Luke 20: 41 - 44
41 But he said to them, “How can they say that the Christ is David's son? 42 For David himself says in the Book of Psalms,
“‘The Lord said to my Lord,
“Sit at my right hand,
43 until I make your enemies your footstool.”’
44 David thus calls him Lord, so how is he his son?”
Questions:
ReplyDelete1. Isn't Christ David's son? What point is Jesus trying to make?
https://hartmangroupdevotionsmark.blogspot.com/2018/11/mark-1228-37-28-one-of-teachers-of-law.html says:
ReplyDeleteDavid's Lord, the Jews understood is Messiah, who God or Jehovah will command to take His place at the position of power and authority, until David's Lord's "enemies" are subjugated. No doubt the scribes, Pharisees, Sadducees, chief priests and elders of the people, would reflect on this later and realize that according to Jesus, the "enemies" to be subjugated in the future, was a veiled reference to themselves. The Lord Jesus would suffer at their hands, but sit at the right hand of God, patiently awaiting the total subjugation of His enemies, including those very religious leaders.
Obviously, they couldn't answer because they refused to believe. Their theology recognized that the coming Messiah would be of the lineage of David and their theology recognized that God would address Him as "Lord," but they couldn't understand how king David could address Him as Lord. The title of "Lord" or Adonai (in the Hebrew) implies sovereign ruler over someone. If David called Him, "Lord," then he would be calling his own son, the sovereign ruler over himself, in acknowledgment of subjection to Him. This to the Jewish thinking, where the respect of one's father was a serious duty, presented a serious problem! And of course, for someone accepting Jesus as the Messiah and sovereign God, this is no problem. David welcomes Jesus as his sovereign Lord regardless of the fact that these Jewish religious leaders refused Him and this was the very issue that Jesus was driving at in the first place.
What a profound argument! Jesus took the religious leaders on a mental journey, beginning with what they believed and leading them to the logical conclusion of what they refused to accept, i.e., that He was the promised Messiah and allegiance to His Lordship was their personal obligation. They were not to try to trap Him with silly political, theological or ethical questions, but to humble themselves before Him and one coming day, as His "enemies, be made His footstool!"
The entire portrait here in Psalm 110 is the granting of authority to rule to the Messiah, by Jehovah God, who then makes war against His enemies, until completely victorious and the dead bodies lay as a testimony to the world of the sovereign power of the Messiah! This final silencing question of Jesus' wasn't simply meant to arouse the curiosity of His enemies, but to announce their impending doom! These enemies of the Messiah would one day be crushed under the authority of His power as all who seek to rebell against Him.
The chief priests, scribes, Pharisees and Sadducees would have their day of rejecting Christ and finally rally together to place Him on the Cross to die, but that's not the end of the book about the Messiah. There's another chapter that's already been written and it contains their impending doom and the total destruction of all those who reject Jesus Christ as the rightful Lord of their life.
https://hartmangroupdevotionsmark.blogspot.com/2018/11/mark-1228-37-28-one-of-teachers-of-law.html continued:
ReplyDeleteBut there's one more question and it doesn't come from them to Him, it comes from Him to them. And the purpose of this question is to make very clear the identity of the Christ, the Messiah. You see, they were living under the false assumption that the Messiah would be just a human military leader. Oh, He had to have all the right credentials, but He was human in the view of these religious leaders and their followers. And so the Lord confronts them and the crowd gathered there at the Passover season with a pronouncement here that the Messiah in fact is far more than just a human, He is God. And that's the essence of this passage.
And so I think it comes not only as an indictment saying, in effect, how could you be so foolish not to know your own scriptures, how could you be so foolish to have missed all of this, but it comes also as an invitation to those whose hearts are still open.
So what is your opinion about the Messiah, the anointed one, the one you're waiting for? Whose Son is He? Whose Son is He? Very simple question, as far as the Jews were concerned. Very easy to answer. In fact, it was so easy because they didn't know the full answer. They thought they knew the answer. They didn't know. They thought the Messiah was nothing more than a man, human. So the question appeared to them to be very easy to answer.
You know well that they could have disqualified Jesus instantaneously from being Messiah if they could have proven that He did not have a Davidic genealogy, right? They could have eliminated Him very fast. And you know well that they must have checked.
