---
title: "Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible -  Luke 15"
description: "CHAPTER 15   :-. PUBLICANS AND
SINNERS WELCOMED
BY CHRIST—THREE
PARABLES TO EXPLAIN
THIS. 1. drew near . . . all the publicans
and sinners, &c.—drawn"
image: "/images/missing.jpg"
url: "https://realbiblebelievers.com/commentaries/commentary-critical-and-explanatory-on-the-whole-bible/luke/15"
---

CHAPTER 15

. PUBLICANS AND
SINNERS WELCOMED
BY CHRIST—THREE
PARABLES TO EXPLAIN
THIS.

**1. drew near . . . all the publicans
and sinners,** &c.—drawn around Him by the extraordinary
adaptation of His teaching to their case, who, till He appeared—at
least His forerunner—might well say, "No man careth for my
soul."

**2. murmured, saying,** c.—took
it ill, were scandalized at Him, and insinuated (on the principle
that a man is known by the company he keeps) that He must have some
secret sympathy with their *character.* But oh, what a truth of
unspeakable preciousness do their lips, as on other occasions,
unconsciously utter., Now follow three parables representing the
sinner: (1) *in his stupidity* (2) as *all-unconscious of his
lost condition;* (3) *knowingly and willingly estranged from God*
[BENGEL]. The first two
set forth the *seeking* love of God; the last, His *receiving*
love [TRENCH].
. I. THE LOST
SHEEP.

**3-7.** Occurring again (); but there to show how precious one of His sheep is to
the Good Shepherd; here, to show that the shepherd, though the sheep
stray never so widely, will seek it out, and when he hath found, will
rejoice over it.

**4. leave the ninety and nine**—bend
all His attention and care, as it were, to the one object of
recovering the lost sheep; not saying. "It is but one; let it
go; enough remain."
**go after . . . until,**
&c.—pointing to all the diversified means which God sets in
operation for recovering sinners.

**3-7.** Occurring again (); but there to show how precious one of His sheep is to
the Good Shepherd; here, to show that the shepherd, though the sheep
stray never so widely, will seek it out, and when he hath found, will
rejoice over it.

**6. Rejoice with me,** &c.—The
principle here is, that one feels *exuberant joy* to be almost
too much for himself to bear alone, and is positively relieved by
having others to *share it with him.* (See on ).

**7. ninety-nine just . . . needing no
repentance**—not *angels,* whose place in these parables is
very different from this; but those represented by the *prodigal's
well-behaved brother,* who have "served their Father"
many years and not at any time transgressed His commandment (in the
outrageous sense of the prodigal). (See on ; [Luke 15:1](../../../kjv/luke/15/1)). In other
words, *such as have grown up from childhood* in the fear of God
and as the sheep of His pasture. Our Lord does not *say* "the
Pharisees and scribes" were such; but as there was undoubtedly
such a class, while "the publicans and sinners" were
confessedly the strayed sheep and the prodigal children, He leaves
them to fill up the place of the other class, *if they could.*
[Luke 15:1](../../../kjv/luke/15/1). II. THE LOST
COIN.

**8. sweep the house**—"not
done without *dust* on man's part" [BENGEL].

**10. Likewise**—on the same
principle.
**joy,** c.—Note carefully
the language here—not "joy *on the part,*" but "joy
*in the presence* of the angels of God." True to the idea
of the parables. The Great Shepherd. The Great Owner Himself, is He
*whose the joy properly is over His own recovered property* but
so vast and exuberant is it (), that as if He could not keep it to Himself, He "calleth
His friends and neighbors together"—His whole celestial
family—saying, "Rejoice WITH
ME, for I have found *My*
sheep-My-piece," c. In this sublime sense it is "joy,"
*before* "*or in the presence* of the angels"
they only "catch the flying joy," sharing it *with Him!*
The application of this to the reception of those publicans and
sinners that stood around our Lord is grand in the extreme: "Ye
turn from these lost ones with disdain, and because I do not the
same, ye murmur at it: but a very different feeling is cherished in
heaven. There, the recovery of even one such outcast is watched with
interest and hailed with joy; nor are they left to come home of
themselves or perish; for lo! even now the great Shepherd is going
after His lost sheep, and the Owner is making diligent search for the
lost property; and He is finding it, too, and bringing it back with
joy, and all heaven is full of it." (Let the reader mark what
sublime claims Himself our Lord covertly puts in here—as if in Him
they beheld, all unknown to themselves, nothing less than heaven in
the habiliments of earth, the Great Shepherd above, clothed in a
garment of flesh, come "to seek and to save that which was
lost")!
. III. THE
PRODIGAL SON.

