Luke 4:5-8 And the devil, taking him up into an high mountain, showed to him all the kingdoms of the world in a moment of time.… Here the temptation seems eminently gross. Yet devil-worship can assume many forms, and some of these may be most refined. Worship is homage, and homage to a person, real or supposed, representative of certain principles, modes of action, and aims. What it here means seems evident enough. Jesus is recognized as seeking a kingdom, as intending, indeed, to found one. His aims are confessed to be more than Jewish, not national, but universal; not an extension of Israel, but a comprehension of the world. It is known that His purpose is to be the Messiah, not of the Jews, but of man. The only question is as to the nature of His kinghood and kingdom. The kingdom here offered is one not of the Spirit, but "of the world." And "world" here means not what it may be to the good, but what it is to the bad. it and its kingdoms may be won at once, and will be, if Jesus worships the devil, i.e., makes evil His good, uses unholy means to accomplish His ends. It is as if the tempter had said, "Survey the world, and mark what succeeds. Away there in Italy lives and rules the emperor of the world, a selfish, sensual man, whose right is might. Over there in Caesarea sits his red-handed, yet vacillating, procurator. In your own Galilee a treacherous and lustful Herod reigns, its deputy lord. Up in Jerusalem are priests and scribes, great in things external, the fierce fanatics of formalism. Everywhere unholy men rule, unholy means prevail. Worldliness holds the world in fee. By it alone can you conquer. Use the means and the men of Caesar, and your success will be swift and sure. Worship me, and the kingdoms of this world are thine." The temptation was subtly adapted to the mood and the moment, and was as evil as subtle. Bad means make bad ends. Good ends do not justify evil means; evil means deprave good ends. So a Messianic kingdom, instituted and established by worldliness, had been a worldly kingdom, no better than the coarse and sensuous empire of Rome. And Jesus, while He felt the force, saw the evil of the temptation, and vanquished it by the truth on which His own spiritual and eternal city was to be founded, "Thou shalt worship the Lord thy God," &c. (A. M. Fairbairn, D. D.) Parallel Verses KJV: And the devil, taking him up into an high mountain, shewed unto him all the kingdoms of the world in a moment of time. |
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