Mat 6:16, 9:15 | Clarke | e4.org | Verse 16. When ye fast ] A fast is termed by the Greeks νηστις, from νη not , and εσθειν to eat ; hence fast means, a total abstinence from food for a certain time . Abstaining from flesh , and living on fish, vegetables , &c., is no fast, or may be rather considered a burlesque on fasting. Many pretend to take the true definition of a fast from , and say that it means a fast from sin . This is a mistake; there is no such term in the Bible as fasting from sin ; the very idea is ridiculous and absurd, as if sin were a part of our daily food . In the fast mentioned by the prophet, the people were to divide their bread with the hungry, ; but could they eat their bread, and give it too? No man should save by a fast : he should give all the food he might have eaten to the poor. He who saves a day's expense by a fast, commits an abomination before the Lord. . As the hypocrites-of a sad countenance ] σκυθρωποι, either from σκυθρος sour, crabbed , and ωψ the countenance ; or from σκυθης a Scythian , a morose, gloomy, austere phiz, like that of a Scythian or Tartar . A hypocrite has always a difficult part to act: when he wishes to appear as a penitent, not having any godly sorrow at heart, he is obliged to counterfeit it the best way he can, by a gloomy and austere look.

‏ Matthew 6:16

Verse 16. When ye fast] A fast is termed by the Greeks νηστις, from νη not, and εσθειν to eat; hence fast means, a total abstinence from food for a certain time. Abstaining from flesh, and living on fish, vegetables, &c., is no fast, or may be rather considered a burlesque on fasting. Many pretend to take the true definition of a fast from Isa 58:3, and say that it means a fast from sin. This is a mistake; there is no such term in the Bible as fasting from sin; the very idea is ridiculous and absurd, as if sin were a part of our daily food. In the fast mentioned by the prophet, the people were to divide their bread with the hungry, Isa 58:7; but could they eat their bread, and give it too? No man should save by a fast: he should give all the food he might have eaten to the poor. He who saves a day's expense by a fast, commits an abomination before the Lord. See Clarke on Mt 9:15.

As the hypocrites-of a sad countenance] σκυθρωποι, either from σκυθρος sour, crabbed, and ωψ the countenance; or from σκυθης a Scythian, a morose, gloomy, austere phiz, like that of a Scythian or Tartar. A hypocrite has always a difficult part to act: when he wishes to appear as a penitent, not having any godly sorrow at heart, he is obliged to counterfeit it the best way he can, by a gloomy and austere look.

‏ Matthew 9:15

Verse 15. Can the children of the bride-chamber] νυμφωνος. Or, νυμφιου, bridegroom, as the Cod. Bezae and several versions have it. These persons were the companions of the bridegroom, who accompanied him to the house of his father-in-law when he went to bring the bride to his own home. The marriage-feast among the Jews lasted seven days; but the new married woman was considered to be a bride for thirty days. Marriage feasts were times of extraordinary festivity, and even of riot, among several people of the east.

When the bridegroom shall be taken from them, &c.] There was one annual fast observed in the primitive Church, called by our ancestors [Anglo-Saxon] the spring fast, and, by us, LENT; by the Greeks τεσσερακοστη, and by the Latins, Quadrigessima. This fast is pretended to be kept by many, in the present day, in commemoration of our Lord's forty days' fast in the wilderness; but it does not appear that, in the purest ages of the primitive Church, genuine Christians ever pretended that their quadrigessimal fast was kept for the above purpose. Their fast was kept merely to commemorate the time during which Jesus Christ lay under the power of death, which was about FORTY HOURS; and it was in this sense they understood the words of this text: the days will come, &c. With them, the bridegroom meant Christ: the time in which he was taken away, his crucifixion, death, and the time he lay in the grave. Suppose him dying about twelve o'clock on what is called Friday, and that he rose about four on the morning of his own day, (St. John says, Early, while it was yet dark, Mt 20:1,) the interim makes forty hours, which was the true primitive Lent, or quadrigessimal fast. It is true that many in the primitive Church were not agreed on this subject, as Socrates, in his Church History, book v. chap. 22, says, "Some thought they should fast one day; others two; others more." Different Churches also were divided concerning the length of the time, some keeping it three, others five, and others seven weeks; and the historian himself is puzzled to know why they all agreed in calling these fasts, differing so much in their duration, by the name of Quadrigessima, or forty days' fast: the plain obvious reason appears to me to have been simply this: They put DAYS in the place of HOURS; and this absurdity continues in some Christian Churches to the present day. For more on fasting, See Clarke on Mt 6:16.