A prophet – A teacher sent from God. They did not now call him the Messiah, for his death had led them to doubt that, but they had no doubt that he was a distinguished prophet. The evidence of that was so clear that they could not call it in question.

Mighty in deed – Powerful in working miracles, in raising the dead, healing the sick, etc.

In word – In teaching.

Before God and all the people – Manifestly; publicly. So that God owned him, and the people regarded him as a distinguished teacher.

Fuente: Albert Barnes’ Notes on the Bible

Verse 19. Which was a prophet] , a man prophet, a genuine prophet; but this has been considered as a Hebraism: “for, in Ex 2:14, a man prince is simply a prince; and in 1Sa 31:3, men archers mean no more than archers.” But my own opinion is, that this word is often used to deepen the signification, so in the above quotations: Who made thee a man prince (i.e. a mighty sovereign) and a judge over us! Ex 2:14. And, the battle went sore against Saul, and the men archers (i.e. the stout, or well aiming archers) hit him, 1Sa 31:3. So in PALAEPHATUS, de Incredib. c. 38. p. 47, quoted by Kypke, , He was a great and eminent king. So here signifies, he was a GENUINE prophet, nothing like those false ones by whom the people have been so often deceived; and he has proved the divinity of his mission by his heavenly teaching, and astonishing miracles.

Mighty in – word] Irresistibly eloquent. Powerful in deed, working incontrovertible miracles. See Kypke in loco.

Fuente: Adam Clarke’s Commentary and Critical Notes on the Bible

19. Concerning Jesus, &c.Asif feeling it a relief to have someone to unburden his thoughts andfeelings to, this disciple goes over the main facts in his owndesponding style, and this was just what our Lord wished.

Fuente: Jamieson, Fausset and Brown’s Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible

And he said unto them, what things?…. Still appearing as if he was ignorant, and in order to, draw out of them a particular relation:

and they said unto him; both of them, or rather Cleophas, for himself and his companion:

concerning Jesus of Nazareth; that is, what had happened to him, who was commonly known by this name, and was called so by way of contempt: but

which was a prophet; not only a foreteller of things to come, as he foretold his sufferings, death, and resurrection, the troubles that should befall his disciples, the destruction of Jerusalem, and the end of the world; but he was a preacher of the Gospel, an eminent one, a famous and extraordinary one, that prophet which Moses spake of should come; and who was mighty in deed and word: he was anointed with the Holy Ghost and with power, which he showed by the miracles he wrought; such as healing the sick, cleansing lepers, casting out devils, restoring sight to the blind, causing the deaf to hear, the dumb to speak, the lame to walk, and raising the dead to life; and in the doctrines he taught, which were with authority, and such as never man spake:

before God and all the people; he was sent and anointed by God as a prophet, and approved by him; who bore a testimony to him by a voice from heaven, declaring him to be his beloved Son; and the works he wrought, were done publicly before men, who glorified God on that account; and the doctrines he taught, were not taught in secret, but in the synagogues and in the temple, in the audience of all the people, and to their surprise and admiration.

Fuente: John Gill’s Exposition of the Entire Bible

1)“And he said unto them, what things?” (kai eipen autois poia) “and he replied to them, what things?” Just tell me about them. It was not that He needed to be told but that they needed to unload their burdens, their heavy hearts. Jesus encourages confidence, that He may better comfort and instruct those who are sad, 1Co 10:31.

2) “And they said unto him,” (hoi de eipen auto) “And they responded to him,” to give a witness of Jesus, and their faith and hope in Him, which had wavered, needed strengthening.

3) “Concerning Jesus of Nazareth,” (ta per lesou tou Nazarenou) “The things concerning Jesus, the Nazarene.

4) “Which was a prophet mighty in deed and word,” (hos egeneto aner propetes dunatos en ergon kai logon) “Who became a man, a prophet, dynamic in word and work, ” Act 7:22. That one foretold by Moses, Deu 18:15-18; confirmed by Peter at Pentecost, Act 3:22-23; Act 2:22; Act 7:22. They confessed what the enemy denied, Luk 7:16; Joh 3:2.

5) “Before God and all the people.” (enention tou theou kai pantos tou laou) “Openly before both God and all the people,” Luk 9:19; Act 2:23.

Fuente: Garner-Howes Baptist Commentary

19. Powerful in deed and in word. Luke has employed nearly the same form of expression in reference to the person of Stephen, (Act 7:22,) where he says of Moses, by way of commendation, that he was powerful in words and in actions. But in this passage it is uncertain if it is on account of miracles that Christ is said to be powerful in actions, (as if it had been said that he was endued with divine virtues which proved that he was sent from heaven;) or if the phrase is more extensive, and means that he excelled both in ability to teach, and in holiness of life and other remarkable endowments. I prefer the latter of these views.

