Summary
Chapter summary
Discourse 2. The mission of the Twelve. Names of the apostles. Sent to the lost sheep of the house of Israel, with authority over unclean spirits. Instructions: take no provision, greet the worthy, shake dust against the unworthy. The cost of confession, the sword not peace, cross-bearing, receiving the disciple is receiving Christ.
Context
Gospel · Matthew — Matthew overview
- A. 1–15 The Twelve Sent Out With Authority
- B. 16–25 Sheep Among Wolves: What to Expect
- C. 26–33 Do Not Fear Those Who Kill the Body
- D. 34–42 Not Peace but a Sword; the Cost and the Cup of Water
The outline
A.The Twelve Sent Out With Authorityvv. 1 to 15
Read vv. 1 to 15 →B.Sheep Among Wolves: What to Expectvv. 16 to 25
Read vv. 16 to 25 →C.Do Not Fear Those Who Kill the Bodyvv. 26 to 33
Read vv. 26 to 33 →D.Not Peace but a Sword; the Cost and the Cup of Watervv. 34 to 42
Read vv. 34 to 42 →
The world behind this chapter
Matthew 10The history
The travel instructions are specific about money. Gold, silver, and copper were the three metals coins were struck in, so forbidding all three means carrying no money at all. No bag, no spare tunic, no staff — a travelling teacher normally carried all of these. They were to depend on hospitality, which in that culture was a binding duty, not a favour.
Shaking the dust off the feet was a recognised gesture. Jews returning from Gentile territory shook off the dust so as not to carry pagan soil into the land. Doing it to a Jewish village said something shocking about where that village now stood.
The floggings Jesus predicts were a synagogue penalty, not a Roman one — thirty-nine strokes, one short of the forty the Law allowed, administered by the congregation's own officer. Being handed over to governors and kings was the next step up: a provincial governor held the power of death, and a client king like Antipas could imprison and execute on his own account.
Two small coins frame the comfort. Sparrows were the cheapest meat in the market, sold two for the smallest copper coin in circulation, and Jesus says not one falls without the Father.
What it meant to them
This chapter was read as instructions, not history. Matthew's readers were living every line of it — arrested, flogged in the meeting houses they grew up in, betrayed by relatives.
So the hard sayings about a sword rather than peace, and a man's enemies being his own household, were not shocking to them. They were a description of Tuesday. What was new was being told it had been foreseen, and that acknowledging him publicly is answered by his acknowledging them before the Father.
Sources cited
- Craig S. Keener, The IVP Bible Background Commentary: New Testament
- F. F. Bruce, New Testament History
The text of this chapter
This page carries no textual note on Matthew 10. Where this site has examined a place the manuscripts differ, the examination is in the manuscripts room. Every place this site examines →
Connections from this chapter
This page draws on Jamieson, Fausset & Brown, Commentary Critical and Explanatory; John Calvin, Commentaries; John Wesley, Explanatory Notes Upon the New Testament and Matthew Henry, Complete Commentary.