Luke 21:1–4. The Widow’s Two Mites
These verses frame a bridge that links the Savior’s condemnation of the scribes and His warning about the temple’s destruction (Luke 20:45–47; 21:5–6). His critique of the scribes is direct and open. At the center of His harsh words stands His rebuke of how some of them treat women, specifically widows, the most vulnerable people in His society. All are under scriptural mandate, especially the scribes, the experts in interpreting scripture, to look out for the best interests of women and widows. But they do not.[fn]See Isaiah 1:17, 23; 10:2; Jeremiah 7:6; Micah 2:9; Zechariah 7:10; and so forth. [/fn]
On a similar track, Jesus chastises temple authorities, but His reprimand is indirect. He speaks of the temple and gifts that come to it (Luke 21:3–4) and its eventual fate, not mentioning priests and Levites directly; yet He implicates them by condemning the temple culture that pays attention to gifts of the wealthy and barely acknowledges the gifts of the poor, in this case gifts from widows, the persons least able to afford to give. But these women give from the inner depths of their souls. And no one notices. Except Jesus.
Because Jesus notices, He is able to draw His disciples into a lesson of ultimate sacrifice, ultimate devotion, ultimate worship, ultimate discipleship. The poor widow’s gift reaches into the fabric of her livelihood, into her empty cupboards, her spent storage jars, her bare clothes closet, her bed made lonely by the death of her husband. Her gift diminishes her ability to provide for herself in even the most basic ways: “She of her penury hath cast in all the living that she had” (Luke 21:4). She is the true disciple, giving all.
Moreover, as does the mention of widows in Luke 20:47, the widow’s appearance here brings forward the whole matter of Jesus’s interest in families, particularly families who experience enormous challenges in the absence of fathers. How so? Because the Old Testament, the guiding scripture of Jesus’s society, links the welfare of widows closely with that of the fatherless and orphans.[fn]See Deuteronomy 14:29; Isaiah 1:17; Jeremiah 7:6; 22:3; Ezekiel 22:7; Zechariah 7:10.[/fn] More than this, scripture insists that the mistreatment of widows and orphans will bring an offender, frighteningly, “into the hands of the living God.”[fn]Hebrews 10:31; also Deuteronomy 10:18; Psalm 146:9.[/fn]
In a literary way, Jesus’s notice of the poor widow in the treasury (Luke 21:1–2) forms an inclusio of sorts, bringing to completion a theme that Luke introduces at the beginning of Jesus’s mortal life when His mother brings Him to the temple, specifically to the Court of the Women or the treasury, where she pays the five-shekel redemptive price for her firstborn son and where, at a distance, she witnesses the sacrifice of the two birds, a sacrifice of the poor. This aspect of poverty, shared by the young Mary and the widow and emphasized dramatically by the refined and opulent presence of the temple, frames virtually all of Jesus’s mortal life, imparting to His life and ministry a quiet assurance of His concern for those who experience poverty as a part of their lives, for He has known such a life.[fn]See the comments on Luke 2:21–24.[/fn]
Adapted from S. Kent Brown, The Testimony of Luke (Provo, UT: BYU Studies, 2015), 934–935.
Luke 21:5–6. The Temple’s Fall
The fall of the temple and the city will form a watershed for the Jewish people matched only by the first fall of Jerusalem in 587 BC. In both instances, the survivors find themselves exiled to faraway lands among completely foreign peoples or, worse, subjected to the vagaries and indignities of slavery. The city will not welcome the Jews again until the twentieth century, and the temple will remain only a vacant, dim memory.