But their answer, as right as it was, was inadequate. It was true but it was partial. It was correct but it fell short of the full answer. And, you see, they're saying to Him, "Who do You think You are, letting people call You Son of David? That great Messianic title is too great a title for You." And He is saying no, it's too a small a title for Me. Just the opposite.
Number one, He's saying the Psalm is Messianic because David is talking about Messiah. Secondly, He is affirming Davidic authorship. He is saying David said it. Thirdly, most important of all, Jesus affirms the deity of Messiah.
Now how can you be the source of David and the offspring of David? Same thing. He is David's Son, He is David's Lord, the God-man.
https://biblehub.com/commentaries/matthew/22-41.htm says:
ReplyDeleteWhile the Pharisees ... - Jesus, having confounded the great sects of the Jews, proceeds, in his turn, to propose to them a question for their solution.
This was done, not for the purpose of vain parade and triumph, but:
1. to show them how ignorant they were of their prophecies.
2. to humble them in view of their ignorance.
3. to bring to their attention the true doctrine respecting the Messiah - his being possessed of a character superior to that of David, the most mighty king of Israel - being his Lord, at the same time that he was his descendant.
https://biblehub.com/commentaries/matthew/22-43.htm says:
How is this doctrine that he is "descended" from David consistent with what David says when he calls him "lord?" How can your opinion be reconciled with that? That declaration of David is recorded in Psalm 110:1. A "lord" or master is a superior. The word here does not necessarily imply divinity, but only superiority. David calls him his superior, his lord, his master, his lawgiver, and expresses his willingness to obey him. If the Messiah was to be merely a descendant of David, as other men descended from parents if he was to have a human nature only if he did not exist when David wrote - with what propriety could he, then, call him his lord?
In spirit - By the inspiration of the Holy Spirit. As a prophet, Acts 2:30; Acts 1:16; 2 Samuel 23:2.
https://biblehub.com/commentaries/matthew/22-45.htm says:
If he was then David's lord if he was his superior - if he had an existence at that time how could he be descended from him? They could not answer him.
Nor is there any way of answering the question but by the admission that the Messiah was divine as well as human; that he had an existence at the time of David, and was his lord and master, his God I and king, and that as man he was descended from him.
https://biblehub.com/commentaries/luke/20-41.htm says:
ReplyDeleteIn his later parables, too, he had with startling clearness predicted his approaching violent death. Now, Jesus was aware that the capital charge which would be brought against him would be blasphemy, that he had called himself, not only the Messiah, but Divine, the Son of God (John 5:18; John 10:33; Matthew 26:65). He was desirous, then, before the end came, to show from an acknowledged Messianic psalm that if he was Messiah - and unquestionably a large proportion of the people received him as such - he was also Divine. The words of the psalm (110.) indisputably show this, viz. that the coming Messiah was Divine. This, he pointed out to them, was the old faith, the doctrine taught in their own inspired Scriptures. But this was not the doctrine of the Jews in the time of our Lord. They, like the Ebionites in early Christian days, expected for their Messiah a mere "beloved Man." It is most noticeable that the Messianic claim of Jesus, although not, of course, conceded by the scribes, was never protested against by them. That would have been glaringly unpopular. So many of the people, we know, were persuaded of the truth of these pretensions; Jesus had evidently the greatest difficulty to stay the people's enthusiasm in his favour. What the scribes persistently repelled, and in the end condemned him for, was his assertion of Divinity. In this passage he shows from their own Scriptures that whoever was Messiah must be Divine. He spoke over and over again as Messiah; he acted with the power and in the authority of Messiah; he allowed himself on several public occasions to be saluted as such: who would venture, then, to question that he was fully conscious of his Divinity? This conclusion is drawn, not from St. John, but exclusively from the recitals of the three synoptists. Luke 20:41
https://biblehub.com/commentaries/luke/20-42.htm says:
The Eternal addresses this Person as One raised to sit by him, that is, as a Participator in his all-power, and yet this one is also David's Son! The scribes are asked to explain this mystery; alone this can be done by referring to the golden chain of Hebrew Messianic prophecy; no scribe in the days of our Lord would do this. Such passages as Isaiah 9:6, 7; Micah 5:2; and Malachi 3:1, give a complete and exhaustive answer to the question of Jesus. Luke 20:42
https://www.preceptaustin.org/luke-20-commentary says:
ReplyDeleteAs will be discussed Psalm 110:1 when properly interpreted shows that the Messiah would be a man (David's son) and would also be God (David's Lord). The Jews then believed Messiah would be human but not God. The Jews of Jesus' day believed Messiah would descend from the line of David.
