THE PHARISEES BLASPHEME AT JESUS’ HEALING OF A DEMONIAC V. 22-30

1) “Then was brought unto him,” (tote prosenechthe auto) “Then (at that moment) there was brought to him,” to Jesus for help.

2) “One possessed with a devil,” (daimonizomenos) “A demon-possessed man,” a man mentally and emotionally deranged, a demonized person.

3) “Blind, and dumb:” (tuphlos kai kophos) “As well as blind and dumb,” (Kai etherapeusen auton) “And he healed him,” of both his physical afflictions, and mental derangement of demon obsession. He had healed one that was dumb only, Mat 9:32.

4) “Insomuch that the blind and dumb both spoke and saw.” (hoste ton kophon lalein kai blepein) “So as to cause the dumb, afflicted man both to speak and to see,” or to the effect that the one who was brought to Him for help was healed by Jesus completely so that he could, 1) See, 2). Speak 3) and control himself emotionally and mentally. Speech is the light or influence of the mind, cast forth to bless or to curse others. Luk 11:14 describes the dumbness of the man only, not disclosing that he had also been blind. Yet all witnesses agree that the cure effected the well being of the whole man.

Fuente: Garner-Howes Baptist Commentary

Mat 12:22

. Then was brought to him. Luke explains from the effect, that the devil by which the man was possessed was dumb; but Matthew says, that a twofold plague had been inflicted on the man. Many persons, no doubt, are blind and deaf on account of natural defects; but it is evident, that this man had become blind, and had been deprived of the use of speech, though there was no defect in his optical nerves, (104) or in the proportion of his tongue. We need not wonder that so much liberty should be allowed to Satan in injuring the bodily senses, when God justly permits him to corrupt or pervert all the faculties of the soul.

(104) “ Aux nerfs appelez Optiques, qui sont les conduits de la veue;”— “in what are called the Optical nerves, which are the conductors of vision.”

Fuente: Calvin’s Complete Commentary

CRITICAL NOTES

Mat. 12:23. Is not this the Son of David?See The Parallel New Testament (1882). The not is omitted in both columns. It was wisely omitted by King James translators. It is not found in the 1611 edition, the primary edition. Neither is it found in the four succeeding folio editions, those of the years 1613, 1617, 1634, 1640. But somehow or other it has got smuggled into our present copies (Morison). The form of the question expresses bewilderment and hesitation; but hesitation, nevertheless, that inclined to a negative decision. The idea that the Wonder-worker was the Messiah, the Messianic son of David, was forced in upon their minds, but yet they could not entertain it (ibid.).

Mat. 12:24. Beelzebub.See on Mat. 10:25. A like narrative has met us in Mat. 9:32, and it is probable enough that the charge was repeated as often as the occasion presented itself, and as often answered in identical or like words (Plumptre). The words appear to have been whispered by the Pharisees among the people. They were not addressed to Jesus (ibid.). Two things are here implied:

1. That the bitterest enemies of our Lord were unable to deny the reality of His miracles.

2. That they believed in an organised infernal kingdom of evil, under one chief. This belief would be of small consequence, had not our Lord set His seal to it; but this He immediately does (Mat. 12:25-26) (Brown).

Mat. 12:27. By whom do your children cast them out?The children of the Pharisees are their disciples, and in this case, such as practised exorcism, like the sons of Sceva in Act. 19:13. The belief in demoniacal possession had as its natural accompaniment the claim, on the part of those who could control the disordered reason of the possessed person, of power to cast out the demon. We need not assume that such power was always a pretence, or rested on spells and incantations. Earnestness, prayer, fasting, faiththese are always mighty in intensifying the power of will, before which the frenzied soul bows in submission or yields in confidence, and these may well have been found among the better and truer Pharisees. Our Lords question, indeed, requires for its logical validity the admission that the children of the accusers did really cast out demons, and that not by Beelzebub (Plumptre).

Mat. 12:28. The kingdom of God.The Destroyer of Satan is already in the midst of you, and that kingdom which is destined to supplant His, is already rising on its ruins (Brown). Come unto you.Upon you (R.V.). Literally, surprised you by coming, came upon you unawares (Carr).

Mat. 12:31. Blasphemy.In general, the idea of a malicious attack upon a person, whose fame is calumniously injured, attaches to the term blasphemy. Hence, defamation of what is good, noble, and holy, on its appearance in the world, with malicious (lying and murderous) intent (Lange).

Mat. 12:32. Neither in this world, etc.Just an extended way of saying never. Cf. Mar. 3:29 (Morison).

Mat. 12:33. Either make the tree good, etc.The meaning and connection are: Be honest for once; represent the tree as good, and its fruit as good, or the tree as evil, and its fruit as evil; either say that I am evil, and that my works are evil, or, if you admit that My works are good, admit that I am good also and not in league with Beelzebub (Carr).

Mat. 12:34. O generation of vipers, etc.Ye offspring of vipers (R.V.). Here the law which had been pressed in its logical bearing in the preceding verse, is brought in to explain the bitter and evil words of the Pharisees (Plumptre). Out of the abundance of the heart, etc.What is in the well will be in the bucket (Trapp).

Mat. 12:37. By thy words.Words exhibit the righteousness or unrighteousness which is in the heart (Bengel).

SUPPLEMENTARY NOTES

Mat. 12:31-32. The sin against the Holy Ghost.In Exegetical Studies, by the Rev. P. J. Gloag, D.D. (T. and T. Clark), there is an able exposition of this subject, in which the various opinions that have been held are stated. Dr. Gloags view is similar to that of Dr. David Brown, as given in the outline on p. 309. He says, The sin, then, against which our Lord cautioned the Pharisees, supposing, as we think most probable, His words to be a caution and not a sentence, was the continuance in their opposition to Him and to His doctrine after the Holy Ghost was given. These blasphemies against Him were pardonable; their malicious disposition had not, as yet, placed them outside the pale of Divine mercy; if, however, they persevered in their opposition after the Holy Ghost was given, they would never have forgiveness, but be guilty of eternal sin. And from this we infer that it is probable that the blasphemy against the Holy Ghost is no particular act of sin, but a malicious disposition; a perseverance in opposition to Christ in spite of the Spirits influences to overcome that opposition; an incurable, and therefore, an unpardonable, evil disposition; and this disposition is here called blasphemy against the Holy Ghost, because it consists in a continued resistance to His influences. An article on the subject in the Evangelical Magazine, from the pen of the Rev. G. S. Barrett, B.A., called forth some valuable discussions and notes in the Expository Times, November 1891 to March 1892.

MAIN HOMILETICS OF THE PARAGRAPH.Mat. 12:22-37

Encountering blasphemy.The best way of dealing with some adversaries is to leave them alone. So, in our last, with those mentioned in Mat. 12:14. Here we read of some adopting a different line. An (apparently) most unusual case of demoniac dispossession had produced a corresponding effect on the people at large. Is this, they saidwhen the blind and dumb both spake and sawis this indeed the Son of David? Stirred up by this question, the Pharisees fell back, as once before (Mat. 9:34), on counsels of despair. Having nothing better to say, they say as before: He casteth out devils by Beelzebub, the prince of the devils (Mat. 12:24). This time the Saviour, hearing their words, and knowing their thoughts, thinks it well to take up the accusation in question, and will be found, in doing so, to point out its extreme folly in the first place, and its extreme peril in the second. He also finally counsels men as to how best to avoid the extreme peril described.

I. The extreme folly involved.The proposed solution was utterly foolish:first, because it was not consistent with what was true about Satan. Had things been as they alleged, the kingdom of Satan would before now have come to its end (Mar. 3:26). That is true of all kingdoms, and therefore of this. A king opposed is a king deposedif opposed by himself. The very fact, therefore, that there still existed demoniacs to be healed, proved of itself that His way of healing them was not of this kind. The proffered solution, in the next place, was not consistent with what they believed of themselves. Besides the Saviour Himself there were those who were considered capable of effecting similar cures, and who, either because of their birth and extraction (as the Saviours own disciples, it may be), or else because of their extraction and faith (as some of their own disciples, it may possibly mean (Act. 19:13))might be described as being their children. Anyway, whoever they were, it was to them He appealed. Let them deal with this charge (Mat. 12:27). Lastly, the explanation was foolish because it was not consistent with what was true about Christ. For, after all, in the instances before you, what is it you see? Do you not, in fact, see the strong man spoiled of his goods? And do you not, therefore, see that there is something present which is stronger than he? And what can that something be except that which we know of as the kingdom of God? Who, in a word, can cast out the spirit of evil except the Spirit of God? That is the solutionthe only solutionof the miracles you behold (Mat. 12:28-29).

II. The extreme peril involved.This the Saviour seems to point out by a succession of steps. To attribute works wrought in the way just described to the spirit of evil is fraught with danger of the extremest kind; first, because it is practically taking the wrong side on this question. If the kingdom of God has indeed come thus upon you (Mat. 12:28), you cannot safely, in this way, declare that it has not. If you are not with Me in acknowledging this, you are against Me, and, in fact, denying it (Mat. 12:30). And you are openly putting yourselves, therefore, in other words, against the kingdom of God. Also, next you are taking that side in a peculiarly deliberate way. For, to do as you are doing, is not only to sin against light, but against special light as it were. It is to do even worse. It is to turn that light, as it were, into darkness. It is to use the proofs of truth as supports of error. And so, not only to show contempt for the person of the Ambassador but for His very credentials as well. In other words, not only to sin against the Son of man, but against the Spirit of God. Lastly, you are on the way towards committing yourself to that wrong side in an irreversible manner. For there is a possibility in this direction of going so far as to make it impossible to come back. There is a blasphemy in this sort of blasphemy for which no remedy has been provided. Neither this worldnor yet the world to comeknows anything of the kind. This I say unto you because of that which ye have said now about Me (Mar. 3:30).

III. The best way to escape.It is like the Saviour to conclude this subject with a word on this point. It is like Him also to do so in the way that he does. Some would deliver us from the sin intended by attempting to define it. Of these we may say much as in Mar. 14:59. The Master would deliver us from it by impressing on us not to go near. In two ways especially He here seems to impress this upon men. First of al He says to them, take care of thy heart. The sin in question, whatever its after developments, springs up in the heart. This is true of all sin, therefore most so of this. In no other case can a corrupt source produce a wholesome result (Mat. 12:33). Least of all, therefore, in the case of this sin of sinsthe most venomous known (Mat. 12:34). Seek, therefore, if you would escape its outgrowth, to have none of its root in your heart. Rather seek to have there a perfect treasure of thoughts of the exactly opposite kind (Mat. 12:35). In the next place, take care of thy lips. Take care of thy lips lest they should unadvisedly utter any thoughts of this kind. Take care of thy lips because of the part which thy words are to play at the last. They are to provided much of the evidence by which is to be determined thy true state before God (Mat. 12:37). Even, therefore, the apparently idlest of them may have much weight in this way (Mat. 12:36). Also rememberso it seems to be meantthat of all evidence furnished in this way of the true state of the heart, none is more weighty than that furnished by suppression of speech. Evil expressed is evil approved of and brought to the birth (Jas. 1:15). Evil suppressed is evil repented of before it is born. Let the evil within thee, therefore,if there is to be anybe all of this sort. So shalt thou be safe from ever giving utterance to what is here meant! The only proper sequel to these solemn thoughts is in the language of prayer. Set a watch, O Lord, before my mouth; keep the door of my lips (Psa. 141:3).

HOMILIES ON THE VERSES

Mat. 12:22. Blind and dumb.

1. The fearful condition of men spiritually possessed by Satan may be seen in bodily possessions; and among the rest, in this man, on whom Satan shutteth all doors, that he can neither let in comfort, nor let forth the sense of his misery, for he maketh him blind and dumb, which dumbness is ordinarily accompanied with deafness also.
2. Such as Christ will deliver from Satan, albeit they cannot come of themselves to Him, yet He can furnish means to bring them to Him.
3. Christ is the powerful Physician of evils inflicted by the devil, as here He giveth evidence, in healing this man perfectly.David Dickson.

Mat. 12:25-26. Sound reasoning.

1. In pondering mens sins the Lord looks much to the inward disposition, mind, and affection of sinners, whether they sin of infirmity or of presumption; of ignorance, or against their light. Jesus knew their thoughts.
2. The way to preserve all societies is union, and the way to ruin them is dissension.
3. Satan hath a kingdom among men, which by all means he goeth about to maintain, and will be loth, really and in effect, wholly to dispossess himself, both of the soul and body of any in whom he hath power and place.Ibid.

Mat. 12:25. Thoughts.

I. Thought, the seat of greatest sin.Of sin that men dare not actually commit, or speak.

II. Thought, the seat of grandest wishes and holiest aspirations.Biblical Museum.

Mat. 12:28. The true evidence of Christianity.The world is growing singularly impatient of institutions which cannot justify themselves by some practical work, by the test of some good effect. The Founder of our religion based His appeal on results. The Apostles took up the same ground. Whenever men seriously attempt to apply to Christian history and Christian experience the processes of scientific investigation, weighing and counting over the effects which the gospel has produced, then the church may calmly and with confidence await the verdict, for then the world will be nearer than it has been to the truth that Jesus Christ is the Saviour of mankind. For one reason, however, the force of this argument is less felt than it deserves to be. We expect from the gospel what it never professes to do, and because we are disappointed, we fancy that it has failed. It is only fair that the gospel should be tried upon its own pretensions.

I. Did Jesus speak as though on the advent of the gospel sin was to be abolished from society?Did He ever dream of founding a perfect society which should contain no black sheep? On the contrary, the gospel shows that His eyes gauged more accurately than those of His friends the future of the world. He expected, indeed, His religion to fill the land and overshadow the earth. But for all that, the vision before His eyes was of a little company of saints, persecuted and almost crushed by evil, etc. The Apostles predicted schisms and false Christs inplenty, but they never encouraged the hope of a whole world turning to God.

II. What, then, did our Lord and His Apostles profess the gospel should effect?This, that it could create peace with God for every human being, no matter how degraded, who believed the gospel in its entirety, and should follow the doctrines laid down therein.

III. Has the gospel established its claim by irrefutable facts?

1. Take all the most characteristic lives we know of such as have attained the character of Christians. These state that they have obtained, though with a struggle, peace of conscience and entered into happier relations with the Most High.
2. They all agree as to the value of Christianity in giving a fresh motive for virtue, more effectual than they possessed before.
3. They are equally at one in referring these happy changes to the power of the indwelling of the Holy Ghost; and while they constantly bemoan their failures, they as constantly blame for these failures only themselves.
4. This is the uniform testimony of Christians in every age.
5. And of every race. Thus,
(1) the gospel does accomplish what Christ promises;
(2) its proper work is limited only by a full and free out and out acceptance of it, and submission to its demands on the part of every human being.

IV. Practical inferences.

1. How completely it rests upon us to demonstrate the value of Christs gospel by our own lives.
2. To inquirers and hesitatorsChristianity is in practice and in power. It offers you deliverance from evil; it asks nothing but implicit trust and self-surrender. If you doubt it, then it refers you to its success in others.
3. To those who pretend to be Christians, but do not in their lives show Christs work. The only test of being Christs is that His work upon us succeeds, and this work is to make us holy. The failure is in yourselves and not in the gospel.New Outlines.

Mat. 12:30. The intolerance of the gospel.Rejecting the idea that Satan was divided against himself, our Saviour added, that if Satan was not His accomplice, as the Pharisees supposed, it followed that he was His adversary. And why? Because with reference to Jesus Christ it is absolutely necessary to be one thing or another. Thus Jesus Christ took occasion from a particular fact, to proclaim a great truth. Who is the man that is against Jesus Christ? It must be sufficiently obvious to all, that, by this expression, our Saviour designs every man to whom the gospel is an object of aversion and hatred, whether he conceal his sentiments in his heart, or manifest them in his words and actions. Who, then, is the man that is not with or for Jesus Christ? The world is full of persons who are not for Him. We recognise them in all those members of the Christian church who belong to it only by birth, and by certain external usages, but whose whole life proves that the church inspires them with no interest. Religion is to them a matter of high propriety, an interesting fact, a social necessity, but nothing more. It is neither the rule of their life, nor one of their interests. We do not know a better way of establishing the truth of what the Saviour says in reference to such men than by showing the falseness of the contrary proposition, viz. One may not be for Jesus, and yet not be against Him; he may be neither His friend nor His enemy; he may observe with respect to Him a species of neutrality. Let us see if such neutrality is possible.

1. A real neutrality is one of the rarest things in the world.Man is not made for indifference. Whatever affects him nearly, everything which exerts an influence upon his fortune, nay more, everything which he sees exciting general interest, becomes to him an object of some kind of sentiment.

2. This is specially so in the domain of religion.If a religion is true, it follows that we ought to love it with all our heart, if false, to detest it with all our heart; for the question turns upon a matter of the highest excellence, or a criminal imposture; a work of God, or a work of the devil. Is neutrality, in such a case, possible?

3. If we had even remained indifferent, we would not the less have made, without willing it, a choice.Because true religion, meriting nothing less than our whole love, not to devote ourselves to it is to be against it; and a false religion, not deserving anything but our deepest hatred, not to oppose it is to be for it.

4. To make this last truth more evident, suppose that God manifest in the flesh has descended to the earth, in the person of a being resembling you; that the character of that being is the ideal of perfection; His work, the salvation of the human race; His precepts, holiness itself; His feelings in reference to you, a boundless compassion. You acknowledge in Him all these attributes, and you say to Him, Since Thou art the ideal of perfection, the rule of holiness, God Himself manifest in the flesh; since Thou hast shed Thy blood upon the cross for the salvation of my soul, I cannot be against Thee, but I will not be for Thee. For whom then is that heart? The heart must attach itself to something.

5. The better to appreciate this neutrality, let us enter the heart of the indifferent, and give account of the feelings which reign there. He says he has no hatred. But are there in his heart love and obedience; love especially for Jesus Christ? Assuredly not, seeing he is not for Jesus Christ. Well, to refuse love to Jesus Christ, I affirm, is to do Him all the evil which an open enemy could, or at least, would do. He who loves not obeys not.

6. When circumstances will it, the indifferent becomes an enemy, positively, and in fact.As long as it is not excited by circumstances, this enmity remains asleep; and, in some persons, it remains in this form, the most dangerous, perhaps, all their life long. But, in many others, unforeseen circumstances awaken it, and cause it to appear in its real character.

7. To hate Jesus Christsuch is the result in which neutrality and indifference eventually terminate.A Vinet, D.D

Christian work.We learn:

I. That Christian work is constructive.It is gathering together, collecting, saving, preserving. Worldly work is destructive, scattering, altering, tinkering.

II. That Christian work is collective.It is in accordance with laws. It must follow the direction of Christ, the ways of Christ, the object of Christ, and it must promote the glory of Christ. Worldly work is undisciplined. Every man would be a master, and the scene would become a tower of Babel.B. in Homilist.

Mat. 12:32. Sin against the Son of man and against the Holy Ghost.I. Observe, Christ speaks of Himself here as the Son of man, the Son of God in a disguise, as it were; God under the veil of human flesh. Can we wonder that He should look with a merciful and forgiving eye upon any of His brethren who, not suspecting His greatness, should rudely jostle against Him in the crowd? Suppose, for instance, a king were to assume for purposes of state the disguise of a subject, and to mingle with the simplest and rudest of his people, and suppose that while in such disguise he were to meet with an insult; would not a broad line of demarcation be drawn between an insult so offered and an act of avowed treason against the king upon his throne? A comparison of this kind will be of considerable help to us in understanding our subject. Even the murderers of Christ sinned against the Son of man, against Christ in His human nature; whereas, had they known who it was whom they crucified, many might possibly have been overwhelmed with shame, and have besought His forgiveness.

II. But in the case of blasphemy against the Holy Ghost no such plea can be set up.Here we have a sin not against God in the guise of Jesus the Son of Joseph the carpenter, but against God in His essential Deity, God upon the throne of heaven, God who does good, and is the Author of all good both in heaven and earth. The sin of the Jews which our Lord rebuked partook of this character; for they had said that He was under the influence of, and in league with, an unclean spirit; to do good, to love mercy, and to perform acts which undeniably tended to overturn the kingdom of Satan and establish the kingdom of Godthis, they said, was the work of the devil. Now unquestionably this was to put darkness for light and light for darkness, to confound all distinctions between good and evil, to confuse the works of Satan and those of the Most High God, as though they were not the exact opposites of each other. The person who does fully commit this sin places himself exactly in the position of the lost angels; the sin of Satan is that of deliberately worshipping evil and hating good, and on this account is unpardonable sinunpardonable for this reason, if for no other, that it cannot be repented of.Bishop Harvey Goodwin.

The sin against the Holy Ghost.What, then, is this sin against the Holy Ghost, the unpardonable sin?

I. One thing is clear. Its unpardonableness cannot arise from anything in the nature of the sin itself; for that would be a naked contradiction to the emphatic declaration of Mat. 12:31, that all manner of sin is pardonable. And what is this, but the fundamental truth of the gospel?

II. Then, again, when it is said that to speak against or blaspheme the Son of man is pardonable, but the blasphemy against the Holy Ghost is not pardonable, it is not to be conceived that this arises from any greater sanctity in the one blessed Person than the other.These remarks so narrow the question, that the true sense of our Lords words seems to disclose itself at once.

III. It is a contrast between slandering the Son of man in His veiled condition and unfinished workwhich might be done ignorantly, in unbelief (1Ti. 1:13), and slandering the same blessed Person after the blaze of glory which the Holy Ghost was soon to throw around His claims, and in the full knowledge of all that.This would be to slander Him with eyes open, or to do it presumptuously. To blaspheme Christ in the former conditionwhen even the Apostles stumbled at many thingsleft them still open to conviction on fuller light; but to blaspheme Him in the latter condition would be to hate the light the clearer it became, and resolutely to shut it out; which, of course, precludes salvation. The Pharisees had not, as yet, done this; but they were bordering upon, and in spirit committing, the unpardonable sin.D. Brown, D.D.

Mat. 12:36. The connection.Our first rule in seeking to understand a passage of Scripture must always be to review it in connection with its context. The discourse, of which the words in question form a part, had its rise in the circumstance of the Pharisees attributing our Lords miracles (even those of them whose character presented most difficulty to such an explanation) to Satanic agency. Now, at first sight, it is natural to suppose that by idle words are meant such as the Pharisees had just ventedwords of blasphemy against the Holy Ghost. And it is not difficult to perceive what kind of words those were. The Pharisees, like the multitude (Mat. 12:23), were internally convinced of the Messiahship of Jesus by the miracle which they had witnessed. But it would have been inconvenient to them to have acknowledged His claims. By doing so, they would have to retract their whole previous careerto place themselves after the fashion of Mary at His feet, as His disciples. This would have humbled the pride of those ecclesiastical rulers, and such a humiliation they could not brook. So, without honestly believing their own explanation, they attributed the cure of the blind and dumb man to the agency of Satan. It was a supernatural curethat they admittedbut there are, said they, supernatural evil agencies, as well as supernatural good ones, and this particular miracle is due to the first of these causes. It might have occurred to them (probably it did occur to them in the deep of their hearts) that this was a flimsy and transparently false explanationthat, on no recognised principle of craft or policy, could the devil cast out his own agents. Yes, such an account would not serve the turn; it was a dishonest shuffle, and they knew it to be so, to avoid making a confession which was irresistibly forced upon their minds, but which would have involved them in consequences from which their pride and jealousy shrunk. And then came in the corrupt special pleading, so natural to the human mind under such circumstances: After all, though I am giving an explanation which I do not believewith which I am not satisfied myselfwhich finds no response whatever in my convictionsyet these are but words, the breath of the lips, lightly uttered and soon forgottenmy mind recognises the truth, though I cannot bring my tongue to confess it. The eye of Him who knew what was in man detected this reasoning at the bottom of their hearts; and down came the lightning of His censure to crush and blast a fallacy so dangerous: Whosoever speaketh a word against the Son of man (without violating internal convictions, like Paul before his conversion, who spake many things against the Son of man, but spake them ignorantly in unbelief) it shall be forgiven himbut whosoever speaketh against the Holy Ghost (violates those internal convictions of truth which are wrought in the mind by the Holy Spirit) it shall not be forgiven him, neither in this world, neither in the world to come. As if the Lord had said: Your language is not, as you vainly imagine, a separate and separable thing from your reason: it has a deep and living connection with your state of mind. Language and reason have their fibres twined up togetherso that a corrupt language argues a corrupt reason. And then follows our passage, introduced by the formula, But I say unto youEvery idle word, etc.E. M. Goulburn, D.D.

The idle word.Now is the idle word to be explained simply and solely by the blasphemy preceding? If so, the warningthough still an awful onewill scarcely possess a general applicability; for the number of those is few, whose circumstances resemble the circumstances of the Pharisees. We think there are reasons for giving to these solemn words a far more extended applicability.

1. They are introduced by a formula, which will be found, I think, to indicate a transition from a more limited to a more extended application, the word translated but having the force of moreover, furthermore.

2. The same conclusion will follow from examining the word rendered idle (). According to its derivation, this word means not working (-). Now, the words of the Pharisees were not simply useless, unfruitful, unprofitable words; but far worse. They were false words; they counteracted conviction; their fault was not that of omission; they were positively bad, mischievous, and wicked words. They were a lie in the teeth of conviction, and they were calculated to do harm, to mislead the ignorant people who looked up to their authority. Hence we infer that when our Lord condemns idle words, He is going a step beyond that sin of blasphemy upon which His censure had, at the outset of the discourse, so heavily fallen; and that our text, rendered so as to exhibit the emphatic transition, would run thus: Nay, I even say unto you, that every idle word (not merely every false and blasphemous, but every idle word) that men shall speak, they shall give account thereof in the day of judgment. Nor is there anything which need surprise us, in this strictness of the Christian law on the subject of words. It is strictly in accordance with the general tenor of evangelical precept. We are often instructed that that precept cannot be satisfied by innocuousnessthat we are required not merely to abstain from harm, but to do positive good. What the passage condemns is useless words, words conducive neither to instruction nor to innocent entertainment; words having no salt of wit or wisdom in themflat, stale, dull, and unprofitable, thrown out to while away the time, to fill up a spare five minutes; words that are not consecrated by any seriousness of purpose whatever.Ibid.

What are, and what are not, idle words.Words are idle which do not fulfil the proper end of the existence of words. We may remark, in general, that what constitutes the excellence or virtue of anything, is that it should fulfil its proper end. What, then, is the proper function of words, the end for which they were given, by fulfilling which they become good, and escape the censure of being idle words?

1. The first, and perhaps (by comparison) the lowest end of words, is to carry on the business of life.

2. The second end which words should fulfil, and for which they were no doubt designed, is to refresh and entertain the mind.Ibid.

Responsibility for idle words.The Pharisees might have imagined that as they had but spoken, and had perpetrated no real act of enormity, no guilt was contracted. Christ disabuses them here of such an impression. Every idle word. There are three considerations which may serve to show us the responsibility that attaches to idle words.

I. Their reactive force.Those things which proceed out of the mouth come forth from the heart, and they defile the man.

II. Their social influence.Science affirms that every movement in the material creation propagates an influence to the remotest planet in the universe. Be this as it may, it seems morally certain that every word spoken on the ear will have influence lasting as eternity.

III. Their Divine recognition.The great Judge knows every word we have spoken. Out of thine own mouth will I judge thee.Homilist.

Mat. 12:37. Condemning words.Consider some of the ways by which words are used that minister to our condemnation.

I. At the head of this list we must put profane swearing.

II. Another way in which we expose ourselves to Gods displeasure is by what St. Paul calls foolish talking.

III. Another example of the improper use of the gift of speech is an indulgence in the petulant and complaining language which so often destroys the harmony of private life.

IV. A fourth illustration of our text is found in the case of misrepresentation and slander.

V. Angry words are another description of words by which we may endanger our everlasting salvation.J. N. Norton.

Fuente: The Preacher’s Complete Homiletical Commentary Edited by Joseph S. Exell

Section 28
JESUS ANSWERS THE CHARGE OF BEING IN LEAGUE WITH SATAN

(Parallel: Mar. 3:19-30)

TEXT: 12:2237

22.

Then was brought unto him one possessed with a demon, blind and dumb: and he healed him, insomuch that the dumb man spake and saw.

23.

And all the multitudes were amazed, and said, Can this be the son of David?

24.

But when the Pharisees heard it, they said, This man doth not cast out demons, but by Beelzebub the prince of the demons.

25.

And knowing their thoughts he said unto them, Every kingdom divided against itself is brought to desolation; and every city or house divided against itself shall not stand:

26.

and if Satan casteth out Satan, he is divided against himself; how then shall his kingdom stand?

27.

And if I by Beelzebub cast out demons, by whom do your sons cast them out? therefore shall they be your judges.

28.

But if I by the Spirit of God cast out demons, then is the kingdom of God come upon you,

29.

Or how can one enter into the house of the strong man, and spoil his goods, except he first bind the strong man? and then he will spoil his house.

30.

He that is not with me is against me; and he that gathereth not with me scattereth.

31.

Therefore I say unto you, Every sin and blasphemy shall be forgiven unto men; but the blasphemy against the Spirit shall not be forgiven.

32.

And whosoever shall speak a word against the Son of man, it shall be forgiven him; but whosoever shall speak against the Holy Spirit, it shall not be forgiven him, neither in this world, nor in that which is to come.

33.

Either make the tree good, and its fruit good; or make the tree corrupt, and its fruit corrupt; for the tree is known by its fruit.

34.

Ye offspring of vipers, how can ye, being evil, speak good things? for out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaketh.

35.

The good man out of his good treasure bringeth forth good things: and the evil man out of his evil treasure bringeth forth evil things.

36.

And I say unto you, that every idle word that men shall speak, they shall give account thereof in the day of judgment.

37.

For by thy words thou shalt be justified, and by thy words thou shalt be condemned.

THOUGHT QUESTIONS

a.

How can ones friends and family be a more treacherous hindrance to ones work and the accomplishment of ones mission, than any number of outsiders who attack openly from without? See Marks parallel text,

b.

Do you think that Jesus friends or His family tried to hinder His busy ministry by attempting to seize Him? On what basis do you decide this?

c.

Why would the crowds begin to remark that Jesus could not be the Son of David, could He? when they knew His name to be Jesus? What are they suggesting in this negative way?

d.

The Pharisees were no fools, even though badly mistaken about Jesus. How could they charge with any plausibility at all that this man does not cast out demons, but by Beelzebub the prince of the demons? What is the unstated premise behind this assertion, a premise more or less acceptable to their audience, which rendered logically unobjectionable their conclusion?

e.

Explain the opposite of the common proverb: Seeing is believing. These Pharisees actually saw Jesus cast the demon from the blind, dumb demoniac and yet did not believe Him. They saw but did not believe. Why? What kind of mental block does it require to reject the meaning of what the senses undoubtedly see?

f.

Is it ever necessary to use logical arguments to deal with the false beliefs of others? Following good Bible examples some believe that to quote a passage of Scripture is all that is required to correct the false or inadequate arguments of others. How does Jesus method in this section broaden our view on this question?

g.

Why would Jesus family and friends think that He was going crazy? Does not this fact, that the people closest to Jesus suspected His mental sanity, disturb you? We have argued before that Jesus must either be a gross imposter, insane or else precisely what He claimed to be. How does this evidence from the personal observations of those closest to Jesus affect our understanding of His nature and claims?

h.

Do you believe that demons inhabit the world today? If so, where? If not, why not? Can you explain the apparent phenomenon that demons do not show the same character as during the lifetime of Jesus? Was that merely a wonder strictly limited to that credulous age, as some hold, or have demons changed their tactics to accommodate to the age?

i.

What is your opinion: could Satan and/or demons make more progress in our materialistic age by pretending not to exist, while continuing their demonic activity in the souls of men? Beware of labelling every thing you do not like demonic activity, but, with this caution in mind, do you see any evidences of demonic activity in our age? If so, what Biblical passages lead you to conclude that demons are really at work in what you see? If not, what Scripture leads you to conclude that no demons are at work?

j.

Supposing that modern-day miracles, regardless of the religious tenets of the one performing them, are actual, verifiable facts, what safeguards do we have that protect us from either (1) attributing miracles done by Gods power to Satans agency, thus blaspheming in one way the Holy Spirit, or else (2) being ourselves deceived by demons, hence led off into damning heresy? Should we disregard the religious tenets of the one performing the true, verifiable miracle? What should we do if his ministry glorifies Jesus, leading men to true conversion in harmony with the already revealed will of Christ in the New Testament? What other Bible passages bear on this subject?

k.

If the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are all deity, as the Bible teaches, how can it be that sin against the Father and Son would be forgiven, but not sin committed against the. Holy Spirit? What, in the nature of the work of each, helps us to answer this?

1.

So many people have difficulty understanding the meaning of the expression blasphemy against the Holy Spirit. Do you believe that this sin is serious? Do you believe that such a sin would be so involved and so difficult to understand that not only would most people commit it without ever knowing it, but also that most Christians would not be able to protect themselves against it, due to its mysterious, hidden nature? If so, then what has Gods mercy provided as an escape or an antidote against it? If not, then the sin against the Holy Spirit must be something very fundamental and necessarily obvious by nature, and something which involves the daily thought and practice of everyone. What, then, do you conclude to be blasphemy, or the sin, against the Holy Spirit?

m.

There exist in our vocabulary words that have lost their meaning. However, are there any words in our speech that are entirely devoid of meaning, words about which we can say, But I did not mean anything by what I said? Are there any words that do not count, words for which God will not hold us accountable?

n.

Why are a mans words so good an index of his character?

o.

If a person thinks he has committed the sin of blasphemy against the Holy Spirit and is deeply disturbed about it, has he, in fact, sinned against the Holy Spirit? How do you know? What should be done about (or for) such a person? Can we tell when a person has committed this sin?

PARAPHRASE AND HARMONY

Then Jesus returned home to Capernaum. But no sooner had He arrived than a large crowd of people assembled, leaving Jesus and His disciples no time nor opportunity to eat. When His relatives heard how much pressure under which He was working, they came to take Him away by force to save Him from Himself, because they were saying, He is going crazy!
Just then a blind, dumb demoniac was brought to Jesus. He healed him, casting out the demon. The result was that the dumb man could both speak and see. All the by-standers, amazed by what they saw, kept remarking, Jesus could not be the Messiah, could He? . . .
But when the Pharisees and theologians, who had made a special trip down from Jerusalem, heard that kind of taLk. they growled, He Himself is possessed by Satan! It is only by special secret agreement with the king of evil spirits, that this guy drives out the demons!
Knowing what was in their minds, Jesus deliberately called them to Him and said in proverbial form: Tell me, how CAN Satan drive out Satan? A kingdom torn by civil war is easily destroyed. No divided kingdom can last for long. A city or home filled with division and strife soon destroys itself. So, if Satan rebels against himself, i.e. if Satan casts out Satan, as you say, then he is fighting himself! How long can this rule last? If you are right, then he is destroying himself! And thats the end of him! Stop complaining and rejoice!
Further, if I drive demons out by invoking the devils powers, as you argue, by what secret agreement do your own people drive them out? If this is your argument, then they themselves will decide whether you are being fair with me or not.
On the other hand, if my secret power is really Gods Spirit that is destroying the power of Satans might, then you may be certain that Gods Kingdom and Gods rule has just come to earth. It is in your midst and you fail to see it!
Or to put it another way: how could anyone break into the house of a strong man like Satan and rob him of his victims, unless he first tie him up? He cannot. But if Satan were bound and gagged, then a person like me could ransack his house and free as many demonized victims as he pleased.
Do not forget that anyone who is not on my side is automatically against me! Anyone who does not help me, hinders. Satan fights me: not for me!
So I can tell you for sure that God can forgive people for any sin and slander, yes, whatever blasphemy they utter. But to slander Gods Spirit is to go beyond the point where God cannot forgive you. Even someone who says something against me, Jesus, can be forgiven. But the man who speaks against or slanders the Spirit will not be forgivennevereither in this world or in the world to come. That man is guilty of eternal sin.
(Jesus said this because they were saying, He is possessed by an unclean spirit, instead of recognizing His work as that of the Holy Spirit.)
Jesus went on, Choose: if you see that a trees fruit is good, you know that it is a tree of quality. If you see that a trees fruit is bad, then you must admit that the tree is bad too. You can tell what kind of tree it is, by the fruit it produces, You sons of snakes! How can what you say be good, when you are yourselves evil? Whatever is really in your heart will find expression in your talk: it must come out! That with which you have filled your life is betrayed by your taLk. A man that is really good at heart talks like it, and conversely, an evil man cannot help but reveal the evil that is in him. It will come out in what he says. I can tell you this: men will stand accountable on judgment day for every thoughtless word they have ever said! Do you realize that you could go to hell or be eternally saved just on the basis of what you once said here on earth?

