Expositor's Bible Commentary Commentary Luke 1:35

"And the angel answered and said unto her, The Holy Spirit shall come upon thee, and the power of the Most High shall overshadow thee: wherefore also the holy thing which is begotten shall be called the Son of God." — Luke 1:35 (ASV)

Once again (cf. v.15) Luke mentions the Holy Spirit, as he does six more times in his first two chapters (1:41, 67, 80; 2:25, 26, 27). The word for “overshadow” (GK 2173) carries the sense of the holy, powerful presence of God, as in the description of the cloud that covered the tabernacle (Exodus 40:35). This word is used in all three accounts of the Transfiguration to describe the overshadowing of the cloud (Matthew 17:5; Mark 9:7). Likewise, in each account the voice comes out of the cloud identifying Jesus as God’s Son, a striking reminder of this verse where the life that results from the enveloping cloud is identified as “the Son of God.” The child is called “the holy one,” both because of this connection with the Holy Spirit and because of Jesus’ life of purity.