XXIX. “HE STEDFASTLY SET HIS FACE TO GO TO JERUSALEM”

It appears to me that there is a coincidence in the following particulars, relating to this same locality, not the less valuable from being in some degree intricate and involved.

1. Luke 9:51.—“And it came to pass, when the time was come that he should be received up, he stedfastly set his face to go to Jerusalem.”

Expressions occur in the remainder of this and in the following chapter, which show that the mind of St. Luke was contemplating the events which happened on this journey, though he does not make it his business to trace it step by step: thus (ver. 52), “And they went, and entered into a village of the Samaritans.” And again (vet. 57), “And it came to pass, that, as they went in the way, a certain man said unto him,” &c.; And again (10:38), “Now it came to pass, as they went, that he entered into a certain village: and a certain woman named Martha received him into her house. And she had a sister called Mary.” The line of march, therefore, which St. Luke was pursuing in his own mind in the narrative, was that which was leading Jesus through Samaria to Jerusalem; and in the last of the verses I have quoted, he brings him to this “certain village,” which he does not name, but he tells us it was the abode of Martha and Mary.

Accordingly, on comparing this passage with John (11:1), we are led to the conclusion that the village was Bethany; for it is there said, that Bethany was “the town of Mary and her sister Martha.”

But on looking at St. Mark’s account of a similar journey of Jesus, for probably it was not the same [See Luke 13:22; 17:11; 18:31; where a subsequent journey is perhaps spoken of.] , we find that the preceding stage which he made before coming to Bethany was from Jericho (Mark 10:46). “And they came to Jericho: and as he went out of Jericho with his disciples and a great number of people,” &c.; And then it follows (11:1), “And when they came nigh to Jerusalem, unto Bethphage and Bethany, ” &c.; This, therefore, brings us to the same point as St. Luke. Thus, to recapitulate: we learn, from St. Luke, that Jesus, in a journey from Galilee to Jerusalem, arrived at the village of Martha and Mary.

We learn from St. John, that this village was Bethany.

And we learn from St. Mark, that the last town Jesus left before he came to Bethany, on a similar journey, if not the same, was Jericho.

Now let us turn once more to St. Luke (10:30), and we shall there discover Jesus giving utterance to a parable on this occasion, which is placed in immediate juxtaposition with the history of his reaching Bethany, as though it had been spoken just before. For, as soon as it is ended, the narrative proceeds, “Now it came to pass, as they went, that he entered into a certain village: and a certain woman named Martha received him into her house” (10:38). And what was this parable? That of “a certain man who went down from Jerusalem to Jericho, and fell among thieves,” &c.; It seems, then, highly probable, that Jesus was actually travelling from Jericho to Jerusalem (Bethany being just short of Jerusalem) when he delivered it. What can be more like reality than this? Yet how circuitously do we get at our conclusion!

2. Nor is even this all. The parable represents a priest and Levite as on the road. This again is entirely in keeping with the scene: for whether it was that the school of the prophets established from of old at Jericho [2 Kings 2:5.] had given a sacerdotal character to the town; or whether it was its comparative proximity to Jerusalem, that had invited the priests and Levites to settle there; certain it is that a very large portion of the courses that waited at the temple resided at Jericho, ready to take their turn at Jerusalem when duty called them [See Lightfoot, vol. ii. p. 45, fol.] ; so that it was more than probable that Jesus, on coming from Jericho to Jerusalem, on this occasion, with his disciples, would meet many of this order. How vivid a colouring of truth does all this give to the fact of the parable having been spoken as St. Luke says!

3. Nay more still—I can believe that there may be discovered a reason coincident with the circumstances of the time, in Jesus choosing to imagine a Samaritan for the benefactor at this particular moment—for it had only been shortly before, at least it was upon this same journey, that James and John had proposed, when the Samaritans would not receive him, to call down fire from heaven and consume them (Luke 9:54). Could the spirit they were of be more gracefully rebuked than thus? Again, how real is all this! [Comp. No. XII. of the Appendix.]