SUMMARY

Jesus family and friends tried to interfere with His ministry. Since He drove Himself so hard, people thought Him to be going mad. Jesus cast the demon from a blind and dumb man. Excited crowds began to attribute Jesus power to that which would animate the Messiah. The religious leaders tried to stifle Jesus influence with the people by charging His stupendous feats to being in league with Satan, Jesus brilliant rebuttal was:

1.

Satan is fighting himself? Rejoice, he will not last Jong that way!

2.

You do not molest those Jews among you that purportedly cast out demons, why bother me?

3.

Reasonable alternative: Gods Spirit empowers me.

4.

To overcome Satan, one must actually be mightier than Satan.

5.

Neutrality is impossible: either between Satan and me or between you theologians and me.

6.

Beware of slandering Gods Spirit.

No talk is cheap, since for good or ill, talk reveals the real content of a mans life. There are no words that do not count.

NOTES A. SITUATION

1.

THE HEALING OF A BLIND, DUMB DEMONIAC RESULTED IN THE CROWDS ASKING IF JESUS BE THE MESSIAH. (Mat. 12:22-23)

Mat. 12:22 Then was brought to him one possessed with a demon, blind and dumb: and he healed him, insomuch that the dumb man spake and saw. (Cf. Mat. 9:32-34 and the Notes thereon. For a fuller defense of the accounts of demon-possession and of the reality of demons, see Notes on Mat. 8:28 to Mat. 9:1 and on Mat. 10:8. It should be evident that no part of the following conversation can have any sense, unless both the Lord and His critics are actually correct in their assuming that (1) demons have objectively real existence and are known to inhabit human beings, and that (2) Jesus literally expelled them with a word. Whatever case may be made for the Pharisees superstitious ignorance of the true explanation behind the observable phenomena, one cannot deny that they had no doubts about the certainty of their occurrence, nor about the fact that He had really cast the demon out.

Is this the same event as recorded in Luk. 11:14-15; Luk. 11:17-23? That it may not be the same event repeated from Mat. 9:32 is evidenced by the fact that the former demoniac was dumb (kfos), whereas this man is both blind and dumb (tufls ka kfos), although it is possible that Matthew has included the fuller discussion here, since it might have been inappropriate at that earlier place. Here he can expand upon Jesus answers to the Pharisees libelous charges, whereas had he included this material in chapter 9 the organization of what we may suppose to be his outline would have been clumsy. (See Notes on Matthews organization of his materials, especially on Mat. 4:23-25; Mat. 9:35-38.) If this is what really happened, the fact of the demoniacs blindness may not have been important enough to mention. And due to the topical character of Matthews narrative, it may be that he has included here, for special reasons, the narrative recorded by Luke (Luk. 11:14-23) in its proper chronological setting.

Mat. 12:23 And all the multitudes were amazed, and said, Can this be the Son of David? (Cf. similar popular reactions to Jesus miracles: Mat. 9:32-34; Mar. 1:27; Mat. 9:8; Luk. 7:16; Mat. 8:27; Mat. 8:34; Mat. 13:54; Mat. 13:57) The trend of these passages indicates that, although there were undoubtedly many individual reactions that parroted the snarl of the Pharisees or else ended merely in a curiosity satisfied about supernatural phenomena, nevertheless the consistent impression made by Jesus mighty works was that God was doing them. People sensed that God had come near to His people. But more than this, they began to draw nearer to the conclusion to which Jesus had so skillfully led them. Could this be the Messiah? (Cf. Joh. 10:37-38) And the effect continued. (Joh. 6:14; Mar. 7:37; Mat. 15:31; Luk. 9:43; Luk. 13:17; Luk. 18:43) The Son of David = Messiah, the Christ. (Cf. Mat. 9:27; Mat. 15:22; Mat. 20:30) Can this be? This is a surprisingly emphatic demonstrative pronoun: this man of all people who does not look nor act like the Messiah we expect, can HE be the Messiah? Can this be? (mti hotos estin) is a question asked in Greek as if a negative answer were expected (This could not be the Messiah, could it?), but because of the circumstances in which it is offered, one can almost feel the half-joyful, half-fearful tension in those who dared voice it in the presence of those great theological experts, the Pharisees. (Cf. Joh. 7:31) This hesitation born of perplexity is certainly justified by their long experiences with the rabbis and by the retort growled by those theologians just as soon as this wavering question is voiced.

Worse still, their timid question is accompanied by no recorded challenge to the blasphemous dogmatic assertion of the Pharisees that Jesus miracles were but the result of satanic collusion. In Jerusalem others had defended the Lord when essentially the same accusation was levelled at Him (Joh. 10:21), yet here in Galilee no one said a mumbling word of defense (so far as the record goes). Farrar (Life, 346f.) suggests two chief reasons for this:

1.

Despite the merciful expressions that convinced them of His real concern for them, they intuitively sense that in His presence they stood on that twilight zone between the earthly, workaday world and the real, unseen world of spirits. Until they are personally convinced that the Spirit He represents is Gods and not Satans, the awesomeness of His personal powers could be interpreted either way, even though the weight of the evidence had been totally on the side of God.

2.

Those reverend inquisitors from headquarters commanded such an extraordinary sway over these simple Galileans that it left them the more easy dupes of this haughty and dogmatic, however false, calumny. But while none dared stand and raise his voice against that hideous blasphemy, Jesus needed no human backing to shatter it to smithereens!

2. JEALOUS PHARISEES COUNTERATTACK, ASSERTING JESUS WORKS DONE BY DEVILS POWER (12:24)

Mat. 12:24 But when the Pharisees heard it. Mark (Mar. 3:22) calls them scribes from Jerusalem, so the pressure is on. (Cf. Matthew 15 :l = Mar. 7:1) Judging from their pontifical attitude, they are an official investigating committee sent out to examine the claims of any popular leader. (Cf. Joh. 1:19)

But when the Pharisees heard what the crowds were beginning to say, they knew that this young Rabbis popular movement was getting out of hand and that He must be stopped immediately, publicly and finally. But how? Grasping for straws and without a moments reflection, they spat out their abuse: This man doth not cast out demons, but by Beelzebub the prince of demons. Later, disenchanted people jeer similar abuse. (Joh. 7:20; Joh. 8:48; Joh. 8:52; Joh. 10:20) Had they reflected upon the logical implications of this statement, they might have sought something a bit more substantial, since the Lord easily mows down their argument. Did the Pharisees themselves believe this calumny? Two views are offered:

1.

It was a clever, desperate lie and they knew it to be false when they said it.

2.

They were psychologically and ethically incapable of discerning where truth lay: they mistook good for evil, God for the devil.

Beelzebub (cf. Mar. 3:22 : He has Beelzebul in him! and Mar. 3:30 : He has an unclean spirit. Cf. Mat. 10:25) The charges are two: (1) that He is Himself demon-possessed, and (2) that He performs miracles in collaboration with the demon prince. The first charge is an attack on His sanity; since he has a demon is not intended to affirm actual demon-possession, but is the affirmation that the person so labelled acts as if he were, hence, must be dismissed as mad. (Cf. Mat. 11:18; Joh. 7:20; Joh. 8:48-49; Joh. 8:52; Joh. 10:20) This does not mean, however, that the Jews mistook mere insanity for demon-possession. Rather, on the contrary, their harsh experiences with demon-possession gave them a terribly cutting metaphor to hurl at anyone they wished to put down or put away as insane. Whether or not the Pharisees sincerely thought Jesus to be the walking embodiment of Satan when they snarled He has Beelzebub, is not the point, for it is an old trick to turn public opinion away from a would-be leader by asserting his insanity. The second charge, and by far the more serious, is that of a secret pact with Satan. And that it is with Satan and no lesser demon that they charge His allegiance and alliance, is amply proved by Jesus answers in which He shifts easily from Beelzebul to Satan without any conscious change of subject. (See on Mat. 12:26-27)

Note carefully the Pharisees wording: This man does not cast out demons, except by Beelzebub . . . Let it be noted with A. B. Bruce (Expositors Greek Testament, ad loc.) that the various opinions offered to explain Jesus (that He was mad, that He was the Messiah or in league with Satan, even Herods view that He was John the Baptist risen from the dead) merely prove the reality of Jesus ministry of miracles. None doubted the reality of His works, even though they chose to place a different construction on them. How these scribes would gladly have cried, He casts out no demons whatsoever! But the undeniable nature of the facts drove them to concoct a hypothesis that would attempt to undermine the importance of the fact.

But beyond their obvious professional jealousy, what is the rationale behind this slander which makes it even half palatable to men who by virtue of their training and position were no fools?

1.

The logical rationale may be stated thus: The prince of demons obliges Jesus by recalling the demons from their victims whenever Jesus wishes it. What they are saying is not at all impossible, since Satan can empower human servants to work miracles. (2Th. 2:9-10; Mat. 24:24) McGarvey (Matthew-Mark, 107) thinks that

The assertion, if believed by the people, would not only have destroyed their confidence in the divine mission of Jesus, but it would have established in the place of it the injurious supposition of a league with Satan. It derived great plausibility from the consideration, that as there were at least two powers by which demons might be cast out, and as both were invisible, it might appear impossible to decide whether it was the power of God or the power of Satan. The Pharisees thought that they had advanced an explanation which, whether true or false, Jesus could not clearly disprove . . .

2.

The moral rationale is best stated by Edersheim (Life, I, 574)

It could no longer be denied that miracles were wrought by Jesus. At least, what to us seem miracles, yet not to them, since miraculous cures and the expelling of demons lay within the sphere of their extraordinary ordinarywere not miracles in our sense, since they were, or professed to be, done by their own children. The mere fact, therefore, of such cures would present no difficulty to them. To us a single well-ascertained miracle would form irrefragable evidence of the claims of Christ; to them it would not. They could believe in the miracles, yet not in the Christ. To them the question would not be, as to us, whether they were miraclesbut, By what power, or in what Name, He did these deeds? From our standpoint, their opposition to the Christ wouldin view of His miraclesseem not only wicked, but rationally inexplicable. But ours was not their point of view. And here again, we perceive that it was enmity to the Person and Teaching of Jesus which led to the denial of His claims. The inquiry: By what Power Jesus did these works? they met by the assertion, that it was through that of Satan, or the Chief of the Demons. . . . All this, because the Kingdom which He came to open and which He preached, was precisely the opposite of what they regarded as the Kingdom of God. Thus it was the essential contrariety of Rabbinism to the Gospel of the Christ that lay at the foundation of their conduct towards the Person of Christ. We venture to assert that this accounts for the whole after-history up to the Cross. Thus viewed, the history of the Pharisaic opposition appears not only consistent, but is, so to speak, morally accounted for . . . their deeds being evil. Once arrived at the conclusion, that the miracles which Christ did were due to the power of Satan, and that He was the representative of the Evil One, their course was rationally and morally chosen. To regard every fresh manifestation of Christs power as only a fuller development of the power of Satan, and to oppose it with increasing determination and hostility, even to the Cross: such was henceforth the natural progress of this history.

B. JESUS BASIC REBUTTAL (12:2537)
1. SATAN Is DIVIDED AGAINST HIMSELF: GOOD! (12:25, 26)

Study Jesus procedure in making this answer:

1.

He surrounded Himself deliberately with Pharisees, in order to deal with their slander to their face. (Mar. 3:23)

2.

He runs together three well-known and easily admitted illustrations of internal dissention producing weakness and precipitating a fatal crisis: divided kingdoms, cities and homes.

3.

He drives home the application to Satans case.

Mat. 12:25 And knowing their thoughts he said unto them (Cf. Mat. 9:4; Mar. 2:8; Luk. 6:8; Luk. 9:47) He discerns not merely what they had said, for it would require little of anyone to overhear the words murmured by the scribes for the ears of everyone who might be swayed by the dangerous opinion that Jesus of Nazareth might somehow be the Messiah. He read their thoughts (enthumseis), those secret deliberations of their minds that motivated their words.

Did the Pharisees really believe that Satan could be so stupid as to combat his own best interests by aiding Jesus to destroy his own influence exercised in and through the demons? Or was this not rather just an error in their thinking that they committed without really being committed to the necessary conclusion to which their assertions must lead? He who is grasping desperately for proof in an uneven debate does not often have time to assess the absurd ramifications that a certain position must take. However, it is true that evil is the ultimate folly, and, in the long view, Satan is the biggest fool, because he has rejected the wisdom and reality of Gods moral government of the universe, Thus, once admitted the conclusion that Jesus is not of God, a position held by these scribes, it was an easy step to conclude that the usually very crafty Satan could perhaps have been napping intellectually when he empowers Jesus to destroy the hold of his own demons. Or, perhaps they thought that he could deceive people by seeming to perform in Gods name miracles that were actually Satans doing. And if evil be the ultimate folly, who can say that the Pharisees themselves, because of the arrogant tenacity with which they adhered to their false notions, and by which they pursued their evil course, could actually reason correctly? Even if their reasoning is correct, they were wrong, since Jesus helping God by bringing internal dissension to Satans ranks, really meant the victory of Gods Kingdom anyway.
Jesus argument which reveals the foolishness involved in their suggestion:

Major premise: Any organization, divided against itself, will fall.
Minor premise: Satan is divided against himself.
Conclusion: Therefore, his organization will fall.

Rather than make His conclusion explicit by stating it, Jesus frames it into a question which neither the Pharisees or anyone else were qualified to answer: How then shall his kingdom stand? How indeed? This leads us to see that Jesus puts beyond doubt the fact that Satan cannot afford such luxuries as the internal strife which the Pharisees unwittingly attribute to him by their bad logic. Satan could not tactically tolerate nor practically permit the casting out of his minions, for, either way, he loses. If he permits or empowers Jesus to exorcize demons, he loses control over the victims, and Jesus gains a popular pulpit from which to trumpet His message of the near arrival of Gods Kingdom. The constant and vigorous proclamation of Gods rule on earth would be a strange platform indeed from which to mount an insidious, diabolical counteroffensive against God!

None can deny the real, inner discord that reigns in Satans kingdom, but this, of course, cannot refer to a complete break or a total self-annihilation through civil war among the demons. While each part of Satans realm is really mutually contradictory and contrary to every other part, yet, in relation to Gods Kingdom, the powers of darkness are united and solidly against Gods rule. It is upon this fundamental, unified antagonism to Gods reign on the part of all of Satans servants, that Jesus founds His argument.

No passage could more clearly teach that the reign of evil in the universe has a personal, malevolent chief who functions as a polarizing force that unites every other force into its common rebellion against the rule of God. But this text heralds also the final defeat of that dark ruler. Here in a few words is the final rebuttal to that dualism that insists that there are two equally powerful forces in the universe, one infinitely good, the other infinitely evil, that decide the fates of man. Jesus insistence upon the impossibility of stability amidst internal strife applies with equal force to Gods Kingdom too: if God fights the god of this world as an equal, the strife could conceivably wreck the universe. But God recognizes no equals, much less Satan! (Cf. Isa. 42:8; Isa. 43:10-13; Isa. 44:6; Isa. 44:8; Isa. 45:18; Isa. 45:21-23; Isa. 46:9)

2. WHAT ABOUT YOUR STUDENTS WHO EXORCIZE DEMONS? (12:27)

Mat. 12:27 And if I by Beelzebub cast out demons, by whom do your sons cast them out? Therefore shall they be your judges. Your sons is not likely the physical offspring of the Pharisees, but rather refers to someone of whom the Pharisees could say no evil and whom they publicly approved as experts in demon-exorcism. Sons, taken Hebraistically, suggests that they were their disciples. Is this an obscure reference to exorcists similar to those described by Luke (Act. 19:13-14) and by Josephus (Antiquities, VIII, 2, 5; Wars, VII, 6, 3)? Two views have been entertained concerning the activity of these sons of the Pharisees:

1. They really exorcized demons by Gods power.

a.

Lenski (Matthew, 478) uncovers the force of Jesus argument:

The fact that Satan neither could nor would lend himself to such expulsions, v. 25, 26 have put beyond question. Whoever drives out devils can do so only in the necessary connection with God. What a desperate self-contradiction, therefore, to claim that when Jesus drives out devils, this is done in connection with Satan; but when their own experts drive them out, this is done in connection with God! Something is viciously wrong with men who ascribe the identical effect to absolutely opposite causes.

b.

In favor of this view is the present indicative verb (they) are casting out (ekbllousin). (Or is this a gnomic present, i.e. one which speaks only of what is thought to happen in general, without deciding whether the action involved is real or not?) It must not be argued, however, that such a concession on the part of Jesus would somehow invalidate the uniqueness of Jesus miracles, simply because He acknowledged the exorcism of demons by Jewish exorcists, any more than that the Exodus narrative justifies Egyptian magic in competition with the genuine miracles of Moses, merely because Exodus records these feats of magic. (Cf. Exo. 7:8 to Exo. 8:18)

c.

And if they really exorcized spirits by Gods power, then the same explanations that described their activity could well be true of Him as well. (That those exorcists might have actually worked miracles by Gods power may be suggested by the realization that God could easily have done so in order to give merciful relief to the suffering victims, despite the inadequacy of the understanding of the Jewish exorcist whose prayers and incantations were mistakenly thought to be the effective cause. This, because God has never promised to limit His goodness to the righteous, and His Son clearly proved Gods concern for the desperately mistaken. (Mat. 5:44-45; Luk. 6:35-36)

d.

So, for these reasons, these Pharisean experts who labored to exorcize demons by the exercise of divine power would be in a position to convict their own teachers of injustice.

2.

These exorcists only appear to exorcize demons, but they really did what they did either by use of human psychology or by use of Satans means and power. This becomes an argument by concession: Granted for sake of argument that your students actually exorcize demons . . .

a.

It may be that these experimental practitioners among the Pharisees worked in much the same manner in which the exorcists, mentioned by Luke and Josephus, expelled demons, i.e. by magical formulas or incantations, the use of talismans and perhaps direct witchcraft. (See ISBE, 1067b; cf. Tobias Mat. 6:1 to Mat. 8:3)

b.

If this is the case, then Jesus would be arguing, Would you dare assert that your experts cast out demons using the indubitable methods of the living God and not rather the methods suggested by clever men trying to do this without Gods help? Those experts, against which you can say no wrong, are using methods other than the unquestionable power of God. And since you affirm that these actually exercise a spiritual power upon the demons, and since you know that there are only two such powers, and since you cannot attribute their activities to that of God, you must admit that their methods and power is of Satan! What objection can you possibly make to MY doing so (for you say I use Satans power), when those whom you approve do the same? They will unmask the injustice of your accusations, for by blaming me, you blame them too!

c.

This view of the question has the weakness of not really advancing Jesus cause by producing another objective argument, since this view tends merely to see a tension created by Jesus between the Pharisees and their own disciples.

d.

Further, our ignorance of the actual methods or success of these Pharisean exorcists does not permit us to dogmatize on their connections either with God or Satan.

3.

Either way, Jesus had them trapped:

a.

If by your own definitions Satan empowers your disciples, they will condemn you, for they would never willingly attribute their pretended success to his power. And yet they cannot, as do I, cast out demons by the simple exercise of a single word of authority, or they would be noted for their miracles as am I.

b.

If God, by your calculation, empowers your disciples, then you must prove that they have some better claim to Gods help than do I. Since they dare not pretend so much, else they would come forward to challenge my labors, they shall decide whether my work is Gods or demonic.

3. REASONABLE ALTERNATIVE: GODS SPIRIT EMPOWERS ME. (12:28)

Mat. 12:28 But if I by the Spirit of God cast out demons, then is the kingdom of God come upon you. Luke has finger of God (Luk. 11:20; cf. Exo. 8:19; Deu. 9:10) Here in the protasis we have an implicit explanation of His mysterious power: I cast out demons by the Spirit of God. This is the reason why Jesus sounds the dreadful alarm (Mat. 12:32) against blasphemy of the Holy Spirit. While it will be seen that the attribution of Jesus miracles to Satanic influence is not the only way to blaspheme the Spirit, it is certain that the rejection of Jesus alternative reflects a distorted bent of mind that would drive a man sooner or later to reject whatever evidence God offers him through the Spirit whether before or after Pentecost,

Implicit in this alternative is the dilemma universally recognized by the Pharisees: Either He expels demons by Gods power or by collusion with Satan. Jesus had just eliminated the second alternative as logically absurd. (Mat. 12:25-27) The critics are left with the only other possible alternate explanation: The Spirit employed by Jesus cannot be that malignant demon but must be Gods. And, if so, the divine authority of everything He was saying was thereby vindicated, especially what He had so insistently preached about the near approach of Gods Kingdom.

Then is the kingdom of God come upon you. This is not merely an interesting, academic alternative: it is a direct, ominous warning that they have just been confronted with the presence and power of the rule of God Himself! And, since they had deliberately and maliciously attacked Him Who in the human form represented that God they profess to serve, they were caught in open rebellion against the King of heaven and earth. Because in their view the coming of the Kingdom of God and the arrival of the Messiah must occur simultaneously, there is also implied in this statement the reality that Jesus Himself is the Messiah and King of the Kingdom which they had so grossly insulted. But these Pharisees, blinded by their own views as to what the coming Messianic Kingdom must be, could not recognize in the ministry of Jesus the obvious signs of its beginning. (Cf. Luk. 17:20-21 where they were still asking for a time schedule, since they could not visualize anything so inward, so spiritual as the rule of God by means of a spiritual government right in their midst.) These theological doctors could only rock back on their heels with tongue in cheek and raised eyebrows, smirking, What kind of a kingdom do you think YOU represent? certainly not the great messianic reign that WE anticipate!

Then is the kingdom . . . come upon you. (phthno, Arndt-Gingrich, 864: (1) come before, precede; (2) be just arrived, then simply, arrive, come; (3) come up to, attain to. The Lord is not here discussing the (then) future appearance of Gods reign in and through the Church, which was the object of much of His preaching. Instead, He refers to the even then tangible evidences that fairly shouted for all to hear that God was taking over from Satan! Satan is being bound even now! Instead of complaining about Jesus successes, these very Pharisees should have led the whole Jewish nation in festal rejoicing in their glorious good fortune to be able to live to see the very realization of all that their religion had prepared them for.

4. To OVERPOWER SATAN, ONE MUST BE STRONGER THAN HE. (12:29)

Mat. 12:29 This simple, clear illustration is easily visualized by anyone who knows what it would require to plunder the house of the strong. Jesus intended to do two things regarding Satan:

1. Bind the strong man

a.

By His perfect submission to the will of the Father, Jesus had been tying Satans hands ever since the beginning of His ministry. (Mat. 4:1-11) Since Jesus refused to indulge Himself along the lines suggested by Satan, the tempter found himself completely helpless, because the devil could not force Jesus to sin. By staying well within the will of God for man, Jesus was perfectly protected by the power of God that obliged Satan to respect those limits.

b.

But in this context, Jesus argument assumes the fact that Satan has already been defeated, because His own miracles prove it. That is, if Jesus has already triumphed over demons, it is proof that He had defeated their master as well. Those Pharisees were standing in the presence of the Conqueror and Destroyer of Satans dominion! But in what sense and at what time did Jesus bind Satan?

(1)

In the absolute sense, he had not done so at that moment, since Satan continued to attack Him again and continues to harrass His disciples.

(2)

Therefore, Jesus must mean that Satan was bound only in the sense that he stood helpless to hinder every single victory that Jesus wrought over his realm, whether in demon-expulsion or in making physically right all that sin and disease had distorted.

2.

Spoil his house. Spoil his goods (t skeu auto harpsai) could perhaps be better rendered steal his instruments, his vessels, his goods so that the language may more clearly refer to the poor wretches who had served as his vessels. (Cf. Act. 26:18; 1Jn. 3:8; 2Ti. 2:26; Col. 1:13) The fact that Jesus had already begun His victorious liberation movement to set the prisoners free, proves that He had already successfully bound their lord. Though Jesus states this as a logical necessity, His miracles demonstrated beyond all doubt that He was doing what He here claims. The reason the Son of God came into the world was to destroy the works of the devil! (1Jn. 3:8; cf. also Col. 2:15; 1Jn. 4:4) So, His argument is: By the very fact that I am doing my best to unchain a demoniac enslaved to Satan, I prove myself to be his enemy. By succeeding I prove myself his Master!

5. WARNING: NEUTRALITY IS IMPOSSIBLE (12:30)

Mat. 12:30 He that is not with me is against me; and he that gathereth not with me scattereth. This text is not to be confused with Mar. 9:38-40 or Luk. 9:49-50 nor thought to be the contradictory of them. In those texts the Lord provides a rule whereby a disciple is to judge another (with humility and tolerance), whereas here He provides the test whereby a disciple may judge himself (with strict intolerance). (See Plummer, Luke, 259f.) Whereas this terse axiom simply means to say Neutrality is impossible, several knotty problems arise regarding its application: to whom does Jesus address these words: to the Pharisees? or to the undecided crowds? To what does He refer: His relation to Satan or the relation of every man to truth?

1.

His relation to Satan. This view sees Jesus as only now concluding His argument regarding His true relation to Satan: Satan, instead of helping me as you say, fights my ministry! He definitely does NOT remain neutral or take my part. I could wish that you could see the intensification of his efforts to thwart me at every turn! Could you but see what I know from repeated personal combat with this Liar, Murderer and Accuser, you would never have so carelessly suggested that my powers are to be explained by some supposed, secret pact with him! Morgan (Matthew, 130) has it this way:

(Jesus) had cast the demon out of a man and so had gathered him back into unified and balanced life, had gathered him back to His family, and to the family of God. It was Satan that had scattered, . . . spoiled. . . . Do not confuse the Person Who stands at the centre of the gathering force with the person who stands at the center of the scattering force.

If one man gathers what another scatters and vice versa, it should be clear that their goals are completely at odds. This utter diversity of aims should prove that Satan and Jesus have nothing in common.

2.

His appeal to the undecided in this audience. If this thrust expresses His intended application, then He insists that no one can remain neutral when right and truth can be known. An agnostic mentality, in the presence of the positive, beneficial evidence of my true identity demonstrated by my miracles, is to align oneself with my enemy: there is no middle ground.

a.

Lenski (Matthew, 481) thinks that Jesus now switches from objective to subjective argument here, having sufficiently dealt with the truly antithetic positions of Satan and Himself.

b.

But were the Pharisees endeavoring to maintain a neutralist posture at this time? Evidence against this is their regular convocations to deliberate the right means of eliminating Jesus. (Cf. Mat. 12:14 and parallels; Joh. 5:18; Joh. 7:7) They might be feigning a neutrality they do not feel, merely to pretend, in the presence of the crowds at least, objectivity as they examine this upstart Rabbi and to render a carefully deliberated judgment.

c.

But if the Pharisees are not to be thought of as attempting a mediating position, reserving judgment until all the evidence is weighed, then Jesus is to be seen as directing this warning at the uncommitted crowds. This stern warning admonishes the undecided to make up their mind about Jesus. The highest degree of psychological probability lies behind their uncertainty, since their new-found appreciation of Jesus (Mat. 12:23) now demands of them an open repudiation of leaders that had long held their esteem for their prodigious learning. To this hesitating multitude, frustrated by its own indecision, Jesus launches this warning:

(1)

The Pharisees, as a group, are far from being neutral or objective. They do not have eyes for truth wherever it might be found.

(2)

Anyone who shares this mentality is really opposed to me. Any who accept my message and my authority must break with that mentality.

(3)

Therefore, choose!

It is not necessary to the sense to discover what it is that each gathers or scatters, for there is enough antithetical tension in the simple sense of each verb to prove the diametrically opposed purposes of those engaged in either activity.

C. JESUS EXPANDS HIS WARNING AGAINST BLASPHEMY OF THE SPIRIT (12:31, 32)

1.

ALL SINS FORGIVEABLE, EXCEPT THAT WHICH REJECTS THE MEANS BY WHICH ALL KNOWLEDGE OF GODS TRUTH AND FORGIVENESS IS COMMUNICATED, I.E. BY HIS SPIRIT.

Mat. 12:31 Therefore I say unto you. Therefore (di toto: on account of this, or, for this reason) is the conclusion based on what reason: on account of this what?

1.

Immediate context: Since neutrality regarding Jesus is impossible due to the fact that he who is not with Him automatically declares himself against Him. . . . Because of this mindset in those who were against Jesus, it would be patently impossible for the Holy Spirit to bring enough convicting evidence that would lead men to submit to Jesus as Lord.

2.

Larger context. The terrible warning Jesus now utters is occasioned; not only or merely because of the impossibility of neutrality (although this too is involved), but because they had said at the very outset of this debate He is possessed by Beelzebul; (Mar. 3:22) and It is only by Beelzebul, the prince of demons, that this fellow casts out demons. (Mat. 12:24) This is probably the better interpretation, being confirmed as it is by Marks explanation of the same ominous forewarning: for they had said, He has an unclean spirit. (Mar. 3:30)

That this is truly Marks explanation of the occasion of this unusually severe utterance, and not part of the warning itself, is demonstrated by three suggestive approaches:

a.

Marks citation of Jesus words abruptly changes from first and second persons to third, i.e. from I say to you to for they had said, He has . . . This change of persons, admittedly, could be taken as an aside uttered to His disciples in which the Lord quotes accurately what the Pharisees were muttering, without turning their words into first person, as we do in English; for they said, I have an unclean spirit. The change of persons alone is not decisive.

b.

Marks writing switches from direct quotation (vv. 28, 29) to simple narration. Mark does not, like Matthew, intend to include other material on this same subject at this time. Rather, since he will move immediately to the next episode, it will be seen that he inserted this brief word which at once justifies the unusual harshness of Jesus warning and concludes the incident.

c.

Mark is therefore not attempting to define the blasphemy of the Holy Spirit, thus limiting it to the accusing Jesus of alliance with demons. Rather, we should notice that his scope is larger. Mark would show the brilliance and completeness of his Masters handling of two very delicate situations in which Jesus is being opposed in one way or another:

(1)

Mar. 3:21 : for they were saying, He is beside Himself. (legon gr hti exst).

(2)

Mar. 3:30 : for they were saying, He has an unclean spirit. (legon pnema aktharton echei).

So the reason for what follows lies in the fact that the Pharisees were so very close to blaspheming the Holy Spirit, if they had not already done so, not merely because they gave the wrong explanation of Jesus miracles, but because they had for so many years before deliberately shut their eyes and ears to God and so long resisted submission to being taught by Him, that when they met Him in this direct confrontation in the person of Jesus of Nazareth, they could not recognize Him. Rather, their habitual insensitivity to God automatically led them to discount everything God was saying through Jesus. It is no wonder that Jesus repeatedly scored them both publicly and privately for their moral insensitivity and deliberate resistance. (Cf. Matthew 23; Mat. 16:5-12)

Every sin and blasphemy will be forgiven: what glorious news! In our efforts to find the elusive meaning of the unforgiveable sin, we trample down this astounding announcement! Every sin, no matter how heinous, every blasphemy, even those vicious, mocking words hurled directly at God or that spiteful spitting upon all that God calls holy, can and shall be forgiven. Trumpet this news down into the self-imposed dungeons of those hopeless souls whose ritual of self-accusation has them spell-bound into believing that for them there can be no hope or forgiveness! And, when Mark (Mar. 3:28) cites Jesus as adding: whatever blasphemies they utter, he seems to be searching for the vilest sin to which man can stoop. Not that sins may be catalogued as mortal and venial, but since man would naturally understand crime against God as the most serious, Jesus includes the foulest blasphemies of which the human heart is capable: Yes, even this shall be forgiven! It is not within the purpose of Jesus at this point to outline the terms by which this forgiveness may be obtained, this latter revelation remaining for future messages to clarify. But the usual blasphemies and sins may be forgiven, because, by their nature, they do not make repentance impossible. (Cf. Isa. 1:18) Who cannot rejoice here? (Mic. 7:18)

But the blasphemy against the Spirit will not be forgiven. To the above-stated general principle, Jesus attaches one all-important amendment. There are two ways to consider this exception:

1.

Is this a sin which is only one of an infinitely long list of relatively similar sins? Apparently not, because the Lord throws this particular sin into contrast with every (other) sin and blasphemy.

2.

Or is this a sin which is so fundamental that it potentially touches, affects and includes all the others, so that, to fail in regard to it is to cut oneself off from all possibility of forgiveness for all the others? It is that moral perverseness that, in full knowledge of the good, calls good evil and evil good. It takes an unforgivably wicked mind to ascribe evil to someone whose work and teaching stand only on the side of righteousness and merciful helpfulness to sinful, suffering humanity. Since these fruits of His life are the proof of Gods Spirit at work through Him, to slander the Spirits gifts and power, contrary to what ones own mind must recognize as from God, is evidence of the deepest perversity, the display of an incredible maliciousness.

Why is this sin so inexorably unforgiveable? Simply because a man in this frame of mind just cannot repent. Barclay (Matthew, II, 49) explains something of this impossibility:

If a man cannot recognize the good when he sees it, he cannot desire the good. If a man does not recognize the evil as being evil, he cannot be sorry for it, hate it and wish to depart from it.

But what is involved here is not the native ability or inability to discern evil, but the gradually developed unwillingness to be able to see truth as truth, good as good and evil as evil.

Mat. 12:32 And whosoever shall speak a word against the Son of man, it shall be forgiven him. Even the very people responsible for Jesus death are described as having done it in ignorance! (Cf. Act. 3:17; Act. 13:27; 1Co. 2:8; Luk. 23:34; 1Ti. 1:13), Even though the sins of ignorance are still culpable. (Cf. Lev. 5:17-19) God did not overlook them. But how is it possible for Jesus here to pronounce forgivable what is said against Himself, whereas the Apostles later would reserve to the hottest hell anyone who dared speak against Jesus? (Cf. Heb. 10:29; 2Pe. 2:1; 1Jn. 2:22-23; 1Jn. 4:2; 1Jn. 5:10-12; Jud. 1:4; 1Co. 16:22!).

1.

Jesus recognizes the facility with which men misunderstand the true nature of what appears to the Jews as a mere human messenger but in reality is God Himself in human dress. Incarnation is a unique experience, so unique, in fact, that He admits that a man could possibly be scandalized by His humanness, as if He were but another rabbi, or, at best, another prophet. Though the seemingly human Messenger (Jesus Himself) might be open to misconstruction, Gods Spirit at work on mens conscience would not be hampered by this impediment of incarnation. Hence to reject wilfully what must be the admission of ones own heart under conviction by what one knows of Gods message must be utterly unforgiveable.

2.

The Apostles say what they do during the unique era of the Holy Spirits ministry. Since it was the Spirits specific mission to glorify Jesus, anyone who rejected His testimony to Jesus thus turned his back upon the Spirits best efforts to save him. So the Apostles warn that to reject Jesus or His message is to perish! So the apparent contradiction is resolved by distinguishing the dispensations under which each declaration was made.

Blasphemy against the Spirit . . . speak against the Holy Spirit. Blasphemy is chat speaking against someone or something with malicious intent, or the defamation of what is holy, good or noble. While it is true that every sin, whatever its specific character, tends toward blasphemy, because of that rebellious heart that wants to be its own master and is willing thus to deny and crush all authority but its own self-rule, and while every blasphemy of what is holy tends toward the defamation of Him who makes it holy, i.e. the Holy Spirit, because of that bent of mind that calls evil good and good evil, still Jesus is warning of a line which, if crossed, leaves no room for pardon, because repentance has then become a psychological impossibility. Along that line that approaches the point of impardonability are other sins dreadfully near in character to blasphemy against the Spirit: quenching the Spirit (1Th. 5:19), grieving the Spirit (Isa. 63:10; Eph. 4:30), resisting Him (Act. 7:51). In none of these cases is found the dire warning against committing sin for which there is no expiation, as IS found in passages which thunder their warnings against that haughty trampling upon Gods most strenuous efforts to save man. (Cf. Heb. 6:4-6; Heb. 10:26-31) These sins are not so very far apart, however, since, in the wider sense, every sin of the believer who has experienced the power and influence of the Holy Spirit, may be called a sin against the Holy Spirit. But these sins against His influences in the life of the believer, while potentially leading man to harden himself enough to want to blaspheme against the Spirit, still are not unpardonable, for, otherwise, who could be saved?

