Morning Bible Study: Luke 6:1-5

Lord of the Sabbath

6:1 On a Sabbath, he passed through the grainfields. His disciples were picking heads of grain, rubbing them in their hands, and eating them. 

2 But some of the Pharisees said, “Why are you doing what is not lawful on the Sabbath?”

3 Jesus answered them, “Haven’t you read what David and those who were with him did when he was hungry— 

4 how he entered the house of God and took and ate the bread of the Presence, which is not lawful for any but the priests to eat? He even gave some to those who were with him.” 

5 Then he told them, “The Son of Man is Lord of the Sabbath.”

Commentary

(the following is from Matthew Henry's Complete Commentary, 1706 -- www.christianity.com)

"These two passages of story [Luke 6:1-5 & Luke 6:6-11] we had both in Matthew and Mark, and they were there laid together (Mt. 12:1; Mk. 2:23; 3:1), because, though happening at some distance of time from each other, both were designed to rectify the mistakes of the scribes and Pharisees concerning the sabbath day, on the bodily rest of which they laid greater stress and required greater strictness than the Law-giver intended."

"Jesus Christ will justify his disciples when they are unjustly censured, and will own and accept of them in many a thing which men tell them it is not lawful for them to do. How well is it for us that men are not to be our judges, and that Christ will be our Advocate!"

"Works of necessity are particularly allowable on the sabbath day; but we must take heed that we turn not this liberty into licentiousness, and abuse God's favorable concessions and condescensions to the prejudice of the work of the day."

"Jesus Christ, though he allowed works of necessity on the sabbath day, will notwithstanding have us to know and remember that it is his day, and therefore is to be spent in his service and to his honor (v. 5): The Son of Man is Lord also of the Sabbath."