The Doctrine and Covenants and the Joseph Smith Translation add significant pieces to this brief yet broad sweep of the Savior’s vision of the city’s future. For example, He hints at the length of time before fearsome events engulf the city—people now residing in Jerusalem will live to see its fall: “This people shall be destroyed and scattered among all nations.” Further, “this generation of Jews shall not pass away until every desolation which I have told you concerning them shall come to pass” (Doctrine and Covenants 45:19, 21). In another vein, the overwhelming wave of “desolation shall come upon this generation as a thief in the night,” allowing little time for preparation and crippling the powers of resistance (Doctrine and Covenants 45:19). Along the way, “in those days, shall be great tribulation on the Jews, and upon the inhabitants of Jerusalem; such as was not before sent upon Israel, of God, since the beginning of their kingdom until this time; no, nor ever shall be sent again upon Israel” (Joseph Smith Translation, Matthew 24:18; also Joseph Smith Translation, Mark 13:20). The Savior’s prophetic words that “there shall not be left one stone upon another” will be literally and frightfully fulfilled (Luke 21:6).
Adapted from S. Kent Brown, The Testimony of Luke (Provo, UT: BYU Studies, 2015), 937–938.
Luke 21:7–11. Signs of the End-Time
These verses produce a zesty whiff from the cooking pot of the substantial delay between this moment and events associated with the Savior’s return. For, in Jesus’s words as recorded by Luke, enough time will pass that a twin deception will be mixed into the stew: some, because of the delay, will come with a false double message, “I am Christ; and the time [of the end] draweth near” (Luke 21:8). For many commentators, the language of delay is not original with Jesus but arises from the early Church or, partially, from Jewish apocalyptic expectation. Why? Because, in their view, Jesus expects to be back soon: “This generation shall not pass away, till all be fulfilled” (21:32). But the Joseph Smith Translation clarifies that Jesus Himself, not His followers, sets out the dimensions of the long interval.
In this section, the Joseph Smith Translation takes out one of the parts of the false double message, which is preserved only in Luke’s report, and moves it to the beginning of the verse so that Joseph Smith Translation, Luke 21:8 reads: “And he said, The time draweth near, and therefore take heed that ye be not deceived.” Thus, for the first time and in answer to the Apostles’ question “When shall these things be?” (Luke 21:7), Jesus’s saying churns an element of time into the mix that arises within Jesus’s words, not those of deceivers. That said, the declaration that “the time draweth near” does not mean that the time is at the door. Why not? Because the Joseph Smith Translation interprets this expression in the next verse by subtle changes at its conclusion: “These things must first come to pass; but this is not the end” instead of “these things must first come to pass; but the end is not by and by” or, more accurately, “the end is not immediate.”[fn]Joseph Smith Translation, Luke 21:9, compared to Luke 21:9.[/fn] The Joseph Smith Translation reading carries a clearer, firmer sense that the events that Jesus predicts do not herald the end-time. Instead, the end-time stands in the far distance, on a slow boil. As we shall see, other Joseph Smith Translation changes in following verses in Luke and in the other Gospels garnish this conclusion.
We are left to speculate why Luke does not locate the sermon on the Mount of Olives as do the other two Evangelists and modern scripture.[fn]Matthew 24:3; Mark 13:3; Doctrine and Covenants 45:48.[/fn] The guesses are many, ranging from Jesus’s desire to make His discourse a public affair, topped with a bitter conflict with temple authorities, to Luke’s interest in connecting the sermon to the temple, a sermon that deals in part with the temple’s fate. Surely he knows the setting of this sermon, a mostly private affair on the Mount of Olives with the Twelve and perhaps others, but for his own purposes he positions it in the temple in a public setting.
We also see that the tradition associated with this sermon pictures Jesus as sitting when speaking to the Apostles (Matthew 24:3; Mark 13:3). But this scene is wrong. Instead, He stands. This item is an example of how memories grow dim or details can be lost as stories are passed along from one person to another. In the Risen Savior’s recollection, a first person reminiscence directly from Him, He declares, as He is about to rehearse His whole sermon, “I will show it plainly as I showed it unto my disciples as I stood before them in the flesh, and spake unto them” (Doctrine and Covenants 45:16; emphasis added).
Adapted from S. Kent Brown, The Testimony of Luke (Provo, UT: BYU Studies, 2015), 942–943.
