“But not during the feast,” they said, “or there may be a riot among the people.”
5. But they said, Not during the festival. They did not think it a fit season, till the festival was past, and the crowd was dispersed. Hence we infer that, although those hungry dogs eagerly opened their mouths to devour Christ, or rather, rushed furiously upon him, still God withheld them, by a secret restraint, from doing any thing by their deliberation or at their pleasure.
And they said, not on the feast day,.... Upon mature deliberation, it was an agreed point with them, at least it was carried by a majority, that nothing of this kind should be attempted to be done on the feast day, on any of the days of the feast of passover, which was now at hand; though this was contrary to their common rules and...
Verse 5. Not on the feast day. Not during the feast. The feast lasted seven days. A vast multitude attended from all parts of Judea. Jerusalem is said to have contained at such times three millions of people. Amidst such a multitude there were frequent tumults and seditions; and the sanhedrim was justly apprehensive there would be now, if in open day, and in the...