Luke 5:31
Jesus answered, “It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick.
BSB
Parallel translations (2) ▾
ASV
And Jesus answering said unto them, They that are in health have no need of a physician; but they that are sick.
KJV
And Jesus answering said unto them, They that are whole need not a physician; but they that are sick.
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Commentary
1 voiceVoices on this verse
loading…Hebraic traditional view
Levi's feast and the old wine
Levi “made him a great feast in his own house,” and the objection came at the guest list: the Pharisaic table discipline meant an observant associate did not eat with the non-observant, whose food might be untithed and whose vessels unclean, and tax collectors stood furthest outside the circle of trust: the Mishnah rules a house unclean if tax collectors have entered it (Taharot 7:6), and even permits declaring untruths to them under duress, classing them with robbers (Nedarim 3:4). The table Jesus chose was a boundary deliberately crossed: “I came not to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance.” The fuller table-and-fasting background is in this site's Matthew 9 note.
Luke alone keeps the last saying: “No man also having drunk old wine straightway desireth new: for he saith, The old is better.” Spoken at a Jewish table about Jewish devotion, it is a gracious word, not a sneer: Jesus knows exactly why the old ways taste right to those formed by them, even as He announces something new that will not fit the old wineskins.
Sources: Mishnah Taharot 7:6 (tax collectors and the unclean house) · Mishnah Nedarim 3:4 (vows made to tax collectors)
Original language & word study
17 tagged words| Original | Transliteration | Meaning | Word study |
|---|---|---|---|
| Καὶ | Kai | And | G2532 → |
| ἀποκριθεὶς | apokritheis | answering | G611 → |
| ὁ | ho | <the> | G3588 → |
| Ἰησοῦς | Iēsous | Jesus | G2424 → |
| εἶπεν | eipen | said | G2036 → |
| πρὸς | pros | to | G4314 → |
| αὐτούς· | autous | them; | G846 → |
| οὐ | ou | No | G3756 → |
| χρείαν | chreian | need | G5532 → |
| ἔχουσιν | echousin | have | G2192 → |
| οἱ | hoi | those | G3588 → |
| ὑγιαίνοντες | hugiainontes | being well | G5198 → |
| ἰατροῦ | iatrou | of a physician | G2395 → |
| ἀλλ᾽ | all᾽ | but | G235 → |
| οἱ | hoi | those | G3588 → |
| κακῶς | kakōs | sick | G2560 → |
| ἔχοντες. | echontes | being. | G2192 → |
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