a light for revelation to the nations, and the glory of your people Israel.”
Parallel Translations
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a light for revelation to the nations, and the glory of your people Israel.”
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A light to lighten the gentyls and the glory of thy people Israel.
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A light to be reueiled to the Gentiles, and the glory of thy people Israel.
Cross-references (18)
Passages linked to Luke 2:32 in the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge, ordered by reader-vote popularity; verse text shown in World English Bible.
- Isaiah 60:1-3 “Arise, shine; for your light has come, and Yahweh’s glory has risen on you. For, behold, darkness will cover the earth, and thick darkness the peoples; but Yahweh will arise on you, and his glory shall be seen on you. Nations will come to your light, and kings to the brightness of your rising.
- Isaiah 49:6 Indeed, he says, “It is too light a thing that you should be my servant to raise up the tribes of Jacob, and to restore the preserved of Israel. I will also give you as a light to the nations, that you may be my salvation to the end of the earth.”
- Acts 26:23 how the Christ must suffer, and how, by the resurrection of the dead, he would be first to proclaim light both to these people and to the Gentiles.”
- Acts 13:47-48 For so has the Lord commanded us, saying, ‘I have set you as a light for the Gentiles, that you should bring salvation to the uttermost parts of the earth.’ ” As the Gentiles heard this, they were glad, and glorified the word of God. As many as were appointed to eternal life believed.
- Isaiah 42:6-7 “I, Yahweh, have called you in righteousness. I will hold your hand. I will keep you, and make you a covenant for the people, as a light for the nations, to open the blind eyes, to bring the prisoners out of the dungeon, and those who sit in darkness out of the prison.
- Isaiah 9:2 The people who walked in darkness have seen a great light. The light has shined on those who lived in the land of the shadow of death.
- Revelation 21:23 The city has no need for the sun or moon to shine, for the very glory of God illuminated it, and its lamp is the Lamb.
- Isaiah 60:19 The sun will be no more your light by day; nor will the brightness of the moon give light to you, but Yahweh will be your everlasting light, and your God will be your glory.
- Matthew 4:16 the people who sat in darkness saw a great light, to those who sat in the region and shadow of death, to them light has dawned.”
- Acts 28:28 “Be it known therefore to you, that the salvation of God is sent to the nations, and they will listen.”
- Isaiah 4:2 In that day, Yahweh’s branch will be beautiful and glorious, and the fruit of the land will be the beauty and glory of the survivors of Israel.
- Isaiah 45:25 All the offspring of Israel will be justified in Yahweh, and will rejoice!
- Zechariah 2:5 For I,’ says Yahweh, ‘will be to her a wall of fire around it, and I will be the glory in the middle of her.
- Romans 15:8-9 Now I say that Christ has been made a servant of the circumcision for the truth of God, that he might confirm the promises given to the fathers, and that the Gentiles might glorify God for his mercy. As it is written, “Therefore I will give praise to you among the Gentiles and sing to your name.”
- Psalms 85:9 Surely his salvation is near those who fear him, that glory may dwell in our land.
- Jeremiah 2:11 Has a nation changed its gods, which really are no gods? But my people have changed their glory for that which doesn’t profit.
- Luke 2:10 The angel said to them, “Don’t be afraid, for behold, I bring you good news of great joy which will be to all the people.
- 1 Corinthians 1:31 that, as it is written, “He who boasts, let him boast in the Lord.”
Cross-references from openbible.info (CC BY 4.0)
Explain this verse (11 sources)
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John Trapp 1656 · Public Domain 32 A light to lighten the Gentiles, and the…
32 A light to lighten the Gentiles, and the glory of thy people Israel.
Ver. 32. The glory of thy people Israel] Oh! pity their perverseness, and pray their conversion, that the Jews may call God Abba, the Gentiles Father, Dan 12:11. There is a prophecy of the Jews’ final restoration (saith Mr Case, God’s waiting to be gracious), and the time is expressed, which is 1290 years after the ceasing of the daily sacrifice, and the setting up of the abomination of desolation; which is conceived to be about Julian’s time, who assayed to rebuild the temple of the Jews, but was hindered from heaven. This was anno Dom. 360, to which if you add 1290 years, it will pitch the calculation upon the year 1650.