Before God and all the people. The addition of these words ought not to be reckoned superfluous; for they mean that the high excellence of Christ was so well known, and was demonstrated by such undoubted proofs, that he had no hypocrisy or vain ostentation. And hence we may obtain a brief definition of a true Prophet, namely, that to what he speaks he will likewise add power in actions, and will not only endeavor to appear excellent before men, but to act with sincerity as under the eyes of God.

Fuente: Calvin’s Complete Commentary

(19) What things?Literally, What kind of things?

Concerning Jesus of Nazareth, which was a prophet.The words indicate the precise stage of faith which the two disciples had reached. They believed in Jesus as a prophet; they hoped that He would redeem Israel. They had not risen to the belief that He was the Christ, the Son of God. And now even that faith was tottering. The whole narrative suggests that our Lord was choosing this exceptional method of dealing with them as a step in the spiritual education which was to lead them on to the higher truth.

Fuente: Ellicott’s Commentary for English Readers (Old and New Testaments)

19. What things? He who asks a question does not affirm that he does not know the answer. He may act as a teacher, a catechist, or an experimentist, to draw out and develop the mind of another. This last was our Lord’s design.

A prophet He has not the faith to say the Messiah. The late events have dashed that hope, but he still dare style him what Moses was called, a prophet mighty in deed and word. Before God and all the people A brief confession of unbroken faith in the genuine character of the Crucified One.

Fuente: Whedon’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments

‘And he said to them, “What things?” And they said to him, “The things concerning Jesus the Nazarene, who was a prophet mighty in deed and word before God and all the people,”

To this the Stranger asked, ‘What things?’ And that caused the dam to burst and it all poured out. Luk 24:21-24 need to be read as one in order to see how they hurried on from one idea to another in a typical outburst of feeling. They read precisely like the words of people who had been under constraint, as they gabbled out one idea after another, including ideas which the Stranger could not possibly have known about. They just could not keep it in any longer. Notice the ‘they’. The point is that there were two witnesses.

They firstly described Who Jesus was from a Jewish, pre-resurrection point of view. He was Jesus the Nazarene, who was a prophet mighty in deed and word in the eyes of both God and man. Jesus was very much seen as a great prophet by His followers (see Luk 4:16-30; Luk 7:16; Luk 9:7-9; Luk 9:18; Luk 13:31-35). They could still see Him in their mind’s eye as He stood in the Temple courtyard, or on the mountainside, outstanding in the power of His preaching. They could still see Him walking among the sick and demon possessed, laying His hands on those who were diseased and healing all of them, and casting out evil spirits with a word of power. So they had every reason for thinking of Him as a prophet, for that is how Jesus had described Himself. He had revealed Himself as the anointed Prophet of Isa 61:1-2 (Luk 4:17-19). He had declared that it was the failure to hear His preaching as the One Who was greater than Jonah and Solomon that condemned the current generation (Luk 11:31-32). He was seen as the great Prophet like to Moses (Act 3:22). He was God’s Servant, fulfilling the promises concerning the Servant in Isaiah (Mat 8:17; Mat 12:18-21; Act 4:30). He was the Prophet Who must not die outside Jerusalem (Luk 13:33).

The unusual word used for ‘Nazarene’ (Nazarenou as in p75, Aleph, B, etc) serves to confirm that Luke is citing a source.

Fuente: Commentary Series on the Bible by Peter Pett

Luk 24:19-21 . ] scil . . . . The qualitative word of interrogation presupposes things of a special kind which must have happened; , Euthymius Zigabenus.

] Probably here also Cleopas was the speaker, and the other added his own assent to what was said.

] not: who was (thus usually), but: who became , whereby the idea se praestitit, se praebuit (see Khner, ad Xen. Anab . i. 7. 4), is expressed.

.] an honourable expression, Bernhardy, p. 48.

. ] Comp. Thuc. i. 139. 4, where Pericles is called . marks the sphere wherein, etc. Comp. Act 18:24 ; Act 7:22 ; Jdt 11:8 ; Sir 21:8 . In the classical writers the mere dative of the instrument is the usual form. See Bornemann, Schol . p. 159. See examples of both arrangements: . . and . ., in Lobeck, Paralip . p. 64 f.; Bornemann, ad Xen. Mem . ii. 3. 6; Pflugk, ad Eur. Hec . 373. In this place is put first as containing the first ground of acknowledgment of the Messianic dignity. Comp. Act 1:1 ; Joh 10:38 ; Act 10:38

. . .] i.e. so that He represented Himself as such to God and the whole people.

