of Christ, dishonoured him by denying him thrice, so Pilate, a heathen, honoured Christ, by thrice owning him to be innocent.... [ Continue Reading ]

Luke 23:31

If they do these things in the green tree, what shall be done in the dry? — Our Lord makes use of a proverbial expression, frequent among the Jews, who compare a good man to a green tree, and a bad man to a dead one: as if he had said, If an innocent person suffer thus, what will become of the wicke... [ Continue Reading ]

Luke 23:34

Then said Jesus — Our Lord passed most of the time on the cross in silence: yet seven sentences which he spoke thereon are recorded by the four evangelists, though no one evangelist has recorded them all. Hence it appears that the four Gospels are, as it were, four parts, which, joined together, mak... [ Continue Reading ]

Luke 23:35

If thou be the Christ; Luke 23:37. If thou be the king — The priests deride the name of Messiah: the soldiers the name of king.... [ Continue Reading ]

Luke 23:39

And one of the malefactors reviled him — St. Matthew says, the robbers: St. Mark, they that were crucified with him, reviled him. Either therefore St. Matthew and Mark put the plural for the singular (as the best authors sometimes do) or both reviled him at the first, till one of them felt "the over... [ Continue Reading ]

Luke 23:40

The other rebuked him — What a surprising degree was here of repentance, faith, and other graces! And what abundance of good works, in his public confession of his sin, reproof of his fellow criminal, his honourable testimony to Christ, and profession of faith in him, while he was in so disgraceful... [ Continue Reading ]

Luke 23:42

Remember me when thou comest — From heaven, in thy kingdom — He acknowledges him a king, and such a king, as after he is dead, can profit the dead. The apostles themselves had not then so clear conceptions of the kingdom of Christ.... [ Continue Reading ]

Luke 23:43

In paradise — The place where the souls of the righteous remain from death till the resurrection. As if he had said, I will not only remember thee then, but this very day.... [ Continue Reading ]

Luke 23:44

There was darkness over all the earth — The noon — tide darkness, covering the sun, obscured all the upper hemisphere. And the lower was equally darkened, the moon being in opposition to the sun, and so receiving no light from it. Matthew 27:45.... [ Continue Reading ]

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