Her purification] RV 'their purification,' i.e. either, (1) the Jews' purification, or (2) the purification of mother and child. Strictly speaking, however, only the mother (not the child) was ceremonially unclean.

25-35 Simeon and the Nunc Dimittis] Simeon belonged, like Zacharias and Anna, to the class of humble and devout Jews who 'looked for the redemption of Jerusalem,' and whose type of piety was very different from that of the scribes: see Luke 2:37; Luke 2:38. To such persons the sacrificial system of the Old Covenant and the spiritual teaching of the prophets had been a true preparation for Christ, and consequently God shed abroad among them the gift of prophecy, and revealed to them truths to which the doctors of the Law were blind.

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