John Trapp, A Commentary or Exposition upon All the Books of the Old and New Testament (1647–1656) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
John Gill 1763 · Public Domain And Joseph and his mother,.... The Vulgate Latin reads,…
And Joseph and his mother,.... The Vulgate Latin reads, "and his father and mother". The Ethiopic version retains both his name and his relation, and reads, "and Joseph his father, and his mother"; but all the ancient copies read only "Joseph", without the addition, his father; and so the Syriac, Arabic, and Persic versions: they
marvelled at those things which were spoken of him; the child Jesus: not that those things which Simeon said, were new and strange to them; for they not only knew that the same things were predicted of the Messiah, but they had heard and known, and believed the same concerning this child; but they wondered, that a stranger to them and the child, coming into the temple at this instant, should have such a revelation made to him, and be able to say the things he did. Moreover, there is no need to confine this passage to what were said by Simeon, but it may reach to, and include every thing; that as yet had been spoken concerning Jesus; either before, or since his birth; as by the angel to them both, to the one before his conception, to the other after; and by Zacharias and Elisabeth, and by the angel to the shepherds, who had reported the same to Joseph and Mary, and now by Simeon; and they were astonished, at the exact agreement there was between them.
John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
John Wesley 1765 · Public Domain And the glory of thy people Israel - For…
And the glory of thy people Israel - For after the Gentiles are enlightened, all Israel shall be saved.
John Wesley, Explanatory Notes Upon the Whole Bible (1754–1765) — public domain. Text via the GEBible commentary corpus.
Adam Clarke 1810 · Public Domain Verse 32. A light to lighten the Gentiles] φως…
Verse 32. A light to lighten the Gentiles] φως εις αποκαλοψιν εθνων - A light of the Gentiles, for revelation. By Moses and the prophets, a light of revelation was given to the Jews, in the blessedness of which the Gentiles did not partake. By Christ and his apostles, a luminous revelation is about to be given unto the Gentiles, from the blessedness of which the Jews in general, by their obstinacy and unbelief, shall be long excluded. But to all true Israelites it shall be a glory, an evident fulfilment of all the predictions of the prophets, relative to the salvation of a lost world; and the first offers of it shall be made to the Jewish people, who may see in it the truth of their own Scriptures indisputably evinced.
Adam Clarke's Commentary on the Bible (1810–1826) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Albert Barnes 1834 · Public Domain A light to lighten the Gentiles - This is…
A light to lighten the Gentiles - This is in accordance with the prophecies in the Old Testament, Isa. 49; Isa 9:6-7; Psa 98:3; Mal 4:2. The Gentiles are represented as sitting in darkness that is, in ignorance and sin. Christ is a “light” to them, as by him they will be made acquainted with the character of the true God, his law, and the plan of redemption. As the darkness rolls away when the sun arises, so ignorance and error flee away when Jesus gives light to the mind. Nations shall come to his light, and kings to the brightness of his rising, Isa 60:3.
And the glory ... - The first offer of salvation was made to the Jews, Joh 4:22; Luk 24:47. Jesus was born among the Jews; to them had been given the prophecies respecting him, and his first ministry was among them. Hence, he was their glory, their honor, their light. But it is a subject of special gratitude to us that the Saviour was given also for the Gentiles; for:
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We are Gentiles, and if he had not come we should have been shut out from the blessings of redemption. It is he only that now.
“Can make our dying bed.
Feel soft as downy pillows are,
While on his breast we lean our head,
And breathe our life out sweetly there.”
Thus our departure may be like that of Simeon. Thus we may die in peace. Thus it will be a blessing to die. But,
In order to do this, our life must be like that of Simeon. We must wait for the consolation of Israel. We must look for his coming. We must be holy, harmless, undefiled, “loving” the Saviour. Then death to us, like death to Simeon, will have no terror; we shall depart in peace, and in heaven see the salvation of God, 2Pe 3:11-12. But, Children, as well as the hoary-headed Simeon, may look for the coming of Christ. They too must die; and “their” death will be happy only as they depend on the Lord Jesus, and are prepared to meet him.
Albert Barnes' Notes on the Bible (1834–1885) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Daniel D. Whedon 1874 · Public Domain 32. To lighten the Gentiles—The secular and unspiritual masses…
32. To lighten the Gentiles—The secular and unspiritual masses of Jews fell into the fanatical and arrogant notion, that Christ was to be merely a circumscribed and exclusively Jewish Messiah; the twelve apostles could hardly be made to resign that notion. Even after the resurrection it took the independence of a martyred Stephen and all the powers of an inspired Paul to assert the full rights of the Gentiles in the Church of God. Scholars have said that in the work of opening the gates of Christianity to the Gentiles Stephen was the forerunner of Paul. Might it not be said that Simeon was the forerunner of Stephen, and the Gentile Luke the historian of both? Yet the true doctrine on the subject is explicitly and repeatedly declared not only here but in the prophecies of the Old Testament. Compare Isa_9:2; Isa_40:1; Isa_49:6. Those who understood the prophets, and caught their true spirit like Simeon, would not need the power of prophecy to understand those passages.
