Editorial note — LESSON XVI.
Reading edition
[Footnote A: St. John i:32.]
[Footnote B: St. Luke iii:22. The International Revision Commentary on the New Testament, says of the passage: "This statement, in which all four evangelists agree, is to be understood literally. A temporary embodiment of the Holy Spirit occurred to inaugurate our Lord as the Messiah."
"In bodily shape;" "that is," says the Commentary of Jamieson-Fausset-Brown, on the passage in Matthew iii:16—"that is, the blessed Spirit, assuming the corporeal form of a dove, descended thus upon his sacred head." "And in this form because the emblem of chastity, purity, meekness, gentleness, beauteousness," Dummelow's Commentary says: "As he (the Christ) rises from the baptismal waters, the Holy Ghost, the living bond of love and unity in the Godhead descends. The appearance of the Holy Ghost in the form of a dove was a symbolic vision, and, as spiritual things are spiritually discerned, the vision was probably seen only by our Lord and the Baptist. The dove is the type of the Spirit because of its innocence, gentleness and affection. (Dummelow Commentary, p. 632).]