Luke 17:28

Likewise also as it was in the days of Lot; they did eat, they drank, they bought, they sold, they planted, they builded;

EXPOSITORY (ENGLISH BIBLE)

Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers

(28) Likewise also as it was in the days of Lot.—The illustration does not occur in the otherwise parallel passage of Matthew 24:26-27, but was naturally suggested by our Lord’s frequent reference to the Cities of the Plain (Luke 10:12; Matthew 10:15; Matthew 11:23); The allusion to Lot in 2Peter 2:7, may perhaps be traced to the impression made on the Apostle by this revival of the history.

They bought, they sold.—As in the preceding verse, the imperfect tense is used, they were buying, they were selling. There is a characteristic difference in the insertion of these verbs and the two which follow, as indicating a higher advance in social life than in the days of Noah.

Matthew Henry's Concise Commentary

17:20-37 The kingdom of God was among the Jews, or rather within some of them. It was a spiritual kingdom, set up in the heart by the power of Divine grace. Observe how it had been with sinners formerly, and in what state the judgments of God, which they had been warned of, found them. Here is shown what a dreadful surprise this destruction will be to the secure and sensual. Thus shall it be in the day when the Son of man is revealed. When Christ came to destroy the Jewish nation by the Roman armies, that nation was found in such a state of false security as is here spoken of. In like manner, when Jesus Christ shall come to judge the world, sinners will be found altogether regardless; for in like manner the sinners of every age go on securely in their evil ways, and remember not their latter end. But wherever the wicked are, who are marked for eternal ruin, they shall be found by the judgments of God.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

They did eat ... - They were busy in the affairs of this life, as if nothing were about to happen.

The same day ... - See Genesis 19:23-25. "It rained." The word here used "might" have been rendered "he" rained. In Genesis it is said that the "Lord" did it.

Fire and brimstone - God destroyed Sodom on account of its great wickedness. He took vengeance on it for its sins; and the example of Sodom is set before people to deter them from committing great transgressions, and as a "full proof" that God will punish the guilty. See Jde 1:7; also Isaiah 1:10; Jeremiah 23:14. Yet, in overthrowing it, he used natural means. He is not to be supposed to have "created" fire and brimstone for the occasion, but to have "directed" the natural means at his disposal for their overthrow; as he did not "create" the waters to drown the world, but merely broke up the fountains of the great deep and opened the windows of heaven. Sodom and Gomorrah, Admah and Zeboim Deuteronomy 29:23, were four great cities, on a plain where is now the Dead Sea, at the southeast of Palestine, and into which the river Jordan flows. They were built on ground which abounded, doubtless, as all that region now does, in "bitumen or naphtha," which is easily kindled, and which burns with great intensity. The phrase "fire and brimstone" is a Hebrew form of expression, denoting sulphurous fire, or fire having the smell of sulphur; and may denote a volcanic eruption, or any burning like that of naphtha. There is no improbability in supposing either that this destruction was accomplished by lightning, which ignited the naphtha, or that it was a volcanic eruption, which, by direction of God, overthrew the wicked cities.

From heaven - By command of God, or from the sky. To the people of Sodom it had "the appearance" of coming from heaven, as all volcanic eruptions would have. Hundreds of towns have been overthrown in this way, and all by the agency of God. He rules the elements, and makes them his instruments, at his pleasure, in accomplishing the destruction of the wicked.

Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary

26-30. eat … married … planted—all the ordinary occupations and enjoyments of life. Though the antediluvian world and the cities of the plain were awfully wicked, it is not their wickedness, but their worldliness, their unbelief and indifference to the future, their unpreparedness, that is here held up as a warning. Note.—These recorded events of Old Testament history—denied or explained away nowadays by not a few—are referred to here as facts.

