Tool Beta
The Ancient World Behind the Text
Pick a passage anywhere in the New Testament. See the customs and ideas a first reader knew without being told.
Luke 7:11-17, A widow's only son on the bier
At the gate of Nain Jesus meets a funeral for a widow's only son. He touches the bier, raises the young man and gives him back to his mother, and the crowd says a great prophet has arisen.
Luke 7:11-17, in every translation this tool compares.
At the gate of the town of Nain, Jesus meets a funeral procession carrying out a widow's only son, with many townspeople walking alongside her. Moved by her loss, he tells her to stop crying, touches the stretcher, and tells the young man to rise; the dead man sits up and speaks, and Jesus returns him to his mother. The onlookers are awed and say that a great prophet has appeared and that God has stepped in for his people.
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- {"u":"https:\/\/jayms.com\/bible-study-tools-2\/ancient-world-ideas\/widows\/","n":"Widows","s":"A woman whose husband died usually lost her income with him and depended on a son, relatives or charity. A widow who stayed faithful to her husband's memory and did not remarry was honored.","r":""}
- {"u":"https:\/\/jayms.com\/bible-study-tools-2\/ancient-world-ideas\/unclean-by-touch\/","n":"Unclean by touch","s":"Under the law, skin disease, bleeding, corpses, tombs and certain animals made a person ritually unclean, and touch could pass it on.","r":""}
- {"u":"https:\/\/jayms.com\/bible-study-tools-2\/ancient-world-ideas\/elijah-expected\/","n":"Elijah expected","s":"Malachi promised Elijah would come back before the great day of the Lord. By Jesus' time many were waiting for him, and the Gospels keep raising his name.","r":""}
The bereaved mother led the funeral procession out of town, with the townspeople behind her (Keener and his notes), and rabbinic writings said one should break off studying the law to join a small funeral procession but not a large one, so the size of this crowd shows the grief (Strauss). Keener writes, "Interrupting a funeral was a blatant breach of Jewish law and custom": touching the bier brought a day's uncleanness and touching the corpse a week's (Numbers 19). The bier was an open stretcher, not a closed coffin (Keener), and Wright notes that nobody but the official bearers would normally touch it. Elijah and Elisha had each raised a mother's son (1 Kings 17:17-24; 2 Kings 4:36), and the crowd's words echo the Old Testament language of God visiting his people (Keener and his notes). Wright puts Nain about five miles from Nazareth and Strauss about six, on the north slope of the hill of Moreh; Shunem, where Elisha raised a child, lies on the hill's south side (the Zondervan Bible dictionary). Wright sees Luke pointing ahead to another widow's only son carried out for burial at Jerusalem.
- Craig S. Keener, The IVP Bible Background Commentary: New Testament, on Luke 7:11-17, 7:13, 7:14 and 7:15-17
- NIV Cultural Backgrounds Study Bible, notes on Luke 7:13, 7:14 and 7:16
- N. T. Wright, Luke for Everyone, comment on Luke 7:11-17
- Mark L. Strauss, Luke, in Zondervan Illustrated Bible Backgrounds Commentary, ed. Clinton E. Arnold, on Luke 7:11-17, 7:11, 7:12 and 7:14
- J. D. Douglas and Merrill C. Tenney, Zondervan Illustrated Bible Dictionary, Nain
