Bible Talk

Temptation

TEMPTA'TION, n. The act of tempting; enticement to evil by arguments, by flattery, or by the offer of some real or apparent good.

 

When the devil had ended all the temptation, he departed from him for a season. Luke 4.

 

1. Solicitation of the passions; enticements to evil proceeding from the prospect of pleasure or advantage.

 

2. The state of being tempted or enticed to evil. When by human weakness you are led into temptation, resort to prayer for relief.

 

3. Trial.

 

Lead us not into temptation.

 

4. That which is presented to the mind as an inducement to evil.

 

Dare to be great without a guilty crown,

 

View it, and lay the bright temptation down.

 

5. In colloquial language, an allurement to any thing indifferent, or even good.

to the twelve tribes which are scattered abroad]

 Literally, that are in the dispersion. The superscription is interesting as shewing that the ten tribes of the Kingdom of Israel, though they had been carried into a more distant exile than Judah and Benjamin, were thought of, not as lost and out of sight, but as still sharing the faith and hope of their fathers. So St Paul speaks of “the twelve-tribed nation” as “serving God day and night” (Act_26:7), and our Lord’s promise that His twelve disciples should sit on thrones judging the twelve tribes of Israel (Mat_19:28), and the Apocalyptic vision of the sealing of the tribes (Rev_7:5-8) imply the same belief. The legend as to the disappearance of the Ten Tribes, which has given rise to so many insane dreams as to their identification with the Red Indians of America or our Anglo-Saxon forefathers, appears for the first time in the Apocryphal 2 Esdras (13:39–47), a book probably of about the same date as the Revelation of St John.

The term, “the dispersion,” the abstract noun being used for the concrete, had come to be a technical term for the Hellenistic and other Jews who were to be found within, or beyond, the limits of the Roman Empire. So the Jews ask whether our Lord will go “to the dispersion of (i. e. among) the Greeks” (Joh_7:35). So St Peter writes to “the sojourners of the dispersion” in the provinces of Asia Minor (1Pe_1:1). The term had probably come into use from the LXX. of Deu_28:25 (“There shall be a dispersion in all the kingdoms of the world”). So in Jdt_5:19, Judah and Benjamin are said “to have come back from the dispersion,” and the prayer of Nehemiah in 2Ma_1:27 is that “God would gather together his dispersion,”

JUDGES CHAPTER 15 

Samson desireth to visit his wife; is denied her; wherefore he tieth firebrands to three hundred foxes’ tails, and sets the corn on fire,  Jud_15:1-5; for which they burn his wife and her father,  Jud_15:6. Samson’s revenge,  Jud_15:7,8. The Philistines pitch in Judah, and demand Samson: the men of Judah bind and deliver him,  Jud_15:9-13. He breaketh his bands, and slayeth one thousand Philistines with the jawbone of an ass,  Jud_15:14-17. He is athirst; prays; obtains water out of it,  Jud_15:18-20.

Nehemiah 8:8

So they read in the book,.... Ezra and those with him; he first began to read and expound, and when weary they relieved him, and did the same:

in the law of God distinctly; which was the book they read in, and which they read plainly and intelligibly, so as to be heard and understood; this seems to respect the clear and distinct pronunciation of the words of it, and not the explanation or meaning of it, which is after expressed; some think the sense is, that they first read it in Hebrew, and then translated it into Chaldee, that the people might better understand it, being just come out of Babylon, where they had been used to the Chaldee language; but though this was a practice in later times, it does not seem to have obtained so early, or that there was a necessity of it:

and gave the sense, and caused them to understand the reading; not hereby how to read it, but chiefly to understand what was read, that they might clearly know their duty to God and men: the Talmudists (q) give the meaning of the text thus; "by the law of God" they understand the Scripture; by the phrase "distinctly", the Targum or translation of it into Chaldee; by "the sense", the verses or the accents; and by "the reading", the distinction of the accents: some think from hence came the practice of reading the law in the synagogues every sabbath day, Act_13:15.

Mathew Henry Concise Commentary

Judges 13:1-7

Israeldidevil: then God delivered them again into the hands of the Philistines. When Israel was in this distress, Samson was born. His parents had been long childless. Many eminent persons were born of such mothers. Mercies long waited for, often prove signal mercies; and by them others may be encouraged to continue their hope in God's mercy. The angel notices her affliction. God often sends comfort to his people very seasonably, when they feel their troubles most. This deliverer of Israel must be devoted to God. Manoah's wife was satisfied that the messenger was of God. She gave her husband a particular account, both of the promise and of the precept. Husbands and wives should tell each other their experiences of communion with God, and their improvements in acquaintance with him, that they may help each other in the way that is holy.

Judges 12:1-7

The Ephraimites had the same quarrel with Jephthah as with Gideon. Pride was at the bottom of the quarrel; only by that comes contention. It is ill to fasten names of reproach upon persons or countries, as is common, especially upon those under outward disadvantages. It often occasions quarrels that prove of ill consequence, as it did here. No contentions are so bitter as those between brethren or rivals for honour. What need we have to watch and pray against evil tempers! May the Lord incline all his people to follow after things which make for peace!

Job 8:8

prepare thyself to the search] i. e., give heed to the research, or, to that which their fathers have searched out. By referring to a former age, and then to the fathers of that age or generation, Bildad intimates that his truth was recognised through all antiquity backwards till history loses itself in the beginnings of time.

Judges 11:1

[1]Now Jephthah the Gileadite was a mighty man of valour, and he was the son of an harlot: and Gilead begat Jephthah.

Neh_8:8. So they read, &c.] The Rabbis understand it to be a paraphrase in the Chaldee language for those who were not acquainted with the ancient Hebrew. Others, exposition and application. “Perhaps Ezra first read a section of the law, and the Levites then expounded to the people the portion just read; the only point still doubtful being whether the Levites expounded in succession, or whether they all did this at the same time to different groups of people.”—Keil.

Judges 6:1

And the children of Israel did evil in the sight of the Lord,.... After the death of Deborah and Barak, during whose life they kept to the pure worship of God, and who, perhaps, lived pretty near the close of the forty years' rest, or of the twenty years from their victory over Jabin; but they dying, the children of Israel fell into idolatry, for that that was the evil they did appears from Jdg_6:10, even worshipping the gods of the Amorites:

and the Lord delivered them into the hand of Midian seven years: this was not the Midian where Jethro, the father-in-law of Moses, lived, which lay more southward, but that which joined to Moab, and was more eastward. This people had been destroyed by the Israelites in the times of Moses, in their way to the land of Canaan, Num_31:1 wherefore they might bear them a grudge, and now took the opportunity to revenge themselves on them, God permitting them so to do for their sins; and though the destruction of this people by Israel was very general, yet as some of them might make their escape, and afterwards return to their own land, and this being about two hundred years ago, might, with others joining them, repeople their country by this time, and become strong and powerful.