Biblical commentary on the New Testament - The Christian ...

216 Luke I. 35.
stands as explanatory of tTceXevaerai ini ae, shall come upon thee
'Emaiud^etv^ overshadow, does not at all involve the idea of "pro-
tecting, screening" (according to the analogy of the Hebrew ^kd) ;
the connexion leads evidently to the idea of generation. It is best,
therefore, to compare it vs^ith the Hebrew c-^sss v-jz (Ruth iii. 9 ;
Ezek. xvi. 8) in the signification of spreading out the wings (=
skirts of a garment), consequently "to surround," "to overshadow,"*
Avhich is an euphemistic expression for connubial intercourse. Pe:haps
the term contains also a remote allusion to ri?'7"'= in Gen. i. 2.
The word tijrrn is well known to have the meaning " to hover over ;"
and in Deut. xxxii. 11, it is placed in parallelism with c-is:^ lans.
The whole thought of the remarkable verse is, therefore, no other
than this, that Mary, without the intervention of a man, would become
a mother—the pure and chaste power of the creative Divine
Spirit would be the generator.f Consequently, the appearance of
the Saviour among mankind is represented as a new, immediate,
and divine act of creation, and thus the transmission of sinfulness
from the sinful race to him is excluded. But inasmuch as this act
of creation did not altogether exclude the substance of human
nature, in consequence of Mary's relation to Jesus, the Saviour,
though free from sinfulness in the principle of life, yet partook
in common with men of the daOiveia rfig oapaSg, iveahiess of the
jlesh (2 Cor. xiii. 4.) On this depended his capacity of suffering,
which again was a necessary condition of his whole work as the
Saviour.^ In Ms human nature he glorified human nature in gen-
eral. The fact of the promised offspring being referred for his origin
to the " Holy Spirit," necessarily shews him to be holy himself,
and as such he is called Son of God.§ (The words tK gov were pro-
* The cherubim also spreading their wings over the ark of the covenant, denote the
active presence of God. Exod. xl. 34; Numb. ix. 18, 22. See also Suiceri Tlies., vol.
i., p. 1175.
f The iiriaKLd^Ecv, overshadow, hardly implies creation. Of Christ's being generated
Scripture nowhere speaks, and how could the Son, who existed before the world
(John xvii. 5), be generated ? Evidently he could only enter a new form of existence, pass-
ing, viz., from an eternal, absolute, omniscient existence, to the limitations that belong to
the soul of a child. Having become a human soul, he entered the bosom of a virgin (was
conceived), and here formed to himself a body. For this the existing material was to be
prepared and sanctified by that overshadowing of the "Holy Ghost, precisely as, Gen. i. 2,
the elements of chaos were prepared, by the overshadowing of the Holy Ghost, to receive
the influences of the "Word of God.— (E.)
% If Jesus had come into the world by ordinary generation, he would have shared
in the necessitas moriendi, together with general depravity; if he had not been born of a
human mother, the impossihiUtas moriendi would have belonged to him ; accordingly,
only the narrative presented in the Gospels fulfils all that is required in the idea of a
Saviour. Being born as a man, the Saviour passed a really human life ; but, like that of
Adam before the fall, with a possihilitas tentationis et mortis, which then, by his victory
became an impossihiUtas. (See further note on Matth. iv. 1, fif.)
§ Son of God, vide Qeov, is here no designation of the eternal, pre-existent Son of
God, as pre-existent ; it designates primarily the assuming of humanity, the man Jesus, as