Exegesis of Luke 22:39-46
There is no Biblical writer who emphasizes the importance of prayer more than St. Luke. In his gospel, we encounter Jesus either praying or on his way to pray at least ten times (3:21; 5:16; 6:12; 9:18,28,29; 11:1; and 22:11,32,39,41,44), and we hear him encouraging prayer at least seventeen more times. In contrast, Matthew and Mark use the word “pray” just 31 times — combined. And interestly, although John records the longest, most detailed and most magnificent prayer in Scripture, the high priestly prayer of chapter 17, he uses the word pray only twice, both of which appear in 17:9. Luke will continue his prayerful theme throughout the book of Acts, where it comes up another 31 times. In contrast, Paul, despite his call for us to pray unceasingly, wrote about prayer just 37 times.
Mary and Zechariah get credit for the most beautiful prayers in Luke’s gospel, but no prayer by Jesus is either more intense than the one recorded in Luke 22:39-46. Modeling what he taught us during the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus provides yet one more shining example of exactly how we should all pray: “Father, if you are willing.” And even as we are sweating blood: “Not my will, but yours be done.”
Jesus had entered Jerusalem just a few days earlier as “the whole multitude of his disciples began to rejoice” (Lk 19:37). After cleansing the temple (19:45-48), clashing with the chief priests and scribes (20:19,46-47; 22:2), silencing the Sadducees (20:40), foretelling destruction (21:5-9,20-24) and betrayal (22:21), Jesus eats one last supper with his disciples before leading them to the mountain, once again, to pray.
Matthew (26:36-46) and Mark (14:32-42) both have longer versions of this night. But the additional detail — it happened in the Garden of Gethsemane; Peter and the sons of Zebedee were there; and Jesus had to wake the disciples three times, admonishing them to pray — doesn’t improve the narrative. With fewer words, Luke’s account is far more intense. The most significant addition is what Luke provides: Jesus faced such intense agony that his sweat became like great drops of blood (22:44). Luke also has a significant change in the story. Matthew and Mark describe Jesus as “sorrowful” (Mt 26:37) or “distressed” (Mk 14:33), whereas Luke says it is the disciples who are “sleeping for sorrow” (22:45).
It goes without saying, but prayer is the central theme in this pericope. Employing a chiasm, Luke not only leads off and ends the section with prayer, Jesus’ prayer of supplication it is at the heart of the matter.
Textual notes
39. “And after going out, he journeyed according to custom to the Mount of Olives, and the disciples followed him.”
Καὶ ἐξελθὼν ἐπορεύθη — In the preceding verses, Jesus is the subject. Therefore, the nominative aorist participle ἐξελθὼν, coupled with the καὶ, continues his actions. Beyond the traditional definitions of moving out of, coming out, going out, and retiring (BDAG, 347), ἐξέρχομαι carries a darker sense of “departing in death” (BDAG, 348.2). Of course, Luke knows what happens next: It won’t be long before the mob arrives to arrest Jesus. But it would nonetheless be better to stick with a more traditional rendering of going out.
κατὰ τὸ ἔθος εἰς τὸ ὄρος τῶν ἐλαιῶν — Only three New Testament writers — Luke, John, and the author of Hebrews — use the word ἔθος, which means a usual or customary manner, habit, or long-established usage. More than a half dozen of these references carry a sense of religious practice (Lk 1:9, 2:42; Jn 19:40; Acts 6:14, 15:1, 21:21; Heb 10:25). The custom could be that Jesus was simply retreating to the mountain. Jesus loved to spend his nights, in prayer, on the mountain (Lk 6:12; but also Lk 9:28, 21:37; Mt 14:23, 15:29).
The Mount of Olives also is known as Olivet and The Olive Grove (BDAG, 313). Luke doesn’t identify the specific location of Jesus’ journey, but other Gospel writers do in their parallel accounts (Mt 26:36; Mk 14:32): the Garden of Gethsemane is located about a half mile from Jerusalem’s walls. The location in Luke’s Gospel is theologically significant. As Dr. Naomichi Masaki put it, “everything important happens on the mountain.” In Luke, not only did Jesus rebuke the devil on the mountain during his first temptation (4:5,29), he was transfigured on the mountain (9:28) before the betrayal by the disciple who didn’t follow him there was finalized.
40. “And having come to the place, he said to them, “Pray you do not go to trial.”
γενόμενος δὲ ἐπὶ τοῦ τόπου — With the articular τόπου, Luke intimates that the disciples would have known exactly where Jesus was going; he often went there (Jn 18:2). This is the place where Jesus likely slept every night after his arrival in Jerusalem (Lk 21:37), a fact that Judas knows (Jn 18:2).