Luke 21:12–19. The Disciples’ Challenging Future
The Savior now stirs together a spicy stew that the Apostles will partake of, whether they want to or not. This future will be theirs. To be sure, Jesus underscores beforehand the broad reaches of His prophecy—“Nation shall rise against nation” and “great earthquakes shall be in divers places” and “great signs shall there be from heaven” (Luke 21:10–11). But such events may or may not impact the Apostles and their ministry. What will curtail their efforts are those who “shall lay their hands on [them], and persecute [them]” and those who cause them “to be put to death.” These occurrences will take place in prisons, not in a prison in Jerusalem, and before kings and rulers, not before the Roman prefect who has charge of Judea (21:12, 16). Other than James son of Zebedee, who was executed in Jerusalem (Acts 12:1–2), some disciples will be forced out of the capital city and will travel far and wide, driven away by their enemies (Acts 8:1, 14).
It is important to observe that by recording Jesus’s prophecy about the Apostles’ future, Luke is already looking back on some events that fulfill this part of Jesus’s predictions, as Luke’s record in the book of Acts will verify. Throughout his life as a converted disciple, Luke witnesses or knows of persecutions that envelop other believers in different regions of the Roman Empire. Writing in the second half of the first century, he certainly knows of the execution of James by King Agrippa (“Some of you shall they cause to be put to death” [Luke 21:16; also Acts 12:2]). Peter and Paul are thought to have been executed during Nero’s reign (AD 54–68), and we have an account of their deaths through Clement, bishop of Rome, who writes an epistle to the Saints in Corinth in about AD 96 and includes rather unspecific details about the two Apostles and their deaths. These unhappy events may simply lie beyond the scope of Luke’s book of Acts. But it is also possible that Luke writes his two-volume work—his Gospel and his book of Acts—before Peter and Paul meet their end.[fn]See the comments on Luke 21:20–24.[/fn]
Within these verses, the Joseph Smith Translation deals once again with the delay of Jesus’s return, attributing the added words to Jesus Himself. In Luke’s version of Luke 21:12 we read, “But before all these, they shall lay their hands on you.” The Joseph Smith Translation adds three words: “But before all these things shall come, they shall lay their hands . . .” (Joseph Smith Translation, Luke 21:11; emphasis added). The sense remains the same from one version to the other, but the inserted words underline more sharply both the sequence of events and the fact that before the looming turmoil that lies in their future, the disciples will experience severe challenges.
In any analysis, the Savior’s promise of inspiration on the spot is extraordinary—“I will give you a mouth and wisdom” (Luke 21:14–15). Nothing in ancient literature is its equal. Naturally, one of the main reasons for such inspiration grows out of Jesus’s unwearying desire to try to touch the souls of everyone through His disciples, including hostile authorities and their associates. Besides that, another need is to let the disciples’ words stand as a sleepless witness against perpetrators in the Final Judgment, as is expressed in other scripture: “That the judgments which [God] shall exercise upon them in his wrath may be just; and the blood of the innocent shall . . . cry mightily against them at the last day” (Alma 14:11).
Adapted from S. Kent Brown, The Testimony of Luke (Provo, UT: BYU Studies, 2015), 947–949.