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Amazing! Jesus knows He will soon die in just a few day and yet He is still TEACHING! What does that say about how important it is that we continue teaching (and that includes us older guys out there -- If you are 70+ and you are not teaching, let me say it gently "Shame on you!" We must imitate our Lord. We know when we are 70+ that we are in the last part of our race and we should ask God to enable us by His Spirit to be able to quote 2 Ti 4:8 on our deathbed.)
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So Mark says He was teaching and here are a group of Pharisees, His avowed enemies and He is still teaching them! Not only is He teaching but as we will discuss below, He teaching them truth about Himself which if grasped could set them free from their legalism and eternal death. One might say, "I thought we were not supposed to cast our pearls before swine." True enough. But Jesus sees hearts and has just stated in Mk 12:34 "You are not far from the kingdom of God." Jesus knew there were men like Joseph of Arimathea who would eventually believe in Him.
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John MacArthur characterizes Jesus' question regarding Ps 110:1 as His "one final evangelistic effort. Even after all the hatred expressed by these leaders, the superficial interest of the fickle, indecisive crowd, Jesus in spite of all of the rejection is still the compassionate evangelist. He is still (evangelizing) even in His very last conversation, inviting sinners who otherwise are headed to hell, to know Him for Who He truly is, to cease their rejection and indecision....He still manifests enough concern to speak one more time the truth for He as God has no pleasure in the death of the wicked. His joy is in the salvation of sinners. His sadness is in their destruction. So, once more, the Lord Jesus affirms and asserts His divine nature as God, and thus offers Himself even to those who despised Him.
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one cannot be just "partially correct" regarding the Messiah, for one's eternal destiny hangs on what one believes about the Son of David. The Jews believed Messiah was to be a man ("Son of David"), but they did not believe He was to be God and that is the fatal misunderstanding which Jesus lovingly and mercifully sought to correct in this last evangelistic salvo to the Jews just days before He went to the Cross. He knew that to believe on Him as a human Messiah and not a divine Messiah would condemn a person to hell for eternity.
https://www.preceptaustin.org/luke-20-commentary continued:
ReplyDeleteMark adds "David himself said in the Holy Spirit." (Mk 12:36) In other words, the synoptic passages underscore the fact that these were not just David's words (which they were), but they were also the words that the Holy Spirit had inspired David to record, "for no prophecy was ever made by an act of human will, but men moved by the Holy Spirit spoke from God." (2 Peter 1:21).
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Therefore David calls Him 'Lord,' and how is He his son? - As mentioned, in ancient times it was unheard of for a father to refer to their son as lord. Of course that is the major point that if David spoke of a descendant as his lord, he must have been referring to someone who was more than a physical descendant. What Jesus is trying to draw out of the listeners is the response in His Deity, the Messiah is David’s Lord. In His humanity, the Messiah is David’s son. Now if you are like me, you read Psalm 110:1 and do not see the word "son" in the passage and so you wonder how can David call Jesus a son? The reason is that Adonay (the Messiah) to whom David referred in Psalm 110:1 was understood by those of Jesus’ day on the basis of passages such as 2 Sa 7:11-16 to be David’s son. Recall that this is exactly what the religious experts had answered when Jesus asked in Mt. 22:42 - "“What do you think about the Christ, whose son is He?” They said to Him, “The son of David.”
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Brian Bell adds that "Jesus is both “the root and offspring of David” (Rev 22:16-note). As the “root of David,” He brought David into existence; but As the “offspring of David,” David brought Him into the world. He is David’s son, thus affirming his humanity. He is David’s Lord, thus affirming his deity.
Questions and findings:
ReplyDelete1. Isn't Christ David's son? What point is Jesus trying to make?
Jesus is fully human and David's son. Jesus is also fully God and David's Lord and creator. Jesus is attempting to open the eyes of the Pharisees to make them understand who the Messiah is. When Jesus dies in a few days, they will have a basis to understand why and for what.