Matthew Poole's Commentary

See Poole on "Luke 17:26"

Gill's Exposition of the Entire Bible

Likewise also as it was in the days of Lot,.... When he lived in Sodom, and before, and at the time of the destruction of that city with other neighbouring ones:

they did eat, they drank; See Gill on Luke 17:27, and Ezekiel 16:49. This is to be understood of the inhabitants of Sodom, and the other cities that perished with it:

they bought, they sold: they traded among themselves, and with their neighbours; and, as it appears from the text referred to, they had no regard to the poor and needy; they made no conscience of defrauding and oppressing them:

they planted; vineyards, and fruit trees; living in a very fruitful soil, like the garden of God, Genesis 13:10

they builded; houses for themselves and posterity; and thus, as a Jewish writer (h) observes of them, in agreement with our Lord's design in all this, being filled with the increase of the earth, they lived in security, peace, and tranquillity.

(h) Pirke Eliezer, c. 25.

Geneva Study Bible

Likewise also as it was in the days of Lot; they did eat, they drank, they bought, they sold, they planted, they builded;

EXEGETICAL (ORIGINAL LANGUAGES)

Meyer's NT Commentary

Luke 17:28-30. Ὁμοίως] does not belong to ἅπαντας (Bornemann, who assumes a Latinism: perdidit omnes pariter atque ut accidit), against which is to be set the similarity of the twofold καὶ ἀπώλεσεν ἅπαντας, Luke 17:27; Luke 17:29. Moreover, we are not to conceive of ἔσται again after ὁμ. καί (Paulus, Bleek), against which is Luke 17:30; but similiter quoque, sicuti accidit, etc. This ὁμοίως καί is afterwards again taken up by κατὰ τὰ αὐτά, Luke 17:30, and the ἤσθιον … ἅπαντας that lies between the two is epexegetically annexed to the ὡς ἐγένετο, as in Luke 7:11, Luke 8:40, and frequently; so that ἤσθιον … ἅπαντας is not to be put in a parenthesis at all (Lachmann), but neither is any point to be placed after ἅπαντας (Tischendorf).

Luke 17:29 f. ἔβρεξε] scil. θεός. Comp. Matthew 5:45; Genesis 19:24. In remembrance of the latter passage the subject is presupposed as known, and hence the verb is not intransitive, as at Revelation 11:6 (Grotius). On the use of the word in classical Greek, see Lobeck, ad Phryn. p. 291.

πῦρ κ. θεῖον] Comp. Hom. Od. xxii. 493; it is not to be transformed into lightnings (Kuinoel); Jesus follows the representation of Genesis 19

ἀποκαλύπτεται] is revealed, 1 Peter 5:4; 1 John 2:28; 1 John 3:2. Up to that time He is hidden with God in His glory, Colossians 3:3 f.; 2 Thessalonians 1:7; 1 Corinthians 1:7; 1 Peter 1:7; 1 Peter 4:13.

Expositor's Greek Testament

Luke 17:28. ὁμοίως: introducing a new comparison = similarly, as it was in the days, etc.—so shall it be in the day of, etc. (Luke 17:30). Bornemann ingeniously connects ὁμοίως with ἅπαντας going before, and, treating it as a Latinism, renders perdidit omnes pariter.—ἤσθιον, etc.: again a series of unconnected verbs, and a larger, six, and all in the imperfect tense. This second comparison, taken from Lot’s history, is not given in Mt. The suddenness of the catastrophe makes it very apposite.

Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

28. in the days of Lot] See Genesis 19:15-25; Jdg 1:7; Ezekiel 16:46-56; Amos 4:11; Isaiah 13:19.

Bengel's Gnomen

Luke 17:28. Ἐν ταῖς ἡμέραις Λὼς, in the days of Lot) Genesis 19:14.—ἠγόραζον, they were buying) Already the world had become more motley in its employments in the time of Lot, than in that of Noah; how much more so in our times, when the arts of merchandise, navigation, war, the bar [or the market], the school, the senate, etc., have been advanced to the highest perfection!

Luke 17:28