Daniel D. Whedon (gen. ed.), Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1874–1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges 1878 · Public Domain 32. to lighten the Gentiles] Rather, for revelation to.…
32. to lighten the Gentiles] Rather, for revelation to. A memorable prophecy, considering that even the Apostles found it hard to grasp the full admission of the Gentiles, clearly as it had been indicated in older prophecy, as in Psa_98:2-3. “All the ends of the earth have seen the salvation of our God,” Isa_52:10. “I will give thee for a covenant of the people, for a light of the Gentiles,” Isa_42:6; Isa_49:6.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges (gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne; Cambridge University Press, 1878–1918) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers 1878 · Public Domain (32) To lighten the Gentiles.—Literally, for a revelation to…
(32) To lighten the Gentiles.—Literally, for a revelation to the Gentiles. The idea is strictly that of the withdrawal of the “veil spread over all nations” of Isa_25:7.
The glory of thy people Israel.—Here, again, the language is the natural utterance of the hope of the time, not the after-thought of later years. The Christ whom Israel had rejected was hardly “the glory of the people” when St. Luke wrote his Gospel.
A Bible Commentary for English Readers, edited by Charles John Ellicott (1878–1897) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Biblical Illustrator 1887 · Public Domain A light to lighten the Gentiles
Luk_2:32
A light to lighten the Gentiles
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The light of the Gentiles
I.
EXPLAIN THE IMPORT OF THE TEXT.
1. The character of Jesus is exhibited under the image of light--the most glorious of all the creatures of God.
(1) Among the properties of light are penetration and universality. Light would have been an inappropriate image, in reference to Christ, had He not intended to illuminate the world. Not to a district, not to an empire, not to one quarter of the globe, does that glorious boon--light--confine its influences. It visits all in their turn. It burns within the torrid zone, it reaches the dark and distant poles; it proceeds with a gradual, yet inconceivable speed, in its restless career, till it has enlightened the whole.
(2) Light is a source of comfort (Ecc_11:7).
(3) Another quality of light is purity. It is this which renders it a fit emblem of Deity (1Jn_1:5).
2. The subjects of His influences--The Gentiles--i.e., all nations that have not yet heard the tidings of the gospel in Him.
3. The result of the manifestation of Christ to the world will be universal illumination. He rises upon the nations to lighten them.
II. APPLY ITS TESTIMONY TO MISSIONARY EXERTIONS.
1. Examine the principles on which they are founded.
(1) They are founded in nature. The same cause should produce the same effects. Whoever sincerely loves the Saviour will feel a proportionate attachment to His laws, His people, His interests. He cannot sit down indifferent to the last, any more than he can consent to break the first.
(2) They are founded on the purest principles of reason. Missionary effort must be used as a means, to bring about the end in view--the spread of the gospel. God employs in the meantime human instruments for the carrying out of His Divine purposes.
(3) They are founded on the purest principles of humanity. The gospel is the only effectual remedy of all this world s evil and misery.
(4) They are founded on the purest principles of patriotism. Religious lethargy precedes national ruin; patriotism, therefore, calls for the support of religious zeal.
(5) They are founded on the purest principles of religion.
2. The considerations by which we are encouraged.
(1) Revelation.
(2) Experience.
(3) Existing circumstances. Is there not crying need throughout the world of those consolations which the gospel alone can bring, and of the Saviour whom the gospel alone proclaims? (W. B. Collyer, D. D.)
Christ the light of all nations
He gives the light of truth, of spiritual sight, of knowledge, of holiness, of joy, of heaven. The natives of arctic regions put on their holiday attire, and enthusiastically welcome the returning sun, when after months of absence, he again revisits them with his rays. How much more should we rejoice in the light of the Sun of Righteousness? There was a light once on or near the Goodwin Sands, called The light of all nations, because it was supposed that some of all nations would see it. The light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ will one day cover the earth. When Christ gives us light, we must reflect it (see Mat_5:14-16). The lighthouse, when its lights burn truly, will warn the mariner against danger, and enable him to pursue the right and safe way. So we may each guide some from the darkness and danger of sin, to the light and safety of Gods mercy in Christ. (Henry R. Burton.)
