Jamieson, Fausset & Brown

“They took the whole temple service for a week each. his wife was of the daughters of Aaron--The priests might marry into any tribe, but "it was most commendable of all to marry one of the priests' line" [LIGHTFOOT].”

“This again was a symbol of the "living sacrifice" of themselves and their services offered daily to God by the worshippers. Hence the language of Ps 141:2; But that the acceptance of this daily offering depended on the expiatory virtue presupposed in the burn…”

“(See Mt 11:10, 11.) drink neither wine nor strong drink--that is, shall be a Nazarite, or "a separated one" (Nu 6:2, &c.). As the leper was the living symbol of sin, so was the Nazarite of holiness; nothing inflaming was to cross his lips; no razor to come…”

“Whereby, &c.--Mary believed what was far harder without a sign. Abraham, though older, and doubtless Sarah, too, when the same promise was made to him, "staggered not at the promise of God through unbelief, but was strong in faith, giving glory to God." This w…”

“As the mother of our Lord, she was the most "blessed among women" in external distinction; but let them listen to the Lord's own words. "Nay, rather blessed are they that hear the word of God and keep it." (See on Lu 11:27).”

“The angel purposely conforms his language to Isaiah's famous prophecy (Isa 7:14) [CALVIN]. This is but an echo of the sublime prediction in Isa 9:6, 7.”

“How, &c.--not the unbelief of Zacharias, "Whereby shall I know this?" but, taking the fact for granted, "How is it to be, so contrary to the unbroken law of human birth?" Instead of reproof, therefore, her question is answered in mysterious detail.”

“Son of God--That Christ is the Son of God in His divine and eternal nature is clear from all the New Testament; yet here we see that Sonship efflorescing into human and palpable manifestation by His being born, through "the power of the Highest," an Infant of …”

“An additional benediction on the Virgin for her implicit faith, in tacit and delicate contrast with her own husband. for--rather, as in the Margin, "that."”

“His "Anointed," whose horn He will exalt (1Sa 2:10); in the Virgin's song, it is as the "Help" promised to Israel by all the prophets. My soul . . . my spirit--"all that is within me" (Ps 103:1).”

“Lord God of Israel--the ancient covenant God of the peculiar people. visited and redeemed--that is, in order to redeem: returned after long absence, and broken His long silence (see Mt 15:31). In the Old Testament, God is said to "visit" chiefly for judgment…”

“Hence, not only "grace," or the thing promised; but "truth," or fidelity to the promise, are said to "come by Jesus Christ" (Joh 1:17). That he would grant us, &c.--How comprehensive is the view here given! (1) The purpose of all redemption--"that we should s…”

“Here are the dying echoes of this song; and very beautiful are these closing notes--like the setting sun, shorn indeed of its noontide radiance, but skirting the horizon with a wavy and quivering light--as of molten gold--on which the eye delights to gaze, til…”

“Through the tender mercy of our God--the sole spring, necessarily, of all salvation for sinners. dayspring from on high--either Christ Himself, as the "Sun of righteousness" (Mal 4:2), arising on a dark world [BEZA, GROTIUS, CALVIN, DE WETTE, OLSHAUSEN, &c.…”

“"That St. Luke, of all the Evangelists, should have obtained and recorded these inspired utterances of Zacharias and Mary--is in accordance with his character and habits, as indicated in Lu 1:1-4" [WEBSTER and WILKINSON].”

“A little longer stay at Nazareth, and the prophecy would have failed. But lo! with no intention certainly on her part, much less of Cæsar Augustus, to fulfil the prophecy, she is brought from Nazareth to Bethlehem, and at that nick of time her period arrives,…”

“The ancient tradition, that our Lord was born in a grotto or cave, is quite consistent with this, the country being rocky. In Mary's condition the journey would be a slow one, and ere they arrived, the inn would be fully occupied--affecting anticipation of the…”

“Thus was Nathanael engaged, all alone but not unseen, under the fig tree, in unconscious preparation for his first interview with Jesus. So was the rapt seer on his lonely rock "in the spirit on the Lord's Day," little thinking that this was his preparation fo…”

“Compare Isa 9:6, "Unto us a Child is born." It is a birth--"The Word is made flesh" (Joh 1:14). "In the city of David"--in the right line and at the right spot; where prophecy bade us look for Him, and faith accordingly expected Him. How dear to us should b…”

“"Peace" with God is the grand necessity of a fallen world. To bring in this, and all other peace in its train, was the prime errand of the Saviour to this earth, and, along with it, Heaven's whole "good will to men"--the divine complacency on a new footing--de…”

“Let us go, &c.--lovely simplicity of devoutness and faith this! They are not taken up with the angels, the glory that invested them, and the lofty strains with which they filled the air.”

“Still the circumcision of Christ had a profound bearing on His own work--by few rightly apprehended. For since "he that is circumcised is a debtor to do the whole law" (Ga 5:3), Jesus thus bore about with Him in His very flesh the seal of a voluntary obligat…”

“It was in obedience to this "law of Moses," that the Virgin presented her babe unto the Lord, "in the east gate of the court called Nicanor's Gate, where she herself would be sprinkled by the priest with the blood of her sacrifice" [LIGHTFOOT].”

“How would the one sight gild the gloom of the other! He was, probably, by this time, advanced in years. The Spirit guided him to the temple at the very moment when the Virgin was about to present Him to the Lord.”

“Anna--or, Hannah. a prophetess--another evidence that "the last times" in which God was to "pour out His Spirit upon all flesh" were at hand. of the tribe of Aser--one of the ten tribes, of whom many were not carried captive, and not a few reunited themselve…”