**12. the younger**—as the more
thoughtless.
**said,** c.—weary of
restraint, panting for independence, unable longer to abide the check
of a father's eye. *This is man* impatient of divine control,
desiring to be independent of God, seeking to be his own master that
"sin of sins, in which all subsequent sins are included as in
their germ, for they are but the unfolding of this one"
[TRENCH].
**he divided,** c.—Thus
"God, when His service no longer appears a perfect freedom, and
man promises himself something far better elsewhere, allows him to
make the trial and he shall discover, if need be by saddest proof,
that to depart from Him is not to throw off the yoke, but to exchange
a light yoke for a heavy one, and one gracious Master for a thousand
imperious tyrants and lords" [TRENCH].

**13. not many days**—intoxicated
with his new—found resources, and eager for the luxury of using
them at Will.
**a far country**—beyond
all danger of interference from home.
**wasted,** c.—So long as
it lasted, the inward monitor () would be silenced ([Isaiah 9:10](../../../kjv/isaiah/9/10)
[Isaiah 57:10](../../../kjv/isaiah/57/10); [Amos 4:6-10](../../../kjv/amos/4/6-10)).
**riotous living**— ([Amos 4:6-30](../../../kjv/amos/4/6-30)), "with harlots." Ah! but this reaches farther
than the sensualist; for "in the deep symbolical language of
Scripture fornication is the standing image of idolatry; they are in
fact ever spoken of as one and the same sin, considered now in its
fleshly, now in its spiritual aspect" ([Jeremiah 3:1-15](../../../kjv/jeremiah/3/1-15);
[Ezekiel 16:1-17](../../../kjv/ezekiel/16/1-17)) [TRENCH].

**14. when he had spent all . . . a
mighty famine**—a mysterious providence holding back the famine
till he was in circumstances to feel it in all its rigor. Thus, like
Jonah, whom the storm did not overtake till on the mighty deep at the
mercy of the waves, does the sinner feel as if "the stars in
their courses were fighting against" him ().
**in want**—the first stage
of his bitter experience, and preparation for a change.

**15. joined himself,** &c.—his
pride not yet humbled, unable to brook the shame of a return.
**to feed swine**—glad to
keep life anyhow, behold the son sank into a swineherd—among the
Jews, on account of the prohibition of swine's flesh, emphatically
vile! "He who begins by using the world as a servant, to
minister to his pleasure, ends by reversing the relationship"
[TRENCH].

**16. would fain have filled**—rather,
"was fain to fill," ate greedily of the only food he could
get.
**the husks**—"the
hulls of a leguminous plant which in the East is the food of cattle
and swine, and often the nourishment of the poorest in times of
distress" [STIER].
**no man gave . . . him**—not
this food, for that he had, but *anything better* (). This was his lowest depth—*perishing unpitied, alone
in the world,* and *ready to disappear from it unmissed!* But
this is just the blessed turning-point; midnight before dawn of day
([2 Chronicles 12:8](../../../kjv/2-chronicles/12/8); [2 Chronicles 33:11-13](../../../kjv/2-chronicles/33/11-13);
[Jeremiah 2:19](../../../kjv/jeremiah/2/19)).

**17. came to himself**—Before, he
had been "beside himself" (), in what sense will presently appear.
**How many hired,** &c.—What
a testimony to the *nature* of the home he had left! But did he
not know all this ere he departed and every day of his voluntary
exile? He did, and he did not. His heart being wholly estranged from
home and steeped in selfish gratification, his father's house never
came within the range of his vision, or but as another name for
bondage and gloom. Now empty, desolate, withered, perishing, *home,*
with all its peace, plenty, freedom, dignity, starts into view, fills
all his visions as a warm and living reality, and breaks his heart.

**18. I will arise and go to my****FATHER******—The change has come at last, and what a change!—couched in
terms of such exquisite simplicity and power as if expressly framed
for all heart-broken penitents.
**Father,** c.—Mark the
term. Though "no more *worthy* to be called his son,"
the prodigal sinner is taught to claim the *defiled,* but *still
existing* relationship, asking not to be made a servant, but
*remaining a son* to be made "*as* a servant,"
willing to take the lowest place and do the meanest work. Ah! and is
it come to this? Once it was, "Any place rather than home."
Now, "Oh, that home! Could I but dare to hope that the door of
it would not be closed against me, how gladly would I take any place
and do any worK, happy only to be there at all." Well, *that
is conversion*—nothing absolutely new, yet all new old familiar
things seen in a new light and for the first time as realities of
overwhelming magnitude and power. *How this is brought about the
parable says not.* (We have that abundantly elsewhere, , &c.). Its one object is to paint the *welcome home*
of the greatest sinners, when (no matter for the present *how*)
they "arise and go *to their* Father."

