John Calvin Commentary Matthew 10:25

"It is enough for the disciple that he be as his teacher, and the servant as his lord. If they have called the master of the house Beelzebub, how much more them of his household!" — Matthew 10:25 (ASV)

If they have called the master of the house Beelzebub. This is equivalent to his calling himself Lord of the Church, as the apostle, when comparing him to Moses and the prophets (Hebrews 3:1), says that they were servants, but that he is the Son and heir. Though he bestows on them the honor of calling them brethren (Hebrews 2:11), yet he is the first-born (Romans 8:29) and head of the whole church; and, in short, he possesses supreme government and power.

Nothing, therefore, can be more unreasonable than to wish to be considered believers, and yet to grumble against God when he conforms us to the image of his Son, whom he has placed over all his family. What sort of delicacy do we claim if we wish to hold a place in his house and to be above the Lord himself? The general meaning is that we carry our delicacy and tenderness to excess if we consider it a hardship to endure reproaches to which our Prince willingly submitted.

Beelzebub is a corrupted term and would have been more correctly written Baalzebub. This was the name given to the chief of the false gods of the Philistines, who was worshipped by the inhabitants of Ekron (2 Kings 1:2). Baalim was the name of the inferior deities, whom the Papists of the author's day called patrons. Now, as Baalzebub means the patron of the fly, or of the flies, some have thought that he was so called on account of the great multitude of flies in the temple, caused by the number of sacrifices; but I rather conjecture that the assistance of the idol was implored against the flies which infested that place.

When Ahaziah, under the influence of superstition, inquired of him about his recovery, he called him by this name (Baalzebub), which, from that circumstance, would appear not to have been a term of reproach.

But just as the name gehenna was applied by holy men to hell to stamp that place with infamy, so, to express their hatred and detestation of the idol, they gave the name Beelzebub to the devil. From this we infer that wicked men, to make Christ detestable to the multitude, employed the most reproachful term they could invent by calling him the devil, or, in other words, the greatest enemy of religion.

If we happen to be assailed by the same kind of reproach, we should not think it strange that what began in the head should be completed in the members.