But blasphemy, or also, speaking against the Holy Spirit is the grave danger it is, for this is the external evidence that the individual has been committed to this unwillingness to repent for some time. The grave danger, of which this utterance is but the outward proof, is that bent of mind that has long before chosen not to recognize truth and goodness when it is encountered. As Jesus says next (Mat. 12:35), blasphemy against the Spirit, spoken by the lips, is but the true product of the heart. What was the persons mentality will finally come out in his talk. There IS a serious, public commitment of oneself to that position already taken in his heart, for, whereas his indifference to truth and goodness had become more or less to be suspected, the unblushing maliciousness of his words not only commits him publicly to his damnable stand, but shows others what he had been thinking privately for quite some time before he arrived at that moment. Viewed in this light, the sin against the Holy Spirit is, as Barclay (Matthew, II, 49) describes it:

If a man for long enough shuts his eyes and ears to Gods way, and takes his own way, if he for long enough refuses to listen to the guidance God is offering him, if he for long enough turns his back upon the messages which God is sending him, if he for long enough prefers his own human ideas to the ideas which God seeks to put into his mind, then in the end he comes to a stage when he cannot recognize Gods truth . . . beauty and goodness when he sees them. He comes to a stage when his own evil seems to him good, and when Gods good seems to him evil.

Speak against the Spirit. There have been disciples of the Lord who have insisted upon a resurgence of miraculous manifestations of the Holy Spirits activity as evidence of the real government of God. They feel that this would serve concretely as scientific proof to an agnostic world that these modern Christians are really the bearers of the divine message. Classic Christianity, on the other hand, has rightly affirmed the adequacy of the proofs once for all given by the Apostles and early believers to support the divine origin of their message. Once vindicated as from God, the message needed no continual propping up with continued miracles. Nevertheless, in contrast to this, sincere disciples urge a resurrection of Pentecostal power, and insist that any who cannot speak in tongues (ironically chosen by many though not all as the unique sign of the Spirits presence) are somehow inferior Christians. Rather than listen to the message of the Spirit that leads to real repentance and transformation of life, deeper love for ignorant and imperfect brethren and longsuffering patience and a greater constancy, these disciples tend to spend energy and time promoting the external forms of the Spirits manifestation of the first century. As a reaction against this warped understanding of the Spirits word, other Christians, who do not share this view, attribute the so-called manifestations of the Spirit, cited by modern Pentecostalists, to forces other than the genuine power of God. (The power of ones own spirit through self-hypnosis, demonic activity, etc. are mentioned as explanations.) Chagrined, the modern charismatics feel that this accusation is to speak against the Spirit. Both sides need to beware lest the one attribute Gods real activity in the modern world to Satan and lest the other mistake freaks of their own minds or actual demonic activity for Gods leadership. Both sides must recognize their own need for patient love and generous consideration of the weaknesses of the other, since these attitudes ARE the undoubted fruit of the Spirit. While it is this authors opinion that God may work many true modern miracles through leaders of any denomination, either out of mercy in answer to their prayers and to convince them of His love despite their ignorance and imperfection (Cf. Mat. 5:45), or because He desires to test the loyalty of His own people whether they will follow Him alone or not (Cf. Deu. 13:1-5), the likelihood of repeated manifestations of the Spirits special gifts is small due to their nature and purpose. (See my article Miracles in this volume.) As a result, to object to the unfortunate conclusions of convinced charismatics (or those who suppose themselves such) is not to speak against the Spirit, but rather to try the spirits whether they be of God.

Not forgiven . . . neither in this world, nor in that which is to come. Should the explanation of this sin be based on the interpretation placed on the phrases in this world and that to come?

1.

It is true that the word world (aini) is susceptible of being translated age, in the sense of dispensation, epoch, era. (Cf. Arndt-Gingrich, 26, 27)

a.

Accordingly, we should interpret, according to this view, this age in reference to the pre-Messianic or Jewish period, and the coming one in reference to the age of the Messiah, or Christian epoch.

b.

But the alternative explanation, neither in this world bounded by time and space, nor in the coming world, as limitless as eternity itself, covers practically the same ground, since

(1)

this world includes both Jewish and Christian dispensations;

(2)

furthermore, there is no opportunity to repent nor any further provision of grace between the present age and eternity wherein forgiveness could be granted;

(3)

the distinction of the Jewish age from the Christian makes no practical difference anyway, since, if a man is not forgiven as a Jew nor as a Christian, to what could he possibly appeal? The Jewish age flowed right into the Christian dispensation which will halt only for judgment and, after that eternity.

2.

Further evidence that the division of this world and the coming one into Jewish and Christian ages is a false one, is to be seen in the fact that there is no record of an exception made either by Christ or the Apostles whereby they limited the universality of their Gospel invitations. So far as the record goes, none ever excluded any individual who, in any time previous to their presenting themselves as candidates for conversion, had blasphemed the Holy Spirit. But the problem arises, would any who had really blasphemed the Spirit present himself as a candidate for baptism? (Study Act. 7:51 ff.)

3.

Additional evidence against this distinction of Jewish and Christian epochs is to be found in the specific announcement by Jesus that every sin and blasphemy (against the Father) and whosoever speaks against the Son shall be forgiven. Now, if this world means that the Jewish age, an age in which Jesus was being spoken against and in which He was ultimately crucified, then a man who blasphemed the Holy Spirit at work in Jesus through His miracles and His God-inspired message (cf. Mat. 12:28), could both have and not have forgiveness, which is a manifest self-contradiction.

4.

This world and the world to come is NT language for

a.

This era of human history bounded by time and space plagued by cares. (Mar. 10:30 a; Luk. 16:8; Luk. 18:30 a; Mat. 20:34; Eph. 1:21 a; 1Ti. 1:17; 2Ti. 4:10; Tit. 2:12; Mat. 13:22; Mat. 13:39)

b.

The post-judgment era as unlimited as eternity (Mar. 10:30 b; Luk. 18:30 b; Isa. 20:35; Eph. 1:21 b; 1Ti. 6:19?; Heb. 6:5)

So, Jesus says that this sin will absolutely never be forgiven. It is difficult to imagine how He could have stated the eternality of future punishment in more unequivocal terms! Lenski (Matthew, 483) is right to observe that:

Jesus is warning the Pharisees who had never believed in him. Hence the sin against the Holy Ghost may be committed, not only by former believers . . . but also by men who have never believed.

Neither in this world nor in that to come, taken in reference to this unforgiveable sin, must not be supposed to suggest that for other lesser sins, forgiveness might yet be hoped for, if not now, perhaps after death. There is no purgatory or second hope of grace for those who die without pardon. Jesus expression intends only to reinforce the absolute hopelessness of the person who blasphemes Gods Spirit. (Cf. Luk. 16:26; Heb. 3:13; Heb. 9:27; Gal. 6:7) From the foregoing passages it is clear that death without pardon merely fixes a souls destiny and teaches that everything depends upon the choices man has made in this life.

Even the Mosaic economy distinguished between unintentional and deliberate sin. (Cf. Num. 15:22-30) For the former, forgiveness was possible; for the latter, nothing but extermination was prescribed: because he despised the word of Jehovah, and hath broken his commandment, that soul shall utterly be cut off; his iniquity shall be upon him. (Cf. 1Sa. 2:25; 1Sa. 3:14; Isa. 22:14)

2.

ETERNAL DAMNATION AWAITS THE SINNER WHO REJECTS ALL THAT IS THE SPIRITS WORK AMONG MEN.

a.

One key to understanding this sin against the Spirit is the question: What is the Holy Spirits work? When did it begin?

(1)

It began primarily at Pentecost after Jesus earthly message and work were fully completed. (Act. 1:7-8; Acts 2; Joh. 16:7-14; Joh. 15:16-17; Joh. 15:26)

(2)

It consisted in glorifying Jesus and revealing Gods will through the Apostles words and works. (Joh. 15:26; Joh. 16:13-15; Mat. 10:19-20)

(3)

It consisted of convincing the world of its sin, its need of righteousness and the reality of judgment. (Joh. 16:7-11) It consisted in leading men to repentance. Thus to blaspheme Him is to put the sinner in an attitude so hardened as to render repentance absolutely impossible, because he mentally sets his will against the Spirits appeals.

(4)

It consisted in making men holy, like God. It becomes a deliberate insult to God for men to claim to be unable to distinguish His work from that vileness and spiritual rottenness produced by that unclean spirit which is the antithesis of all that God stands for! That immoral pretense to be unable to discern lasting good in the feeblest efforts of Gods human agents and institutions, however imperfect and ineffectual they may seem, is a mindset that calls good evil and evil good. This is the damnation of agnosticism and of those skeptics that pretend to be quite unable to make a firm decision for truth and righteousness. Even though some of them admit the rightness of Gods standards, they see much unholiness and unrighteousness in the Church, as judged by the Churchs own ideals, but they do not commit themselves to those ideals nor preach them in the unselfish endeavor to bring every man up to the unbesmirched standard they pretend to honor. The end result is their rejecting as unworthy of their higher intelligence the only work and wisdom which is capable of bringing them to ultimate reality: Gods.

b.

Blasphemy of the Holy Spirit, then, consists in the final and complete rejection of all that the Holy Spirit has used to bring man to repentance: the Scripture which is His own written message and the Church which is His living voice in the world. (Heb. 2:1-4; Heb. 3:19 to Heb. 4:11; Heb. 6:4-8; 1Co. 10:1-13; Joh. 15:1-5; Eph. 3:10) It is the final and complete suppressing of all that ones own conscience, however enlightened by the revelation of God it might have been, would have the man do. This sin is not one single act, nor merely backsliding followed by repentance, but rather that final, complete and perpetual rejection and opposition to the Spirits message which is the expression of a mind willfully shut to Gods proffered mercy. (Cf. Luk. 12:8-10; Heb. 10:26-31)

Contrary to the opinion of some, the blasphemy of the Holy Spirit is not only possible in the present age, but also much more likely and common, since prejudices against the Spirits influence in ones life, and superficial sophistication that close haughty eyes to what is good, right and true, have had the advantage of nearly twenty centuries of human experience recorded by history, from which to learn to love the right and abhor the evil. And yet, despite these distinct advantages that derive from living in this century, nevertheless, men continue to accumulate for themselves teachers to suit their own likings, and turn away from listening to the truth and wander into myths . . . who will listen to anybody and can never arrive at a knowledge of the truth, (Cf. 2Ti. 4:3-4; 2Ti. 3:7) or be moved to action by it, even though they are genuinely convicted by it.

D. TALK IS NOT CHEAP (12:3337)
1. BECAUSE SPEECH REVEALS OUR SENSE OF MORAL DISCERNMENT (12:3335)

Mat. 12:33 Either make the tree good, and its fruit good; or make the tree corrupt, and its fruit corrupt: for the tree is known by its fruit. The transparency of this germ-parable is no problem, for the tree is the source of the fruit, infusing into the fruit its own nature and vigor, whether for good or ill. (Cf. Jas. 3:10-11) The question here is just how the Lord means this obvious truth to be applied. What is the tree and what its fruit in this figure? Is Jesus the tree, or the Pharisees? Is the fruit His work, His results, His doctrine, or theirs or both? In either case, the imperative (make the tree) has nothing to do with changing the objective character of the tree, but refers only to everyones understanding of that character. This is evident from the fact that Jesus would not order anyone to make himself morally worthless, nor could He order them to change His objective character either for better or worse (good or corrupt), since this lies outside their power. But He CAN order them to examine how they put the case in their own mind, regardless of the persons to which they ultimately apply this figure. (Cf. uses of poien in Joh. 5:18; Joh. 8:53; Joh. 10:33)

1.

Jesus Himself is the tree referred to and His ministry its fruit. If so, He applies to Himself here the same rule He lays down as a measurement of all others. (Cf. Mat. 7:16-20; Luk. 6:43-45) In this illustration Jesus demands that the opposition make a choice: if the results of His life and work are evil, then they are justified in exposing Him as evil, for He produced them. But if casting out demons, and His other miracles in general, brings only glory to God and blessing to mankind, then they are driven to pronounce Him good, for these positive benefits are also His work. Now the Pharisees themselves are faced with a real dilemma: If we pronounce His work to be good, we are forced to admit the good Spirit at work in Him, in which case we will be laughed off as fools for antagonizing this man of God and we will be found in opposition to God. But if we judge the freeing of a human being from the clutches of demons as a vile, evil deed, the people who recognize this act as humanitarian, will damn us for inhumanity! The problem He lay before them put their conscience to its most crucial test: can the evident, consistent, excellent results of Jesus work be the deed of a vile imposter empowered by Satan? (Study Joh. 10:25; Joh. 10:37-38 in this connection!)

2.

An interesting interpretation of this verse is suggested by an alternative translation: Either make the tree good, and its fruit (will be) good, or else make the tree corrupt, and its fruit (will be) bad. The addition of the copulative verb is perfectly possible, and even though this translation may also suggest the foregoing meaning, it seems to give another twist to Jesus picture. Instead of pointing back to the Pharisees unfair evaluation of His work, it becomes an exhortation to purify the heart, so that all that it produces in words and actions will be sound. Leave the heart corrupt and all that flows from it is corrupted. In support of this explanation it should be noticed that in the following verse Jesus proceeds with this same observation, using more or less literal language. As Lenski (Matthew, 487) puts it: The heart overflowing in speech through the mouth is about the same as the tree with its native fruit. The overflow shows what is in the reservoir.

Mat. 12:34 Ye offspring of vipers, how can ye, being evil, speak good things? Offspring of vipers (gennmata echidnn) is crisp, vigorous language coming right out of the heart of Jesus, and is the true representation of His heart too, but totally free of that hate-filled bitterness that language like this usually reflects. It is the indignation of the righteous in the face of hypocrisy. But, more important, it represents the judgment of the Judge Himself. He condemns them as morally hopeless! Ironically, by the common standards of Jewish piety, many sincere people accounted these very leaders to be a generation of saints, and, granted the basis upon which this supposed righteousness was founded, this popular opinion is understandable. But the Lord exposes them as a brood of vipers! (Cf. Mat. 3:7; Mat. 23:33) Because the Pharisees had expressed the maliciousness in their hearts when they accused Jesus of having a secret alliance with the Devil, Jesus is perfectly justified in pointing out the true condition of their lives. (Mat. 12:24) Ye being evil (= You are evil): let humble souls, heretofore scandalized by the well-known hypocrisy of these leaders or perhaps burdened by the endless rules required by them or staggered by their deadly treachery in politics and their moral blindness in practical religion, fear them no longer, for they are evil. Even at this point in His ministry, Jesus spares no words in exposing the devilish animus of these accusers.

How can you? The answer anticipated by absolute Justice is You cannot! This is the application of Jesus implied simile about trees and fruits: why should anyone expect moral excellence from you who are so viciously wicked? Should I, or anyone else, look for prime quality fruit on such trees as you? The reason is clear: for out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaketh. What is in ones heartits orientation, its prejudices, its points of view, its ideals, its desires, its hates and its lovesMUST come out in his speech, whether it be the very wisdom of God or the vilest lies ever conjured up by the Adversary. (Cf. Rev. 13:11; Rev. 5:6; Rev. 16:10-11; 1Pe. 1:22 to 1Pe. 2:2; Jas. 3:5 ff.; Tit. 1:15; Mat. 15:11-18; Mar. 7:21-23) Study Jesus way of arguing the proposition that the Jews could not be brought to believe in Him precisely because of the condition of their heart:

1.

They did not have Gods Word abiding in their heart (Joh. 5:38).

2.

Nor did they have the love for God in them, so the hate that came from their lips was more than explicable. (Joh. 5:42)

3.

Their heart was set on human approval. (Joh. 5:44)

4.

Their heart was hardened (Joh. 12:39) so much so that they could not bear to hear the truth when presented to them (Joh. 8:43). See also Rom. 8:5-7.

What is in the heart will be revealed sooner or later as the conscious or unconscious confession of the lips. (Cf. Rom. 10:9-10)

Mat. 12:35 The good man out of his good treasure bringeth forth good things: and the evil man out of his evil treasure bringeth forth evil things. Study Mat. 13:52 where Jesus uses this same figure to speak of scribes trained for the Kingdom of God as being similar to a provident householder who is able to bring out of his treasure both old and new things. This is possible, because the man actually possesses those things and is, therefore, the richer for it. Jewish theologians of Jesus day who were willing to accept the mentality of Jesus, His point of view regarding the Kingdom, etc., coming as they did from the rich history of Gods dealings with Israel, were able to produce out of their own religious heritage and theological experience, great, new insights into true reality and the will of the living God. From the human stand-point alone, they were centuries ahead of mere philosophers groping for insight without the benefit of the same divine revelation which the Hebrews had in their theological treasure. So also here, to bring forth (something) out of (ones) treasure means that any man can hope to express, by means of his words, actions and influence, only what he himself really is or what he really possesses in his life. This observation, when used as objectively as humanly possible, becomes the test whereby we can judge our progress toward maturity: what is the general character of the way we are treating people? What is the general tone of our conversation? (Use Eph. 4:25-32; Eph. 5:3-4; Php. 2:14; Php. 4:4-8; Col. 3:8-17; Col. 4:5-6, etc. as typical standards.) It should be obvious from this, although, unfortunately, too often it is not, that the subject, direction and tone of our conversations is a perfect mirror of the condition of our life. Christians may too often presume that indulging in complaining, merciless censuring, selfish wrangling and the like, is perfectly harmless precisely because it cannot harm the person or possessions of another fellow human, as would theft, rape or murder. But Jesus insists here that everything we say is an accurate reflection of what we are, and for this reason, we must be judged by what we say. (Mat. 12:37)

As in the preceding verse, so also here, a mans treasure is what HE thinks valuable, whether it be objectively good or bad. It is his wealth measured in thoughts, judgments, convictions and the like. (Lenski, Matthew, 487) And it is truly his treasure in the sense that only he has made it so by assembling what is there deposited and only he can draw from that fund of knowledge, opinions or attitudes. (When we speak of drawing on the knowledge-fund of others, we really mean to increase our own treasure from which we may later draw as the occasion arises. And we can only draw from their treasure as they are willing to communicate or share with us what is in their mind. So it is we ourselves who decide what goes into the treasury of our own minds.) Barclay (Matthew, II, 51f.) reminds us that:

It is an obvious fact that there is nothing so revealing as words. We do not need to talk to a man long before we discover whether he has a mind that is pure or a mind that is dirty; . . . whether he has a mind that is kind and sympathetic or . . . cruel, callous, critical; we do not need to listen for long to a man who is preaching, teaching or lecturing to find out whether his mind is clear and lucid or . . . muddled and involved . . . It is the words which a man speaks in his unguarded moments, the words which he speaks without thinking, . . . when the conventional restraints are removed, which really show what he is like. As Plummer puts it, The carefully spoken word may be a calculated hypocrisy.

But does not Jesus general discourse here contradict much of human experience? He urges that character is known by conduct: So then by their fruits you will know them. . . . What is in the heart will come out in the speech, He says. Nevertheless, is it not one of the facts of experience that right conduct and bad character may be found together right in the same person? Is it not a rather common fallacy to think that the really important test of a mans character is what he does, thus implying that right conduct is always a safe and certain clue to character? Marshall (Challenge of New Testament Ethics, 63ff.) illustrates this point well and concludes that proper conduct is neither a certain clue to character nor a way to achieve it. Then he resolves the apparent inconsistency between this universal observation about human conduct and what Jesus intends to teach:

It is sometimes objected that such an idea (i.e. conduct is no certain clue to character) is flatly contradicted by our Lords words: So then by their fruits you will know them. Here surely Jesus teaches that character is known by conduct, that just as a fig tree is known as such by the fruit it bears, so what a man is is known by what he does! That is true, but Jesus is thinking of conduct as a whole, conduct so extended as to cover the whole man, with all his actions, words, motives and thoughts, conduct as the natural and inevitable expression of a mans very nature, like the fruit which a tree bears because it can bear no other. The whole point of the illustration which precedes this utterance of Jesus is that without a good tree there can be no really good fruitand just as a good tree is essential to genuinely good fruit, so a good character is essential to genuinely good conduct. . . . When outwardly right conduct does happen to appear in a man whose motives are mean or base, it would be dismissed, if all the facts were known, as rotten fruit. That right conduct of a sort can and does appear in men whose character leaves much to be desired, Jesus was well aware.

So, what has been observed here about ones unplanned or unconscious expressions explains why, on the one hand, we can find right conduct in those whose motivations are corrupt, since for some reason they believe that their own interests can be advanced and so what they do is done for personal profit. Hence, what they express publicly as apparently good or right conduct is no indicator of their real character, for it takes in too little of their total conduct. A study of their total conduct would disclose their sinful prudence, their scheming, their cunning and selfishness. It is in this sense alone that Jesus intends His dictum: By ALL their fruits you shall know them. . . . The (genuinely) good man out of his (total) good treasure brings forth good. . . .

So, what should the good man do, when he hears out of his own mouth clamor or bitter, hateful talk of which he is immediately ashamed? Let him thank God for this reminder that he is yet in need of Gods grace and dependent upon Him for forgiveness, lest he be proud of his growth toward maturity. Let him humble himself and say, I am afraid that there is probably more vileness down there in my heart than I had thought, since I had thought myself incapable of such language. But I was wrong. Forgive me for what I myself repudiate, even though I said it! The motivation behind such confession of sin is not only the transparent honesty that admits sin even in oneself, but also that genuinely righteous unwillingness to justify it even to protect oneself. In the ultimate analysis, it is only with SINNERS that Jesus can do anything. (Cf. Mat. 9:9-13 Notes) For the righteous (those who fancy themselves such), who drive themselves unmercifully to present themselves as perfect in the eyes of others, do not wish so to bare their sinfulness before men.

Observe that,-for Jesus, there are only two classes: the good man and the evil man. Elsewhere the Lord defines what constitutes the difference between each class and what qualifies a person to be in it: total confidence in Jesus or lack of it. Even a disciple of Jesus, who is yet quite imperfect and troubled by sin, is good, by Jesus reckoning, because he trusts Jesus to make him perfect. This makes even the relative good moral person, who trusts his own relative moral maturity to carry him, an evil man. This concept is more fully developed by Paul, especially in his meaty discussions on the relative uselessness of the works of righteousness which man himself does trying to be good enough.

2. THERE ARE No WORDS THAT Do NOT COUNT, FOR GOD HOLDS Us ACCOUNTABLE FOR ALL WE SAY (12:3637)

Mat. 12:36 And I say unto you. What follows is no mere addition to the foregoing argument (though it is this too, of course). What follows is the authoritative declaration of One qualified to declare the norms by which every member of the human race will be judged in that great Day. Every idle word that men shall speak, they shall give account thereof in the day of judgment. Idle (args) means (1) unemployed, idle, with nothing to do of men in the marketplace, Mat. 20:3; Mat. 20:6; (2) idle, lazy of widows, 1Ti. 5:13, . . . neglectful of, careless . . . (3) useless, Jas. 2:20; 2Pe. 1:8; rhma argn, a careless word, which, because of its worthlessness, had better been left unspoken. (Arndt-Gingrich, 104) Does the Lord ,see some of His audience squirming and uncomfortable because of His frank appraisal of their most honored theologians, who would wish to excuse them by whining that they had not seriously intended to accuse Him of being in league with Satan? Or that their accusation of demon-possession had been hastily or carelessly uttered? If so, even those tell-tale words spoke eloquent volumes about the men who had uttered them. Men are more or less willing to accept responsibility for words which they have carefully considered and tend to excuse themselves for careless utterances to which they give little importance and which are soon forgotten. But the Master insists that every idle word is the object of Gods notice and concern, not merely those words which were carefully calculated to impress the hearers, and if every idle word, how much more those which are well-pondered! (Psa. 139:4) In the field of human psychology Sigmund Freud receives credit for discovering, or, at least, popularizing, what Jesus Christ had already stated: what issues from the lips in speech was really present in the mind of the speaker and so much a part of his personality as to be a correct index of his character. A person is really accountable for ALL that he says, even though he may wish to repent of those his own words of which he may be ashamed. Thank God for repentance and forgiveness of sins!

But if it be true that the carefully spoken word may be a calculated hypocrisy (Plummer), and if careless, idle speech is that for which the speaker takes no conscious responsibility, what is the practical implication of Jesus doctrine and how are we to understand the Apostles urging Christians to control their speech? (cf. Eph. 5:4; Col. 4:6; Jud. 1:15-16, et al.) Would this not tend to cause men merely to sublimate their vilest blasphemies, thus leaving their real thoughts unsaid and so promote the deepest hypocrisy?

1.

No, because if men for Jesus sake begin to start taking their own careless speech seriously, it ceases to be idle or careless. It becomes considered speech. And as they seriously ponder the worthlessness, the carelessness and the real damage to themselves and others that it represents, they arrive at the conclusion that they must repent of it and seek Gods forgiveness. This is not mere sublimation, but elimination.

2.

And the conscious effort to cultivate proper speech that gives grace to the hearer is not done for the sake of mere culture, but for Jesus sake and in order to grow up into the image of Him.

3.

The total result of the Lords approach is the conversion of the character of the individual, so that for him there can be no words which are somehow secular while others are holy, some which count while others do not. Here again, as earlier (Mat. 5:33-37), Jesus is insisting upon the sanctity and importance of every human expression.

Our Savior knows that if any one makes no mistakes in what he says, he is a perfect man, able to bridle the whole body also. (Jas. 3:2) This is why His admonition is psychologically so important, for He knows that the discipline, required to control ones own tongue, is going to produce the desired effect in the discipline of all else in ones life. Unlike merely human psychologies, Jesus view of man has a thorough-going theological orientation, so fundamental that it really deals with mans total need.

Account in the day of judgment. Here there is no debating the reality or necessity of judgment, but simply the insistence that we recognize the fact that, though our words be as unrecallable or ungovernable as feathers strewn in a windstorm, yet God has them all collected and on file. Long-forgotten conversations that seemingly made little impression upon our consciousness are subject to immediate recall by God! (Rom. 14:12; 1Pe. 4:5)

Mat. 12:37 For: He states the reason for the surprising conclusion just given. The severely-measured accountability is based upon the scrutiny of ones heart and this is revealed by whatever the mouth betrays about the hearts contents and character. By thy words, or by what a man says, he betrays his real religion, regardless of all his protestations to the contrary. Orthodoxy of creed is not the final test, says Jesus, but what that creed causes a man to do or say. (Jas. 1:26; cf. Pro. 18:21; Pro. 13:3; Mal. 3:13-15; Luk. 19:22) Thou shalt be justified . . . condemned. Nothing is intended here about a persons justifying himself by the sheer glibness of his speech, for the real Justifier here, as ever, is God. While it is true that in this life we really do justify or condemn an individual by his words, holding him responsible for what he says, and while it is true that people try to clear themselves by artful self-defence, Jesus is discussing issues that will be concluded in the day of judgment. There only God justifies or condemns.

FACT QUESTIONS

1.

Tell of the character and position of the Pharisees, showing why they would level such a charge as they make against Jesus in this section.

2.

Does either Matthew or Mark say clearly that the Pharisees (who said Jesus was in league with Beelzebub) actually did blaspheme the Holy Spirit? If so, how? If not, what did Jesus mean by what He said regarding blasphemy?

3.

Quote or paraphrase all of Jesus answers to the charge that He was in league with Satan. Explain what they meant and how they applied to the accusation.

4.

What is the meaning of the expression Son of David? How was it intended by the crowds in this section? Why did the Pharisees object to its use with reference to Jesus?

5.

Did the crowds actually call Jesus the Son of David? How do you know?

6.

Explain as far as the evidence goes what can be known about demons and demon possession. Who or what are demons? List the phenomena mentioned in the Bible generally surrounding demon possession. Describe Jesus methods for casting them out.

7.

Who were the sons of the Pharisees who cast out demons? What was the point Jesus was making by bringing them into the argument?

8.

What is the slander involved in linking Jesus with Beelzebul? Who or what was Beelzebul or Beelzebub in Jewish thinking?

9.

What is the meaning of the argument about the strong man, and the method for stealing his goods?

10.

What are the possible interpretations of Jesus denial of the possibility of neutrality: He that is not with me is against me? Give evidence for and against each, selecting which you think best fits Jesus meaning in this context.

11.

From what field of endeavor does the expression come: He that gathers not with me, scatters? Is this a Hebraism, parallel to the preceding declaration, or is this a separate thought, advancing Jesus argument one more full step?

12.

In what sense does Jesus mean the statement: Every sin and blasphemy shall be forgiven unto men?

13.

Of what sin were the Pharisees and theologians who were then attacking Jesus guilty? What was the real source of their sin?

14.

Explain the connection between the discussion about the sin of blasphemy against the Holy Spirit and the following discussion about the nature of ones heart.

15.

Had the Pharisees and theologians committed the sin of blasphemy against the Holy Spirit? What evidence indicates this?

16.

Had Jesus friends committed the unpardonable sin against the Holy Spirit by referring to His unflagging zeal to keep on helping people at the expense of His own rest and comfort as madness?

17.

Who were these well-meaning friends and/or relatives who tried to save Jesus from Himself by seizing Him to take Him away from it all? How do you know? What relation does your answer have to the fact that shortly after this event Jesus mother and brothers interrupt Jesus preaching by asking Him to step outside to talk with them?

18.

Can a man speak righteously and have a wicked heart? Can a man speak wickedly and have a good heart? State Jesus general rule and then show how the seeming exceptions to the rule are not exceptions at all, but examples of something else of which Jesus warned us, which, in turn, proves this general rule true also.

19.

What kind of a word is an idle word?

20.

What is the meaning of the expression (in Marks parallel) He hath Beelzebub?

21.

Was the remark, that Jesus casts out demons by the prince of demons, itself blasphemy against the Holy Spirit? Explain.

22.

Is the sin against the Holy Spirit something people can and do commit today? If so, how? If not, why not?

Fuente: College Press Bible Study Textbook Series

(22) The narrative that follows is again a stumbling-block in the way of harmonists. St. Luke (Luk. 11:14) places it after the feeding of the five thousand; St. Mark (Mar. 3:22) immediately after the mission of the Twelve. A like narrative has met us in Mat. 9:32, and it is probable enough that the charge was repeated as often as the occasion presented itself, and as often answered in identical or like words. St. Mark states that the Pharisees who brought it were those who had come down from Jerusalem, and this falls in with all that we have seen of the activity of those emissaries of the party.

Possessed with a devil, blind, and dumb.In Mat. 9:32, the man was simply dumb; here the phenomena of the suspension of conscious sensation and volition were more complicated.

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

22. One possessed with a devil, blind, and dumb The kingdom of wickedness naturally associates with the natural evils of men. Disease and possession are the product of sin, and they are thus found going naturally together. See note on Mat 4:24.

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

‘Then was brought to him one who was possessed with a demon, blind and dumb, and he healed him, in so much that the dumb man spoke and saw.’

Matthew now introduces an example of someone who needs the power of the Spirit of God exercised on his behalf. He is possessed by a demon which makes him both blind, and deaf and dumb. The word used for ‘dumb’ regularly includes deafness. It is no coincidence that these are the spiritual problems of Israel (Mat 13:14-15), and Matthew has that in mind. The people of Israel are blind and cannot recognise Who Jesus is, they are deaf and dumb and do not testify to His Name. But once Jesus had healed the man he both spoke and saw. (Notice the minor chiasmus – ‘blind – dumb – spoke – saw’). So it could be for Israel if they would only look to Him. They would be able to ‘see God’ (Mat 5:8) and be able to testify of Him (Mat 10:32).

Note that the man is described as ‘healed’ which is unusual for the casting out of demons (but compare Mat 15:28). It may well be that Jesus wants to connect it with the overall ‘healing’ of Israel in Mat 12:15. Normally a demon is spoken of as being cast out by a word (Jesus is never said to lay hands on a demon-possessed person).

Fuente: Commentary Series on the Bible by Peter Pett

The Holy Spirit Triumphs Over The Evil Spirit World Establishing the Kingly Rule of God For All Who Will Hear And Respond (12:22-32).

Following on this emphasis on the coming of the Servant of YHWH with the Holy Spirit upon Him we are now to learn something of His activity against the powers of evil. Prior to this mention has been made of the casting out of evil spirits Mat 4:24; Mat 8:16; Mat 8:28-34; Mat 9:32-34; Mat 10:1; Mat 10:8 (although interestingly not as a sign of the Coming One – Mat 11:5), and even of the accusation that it was by the prince of demons that Jesus cast them out (Mat 9:34). But now we are to be introduced to the implications of this situation. The reason that He can cast out evil spirits by a word is because the Spirit of God is now active in Israel through Him. The Servant has come in the full power of the Spirit of God and the forces of evil are in retreat. In this section there is a powerful emphasis on the activity of evil spirits, and Jesus’ response to it. For not only does He signify that His activity in casting out evil spirits by the Spirit of God has revealed that Satan has been bound and that the Kingly Rule of God has come to Israel (Mat 12:28) in power, but He also indicates that Israel as a whole is like a demon possessed man who has been freed from an evil spirit, only for it to return with seven other worse spirits, because he had not responded from his heart to God, so that his position is even worse than before (Mat 12:43-45). This picture He applies directly to Israel (Mat 12:45). He is binding Satan on their behalf. But if they fail to respond to the new Rule that He now offers, the Kingly Rule of God, they must expect something seven times worse.

The very detail with which Matthew goes into this passage demonstrates how important he saw the detail to be, for normally he abbreviates and only states the basically important points. Here all the points are clearly seen as basically important.

First, however, we are brought face to face with the reality of the situation in a blind and deaf/dumb spirit which is possessing a man. This is blindness and deafness is a picture of Israel (Mat 13:14-15). And Jesus heals the man so that he can both see and speak, just as He would do to Israel if it would turn to Him. That we are to interpret it in that way comes out in Mat 12:43-45.

Prior to the quotation of the prophecy of Isaiah, Matthew had shown us an Israel that was dumb in response to Jesus works (Mat 11:20-24), and blind to His message (Mat 11:17), and even blinder Pharisees who were out to bring Him down (Mat 12:1-14). Now here after the quotation pointing to the Servant, new hope springs up for at least some of the blind, and deaf and dumb, of Israel. But for the hardened among the Pharisees there is still seen to be little hope, because they are deliberately closing their minds. Notice that Matthew constantly introduces the Pharisees where the other Gospels are less emphatic. It is clear that he particularly saw them as being against Jesus. This would tie in with he himself being an ex-public servant and thus especially looked down on by the Pharisees.

Analysis.

a Then was brought to him one who was possessed with a demon, blind and dumb (Mat 12:22 a).

b And he healed him, in so much that the dumb man spoke and saw (Mat 12:22).

c And all the crowds were amazed, and said, “Can this be the son of David?” (Mat 12:23).

d But when the Pharisees heard it, they said, “This man does not cast out demons, except by Beelzeboul, the prince of the demons” (Mat 12:24).

e And knowing their thoughts he said to them, “Every kingdom divided against itself is brought to desolation, and every city or house divided against itself will not stand, and if Satan casts out Satan, he is divided against himself. How then will his kingdom stand?” (Mat 12:25-26).

d “And if I by Beelzeboul cast out demons, by whom do your sons cast them out? Therefore shall they be your judges” (Mat 12:27).

c “But if I by the Spirit of God cast out demons, then is the Kingly Rule of God come upon you” (Mat 12:28).

b “Or how can one enter into the house of the strong man, and spoil his goods, except he first bind the strong man? And then he will spoil his house” (Mat 12:29).

a “He who is not with me is against me, and he who does not gather with me scatters”

Note that in ‘a’ the man is blind and dumb, and in the parallel the one who is not with Him is against Him, and the one who does not gather with Him, scatters. In ‘b’ Jesus binds the strong man and enters his house, for He arranges the healing of a demon possessed man, and in the parallel the point is made that no one can enter the strong man’s house and free his goods unless He first bind the strong man. Then he may spoil his house. In ‘c’ the crowds ask if this is the Son of David, and in the parallel the answer is that the Kingly Rule of God (to be introduced by David’s seed) is upon them. In ‘d’ the Pharisees say that He casts out spirits by the prince of demons, and in the parallel Jesus asks how, if that is so, there own sons cast them out. Centrally in ‘e’ is the concept that if Satan fights against himself his kingdom will collapse. Thus it cannot be true. (It is only men who do stupid things like that).