Light an emblem of Christ
There is no figure more common nor more beautiful in the Scriptures, than that by which Christ is compared to light. Incomprehensible in its nature, itself first visible, and that by which all else is so; light represents to us Christ, whose generation none can declare, but who must shine on us ere we can know aught aright whether of things Divine or human. Pure, uncontaminated, though visiting the lowest parts of the earth, and penetrating the most noisome recesses; what is light an image of, if not of that Divine Mediator, who contracted no stain, though born of a woman, in the likeness of sinful flesh? Instrumental in all the processes of vegetation, so that, without its vivifying power, the earth could not yield its kindly fruits, nor expose its verdant hues, what is light but the emblem of that source of illumination, of whom the Evangelist declares that He was the Light and Life of men? And without searching too narrowly into the particular sources by which this resemblance might be proved, we may say that Christ is to the material world what the sun is to the natural; and wherever the gospel has been published and received as a communication from God, the darkness has fled, as night flies before the day; and we know, that wherever the revelation made through Christ has been dispersed, wherever it has vouchsafed its cheering rays, the clouds of ignorance, and superstition, and irreligion have vanished, and holiness purity, and morality have illumined the horizon. It has done more. It has hung the very grave with bright lamps, and re-kindled the blazings of an almost quenched immortality. (H. Melvill, B. D.)
And the glory of Thy people Israel--
Christ the glory of His people
We shall now employ the natural Israel as a type of the Lords elect ones, and surely there is no straining of the text, when we say that Jesus Christ is the glory of the spiritual seed, the redeemed people. And why, with evident propriety, may the saints of God be compared to Israel?
1. Surely because God has made a covenant with them as He did with Jacob.
2. We may be compared with Israel, again, because if we be the children of God we have learned to wrestle with the angel and prevail.
3. It may be that you have another likeness to Israel in the fact that you are much tried. Faith must be tried. God had one Son without sin, but He never had a Son without the rod.
4. The true Israel, which are spiritually the Church of Christ, are said, according to the text, to be the Lords people.
(1) By His eternal choice.
(2) By redemption.
(3) By voluntary dedication of yourselves to Him.
I. When we say that Christ is our glory, we mean that WE GET ALL THE GLORY WE HAVE THROUGH HIM. Some men go to the schools for glory, others to the camps of war. In all kinds of places men have sought after honour, but the believer saith that Christ is the mine in which he digs for this gold, Christ is the sea in which he fishes for this pearl; he gives up all other searchings and looks for glory in Jesus, and nowhere else.
1. The glory of election.
2. The glory of redemption.
3. The glory of adoption.
4. The glory of justification.
5. The glory of sanctification.
Thus I might continue showing you that there is not a single treasure which a Christian possesses which does not come to him through Christ. He has nothing in which he can glory but what he is sweetly compelled to say of it, I gained this in the market of Calvary; I found this in the mines of a Saviours suffering; all this came to me through my bleeding, buried, risen, coming Lord, and He shall have the glory of it as long as I live.
II. WE SEE A GLORY IN CHRIST which swallows up all other glories, as the suns light conceals the light of the stars.
1. In Christs person.
2. In Christs sufferings.
3. In Christs resurrection.
4. In Christs ascension.
5. In Christs intercession.
6. In Christs second advent.
III. The text is true in the sense that WE GIVE GLORY TO HIM. There is life in a look at the Crucified One. There is life in simple confidence in Him, but there is life nowhere else. God send to His Church an undying passion to promote the Saviours glory, an invincible, unconquerable pang of desire, and longing that by any means King Jesus may have His own, and may reign throughout these realms! In this sense, then, Jesus is and must be the glory of His people.
IV. But there is another sense--namely, FROM JESUS IS REFLECTED ALL THE GLORY WHICH IS PUT UPON HIS PEOPLE. Whatever glory they have, and they have much in the eyes of angels, and much honour in the eyes of discerning men, it is always the reflection of the Saviours glory. I know some holy men and women for whom I cannot but feel the deepest and intensest respect, but the reason is because they have so much of my Master about them. I think I would travel many miles to talk with some of them, because their speech is always so full of Him, and they live so near to Him.