Luke 21:20–24. The Fall of Jerusalem
Two verses in particular, Luke 21:20 and 21:24, both from the Savior’s lips, bring two issues to a boil. The passages read, “When ye shall see Jerusalem compassed with armies” (21:20) and “They shall fall by the edge of the sword, and shall be led away captive into all nations: and Jerusalem shall be trodden down of the Gentiles” (21:24). The questions that these verses pose are (1) Does Jesus utter these predictions as we have them? and (2) When does Luke compose his Gospel and the book of Acts? These questions press hard for an earnest answer, first, because of the specific details that both match the Roman siege of Jerusalem and uncover the blighted fate of the people in the city and, second, because Jesus’s language in these two passages appears in no other ancient source. With these passages we group Jesus’s predictions in 13:35, 19:43–44, and 23:28–30 that also exhibit a high level of specificity for Jerusalem’s bleak future. Except for an almost exact parallel between Luke 13:35 and Matthew 23:38–39, Luke’s reports are thus unique, a feature of his record that we encounter in dozens of other passages.[fn]For example, the raising of the widow’s son at Nain (Luke 7:11–16), the parable of the good Samaritan (10:25–37), the story of Martha and Mary (10:38–42), and the parable of the prodigal son (15:11–32).[/fn]
Any person’s judgment about Jesus’s inability to prophesy the future in detail—any detail—rests squarely on that person’s unsupported assumption that no one, including Jesus, can predict what will occur. This point of view has ever been with us and affects not at all whether Jesus is able to foresee the future. To be sure, we mortals struggle to anticipate what will happen to us over time, but that struggle has nothing to do with Jesus’s capacity to look into the future. Scripture brims with accounts of prophets and teachers who under heavenly inspiration learn what the future will bring. That is certainly the case with Him. Remarkably, when a person chooses to believe such reports, that person can come to enjoy, in modest measure, flashes of inspiration about the future that will serve as a guide: “Settle it therefore in your hearts, not to meditate . . . I will give you . . . wisdom” (Luke 21:14–15).
In this light, what might we say about the dating of Luke’s records? If Jesus speaks prophetically, in detail, about Jerusalem’s fate, we need not suppose that Luke or his source adds such details after the fact. This observation throws open the question about the date of Luke’s literary efforts. Dating the composition of his Gospel and book of Acts to sometime between AD 80 and 89, a preferred estimate, rests in large measure on seeing some particulars of his record (especially those within Jesus’s predictions about Jerusalem’s future) as looking back to specifics from the capture of the city by the Romans in AD 70. But if we see Jesus as the prophetic voice that spells out these predictions, then Luke may well have composed his Gospel before the war broke out in AD 66, perhaps as early as the late 50s or early 60s, as F. F. Bruce suggests.
In this connection, one further matter deserves attention. The Joseph Smith Translation lets Jesus’s prophetic words stand as they appear in Luke’s record. But more than this, the Joseph Smith Translation adds words to Jesus’s discourse where it focuses on the fate of the city as recorded in Matthew and Mark. In Matthew we read, “Then shall be great tribulation, such as was not since the beginning of the world to this time” (Matthew 24:21). Mark’s report is similar: “In those days shall be affliction, such as was not from the beginning of the creation” (Mark 13:19). The Joseph Smith Translation version of each of these passages is much fuller: “Then, in those days, shall be great tribulations on the Jews, and upon the inhabitants of Jerusalem; such as was not before sent upon Israel, of God, since the beginning of their kingdom” (Joseph Smith Translation, Matthew 24:18; Joseph Smith Translation, Mark 13:20). Thus, in the records of Matthew and Mark, the Joseph Smith Translation attributes to Jesus a marked ability to foresee the dark future of the city, just as Luke’s report does.
The expression “the times of the Gentiles” (Luke 21:24) invites more exploration, particularly because the Savior makes a series of statements about this future era in the first-person rehearsal of His sermon preserved in the Doctrine and Covenants. This age, He declares, will be filled with news about “wars and rumors of war”; additionally, “men’s hearts shall fail them, and they shall say that Christ delayeth his coming.” Moreover, “the love of men shall wax cold,” and that generation “shall see an overflowing scourge; for a desolating sickness shall cover the land.” Furthermore, “there shall be earthquakes also in divers places, and many desolations,” and sadly, “they will take up the sword, one against another, and they will kill one another.”[fn]Doctrine and Covenants 45:26–27, 31, 33; also Isaiah 29:6; 2 Nephi 25:12.[/fn] On the other hand, “when the times of the Gentiles is come in, a light shall break forth among them that sit in darkness.” As a result of the coming of this divine light in this stormy era, “my disciples shall stand in holy places, and shall not be moved.” Moreover, “when they shall see all these things, then shall they know that the hour is nigh [for the Second Coming]” because “they shall see signs and wonders . . . in the heavens above, and in the earth beneath.” As a consequence, “they shall look for me, and, behold, I will come.”[fn]Doctrine and Covenants 45:28, 32, 38, 40, 44; also 39:16, 21.[/fn]
As in prior sections, the Joseph Smith Translation adds a piece to the issue about the timing of future events, clarifying that Jesus and the disciples see them occurring far off. The additional piece comes in a verse that does not appear in Luke’s record as it stands. The Joseph Smith Translation contributes the following after the text of Luke 21:24: “Now these things he spake unto them, concerning the destruction of Jerusalem. And then his disciples asked him, saying, Master, tell us concerning thy coming?” (Joseph Smith Translation, Luke 21:24). Plainly, as they sit together on the Mount of Olives, the disciples grasp that Jesus is disclosing a series of future scenes and that His Second Coming is detached, in time, from the destruction of Jerusalem.
