Luke 22:31-34

“ And the Lord said, Simon, Simon, behold, Satan hath desired to have you, that he may sift you as wheat. 32. But I have prayed for thee, that thy faith fail not; and when thou art converted, strengthen thy brethren. 33, 34.”

The warning Luke 22:31 might be connected with Luke 22:28: “ Ye are they which have continued with me. ” There would be a contrast: “Here is a temptation in which ye shall not continue.” But the mention of Satan's part, in respect of the disciples, seems to be suggested by the abrupt departure of Judas, in which Satan had played a decisive part (John 13:27: “ And after the sop, Satan entered into him ”). The tempter is present; he has gained the mastery of Judas; he threatens the other disciples also; he is preparing to attack Jesus Himself. “ The prince of this world cometh,” says Jesus in John (John 14:30). And the danger to each is in proportion to the greater or less amount of alloy which his heart contains. This is the reason why Jesus more directly addresses Peter. By the address: Simon, twice repeated, He alludes to his natural character, and puts him on his guard against that presumption which is its dominant characteristic. The ἐξ in ἐξῃτήσατο includes the notion: of getting him drawn out of the hands of God into his own. Wheat is purified by means of the sieve or fan; σινιάζω may apply to either. Satan asks the right of putting the Twelve to the proof; and he takes upon himself, over against God, as formerly in relation to Job, to prove that at bottom the best among the disciples is but a Judas. Jesus by no means says (Luke 22:32) that his prayer has been refused. Rather it appears from the intercession of Jesus that it has been granted. Jesus only seeks to parry the consequences of the fall which threatens them all, and which shall be especially perilous to Peter. Comp. Matthew and Mark: “ All ye shall be offended because of me this night. ” The faithlessness of which they are about to be guilty, might have absolutely broken the bond formed between them and Him. That of Peter, in particular, might have cast him into the same despair which ruined Judas. But while the enemy was spying out the weak side of the disciples to destroy them, Jesus was watching and praying to parry the blow, or at least to prevent it from being mortal to any of them. Langen explains ἐπιστρέψας in the sense of שׁוּב, H8740: “strengthen thy brethren anew. ” But this meaning of ἐπιστρέφειν is unknown in Greek, and the πότε distinguishes the notion of the participle precisely from that of the principal verb. This saying of Jesus is one of those which lift the curtain which covers the invisible world from our view. Although it has been preserved to us only by Luke, Holtzmann acknowledges its authenticity. He ascribes it to a special tradition. That does not prevent him, however, from deriving this whole account from the common source, the proto-Mark. But Luke 22:35-38 are also peculiar to Luke, and show clearly that his source was different.

Peter believes in his fidelity more than in the word of Jesus. Jesus then announces to him his approaching fall. The name Peter reminds him of the height to which Jesus had raised him. Three crowings of the cock were distinguished; the first between midnight and one o'clock, the second about three, the third between five and six. The third watch (from midnight to three o'clock), embraced between the first two, was also called ἀλεκτοροφωνία, cock-crow (Mark 13:35). The saying of Jesus in Luke, Matthew, and John would therefore signify: “To-day, before the second watch from nine o'clock to midnight have passed, thou shalt have denied me thrice.” But Mark says, certainly in a way at once more detailed and exact: “ Before the cock have crowed twice, thou shalt have denied me thrice. ” That is to say: before the end of the third watch, before three o'clock in the morning. The mention of those two crowings, the first of which should have already been a warning to Peter, perhaps makes the gravity of his sin the more conspicuous.

Matthew and Mark place the prediction of the denial on the way to Gethsemane. But John confirms the account of Luke, who places it in the supper room. We need not refute the opinion of Langen, who thinks that the denial was predicted twice.