Fuente: Commentary Series on the Bible by Peter Pett

The Rejection of the Testimony of Miracles (God’s Testimony to Man’s Physical Body) Mat 12:22-45 offers two pericopae that reveal how the religious leaders had rejected the testimony of Jesus’ miracles when He healed the blind demoniac (Mat 12:22-37) and when they asked Him to perform a miracle for them (Mat 12:38-45). These miracles of healing men’s physical bodies testified to those who were experienced the healing and to those who saw it that Jesus Christ is the Messiah.

Outline Here is a proposed outline:

1. Persecution over Miracles Mat 12:22-37

2. Persecution over Miracles Mat 12:38-45

3. Jesus Declares the Family of the Kingdom Mat 12:46-50

Mat 12:22-37 Persecution over Miracles: The Blasphemy of the Holy Spirit by the Pharisees ( Mar 3:20-30 , Luk 11:14-23 ; Luk 12:10 ) In Mat 12:22-37 Jesus heals the blind demoniac, after which the Pharisees reject this miracle. Jesus responds to their accusations that He was casting out demons by Beelzebub, the prince of the devils by telling them that they were blaspheming against the Holy Spirit. Thus, a person blasphemes the Holy Spirit by crediting His office and ministry to the works of Satan. Jesus builds His case of judgment against them by explaining that they will be judged by their words spoken against Him and the Holy Spirit.

Mat 12:27  And if I by Beelzebub cast out devils, by whom do your children cast them out? therefore they shall be your judges.

Mat 12:27 Comments – Apparently the Jews had those whose duty or work involved casting out devils, which Jesus refers to as “your children.” Note Act 19:13, “vagabond Jesus, exorcists.”

Act 19:13, “Then certain of the vagabond Jews, exorcists, took upon them to call over them which had evil spirits the name of the Lord Jesus, saying, We adjure you by Jesus whom Paul preacheth.”

Mat 12:28  But if I cast out devils by the Spirit of God, then the kingdom of God is come unto you.

Mat 12:28 “But if I cast out devils by the Spirit of God” Comments – The Scriptures tell us that Jesus Christ cast spirits out with His Word. But it also says that He cast them out by the Spirit of God. This means that Jesus operated in the gifts of discerning of spirits or by a word of knowledge to cast out demons.

In one of the major visions that Kenneth Hagin experienced in his life, the Lord Jesus used the story of the girl possessed with a spirit of divination to teach him the important of casting out demons by the Spirit of God. Hagin explains that a believer has authority over Satan any time, but he does not have authority over the will of other people. Each person must choose to be set free from the powers of darkness. Jesus explained that this girl followed Paul and Silas around Philippi for “many days” crying, “These men are the servants of the most high God.” Jesus Christ asked Hagin, “Do you know why Paul did not deal with that spirit the first day?” Hagin replied, “No, I really don’t. I’ve wondered about it. Why didn’t Paul, an apostle, a man of God, a man of authority, just take authority over that evil spirit the first day?” Jesus said, “He had to wait for the manifestation of the Spirit; he had to wait until the Spirit of God gave him discerning of spirits.” [460]

[460] Kenneth Hagin, The Believer’s Authority (Tulsa, Oklahoma: Faith Library Publications, c1984, 1992), 58; Kenneth Hagin, I Believe In Visions (Tulsa, Oklahoma: Faith Library Publications, c1984, 1986), 72-3.

We can cast Satan out of our lives and out of our home anytime we choose because we have authority over him 24-hours a day. But we must be led by the Spirit when casting demons out of others. We must operate with a word of knowledge or discerning of spirits like Paul, or this person must be willing to be delivered.

Mat 12:31  Wherefore I say unto you, All manner of sin and blasphemy shall be forgiven unto men: but the blasphemy against the Holy Ghost shall not be forgiven unto men.

Mat 12:31 Scripture Reference – Note:

1Ti 1:13, “Who was before a blasphemer, and a persecutor, and injurious: but I obtained mercy, because I did it ignorantly in unbelief.”

Mat 12:32  And whosoever speaketh a word against the Son of man, it shall be forgiven him: but whosoever speaketh against the Holy Ghost, it shall not be forgiven him, neither in this world, neither in the world to come.

Mat 12:36-37 Comments – Idle word – Note that Jesus was very much to the point and terse in His conversation. He was not a wordy speaker.

Mat 12:38-45 Persecution over Miracles: A Wicked Generation Seeks a Sign ( Mat 12:38-45 ) In Mat 12:38-45 Jesus is asked to perform a miracle. In response, Jesus rebukes the religious leaders by telling that them a wicked heart seeks a sign since they have rejected the signs and testimony of Jesus Christ.

Mat 12:38  Then certain of the scribes and of the Pharisees answered, saying, Master, we would see a sign from thee.

Mat 12:38 Comments What did the scribes and Pharisees want Jesus to prove with a sign? The people had just declared that Jesus was the Messiah in Mat 12:23 when He healed the deaf and dumb man (Mat 12:22), and this had offended the Jewish leaders. They would not have believed an addition sign had Jesus worked another miracle, for they were trying to prove Him false in the presence of the people.

Mat 12:22-23, “Then was brought unto him one possessed with a devil, blind, and dumb: and he healed him, insomuch that the blind and dumb both spake and saw. And all the people were amazed, and said, Is not this the son of David?”

Mat 12:39  But he answered and said unto them, An evil and adulterous generation seeketh after a sign; and there shall no sign be given to it, but the sign of the prophet Jonas:

Mat 12:40  For as Jonas was three days and three nights in the whale’s belly; so shall the Son of man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth.

Mat 12:40 Comments We know this to be a reference to the death, burial and resurrection of the Lord Jesus Christ. There are very few Scripture references to the three days that Jesus spent in the heart of the earth (Eph 4:8-10, 1Pe 3:18-19; 1Pe 4:6). Mat 12:40 serves as the clearest evidence that Jesus visited Hell prior to His resurrection. Note

Eph 4:8-10, “Wherefore he saith, When he ascended up on high, he led captivity captive, and gave gifts unto men. (Now that he ascended, what is it but that he also descended first into the lower parts of the earth? He that descended is the same also that ascended up far above all heavens, that he might fill all things.)”

1Pe 3:18-19, “For Christ also hath once suffered for sins, the just for the unjust, that he might bring us to God, being put to death in the flesh, but quickened by the Spirit: By which also he went and preached unto the spirits in prison;”

1Pe 4:6, “For for this cause was the gospel preached also to them that are dead, that they might be judged according to men in the flesh, but live according to God in the spirit.”

Mat 12:39-40 Comments Jesus Will Be a Sign for the Jews – The Jews were seeking a sign, so the resurrection of Jesus Christ will be a sign for all of those who do not believe in Him. Note:

1Co 1:22-23, “For the Jews require a sign, and the Greeks seek after wisdom: But we preach Christ crucified, unto the Jews a stumblingblock, and unto the Greeks foolishness;”

Mat 12:43  When the unclean spirit is gone out of a man, he walketh through dry places, seeking rest, and findeth none.

Mat 12:43 Comments – Jack Hayford says that he asked the Lord what the words “dry places” means, and the Lord told him that it refers to any place where the Spirit of God is not present or flowing. [461]

[461] Jack Hayford, “Spirit Formed with Jack Hayford,” on Trinity Broadcasting Network (Santa Ana, California), television program.

Mat 12:44  Then he saith, I will return into my house from whence I came out; and when he is come, he findeth it empty, swept, and garnished.

Mat 12:45  Then goeth he, and taketh with himself seven other spirits more wicked than himself, and they enter in and dwell there: and the last state of that man is worse than the first. Even so shall it be also unto this wicked generation.

Mat 12:45 Comments – The number seven always represents divine judgment.

Gen 4:15, “And the LORD said unto him, Therefore whosoever slayeth Cain, vengeance shall be taken on him sevenfold . And the LORD set a mark upon Cain, lest any finding him should kill him.”

Lev 4:6, “And the priest shall dip his finger in the blood, and sprinkle of the blood seven times before the LORD , before the vail of the sanctuary.”

Lev 26:18, “And if ye will not yet for all this hearken unto me, then I will punish you seven times more for your sins .”

Lev 26:21, “And if ye walk contrary unto me, and will not hearken unto me; I will bring seven times more plagues upon you according to your sins .”

Lev 26:24, “Then will I also walk contrary unto you, and will punish you yet seven times for your sins .”

Lev 26:28, “Then I will walk contrary unto you also in fury; and I, even I, will chastise you seven times for your sins .”

Deu 28:25, “The LORD shall cause thee to be smitten before thine enemies: thou shalt go out one way against them, and flee seven ways before them : and shalt be removed into all the kingdoms of the earth.”

Psa 79:12, “And render unto our neighbours sevenfold into their bosom their reproach, wherewith they have reproached thee, O Lord.”

Dan 3:19, “Then was Nebuchadnezzar full of fury, and the form of his visage was changed against Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego: therefore he spake, and commanded that they should heat the furnace one seven times more than it was wont to be heated .”

Also, seven of Saul’s sons died for the sins of one man:

2Sa 21:6, “ Let seven men of his sons be delivered unto us , and we will hang them up unto the LORD in Gibeah of Saul, whom the LORD did choose. And the king said, I will give them.”

In the New Testament, Jesus said that a man who backslides would have seven more demons enter him after being delivered from one demon.

Mat 12:45, “Then goeth he, and taketh with himself seven other spirits more wicked than himself , and they enter in and dwell there: and the last state of that man is worse than the first. Even so shall it be also unto this wicked generation.”

Peter sought an answer from Jesus for forgiveness, in the place of judgment. Peter suggested seven times:

Mat 18:21-22, “Then came Peter to him, and said, Lord, how oft shall my brother sin against me, and I forgive him? till seven times ? Jesus saith unto him, I say not unto thee, Until seven times: but, Until seventy times seven.”

God uses seven years to judge nations and kings of major sins:

Gen 41:30, “And there shall arise after them seven years of famine ; and all the plenty shall be forgotten in the land of Egypt; and the famine shall consume the land;”

2Sa 24:13, “So Gad came to David, and told him, and said unto him, Shall seven years of famine come unto thee in thy land ? or wilt thou flee three months before thine enemies, while they pursue thee? or that there be three days’ pestilence in thy land? now advise, and see what answer I shall return to him that sent me.”

King Nebuchadnezzar was judged for seven years:

Dan 4:16, “Let his heart be changed from man’s, and let a beast’s heart be given unto him; and let seven times pass over him .”

God uses seven days to judge individuals of minor sins and uncleanness in the Scriptures.

Lev 12:2, “Speak unto the children of Israel, saying, If a woman have conceived seed, and born a man child: then she shall be unclean seven days ; according to the days of the separation for her infirmity shall she be unclean.”

Lev 15:24, “And if any man lie with her at all, and her flowers be upon him, he shall be unclean seven days ; and all the bed whereon he lieth shall be unclean.”

God’s judgment on the earth in the book of Revelation comes in sevens:

Rev 15:8, “And the temple was filled with smoke from the glory of God, and from his power; and no man was able to enter into the temple, till the seven plagues of the seven angels were fulfilled .”

Therefore, it appears that a man will be possessed with seven more demons as an act of God’s judgment, as He allows these demons to come back into a man because of his disobedience.

Mat 12:43-45 Comments The Unclean Spirits How does the discussion of the wandering of unclean spirits logically follow after the previous topic of the sign of the resurrection of Jesus Christ? If we look back at the beginning of this narrative scene, this confrontation between the scribes and Pharisees was sparked by the exorcism of an unclean spirit when Jesus healed the blind and dumb man (Mat 12:22). He had gone through their cities and set many free from demonic possession as one sign that He was the Messiah, and may Jews were rejecting this sign. Jesus now warns those Jews in the nation of Israel that reject Him after He has delivered them from demonic possession and healed them that their fate will be worst afterwards than before they were set free. They will be seven times more bound by demonic possession and sins than before. In other words, the Jews who reject Him will be in worse condition than before Jesus began His public ministry.

Fuente: Everett’s Study Notes on the Holy Scriptures

A demoniac healed:

v. 22. Then was brought unto Him. one possessed with a devil, blind, and dumb; and He healed him, insomuch that the blind and dumb both spake and saw.

This narrative fittingly illustrates the gradual growth of opposition, hatred, enmity, malice, and calumny on the part of the Pharisees. A man was brought to Christ whom the Evil Spirit had deprived of both sight and speech, thus torturing him by the loss of these senses.

v. 23. And all the people were amazed and said, Is not this the Son of David?

Their minds had not yet been saturated with the poison of enmity toward Christ; they were frankly overwhelmed by this new evidence of divine power, and openly declared their conviction that this man must be the Son of David in the absolute sense, the promised Messiah, in whom the prophets had bid them trust. They still express themselves somewhat doubtfully, however: Can this possibly be He? There can surely no longer be any doubt. The Pharisees, ever present, immediately harbored bitter thoughts:

v. 24. But when the Pharisees heard it, they said, This fellow doth not cast out devils but by Beelzebub, the prince of the devils.

This thought was provoked by the frank expression of amazement on the part of the people. Apparently, they did not voice their sentiments outside of their own circle, because they feared the multitude; but, after the manner of their kind, they murmured and grumbled among themselves, accusing Christ of being in league with the devil, as once before, chapter 9:34. Beelzebub, which means god of flies, and Beelzebub, god of dung, had originally been names of idols, and were by the Jews applied to the devil. It was an insult without parallel which they thus heaped upon the Lord.

Fuente: The Popular Commentary on the Bible by Kretzmann

Mat 12:22. One possessed, &c. A demoniac.

Fuente: Commentary on the Holy Bible by Thomas Coke

Mat 12:22 . In Luke (Mat 11:14 ff.) this incident comes in at a later stage, while he reports less of what was spoken on the occasion, and arranges it to some extent in a different, though not the original, order; Mar 3:22 ff., who omits the incident in question, introduces the discourse which follows in a peculiar connection of his own.

The resemblance of the narrative to that contained in Mat 9:32 is not due to a mixing together of different incidents, viz. the healing of the blind man on the one hand, and of the man who was dumb on the other, Mat 9:27 ; Mat 9:32 (Schneckenburger, Hilgenfeld), nor to the way in which incidents often assume a twofold form in the course of tradition (Strauss, de Wette, Keim), but is founded upon two different events: the former demoniac was dumb, the present one is blind as well, a circumstance, however, which is not recorded by Luke, who follows a less accurate version. The term Beelzebul, used in this connection as in Mat 9:34 , is one, however, which may have been found often enough upon the lips of the Pharisees. Its recurrence can no more prove that a later hand has been at work (Baur, Hilgenfeld), than the circumstance that we find ourselves back again into the heart of the contest, although from Mat 12:14 it seemed to have reached its utmost extremity; for the measures which in Mat 12:14 the Pharisees are said to have taken, have just led to further and no less bitter hostility, a hostility in keeping with the spirit of the purpose they have in view.

. . .] the thing as it actually takes place . Casaubon and Fritzsche, without sufficient grounds, assume the existence of a Chiasmus here.

Fuente: Heinrich August Wilhelm Meyer’s New Testament Commentary

3. Miraculous healing of a demoniac, blind and dumb. Blasphemous accusation of the Pharisees, that Jesus was in league with Beelzebub; and reply of Christ about the blasphemy against the Holy Ghost. The Pharisees seek a sign from heaven; but Jesus promises them a sign from the deep, and announces the impending spiritual doom of an apostate and unbelieving race. Mat 12:22-45

(Mar 3:20-30; Luk 11:14-26; Luk 11:29-32.)

22Then was brought unto him one possessed with a devil, blind, and dumb: and he healed him, insomuch that [so that, ] the blind and dumb19 both spake and saw. 23And all the people were amazed, and said, Is not this [Is this]20 the Son of David? 24But when the Pharisees heard it, they said, This fellow [man]21 doth not cast out devils, but by Beelzebub [Beelzebul], the prince of the devils. 25And Jesus knew their thoughts, and said unto them, Every kingdom divided against itself is brought to desolation; and every city or house divided against itself shall not stand: 26And if Satan cast [casts] out Satan, he is divided against himself; how shall then his kingdom stand? 27And if I by Beelzebub [-l] cast out devils, by whom do your children cast them out? therefore they shall be your judges. 28But if I cast out devils by the Spirit of God, then 29the kingdom of God is come unto you [upon you].22 Or else, how can one enter into a strong mans23 house, and spoil [take from him, seize upon his]24 his goods [instruments, , i. e., here the demoniacs], except he first bind the strong man? and then he will spoil [plunder] his house. 30He that is not with me is against me; and he that gathereth not with me scattereth abroad. 31Wherefore I say unto you, All manner of sin and blasphemy shall be forgiven unto men: but the blasphemy against the Holy Ghost [of the Spirit] shall not be forgiven unto men. 32And whosoever speaketh a word against the Son of man, it shall be forgiven him: but whosoever speaketh against the Holy Ghost [Spirit], it shall not be forgiven him, neither in this world [on], neither in the world [that which is] to come. 33Either make the tree good, and his [its] fruit good; or else make the tree corrupt, and his [its] fruit corrupt: for the tree is known by his [its] fruit. 34O generation of vipers, how can ye, being evil, speak good things? for out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaketh. 35A good man out of the good treasure of the heart25 bringeth [sendeth] forth good things: and an evil man out of the evil treasure bringeth [sendeth] forth evil things. 36But I say unto you, That every idle word that men shall speak, they shall give account thereof in the dayof judgment. 37For by thy words thou shalt be justified, and by thy words thou shalt be condemned.

38Then certain of the scribes and of the Pharisees answered [him],26 saying, Master,we would see a sign from thee. 39But he answered and said unto them, An evil and adulterous generation seeketh after a sign; and there shall no sign be given to it, butthe sign of the prophet Jonas [Jonah the prophet]: 40For as Jonas [Jonah] was three days and three nights in the whales belly [belly of the great fish]; so shall the Son of man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth. 41The men of Nineveh shall rise in [the, ] judgment with this generation, and shall condemn it: because [for]27 they repented at the preaching of Jonas [Jonah]; and, behold, a greater than Jonas [Jonah] is here. 42The queen of the south shall rise up in the judgment with this generation, and shall condemn it: for she came from the uttermost parts [the ends] of the earth to hear the wisdom of Solomon; and, behold, a greater than Solomon is here. 43When the unclean spirit is gone out of a man, he walketh through dry places, seeking rest, and findeth none. 44Then he saith, I will return into my house28 from whence I came out; and when he is come, he findeth it empty, swept, and garnished. 45Then goeth he, and taketh with himself [him] seven other spirits more wicked than himself, and they enter in and dwell there: and the last state of that man is worse than the first. Even so shall it be also unto this wicked generation.

EXEGETICAL AND CRITICAL

Chronological Arrangement.Luke relates these addresses imperfectly, and in another, but apparently more correct, order. This section manifestly describes the close of the public ministry of Jesus in Galilee, and the open breach between the Lord and the pharisaical party in that province, corresponding to the conflict in Jerusalem, related in chs. 21 and 23. Ch. 24 records a prior event; and the two conflicts in chs. Mat 15:1 and Mat 16:1 form only the conclusion of the contest which was now opening. After the festival of Purim, the pharisaical party in Galilee had received instructions from Jerusalem to persecute the Lord. This behest was obeyed, though in a coarser manner than by the chiefs in Jerusalem. The former private accusation, that Jesus was in league with Satan ( Mat 9:34, comp. Mat 10:25), was now publicly and boldly brought forward. The resemblance between this occurrence and that recorded in Mat 9:32, is not owing to the circumstance that different facts are mixed up (Schneckenburger), nor to a traditionary embellishment of one and the same history (Strauss, de Wette). The two events are in reality different, though analogous. The former demoniac was dumb, while this one is both dumb and blind; which latter circumstance Luke, following a less accurate tradition, does not record. Meyer.

Mat 12:22. One possessed with a devil, blind and dumb.Not blind and dumb by nature, but by demoniac possession. To relieve one so fearfully under the power of the enemy, was the most difficult miracle, especially as the Pharisees watched Him with unbelief and in bitterness of heart.

Mat 12:23. Is this the Son of David?The people were here on the point of openly proclaiming Jesus as the Son of David, or the Messiah. But they were prevented by the hierarchical party, who now came forward with their blasphemous accusation.

Mat 12:24. This (significantly put first)should it be this one? This one does not cast out devils, etc.29We have already shown that the term Beelzebul is equivalent to, the prince of the devils; hence the latter expression (, without an article) serves as explanation of a name invented by them, probably with reference to Beelzebub, the god of the Philistines.

Mat 12:26. If Satan casts out Satan.Meyer rightly argues against the rendering, If one Satan cast out another. There are many demons, but Satan alone is the chief of them. Hence the charge implied, that Satan was represented both by the demon who possessed the individual, and by the demoniac exorcist; or, that in reality he cast himself out. In the same sense Christ employs also the simile of a city or a house divided against itself. Not that He denied that discord prevails in the kingdom of darkness; but this does not amount to an absolute breach, or to complete self-negation, which would necessarily lead to immediate annihilation. On the other hand, it is to be observed, that the kingdom of Satan had been of long standing, and hence must possess a certain measure of unity and consistency. The argumentation of Jesus was based on the distinction between this relative and an absolute division in the kingdom of Satan, and not, as de Wette supposes, on transferring the principles of the kingdom of light to that of darkness. Meyer is also right in suggesting, that the supposition of the Pharisees, that Satan might in this instance have damaged his own cause, is refuted by the constant antagonism waged between Christ and the kingdom of darkness. Besides, it deserves notice, that Christ here claimed to cast out, not merely individual demons, but Satan himself.30

Mat 12:27. Your childreni. e., in a spiritual sense, your disciples, Jewish exorcists, Act 19:13. Argumentum ex concessis. On the exorcism of the Pharisees, see von Ammon, Leben Jesu, ii. p. 151. In the schools of the Pharisees, a so-called higher magic was taught, by which demons were to be expelled and drawn out of the noses of persons possessed, by means of certain roots, by exorcism, and by magical formulas, supposed to have been derived from king Solomon. Comp. Joseph. Ant. viii. 2, 5; De Bello Jud. vii. 6, 2.It were an entire misunderstanding, with Gerlach, to apply the expression, your children, to the disciples of Jesus. Nor is there any ground for apprehending that the authority of the miracles of Jesus might be invalidated by an acknowledgment of Jewish exorcism. Compare the contrast between Moses and the magicians of Egypt.

Mat 12:28. The kingdom of God is come upon [not: unto] you.As in 1Th 4:15, so here, the term must be taken in its full meaning: It has come upon you in a sudden manner, by surprise, and finds you unprepared. The statement also implied that Jesus stood before them as the Messiah. Thus Mat 12:28 forms a transition from the defensive to the offensive; while the expression, , which refers to the contrast with Beelzebul, serves as introduction to what is afterward said about the blasphemy of the Holy Spirit.

Mat 12:29. Or else, how can one.This is not merely another argument, but at the same time also a more explicit statement of the idea, that, compared to Satan, Jesus was the stronger, or the Lord of the kingdom of heaven.The strong man (), with the articlewith special reference to the , who combats him; but also with a view to the fact, that the preceding explanation rendered the figure completely perspicuous. Comp. Isa 49:24.And take from him his instruments, ).Referring to those who were possessed. [The author, version, spoil his goods, gives a different sense.] The casting out of devils implied the binding of the strong man, i. e., a spiritual victory over Satan. No doubt the Lord here alludes to the history of the temptation in Matthew 4. At a later period, Christ had, indeed, to enter on another physical, psychical, and spiritual conflict with Satan, when He was assailed by the enemy in connection with the sorrows and the misery of the world. But His former victory over the temptation from the lust of the world, laid the foundation and prepared the way for His later conquest.

Mat 12:30. He that is not with Me.The decisive moment of the breach with the opposition in Galilee was approaching. The idea is further carried out in Mat 21:43-44. On this occasion, however, it was still couched in hypothetical and general language. Still, the alternative here presented evidently applied to the Pharisees and scribes; and any other interpretation overlooks the importance of that decisive moment. (Bengel, Schleiermacher, and Neander apply it to Jewish exorcists; Chrysostom, to Satan, etc.) This is further shown by what follows: wherefore I say unto you; viz., with reference to your blasphemy of My Person, by which your enmity appears. Know then what this enmity implies. In significant contrast the Saviour says in reference to the disciples, Mar 9:40 and Luk 9:50. He that is not against us is for us. [Alford: I believe Stier is right in regarding it as a saying setting forth to us generally the entire and complete disjunction of the two kingdoms, of Satan and God. There is and can be in the world no middle party; they who are not with Christ are against Him and His work, and as far as in them lies are undoing it.P. S.]

Mat 12:31. All manner of sin and blasphemy.i. e., Every sin shall be forgiven to men, even to blasphemy in the general sense, provided they do not progress to blasphemy against the Holy Spirit, but turn from it. Hence, on the supposition of repentance. And thus shall it be in every casethey shall either return, or progress to blasphemy against the Holy Spirit. The blasphemy which is still capable of being forgiven, is both a species and an aggravation of general sin. De Wette: , not merely blasphemy against God; but, on the other hand, not simply evil-speaking generally, but defaming of what is holy, as, for example, of Christ, the Sent of God. In general, the idea of a malicious attack upon a person, whose fame is calumniously injured ( ), attaches to the term, blasphemy. Hence, defamation of what is good, noble, and holy, on its appearance in the world, with malicious (lying and murderous) intent. Up to this point blasphemy forms the climax of sin, but of sin which may still be forgiven; because, in his fanatical enthusiasm for what he deems noble, good, and holy, a man may overlook and misunderstand even a higher manifestation of it. But blasphemy against the Holy Spirit cannot be forgiven. It is open and full opposition to conversion, and hence to forgiveness. The Holy Spirit, who is here spoken of in distinct terms, is the last and highest manifestation of the Spirit of God, who completes and perfects the revelation of God, and in that capacity manifests Himself in the human consciousness. Blasphemously to rebel, in opposition to ones better knowledge and conscience, against this manifestation and influence of the Holy Spirit, is to commit moral suicide, and to destroy ones religious and moral susceptibility. In fact, this can never be fully accomplished, on account of the infinite contrast between blasphemy and the Holy Spirit. But the approximation thereto implies impending judgment, which extends far beyond the present world into endless existence. Although blasphemy against the Holy Spirit, in its full idea, is infinite, yet blasphemy against the Son of Man, or against Christ in the form of a servant, constitutes an approximation to it. Hence the Lord adds, Mat 12:22, by way of explanation, as approximating to this sin: Whosoever speaketh a word (in passing) against the Son of Man. The person whom, from prejudice or ignorance, a word of blasphemy may escape against Christwhom in His form as a servant he may possibly mistakeshall be forgiven; but whosoever speaketh (without the addition, a word)whosoever speaketh decidedly against the Holy Spirit, etc. In this case, to speak and to blaspheme is identical.Meyer and other critics maintain that the accusation of the Pharisees, in Mat 12:24, was an instance of blasphemy against the Holy Spirit. But theirs was, in the first place, only a blasphemy against the Son of Man, and against the power in which He wrought. In committing this sin, they necessarily approximated blasphemy against the Holy Spirit; but how closely (see Joh 7:39), our Lord does not express, as appears even from the peculiar warning given them of their danger. In these circumstances, criticism cannot help us in defining the matter more clearly. In the Gospel of Mark, the first statement (about blasphemy) alone is mentioned; in that of Luke, the second (about speaking a word).

Mat 12:32. Neither in this world; or, rather, in this on. , ; , . See Lightfoot, Wetstein, and others. In the first place, the period before and after Christs appearing; then, secondarily, the contrast between the one and the other order of things, as based on the old and the new era. It should not be overlooked that His historical advent laid the foundation for His future , and consequently that the new on, like the kingdom of heaven, is already at hand, and unfolding itself in the old, breaking through it and gradually abolishing it. Hence the Jewish theology was not wrong in dating the new on from the advent of the Messiah; only they were wrong in not making a proper distinction between the suffering and the glorified Messiah.

Mat 12:33. Either exhibit, present (in the authorized version, make).The term cannot refer to planting, as we have here an allusion not only to the tree but also to its fruit. It must refer to a mental act, or to a representation, and alludes here to the of the poets.31 Those who blaspheme are bad and self-contradictory poets. In the strangest manner, they conceive and represent as a poisonous tree (Christ as inspired by Satan) that which only yielded good fruit (casting out of devils). Hence, not in the sense of a declarative judgmentmake (Theophylact, Erasmus, Meyer, etc.); least of all with exclusive reference to the Pharisees (Mnster, Castellio, de Wette); nor yet as equivalent to vut, or plant, regarding and treating these blasphemies as fruits (Ewald); but in the sense of, to suppose, to represent (Grotius, Fritzsche, etc.). The first tree is manifestly intended as an emblem of Christ; the second, of the Pharisees, who manifested their inward state by their outward fruit, or their blasphemy. For the tree is known by its fruit; comp. Mat 7:20.

Mat 12:34. O brood of vipers.The terms in which the Baptist had from the outset addressed the Pharisees ( Mat 3:7), are now taken up even by the merciful and compassionate Saviour. The expression is closely allied with the . Poisonous plants, and a generation of vipers, were the noxious remnants of pre-Adamic times, and hence served as allegorical figures of satanic evil (which are not to be confounded with the thorns and thistles consequent upon the curse). Hence the first symbol of coming salvation was, that the seed of the woman should bruise the head of the serpent.How can ye? etc.The physical impossibility that a generation of vipers could give forth what was salutary, served as an emblem of the moral impossibility of this moral generation of vipers speaking good things.

For out of the abundance, the overflowing.But this abundance is not passive; it is organic, and reproducing itself. With this it may be well to connect the biblical idea of , to develop organically.

Mat 12:35. Out of the good treasure.Another figure in which the heart is represented as a spiritual treasury. Each one can only give forth what he finds in his treasury. The expression, heart, implies the sum-total of all the thoughts, words, and works of a man; in short, his entire spiritual possessions.

Mat 12:36-37. Every idle word.The term , in its connection with , meaning morally useless, and at the same time hurtful,, as some minuscule MSS. read. This judgment according to their words, would not exclude that according to their deeds. From Mat 25:31, we gather that the actions of the righteous and of the wicked are sealed by their words. A mans speech, as elucidating, and elucidated by, his life, will serve as a sufficient index of his character in the day of judgmentas Heubner explains it, partly from its wickedness, and partly from its pharisaical severity, which recoils on him who is guilty of it.

Mat 12:38. Then certain of the scribes and of the Pharisees answered.His opponents felt that, in these statements, Jesus had confronted them in His character as the Messiah, invested with royal and judicial authority. Accordingly, they were constrained either to acknowledge or to reject His claims. In this difficulty, some of them tried to tempt Him; i. e., partly in derision, and partly with a lingering desire after the manifestation of a worldly Messiah, they asked for a sign, by way of accrediting His claims. No doubt they referred to the chiliastic sign from heaven. Thus we notice here the appearance of a new hostile device, which appears in its full proportions in Mat 16:1, just as that which had first appeared in Mat 9:34 had now been fully brought out. Gerlach and Lisco suggest that these Pharisees were better inclined, and less opposed to Jesus, than the others. But in our opinion, they were rather the worst among the bad.

Mat 12:39. An adulterous generation.. Theophylact: . Adultery, taken in a spiritual sense, according to the Old Testament idea, equivalent to apostasy or idolatry; Isa 23:17. Jesus foreknew that the apostasy of the Pharisees would lead them even to an outward alliance with the heathen in the act of His crucifixion.

There shall no sign be given to it.Christ considered His miracles as signs, Joh 11:41. The perfect sign of His Messiahship, however, was His death on the cross, and His resurrection. And as the true Messiah was exactly the opposite of the carnal counterfeit which the Pharisees had drawn for themselves, so was the true and great sign of the Messiah the direct contrary to their carnal and unwarranted clamor for a sign from heaven. This applies especially to the solemn call to repentance which His answer contained. The Pharisees sought a sign from heaven, to confirm and to crown with success their own corrupt views and state: the Lord offered them a sign from the deep of the realm of death, to condemn their hypocritical worldliness. Hence the sign of Jonah; i. e., the sign which had typically appeared in the history of Jon 2:1.

Mat 12:40. The belly of the great fish: , .The expression does not necessarily mean a whale [as the E. V. translates], but any sea-monster. We suppose it was a shark [the white shark, squalus carcharias, also called lamia, which is found to this day in the Mediterranean, sometimes as long as sixty feet.P. S.] rather than a whale. Heubner relates an instance of a sailor who was swallowed by a shark, and yet preserved.

So shall the Son of man be three days and three nights.A round number according to the popular mode of Hebrew reckoning, 1Sa 30:12; although Christ lay only one day and two nights in the grave.32In the heart of the earth.1. In the grave. So most interpreters. 2. In hades (Tertullian, Irenus, etc.).33 Meyer pronounces in favor of the interpretation hades, on the supposition that it is analogous to in Jonah 2, which referred to the depths of the sea. Besides, in Luk 23:43, Christ Himself had designated His death as a descent into hades [or rather an entrance into paradise as a part of hades].But we remark, first, that these two things, the grave and the realm of the dead, cannot be disjoined. Secondly, that the Lord frequently uses the term, earth, in reference to the ancient hierarchical and political constitution of the world. Jonah was only buried in the depths of the sea; Christ in that of the ancient earth (the grave and hades), and of the ancient world (its condemnation and contumely). Paulus, Schleiermacher, Neander, and others, apply the expression, sign of Jonah the prophet to the preaching and appearance of the Lord. But this view requires no formal refutation. Such could scarcely have been designated as in any specific sense a sign of the prophet Jonah; not to speak of the fact that it ignores the explanation furnished in the Gospel of Matthew itself. We do not deny, however, that the expression may contain some reference to the universal mission of Jonah, which constituted him a type of Christ. Jonah was unwilling to preach to the heathen Ninevites, and was buried in the depths of the sea, which is an emblem of the sea of nations. Jesus designed His gospel for all nations, and was hurled by the Jewish hierarchy into the depth of the earth, and into that of their theocratic and hierarchical condemnation. But Jonah emerged once more to preach repentance to the Gentiles; so Christ also rose to preach the gospel to the nations.The circumstance, that our Lord repeats this simile in Mat 16:4, shows that He attached considerable importance to it.

Mat 12:41. Shall risei. e., as witnesses in the judgment. So in Job 16:8., for; not, because [as in the author version].This judgment is that of the Lord.

Mat 12:42. The queen of the south.See 1 Kings 10, and the article Sheba in Winers Real Worterb. [and in Calmets Diction. of the H. Bible, Taylors edit., Lond., p. 815 sqq.]. Saba, a district in Arabia Felix. Josephus erroneously represents her as a queen of Ethiopia (Ant. viii. 5, 5). Similarly, modern Abyssinian tradition assigns to her the name of Maqueda, and represents her as a convert to Judaism, and as having had a son by Solomon, whose name was Menilek. The Arabs mention her, under the name of Balkis, among the rulers of Yemen.

Mat 12:43. When the unclean spirit is gone out of a man.A simile referring to the state of the Jewish nation, with special reference to the casting out of devils, and to the blasphemy of the Pharisees and scribes, which had just taken place. The man set free from the unclean spirit is an emblem of the Jewish nation as under the sway of Pharisaism. Hence the healing represents the blessed and gracious activity of Jesus in Israel.The unclean spirit who is cast out walketh through dry desert placesdeserts being represented as the habitation of devils, Job 30:3; Bar 4:35; Rev 18:2; Lev 16:21. The wilderness, an emblem of their dwelling-place in another world, of their activity, of their desolation and their banishment into desolation.

Mat 12:44. He findeth the house empty, swept, and garnished.Not, as de Wette has it, the soul restored, but inviting to the unclean spirit,not being inhabited by a good spirit.

Mat 12:45. Seven other spirits more wicked than himself.This evidently refers to a more full possession by devils,i. e., to a voluntary and damnable self-surrender to Satan by a wicked life, or to such hardening of unbelief as that of which the Jewish hierarchy and nation were guilty.And the last state is worse than the first.Their former low and miserable estate is followed by moral guilt, and a voluntary surrender to the power of evil,such, alas! as has been manifested in the history of Israel.