Adapted from S. Kent Brown, The Testimony of Luke (Provo, UT: BYU Studies, 2015), 953–956.
Luke 21:25–28. Signs of the Coming Son of Man
In these verses, the Savior turns to the signs that will precede His Second Coming and the end-time, illuminating a gap between the fall of Jerusalem and these future events. By borrowing language from the Old Testament that is difficult to grasp in places, Jesus predicts troubling portents in the heavens, on the earth, and among men and women. Frighteningly, no one will escape except those who can “lift up [their] heads” and confidently anticipate that their “redemption draweth nigh” (Luke 21:28). Hence, Jesus graciously offers the optimistic view to His followers that He and they will ultimately triumph even when challenges seem sharpest and most daunting.
Earlier, Jesus presents Himself as Son of Man in both His contemporary, earthly contexts and His future, heavenly scenes.[fn]Luke 9:26; 11:30; 12:8, 40; 17:22, 24, 26, 30; 18:8.[/fn] In each of these settings, Jesus offers a hint or an aspect of His work, both here and hereafter. But when He sketches His future arrival as one “in a cloud with power and great glory,” He places a capstone on His ministry, affirming that He comes as lord and king of all, arriving “with all the holy angels.”[fn]Luke 21:27; Doctrine and Covenants 45:44; “all the hosts” in Doctrine and Covenants 29:11.[/fn]
More concretely for His Apostles, Jesus affirms personally to them in His first-person account that when He comes again, “if ye have slept in peace blessed are you; for as you now behold me and know that I am, even so shall ye come unto me” from their sleep in the grave. More than this, in that day “your redemption shall be perfected,” bringing a glorious climax to their quest for eternal life (Doctrine and Covenants 45:46).
In this section of Luke’s record, the Joseph Smith Translation adds clarifying words both to the setting with the Twelve and to the Savior’s sayings that support the idea of a substantial gap between the fall of Jerusalem and the Second Coming. To the beginning of Luke 21:25 (“there shall be signs”) the Joseph Smith Translation inserts the following: “And he answered them, and said, In the generation in which the times of the Gentiles shall be fulfilled, there shall be signs” (Joseph Smith Translation, Luke 21:25). Jesus is responding to a request from the Twelve that does not appear in Luke’s report—“Master, tell us concerning thy coming?” (Joseph Smith Translation, Luke 21:24)—elucidating that Jesus’s discussion of the signs arises from the disciples’ honest query. Those signs will appear only “in the generation in which the times of the Gentiles shall be fulfilled” (that is, in a distant day) and will include “the earth also [being] troubled” along with “the waters of the great deep” (Joseph Smith Translation, Luke 12:24). In a word, Jesus’s Second Coming and the signs that precede it are not imminent. They remain far away.
Adapted from S. Kent Brown, The Testimony of Luke (Provo, UT: BYU Studies, 2015), 960–961.
Luke 21:29–33. Parable of the Fig Tree
Themes of death and life flavor the main dish of the Savior’s prophetic words in these verses. The fig tree, whose early budding signals the return of life to the earth after winter, stands as a green marker of both physical well-being and approaching spiritual life (Luke 21:29–31; Micah 4:4). As surely as the fig begins to bud in late winter, so “the kingdom of God [shall be] nigh at hand” to those who are watchful and faithful as events of the end-time are cooked and served (Luke 21:31).
