Luke 13 - In Depth Bible Commentaries

2658(...continued)John 9:1-2 tells how the closest followers of Jesus held the view that human calamitiessuch as blindness were a direct result of sinfulness: "As Jesus walked along, he saw a man blindfrom birth. His disciples asked him: Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was bornblind?” Jesus' answer rejected their simple conclusion that calamity is a direct result of humansinfulness: "Jesus answered, Neither this man nor his parents sinned; he was born blind so thatGod's works might be revealed in him. (John 9:3)However, on another occasion recorded in John 5:14, Jesus told the man He had justhealed at the Sheep Gate Pool to “no longer miss the mark (or, ‘sin’), in order that a worsecalamity not come upon him.”Here, in the present incident being described by Luke, we can see how easy it would be toargue that the Galileans whose blood Pilate had mixed with their sacrifices were greater missersof-the-mark,greater "sinners," than other Galileans who had not so suffered. Nolland commentsthat Jesus does not reject this idea of the connection between human sinfulness and the experienceof tragedy, "But Jesus will...dispute the possibility of determining the degree of sinfulnessfrom the experience of calamity and will shift the focus away from the passing of judgment onothers to the need to put one's own house in order." (2, p. 718)2659Jesus does not hesitate to answer the question being asked Him. Knox comments that"Jesus cut across the current belief: 'I tell you, No.' That was a radical stroke. But Jesus was arealist: He confronted the truth that calamity is no respecter of persons, even though that truthmight double the mind's questionings." (P. 239) Gilmour states in like manner, "Jesus repudiatedthe popular theory that suffering was the consequence of sin, but did not concern himself in thisinstance with any other answer to the problem." (Ibid.)2660 ndThe 2 person plural present subjunctive active verb metanoh/te, "you may turn around,"nd"you may repent," is changed to the 2 person plural, aorist subjunctive active verb metanoh,shte,with the same meaning, by Alexandrinus, Bezae, Gamma, Theta, Families 1 and 13 of Minuscules,Minuscules 579 (see), 892 (margin), 1241, 1424, 2542, some other Greek manuscriptsand Epiphanius of Constantia (who died 403 A.D.).The change in tense does not change the meaning of Jesus' warning, although it changesfrom a continuing repentance to a momentary, once-for-all repentance. Either way, Jesusteaches that without "turning around," or "repentance," there can be no salvation from perishing.In so teaching, Jesus unites his voice with that of the great spokespersons of Israel who sopowerfully proclaimed the divine demand for repentance to Northern Israel and to Judah prior tocoming of the day of YHWH on the northern kingdom by the Assyrian invasion in 722-21 B.C.,and on the southern kingdom by the Babylonian invasion in 587-86 B.C.See, for example the statement of king Solomon in 1 Kings 8:47-50, "If they miss-the-mark(‘sin’) against You--for there is no one who does not miss-the-mark (‘sin’)--and You are angry withthem and give them to an enemy, so that they are carried away captive to the land of the enemy,(continued...)1268