From the details of Christs dealing with the Pharisees, as recorded by Luke, we derive a clear view of His increasing earnestness and directness in reproving them. What in the beginning He had only said to the disciples in the first Sermon on the Mount, and in His instruction to the Apostles, He now publicly repeated,partly in the hearing of the Pharisees themselves, and partly in presence of all His professing disciples.

DOCTRINAL AND ETHICAL

1. From this and other passages of Scripture ( Mat 12:26-30), we learn that the kingdom of darkness has also its head, who serves as a centre of connection, combining all the isolated forces into common resistance to Christ and His kingdom.Lisco. See Matthew 13.

2. The position of the Lord with reference to the Pharisaical party had now reached that stage of decision when each one must choose a distinct part. This was clearly indicated in the solemn statementHe that is not with Me (in this conflict) is against Me (and hence on the side of Satan, against whom the conflict is waged); and he that gathereth not with Me (in the harvest) scattereth abroad (is a destroyer of Gods harvest).

3. Blasphemy against the Holy Spirit, Mat 12:31-32.For a full discussion of this subject, we must refer to other works, especially my Leben Jesu, Mat 2:2, p. 825; my Posit. Dogmatik, p. 453, and the exegetical, dogmatical, and ethical treatise of Phil. Schaff: Die Snde wider den Heil. Geist, Halle, 1841 (written with reference to the dissertations on the same subject by Grashof, and Gurlitt in the Studien und Kritiken for 1833 and 1834; Tholuck in his Miscellanies, 1839; Nitzsch, System der christlichen Lehre, etc., and with a historical appendix on the terrible end of Francesco Spiera).34 In all the legislations of antiquity, a distinction was made between inexpiable and expiable transgressions. Blasphemy of the Divine name belonged to the former class. If, therefore, there was anything inexpiable and unpardonable under the New Testament dispensation, blasphemy would naturally be the Old Testament symbol of it. Nor can there be any doubt that the Lord had, in this respect, warned His hearers against the sin of blasphemy; at the same time distinguishing various degrees of it (Mat 12:31; Mar 3:28; Luk 12:10). More especially do we gather from the Gospel of Mark, that Jesus here intended to define more accurately, or to give a more correct explanation of, the law of Moses, in Leviticus 24. In that passage, a punishment was denounced ( ) against any blasphemy of the Deity ( ), while the punishment of death was awarded to express blasphemy of . This distinction between simply punishable and absolutely unpardonable blasphemy (, 1Sa 3:13, Sept.), was explained by the Saviour, in the Gospel of Mark, in the sense that the pardonable, sin consisted in blasphemy against Elohim, while in the Gospel of Matthew, He applied it to blasphemy against the Divine Messenger, or the Son of Man. In both Gospels, however, the unpardonable blasphemy against the name of Jehovah, is further explained as being the blasphemy against the Holy Spirit. We cannot, therefore, see sufficient ground for the view advocated by Olshausen in his Commentary, that there were three degrees in the sin of blasphemythat against the Father, that against the Son, and, finally, that against the Holy Spirit. (Nitzsch, System, etc., p. 200.) The following dogmatical points seem to us of special importance: (1) From its very nature, every sin tends toward blasphemy, and every blasphemy toward blasphemy against the Holy Spirit. (2) It is unscriptural to identify blasphemy against the Holy Spirit with sin against the Holy Spirit.[35] This mistake has given rise to much distress of mind, and should be carefully avoided.36 (3) Accordingly, we must reject as unsatisfactory and dangerous the patristic and other specifications of this sin as if it referred to rejection of the gospel (Gnosticism, according to Irenus), or to denial of the divinity of Christ (Athanasius and Hilarius), or to every mortal sin committed after baptism (Origen), or duritia cordis usque ad finem hujus vit,meaning thereby every impenitent death in the judgment of the Church (Augustine), or to the sin of the Pharisees, as recorded in the text (as some modern interpreters have it). (4) A complete commission of this sin can scarcely be conceived, since the Holy Spirit would withdraw His manifestations from the blasphemer; and the latter would be staggered, being unable always to perceive the presence of the Spirit of God. (Hence the view of H. L. Nitzsch the elder is not without a measure of truth: de peccato homini cavendo, quamquam in hominem non cadente. Viteb. 1802.) (5) Still, according to the statement of the Lord, and from the very nature of the thing, a man may approach most closely to this sin, even to the insuring of his own certain condem nation. (6) Consequently, this state must be regarded as a hardening of the mind, which leads to, and manifests itself in, blasphemies. But we cannot agree with Grashof and Tholuck, in regarding this state as pure hatred against what is holy; nor yet with Nitzsch, as decided deadness and complete indifference. We conceive, with Schaff, that these two elements are here combined, since it is impossible to hate the true life without complete deadness, or, on the other hand, to be completely dead to the true life without hating it. (7) It is necessary to bear in mind that, following the example of the Lord, this warning must be cautiously handled. He only employed it at a season of extreme peril, and in the prospect of that sin. Heubner: The Holy Spirit is referred to in the text more operative than personaliter, as a Divine principle, working on the heart of man in the way of awakening, rousing, and urging them, of all which man is conscious. Still the complete revelation of the Holy Spirit includes also that of His personal glory; and blasphemy against what is holy is closely allied to blasphemy against the Person of the Spirit. Compare, however, the instructive communications of Heubner, p. 170 sqq., on this question.

4. Neither in this world, nor in the world to come, Mat 12:32.De Wette: The expression is evidently equivalent to never, in the absolute sense, no matter whether we understand the terms of the kingdom of Messiah and of eternity, or only of the latter. But, in order to deduce from it the eternity of future punishments (Olshausen), we would require to take the words of Jesus in their strict literality, while they are evidently a proverbial expression (see Wetstein). The mild Chrysostom saw nothing in them beyond the idea of highest guilt,or, perhaps, more correctly, difficulty of amendment.37But what if this difficulty were here declared absolute, or amounting to an impossibility? Nor must we lose sight of the fact, that there can be nothing general or unmeaning in a declaration which contains some most important dogmatic distinctions. The following ideas are evidently laid down in it: (1) In every sin there is hope of pardon, except in this,the blasphemy against the Holy Spirit. (2) Pardon may be accorded in the world to come, as well as in this world. Comp. 1Pe 3:19; 1Pe 4:6. (3) There is no pardon either in this world, or in the world to come, for blasphemy against the Holy Spirit. (4) To blaspheme against the Son of Man, is to approximate to this sin; but in how far and how closely, the Lord does not warrant us to say. (5) The decision as to the amount of difference between the damnable approximation to the sin of blasphemy against the Holy Spirit, and that sin itself, belongs to God alone, who rules both in this world and in that which is to come. (6) Even an approximation to this sin leads to corresponding punishment in this world. (7) It is of the utmost importance that this sin should be described as one manifesting itself in a completely hardened state of mind, and in analogous outward expressions. This may be popularly explained as follows: God cannot forgive this sin, because it consists in perfect hardening and impenitence; and therefore will He not forgive it. True, such hardening is itself a judgment of God; yet in the sense that its guilt arises from, and depends upon, the moral state of man, and not on any fate or decree connected with time, place, or anything that is external.

[The importance of the subject justifies and demands some remarks, explanatory and cautionary, on the second inference of Dr. Lange from Mat 12:32, concerning the remission of sins in the future world, since it runs contrary to the old Protestant doctrine, and the prevailing views of the Anglo-American churches.

St. Augustine was the first, I believe, who clearly and decidedly drew this inference from the passage, De Civit. Dei, Mat 21:24 (Opera ed. Bened. vol. vii. p. 642 sq.): Sicut etiam facta resurrectione mortuorum non deerunt quibus post pnas, quas patiuntur spiritus mortuorum, impertiatur misericordia, ut in ignem non mittantur ternum. Neque enim de quibusdam veraciter diceretur, quod non eis remittatur neque in hoc sculo, neque in futuro (Mat 12:32), nisi essent quibus, etsi non in isto, tamen remittetur in futuro. Since that time, this passage, together with 1Co 3:15 ( , ), has been often quoted by fathers, schoolmen, and modern Roman divines, in favor of the doctrine of purgatory, and a probationary state after death. Compare Maldonatus ad loc.: Cterum recte Augustinus et Gregorius, Beda, Bernardus, ex hoc loco purgatorium probaverunt,. colligentes aliqua in futuro sculo peccata remitti. Several modern Protestant commentators of Germany, including Olshausen (vol. i. 460, in Kendricks edition, who lets it pass without protest), find a similar idea implied in this declaration of our Lord, but they divest it, of course, of the Romish figment of purgatory.

The Roman system, according to the principle extra ecclesiam (Romanam) nulla salus, hopelessly condemns to hell all unbaptized persons, including children, though, of course, with different degrees of punishment, according to the measure of guilt (see Dantes Inferno), and confines the second probation of purgatory exclusively to imperfect Christians, who are too good for hell and too bad for heaven, and consequently must pass after death through a tedious and painful process of penances and self-purifications before their final entrance into heaven. The modern German Protestant opinion in its evangelical form, starting from the idea of the absolute justice and universal love of God, maintains that Christ will ultimately be revealed to all human beings, and prove to them, according to their faith or unbelief, either a savor of life unto life, or of death unto death; that there is therefore a possibility of pardon and salvation in the state between death and the resurrection for unbaptized children, heathen, and all others who die innocently ignorant of Christ; and that pardon can be obtained there on the same condition as here, viz., repentance and faith in Christ whenever He is presented to them. Some lay the stress on the declaration that all sins are pardonable save one, and conclude, that final condemnation will not take place till after the blasphemy of the Holy Spirit, which implies a previous knowledge of Christianity. Several Greek fathers, and Luther and Zwingli, likewise, entertained hopeful views concerning the final fate of virtuous heathen.

But the orthodox Protestant divines of England, Scotland, and America almost unanimously reject the whole idea of a probationary state and the possibility of forgiveness after death, and deny that this passage justifies any inference favorable to it. We quote some of the latest commentators on Matthew. Alford: No sure inference can be drawn from the words with regard to forgiveness of sins in a future state. In the most entire silence of Scripture on any such doctrine, every principle of sound interpretation requires that we should hesitate to support it by two difficult passages [1Pe 3:19; 1Pe 4:6], in neither of which does the plain construction of the words absolutely require it. Wordsworth (who in this case omits to quote from his favorite fathers): Some have hence inferred that sins not forgiven in this world may be forgiven in another. But this inference contradicts the general teaching of Scripture (Luk 16:26; Joh 9:4; Heb 3:13; Heb 9:27). The phrase taken together signifies nunquam, and is a Hebraism found in the Talmud. Owen: The whole expression, neither in this world, neither [nor] in the world to come, is beyond all question an emphatic never. Then he contradicts Olshausen, and adds that the idea of the remission of sins in the other world is neither taught here, nor in 1Pe 3:18 [19], and is directly at war with many other passages, expressly declaring the immutability of the souls condition beyond the grave. Nast: Neither in this world nor the world to come. The Greek word for world is , age; it was a proverbial expression among the Jews, meaning neither at present nor in future, that is: never, as Mark also expresses it in the parallel passage: He has never forgiveness. Most of the modern theologians of Germany infer from this passage that since it is said that the sin or blasphemy against the Holy Ghost alone shall not be forgiven neither in this world nor in the world to come, there is a possibility of pardon for all other sins even in the world to come; that is, that those who die in a state of impenitence, not involving the blasphemy against the Holy Ghost, will either proceed in the spirit-world in their downward course, till their sin is the blasphemy against the Holy Ghost, or that, if they should repent, they may find pardon. Then, after quoting Alford against this opinion, Dr. Nast adds: So much is certain, that it would be reckless folly to put off the one thing needful to an uncertain futurity or the state after death, of which the Bible says so little, where the means of grace are, even if not entirely cut off, not as powerful as here; add to this, that the longer conversion is put off the more difficult it becomes.

At the same time, however, American Protestant divines generally incline to the belief that all infants who die in infancy, whether baptized or not, will be saved by the atonement of Christ. This would involve the salvation of the greater part of the human family, since one half of them are supposed to die in infancy; while the Roman Catholic orthodoxy, by asserting the necessity of baptism for salvation, excludes all the unbaptized from the kingdom of heaven.

A full discussion of the final fate of the countless millions of human beings who live and die without any knowledge of Christ, would require us to take into consideration the various passages which relate to the heathen, Mat 11:21-24; Mat 12:41-42; Mat 15:28; Act 10:35; Act 14:16-17; Rom 1:19-21; Rom 2:11-15; Rom 2:26-29, and to the manifestation of the Logos before His incarnation, Joh 1:5; Joh 1:9-10, together with the Old Testament examples of the working of divine grace outside of the covenant of circumcision among such persons as Melchisedek (the priest-king and type of Christ), Jethro, Rahab, Ruth (who are in the genealogy of Christ), Hiram, the Queen of Sheba, Naaman, Job, and the wise men from the East, who, following the star of promise and hope, came to worship the new born king of the Jews; also the passages on Christs descent into hades, and preaching to the spirits in prison, Act 2:27; Act 2:31; 1Pe 3:19; 1Pe 4:6, about which, however, there is a wide difference of interpretation.

In these passages carefully compared, as well as in the general Scripture doctrine of the absolute justice and goodness of God, I see much to encourage the charitable hope that God in His infinite mercy will ultimately save, in some way, all infants who die before having committed actual transgression, and such adult heathen as live and die in a frame of mind predisposed to receive the gospel or in an humble and earnest desire after salvation (such as we find, for instance, in Cornelius before the arrival of Peter). But even this is not to be taught as an article of faith, since the Bible, wise in its silence as in its teaching, gives us no explicit revelation on the subject.
The following general propositions on this whole question will probably be approved as sound and scriptural by the majority of evangelical divines, at least in America:
(1) There can be no salvation out of Christ.

(2) There is no second probation after death, but the present life determines the final fate of every man. In the place where the tree falleth, there it shall be (Ecc 11:3). Whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap (Gal 6:7).

(3) We are bound to the ordinary means of grace, but God is free, and will have mercy upon whom he will have mercy (Rom 9:15).

(4) God will judge every man according to his measure of light and opportunity, and it will be more tolerable for the heathen at the judgmen day than for such as sinned against a positive revelation (comp. Mat 11:22-26).

(5) God who is no respecter of persons comp. Act 10:35), and is infinitely more just and merciful than we can conceive of, will clear up, in the future world, all the mysteries of Providence in a manner that will call forth the everlasting praise and adoration of His people.P. S.]38

HOMILETICAL AND PRACTICAL

Opposite effects produced by the glorious manifestations of the Lord, in those who are susceptible, and in those who are opposed to Him: 1. Admiration, indignation; 2. confession, praiserejection and blasphemy; or, recognition of the power and majesty of God, and reviling of the Divine revelation as the power of Satan.The healing of one most fully possessed by an unclean spirit, more easy than the recovery of a hypocrite.It argues a devilish mind to represent as satanic what is Divine.Marks of the devilish cunning of the wicked: 1. They impute this cunning to the Holy One; 2. they surrender themselves to this cunning; 3. they are ensnared by the cunning of the Evil One without being aware of it.The wicked artifice which attempts to represent that which is holy as an artifice, is itself the prey of the worst artifice.Christ victorious over the calumny of His opponents: 1. In His defence; 2. in His justification and manifestation of Himself; 3. in His accusation of the Pharisees; 4. in His warning.The consequences of sin.In what sense can Satan be said to have a kingdom?Christ the Almighty One, who has bound the strong man.Any power which the Evil One wields here, belongs not to him of right, but is usurped and arrogated.Unclean spirits envying and grieving at the happiness of man.Solemn effect on His people in the world, to the last day, of the indignation of Christ, occasioned by the charge, that He carried on His work in conjunction with Satan.The great hour of decision between Christ and Israel: 1. How awful; 2. how solemn; 3. how glorious.The watchword of the Lord: For Me, or against Me.Agreement between these two watchwords: he that is not with Me, etc., and he that is not against us, etc.It may have been possible not to recognize the Son of Man in the form of a servant, but it is not possible wholly to ignore in our consciousness the Holy Spirit in His glory.The Holy Spirit glorifies the Son of Man, and makes the cause of Christ His cause.The sin of prejudice akin to, yet different from, the sin of conscious rejection of what is holy: 1. In its motive; 2. in its consciousness; 3. in its object; 4. in its effects.

Blasphemy against the Holy Spirit. 1. In its source: (a) sin in general; (b) blasphemy in general. 2. In its gradual manifestation: blasphemy of what is divine, of the Son of Man in the form of a servant. 3. In its completion: blasphemy against the highest revelation of God in our consciousness, or against the Spirit of the gospel which had roused the conscience.A warning figure of that sin in all its fulness, and of complete condemnation.The sin of the satanic consequence of pride, when man hardens his mind against the Sun of highest revelation, whose rays penetrate into it.Spiritual suicide, or the sin unto death (1 John 5), the end of one of two ways: 1. Of hardening; 2. of apostasy.How the warning against blasphemy is to be applied by the children of God: 1. Each one is to beware of it; 2. it is not to be imputed to any one; 3. the tendency to judge others would lead to an opposite course of conduct. (For example, the Pharisees have committed it, but we cannot commit it; heretics, etc., but we the orthodox, etc.; those beyond the pale, etc., but we the priests, etc.; our opponents, etc., but we who are in the right, etc.)Christ is always the same; and the glorious characteristics of the gospel appear even when He speaks of blasphemy against the Holy Spirit.All manner of sin shall be forgiven unto men.

The tree is known by his fruit.If we cannot condemn the fruit, we should not condemn the tree.If we cannot praise the fruit, we should not commend the tree.How men may become a generation of vipers in their relationship toward the kingdom of God.Out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaketh.A mans words as indicating his inward state: 1. As being its fruit; 2. as being its spiritual coinage; 3. as being a decisive deed.The account demanded of every idle word.How our justification or condemnation may depend on the fugitive texture of our words.Hypocrisy ever betraying itself by the base coin of its words.Spiritual forgery the worst, and therefore the most unpardonable, fraud upon the kingdom of Christ.
The demand of a sign from heaven, made on the Lord of heaven, a sign of unbelief and hardening.The sign of the Messiah from the deep, the highest sign from heaven.Jonas a type of Christ.Devout heathens the strongest witnesses against hypocritical Christians.The queen of the south; or, holy longing in those who inhabit the dark places of the earth.A greater than Jonah is here, and a greater than Solomon; or, Christ, the man of sorrows and the Lord of glory, in both respects surpassing all others: or, the glory of the New Testament; or, the combined glory of the preaching of repentance and of the doctrine of life, of deed and of word; or, the Lord going to those who are distant, and those who are distant coming to Him.Hardening, a sevenfold possession.The hardening of Israel.Those who are possessed against their will, in a much better condition than those who voluntarily surrender themselves to be the instruments of unclean spirits.The worst devils are those who pretend to be the most spiritual.Lamentable condition of an individual, but especially of a nation, which renounces and contravenes its spiritual experiences.The signs of an evil generation.

Starke:The tyranny of Satan is great; for he deprives man both of the natural and spiritual gifts bestowed upon him.Hedinger: Christ came into the world that He might destroy the works of the devil, 1Jn 3:8.Is Satan a king who has a mighty kingdom; then who would not beware of him?Christ alone is able to destroy the kingdom of Satan, Act 10:38.Where the Spirit of God is, there also is the kingdom of God, Rom 14:17.What concord hath Christ with Belial? 2Co 6:15Majus: The divinity of the Holy Spirit appears also from this, that the sin against Him is unpardonable, Heb 3:10-11.Osiander: Ministers should speak with caution of the sin against the Son of Man, and of that against the Holy Spirit, lest tender consciences be frightened and cast down.Quesnel: The resurrection of Christ the greatest miracle, and the seal of His mission, 1Co 15:16.The example of the Ninevites.Canstein: Those who are nearest to the gospel often despise it most; but thereby they condemn themselves, so that they are without excuse, Heb 2:2.Hedinger: Away, false security; though driven out, the devil may return in greater force.Let him who has escaped take care lest he be ensnared again.Those who invite the devil to take them, garnish the house of their heart for his reception.The more frequently man resists the grace of God, the worse does he become, 2Pe 2:22.

Lisco:The Ninevites: There only a prophet, but here the Son of God Himself; there only a call to repentance, but here the announcement of mercy, and the gift of grace to repentance; there repentance, here impenitence, and hence the punishment which they escaped by their penitence, Luk 11:32.The queen of the south: She came from a far country, despite the difficulties in the way, while here they reject what is pressed on their acceptance; yonder longing and faith, here satiety and unbelief; yonder Solomon, here Christ, with His infinite wisdom.

Gerlach:A mans words are the evidence on which he is to be tried before God.

Heubner:One stronger must come, viz., Christ, by whom we can do all things.Neutrality in matters of religion and of faith, will receive the severest condemnation.Sin a poison.The heart and the mouth cannot be separated.The mouth betrays the heart.An evil treasure a wretched possession.A good treasure is inexhaustible.

[Wordsworth (on the sign of Jonah, Mat 12:39-40):Here is an observable instance of the uses of the Gospels in confirming the Old Testament. By this specimen of Divine exposition, our Lord suggests the belief, that whatever we may now find in the O. T. difficult to be understood, will one day be explained, and perhaps be seen to be prophetic and typical of the greatest mysteries of the gospel; and that in the mean time it is an exercise of their faith and a trial of their humility,a divinely-appointed instrument of their moral probation. And it is because they are strange and marvellous, that such histories as those of Jonah and Balaam are the best tests of the strength of our faith.P. S.]

Footnotes:

[19] Mat 12:22.1. B., D., [Cod. Sinait.], Lachmann, Tischendorf, [Alford]: , [the dumb]. 2. L., X., D., Syr.: , [dumb and blind]. 3. Latter Codd., the text. rec., Griesbach, Meyer, [Wordsworth, Stier and Theile, etc.]: , [the blind and dumb]. We suppose that in the second place is used in a more general sense, signifying stupidity.

[20] Mat 12:23.[ , etc. Lange, correctly, according to the German idiom: Ist doch dieser nicht etwa? Conant and the revised version of the A. B. Union: Is this, etc. This is the original rendering of the English Version in the editions of 1611 and of 1613, in this passage (though not in Joh 4:29): Is this the Son of David? But most editions including that of the Am. B. Soc., read: Is not this, etc. A change for the worse. For or , both in the N. T and in classic Greek, always implies some loubt and the expectation or the wish of a negative answer; while in questions looks to an affirmative answer. witer, Grammatik, 6th ed., p. Matt 453: ( ) steht wo eine Vernrinende Ant-wort vorausgesetst oder erwartet wird, doch nicht?. Der Fragende legt es immer auf eine negative Antwort an und wrde nicht berrascht sein, wenn er eine solche erhielte, Joh 6:33; Joh 8:22; Mat 12:23; Joh 4:29; Joh 7:26; Joh 7:35.P. S.]

[21]Ver 24.[Fellow implies contempt, which is not warranted by the use of the demonstrative pronoun , either here or in the preceding verse. Howard Crosby (The N. T. with explanatory Notes or Scholia): Fellow is an unhappy word to introduce here, although it was not so objectionable when our version was formed. There is no word in the Greek, the pronoun this standing alone. We may say this one.P. S.]

[22] Mat 12:28.[ , which the E. V., in the parallel passage Luk 11:20 renders: the kingdom of God is come upon you. with the Classics means prvenire, to precede, anticipate, overtake, and so 1Th 4:15 (E. V.: shall not precenti. e., in the old English sense of prvenirethem which are asleep); but in Hellenistic and in modern Greek it means also pervenire, to come hear, to come upon, yet often with the idea of surprise, as here. Wesley and Stier: Is already upon you, i. e., before you looked for it.P. S.]

[23] Mat 12:29.[Lit.: the strong mans, , with reference to the particular case in hand, but not: the strong one, viz. Satan (Campbell); for the Saviour draws an illustration from common life to show his relation to Satan.P. S.]

[24] Mat 12:29.[According to the true reading , instead of , which occurs in the following verse.P. S.]

[25] Mat 12:35.The best MSS. [including Cod. Sinait.] omit (of the heart), which seems to be an interpretation.

[26] Mat 12:38.The best MSS. [also Cod. Sinait.] add after .

[27] Mat 12:41.[A is correctly translated in the parallel case Mat 12:42 : for she came.P. S.]

[28] Mat 12:44.The best authorities favor the emphatic position of into my house at the beginning of the sentence. [The Cod. Sinait. likewise reads: . But this does not do as well in English, as in the Greek and German languages.P. S.]

[29][Meyer: , etc. Question of surprise, where the emphasis lies on : It can hardly be that this man. who otherwise has not the appearance of the Messiah, should be the Messiah.P. S.]

[30][We add the remarks of Trench (Notes on the Miracles of our Lord, 6th ed., p. 59): There is at first sight a difficulty in the argument which our Saviour draws from the oneness of the kingdom of Satannamely, that it seems the very idea of this kingdom, that it should be an anarchy, blind rage and hate not merely against God, but each part of it warring against every other part. And this is most deeply true, that hell is as much in arms against itself as against heaven; neither does our Lord deny that in respect of itself that kingdom is infinite contradiction and division: only he asserts that in relation to the kingdom of heaven it is one: there is one life in it and one soul in opposition to that. Just as a nation or kingdom may embrace within itself infinite parties, divisions, discords, jealousies, and heart-burnings; yet if it is to subsist as a nation at all, it must not, as regards other nations, have lost its sense of unity; when it does so, of necessity it falls to pieces and perishes. To the Pharisees He says: This kingdom of evil subsists; by your own confession it does so; it cannot therefore have denied the one condition of its existence, which is, that it should not lend its powers to the overthrowing of itself, that it should not side with its own foes; My words and works declare that i am its foe, it cannot therefore be siding with Me.P. S.]

[31]See the well-known beginning of Horaces Ars pocvica.

[32][St. Jerome: This is to be explained by a figure of speech called synecdoche, by which a part is put for the whole; not that our Lord was three whole days and three nights in the grave, but part of Friday, part of Sunday, and the whole of Saturday were reckoned as three days. Meyer: Jesus war nur einen Tag und zwei Nchte todt. Allein nach populrer Weise (vergl. 1Sa 30:12 sq.) sind die Theile des ersten und dritten Tages als ganse Tage geshlt, wozu die darsustellende gegenbildliche Aehnlichkeit mit dem Schicksal des Jonas veranlasste. Alford: If it be necessary to make good the three days and nights, it must be done by having recourse to the Jewish method of computing time. In the Jerusalem Talmud (cited by Lightfoot) it is said that a day and night together make up a (a ), and that any part of such a period is counted as the whole. See Gen 40:13; Gen 40:20; 1Sa 30:12-13; 2Ch 10:5; 2Ch 10:12; Hos 6:2. Wordsworth: The days of Christs absence from His disciples were shortened in mercy to them as far as was consistent with the fulfilment of the prophecy (?).P. S.]

[33][So also Theophylact, Bellarmin, Maldonatus, Olshausen, Knig (Lehre von der Hllenfahrt Christi. 1842, p. 54), Alford. Wordsworth, while D. Brown and all the American commentators of Matthew, A. Barnes, J. A. Alexander, Owen, Whedon (Jacobus Notes I have not at hand), understand the heart of the earth to mean simply the grave. But hades agrees better with the parallel of the belly of the sea-monster, than the tomb of Joseph of Arimathea, which was on the surface of the earth rather than in the heart thereof; secondly, Jonah himself calls the belly of the sea-monster , LXX: , out of the belly of hades (not hell as in the E. V.), Jon 2:3 (2); and finally, there should be no more dispute now as to Christs actual descent into hades, see Luk 23:43; Act 2:27; Act 2:31 (Greek text); Eph 4:9; 1Pe 3:19. But no doctrinal statements concerning the locality of hades can be justly derived from such popular expressions, which must necessarily adapt themselves to our imperfect finite conceptions.P. S.]

[34][Comp. also Julius Mller: Die christliche Lehre con der Snde, 3d ed., in the latter part of the second volume. An English translation of this profound and important work by Wm. Pulsford (The Christian Doctrine of Sin exhibited) appeared at Edinburgh, 1852, as a part of Clarks Foreign Library.P. S.]

[35][In the wider sense every sin of the believer who has experienced the power and influence of the Holy Spirit, may be called a sin against the Holy Spirit, although far from approaching the nature and guilt of blasphemy. The Scripture speaks of quenching the Spirit, 1Th 5:19, grieving the Holy Spirit of God, Eph 4:30, resisting the same, Act 7:51, and vexing him, Isa 63:10; but all these sins are still within the reach of pardon. M. Henry: It is not all speaking against the person or essence of the Holy Spirit, or some of His more private operations, or merely the resisting of His internal working in the sinner himself, that is here meant; for who then should be saved?P. S.]

[36]The common reply to such doubts is well known. It is to the effect, that he who is guilty of the sin against the Holy Spirit would not feel sorrow for it; and that the fact of such sorrow is itself an evidence that this sin has not been committed. [So also M. Henry in loc.: We have reason to think, that none are guilty of this sin, who believe that Christ is the Son of God, and sincerely desire to have part in His merit and mercy: and those who fear they have committed this sin, give a good sign that they have not.P. S.]

[37][In the same way even Wordsworth weakens the force of : is very unlikely to obtain forgiveness. He quotes from Augustine, Retract. Mat 1:9 : De nullo quamvis pessimo in hac vita desperandum est. This is true enough, because we never know whether a man has committed the unpardonable sin, and we must go on the assumption that he has not. The only hopeless case was that of Judas after Christ Himself with His infallible knowledge had called him the son of perdition, for whom it were better never to have been born. Meyer (p. 268. note) correctly observes: The eternity of punishment here taught is not to be explained away and changed into difficulty of amendment (de Wette), or reduced to the milder conception of the highest degree of guilt (Chrysostom), or greatest difficulty of forgiveness (Socinians), and such like. Whrdon: It is difficult to say in what words the eternity of retribution could be more unequivocally expressed.P. S.]

[38][This annotation of the Am. editor was partly rewritten (Febr. 1865) for the third edition, with a view to make it more clear and explicit.P. S.]

Fuente: A Commentary on the Holy Scriptures, Critical, Doctrinal, and Homiletical by Lange

DISCOURSE: 1353
THE BLIND AND DUMB DMONIAC HEALED

Mat 12:22-23. Then was brought unto him one possessed with a devil, blind and dumb: and he healed him, insomuch that the blind and dumb both spake and saw. And all the people were amazed, and said, Is not this the son of David?

IN establishing the Mosaic dispensation, God introduced it with many miracles. It might well be expected therefore that, when he should supersede that dispensation, and establish another in its place, he would confirm that also with miracles, so as to leave no doubt but that he was the author of that which should remain, no less than of that; which was to vanish away. Accordingly our blessed Saviour wrought miracles without number, and appealed to them as substantiating his claim to divine authority: Though ye believe not me, believe the works; that ye may know and believe, that the Father is in me, and I in him [Note: Joh 10:37-38.]. It should seem that, for the furtherance of this end, Satan was permitted to exercise greater power over the bodies of men, than was ever exercised by him either before or since: that so the divine mission of Jesus might be the more signally marked by his conquests over Satan.

In discoursing on the miracle before us, I shall shew,

I.

What proof the Lord Jesus here gave of his Messiahship

There was a man whom Satan by his malignant influence had caused to be both blind and dumb: and him did our Lord in an instant restore to the perfect use of his faculties, so that the blind and dumb both spake and saw. At this stupendous miracle the people were all amazed: and the conclusion which they drew from it was, Is not this the son of David? Under the name and character of the Son of David the Messiah was expected: and from the miracle which they had seen, the people inferred, that Jesus must be he: yea, so undeniable did this inference appear, that they asked with confidence, Is not this the son of David?
[This miracle was precisely of the kind that the Messiah was expected to perform. It had been foretold by the prophet, Then the eyes of the blind shall be opened, and the ears of the deaf shall be unstopped: then shall the lame man leap as an hart, and the tongue of the dumb shall sing: &c [Note: Isa 35:5-6.]. And to such miracles as these our Lord himself referred in proof of his Messiahship. When John the Baptist sent two of his disciples to inquire of Jesus, Art thou he that should come, or do we look for another? our Lord replied, Go and shew John again the things that ye do hear and see: the blind receive their sight, and the lame walk, the lepers are cleansed, and the deaf hear, the dead are raised up, and the poor have the Gospel preached to them: and blessed is he, whosoever shall not be offended in me [Note: Mat 11:2-6.]. Indeed so wonderful was this miracle, and so evident, on Scripture principles, the truth deduced from it, that the envious Pharisees, in order to obviate the conclusion drawn from it, ascribed the miracle to a confederacy with the devil. But our Lord shewed them, that, on their view of the matter, Satan would be subverting his own kingdom: but, as they could not conceive he would do that, it was clear, that the kingdom of God must be come unto them [Note: ver. 2428.].

Thus did our Lord by this miracle establish his claim to the Messiahship, and give ample ground for all the people to receive him as the appointed Saviour of the world.]
And have these wonders ceased? No: I feel myself authorized to declare,

II.

What corresponding proofs he is ever ready to give to us at this day

Satan has no longer the same power over the bodies of men, that he once exercised. But he has as great power over their souls as ever: and
We are spiritually in the same predicament with the man whom Jesus healed

[We are, whilst in an unregenerate state, both blind and dumb. We arc blind. What is there which we see aright? What views have we of our duty, our interest, or our happiness? One would suppose that every rational being should see it his duty to love and serve his God; and his interest to secure the divine favour; and his happiness to enjoy the presence of God, and a foretaste of his eternal inheritance. But where do we find persons acting in accordance with such views? Mens earthly pursuits appear to them of paramount obligation; and all desire after heavenly things is swallowed up by their anxiety about the things of time and sense. In vain does God tell them, that this world is only as a broken cistern that can hold no water [Note: Jer 2:13.]; and that no solid comfort can be derived from any source but from God, the fountain of living waters: This they will not believe, notwithstanding the experience of every day bears testimony to it. And whence is this unbelief, but from the influence of Satan upon their minds? Yes, The god of this world hath blinded the minds of them that believe not [Note: 2Co 4:4.].

So also are we dumb. Our tongue is spoken of by God as our glory, because by that, more than by any other member, we are enabled to glorify him [Note: Psa 57:7-8.]. But how is that member employed for God? We speak not to him in the exercise of prayer and praise, though our multiplied necessities and mercies call for these acknowledgments every day and hour of our lives. Nor do we in our converse with the world speak of God. Every other subject that can be thought of occupies our tongues rather than this, insomuch that amongst our friends and relatives it seems, as it were, to be banished by general consent. Still less do we speak for God. We see him dishonoured on every side; but we dare not advocate his cause. If our own father or friend were so insulted, we should find somewhat to speak in their behalf: but for God and his honour we have no concern: we can see the whole world risen in rebellion against him, and never once bear our testimony against their impiety. And whence is this, but from the same Satanic influence? Yes, our walking thus according to the course of this world is owing to that prince of the power of the air, the spirit that now worketh in all the children of disobedience [Note: Eph 2:2.].]

But from this state our blessed Lord is ever willing to deliver us
[He is constituted both Lord and Christ [Note: Act 2:36.]. He is exalted on purpose that he may give us the grace we stand in need of [Note: Act 5:31.], and thus destroy in us the works of the devil [Note: 1Jn 3:8.]. He on his ascension to heaven poured out the gifts of the Holy Ghost, which he has promised to us also [Note: Act 2:38-39.]; and by his Spirit he will open the eyes of our understanding [Note: Eph 1:17-18.], and open our lips also that we may shew forth his praise [Note: Psa 51:15.]. This is the very office which he has undertaken to perform: He is made Head over all things to the Church for this very end [Note: Eph 1:22-23.]; and there is a fulness treasured up in him for this express purpose [Note: Col 1:19. Joh 1:16.]. No man has any need to be discouraged, as though he were beyond the reach of this mercy: he cannot be in a more hopeless state than the man who is spoken of in my text: and we are assured, that the things which are hid from the wise and prudent, our Lord will reveal unto babes. Let all then look unto him; the blind, that they may see, and the dumb that they may speak; and not one shall be disappointed of his hope: for our blessed Lord has counselled all to come to him for these blessings [Note: Rev 3:18.],and no soul shall ever seek his face in vain.]

Address
1.