**20. a great way off**—Oh yes,
when but the face is turned *homeward,* though as yet far, far
away, our Father recognizes His own child in us, and bounds to meet
us—not saying, Let him come to Me and sue for pardon first, but
Himself taking the first step.
**fell on his neck and kissed
him**—What! In all his filth? Yes. In all his rags? Yes. In all
his haggard, shattered wretchedness? Yes. "Our Father who art in
heaven," is this Thy portraiture? It is even so (). And because it is so, I wonder not that such incomparable
teaching hath made the world new.

**21. Father, I have sinned,**
&c.—"This confession is uttered *after the kiss of
reconciliation*" () [TRENCH].

**22. But the Father said,** c.—The
son has not said all he purposed, not so much, because the father's
demonstrations had rekindled the filial, and swallowed up all servile
feeling [TRENCH] (on the
word "Father," see on ), but because the father's heart is made to appear too full
to listen, at that moment, to more in this strain.
**the best robe**—Compare
[Zechariah 3:4](../../../kjv/zechariah/3/4) [Zechariah 3:5](../../../kjv/zechariah/3/5),
"Take away the filthy garments from him; behold I have clothed
thee with change of raiment; and they clothed him with garments"
([Isaiah 61:10](../../../kjv/isaiah/61/10); [Revelation 3:18](../../../kjv/revelation/3/18)).
**a ring**—(Compare [Genesis 41:42](../../../kjv/genesis/41/42);
[James 2:2](../../../kjv/james/2/2)).
**shoes**—Slaves went
barefoot. Thus, we have here a threefold symbol of *freedom* and
*honor,* restored, as the fruit of *perfect reconciliation.*

**23. the fatted calf**—kept for
festive occasions.

**24. my son**—now *twice*
his son.
**dead . . . lost**—to *me;*
to *himself*—to my service, my satisfaction; to his own
dignity, peace, profit.
**alive again . . . found**—to
all these.
**merry**—(See on ).

**25. in the field**—engaged in
his father's business: compare , "These many years do I *serve* thee."

**28. came his father out, and
entreated him**—"Like as a father pitieth his children, so
the Lord pitieth them that fear Him" (). As it is the elder brother who now errs, so it is *the
same paternal compassion* which had fallen on the neck of the
younger that comes forth and pleads with the elder.

**29. these many years . . . neither
transgressed I at any time thy commandment**—The words are not to
be pressed too far. He is merely contrasting *his constancy of love
and service* with the conduct of his brother; just as Job,
resenting the charge of *hypocrisy* by his friends, speaks as if
nothing could be laid to his charge (), and David too (). *The father attests the truth of all he says.*
**never . . . a kid**—I say
not a *calf,* but not even a kid.
**that I might make merry with
my friends**—Here lay his misapprehension. It was no
entertainment for the gratification of the prodigal: it was a
*father's* expression of the joy *he* felt at his recovery.
**thy son . . . thy living**—How
unworthy a reflection on the common father of both, for the one not
only to disown the other, but fling him over upon his father, as if
he should say, Take him, and have joy of him!

**31. Son,** c.—The father resents
not the insult—how could he, after the largeness of heart which had
kissed the returning prodigal? He calmly expostulates with him, "Son,
listen to reason. What need for special, exuberant joy over thee?
Didst thou say, 'Lo, these many years do I serve thee?' In that
saidst thou truly but *just for that reason* do I not set the
whole household a-rejoicing over thee. For thee is reserved *what
is higher still*—a tranquil lifelong satisfaction in thee, as a
true-hearted faithful son in thy father's house, nor of the
inheritance reserved for thee is aught alienated by this festive and
fitting joy over the once foolish but now wise and newly recovered
one."

**32. It was meet**—Was it
possible he should simply take his long vacant place in the family
without one special sign of wonder and delight at the change? Would
that have been *nature?* But *this* being the meaning of
the festivity, it would for that very reason be *temporary.* In
time, the dutifulness of even the younger son would become the *law*
and not the *exception;* he too at length might venture to say,
"Lo, these many years do I serve thee"; and of him the
father would say, "Son, thou art ever with me." In that
case, therefore, it would *not* be "meet that they should
make merry and be glad." The lessons are obvious, but how
beautiful! (1) The deeper sunk and the longer estranged any sinner
is, the more exuberant is the joy which his recovery occasions. (2)
Such joy is *not* the portion of those whose whole lives have
been spent in the service of their Father in heaven. (3) Instead of
grudging the want of this, they should deem it the highest testimony
to their lifelong fidelity, that something better is reserved for
them—the deep, abiding complacency of their Father in heaven.

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