Luk 24:20 . ] et quomodo , still depending on the of Luk 24:18 , which is mentally supplied as governing . . . On , to the condemnation of death , comp. Luk 23:24

] for it was their work that He was crucified by the governor. Comp. Act 2:23

Luk 24:21 . ] but we , on our part, were entertaining the hope (observe the imperfect ), etc. This hope, demolished by the crucifixion, how soon was it again inflamed! Act 1:6

] He , and no other

] according to the politico-theocratic idea of the national Messiah. Comp. Act 1:6 , and see Theophylact.

] but indeed , although we cherished this hope. See Hermann, ad Eur. Ion . 1345, Praef . p. xx.; Khner, ad Xen. Mem . i. 2. 12. On the immediate juxtaposition of the two particles, a usage foreign to the older Greek writers, see Bornemann, Schol . p. 160; Klotz, ad Devar . pp. 15 f., 25; Stallbaum, ad Plat. Rep . I. p. 331 B.

] (see the critical remarks): besides .

] denotes the accompanying circumstance: with all this, i.e. with the having undergone all this fate, namely, of being delivered up and crucified (Luk 24:20 ). Comp. Neh 5:18 ; 3Ma 1:22 ; and see, generally, Ellendt, Lex. Soph. II. p. 763.

] The subject is Jesus , who immediately before was the subject emphatically made prominent. Comp. Beza, Kypke. , of time: to spend; as e.g. , to be in the tenth year , and the like, does not belong merely to the later Greek. [273] Compare the passages in Kypke. is equivalent to , or , . See Khner, ad Xen. Anab . iv. 7. 5. Comp. iii. 5. 9. Hence: But indeed, besides all this, He passes this present day as the third since , etc. In this case, it is true, is superfluous, but it corresponds to the painful excitement of the words. Comp. Mar 14:29 . has been ungrammatically taken as impersonal: agitur (Grotius, Bengel, Rosenmller, Kuinoel, de Wette, Baumgarten-Crusius, Ewald, Buttmann, Bleek, and others); while others grasp at arbitrary modes of supplying the subject, as (Camerarius), (Heinsius), (Er. Schmid, Heumann). Bornemann regards as the subject: “Is dies, quem Israel hodie celebrat , tertius est, ex quo,” etc. But the context leads us neither to Israel nor to the mention of the celebration of the festival.

[273] Sophocles, El . 258, has: : What kind of days thinkest thou I am spending ?

Fuente: Heinrich August Wilhelm Meyer’s New Testament Commentary

19 And he said unto them, What things? And they said unto him, Concerning Jesus of Nazareth, which was a prophet mighty in deed and word before God and all the people:

Ver. 19. Which was a prophet ] Yea, and more than a prophet. But the disciples were wondrously ignorant, till the Spirit came down upon them, Act 2:1-4 .

Fuente: John Trapp’s Complete Commentary (Old and New Testaments)

19 24. ] Stier well remarks, that the Lord here gives us an instructive example how far, in the wisdom of love, we may carry dissimulation, without speaking untruth . (See the citation from Jer. Taylor below, on Luk 24:29 .) He does not assert, that he was one of the strangers at this feast at Jerusalem, nor does He deny that he knew what had been done there in those days, but He puts the question by, with What things?

. ] Either, one spoke and the other assented; or perhaps each spoke, sometimes one and sometimes the other; only we must not break up these verses and allot an imagined portion to each. They contain the substance of what was said, as the reporter of the incident afterwards put it together.

. . . . . .] See a similar general description of Him to the Jewish people, Act 2:22 . They had repeatedly acknowledged Him as a Prophet: see especially Mat 21:11 ; Mat 21:46 . The phrase . . occurs of Moses, ref. Acts.

, was, not became (or was becoming ), as Meyer renders it. They speak of the whole life of Jesus as a thing past.

Fuente: Henry Alford’s Greek Testament

Luk 24:19 . , what sort of things? with an affected indifference, the feigning of love : both speak now, distributing the story between them. , a prophetic man, a high estimate, but not the highest. may be viewed as redundant “eleganter abundat,” Kypke.

Fuente: The Expositors Greek Testament by Robertson

What things? = What kind of things? Concerning. Greek. peri. App-104.

a prophet. See Act 3:22.

word. Greek. logos. See note on Mar 9:32.

Fuente: Companion Bible Notes, Appendices and Graphics

19-24.] Stier well remarks, that the Lord here gives us an instructive example how far, in the wisdom of love, we may carry dissimulation, without speaking untruth. (See the citation from Jer. Taylor below, on Luk 24:29.) He does not assert, that he was one of the strangers at this feast at Jerusalem, nor does He deny that he knew what had been done there in those days, but He puts the question by, with What things?