Those who are yet under the power of Satan

[But where shall I find these, or even so much as one of them? Are you, or you, or you amongst this unhappy number? No; if we will take your own word, we shall not find so much as one. But are there none amongst you that are destitute of a spiritual discernment, and whose whole conduct shews them to be blind as to all practical perception of their duty, their interest, and their happiness? Alas! we need not go far to find such as these; for on every side of us we see persons living for themselves, and not for God; for time, and not for eternity. I ask not then respecting your worldly possessions or your intellectual attainments. If you have not a truly spiritual use of your faculties, possess what else ye may, ye are in a far worse condition than the man whom Satan had rendered blind and dumb. His wants might be supplied by others; yours cannot: his would cease at death; yours will never terminate: his might be far more than compensated by the acquisition of spiritual attainments; but what can ever compensate for the wants which you experience? Ten thousand worlds could not be to you any compensation for the loss of spiritual faculties and spiritual enjoyments. Then I entreat you come to the Lord Jesus Christ, who is as able and as willing to supply your wants as ever he was to heal those who were brought to him in the days of old ]

2.

Those who have been delivered from him

[Who that beheld that mans change of state did not cordially congratulate him on the mercy he had received? Yet was not the blessing conferred on him in any degree to be compared with that which they have experienced, whose eyes are opened to behold the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ, and whose tongues are loosed to speak forth his praise. Dear brethren, so far as these blessings are enjoyed by you, you are restored to the happiness which Christ has purchased for you by his blood, the happiness which shall ere long be perfected in glory. Give honour then to the Lord Jesus Christ: and, when you see how many around you still remain both blind and dumb, stand amazed at the distinguishing mercy which has been vouchsafed to you And now, need I tell you how to employ the faculties which have been thus renewed? Surely of yourselves you will feel, that they should be henceforth consecrated altogether to your God. Get then your spiritual senses more and more exercised on spiritual things; and let your one employment henceforth be on earth, what it will ere long without interruption be in heaven, to behold the glory, and to shew forth the praises, of your adorable Benefactor.]

Fuente: Charles Simeon’s Horae Homileticae (Old and New Testaments)

“Then was brought unto him one possessed with a devil, blind, and dumb: and he healed him, insomuch that the blind and dumb both spake and saw. (23) And all the people were amazed, and said, Is not this the son of David?”

Let the Reader always connect with the view of the miracles of Jesus, his compassion to the soul, while healing the body. It is the blind and dumb in spirit, Jesus came to deliver.

Fuente: Hawker’s Poor Man’s Commentary (Old and New Testaments)

XXIX

OUR LORD’S GREAT MINISTRY IN GALILEE

Part IV The Centurion’s Servant Healed, the Widow’s Son Raised, The Sin Against the Holy Spirit

Harmony -pages 52-59 and Mat 8:1 ; Mat 8:5-13 ; Mat 11:2-30 ; Mat 12:22-37 ; Mar 3:1-30 ; Luk 7:1-8:3 .

When Jesus, who spoke with authority, had finished the Sermon on the Mount, he returned to Capernaum where he acted with authority in performing some noted miracles. Here he was met by a deputation from a centurion, a heathen, beseeching him to heal his servant who was at the point of death. This Jewish deputation entered the plea for the centurion that he had favored the Jews greatly and had built for them a synagogue. Jesus set out at once to go to the house of the centurion, but was met by a second deputation, saying to Jesus that he not trouble himself but just speak the word and the work would be done. The centurion referred in this message to his own authority over his soldiers, reasoning that Christ’s authority was greater and therefore he could speak the word and his servant should be healed. This called forth from our Lord the highest commendation of his faith. No Jew up to this time had manifested such faith as this Roman centurion. Then our Lord draws the picture of the Gentiles coming from the east, west, north, and south to feast with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob in the kingdom of heaven while the Jews, the sons of the kingdom, were cast out. Jesus then granted the petition of the centurion according to his faith.

The second great miracle of Jesus in this region was the raising of the widow’s son at Nain, which was a great blessing to the widow and caused very much comment upon the work of our Lord, so that his fame spread over all Judea and the region roundabout. His fame as a miracle worker and “a great prophet, “ reached John the Baptist and brought forth his message of inquiry.

This inquiry of John, which reflects the state of discouragement, and also the testimony of Jesus concerning John, is discussed in Joh 10 of this volume (which see), but there are some points in this incident not brought out in that discussion which also need to be emphasized. First, what is the meaning of “the kingdom of heaven suffereth violence” (Mat 11:12 )? The image is not precisely that of taking a city by storm, but of an eager, invading host, each trying to be first, pressing and jostling each other, as when gold was discovered in California, or at the settlement of the Oklahoma strip. It means impassioned earnestness and indomitable resolution in the entrance upon and pursuit of a Christian life, making religion the chief concern and salvation the foremost thing as expressed in the precepts: “Seek first the kingdom, etc.,” “Agonize to enter in at the strait gate.” It rightly expresses the absorbing interest and enthusiasm of a revival. “Thus Christianity was born in a revival and all its mighty advances have come from revivals which are yet the hope of the world.” This thought is illustrated in Bunyan’s Pilgrim’s Progress, pp. 47-49. Following this is the contrast between the publicans and scribes, the one justifying God and the other rejecting for themselves the counsel of God. Then he likens them unto children in the market, playing funeral. One side piped but the other side did not dance; then they wailed but the others did not weep. So, John was an ascetic and that did not suit them; Jesus ate and drank and that did not suit them. So it has ever been with the faultfinders. But in spite of that, wisdom is justified of her works (or children), i.e., wisdom is evidenced by her children, whether in the conduct of John or Jesus. But this statement does not justify the liquor business as the defendants of it claim.

There is no evidence that Jesus either made or drank intoxicating wine

Then began Jesus to upbraid the cities wherein were done these mighty works, including Chorazin, Bethsaida, and Capernaum, because they had not repented. This shows that light brings with it the obligation to repent, and that this will be the governing principle of the judgment. Men shall be judged according to the light they have. Then follows the announcement of a great principle of revelation. God makes it to babes rather than to the worldly-wise man, and that Jesus himself is the medium of the revelation from God to man, but only the humble in spirit and contrite in heart can receive it. Because he is the medium of the blessing, the God-man, his compassion here finds expression in this great, broad invitation: “Come unto me, all ye that labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn of me; for am I meek and lowly in heart: and ye shall find rest unto your souls. For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light.” Note the two kinds of rest here: First, the given rest, which is accepted by grace, and second, the found rest, which is attained in service.

The next incident is the anointing of our Saviour’s feet by a woman who was a sinner. This incident occurred in Galilee just where I do not know possibly, but not probably, in Nain. It is recorded by Luke alone, who, following a custom of the historians of mentioning only one incident of a special kind, omits the narrative of a later anointing.

Two preceding things seem to be implied by the story: (a) That the host had been a beneficiary in some way of Christ’s healing power over the body; (b) That the woman had been a beneficiary” of his saving power. It is quite probable that her weary and sin-burdened soul had heard and accepted the gracious invitation: “Come unto me, etc.,” just given by the Saviour. At any rate her case is an incarnate illustration of the power of that text and is a living exposition of it. It is far more beautiful and impressive in the Greek than any translation can make it. Several customs prevalent then but obsolete now, constitute the setting of the story, and must be understood in order to appreciate its full meaning.

(1) The Oriental courtesies of hospitality usually extended to an honored guest. The footwear of the times open sandals and the dust of travel in so dry a country, necessitated the washing of the feet of an incoming guest the first act of hospitality. See Abraham’s example (Gen 18:4 ) and Lot’s (Gen 19:2 ) and Laban’s (Gen 24:32 ) and the old Benjaminite (Jdg 19:20-21 ) and Abigail (1Sa 25:41 ). See as later instances (Joh 13 ) our Lord’s washing the feet of his disciples and the Christian customs (1Ti 5:10 ). This office was usually performed by servants, but was a mark of great respect and honor to a guest if performed by the host himself.

(2) The custom of saluting a guest with a kiss. See case of Moses (Exo 18:7 ) and of David (2Sa 19:39 ). To observe this mode of showing affectionate respect is frequently enjoined in the New Testament epistles. As employed by Absalom for purposes of demagogy (2Sa 15:5 ), and as employed toward Amasa by Joab when murder was in his heart (2Sa 20:9-10 ), and by Judas to our Lord when treachery was in his heart, rendered their crimes the more heinous. To this Patrick Henry refers: “Suffer not yourselves to be betrayed with a kiss.”

(3) The custom of anointing the head at meals (Ecc 9:7-8 ; Psa 23:5 ). Hence for the Pharisee to omit these marks of courteous hospitality was to show his light esteem for his guest. It proves that the invitation was not very hearty.

(4) The custom of reclining at meals (Amo 6:4-6 ). This explains “sat at meat” and “behind at his feet.”

With these items of background we are prepared to understand and appreciate that wonderful story of the compassion of Jesus. His lesson on forgiveness and proportionate love as illustrated in the case of this wicked woman has been the sweet consolation of thousands. The announcement to the woman that her faith had saved her throws light on the question, “What must I do to be saved?” There are here also the usual contrasts where the work of salvation is going on. The woman was overflowing with love and praise while others were questioning in their hearts and abounding in hate and censure. This scene has been re-enacted many a time since, as Christianity has held out the hand of compassion to the outcasts and Satan has questioned and jeered at her beautiful offers of mercy.

In Section 47 (Luk 8:1-3 ) of the Harmony we have a further account of our Lord’s ministry in Galilee with the twelve, and certain women who had been the beneficiaries of his ministry, who also ministered to him of their substance. This is the first Ladies’ Aid Society of which we have any record and they were of the right sort.

We now take up the discussion of the sin against -the Holy Spirit found in Section 48 (Mat 12:22-37 ; Mar 3:19-30 ). Before opening the discussion of it, allow me to group certain passages of both Testaments bearing on this question: Psa 19:13 : “Innocent of the great transgression.” Mar 3:29 : “Guilty of an eternal sin.” Num 15:28-31 : “If any soul sin through ignorance, the priest shall make an atonement for the soul that sinneth ignorantly, when he sinneth by ignorance before the Lord, to make an atonement for him and it shall be forgiven him. But the soul that doeth presumptuously, born in the land of a stranger, the same reproacheth the Lord; and that soul shall be cut off from among his people. Because he hath despised the word of the Lord, and hath broken his commandment, that soul shall be utterly cut off; his iniquity shall be upon him.” Heb 10:26-29 : “For if we sin willfully after that we have received the knowledge of the truth, there remaineth no more a sacrifice for sins, but a certain fearful expectation of judgment and a fierceness of fire which shall devour the adversaries. A man that hath set at naught Moses’ law, dieth without compassion on the word of two or three witnesses; of how much sorer punishment, think ye, shall he be judged worthy, who has trodden under foot the Son of God and hath counted the blood of the covenant, wherewith he was sanctified, an unholy thing, and hath done despite unto the Spirit of grace?” Jer 15:1 : “Then said the Lord unto me, Though Moses and Samuel stood before me, yet my mind could not be toward this people: cast them out of my sight, and let them go forth.” 1Jn 5:16 : “If any man see his brother sinning a sin not unto death, he shall ask, and God will give him life for them that sin not unto death. There is a sin unto death: not concerning this do I say that he should make request.” Eze 14:13-14 : “Son of man, when a land sinneth against me, by committing a trespass, and I stretch out mine hand upon it, and break the staff of the bread thereof, and send famine upon it, and cut off from it man and beast; though these three men, Noah, Daniel, and Job, were in it, they should deliver but their own souls by their righteousness, saith the Lord God.”

The scriptures just cited have excited profound interest in every age of the world since they were recorded. In all the intervening centuries they have so stirred the hearts of those affected by them as to strip life of enjoyment. They have driven many to despair. In every community there are guilty and awakened consciences as spellbound by these scriptures as was Belshazzar when with pallid lips and shaking knees he confronted the mysterious handwriting on the wall, Mene, Mene, Tekel, Upharsin. In almost every community we can find some troubled soul, tortured with the apprehension that he has committed the unpardonable sin. Sympathetic and kindly-disposed expositors in every age have tried in vain to break the natural force or soften in some way the prima facie import of these divine utterances. Some have denied that there ever was, or ever could be an unpardonable sin. Others conceded that such sin might have been committed in the days of Christ’s earthly ministry, but the hazard passed away with the cessation of miracles. All the power of great scholarship has been brought to bear with microscopic inspection of words and phrases to establish one or the other of these propositions. And, indeed, if great names could avail in such cases, this slough of despond would have been safely bridged. But no such explanation ever satisfies a guilty conscience or removes from the hearts of the masses of plain people, the solemn conviction that the Bible teaches two things:

First, that in every age of the past, men were liable to commit the unpardonable sin and that as a matter of fact, some did commit it.

Second, that there is now not only the same liability, but that some do now actually commit it. There is something in man which tells him that these scriptures possess for him an awful admonition whose truth is eternal.

Whether all the scriptures just cited admit of one classification matters nothing, so far as the prevalent conviction is concerned. Where one of the group may be successfully detached by exegesis another rises up to take its place. The interest in the doctrine founded on them is a never-dying interest. Because of this interest, it is purposed now to examine somewhat carefully, the principal passages bearing on this momentous theme. Most humbly, self-distrustingly and reverently will the awful subject be approached.

It is deemed best to approach it by considering specially the case recorded by Matthew and Mark. The words are spoken by our Lord himself. The antecedent facts which occasioned their utterance may be briefly stated thus:

(1) Jesus had just delivered a miserable demoniac by casting out the demon who possessed him.

(2) It was a daylight affair, a public transaction, all the circumstances so open and visible, and the fact so incontrovertible and stupendous that many recognized the divine power and presence.

(3) But certain Pharisees who had been pursuing him with hostile intent, who had been obstructing his work in every possible way, finding themselves unable to dispute the fact of the miracle, sought to break its force by attributing its origin to Beelzebub, the prince of demons, charging Jesus with collusion with Satan.

(4) The issue raised was specific. This issue rested on three indisputable facts conceded by all parties. It is important to note these facts carefully and to impress our minds with the thought that as conceded facts, they underlie the issue. The facts are, first, that an evil and unwilling demon had been forcibly ejected from his much desired stronghold and dispossessed of his ill-gotten spoils. It was no good spirit. It was no willing spirit. It was a violent ejectment. It was a despoiling ejectment. Second, the one who so summarily ejected the demon and despoiled him was Jesus of Nazareth. Third fact, the ejectment was by supernatural miraculous power by some spirit mightier than the outcast demon. Evidently Jesus had, by some spirit, wrought a notable miracle. He claimed that he did it by the Holy Spirit of God resting on him and dwelling in him. The Pharisees alleged that he did it by an unclean spirit, even Satan himself. The contrast is between “unclean-spirit” and “Holy Spirit.” An awful sin was committed by one or the other. Somebody was guilty of blasphemy. If Jesus was in collusion with Satan if he attributed the devil’s work by him to the Holy Spirit, he was guilty of blasphemy. If the Pharisees, on the other hand, attributed the work of the Holy Spirit to an unclean spirit, this was slandering God. They were guilty of blasphemy.

(5) Jesus answers the charge against himself by three arguments: First, as the demon cast out belonged to Satan’s kingdom and was doing Satan’s work, evidently he was not cast out by Satan’s power, for a kingdom divided against itself cannot stand, and none could justly accuse Satan of the folly of undermining his own kingdom. Second, the demon could not have been despoiled and cast out unless first overpowered by some stronger spirit than himself, who, if not Satan, must be the Holy Spirit, Satan’s antagonist and master. Third, as the Pharisees themselves claimed to be exorcists of demons, it became them to consider how their argument against Jesus might be applied to their own exorcisms.

Then he in turn became the accuser. In grief and indignation he said, “Therefore I say unto you, every sin and blasphemy against the Spirit shall not be forgiven. And whosoever shall speak a word against the Son of man, it shall be forgiven him, but whosoever shall speak against the Holy Spirit, it shall not be forgiven him, neither in this world nor in that which is to come.”

Or as Mark expresses it, “Verily I say unto you, All their sins shall be forgiven unto the sons of men, and their blasphemies wherewith soever they shall blaspheme: but whosoever shall blaspheme against the Holy Spirit hath never forgiveness, but is guilty of an eternal sin; because they said, He hath an unclean spirit.” Having the case now before us, let us next define or explain certain terms expressed or implied in the record.

Unpardonable. Pardonable means not that which is or must be pardoned, but which may be pardoned on compliance with proper conditions that while any sin unrepented of, leads ultimately to death, yet as long as the sinner lives, a way of escape is offered to him. But an unpardonable sin is one which from the moment of its committal is forever without a possible remedy. Though such a sinner may be permitted to live many years, yet the very door of hope is closed against him. It is an eternal sin. It hath never forgiveness. Sermons, prayers, songs, and exhortations avail nothing in his case. The next expression needing explanation is, “Neither in this world, nor in the world to come.” Construed by itself this language might imply one of two things:

First, that God will pardon some sins in the next world, i.e., there may be for many, though not all, a probation after death. So Romanists teach. On such interpretation is purgatory founded.

Second, or it may imply that God puts away some sins so far as the next world is concerned, but yet does not remit chastisement for them in this world.

Where the meaning of a given passage is doubtful, then we apply the analogy of the faith. That is, we compare the doubtful with the certain. The application of this rule necessitates discarding the first possible meaning assigned. It is utterly repugnant to the tenor of the Scriptures. Men are judged and their destiny decided by the deeds done in the body, not out of it. If they die unjust they are raised unjust. There is no probation after death. It remains to inquire if the second possible implication agrees with the tenor of the Scriptures. Here we find no difficulty whatever. The general Bible teaching is in harmony with the second meaning. The Scriptures abundantly show three things:

First, some sins are remitted both for time and eternity. That is, when they are pardoned for eternity, even chastisement on earth is also remitted.

Second, much graver sins are, on repentance, put away as to eternity, but very sore chastisement is inflicted in time. As when God said to David after Nathan visited him: “The Lord hath put away thy sin; thou shalt not die. Howbeit, because by this deed thou hast given great occasion to the enemies of the Lord to blaspheme, the child also that is born unto thee shall surely die.” The Lord also announced to him that “the sword should never depart from his house” because he had caused the death of Uriah (see 2Sa 12:7-14 ). Here is one unmistakable case out of many that could be cited where sin was forgiven as to the next world, but not as to this world.

The thought is that God, in fatherly discipline, chastises all Christians in this world. To be without chastisement in this world proves we are not God’s children. An awful token of utter alienation from God is to be deprived of correction here, when we sin. To be sinners and yet to prosper. To die sinners and yet have no “bands in our death.” So that the expression “hath never forgiveness, neither in this world nor in the world to come,” implies nothing about a probation after death, but refers to God’s method of withholding correction in this world, from some sinners, but never withholding punishment of this class in the next, and to his method of correcting Christians in this world, but never punishing them in the next world.

Third, the expression teaches that in the case of those who sin against the Holy Spirit, God’s method of dealing is different from both the foregoing methods. In the case of the unpardonable sin, punishment commences now and continues forever. There is no remission of either temporal or eternal penalties. They have the pleasures of neither world. To illustrate: Lazarus had the next world, but not this; Dives had this world, but not the next. But the man who commits the unpardonable sin has neither world, as Judas Iscariot, Ananias, and others.

To further illustrate, by earthly things, we might say that Benedict Arnold committed the unpardonable sin as to nations. He lost the United States and did not gain England. Hated here; despised yonder. The price of his treason could not be enjoyed. He had never forgiveness, neither on this side the ocean nor on the other side. Another term needing explanation is the word,

Blasphemy. This is strictly a compound Greek word Anglicized. It is transferred bodily to our language. In Greek literature it is quite familiar and often used. Its meaning is thoroughly established. According to strict etymology, it is an offense of speech, i.e., of spoken words. Literally, as a verb, it means to speak ill or injuriously of any one, to revile or defame. As a noun, it means detraction or slander. I say it means to defame any one whether man or God. Even in the Bible usage of both the Septuagint and the Greek New Testament, the word is generally applied to both man and God.

When Paul says he was “slanderously reported,” as saying a certain thing, and when Peter says “speak evil of no man,” they both correctly employ the Greek word “blaspheme.” Even this passage refers to other blasphemies than those against God, “all manner of blasphemies except the blasphemies against the Holy Spirit.” In both English and American law, blasphemy has ever been an indictable offense, whether against man or God. Later usages, however, restrict the term “blasphemy” to an offense against God, while the term “slander” is applied to the same offense against men. According to strict derivation, it is an offense of spoken words. To this our Saviour refers in the context when he says, “For by thy words thou shalt be justified, and by thy words thou shalt be condemned.” But one is quite mistaken who limits the meaning of the term to strict etymology. In both human and divine law, the offense of “blasphemy” may be committed by writing the words, or publishing them, as well as by speaking them. We may blaspheme by either printing, painting, or pantomime. Any overt, provable action which intentionally conveys a false and injurious impression against any one comes within the scope of the offense. Under the more spiritual, divine law, the offense may be committed in the mind, whether ever spoken aloud. Our context says, “Jesus knowing their thoughts.” Indeed, the very essence of the offense is in the heart the intent the idea. Words are matters of judgment, solely because they are signs of ideas and expressions of the heart. This our context abundantly shows. Our Saviour says, “Either make the tree good and its fruit good; or make the tree corrupt, and its fruit corrupt: for the tree is known by its fruit. Ye offspring of vipers, how can ye, being evil, speak good things? For out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaketh. The good man out of his good treasure, bringeth forth good things: and the evil man out of his evil treasure bringeth forth evil things.”

From this exhibition of the meaning of the word “blasphemy,” we can easily see that either Jesus or the Pharisees were guilty of the offense. Both could not be innocent. If Jesus, while claiming to act by the Holy Spirit, was but the organ of “an unclean spirit,” then he blasphemed or slandered the Holy Spirit. If his work was wrought by the Holy Spirit, then the Pharisees, by attributing that work to an “unclean spirit,” blasphemed the Holy Spirit.

Having clearly before us the meaning of “blasphemy,” let us advance to another explanation. The character of any code or government is revealed by its capital offenses; the grade of any nation’s civilization is registered by its penal code. If capital punishment, or the extreme limit of punishment is inflicted for many and slight offenses, the government is called barbarian. If for only a few extraordinary and very heinous crimes, the government is called civilized. For instance, under the English law of long ago, a man might be legally put to death for snaring a bird or rabbit. The extreme limit of punishment was visited upon many who now would be pronounced guilty of only misdemeanors or petit larceny. It was a bloody code. The enlightened mind intuitively revolts against undue severity. Modern civilization has reduced capital offense to a minimum. Even in these few cases three things at least must always be proved:

(1) That the offender had arrived at the age of discretion, and possessed a sound mind. A mere child, a lunatic or idiot cannot commit a capital offense.

(2) Premeditation. The crime must be deliberately committed.

(3) Malice. The evil intent must be proved.

The higher benevolence of the divine law will appear from the fact that there is but one unpardonable offense, and that even more must be proved against one accused of this offense than the age of discretion, a sound mind, premeditation, and malice. Indeed, the sin against the Holy Spirit must outrank all others in intrinsic heinousness. This will abundantly appear when we reach the Bible definition and analysis of the sin against the Holy Spirit. We are not ready even yet, however, to enter upon the discussion of the sin itself. Two other preliminary explanations are needed.

Why must the one unpardonable sin be necessarily against the Holy Spirit? What is the philosophy or rationale of this necessity? This question and the answer to it cannot be understood unless we give due weight, both separately and collectively, to the following correlated proposition: There is one law giver, God. His law is the one supreme standard which defines right and wrong prescribing the right, proscribing the wrong. God himself is the sole, authoritative interpreter of his law. The scope of its obligations cannot be limited by finite knowledge, or human conscience. Any failure whatever at conformity thereto, or any deflection therefrom, to the right or left, however slight, and from whatever cause, is unrighteousness. All unrighteousness is sin. The wages of sin is death. All men are sinners by nature and practice.

Therefore, by the deeds of the law can no man be justified in the sight of God. The law condemns every man. It also follows: First, that any possible salvation must flow from God’s free grace. Second, that not even grace can provide a way of escape for the condemned inconsistent with God’s Justice and holiness. That is, any possible scheme of salvation for sinners must both satisfy the law penalty, thereby appeasing justice, and provide for the personal holiness of the forgiven sinner.

To put it in yet other words, the plan of salvation, to be feasible, must secure for every sinner to be saved, three things at least: (a) justification, (b) regeneration, (c) sanctification, which are equivalent to deliverance from the law penalty, a new nature, and personal holiness. I say that these three things are absolutely requisite. I cite just now only three scriptural proofs, one under each head:

Rom 3:23-26 declares that a propitiation must be made for sin in order that God might be just in justifying the sinner. Joh 3:3-7 sets forth the absolute necessity of the new birth the imparting of a new nature.

Heb 12:14 declares that “without holiness no man shall see the Lord.”

To admit into heaven even one unjustified man, one man in his carnal nature, one unholy man, would necessarily dethrone God, while inflicting worse than the tortures of hell on the one so admitted.

No fish out of water, no wolf or owl in the daylight, could be so unutterably wretched as such a man. He would be utterly out of harmony with his surroundings. I think he would prefer hell. The gates of the holy city stand open day and night, which means that no saint would go out, and no sinner would go in. After the judgment as well as now, the sinner loves darkness rather than light. It therefore naturally, philosophically and necessarily follows that salvation must have limitations. A careful study of these limitations will disclose to us the rationale of the unpardonable sin. What, then, are these limitations?

(1) Outside of grace, no salvation.

(2) Outside of Christ, no grace.

(3) Outside of the Spirit, no Christ.

In other words, Christ alone reveals the Father, and the Spirit alone reveals Christ; or no man can reach the Father except through Christ Christ is the door and no man can find that door except through the Spirit. It necessarily follows that an unpardonable sin is a sin against the Spirit. This would necessarily follow from the order of the manifestations of the Godhead: Father, Son and Holy Spirit. From the order of the dispensations: First, the Father’s dispensation of law; second, the Son’s dispensation of atonement; third, the Spirit’s dispensation of applying the atonement. The Spirit is heaven’s ultimatum heaven’s last overture. If we sin against the Father directly, the Son remains. We may reach him through the Son. If we sin directly against the Son, the Spirit remains. We may reach him through the Spirit. If we sin against the Spirit, nothing remains. Therefore that sin is without remedy. So argues our Saviour: “Every sin and blasphemy shall be forgiven unto men; but the blasphemy against the Spirit shall not be forgiven. And whosoever shall speak a word against the Son of man, it shall be forgiven him; but whosoever shall speak against the Holy Spirit, it shall not be forgiven him, neither in this world, nor in that which is to come. He is guilty of an eternal sin.”

Our last preliminary explanation answers this question: Are men now liable to commit this sin? If not liable, the reasons for discussing the matter at all are much reduced. If liable, the reasons for discussion are infinitely enhanced. It is of infinitely greater moment to point out to the unwary of a possible immediate danger, than to relieve the mind from the fear of an unreal danger, however great and torturing may be that fear. It is claimed by many intelligent expositors that this sin cannot be committed apart from an age of miracles, nor apart from the specific miracle of casting out demons, nor apart from attributing the supernatural, miraculous power of the Holy Spirit in said miracle to Beelzebub, the prince of demons.

Very deep love have I for the great and good men who take this position, as, I believe, led away by sentiment, sympathy, and amiability on the one hand, and horrified on the other hand with the recklessness which characterizes many sensational discussions of this grave matter by tyros, unlearned, and immature expositors. Very deep love have I for the men, but far less respect for their argument. I submit, just now, only a few out of many grave reasons for rejecting this interpretation.

(1) Such restriction of meaning is too narrow and mechanical. The Bible could not be to us a book of principles, if the exact circumstances must be duplicated in order to obtain a law. From the study of every historical incident in the Bible we deduce principles of action.

(2) The Scriptures clearly grade miracles wrought by the Spirit below other works of the Spirit. This is evident from many passages and connections. Writing the names of the saved in the book of life was greater than casting out devils (Luk 10:20 ). Fourth only in the gifts of the Spirit does miracle-working power rank (1Co 12:28 ). Far inferior are any of these gifts to the abiding graces of the Spirit (1Co 13:1-13 ; 1Co 14:1-33 ). How, then, in reason and common sense, can it be a more heinous blasphemy to attribute an inferior work of the Spirit to the devil than a superior work? Will any man seriously maintain that this is so, because a miracle is more demonstrable its proof more vivid and cognizable by the natural senses? This would be to affirm the contrary of scriptural teaching on many points. We may know more things about spirit than we can know about matter. This knowledge is more vivid and impressive than the other. Spiritual demonstration to the inner man is always a profounder demonstration than any whatever to the outer man.

(3) Such a restriction of meaning to the days of Christ in the flesh is out of harmony with Old Testament teaching on the same subject.

(4) It fails to harmonize with many other passages in later New Testament time, which will not admit of a different classification without contradicting the text itself, since thereby more than one kind of unpardonable sins would be established.

(5) The utter failure of this exposition to convince the judgment of plain people everywhere, and its greater failure to relieve troubled consciences everywhere, is a strong presumptive argument against its soundness.

Because, therefore, I believe that the sin against the Holy Spirit may now be committed because I believe that some men in nearly every Christian community have committed it because I believe that the liability is imminent and the penalty, when incurred, utterly without remedy, and because I feel pressed in spirit to warn the imperiled of so great condemnation, therefore I preach on the subject preach earnestly preach in tears preach with melted heart.

QUESTIONS

1. How did Jesus vindicate his authority apart from his claims and teaching?

2. What are the details in the incident of healing the centurions servant, how do you reconcile the accounts of Matthew and Luke, and what the lessons of this incident?

3. Describe the incident of the raising of the widow’s son at Nain and its lesson.

4. What inquiry from John the Baptist brought forth by this fame of Jesus and what was Jesus’ reply?

5. What is the meaning of “the kingdom of heaven suffereth violence?

6. What reproof of the Pharisees by our Lord called forth by this?

7. What cities here upbraided by our Lord and what principle enunciated in this connection?

8. What principle of revelation announced here also?

9. What great invitation here announced by our Lord and what is its great teaching?

10. Relate the story of the anointing of the feet of Jesus by the wicked woman.

11. What two things seem to be implied by the story?

12. What Oriental customs constitute the setting of this story and what is the explanation of each?

13. What are the lessons and contrasts of this incident?

14. Give an account of the first Ladies’ Aid Society.

15. What scriptures of both Testaments bearing on the sin against the Holy Spirit?

16. What can you say of the impression made by these scriptures?

17. What efforts of sympathetic expositors to soften the import of these scriptures?

18. What two solemn convictions yet remain?

19. What were the antecedent facts which occasioned the statements of our Lord in Section 48 of the Harmony?

20. What is the meaning of “unpardonable”?

21. What is the meaning of “neither in this world, nor in the world to come”?

22. What is the meaning of “blasphemy”?

23. Show that either Jesus or the Pharisees were guilty of blasphemy on this occasion.

24. How is the character of a code of laws determined? Illustrate.

25. What three things must be proved in the case of capital offenses against our laws?

26. How does the higher benevolence of the divine law appear?

27. What correlated proposition must be duly considered in order to understand the sin against the Holy Spirit?

28. What two things also follow from this?

29. What three things must the plan of salvation secure for every sinner who shall be saved, and what the proof?

30. What are the limitations which determine the rationale of the sin against the Holy Spirit? Explain.

31. What are the claims of some expositors with respect to this sin and what the reasons for rejecting them?

Fuente: B.H. Carroll’s An Interpretation of the English Bible

22 Then was brought unto him one possessed with a devil, blind, and dumb: and he healed him, insomuch that the blind and dumb both spake and saw.

Ver. 22. One possessed with a devil, blind and dumb ] A heavy case, and yet that may be any man’s case. a Cuivis potest contingere, quod cuiquam potest. Every one that seeth another stricken, and himself spared, is to keep a passover for himself; and to say, “Thou hast punished me less than my sins have merited,”Ezr 9:13Ezr 9:13 . The devil had shut up from this man all passages to faith, saith Theophylact, by bereaving him of the use of his eyes, ears, and tongue. See a mercy in the use of our senses, &c. Multo plures sunt gratiae privativae quam positivae, saith Gerson.

a . Xenophon.

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

22 45. ] ACCUSATION OF CASTING OUT DEVILS BY BEELZEBUB, AND OUR LORD’S DISCOURSE THEREON. DEMAND OF A SIGN FROM HIM: HIS FURTHER DISCOURSE. Mar 3:20-30 . Luk 11:14-36 , where also see notes. This account is given by Luke later in our Lord’s ministry, but without any fixed situation or time, and with less copiousness of detail. See also ch. Mat 9:32 , and notes there. St. Mark ( Mar 3:23-29 ) gives part of the discourse which follows, but without any determinate sequence, and omitting the miracle which led to it.

Fuente: Henry Alford’s Greek Testament

Mat 12:22-37 . Demoniac healed and Pharisaic calumny repelled (Mar 3:22-30 ; Luk 11:14-23 cf. Mat 9:32-34 ). The healing of a blind and dumb demoniac has its place here not for its own sake, as a miracle, but simply as the introduction to another conflict between Jesus and the Pharisees. It is a story of wicked calumny repelled. The transition from the fair picture of the true Jesus to this hideous Pharisaic caricature is highly dramatic in its effect.

Fuente: The Expositors Greek Testament by Robertson

Mat 12:22-23 . , blind as well as dumb. The demoniac in Mat 9:32 dumb only. But dumbness here also is the main feature; hence in last clause only, and before . with infinitive, expressing here not merely tendency but result.

Fuente: The Expositors Greek Testament by Robertson

NASB (UPDATED) TEXT: Mat 12:22-24

22Then a demon-possessed man who was blind and mute was brought to Jesus, and He healed him, so that the mute man spoke and saw. 23All the crowds were amazed, and were saying, “This man cannot be the Son of David, can he?” 24 But when the Pharisees heard this, they said, “This man casts out demons only by Beelzebul the ruler of the demons.”

Mat 12:22 This was one of the Messianic signs (cf. Isa 29:18; Isa 35:5; Isa 42:7; Isa 42:16; Mat 9:27-31; Mat 12:22; Mat 15:30; Mat 21:14). Israel herself needed this healing ministry (cf. Isa 6:9-10; Isa 42:18-22). It was a sign they refused to see!

Mat 12:23 “This man cannot be the Son of David, can He” In Greek, this question expected a “no” answer, but with the possibility that maybe it might be true. The term “the Son of David” was a Messianic title from 2 Samuel 7. It was used often by Matthew (cf. Mat 1:1; Mat 9:27; Mat 12:23; Mat 15:22; Mat 20:30-31; Mat 21:9; Mat 21:15; Mat 22:42; also note Rev 3:7; Rev 5:5; Rev 22:16).

Mat 12:24 “the Pharisees heard this, they said” This is the essence of the unpardonable sin, attributing God’s work to Satan and calling that which is true, false and that which is light, darkness. The Pharisees could not deny the marvelous powers of Jesus so they attributed them to the supernatural power of the evil one (cf. Mat 9:32-34; Mar 3:22-30, Luk 11:14-26).

“Beelzebul” This referred to the Ba’al (male Canaanite fertility god) of the City of Zebub (cf. 2 Kings 1). The Jews slightly changed the name to Ba’al of Zebul which meant ” lord of the dung” or “lord of the flies.” This word is spelled differently in the ancient texts. Zebul is in the Latin Vulgate and the Peshitta translations, while the term Zebub is in all the Greek manuscripts. It was a title for Satan. In later Judaism, Zebul was the chief of demons.

Fuente: You Can Understand the Bible: Study Guide Commentary Series by Bob Utley

one possessed with a devil = a demoniac. Greek. daimonizomai.

insomuch that = so that.

Fuente: Companion Bible Notes, Appendices and Graphics

22-45.] ACCUSATION OF CASTING OUT DEVILS BY BEELZEBUB, AND OUR LORDS DISCOURSE THEREON. DEMAND OF A SIGN FROM HIM: HIS FURTHER DISCOURSE. Mar 3:20-30. Luk 11:14-36, where also see notes. This account is given by Luke later in our Lords ministry, but without any fixed situation or time, and with less copiousness of detail. See also ch. Mat 9:32, and notes there. St. Mark (Mar 3:23-29) gives part of the discourse which follows, but without any determinate sequence, and omitting the miracle which led to it.

Fuente: The Greek Testament

Mat 12:22. , one possessed with a devil) extremely miserable.- , both spake and saw) The order of the miracle appears to be thus expressed.

