γενεὰ as in Matthew 11:16, a moral class, “quae in omni malitia et improbitate vivit,” Suicer, s. v. γενεά. μοιχαλὶς, unfaithful to God as a wife to a husband, apt description of men professing godliness but ungodly in heart. ἐπιζητεῖ, hankers after, as in Matthew 6:32; characteristic; men that have no light within crave external evidence, which given would be of no service to them. Therefore: οὐ δοθήσεται : it will not be given either by Jesus or by any one else. He declines, knowing it to be vain. No sign will convince them; why give one? εἰ μὴ, etc.: except the sign of Jonah the prophet, which was no sign in their sense. What is referred to? But for what follows we should have said: the preaching of repentance by Jonah to the Ninevites. So Luke 11:30 seems to take it. Jonah preached repentance to the men of Nineveh as the only way of escape from judgment. Jesus points to that historic instance and says: Beware! Jonah was not the only prophetic preacher of repentance; but, as Nineveh is held up as a reproach to the persons addressed, to single him out was fitting.

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Old Testament