And, behold, there was a man in Jerusalem, whose name was Simeon; and the same man was just and devout, waiting for the consolation of Israel: and the Holy Spirit was upon him.
All Commentaries on Luke 2:25 Go To Luke 2
Cornelius a Lapide
AD 1637
And, behold, there was a man in Jerusalem, whose name was Simeon; and the same man was just and devout, waiting for the consolation of Israel: and the holy Ghost was upon him. Calvin would have it that Simeon was of obscure birth and unknown; but that he was venerable by his age and his sanctity appears from what follows here. Many hold that he was a priest, and that it was in this capacity that he blessed Mary and Joseph. So say Lyranus, Dionysius, Cajetan, Francis Lucas, Toletus, S. Athanasius (in "The Common Essence of the Father and the Son"), S. Cyril ( Deuteronomy 0ccursu Dom.), S. Epiphanius ("Treatise on the Fathers of the Old Testament"), and Canisius (de Deipara, bk. iv. ch10). But Theophylact, Euthymius, Jansenius, and Barradius are of opinion that he was a layman, and gave his blessing not as a priest but as an old man.
And the same was just. From this Galatinus (De Arcanis Fidei, 1. I, cap3) gathers that Simeon was the disciple and son of Hille1who, a little before the birth of Christ, was the founder of the Scribes and Pharisees, as S. Jerome states on Isaiah 8 The words of Galatinus are: "Simeon, the son of Hillel, whom the Talmudists, by reason of his extraordinary sanctity, call "Saddic" the Just. In whom (as it is related in the "Pirke Avoth" or "the chapters of the fathers") the rule of the great Academy of the Synagogue came to an end. He spoke many things concerning the Messiah, and, at length, being in his extreme old age, and having received an answer from the Holy Ghost that he should not see death without seeing the Messiah, receiving Christ Himself in his arms, he confirmed, in the presence of Christ, the truth of those things which he had taught about Him under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit. And his noteworthy sayings are to be found scattered about in the books of the Talmudists."
Genebrardus (Chronology, bk. ii.) is of the same opinion, and adds: "For the belief that with Simeon the spirit of the great Synagogue—a spirit less than the prophetic but greater than the common—died out, the Talmudists are our authority in the treatise "Pirke Avoth." The Rabbi Moses, the Egyptian, records that he was not only the disciple, but also the son of Hillel, and the teacher, and indeed the father, of Gamaliel, at whose feet Paul learnt the law." All this, however, while it appears highly probable, is at the same time uncertain. There were many Simeons or Simons (for the two names are identical) who were just, as, for instance, Simeon the high priest, the son of Oniah, called "the Just," and spoken of with praise at some length in Sirach 1. I. Besides, the successors and disciples of Hillel, the Scribes and Pharisees, were in the highest degree hostile to Christ.
Devout. In Greek ευ̉λαβής—religious, God-fearing. Waiting for the consolation of Israel—the coming of the Messiah, who was to console Israel, that Isaiah , the faithful people, and set them free from the oppression of Satan, of Herod, the Romans , and the Scribes and Pharisees. For, eager for the common weal, "he sought," says S. Ambrose, "the good of his people rather than his own." By the transferring of the sceptre from Judah to Herod, according to the prophecy of Jacob (Gen. xlix10), by the completion of the seventy weeks of Dan. ix, and by other prophecies, Simeon knew that the coming of Christ was at hand, to deliver Israel—that Isaiah , the faithful—from all evil, as well from their sins as from all miseries, partly in this life, partly in the life to come. Christ, then, is the consolation of the faithful, for except in Him there, is no hope of salvation, but only despair, and desolation. Hence Isaiah 40:1, promising the coming of Christ, says, "Comfort ye, comfort ye my people, saith your God: speak unto the heart of Jerusalem." And in Isaiah 51:3, "The Lord shall comfort Sion;" and again in lxi. I, "The Spirit of the Lord is upon me . . . to comfort all them that mourn." And in 2 Corinthians 1:5, S. Paul says, "As the sufferings of Christ abound in us, so our consolation also aboundeth by Christ." In the time of Christ the condition, as well of the State as of the Church of Israel, was one of the deepest affliction. Their body politic, while it lacked its own chiefs, was under the yoke of Herod and the Pagan Romans , and their Church, on the other hand, was under bondage to impious priests, to Scribes and Pharisees; and in S. Matthew 23:5, Christ tells us what manner of men these were—how they oppressed the people, and into what errors and vices they led them.
And the Holy Ghost was upon him, both sanctifying him and conferring on him the gift of prophecy. Observe that in Holy Scripture the Holy Ghost is said to come to, or be in, any one not only by the grace which makes that person acceptable, but also by any grace, "gratis data," i.e, conferred not necessarily in consideration of the merit of the recipient, and not for his own benefit, but for that of others, e.g, the grace of prophecy, as here in the case of Simeon. So in Luke 1:35, the Holy Ghost is spoken of as about to come upon the Blessed Virgin, that she may conceive a Song of Solomon , and become the Mother of God; this is a grace, "gratis data." And again in Luke 41:1 of the same chapter;Elizabeth is spoken of as full of the Holy Spirit when she began to prophecy.
Upon him. In the Greek ε̉π αυ̉τόν, the Holy Ghost, coming down upon him, took possession of his soul, so that he seemed not so much a man of this earth as a celestial and divine being, and this on purpose that his testimony as to Christ might be irrefragable and beyond dispute.
Celsus (De Incredulitate Judæorum apud Vigilium)—to be found among the works of Cyprian) gives a tradition to the effect that Simeon was blind, and recovered his sight when he touched Christ; but S. Luke would not have been silent about so great a miracle, and which would so clearly have been in place here.