Fuente: Gnomon of the New Testament

Mat 12:22-45

8. DISPUTATIONS WITH THE PHARISEES

Mat 12:22-45

22, 23 Then was brought unto him one possessed with a demon.-A record of this miracle is given by Mar 3:22-27 and Luk 11:14-28. It follows immediately the prophecy from Isaiah as a sequel of it. This man was doubly cursed by the demon as he was “blind and dumb”; Luke says that the demon “was dumb”; the man’s affliction was caused by the demon; diseases and the possession of demons are usually found together. The cure of this poor demoniac man seems to have been a signal instance of power; the man could neither hear nor see. Besides this, scribes had come “down from Jerusalem” (Mar 3:22), and the miracle was done boldly in their presence and that of a great multitude. The common people asked the question, after seeing and hearing the man who had been healed, “Can this be the son of David?” They meant by this the Messiah. They saw him fulfilling prophecy and were convinced by his teaching and miracle that he fulfilled the words of the prophet. (Isa 36:5.) They reasoned that the Messiah could do no greater things than these. (Joh 7:31.) Jesus was at this time again in Capernaum. The multitude asked this question in amazement, and could understand him in no other way , he must be “the son of David,” and if so, the Messiah; if not the son of David, he must be some other prophet of God; in either case they should hear and heed his teachings.

24 But when the Pharisees heard it.-The Pharisees reacted in the very opposite; the multitude could reach no other conclusion than that he was from God, or the son of David; but the Pharisees said, “This man doth not cast out demons” by the power of God, “but by Beelzebub the prince of the demons.” “Beelzebub” was the name taken from an idol of the Philistines of Ekron. (2Ki 1:2.) It meant the god of the fly which was worshiped to obtain deliverance from the injuries of that insect; some think that it signified the god of filth; it was a name of bitter contempt in the mouth of the Pharisees. Here is an admission by the Pharisees that Jesus worked miracles; that is, he performed deeds beyond the reach of any unaided human power, but they attribute this power to Beelzebub instead of to God. They did not mean to cast a reflection on God, but on Jesus; they did not understand the close relation between God and Jesus. This miracle was performed in the spiritual realm of Satan, yet they declared that it was done by “the prince of the demons.” They should have known better, may have known better; the devil cannot do works of pure goodness. These Pharisees knew that if the teachings of Jesus should prevail their influence was at an end; so the miracle they do not deny, but ascribe it to an infernal power, “Beelzebub the prince of the demons.”

25-27 And knowing their thoughts he said unto them.-Jesus knew the thoughts of men; he could see into the secret chambers of the heart and read the thoughts of men; “he needed not that any one should bear witness concerning man; for he himself knew what was in man.” (Joh 2:25.) So Jesus read the hearts of these Pharisees and answered their thoughts before they expressed them. This act of his would be another proof of his divinity as it showed another well-known attribute of God in which it is not known that Satan has any power, or that he could read the hearts of men without the help of their words. (Psa 44:21; Psa 139:2.) He said, “Every kingdom divided against itself is brought to desolation.” If he had cast out the demon by the prince of demons, Satan’s kingdom was divided against itself, and would soon come to “desolation.” Thus Jesus refuted their false reasoning by a simple and universal fact. A family, state, or kingdom at war with itself will soon be destroyed. If Satan destroys his own work, he destroys at one time what he builds at another; he is not so guilty of folly as to do this, but would be worthy of ridicule by men. So “if Satan casteth out Satan, he is divided against himself”; the Jews were not ready to concede this; again if this be the case with Satan, Jesus puts this question to these Pharisees, “How then shall his kingdom stand?” If their reasoning be correct, they should be able to answer this question. If Jesus used the power of Satan in casting out this demon, Satan’s kingdom is divided against itself and will soon fall; if he cast out the demon by the power of God, then the kingdom of God and the kingdom of Satan are in direct conflict with each other, and to cast out Satan is the strongest proof that can be visibly given of hostility to Satan.

And if I by Beelzebub cast out demons, by whom do your sons cast them out?-“Your sons” here means your disciples or followers; Jesus shows them that their cavil against him could be retorted upon them with more truth than they had imagined. His reasoning is that your followers or disciples, against whose actions they had made no objection and had actually taught and encouraged them so to do, pretended to cast out demons in some cases, and they had found no fault with them. These Pharisees claimed that their followers could exercise such power only with the power of God; therefore it is foolish and wicked in you now to urge such a cavil against me for doing the very same thing. Some among the Jews claimed this power of exorcism. (Mar 9:38; Act 19:13-14.) After making this argument, Jesus then added “therefore shall they be your judges.” They will arise in judgment against you to prove that you are actuated by ill will and malice. Jesus literally crushed them with this argument, but they were too obstinate to yield to it.

28, 29 But if I by the Spirit of God cast out demons.-Luke says by “the finger of God”; that is, the power of God. The magicians reported to Pharaoh that the miracles wrought by Moses were done by “the finger of God.” (Exo 8:19.) This was the only conclusion that could be reached, it was done by “the finger of God,” or the power of God and since this was true, “then is the kingdom of God come upon you.” The phrase “kingdom of God” is equivalent to saying that the Messiah has come and is in their midst; it is near enough to you to require you to believe and seek it. The kingdom of God is near, and therefore a kingdom of Satan is invaded and weakened. They ought to have rejoiced in the signs of this conquest of good over evil; they should have prepared their hearts to receive a kingdom which had power to perform such works of mercy. But truly they loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil. (Joh 3:19.) Again Jesus enforces his argument with an illustration: “How can one enter into the house of the strong man, and spoil his goods, except he first bind the strong man?” If the kingdom of the Messiah has not come near them in the person of Jesus, how can this power be granted unto Jesus? Jesus now pushed them to extremity. They knew that no prophet had ever claimed such power; they knew that the prophets had foretold that this power would belong to the Messiah. (Isa 49:25; Isa 53:12.) Therefore if Jesus is not the Messiah, this power to cast out demons, as he had done, would be impossible according to their own prophets; but if it was possible and the Messiah should have such power, it was manifested in him and they should accept him as the Messiah. He had entered the strong man’s house and had cast out a demon, thus manifesting his power to bind the strong man. The argument was unanswerable;but their perverse hearts were invincible.

30 He that is not with me is against me.-In the great conflict between life and darkness, good and evil, the kingdom of God and of Satan, there is no middle ground; there is no neutral position; there is no third power to which these miracles can be attributed. These Pharisees were obliged either to join with Christ or be against him; they had to become allies with God or coworkers with Satan; there was no other alternative. “No man can serve two masters” at the same time. (Mat 6:24.) The teachings of Jesus with his unanswerable arguments forced the conclusion upon these Pharisees, and they must now take sides with Jesus or join issue with him; the choice is theirs; sufficient instruction, evidence, and light have been given them for the choice; hence the responsibility of the choice rests upon them. To make the matter clear and easy for them to see, Jesus presents only two alternatives-if they are not with him, they are against him. Jesus further enforces this point by saying “he that gathereth not with me scattereth.” This figure may be taken from the image of war, with two opposing sides, or a harvest field, where the reapers either gather the harvest, or foolishly waste it. Mar 9:40 reverses these words and says “for he that is not against us is for us”; but his meaning is entirely different. Jesus here speaks of the war on Satan’s kingdom, but in Mark he speaks of the charity which his disciples were to show to such as use his name while they were too timid to follow him. The maxim taught by Jesus here is true in every age; people must be for Christ or against him; they are scattering, opposing him, or they are gathering with him.

31, 32 Therefore I say unto you, Every sin and blasphemy. -This is Jesus’ conclusion and application of his teaching. “Blasphemy” is injurious and malicious speaking against God or his attributes , to blaspheme in the scripture sense denotes improper and unworthy speeches against God, his attributes, works, or temple; it means to ascribe to God the weaknesses of men, or to attribute to men the perfections and works of God. Here Jesus fixes a limit of divine mercy. What is “the blasphemy against the Spirit”? Mar 3:30 tells us that the Pharisees had been guilty of blasphemy “because they said, He bath an unclean spirit.” This sin was maliciously ascribing a miracle of divine power to the power of Beelzebub. It is not said here “a sin against,” but “blasphemy against,” which is explained by “speak against the Holy Spirit.” The “blasphemy against the Spirit shall not be forgiven,” but “every sin and blasphemy shall be forgiven unto men” but the one “against the Holy Spirit.” Man may speak “a word against the Son of man” and “it shall be forgiven him,” but “whosoever shall speak against the Holy Spirit, it shall not be forgiven him, neither in this world, nor in that which is to come.” There has been much speculation about “the unpardonable sin” and “the blasphemy against the Holy Spirit.” Jesus came in the flesh, dwelt among men, and revealed the will of God to man. God the Father revealed his will to the Jews through Moses, and Jesus revealed the will of God to us. The Holy Spirit was to come in person and complete the work of Jesus. He said, “It is expedient for you that I go away; for if I go not away, the Comforter will not come unto you; but if I go, I will send him unto you. And he, when he is come, will convict the world in respect of sin, and of righteousness, and of judgment.” (Joh 16:7-8.) Many misunderstood Jesus, his teachings, and his kingdom while he was on earth, and even denied him as being the Messiah, who afterwards repented and were pardoned, and became Christians. (Act 2:37-38; Act 9:1; Act 9:17.) Many could and did reject Jesus while he was on earth, but when the Holy Spirit came and testified of him, they accepted Christ. But when the Holy Spirit came and gave the complete will of God, if men rejected this, there was no other evidence to be furnished, no other divine agency to be given, and if they finally rejected the Holy Spirit, there was no forgiveness for them. There was no forgiveness “neither in this world, nor in that which is to come.” Mark says “hath never forgiveness, but is guilty of an eternal sin.” (Mar 3:29.) No sin unforgiven here or in this world will be pardoned or forgiven hereafter.

[God bore testimony to men through the Old Testament scriptures; Jesus Christ bore testimony in person, given in the New Testament; and he stated that his testimony was incomplete, and he would send the Holy Spirit to complete or perfect that testimony. (Joh 16:7-8; Joh 16:13-14.) (Read also Joh 14:14; Joh 14:20-27; Joh 15:26; Joh 16:8.) They all teach that neither the revelations of the Father nor the Son were complete to guide into life eternal, save as people received the teachings of the Holy Spirit. The Spirit would come, perfect the testimony, and guide into all truth. Without this guidance being followed, they could not know the full faith of God. It is in perfect harmony with all these scriptures and with all the facts recorded in the Bible for Jesus, when they charged him with acting by the power of the devil, to warn them that they might do this now to him and find forgiveness; but if they so rejected and treated the Holy Spirit when he came, there would be no forgiveness, for there would be no more testimony and no more opportunity to repent. It refers, of course, to the final rejection of the will of God. To reject the will of God was to sin against God, to reject the words of Jesus was to sin against him, and to reject the teachings of the Holy Spirit was to sin against the Holy Spirit.]

[To blaspheme is to oppose and speak against. Many construe this to mean that Jesus defined the attributing the works of Jesus to the evil power as the sin against the Holy Spirit; but the Bible does not say so, nor anything that implies this. Read Mar 3:28-30; Luk 12:10. All classes and kinds of men, those that maligned, persecuted, and abused Jesus in every form and manner were warned and exhorted by the Holy Spirit to turn to Jesus and live. Paul was a persecutor and blasphemer of the Lord Jesus and sought the destruction of the whole church of God. Jesus did not mean to say that those who blasphemed and rejected Christ Jesus and regarded him as a servant of Satan might not turn to God when the Holy Spirit brought its message of love and power. He only meant to tell them: “You may reject my teachings, malign and abuse me as you are now doing; but when the Holy Spirit is come and bears his testimony, if you reject that, there will be no further offices of love and mercy, either in this world or the world to come.” To disobey and reject God was to blaspheme him; to reject and disobey Jesus was to blaspheme him , to reject and disobey the teachings of the Holy Spirit was to blaspheme him; and when the Holy Spirit performed his work to teach and save men, God’s provisions of mercy were exhausted.]

33-35 Either make the tree good, and its fruit good.-The general principle that a tree is known by its fruits is often applied by Jesus to the proof that a man’s actions reveal the character of his life. (Mat 7:15-20.) Some think that this explains the preceding verses concerning blasphemy against the Holy Spirit, because it follows immediately those verses. Such malicious language is justly condemned because it proceeds from a corrupted heart. Perhaps it applies and explains a general argument of Jesus that he had worked a miracle by divine power; they could judge Jesus and his character by his teachings and conduct; that is, he said, “Judge of me as you do of trees, by their fruit. Regard me either as good or bad according to my actions. I do works of mercy, and speak reverently of God; these results can come only from a pious heart.” (Joh 9:25; Joh 9:30; Joh 9:33.)

Ye offspring of vipers, how can ye, being evil, speak good things?-A viper is a serpent which was familiar in the east; the poison of its bite caused death with great agonies. John the Baptist had used this expression when many of the Pharisees and Sadducees came to him for baptism; he addressed them, “ye offspring of vipers.” At another time Jesus addressed them, “ye serpents, ye offspring of vipers.” (Mat 23:33.) This was a forceful way of addressing them as they were guileful and hypocritical. As teachable believers and pious persons are likened to doves and lambs, which are innocent and harmless animals, so the malicious and unbelieving are compared to goats, dogs, and vipers, according as they are sensual, foul, or malicious. These Pharisees had shown the hatred and venom of serpents and deserved this epithet. Good works and clear reasoning could not be expected from them; they were corrupted; and hence “out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaketh.” Their hearts were not right and the principles of their lives were wrong, therefore the exhibitions of character were only such as could have been expected. This reveals a very depraved condition and shows the dire need of the Savior whom they were rejecting. The other side is illustrated by the “good man out of his good treasure bringeth forth good things.” The heart of a good man is a treasure of good things. Divine truths, blessed expressions, holy emotions dwell there richly and abound. Like a wealthy banker, he has only to draw the precious treasure forth as occasions demand. On the other hand, “the evil man out of his evil treasure bringeth forth evil things.” From the evil heart comes hostile feelings against truth and goodness, skeptical arguments, malign emotions purposed to prefer self-interest to the right, hatred of God and his truth. All these heaped together make a storehouse of evil works from which the evil man may draw abundantly.

36, 37 Every idle word that men shall speak.-“Idle word” does not mean here what is usually termed now as “idle words”; it does not mean careless, innocent talk on subjects secular and social, and opposed to serious conversation. Rather it signifies wicked, malicious, injurious, slandering, impious words. To “give account thereof in the day of judgment” means that we will be held responsible for such wicked and vicious words uttered against God, Christ, and the Holy Spirit. Our social, insignificant words among friends will not be sufficient to condemn us; only such words as manifest the real principle of our actions, whether we love God truly, or love the world and self, will serve to justify or condemn us. It is dangerous for Christians to be always engaged in foolish, unmeaning conversation, and more dangerous still, a profane and unseemly jesting, because such conduct manifests a state of heart which justifies condemnation. This does not mean that a Christian cannot engage in innocent jesting and levity. “A cheerful heart is a good medicine; but a broken spirit drieth up the bones.” (Prow. 17:22.) A genial and pleasant gracefulness of conversation in social relations helps to adorn a Christian. A mother’s prattling to her babe may be as innocent and as clearly prove a loving heart as her tears over its grave. So the term “idle word” may mean not merely unimportant or insignificant, but implies that there is some positive evil in the word.

[Idle words and jesting mean those which are vulgar and coarse and corrupt the hearer. Idle words are evil words that excite the lusts and corrupt man. Idle words are compared with speaking against the Son of man and the Holy Spirit. In Eph 5:4 jesting is classed with fornication, uncleanness, or covetousness, and in contrast with giving of thanks. The corrupt communication is that which excites the lusts, corrupts and depraves the heart, and in contrast with that which ministers grace to the hearer.]

For by thy words thou shalt be justified.-This explains the preceding verse; by our words, however unimportant, we shall be justified or condemned, according as they are good or evil. If our words are good, we shall “be justified” by them; but if our words be evil, we shall “be condemned.” By good words, good thoughts, and good deeds, we will be judged righteous in the final judgment; but by evil words, evil thoughts, and evil deeds we will be condemned. This is the meaning of “justified” here as in Jas 2:21-25, not as in Rom 5:1, pardoned, which is by faith.

38-40 Then certain of the scribes and Pharisees answered him.-The term “answered” does not mean that Jesus had asked a question; in this instance they made a request of him. They requested to “see a sign” from Jesus; he claimed to be the Son of God; they asked for a sign proving his claim. Luke says that they “sought of him a sign from heaven.” (Luk 11:16.) To ask for this sign was to ignore and count as useless all that he had done; it was to deny that he had worked any miracles by the power of God; hence they now call on him to show them “a sign from heaven.” Paul said the Jews sought after signs and Greeks after wisdom (1Co 1:22);that is, some particular exhibition of divine power and glory. Satan tempted Jesus to show signs of his authority as a Son of God. (Mat 4:6 John 2:18 6:30.) The carnal minds of the Jews prevented them from perceiving the real truth.

Jesus said in reply, “An evil and adulterous generation seeketh after a sign.” A wife who leaves her husband and commits sin against the marriage covenant is called an adulterous person; the Jews were bound to the law by a holy covenant, having all the sacredness of the marriage vow (Eze 16:38; Hos 3:1) even as Christians now are wedded in the most solemn vows to Christ (Eph 5:24; Eph 5:32). When Israel committed idolatries, or sought help from heathen nations, it received this epithet, “adulterous generation.” They merited it because of their unfaithfulness to Jehovah. Jesus called the generation of his day an “adulterous generation” because they had refused him, even after he had given them sufficient evidence of his claim. He told them that no signs should be given “but the sign of Jonah the prophet.”

The “sign of Jonah the prophet” was “as Jonah was three days and three nights in the belly of the whale; so shall the Son of man he three days and three nights in the heart of the earth.” Ezekiel was a sign to the people (Eze 24:4);Isaiah walked barefoot for a sign (Isa 20:3); Jonah was a sign to the Ninevites to foretell their destruction; hence, the Son of man, after his resurrection, would he a sign to prove to the Jews the terrible fate of their unbelief. We have an account of Jonah’s experience in Jon 1:17 and chapter 2. The word “whale” does not determine the kind of animal which became the typical grave of Jonah. The book of Jonah says, “Jehovah prepared a great fish to swallow up Jonah; and Jonah was in the belly of the fish three days and three nights.” (Jon 1:17.) “Three days and three nights”; here we have an expression which has given some trouble to students of the Bible. Jesus was in the grave but two nights and parts of three days, and it is likely that Jonah was in the fish the same length of time. (Luk 24:6-8.) If we had no knowledge beyond the modern division of time, we would be at a loss to explain the difference between the words of Christ and the actual event. The Jews had no word corresponding to our natural day of twenty-four hours, or from midnight to midnight; their meaning was expressed by a word meaning “a night-day,” and to this they added the custom of saying “night and day” for what we mean by a natural day or a revolution of the earth; hence, to express the time of a part of three consecutive days, they were obliged to say three night-days, or three days and three nights. (See Est 4:16 compared with 5:1 and 1Sa 30:12 compared with verse 13.) Esther said she would not eat for “three days, night or day,” yet on the third day she went to the king to ask him to her banquet. The Egyptian whom David found is said to have eaten nothing “three days and three nights,” yet again he says it was the “third day” since he fell sick. (See also 2Ch 10:5; 2Ch 10:12.) The Jews in reckoning time counted a part of a day as a day, and began their days in the evening. Jesus was crucified on Friday, was in the grave part of Friday, all day Saturday, and rose early on Sunday morning, or the first day of the week, and was, in their language, three days and nights in the earth. “In the heart of the earth”; this means simply the grave, or the interior or “lower parts of the earth.” (Psa 63:9; Eph 4:9.) It is the same as the abyss of which Peter spoke (Act 2:27) where Christ “went and preached unto the spirits in prison” (1Pe 3:19). The separate state and place of spirits according to the Jew’s conception was “in the region under the earth,” hence “the heart of the earth.” Some have claimed since Jesus was not buried in the ground, but enclosed in a tomb of rock, that it cannot be truthfully said that he was in “the heart of the earth”; but the rock is a part of the earth as much so as the soil, and there is nothing in the cavil.

41, 42 The men of Nineveh shall stand up in the judgment.-Nineveh was the capital of Assyria; it was a large city on the river Tigris, northeast of Babylon, and was built in early times by Asshur. (Gen 10:11.) It was about fifty miles in circumference, and surrounded by a wall one hundred feet high with fifteen hundred towers, each two hundred and fifty feet in height. It is estimated that its population was six hundred thousand in the time of Jonah. They were idolaters and very wicked but being warned by Jonah to repent they humbled themselves and repented; God spared them and their city for two hundred years longer. Nahum and Zephaniah also prophesied their destruction. (Nah 2:6; Zep 2:13; Zep 2:15.) Nineveh “shall condemn” “this generation” “in the judgment.” The reason assigned for this is that Nineveh “repented at the preaching of Jonah”;but this generation did not repent at the preaching of Jesus who was “a greater than Jonah.” Nineveh compared with that generation had acted prudently and piously; she would show by contrast the awful obstinacy and wickedness of the generation which crucified Jesus. The far superior example of the Ninevites shall reflect condemnation on the inhabitants of that generation. Nineveh repented on much less evidence than had been given to Jerusalem and that generation; however, they had rejected the miracles of Jesus, denied his claim, persisted in their sins, and died in impenitence.

The queen of the south shall rise up in the judgment.- “The queen of the south” was the queen of Sheba. (1Ki 10:1-13.) She was from the southern part of Arabia which was from its great distance from Jerusalem called “the ends of the earth.” If she came from Arabia, she may have been a descendant of Abraham by Keturah, one of whose sons begat Shebah. She may have had a traditional knowledge of the true God, and came to hear Solomon “concerning the name of Jehovah.” She was deeply affected by the visit to Solomon and gave praise to God; her conduct in going so far to seek for better knowledge of God, her generosity and open confession, will all manifest in a more hateful light the hardness of heart which was shown by those to whom Jesus was speaking. Josephus calls her “queen of Egypt and Ethiopia”; however, the Arabians claim her. “A greater than Solomon is here.” The queen of Sheba went a great distance to be instructed by Solomon, yet “a greater than Solomon” was in the very midst of these Jews, and they would not hear him; hence, the example of the queen of Sheba condemned the Jews then and will condemn them “in the judgment.” The example of Solomon and the queen of Sheba reinforces the argument that Jesus based on Jonah and the Ninevites.

[In the days of Solomon the highest good man could attain for himself or bestow on others was to be attained by fearing God and keeping his commandments. This was the whole duty of man. When Jesus came he exclaimed, “Behold, a greater than Solomon is here.” He showed his superiority by bringing to the world greater and more heavenly laws embodying more of the divine spirit. Still the greatest good possible for man to enjoy or bestow is found in doing the commandments of God. The highest claim of excellence put forth by Jesus Christ was that he did the will of his Father who sent him. Any claim to a higher spirituality than can be attained through the faithful observance of God’s laws which were revealed through Christ is blasphemy.]

43-45 But the unclean spirit, when he is gone out of the man.-Jesus warns the Jews that the evil spirits which he had cast out would return, and if they found the man impenitent, they would take possession of his heart with greater malignity than ever and would hasten him on to ruin. The unclean spirit is represented as going “through waterless places, seeking rest, and findeth it not.” The Jews, Arabs, Egyptians, and others believed that deserts were the haunts of evil spirits. The words “wild beasts” and “owls” are referred to as inhabiting deserts. (Isa 34:14; Jer 50:39.) Hence, the evil spirit finds habitation in the desert; it is represented as a man in a fever, who in vain turns to every side for ease, but finds none, or one whose nervous system is disorganized, and cannot remain still, but is driven about by restless madness; so a wicked soul is its own incessant curse; goodness is the soul’s health. The demon, driven by divine power from the hearts of men, is pictured by Jesus as going about searching for a fit abode and restless because no human heart is found for residence.

Then he saith, I will return into my house whence I came out.-That is, return to the living human frame, from whence it had been driven out. When it returns it finds the heart better suited for its abode; the impenitent heart is the fit dwelling place of Satan. When he returns “he findeth it empty, swept, and garnished.” What a garnishing is that which tempts the wicked one to return! Judas, as an individual, is an example of the truth of this parable; the Jewish nation, after the crucifixion of Jesus, illustrated this in terrific outlines. It is a dark picture of sin to find a heart where the best faculties become only as baits and allurements for the foul spirits to take up their abode. Many attractions and qualities which are valued by men are but parts of this evil adorning. Impenitent wills, mere physical beauty, learned talents are often the vanities which have changed the destiny of the soul and given it up to the powers of evil.

Then goeth he, and taketh with himself seven other spirits more evil than himself.-“Seven” was a favorite number with the Jews, and very often used to denote any finished or complete number, also to signify several persons or things, answering to our word “many.” (1Sa 2:5.) The evil spirit will not reenter weak and alone; he will take with him a strong reinforcement so as not again to be ejected. “The last state of that man becometh worse than the first.” This seems to indicate that there are different degrees of depravity among demons as well as among men; they are worse after having returned, and the man into whom they reenter is sevenfold worse. “Even so shall it be also unto this evil generation.” These words show Jesus’ application of the parable; we can now say so it was with that generation. The account given by Josephus of the last years of Jerusalem present a picture of infatuation, demoniac madness and crime such as the world has never elsewhere beheld. The parable refers not merely to verses thirty-eight to forty-two, but to the whole narrative (verses 22-42) which was occasioned by the miracle in verse twenty-two.

[There were evil spirits in those days who took possession of men’s hearts. When cast out, they were supposed to inhabit dry desert places. One was cast out and he walked through dry places, seeking rest, finding none. He said, “I will return into my house,” the heart whence he was cast out. He did so, found it empty, swept, fitted for the abode of a spirit, but none inhabited it. When the evil spirit had been cast out, he did not take it in a good spirit as he should have done. The evil spirit, finding it unoccupied with a good spirit, entered in and took with him seven other spirits more wicked than himself, and the last state of that man is worse than the first. All, too, because he did not fill his heart with good when the evil was cast out. Jesus said it should be so with that evil generation. He had come and by his teaching checked the evil tendency; but as they failed to take him as their guiding spirit it would end in evil. They would be the worse for having known and rejected Jesus. This principle applies to men now. If we know the truth, and fail to practice and obey it, the heart is hardened. We are the worse for having known it. The gospel is a savor of life unto life, or of death unto death.]

Fuente: Old and New Testaments Restoration Commentary

Our King and the Powers of Darkness

Mat 12:22. Then was brought unto him one possessed with a devil, blind, and dumb: and he healed him, insomuch that the blind and dumb both spake and saw.

It is well when men take to bringing others to Jesus: good is sure to come of it. An extraordinary case exhibited a novel form of the handicraft of Satan. The evil spirit had secured himself by stopping up the windows and the door of the soul: the victim was blind and dumb. How could he escape? He could not see his Saviour, nor cry to him. But the double evil vanished when, in an instant, Jesus dislodged the demon: ” the blind and dumb both spake and saw.” When Satan is dethroned, the spiritual faculties begin to work at once. Nothing baffles our Lord. Men who neither see their sin, nor cry for mercy, his grace can save.

Lord, be with us when we preach, and cast out devils by thy Word; then shall moral inability be succeeded by gracious health.

Mat 12:23. And all the people were amazed, and said, Is not this the son of David?

Again and again we have noticed their astonishment; and here a question was asked which may have been the footfall of coming faith in many. Our Revised Version very properly leaves out the “not.” It was natural for the translators to put it in, for it looks as if many must have seen the true Solomon in this great Wonderworker. But as it is not in the original, we must not allow the “not”; and then the question shows how strangely unbelieving they were, and yet how some conviction forced itself on them. “Is he? He cannot be; he must be; but is he? Is this the

Son of David?” There were various voices, yet the people were one in their wonderment: all the people were amazed.

Mat 12:24. But when the Pharisees heard it, they said, This fellow doth not cast out devils, but by Beelzebub the prince of the devils.

This was their former concoction. It was old and stale, yet for lack of a better or more bitter suggestion, they stick to it. Our Lord was too busy to reply to the vile slander on its first appearance (Mat 9:34); or perhaps he so loathed it that he would not touch it, but left the abominable thing to poison itself with its own venom. Now they bring it out again, and come to minuter detail of lying by mentioning Beelzebub as the name of the prince of the devils, with whom he was in league. Lies grow as they move on. Those who doubt God’s work in the conversion of sinners, soon advance in hardihood, and ascribe the blessed change to hypocrisy, self-interest, madness, or some other evil influence.

Mat 12:25-26. And Jesus knew their thoughts, and said unto them, Every kingdom divided against itself is brought to desolation; and every city or house divided against itself shall not stand: and if Satan cast out Satan, he is divided against himself; how shall then his kingdom stand?

The Thought-reader meets them with an argument in the highest degree conclusive, overwhelming them by reducing their statement to absurdity. Imagine Satan divided against Satan, and his kingdom thus rent with civil war! No: whatever faults the devils have, they are not at strife with each other; that fault is reserved for the servants of a better Master. Oh, that divisions in the church were not so many, and so desolating as they are! It would be a very hopeful circumstance if we could hear of divisions among the powers of darkness; for then would Satan’s kingdom fall. No, ye cunning Pharisees; your slanderous suggestion is too manifestly a lie, and reasonable men are not to be entrapped by it!

Mat 12:27. And if I by Beelzebub cast out devils, by whom do your children cast them out? therefore they shall be your judges.

Our Lord here used an argument fitted for the men he dealt with. It was not so forcible in itself as the former one, but as an argument to them it would come home with singular force. Some of the disciples of the Pharisees, and probably some of their children, acted as exorcists; and, whether truly or falsely, professed to cast out devils. If Jesus wrought this marvel by Beelzebub, and the Pharisees had made that discovery, how could they have learned it better than from their own sons? Did their sons have dealings with the demon-prince? This would impale them on the horns of a dilemma, and prevent their uttering that malicious invention again, for the sake of their own friends.

Mat 12:28. But if I cast out devils by the Spirit of God, then the kingdom of God is come unto you.

Our Lord in effect says-If I cast out devils by the Spirit of God, then is a new era begun: the divine power has come into distinct conflict with the evil one, and is manifestly victorious. In my person is “the kingdom of God ” inaugurated, and you are placed in a position of gracious advantage by my being among you. But if the devils be not cast out by the Spirit of God, the throne of God is not among you, and you are grievous losers. The overthrow of evil is a clear proof that the kingdom of grace has come.

Note that, though our Lord had power all his own, he honoured the Spirit of God, and worked by his energy, and mentioned the fact that he did so. What can we do without that Spirit? Lord God the Holy Ghost, teach us to wait on thee!

Mat 12:29. Or else how can one enter into a strong man’s house, and spoil his goods, except he first bind the strong man? and then he will spoil his house.

The devil is the strong man, the giant robber. He holds men in possession as a warrior holds his property. There is no getting his goods from him without first encountering himself. The bare idea of spoiling him while you are his friend, or he is unsubdued, is ridiculous. Our Lord, when his work began, bound Satan: the presence of God in human flesh was a restraint upon man’s foe. Having bound the enemy, he now takes out of his house those spoils which else had been for ever in his possession. There is no deliverance for us save by our Lord’s victory over our powerful tyrant. Glory be to his name, he has bound the mighty, and he takes from him his prey! This was our Lord’s fair and self-evident explanation of the matter concerning which Pharisees theorized so basely.

Mat 12:30. He that is not with me is against me; and he that gathereth not with me scattereth abroad.

Our Lord had made no compromise with Satan. Satan was not with him, but against him. He meant to be equally decisive in his dealings with all other parties. Men must either come to his side, or be reckoned as his opponents; there can be no middle course. Jesus meant war with the great enemy, and with all who sided with evil. Men would of necessity practically take sides: their actions would tend to gather to him or to scatter from him. Jesus is the one and only possible centre of human unity; and whatever teaching does not unite men in him, disperses them through selfishness, pride, hate, and a thousand other disintegrating forces. Our King has thrown down the gage of battle, and he will never accept truce or compromise. Lord, let me never hesitate, but be with thee, and gather with thee.

Mat 12:31. Wherefore I say unto you, All manner of sin and blasphemy shall be forgiven unto men: but the blasphemy against the Holy Ghost shall not be forgiven unto men.

Here is a solemn warning for these slanderous Pharisees: the sin of reviling the Spirit of God, and imputing his work to Beelzebub, is a very great one; and, in fact, so hardens the heart that men who are guilty of it never repent, and consequently are never forgiven. Our Lord let his opponents see whither they were drifting: they were on the verge of a sin for which no pardon would be possible. We must be very tender in our conduct towards “the Holy Ghost”; for his honour has a special guard set about it by such a solemn text as this.

Mat 12:32. And whosoever speaketh a word against the Son of man, it shall be forgiven him: but whosoever speaketh against the Holy Ghost, it shall not be forgiven him, neither in this world, neither in the world to conic.

Why should a word be spoken against Jesus? Yet many words are so spoken, and he forgives. But when it comes to wilfully confounding the Holy Spirit with the evil spirit, the offence is rank, and heinous, and most hardening to the heart. In no state of the divine economy was it ever possible to extend forgiveness to one who wilfully regarded God himself as in league with the devil. This is spiritual death, nay, rottenness and corruption of the most putrid kind. It is no error, but a wicked, wilful blasphemy of the Holy Ghost which dares to impute his works of grace and power to diabolical agency.

He who is guilty of this outrageous crime has sinned himself into a condition in which spiritual feeling is dead, and repentance has become morally impossible.

Mat 12:33. Either make the tree good, and his fruit good; or else make the tree corrupt, and his fruit corrupt: for the tree is known by his fruit.

Still he argues with the Pharisees, and as good as says, “Be consistent; accept me and my works, or reject me and my works; for by my works only can you judge me. But do not admit the work to be a good one, and then charge me with being in league with the devil in the doing of it. If I were in league with the devil, I should do works such as the devil does, and not works which shake his kingdom.” The expostulation is most powerful, because it is founded in righteousness: we judge a tree by its fruits, and a man by his actions, and there is no other truthful mode of judging.

Head the words out of their connection and they teach the great general truth that the inner and the outer life must correspond.

Mat 12:34-35. O generation of vipers, how can ye, being evil, speak good, things? for out of the. abundance of the heart the mouth speaketh. A good man out of the good treasure of the heart bringeth forth good things: and an evil man. out of the evil treasure bringeth forth evil things.

Our Lord accuses them of “being evil.” He repeats John’s words, “O generation of vipers! “They had spoken evil: how could they do otherwise when their hearts were so full of malice towards him? They had gone to the utmost extreme of malevolence in charging him with being in league with Satan, and that only showed what a treasure of evil lay within their hearts. They threw evil forth with energy of temper, and with lavishness of falsehood, because they had such a fulness of it within. That which is in the well comes up in the bucket. The heart betrays itself through the mouth. Had they been good, their words would have been good; but such was their baseness of heart, that they could not “speak good things.” Thus our Lord carried the war into their own territory, and flashed holy indignation in their faces.

Mat 12:36-37. But I say unto you, That every idle word that men shall speak, they shall give account thereof in the day of judgment. For by thy words thou shalt be justified, and by thy words thou shalt be condemned.

They might think that they had done no great wrong when they scattered their black phrases among the people: they had only given their opinion with more or less of levity; at the worst, they had only spoken “idle words.” Thus they would make light of what they had done now that the Lord had most completely crushed them. But our Lord drives them out of this retreat. He deals strictly with such gross offenders. Words are to be accounted for at the last great day. Words prove men just, or worthy of condemnation. Their very works may be judged by their words. There is a something very heart-revealing about men’s language, and especially about those words which spring from deep-seated passion. We may, when we are convicted of unjust speech, shield ourselves behind the notion that our bark was worse than our bite, and that we merely said so and so, and hardly meant it to be taken so seriously, but the plea will not avail us. We must mind what we say about godly men, and especially about their Lord; for libellous words will live, and will be swift witnesses against us in the day of judgment, when we shall find that they were all recorded in the book of God.

Surely this business of charging the Lord Jesus with being in league with Satan was never likely to be heard of again while he lived! He had silenced that form of slander once for all, as far as the Pharisees were concerned.

Dear Master, help me to bridle my tongue, that I be not found guilty of idle words; and teach me when to speak, that I may keep equally clear of idle silence.