The same menu of death followed by life is found in Jesus’s reference to the passing away of heaven and earth because their future, after their passing, is to be glorious and bright and full of life. Although the scriptural sources are scattered, it is possible to suggest an approximate order of scenes that are yet to unfold, beginning with Old Testament passages with which Jesus was familiar. In scriptural language, “the heavens shall vanish away like smoke, and the earth shall wax old like a garment” (Isaiah 51:6). More specifically, the earth and “the heavens . . . shall perish” after growing “old like a garment.”[fn]Psalm 102:25–26; also Doctrine and Covenants 29:23; 88:26.[/fn] The imagery portrays heaven rolled up “as a scroll” and passing away “with a great noise” and “the elements” melting “with fervent heat” (Revelation 6:14; 2 Peter 3:10). In a repetition of plagues before the Exodus, “there shall be a great hailstorm sent forth to destroy the crops of the earth,” and “I the Lord God will send forth flies upon the face of the earth” (Doctrine and Covenants 29:16, 18). On the earth’s surface, “the mountains shall be thrown down,” “the mountains shall melt,” and “every mountain and island” will be “moved out of their places,” with “every mountain and hill . . . made low.”[fn]Isaiah 40:4; Ezekiel 38:20; Joseph Smith Translation, 2 Peter 3:10, 12; Revelation 6:14; also Doctrine and Covenants 49:23; 133:22.[/fn]
All such phenomena are evidently part of the cleansing of the earth for which the earth herself pleads in words heard by Enoch: “When shall I . . . be cleansed from the filthiness which is gone forth out of me?” (Moses 7:48). In a divine response, “righteousness and truth will I [the Lord] cause to sweep the earth as with a flood, to gather out mine elect from the four quarters of the earth” (Moses 7:62). At this point, the earth will rest in a millennial state after “great tribulations” and after the second “coming of the Son of Man, in the last days.”[fn]Moses 7:48, 54, 58, 61, 64–65; also Doctrine and Covenants 29:11.[/fn] As a part of this stunning scene, “Michael, [the] archangel, shall sound his trump, and then shall all the dead awake, . . . and they shall come forth—yea, even all” (Doctrine and Covenants 29:26).
Then the Lord will “create new heavens and a new earth: and the former shall not be remembered,” for “the first heaven and the first earth were passed away” (Isaiah 65:17; Revelation 21:1). In the language of the Articles of Faith, “the earth will be renewed and receive its paradisiacal glory.”[fn]Articles of Faith 1:10; also Ether 13:9; D&C 29:23–24.[/fn] One of the evidences for this remarkable state is the Lord’s action to “make the wilderness a pool of water, and the dry land springs of water” because “in the wilderness shall waters break out, and streams in the desert.”[fn]Isaiah 35:6; 41:18; also Doctrine and Covenants 133:29.[/fn] Another evidence arises when the earth becomes a dwelling place for celestial persons, a feature into which only modern scripture offers a peek. Among those who will take up residence are the Savior, “the Son of Man, . . . for the space of a thousand years,” “the righteous,” and “they who are in the north countries . . . and their prophets.”[fn]Moses 7:65; Doctrine and Covenants 88:26; 133:25, 26.[/fn] Following this millennial era, apparently, the earth will “be sanctified” and “prepared for the celestial glory” (Doctrine and Covenants 88:18, 26). It will be “crowned with glory” when it receives “the presence of God the Father,” thus filling “the measure of its creation” (Doctrine and Covenants 88:19, 25). Hence, life in its fullest sense blossoms and continues on the renewed earth.
Through it all, the Savior assures His Apostles that God is in charge and that even when nature herself seems troubled and events bring fellow humans to fear the future, the Apostles and other believers will “know . . . that the kingdom of God is nigh at hand” and that they will “escape all these things that shall come to pass.” The crowning moment will come, of course, when they “stand before the Son of man” (Luke 21:25–26, 31, 36).
