Luke 11:11-13

“ If a son shall ask bread of any of you that is a father, will he give him a stone? or if he ask a fish, will he for a fish give him a serpent? 12. Or if he shall ask an egg, will he offer him a scorpion? 13. If ye then, being evil, know how to give good gifts unto your children, how much more shall your heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to them that ask Him! ” Undoubtedly it sometimes happens in human relations, that the maxim of Luke 11:10 does not hold good. But in a paternal and filial relationship, such as that which was set before us by the model given at the beginning, success is certain. It is a Father to whom the believer prays; and when praying to Him in conformity with the model prescribed, he is sure to ask nothing except those things which such a Father cannot refuse to His child, and instead of which that Father would not give him other things, either hurtful or even less precious. The end of the piece thus brings us back to the starting-point: the title Father given to God, and the filial character of him who prays the Lord's Prayer. Δέ, then, relates to the a fortiori, in the certainty which we have just expressed. The reading of some Alex., τίς... ὁ υἱός or υἱός, “ What son shall ask of his father,” would appeal to the feeling of sonship among the hearers; the reading τίνα...is clearly to be preferred to it, “ What father of whom his son shall ask,” by which Jesus appeals to the heart of fathers in the assembly.

The three articles of food enumerated by Jesus appear at first sight to be chosen at random. But, as M. Bovet remarks, loaves, hard eggs, and fried fishes, are precisely the ordinary elements of a traveller's fare in the East. Matthew omits the third; Luke has certainly not added it at his own hand. The correspondence between bread and stone, fish and serpent, egg and scorpion, appears at a glance. In the teaching of Jesus all is picturesque, full of appropriateness, exquisite even to the minutest details. ᾿Επιδιδόναι, to transfer from hand to hand. This word, which is not repeated in Luke 11:13, includes this thought: “What father will have the courage to put into the hand...?”

The conclusion, Luke 11:13, is drawn by a new argument a fortiori; and the reasoning is still further strengthened by the words, ye being evil. The reading ὑπάρχοντες, “ finding yourselves evil,” seems more in harmony with the context than ὄντες, being (which is taken from Matthew, where the readings do not vary). ῾Υπάρχειν denotes the actual state as the starting-point for the supposed activity.

Bengel justly observes: Illustre testimonium de peccato originali.

The reading of the Alex., which omits ὁ before ἐξ οὐρανοῦ, would admit of the translation, will give from heaven. But there is no reason in the context which could have led Luke to put this construction so prominently. From heaven thus depends on the word Father, and the untranslateable Greek form can only be explained by introducing the verbal notion of giving between the substantive and its government: “The Father who giveth from heaven.”

Instead of the Holy Spirit, Matthew says, good things; and De Wette accuses Luke of having corrected him in a spiritualizing sense. He would thus have done here exactly the opposite of that which has been imputed to him in respect to Luke 6:20! Have we not then a complete proof that Luke took this whole piece from a source peculiar to himself? As to the intrinsic value of the two expressions, that of Matthew is simple and less didactic; that of Luke harmonizes better perhaps with the elevated sphere of the Lord's Prayer, which is the starting-point of the piece. The use of the simple δώσει (instead of ἐπιδώσει, Luke 11:12) arises from the fact that the idea does not recur of giving from hand to hand.

We regard this piece as one of those in which the originality and excellence of Luke's sources appear in their full light, although we consider the comparison of Matthew indispensable to restore the words of our Lord in their entirety.