Fuente: Spurgeon’s The Gospel of the Kingdom

possessed

(Greek – ,” demonized). (See Scofield “Mat 7:22”)

Fuente: Scofield Reference Bible Notes

was: Mat 9:32, Mar 3:11, Luk 11:14

he healed: Mar 7:35-37, Mar 9:17-26

blind: Psa 51:15, Isa 29:18, Isa 32:3, Isa 32:4, Isa 35:5, Isa 35:6, Act 26:18

Reciprocal: Mat 4:24 – possessed Mat 8:16 – and he Mat 9:27 – two Mat 17:18 – rebuked Mat 20:30 – two Mar 1:27 – they were Mar 9:25 – thou Mar 10:52 – he received Luk 4:36 – They were Joh 11:42 – that they

Fuente: The Treasury of Scripture Knowledge

2:22

Being possessed with a devil is explained at chapter 8:28. It was the man who was rendered blind and dumb, for when the devil was cast out the man spoke.

Fuente: Combined Bible Commentary

THIS passage of Scripture contains “things hard to be understood.” The sin against the Holy Ghost in particular has never been fully explained by the most learned divines. It is not difficult to show from Scripture what the sin is not. It is difficult to show clearly what it is. We must not be surprised. The Bible would not be the book of God, if it had not deep places here and there, which man has no line to fathom. Let us rather thank God that there are lessons of wisdom to be gathered, even out of these verses, which the unlearned may easily understand.

Let us gather from them, in the first place, that there is nothing too blasphemous for hardened and prejudiced men to say against religion. Our Lord casts out a devil; and at once the Pharisees declare that He does it “by the prince of the devils.”

This was an absurd charge. Our Lord shows that it was unreasonable to suppose that the devil would help to pull down his own kingdom, and “Satan cast out Satan.” But there is nothing too absurd and unreasonable for men to say, when they are thoroughly set against religion. The Pharisees are not the only people who have lost sight of logic, good sense, and temper, when they have attacked the Gospel of Christ.

Strange as this charge may sound, it is one that has often been made against the servants of God. Their enemies have been obliged to confess that they are doing a work, and producing an effect on the world. The results of Christian labor stare them in the face. They cannot deny them. What then shall they say? They say the very thing that the Pharisees said of our Lord, “It is the devil.” The early heretics used language of this kind about Athanasius. The Roman Catholics spread reports of this sort about Martin Luther. Such things will be said as long as the world stands.

We must never be surprised to hear of dreadful charges being made against the best of men, without cause. “If they called the Master of the house Beelzebub, how much more shall they call them of his household?”-It is an old device. When the Christian’s arguments cannot be answered, and the Christian’s works cannot be denied, the last resource of the wicked is to try to blacken the Christian’s character. If this be our lot, let us bear it patiently. Having Christ and a good conscience, we may be content. False charges will not keep us out of heaven. Our character will be cleared at the last day.

In the second place, let us gather out of these verses the impossibility of neutrality in religion. “He that is not with Christ is against him, and he that gathereth not with him scattereth abroad.”

There are many persons in every age of the Church, who need to have this lesson pressed upon them. They endeavor to steer a middle course in religion. They are not so bad as many sinners, but still they are not saints. They feel the truth of Christ’s Gospel, when it is brought before them, but are afraid to confess what they feel. Because they have these feelings, they flatter themselves they are not so bad as others. And yet they shrink from the standard of faith and practice which the Lord Jesus sets up. They are not boldly on Christ’s side, and yet they are not openly against Him. Our Lord warns all such that they are in a dangerous position. There are only two parties in religious matters. There are only two camps. There are only two sides. Are we with Christ, and working in His cause? If not, we are against Him. Are we doing good in the world? If not, we are doing harm.

The principle here laid down is one which it concerns us all to remember. Let us settle it in our minds, that we shall never have peace, and do good to others, unless we are thorough-going and decided in our Christianity. The way of Gamaliel and Erasmus never yet brought happiness and usefulness to any one, and never will.

In the third place, let us gather from these verses the exceeding sinfulness of sins against knowledge.

This is a practical conclusion which appears to flow naturally from our Lord’s words about the blasphemy against the Holy Ghost. Difficult as these words undoubtedly are, they seem fairly to prove that there are degrees in sin. Offences arising from ignorance of the true mission of the Son of Man, will not be punished so heavily as offences committed against the noontide light of the dispensation of the Holy Ghost. The brighter the light, the greater the guilt of him who rejects it. The clearer a man’s knowledge of the nature of the Gospel, the greater his sin, if he wilfully refuses to repent and believe.

The doctrine here taught is one that does not stand alone in Scripture. Paul says to the Hebrews, “It is impossible for those who were once enlightened,-if they shall fall away, to renew them again unto repentance.” “If we sin wilfully, after that we have received the knowledge of the truth, there remaineth no more sacrifice for sins, but a fearful looking for of judgment.” (Heb 6:4-6, and Heb 10:26-27.) It is a doctrine of which we find mournful proofs in every quarter. The unconverted children of godly parents, the unconverted servants of godly families, and the unconverted members of evangelical congregations are the hardest people on earth to impress. They seem past feeling. The same fire which melts the wax, hardens the clay.-It is a doctrine, moreover, which receives awful confirmation from the histories of some of those whose last ends were eminently hopeless. Pharaoh, and Saul, and Ahab, and Judas Iscariot, and Julian, and Francis Spira, are fearful illustrations of our Lord’s meaning. In each of these cases there was a combination of clear knowledge and deliberate rejection of Christ. In each there was light in the head, but hatred of truth in the heart. And the end of each seems to have been blackness of darkness for ever.

May God give us a will to use our knowledge, whether it be little or great! May we beware of neglecting our opportunities, and leaving our privileges unimproved! Have we light? Then let us live fully up to our light. Do we know the truth? Then let us walk in the truth. This is the best safeguard against the unpardonable sin.

In the last place, let us gather from these verses the immense importance of carefulness about our daily words. Our Lord tells us, that “for every idle word that men shall speak, they shall give account in the day of judgment.” And He adds, “By thy words thou shalt be justified, and by thy words thou shalt be condemned.”

There are few of our Lord’s sayings which are so heart-searching as this. There is nothing, perhaps, to which most men pay less attention than their words. They go through their daily work, speaking and talking without thought or reflection, and seem to fancy that if they do what is right, it matters but little what they say.

But is it so? Are our words so utterly trifling and unimportant? We dare not say so, with such a passage of Scripture as this before our eyes. Our words are the evidence of the state of our hearts, as surely as the taste of the water is an evidence of the state of the spring. “Out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaketh.” The lips only utter what the mind conceives. Our words will form one subject of inquiry at the day of judgment. We shall have to give account of our sayings, as well as our doings. Truly these are very solemn considerations. If there were no other text in the Bible, this passage ought to convince us, that we are all “guilty before God,” and need a righteousness better than our own, even the righteousness of Christ. (Php 3:9.)

Let us be humble as we read this passage, in the recollection of time past. How many idle, foolish, vain, light, frivolous, sinful, and unprofitable things we have all said! How many words we have used which, like thistle-down, have flown far and wide, and sown mischief in the hearts of others that will never die! How often when we have met our friends, “our conversation,” to use an old saint’s expression, “has only made work for repentance.” There is deep truth in the remark of Burkitt, “A profane scoff or atheistical jest may stick in the minds of those that hear it, after the tongue that spake it is dead. A word spoken is physically transient, but morally permanent.” “Death and life,” says Solomon, “are in the power of the tongue.” (Pro 18:21.)

Let us be watchful as we read this passage about words, when we look forward to our days yet to come. Let us resolve, by God’s grace, to be more careful over our tongues, and more particular about our use of them. Let us pray daily that our “speech may be always with grace.” (Col 4:6.) Let us say every morning with holy David, “I will take heed to my ways, that I offend not in my tongue.” Let us cry with him to the Strong for strength, and say, “Set a watch over my mouth, and keep the door of my lips.” Well indeed might James say, “If any man offend not in word, the same is a perfect man.” (Psa 39:1. Psa 141:3. Jam 3:2.)

Fuente: Ryle’s Expository Thoughts on the Gospels

Mat 12:22. Then. Indefinite, here meaning afterwards.

Was brought. Such an one could not come alone.

One possessed, etc., or, a demoniac, blind and dumb. A different case from that mentioned in chap. Mat 9:32-34. The physical effect of the possession was similar, but more unfortunate; the accusation of the Pharisees was similar, but more blasphemous.

Fuente: A Popular Commentary on the New Testament

As a farther instance of Christ’s miraculous power, he healeth one whom the devil had cast into a disease which deprived him both of speech and sight: at this miracle the multitude wonder, saying, Is not this the son of David? that is, the promised Messias. The Pharisees hearing this, with great bitterness and contempt said, This fellow casteth out devils by Beelzebub the prince of devils.

Observe from hence, How obstinacy and malice will make man misconstrue the actions of the most holy and innocent; Christ casteth out devils, say the Pharisees, by the help of the devil. There never was any person so good, nor any action so gracious, but they have been subject both to censure and misconstructions. The best way is to square our actions by the right rule of justice and charity, and then let the world pass their censures at their pleasure. When the holy and innocent Jesus was thus assaulted, what wonder is it if we his sinful servants be branded on all sides by reviling tongues! Why should we expect better treatment than the Son of God.

Fuente: Expository Notes with Practical Observations on the New Testament

Mat 12:22-24. Then was brought unto him Namely, By the persons friends, one possessed with a devil, blind and dumb Many, no doubt, supposed these defects to be merely natural: but the Spirit of God saw otherwise, and gives the true account, both of the disorder and the cure. How many other disorders, seemingly natural, may even now be owing to the same cause! And he healed him He immediately expelled the evil spirit, and in an instant removed the effects of his diabolical influence: And all the people were amazed At so extraordinary a miracle, by which the noblest sense, and likewise the most useful faculty of the human body, were restored together: and said, Is not this the Son of David? that is, The Messiah. But when the Pharisees Who were present, and the scribes, who had come down from Jerusalem, heard it, that is, heard this natural reflection of the people, and observed that they were beginning to infer, from the wonderful miracles which they saw Jesus perform, that he was the expected Messiah; fearing lest such a belief, if it should gain ground, would put an end to their credit with, and authority over, the people, they said, This fellow doth not cast out devils but by Beelzebub, &c. Thus giving the most malicious and unreasonable turn to the matter which could be imagined.

Fuente: Joseph Bensons Commentary on the Old and New Testaments

XLVIII.

BLASPHEMOUS ACCUSATIONS OF THE JEWS.

(Galilee.)

aMATT. XII. 22-37; bMARK III. 19-30; cLUKE XI. 14-23.

b19 And he cometh into a house. [Whose house is not stated.] 20 And the multitude cometh together again [as on a previous occasion– Mar 2:1], so that they could not so much as eat bread. [They could not sit down to a regular meal. A wonderful picture of the intense importunity of people and the corresponding eagerness of Jesus, who was as willing to do as they were to have done.] 21 And when his friends heard it, they went out to lay hold on him: for they said, He is beside himself. [These friends were his brothers and his mother, as appears from Mar 3:31, Mar 3:32. They probably came from Nazareth. To understand their feelings, we must bear in mind their want of [298] faith. See Joh 7:3-9. They regarded Jesus as carried away by his religious enthusiasm ( Act 26:24, 2Co 5:13), and thought that he acted with reckless regard for his personal safety. They foresaw the conflict with the military authorities and the religious leaders into which the present course of Jesus was leading, and were satisfied that the case called for their interference. Despite her knowledge as to Jesus, Mary sympathized with her sons in this movement, and feared for the safety of Jesus.] a22 Then was brought unto him one possessed with a demon, blind and dumb: {c14 And he was casting out a demon that was dumb.} aand he healed him, insomuch that cit came to pass, when the demon was gone out, athe dumb man spake and saw. [The man was brought because he could not come alone. While Luke does not mention the blindness, the similarity of the narratives makes it most likely that he is describing the same circumstances as Matthew and Mark, so we have combined the three accounts.] 23 And all the multitudes cmarvelled. awere amazed, and said, Can this be the son of David? [It was a time for amazement, for Jesus had performed a triple if not a quadruple miracle, restoring liberty, hearing and sight, and granting the power of speech. It wakened the hope that Jesus might be the Messiah, the son of David, but their hope is expressed in the most cautious manner, not only being stated as a question, but as a question which expects a negative answer. The question, however, was well calculated to arouse the envious opposition of the Pharisees.] c15 But some of them said [that is, some of the multitude. Who these “some” were is revealed by Matthew and Mark, thus:], a24 But when the Pharisees heard it, they b22 and the scribes that came down from Jerusalem said, aThis man doth not cast out demons, but by Beelzebub the prince of the demons. bHe hath Beelzebub, and, By the prince of the demons casteth he out the demons. [Beelzebub is a corruption of Baalzebub, the god of the fly. There was a tendency among the heathen to name [299] their gods after the pests which they were supposed to avert. Thus Zeus was called Apomuios (Averter of flies), and Apollo Ipuktonos (Slayer of vermin). How Beelzebub became identified with Satan in the Jewish mind is not known. In opposing the influence of Jesus and corrupting the public mind, these Pharisees showed a cunning worthy of the cultivated atmosphere, the seat of learning whence they came. Being unable to deny that a miracle was wrought (for Celsus in the second century is the first recorded person who had the temerity to do such a thing), they sought to so explain it as to reverse its potency, making it an evidence of diabolical rather than divine power. Their explanation was cleverly plausible, for there were at least two powers by which demons might be cast out, as both were invisible, it might appear impossible to decide whether it was done in this instance by the power of God or of Satan. It was an explanation very difficult to disprove, and Jesus himself considered it worthy of the very thorough reply which follows.] c16 And others, trying him, sought of him a sign from heaven. [These probably felt that the criticisms of the Pharisees were unjust, and wished that Jesus might put them to silence by showing some great sign, such as the pillar of cloud which sanctioned the guidance of Moses, or the descending fire which vindicated Elijah.] b23 And he called them unto him [thus singling out his accusers], a25 And {c17 But} aknowing their thoughts he said unto them, bin parables [We shall find that Jesus later replied to those who sought a sign. He here answers his accusers in a fourfold argument. First argument:], How can Satan cast out Satan? aEvery kingdom divided against itself is brought to desolation; and every city or house [family] divided against itself shall not stand: b24 And if a kingdom be divided against itself, that kingdom cannot stand. cA house divided against a house falleth. {b25 And if a house be divided against itself, that house will not be able to stand.} a26 And if Satan cast out Satan, he is divided against himself; c18 And if Satan also is [300] divided against himself, ahow then shall his kingdom stand? b26 And if Satan hath risen up against himself, and is divided, he cannot stand, but hath an end. cbecause ye say that I cast out demons by Beelzebub. [The explanation given by the Pharisees represented Satan as divided against himself; robbing himself of his greatest achievement; namely, his triumph over the souls and bodies of men. Jesus argues, not that Satan could not do this, but that he would not, and that therefore the explanation which supposes him to do it is absurd. We should note that Jesus here definitely recognizes two important truths: 1. That the powers of evil are organized into a kingdom with a head ( Mat 13:29, Mat 25:41, Mar 4:15, Luk 22:31). 2. That division tends to destruction. His argument therefore, “constitutes an incidental but strong argument against sectarianism. See 1Co 1:13” (Abbott). Second argument:] 19 And if I by Beelzebub cast out demons, by whom do your sons cast them out? Therefore shall they be your judges. [The sons of the Pharisees were not their children, but their disciples ( 2Ki 2:3, Act 19:13, Act 19:14). Josephus mentions these exorcists (Ant. viii. 2, 5, and Wars vii. 6, 3), and there is abundant mention of them in later rabbinical books. Our Lord’s reference to them was merely for the purpose of presenting an argumentum ad hominem, and in no way implies that they exercised any real power over the demons; nor could they have done so in any marked degree, else the similar work of Christ would not have created such an astonishment. The argument therefore is this, I have already shown you that it is against reason that Satan cast out Satan; I now show you that it is against experience. The only instances of dispossession which you can cite are those of your own disciples. Do they act by the power of Satan? They therefore shall be your judges as to whether you have spoken rightly in saying that Satan casts out Satan. Third argument:] 20 But if I with the finger {aby the Spirit} of God cast out demons, then is the kingdom of God come upon you. [The finger of God signifies the power of God [301] ( Exo 8:19, Exo 31:18, Psa 8:3). [Jesus exercised this power in unison with the Spirit of God. Jesus here draws a conclusion from the two arguments presented. Since he does not cast out by Satan, he must cast out by the power of God, and therefore his actions demonstrated the potential arrival of the kingdom of God. The occasional accidental deliverance of exorcists might be evidence of the flow and ebb of a spiritual battle, but the steady, daily conquests of Christ over the powers of evil presented to the people the triumphant progress of an invading kingdom. It is an argument against the idea that there was a collusion between Christ and Satan. Fourth argument:] c21 When the strong man fully armed guardeth his own court, his goods are in peace: 22 but when a stronger than he shall come upon him, and overcome him, he taketh from him his whole armor wherein he trusted, and divided his spoils. b27 But no one can {a29 Or how can one} enter into the house of the strong man, and spoil his goods, except he first bind the strong man? and then will he spoil his house. [Satan is the strong man, his house the body of the demoniac, and his goods the evil spirit within the man. Jesus had entered his house, and robbed him of his goods; and this proved that, instead of being in league with Satan, he had overpowered Satan. Thus Jesus put to shame the Pharisees, and caused the divinity of his miracle to stand out in clearer light than ever. The power of Jesus to dispossess the demon was one of his most convincing credentials, and its meaning now stood forth in its true light.] 30 He that is not with me is against me; and he that gathereth not with me scattereth abroad. [Jesus here addresses the bystanders. In the spiritual conflict between Jesus and Satan, neutrality is impossible. There are only two kingdoms, and every soul is either in one or the other, for there is no third. Hence one who fought Satan in the name of Christ was for Christ ( Luk 9:50). In the figure of gathering and scattering, the people are compared to a flock of sheep which Jesus would gather into the fold, but which Satan and all who aid him (such as the Pharisees) would [302] scatter and destroy.] b28 Verily a31 Therefore I say unto you, Every sins and blasphemy {ball their sins} shall be forgiven unto the sons of men, and their blasphemies wherewith soever they shall blaspheme [Jesus here explains to the Pharisees the awful meaning of their enmity. Blasphemy is any kind of injurious speech. It is the worst form of sin, as we see by this passage. This does not declare that every man shall be forgiven all his sins, but that all kinds of sin committed by various men shall be forgiven. The forgiveness is universal as to the sin, not as to the men]: abut the blasphemy against the Spirit shall not be forgiven. 32 And whosoever shall speak a word against the Son of man, it shall be forgiven him; but whosoever shall speak {bblaspheme} against the Holy Spirit hath never forgiveness, but is guilty of an eternal sin: ait shall not be forgiven him, neither in this world, nor in that which is to come. b30 because they said, He hath an unclean spirit. [Blasphemy against the Son may be a temporary sin, for the one who commits it may be subsequently convinced of his error by the testimony of the Holy Spirit and become a believer ( 1Ti 1:13). But blasphemy against the Holy Spirit is in its nature an eternal sin, for if one rejects the evidence given by the Holy Spirit and ascribes it to Satan, he rejects the only evidence upon which faith can be based; and without faith there is no forgiveness. The difference in the two sins is therefore in no way due to any difference in the Son and Spirit as to their degrees of sanctity or holiness. The punishment is naturally eternal because the sin is perpetual. The mention of the two worlds is, “just an extended way of saying ‘never'” (Morison). Some assert that the Jews would not know what Jesus meant by the Holy Spirit, but the point is not so well taken. See Exo 31:3, Num 11:26, 1Sa 10:10, 1Sa 19:20; Psa 139:7, Psa 143:10, Isa 48:16, Eze 11:24. We see by Mark’s statement that blasphemy against the Spirit consisted in saying that Jesus had an unclean spirit, that his works were due to Satanic influence, and hence wrought to [303] accomplish Satanic ends. We can not call God Satan, nor the Holy Spirit a demon, until our state of sin has passed beyond all hope of reform. One can not confound the two kingdoms of good and evil unless he does so maliciously and willfully.] a33 Either make the tree good, and its fruit good, or make the tree corrupt, and its fruit corrupt: for the tree is known by its fruit. [The meaning and connection are: “Be honest for once; represent the tree as good, and its fruit as good, or the tree as evil, and its fruit as evil; either say that I am evil, and that my works are evil, or, if you admit that my works are good, admit that I am good also and not in league with Beelzebub”–Carr.] 34 Ye offspring of vipers, how can ye, being evil, speak good things? for out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaketh. [Realizing the hopelessness of this attempt to get an honest judgment out of dishonest hearts, Jesus plainly informs them as to the condition of their hearts. Their very souls were full of poison like vipers. Their sin lay not in their words, but in a condition of heart which made such words possible. The heart being as it was, the words could not be otherwise. “What is in the well will be in the bucket”–Trapp.] 35 The good man out of his good treasure bringeth forth good things: and an evil man out of the evil treasure bringeth forth evil things. [We have here a summary of the contrast given in the Mat 12:33, Mat 12:34. The good heart of Jesus brought forth its goodness, as the evil hearts of the Pharisees brought forth their evil.] 36 And I say unto you, That every idle word that men shall speak, they shall give account thereof in the day of judgment. 37 For by thy words thou shalt be justified, and by thy words thou shalt be condemned. [It may have seemed to some that Jesus denounced too severely a saying which the Pharisees had hastily and lightly uttered. But it is the word inconsiderately spoken which betrays the true state of the heart. The hypocrite can talk like an angel if he be put on notice that his words are heard. Jesus here makes words the basis of the judgment of God. Elsewhere [304] we find it is works ( Rom 2:6, 2Co 5:10), and again we find it is faith ( Rom 3:28). There is no confusion here. The judgment in its finality must be based upon our character. Our faith forms our character, and our words and works are indices by which we may determine what manner of character it is.]

[FFG 298-305]

Fuente: McGarvey and Pendleton Commentaries (New Testament)

THE UNPARDONABLE SIN (BLASPHEMY AGAINST THE HOLY GHOST)

Mar 3:20-30; Mat 12:22-37; & Luk 11:14-23. Mark: And they come into the house; and again a multitude comes together, so that they are not able even to eat bread. And those who were along with Him came out to arrest Him; for they continued to say, That He is beside Himself. Their common charge against Jesus was, that He is beside Himself; i.e., gone crazy, that He has run mad, and that He has a demon. Look out! If you walk in His footprints, do not be jostled if they speak of you in a similar manner. Matthew: Then a demonized man, blind and dumb, was brought to Him, and He healed him, so that the blind and dumb spake and saw. And all the multitudes were astonished? and continued to say, Is not this the Son of David? Mark: The scribes, having come down from Jerusalem, were saying, He has Beelzebul, and that through the prince of the demons, He casteth out demons; and calling them to Him, He spake to them in parables, How is Satan able to cast out Satan? If a kingdom is divided against itself, how is that kingdom able to stand? And if it is divided against itself, that house is not able to stand; and if Satan has risen up against himself, and is divided, he is not able to stand, but has an end. Beelzebub, E.V., is the name of a heathen god, but Beelzebul is simply another name for the devil, as it here occurs in the original. The scribes at Jerusalem had laid all their wits under contribution, and settled down on a theory which they thought would explain all the demoniacal ejectment which Jesus was doing in Galilee; i.e., that He had entered into a collusion with the devil, who is commander-in-chief of these evil spirits, to cast them out. They thought their theory would bear criticism, as, of course, Beelzebul, the prince of devils, had power over all these demons which Jesus was casting out. Do you not see the utter imperturbability of Jesus amid these vile, false accusations? He simply proceeds to answer their argument and expose their sophistry from a logical standpoint, showing up the utter untenability of their exegesis, as in that case, Satan would be divided against himself, and would destroy and utterly break down his own kingdom. Are there not endless division, discord, and disharmony in the kingdom of Satan? Of course there is, hell itself being the very pandemonium of conflict, rage, and all conceivable dissension, animosity, perturbation, variance, and torment. But the point in all this is, that Satans kingdom, both in earth and hell, is a single unit of evil, there being no admixture of good, but evil, with all its endless diversifications. And, pursuant to the Saviors argument, if the kingdom of Satan had a mixture of good and evil, those elements, mutually antagonizing each other, would ultimate in the annihilation of his kingdom. There is no such a mixture in this world, as here we have the two kingdoms at war with each other, and destined, in the case of every individual, the one or the other, to triumph. Hence you will find the argument of our Savior in this case perfectly tenable from the standpoint of fact and logic. Matthew: If I cast out demons through Beelzebul, through whom do your sons cast them out? Therefore they shall be your judges. We see from this Scripture that the Jews were accustomed to cast out demons. How was that? Do you not know that the Jews, from the days of Abraham, were the chosen people of God? How do we cast out demons? We do it by invoking the mercy and power of God on them to cast out the demons and save their souls; e.g., when we gather around an altar of penitence. In a similar manner did the godly Hebrews cast out the demons by invoking the God of Israel. And if, by the Spirit of God, I cast out demons, then has the kingdom of God come nigh unto you. Well said; because none but God can cast out demons. The kingdom of God is the Divine government, in which His power and authority are exercised. Therefore, all of this demoniacal ejectment demonstrates the presence and power of Gods kingdom, involving the logical sequence that the King is present the very fact which they were so slow to apprehend. Luke: When the strong man armed may keep his palace, his goods are in peace; but when the one stronger than he having come, may conquer him, he taketh away his panoply in which he trusted, and spoileth his goods. He who is not with Me, is against Me; and he that gathereth not with Me, scattereth abroad. This world is Satans palace, and he is the strong man. So long as he occupies his palace, his goods, which are human souls, are secure in his possession. Jesus is the Stronger Man, who is going to conquer the devil, when He comes in His glory, and take this world out of his hands; i.e., spoil it, which does not mean to destroy it; but this is a military phrase, and means to take it as spoils are captured and appropriated by a conquering army. So our Savior, the Stronger Man, in the great wars of Armageddon, is going to conquer Satan, the strong man, and take this world out of his hands; i.e., spoil all of his goods, leaving him bankrupt, and locked up in hell. (Rev 20:3.) The Bible is unlike any other book in the wonderful copiousness of its meaning. While the above paragraph is thus expounded, it has another exegesis, equally true and pertinent. While Satan is the strong man, his palace is the human heart, and his panoply, in which he trusts, the evil habits into which he leads his miserable votaries. Jesus, the Stronger Man, conquers the devil in regeneration, taking away the evil habits of the converted soul, in which Satan trusted to hold him fast. Then Jesus goes on, sanctifies that soul, spoiling the devil of all his goods, as in sanctification He takes the soul completely out of the hands of the devil. We see here, in this last verse, that no one can stand neutral in this terrible conflict between the strong man and the Stronger Man, but every one is forced to take sides, either with Jesus or the devil, as neutrality in this case is downright conservatism to Satan and rebellion against God. Matthew: Therefore, I say unto you, All sin and blasphemy shall be forgiven unto the people, but the blasphemy of the Spirit shall not be forgiven unto the people. Whosoever shall speak a word against the Son of man, it shall be forgiven unto him; but whosoever may speak against the Holy Ghost, it shall not be forgiven him, either in this age or in that which is to come. While there is but one God, He is manifested in Three Persons, Father, Son, and Spirit, the latter being the Executive of the Trinity. While the personal Father sits upon the throne of the universe, administering the government of the boundless Celestial Empire, the Son incumbers the Mediatorial Throne at His Right Hand, administering the boundless resources of redeeming grace to all the people in this world, and even the earth itself. Both the Father and the Son send forth the Holy Ghost, the Third Person of the Trinity, into this world, to shed light on every human being, convict every sinner, convert every mourner, sanctify every believer, and glorify every disembodied saint, and thus prepare this whole world for heaven. He is the Successor of our ascended and glorified Savior in the execution of the redemptive scheme on the earth. (Joh 16:7.) Hence you see that the Holy Ghost is the Divine Person of the Trinity who deals with human souls, administering the love of the Father and the grace of the Son, saving and sanctifying all who will let Him. There is a great eleemosynary institution for the relief of all beggars, administered by three officers, A., B., and C. A. has his office in London, England; B., in New York, America; and C., is present on the spot with every dying beggar, and ready to dispense the needed alms. Now you see these poor victims of decrepitude and misery must receive the benefits of this philanthropic institution at C.s hands, as they can never reach A. at London or B. at New York. Here is the dying sinner. The Holy Ghost is with him in his dismal hovel or his gilded palace, ready to dispense to him the infinite benefactions of the loving Father and the dying Son. Suppose he unfortunately reject or grieve Him away, he is at the end of his resources, and must eternally perish. If he will receive the Holy Ghost in conviction, regeneration, and sanctification, He will administer to him all the blessings of the Father and the Son. Blasphemy means contempt. Therefore the ultimate neglect and contemptuous rejection of the Holy Ghost, consummates the sin against Him, which is unpardonable, either in the present age or in that which is to come; i.e., millennial age. Though some very stoutly deny the succession of the gospel age by another, we must remember that the Word of the Lord is the end of all controversy.

Not only this passage, but Heb 6:5, and others, speak positively of the coming age. You now see clearly in what the sin against the Holy Ghost, which is unpardonable, consists. It is clearly revealed and expounded by the Savior in this chapter. It is the imputation of the miracles wrought by the Savior, through the Holy Ghost, to Beelzebul; i.e., the devil. In this way the scribes and Pharisees, and others who followed their influence, committed the sin against the Holy Ghost. A simple analysis of this problem will thoroughly elucidate it. If you impute the work of the Holy Ghost to the devil, your doom is sealed, as it is impossible to convince you. Suppose God literally inundates you with evidence, He must give it all by His Spirit, and you will turn it over to the devil as fast as it comes, and see nothing but the devil in it all. Consequently, you are unconvincible. In this way the antediluvian world was ruined, having sunk so deep in the black darkness of sin, they imputed all the efforts of the Holy Ghost to convict and save them to Satanic influence, thus crossing the dead-line and rejecting God. In a similar manner the Jews, as we see here, imputed the miracles of Jesus to the devil, thus committing the unpardonable sin, rejecting the Son, and sealing their hopeless doom, to the awful destruction which soon overtook them in the Roman wars, as the antediluvians had been destroyed by the flood. In a similar manner the present age is fast rejecting the Holy Ghost, and ripening for the great tribulation, which, to illuminated minds, is already heaving in view, while the wonderful fulfillment of the latter-day prophecies draweth nigh. While the fallen Churches of the present age are fast rejecting the Holy Ghost, pronouncing His work fanaticism, and thus imputing it to the devil, whose trend is the unpardonable sin, the world, with wonderful expedition, is plunging into the same yawning abyss, down Satans greased plank of infidelity, which is wonderfully and fearfully on the increase, both in Christendom and heathendom. God, in His mercy, waited on the antediluvians to repent till the last hope had fled. He did the same for the Jews. A similar destruction is on the track of the God- rejecting Gentile world (Rom 11:21), though, I trow, God, in His unutterable mercy, as in former dispensations, will wait till they cross the deadline, the Churches rejecting the Holy Ghost and the world espousing infidelity, and thus all putting themselves beyond the reach of redeeming mercy, and sealing their doom in hell. Make the tree good, and the fruit will be good; make the tree corrupt, and the fruit will be corrupt; for a tree is known by its fruits. There is no good in this fallen world; it all comes from heaven; therefore when the Holy Ghost is rejected, nothing but corruption is left.

O ye generation of vipers, how are you, being evil, able to speak good things? Out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaketh. How awfully plain this preaching, calling His intellectual auditors generation of vipers! Do not forget that He is especially addressing the preachers and official members; i.e., the scribes and Pharisees. Does not history repeat itself? Shall we be so blind as to leave this with a congregation 1,870 years ago? God forbid! Let us take it home, wake up, and profit by this awful truth. A good man, out of the good treasure of his heart, bringeth forth good things; and an evil man, out of the evil treasure of his heart, bringeth forth evil things. How awful the state of the Jewish Church! The leading preachers and laymen in the hands of the devil! I say unto you, That every idle word which the people may speak, they shall give an account for the same in the day of judgment. For by thy words thou mayest be justified, and by thy words thou mayest be condemned. Language is the exponent of the heart. God has put us here on probation, trying and testing us for vast eternity. Idle is argon, from ergon, work, and is the strongest negative in the Greek language when preceding a word. Hence it means the very absence of all work. God has put us here to work in His vineyard. Hence we have no time to lose. Idle words mean idle minds and bodies, which are condemnatory in the sight of God. O the momentous issues which hang on our words, the exponents of both soul and body! When we are idle, the devil always finds an open door. We see here, in the contingent tense, it is our prerogative to so speak as to determine our justification or condemnation before the judgment-seat of Christ.

Fuente: William Godbey’s Commentary on the New Testament

Mat 12:22-45. Jesus Answer to the Verdict of the Jerusalem Scribes, and the Intervention of His Family (Mar 3:20-35*, Luk 11:14-23; Luk 11:29-32; Luk 12:10; Luk 8:19-21).For the painful statement in Mar 3:20 f. Mt. (like Lk.) substitutes the healing of a blind and dumb man probably a second (compressed) use of Mat 9:27-31 and Mat 9:32-34. The word for were amazed is an adaptation of the word for is beside himself in Mk. To Mk.s account of Satan divided against Satan Mt. adds Mat 12:27 f., probably from Q, which Lk. also draws on at this point. The verses form an additional line of defenceif your own exorcists are not assisted by Beelzebub, they condemn your condemnation of me. The only alternative is that (theyand) I work by the finger (Mt., in view of Mat 12:31, spirit) of God, His power is besting that of Satan, and His Kingdom is at hand. Or perhaps Mat 12:27 and Mat 12:28 are independent of each other, and were already interpolated in Q when Mt. and Lk. used it. Mt. (like Lk.) also adds Mat 12:30neutrality towards Jesus is impossible (cf. Luk 2:34 f.). This is a test for men to use upon themselves. For the inverted form of the saying see Mar 9:40 =Luk 9:50 (addressed to disciples about outsiders). In Mat 12:31 f. Mt. abbreviates and duplicates Mk.s single statement; Lk. (Luk 12:10) takes Mt.s second half. Son of man in Mat 12:32 probably means man. Of the four forms in which we have the saying that in Lk. seems most trustworthy. The contrast is between slandering men and slandering the Spirit of God. Jesus is speaking as a Jew to Jews in language based on OT (Num 15:30 f., 1Sa 31:3 mg., Isa 22:14), and current in His day; He simply means that blasphemy against the Divine Spirit, by whose power He worked, was an infinitely more serious matter than slandering ones fellow-men, bad though that be. Then follow some sayings on the importance of words (cf. Luk 6:43-45). Mat 9:33 is a less original form of Mat 7:16 a, Mat 7:17 f.* Between fruit and good we should supply will be; similarly between fruit and corrupt. Mat 12:34 brings Jesus close to the severity of John the Baptist (Mat 3:7); cf. also Jas 3:11 f. Not only evil words but idle words, words that are not meant to effect anything, will come up for judgment. Mat 12:37 was perhaps a current proverb.

Mat 12:25. Kingdomcityhouse: Mt. alone gives this triad. House in all three evangelists may have its Aramaic meaning of a province or district.

Mat 12:28. kingdom of God: cf. Mat 21:31; Mat 21:43*. Perhaps Mt. only used his usual kingdom of heaven, where the sense is clearly eschatological.

Mat 12:29. the strong man: Satan.his goods: the men in his power who are spoiled or carried off by the stronger than the strong.

Fuente: Peake’s Commentary on the Bible

12:22 {4} Then was brought unto him one possessed with a devil, blind, and dumb: and he healed him, insomuch that the blind and dumb both spake and saw.

(4) A truth, be it ever so obvious, is subject to the slander of the wicked: however, it ought to be resolutely defended.

Fuente: Geneva Bible Notes

2. Conflict over Jesus’ power 12:22-37 (cf. Mar 3:19-30; Luk 11:14-26)

The Pharisees moved beyond debate to personal abuse and character assassination in this pericope.

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

Jesus’ miracle and the response 12:22-24

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

"Then" (Gr. tote) does not demand a close chronological connection with what precedes (cf. Mat 2:7; Mat 11:20). The Greek text describes the man’s afflictions in terms that show that his demon possession produced his blindness and dumbness. The miracle itself did not interest Matthew as much as the confrontation that it produced.

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