As elsewhere in this sermon, the Joseph Smith Translation of these verses further flavors the notion of a time differential between the occasion of the sermon and the timing of Jesus’s Second Coming. Concerning the matter of timing, in Luke’s text we read, “This generation shall not pass away, till all be fulfilled” (Luke 21:32). According to this statement, it appears that Jesus sees the grand and daunting events of the end-time playing out within a few decades. In a word, His Second Coming is close. But the Joseph Smith Translation adds a temporal clause that changes everything: “This generation, the generation when the times of the Gentiles be fulfilled, shall not pass away till all be fulfilled” (Joseph Smith Translation, Luke 21:32). Clearly, the generation when the signs appear and “redemption draweth nigh” will arise in the far distance, not in the immediate future (Luke 21:28).
Adapted from S. Kent Brown, The Testimony of Luke (Provo, UT: BYU Studies, 2015), 964–966.
Luke 21:34–36. Watch Ye Therefore
Perhaps surprisingly, these verses present a garnished meal of the Savior’s expectations for the Twelve and their stewardships, and they appear only in Luke’s record. To be sure, the Joseph Smith Translation makes adjustments that diminish the currency of Jesus’s words to the Twelve and, in a measure, that reallocate His instructions to later generations of followers, especially in Luke 21:34 in which the second person plural “you” is changed to the third person plural “my disciples” and “them.” But Jesus is still speaking directly to the Twelve on the Mount of Olives where they can all behold the city. The setting where they hear Him is firm and concrete. So are His words to them.
Jesus’s expectations for the Twelve wrap themselves around two assignments that come into focus in Luke 21:36: watching over others and praying for those who face challenges. Of course, it is possible to understand Jesus’s instructions “Watch ye” and “pray always” as directives that apply to the individual circumstances of the Twelve who sit before Him and of disciples who come after them—meaning that they watch out and pray for themselves. But at this moment He is addressing His leaders, effectively continuing the training of those who will bear the chief assignments in His kingdom after His death—in fact, He spends forty days with them after His Resurrection in more training sessions (Acts 1:1–3). It is all a part of their education for their ministries. In this light, at least part of the focus rests on how the Twelve will serve and provide leadership in the Church. Their stewardship will include watching over members of the Church and praying for them as they face difficulties. Nothing surprising arises from this observation. It fits naturally into the setting, Jesus and the Twelve together on the mount.
The Joseph Smith Translation makes adjustments which underline that Jesus’s words are for future disciples and leaders as much as they are for the Twelve who sit at His feet. Those changes occur in Luke 21:34, 36. In the place of “take heed to yourselves,” the Joseph Smith Translation substitutes and expands “Let my disciples therefore take heed to themselves,” changing the second person to the third person (Joseph Smith Translation, Luke 21:34). Moreover, the last line of the verse, “that day come upon you unawares,” becomes “that day come upon them unawares.” Moreover, the Joseph Smith Translation adds an entire sentence to the beginning of verse 36, evidently modeled on Mark 13:37: “And what I say unto one, I say unto all.” With these adjustments, Jesus’s words carry a more universal application, reaching out to those who come after the Twelve.
Adapted from S. Kent Brown, The Testimony of Luke (Provo, UT: BYU Studies, 2015), 968–969.
Luke 21:37–38. Jesus’s Daily Routine
Luke’s comments in these last verses tie off the Savior’s body of teachings, something Luke has been cataloging since Jesus’s visit to the city as a twelve-year-old (Luke 2:41–50). To be sure, Jesus will teach more to the Twelve at the Last Supper (22:15–20, 25–37). But these items, at least for the moment, are for their ears only. The literary markers at the beginning and end of this last section of teaching not only signal the weightiness of Jesus’s words in chapters 20 and 21 but also identify and put a wrap around the final block of divine disclosures—the references to “all the people” and to His activities “in the temple.”[fn]Luke 19:47, 48; 20:1; 21:38.[/fn]
Adapted from S. Kent Brown, The Testimony of Luke (Provo, UT: BYU Studies, 2015), 972.