.] Either, one spoke and the other assented; or perhaps each spoke, sometimes one and sometimes the other;-only we must not break up these verses and allot an imagined portion to each. They contain the substance of what was said, as the reporter of the incident afterwards put it together.

. . . …] See a similar general description of Him to the Jewish people, Act 2:22. They had repeatedly acknowledged Him as a Prophet: see especially Mat 21:11; Mat 21:46. The phrase . . occurs of Moses, ref. Acts.

, was, not became (or was becoming), as Meyer renders it. They speak of the whole life of Jesus as a thing past.

Fuente: The Greek Testament

Luk 24:19. ) The things concerning Jesus. This clause, after the description of the Subject (Jesus) has been interposed, is explained in detail in Luk 24:20 : with which comp. Luk 24:14; Luk 24:18 at the end.

Fuente: Gnomon of the New Testament

Concerning: Luk 7:16, Mat 21:11, Joh 3:2, Joh 4:19, Joh 6:14, Joh 7:40-42, Joh 7:52, Act 2:22, Act 10:38

mighty: Act 7:22

Reciprocal: Deu 18:15 – like unto me Deu 18:18 – like unto Psa 69:6 – Let not Zec 10:5 – as Joh 9:17 – He is Joh 15:24 – If Act 1:1 – of Act 3:22 – A prophet Act 18:24 – mighty Heb 2:3 – began

Fuente: The Treasury of Scripture Knowledge

9

Jesus never had to ask men for information, for He knew all about what was in man (Joh 2:24-25). By asking this question He induced the disciples to express their belief in the One from Nazareth.

Fuente: Combined Bible Commentary

Luk 24:19. What things? Our Lord says nothing in regard to either point which Cleopas had assumed (Luk 24:18), but puts a question to draw them out. It was the wisdom of love, concealing without falsehood or deceit.

And they said. Probably Cleopas, the other chiming in. But it is unnecessary to portion out the discourse.

The things concerning Jesus of Nazareth. They give Him the human name, of which a stranger might have heard.

A prophet, mighty in word and deed. The sphere of His power was both in word and in deed. A similar expression is applied by Stephen to Moses.

Before God and all the people. By word and deed He had attested Himself as a Prophet, not only in the eyes of the people, the mass of whom thus regarded Him, but before the face of God.

Fuente: A Popular Commentary on the New Testament

Vers. 19b-24. Account of the Two Disciples.

Jesus has now brought them to the point where He wished, namely, to open up their heart to Him; (Luk 24:21), in spite of the extraordinary qualities described Luk 24:19. may be taken impersonally, as in Latin, agit diem, for agitur dies. But it may also have Jesus for its subject, as in the phrase , he is in his tenth year. But along with those causes of discouragement, there are also grounds of hope. This opposition is indicated by , But indeed there are also… (Luk 24:22).

Ver. 23. , , hearsay of a hearsay. This form shows how little faith they put in all those reports (comp. Luk 24:11).

Ver. 24. Peter, then, was not the only one, as he seemed to be from Luk 24:12. Here is an example, among many others, of the traps which are unintentionally laid for criticism by the simple and artless style of our sacred historians. On each occasion they say simply what the context calls for, omitting everything which goes beyond, but sometimes, as here, adding it themselves later (Joh 3:22; comp. with Luk 4:2). The last words, Him they saw not, prove that the two disciples set out from Jerusalem between the return of the women and that of Peter and John, and even of Mary Magdalene.

Fuente: Godet Commentary (Luke, John, Romans and 1 Corinthians)

Jesus was baiting His companions, getting them to articulate what they knew and to reveal what was important to them. They viewed Jesus as a mighty prophet in the eyes of God and the people (Gr. laos, the open-minded public, cf. Act 18:10).

"This characterization, together with the assertion of full publicity amongst the people, contains pointed echoes of Luke’s introductory summary of Jesus’ ministry [in the power of the] Spirit (Luke 4, 14; cp. Acts 10, 38)." [Note: R. J. Dillon, From Eye-Witnesses to Ministers of the Word: Tradition and Composition in Luke 24, p. 114.]

"The importance of the affirmation of the two disciples here in Luk 24:19 must not in any way be underestimated. It is integral to Luke’s theology and purpose." [Note: Liefeld, "Luke," p. 1052.]

They also laid the blame for Jesus’ death on the religious leaders, another point Luke had been making throughout his Gospel. The rulers did not acknowledge Jesus as a prophet from God.

Fuente: Expository Notes of Dr. Constable (Old and New Testaments)