Luke 14:2
Right there before Him was a man with dropsy.
BSB
ASV
And behold, there was before him a certain man that had the dropsy.
KJV
And, behold, there was a certain man before him which had the dropsy.
The dropsy - Ὑδρωπικος, dropsical; from ὑδωρ, water, and ωψ, the countenance, because in this disorder the face of the patient is often very much bloated. Probably the insidious Pharisee had brought this dropsical man to the place, not doubting that our Lord’s eye would affect his heart, and that he would instantly cure him; and then he could most plausibly accuse him for a breach of the Sabbath. If this were the case, and it is likely, how deep must have been the perfidy and malice of the Pharisee!
There was a certain man before him - It does not appear that he was come thither with any insidious design. Probably he came, hoping for a cure, or perhaps was one of the family.
We do not find that he offered himself, or that his friends offered him to be Christ's patient, but Christ prevented him with the blessings of his goodness, and before he called he answered him. Note, It is a happy thing to be where Christ is, to be present before him, though we be not presented to him.
1816–1900
Expository Thoughts on the Gospels: Luke (lightly modernized text, Grace Gems edition) (1858)
Let us first mark in this passage — how our Lord Jesus Christ accepted the hospitality of those who were not His disciples. We read that "He went into the house of one of the chief Pharisees to eat bread." We cannot reasonably suppose that this Pharisee was a friend of Christ. It is more probable that he only did what was customary for a man in his position. He saw a stranger teaching religion, whom some regarded as a prophet, and he invited Him to eat at his table.
Rare words are the text's own signal of a deliberate thread: the fewer the occurrences, the more the places it appears belong together.
