Note 69 — Chapter II · BAPTISM AND TEMPTATION OF JESUS.

To support this transference of the whole scene to the inward nature of Jesus, commentators think that they can produce some features of the evangelical narrative itself. The expression of Matthew (iv. 1), ἀνήχθη εἰς τὴν ἔρημον ὑπὸ τοῦ Πνεύματος, and still more that of Luke (iv. 1), ἤγετο ἐν τῷ Πνεύματι, correspond fully to the forms: ἐγενόμην ἐν πνεύματι, Rev. i. 10, ἀπήνενκέ με εἰς ἔρημον ἐν πνεύματι, xvii. 3, and to similar ones in Ezekiel; and as in these passages inward intuition is alone referred to, neither in the evangelical ones, it is said, can any external occurrence be intended. But it has been with reason objected,69 that the above forms may be adapted either to a real external abduction by the Divine Spirit (as in Acts viii. 39; 2 Kings ii. 16), or to one merely internal and visionary, as in the quotation from the Apocalypse, so that between these two possible significations the context must decide; that in works replete with visions, as are the Apocalypse and Ezekiel, the context indeed pronounces in favour of a merely spiritual occurrence; but in an historical work such as our gospels, of an external one. Dreams, and especially visions, are always expressly announced as such in the historical books of the New Testament: supposing, therefore, that the temptation was a vision, it should have been introduced by the words εἶδεν ἐν ὁράματι, ἐν ἔκστάσει, as in Acts ix. 12, x. 10; or ἐφάνη αὐτῷ κατ’ ὄναρ, as in Matt. i. 20, ii. 13. Besides, if a dream had been narrated, the transition to a continuation of the real history must have been marked by a διεγερθεὶς, being awaked, as in Matt. i. 24, ii. 14, 21; whereby, as Paulus truly says, much labour would have been spared to expositors.