Albert Barnes Commentary Matthew 3

MATTHEW CHAPTER 3

In those days. The days referred to here cannot be those mentioned in the preceding chapter, for John was only six months older than Christ. Perhaps Matthew intended to extend his narrative to the whole time that Jesus lived at Nazareth; and the meaning is, "in those days while Jesus still lived at Nazareth." John began to preach. It is not probable that John began to baptize or preach long before the Savior began His ministry; and, consequently, from the time mentioned at the close of the second chapter to that mentioned in the beginning of the third, an interval of twenty-five or more years elapsed.

John the Baptist. Or, John the baptizer—so called from his principal office, that of baptizing. Baptism, or the application of water, was a rite well known to the Jews, and practiced when they admitted proselytes to their religion from heathenism.—Lightfoot.

Preaching. The word translated to preach means to proclaim in the manner of a public crier; to make proclamation. The discourses recorded in the New Testament are mostly brief, sometimes a single sentence. They were public proclamations of some great truth. Such appear to have been the discourses of John, calling people to repentance.

In the wilderness of Judea. This region was situated along the Jordan River and the Dead Sea, east of Jerusalem.

The word translated wilderness does not mean, as it does for us, a place of boundless forests entirely destitute of inhabitants; but rather a mountainous, rough, and thinly-settled land, covered to a considerable extent with forests and rocks, and better suited for pasture than for cultivation. There were inhabitants in these places, and even villages, but these were the comparatively unsettled portions of the area (1 Samuel 25:1–2). In the time of Joshua, there were six cities in what was then called a wilderness (Joshua 15:61–62).

Repent ye. Repentance implies sorrow for past offenses (2 Corinthians 7:10), a deep sense of the evil of sin as committed against God (Psalms 51:4), and a full purpose to turn from transgression and to lead a holy life. A true penitent has sorrow for sin, not only because it is ruinous to his soul, but chiefly because it is an offense against God, and is that abominable thing which he hates (Jeremiah 44:4). It is produced by seeing the great danger and misery to which it exposes us; by seeing the justice and holiness of God (Job 42:6); and by seeing that our sins have been committed against Christ, and were the cause of his death (Zechariah 12:10; Luke 22:61–62).

There are two words in the New Testament translated repentance—one of which denotes a change of mind, or a reformation of life; and the other, sorrow or regret that sin has been committed. The word used here is the former, calling the Jews to a change of life, or a reformation of conduct. In the time of John, the nation had become extremely wicked and corrupt, perhaps more so than at any preceding period. Therefore, both he and Christ began their ministry by calling to repentance.

The kingdom of heaven is at hand. The phrases, kingdom of heaven, kingdom of Christ, and kingdom of God, frequently occur in the Bible. They all refer to the same thing. The expectation of such a kingdom was taken from the Old Testament, and especially from Daniel (Daniel 7:13–14). The prophets had told of a successor to David that should sit on his throne (1 Kings 2:4; 1 Kings 8:25; Jeremiah 33:17).

The Jews expected a great national deliverer. They supposed that when the Messiah should appear, all the dead would be raised; that the judgment would take place; and that the enemies of the Jews would be destroyed, and themselves advanced to great national dignity and honor.

The language in which they were accustomed to describe this event was retained by our Savior and his apostles. Yet they early attempted to correct the common notions respecting his reign. This was one design, doubtless, of John in preaching repentance. Instead of summoning them to military exercises and collecting an army, which would have been in accordance with their expectations, he called them to a change of life; to the doctrine of repentance—a state of things far more consistent with the approach of a kingdom of purity.

The phrases "kingdom of God" and "kingdom of heaven" have been supposed to have a considerable variety of meaning. Some have thought that they refer to the state of things in heaven; others, to the personal reign of Christ on earth; others, that they mean the church, or the reign of Christ in the hearts of his people.

There can be no doubt that there is reference in the words to the condition of things in heaven after this life. But the church of God is a preparatory state to that beyond the grave, a state in which Christ preeminently rules and reigns. There is also no doubt that the phrase sometimes refers to the state of things in the church. Therefore, it means the state of things which the Messiah was to set up—his spiritual reign began in the church on earth, and completed in heaven.

The phrase would be best translated, "the reign of God draws near." We do not commonly say of a kingdom that it is movable, or that it approaches. A reign may be said to be at hand, or the time when Christ should reign was at hand.

In this sense, it means that the time when Christ should reign, or set up his kingdom, or begin his dominion on earth under the Christian economy, was about to commence. The phrase, then, should not be confined to any period of that reign, but includes his whole dominion over his people on earth and in heaven.

In the passage here, it clearly means that the coming of the Messiah was near, or that the time of the reign of God, which the Jews had expected, was coming.

The word heaven, or heavens, as it is in the original, sometimes means the place so called; and sometimes is, by a figure of speech, used to stand for the Great Being whose residence is there, as in Daniel 4:26: "the heavens do rule." (Luke 15:18). As that kingdom was one of purity, it was proper that the people should prepare for it by turning from their sins and directing their minds to a suitable fitness for his reign.

