A.T. Robertson Commentary Luke 1:13

"But the angel said unto him, Fear not, Zacharias: because thy supplication is heard, and thy wife Elisabeth shall bear thee a son, and thou shalt call his name John." — Luke 1:13 (ASV)

Is heard (εισηκουσθη). First aorist passive indicative. A sort of timeless aorist, "was heard" when made, and so "is heard" now. Probably the prayer was for a son in spite of the great age of Elisabeth, though the Messianic redemption is possible also.

John (Ιωανην). The word means that God is gracious. The mention of the name should have helped Zacharias to believe. The message of the angel (verses 13-17) takes on a metrical form when turned into Hebrew (Ragg) and it is a prose poem in Greek and English like 1:30-33,35-37,42-45,46-55,68-70; 2:10-12,14,29-32,34-35. Certainly Luke has preserved the earliest Christian hymns in their oldest sources. He is the first critic of the sources of the Gospels and a scholarly one.