Luke 13 - In Depth Bible Commentaries

273713:23 But then someone said to him, "Lord, are the ones being saved few?" But then2735(...continued)By the mention of Jesus "going through cities and villages," and "journey-making" towardsJerusalem, Luke reminds its readers of the context in which all of these teachings are being given--on the road to certain death in Jerusalem.2736The name of the City of Jerusalem is spelled ~Ieroso,luma, by P75, Sinaiticus,Vaticanus, L, Minuscules 579, 892, 1241, 2542, a few other Greek manuscripts and the OldLatin Manuscripts a and a2. It is spelled vIerousalh,m by Alexandrinus, Bezae, W, Theta (see),Psi, Uncial Manuscript 070, Families 1 and 13 of Minuscules, the "Majority Text," the Latin LatinVulgate, a part of the Old Latin witnesses and the Coptic tradition. With this verse, compare Luke9:51, "When the days drew near for him to be taken up, he set his face to go to Jerusalem."2737The question which Luke depicts Jesus as being asked, is concerning oi` sw|zo,menoi,literally, "the ones being delivered (or 'saved')" (nominative plural masculine present passiveparticiple), and the question is concerning how many people are to be included in this category.The verb sw,zein occurs some 470 times in the Greek Bible; the present participle occurssome 39 times. The present plural participle which is used here occurs only at Isaiah 37:32;45:20; Tobit 14:7; Luke 13:23 (here); Acts 2:47; 1 Corinthians 1:18 and 2:15. The meaning ofthe participle is that those who are so described are participating in the divine deliverance, thesaving action of God in their lives. Marshall holds that it refers to "the obtaining of eschatologicalsalvation" (p. 564), but if this is so, the phrase implies that this can be obtained here and now, inthe present world.This is the only passage in the canonical Bible where this specific question is raised,concerning the number of those "being saved." But in the Jewish Apocrypha andPseudepigrapha, see 2 Esdras 8:1 ("The Most High made this world for the sake of many, butthe world to come for the sake of only a few"), 3 ("Many have been created, but only a few shallbe saved"); 9:15-16 ("...There are more who perish than those who will be saved, as a wave isgreater than a drop of water"); 2 Apocalypse Baruch 44:15; 48:45.It is interesting to ask this question in terms of the entire Bible. For example, in the days ofNoah (Genesis 6-9), and in the overthrow of the Cities of the Plain (Genesis 18-19), were thosebeing saved "few" or "many"? The resounding answer of those stories is, "Few!" Or if we ask thequestion concerning the number of those among the "wilderness generation" who were allowed toenter into the promised land under Joshua, again the answer comes "Few!" See Matthew 7:14;22:14; 1 Corinthians 10:5; 1 Peter 3:20.Also see the discussion of this very matter in 4 Ezra 7:45-61, where Ezra states in dialoguewith God, "And now I see that the world to come will bring delight to few, but torments to many.For an evil heart has grown up in us, which has alienated us from God, and brought us into thecorruption and the ways of death, and has shown us the paths of perdition and removed us farfrom life--and that not just a few of us but almost all who have been created!" The divine answerthat comes to Ezra is about the comparison between precious stones (which are few), and lead(continued...)1306