V. The text may be read in this sense: Christ is the glory of His people, that is to say, THEY EXPECT GLORY WHEN HE COMES. Our glory is laid up. When you follow Jesus in resurrection, what glory! But we must not begin to speak of that, for we should never leave off at all if we began to talk about that glory--the glory of perfection, the glory of being delivered from sin, the glory of conquest, having trodden Satan under our feet; the glory of eternal rest, the glory of infinite security, the glory of being like Christ, the glory of being in the light and brightness of God, standing, like Miltons angel, in the very sun itself. If you want to know what heaven is, you can spell it in five letters, and when you put the five letters together they sound like this: Jesus. That is heaven. It is all the heaven the angels round the throne desire to know. They want nothing better than this, to see His face, to behold His glory, and to dwell in it world with out end.
VI. THE PRACTICAL DRIFT OF THE SUBJECT.
1. We would give a word of warning to those of you who seek your glory anywhere else, because as surely aa you do so, even if you meet with honour for a time, you will have to lose it. It is always ill to put your treasure where it will be stolen from yon. Now, suppose you seek your glory in your learning. Well, well, well! Let the sexton take up your skull after you have been dead a little while, and what learning will there be in it, what show of wisdom will be found in it when it is resolved into a little impalpable brown powder? What will your science, and your mathematics, and your classics do for you in death and judgment? Suppose you seek your glory in fame, and become the favourite of the nation as a great soldier. When the grave-digger rattles your old bones about, what will that signify? You will have great fame, you say, and men will talk about you.
But he who hath his glory in Christ, when he openeth his eyes in the next world will see Christ, and so behold his glory safe, and firmly entailed upon him.
2. Another word, and that is a word of rebuke. There are some preachers we know of, and I suppose there will always be some of the genus, who preach, preach, preach, but they never preach what is Israels glory. They talk of anything but Christ.
3. There are some of you to whom I have a last word to say, and that is, some of you love Jesus Christ, but you are ashamed to say so. Now, since He is the glory of His people Israel, I shall be afraid of you and for you if you do not make Him your glory. (C. H. Spurgeon.)
Christ the glory of Israel
Christ was the glory of Israel.
1. Because He was a Jew by birth.
2. Because His history has vindicated all that was peculiar in the Jewish polity.
3. Because He confined His personal ministry to the Jews.
4. Because He has stamped the impress of Jewish thought on the mind of man.
5. Because He has invested the condition and prospects of the Jews with universal interest. (G. Brooks.)
The glory of Israel
There was salvation in this sight: there was light in it; and there was glory in it also. He will be--said Simeon--the glory of Thy people Israel. The prophet Isaiah was speaking of this same Saviour, when he said They shall hang on Him all the glory of His Fathers house Isa_22:24). The chief glory that a nation has is made up of the wise, and good, and great, and useful men who have belonged to it. We speak of Washington as the glory of America. We feel it an honour to belong to the nation which could claim Washington as one of its people. In Holland they call William, Prince of Orange, the glory of their nation. England, our grand old mother country, has had so many wise, and good, and great men, that it is hard to tell which to speak of as the best and greatest. They all help to make up the glory of the people of England. And any one who was born in England may feel it an honour to belong to a country which has produced so many good and great men. And in the same way it is the glory of the Jewish nation, or of Israel, as a people, that Jesus Christ, the Son of God, the Saviour of the world, belonged to their nation. Jesus was a Jew. And the Jewish people may well feel it an honour to belong to the nation among whom He was born. It is true in this sense that He is the glory of His people Israel. (Dr. Newton.)
The Biblical Illustrator, edited by Joseph S. Exell (c. 1880s–1900s) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
B. W. Johnson 1891 · Public Domain 32. A light to lighten the Gentiles. Scholars have…
32. A light to lighten the Gentiles. Scholars have said that in the work of opening the gates of Christianity to the Gentiles, Stephen was the forerunner of Paul. Might it not be said that Simeon was the forerunner of Stephen, and the Gentile Luke the historian of both? Yet the true doctrine on the subject is explicitly and repeatedly declared not only here, but in the prophecies of the Old Testament. Compare Isa. 9:2; 40:1; 49:6.
B. W. Johnson's The People's New Testament with Notes (1889–1891) — public domain. Electronic text from the Christian Classics Ethereal Library (CCEL) ThML edition.
Tyndale Open Study Notes 2022 · CC BY-SA 4.0 2:32 The prophet Isaiah predicted that the coming Kingdom…
2:32 The prophet Isaiah predicted that the coming Kingdom of God would bring salvation to all the nations (Isa 42:6-7; 49:6). • the glory of your people Israel! This quote from Isa 46:13 says that God’s salvation will bring glory to Israel. Israel’s role in the Old Testament was to bring glory to God by revealing God’s light to the nations.
Tyndale Open Study Notes — © Tyndale Open Resources, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Text via the HelloAO Bible API.