The prophet Esaias. The prophet Isaiah. Esias is the Greek mode of writing the name. This passage is taken from Isaiah 40:3. It is here said to have been spoken in reference to John, the forerunner of Christ. The language is such as was familiar to the Jews, and such as they would understand.

It was spoken at first with reference to the return from the captivity at Babylon. Anciently, it was customary in the march of armies to send messengers, or pioneers, before them, to proclaim their approach; to provide for them; to remove obstructions; to make roads, level hills, fill up valleys, etc.

Isaiah, describing the return from Babylon, uses language taken from that custom. A crier, or herald is introduced. In the vast deserts that lay between Babylon and Judea, he is represented as lifting up his voice, and, with authority, commanding a public road to be made for the return of the captive Jews, with the Lord as their deliverer. Prepare you the way of the Lord, make his paths straight, says he; or, as Isaiah adds, Let the valleys be exalted, or filled up, and the hills be leveled, and a straight, level highway be prepared, that they may march with ease and safety. (See Barnes on Isaiah 40:3).

As applied to John, it means, that he was sent to remove obstructions, and to prepare the people for the coming of the Messiah; like a herald going before an army on the march, to make preparations for their coming.

His raiment of camel's hair. This was his clothing. This is not the fine hair of the camel from which our elegant cloth is made, called camlet, nor the more elegant material brought from the East Indies under the name of camel's hair. Instead, it was the long, shaggy hair of the camel, from which a coarse, inexpensive cloth is made, still worn by the poorer classes in the East and by monks. This dress of camel's hair and a leather belt, it seems, was the common dress of the prophets (2 Kings 1:8; Zechariah 13:4).

His meat was locusts. This was his food. These constituted the food of the common people. Among the Greeks, the vilest of the people used to eat them, and the fact that John made his food of them is significant of his great poverty and humble life. The Jews were allowed to eat them (Leviticus 11:22).

Locusts are flying insects and are of various kinds. The green locusts are about two inches in length and about the thickness of a man's finger. The common brown locust is about three inches long. The general form and appearance of the locust is not unlike the grasshopper. They were one of the plagues of Egypt (Exodus 10:1). In eastern countries, they are very numerous. They appear in such quantities as to darken the sky and devour in a short time every green thing. The whole earth is sometimes covered with them for many leagues (Joel 1:4; Isaiah 33:4).

"Some species of the locust are eaten today in eastern countries and are even considered a delicacy when properly cooked. After tearing off the legs and wings and taking out the entrails, they stick them in long rows upon wooden spits, roast them at the fire, and then proceed to devour them with great zest.

There are also other ways of preparing them. For example: they cook them and dress them in oil; or, having dried them, they pulverize them, and when other food is scarce, make bread of the meal. The Bedouins pack them with salt in dense masses, which they carry in their leather sacks. From these, they cut slices as they may need them.

It is remarkable that even learned men have allowed themselves to hesitate about understanding these passages as referring to the literal locust, when the fact that these are eaten by people in the East is so abundantly proved by the concurrent testimony of travelers.

One of them says they are brought to market on strings in all the cities of Arabia, and that he saw an Arab on Mount Sumara who had collected a sack full of them. They are prepared in different ways. An Arab in Egypt, whom he asked to eat locusts in his presence immediately, threw them upon the glowing coals. After he supposed they were roasted enough, he took them by the legs and head and devoured the remainder in one mouthful.

When the Arabs have them in quantities, they roast or dry them in an oven, or boil them and eat them with salt. The Arabs in the kingdom of Morocco boil the locusts; and the Bedouins eat locusts, which are collected in great quantities in the beginning of April, when they are easily caught. After being roasted a little upon the iron plate on which bread is baked, they are dried in the sun and then put into large sacks with a mixture of a little salt. They are never served up as a dish, but everyone takes a handful of them when hungry."

Un. Bib. Die.

Wild honey. This was probably the honey that he found in the rocks of the wilderness. Palestine was often called the land flowing with milk and honey (Exodus 3:8, 17; 13:5).

Bees were kept with great care, and large numbers of them abounded in the fissures of trees and the clefts of rocks. There is also a species of honey called wild honey, or wood-honey (1 Samuel 14:27), or honeydew, produced by certain little insects and deposited on the leaves of trees, flowing from them in great quantities to the ground (See 1 Samuel 14:24–27). This is said to be still produced in Arabia, and perhaps it was this that John lived on.

Jerusalem. The people of Jerusalem.

All Judea. Many people from Judea. It does not mean that literally all the people went, but that great multitudes went. It was general. Jerusalem was in the part of the country called Judea. Judea was situated on the west side of the Jordan. See Barnes on Matthew 2:1.

Region about Jordan. On the east and west side of the river; near to Jordan.