προσεύχεσθε μὴ εἰσελθεῖν εἰς πειρασμόν — The sentence leads off with the present imperative προσεύχεσθε, which provides a distinct directive. Matthew used the same form of the verb in the teaching the Lord’s Prayer (Mt 6:9). The phrase itself is commonly translated as “Pray that you may not enter into temptation” (ESV). But here, πειρασμόν would be better translated as trial, its first definition (BDAG, 793). Jesus knows what the disciples are going to do after his arrest: They will all succumb to temptation by scattering. Therefore, it makes better sense that Jesus urged them to pray they don’t go to trial because he knows Peter will deny him three times, and Thomas will doubt that he would do as he said he would: rise from the dead. Their prayer not to go to trial certainly will be answered by the one who will defend them. As Donald Senor put it in his book The Passion of Jesus in the Gospel of Luke:
“Unprepared, the disciple would be overwhelmed by such ‘tests,’ as Jesus warns in the parable of the sower, where the seeds that fell on rocky soil are interpreted as those ‘who, when they hear the word, receive it with joy; but these have no root, they believe for a while and in time of test (peirasmou) fall away” (8:13).”
An association with temptation isn’t that far off though. Mark’s parallel account adds the additional reasoning that the flesh is weak (σὰρξ ἀσθενής). There is “a close connection with the 6th petition of the Lord’s Prayer; watching consists in prayer in view of our defencelessness (sic) in temptation.”
41. “And he withdrew from them about a stone’s throw, and having fallen to his knees, he was praying, ...”
αὐτὸς ἀπεσπάσθη ἀπ’ αὐτῶν ὡσεὶ λίθου βολὴν — The aorist passive ἀπεσπάσθη, preceded by αὐτὸς, which strongly emphasizes who he is, takes on an active meaning of withdrawing or drawing away (BDAG, 120), in this case “about a stone’s throw.” Luke is the only writer in the New Testament who reckons by the stone’s throw distance, giving some historical critics pause about the authenticity of the passage.
θεὶς τὰ γόνατα καὶ προσηύχετο — The verb τίθημι has a wide variety of definitions, everything from putting or placing, to taking off or giving up, and to making or consigning. Luke continues to show his literary uniqueness by becoming the only NT writer who uses the aorist participial form of τίθημι. In each case of the word (also Acts 7:60, 9:40, 20:36), θεὶς is used in relation to someone falling to their knees and praying. Luke follows it here with the imperfect middle προσηύχετο, which should be used with the continual sense of “he was praying.”
The fact that Jesus is on his knees is noteworthy. Just says: “This is a sign of Jesus’ great humility and the burden of suffering he is about to endure.” Unlike Matthew and Mark, who describe Jesus falling to his face to pray between trips to wake the disciples, the agony in Luke builds with more subtlety here. Whether Jesus was on his knees or falling to his face, it is in contrast with Jewish custom of standing while praying.
42. “... Father, if you are willing, take away this cup from me. Nevertheless, not my will, but yours, be done.”
Although Luke’s narrative of the night in the garden is much shorter than either Matthew or Mark portray, there is intensity throughout Jesus’ prayer. If you listen to this, the second of four prayers by Jesus that Luke records (also see 10:21, 23:34, 23:46), you can hear the agony building to the course he knows has already been marked out for him.
πάτερ, εἰ βούλει παρένεγκε τοῦτο τὸ ποτήριον ἀπ’ ἐμοῦ· πλὴν μὴ τὸ θέλημά μου ἀλλὰ τὸ σὸν γινέσθω — The sentence is almost framed around two imperatives: παρένεγκε and γινέσθω. The first one, which is in second-person, means to bring up or to take away — in this case, the ποτήριον. Normally, that is just a cup (BDAG 857), but it is often used in language of the Eucharist, too. The word is rare in non-Biblical Greek. The figurative uses include the cup of wrath, suffering, and Lord’s Supper, as well as in eschatological and interpretative sayings. The word clearly doesn’t mean the Lord’s Supper here; Jesus will receive all of God’s wrath and suffer horribly on his way to the cross. In the OT, it is used figuratively to express destiny and death in general, and this is no exception. The concept of the cup of suffering is found throughout OT, notably the cup of wrath (Is 51:17), of staggering (Zec 12:2), and of horror (Ez 23:33). τὸ ποτήριον also was used in relation to matyrdom both in Scripture (Mt 20:23) and outside of Scripture (BDAG 857).
Most prominently, Just identifies, is that the passion of the cup is at the center of the story. Using a chiasm, Luke has positioned the cup in the middle of an ABCCBA arrangement. “The whole purpose of Jesus’ ministry, and of the Gospel, is at stake in this request.” Luke then closes with one last imperative: σὸν γινέσθω (your will be done). The force of the third-person imperative isn’t as strong as the second-person, but the prayer is a perfect example of Jesus’ earlier teaching on how to pray (Mt 6:10).
43-44. “And there appeared to him an angel from heaven, strengthening him. And being in an agony he prayed more earnestly; and his sweat became like great drops of blood falling to the ground.”
Great questions arise with the reading of these two verses, including: Did Luke actually write them? If Luke didn’t write them, do they belong at all? Honestly, the church at large has settled that last question: the passage is a fixture in all the major translations.
Nonetheless, there is reason to doubt the authenticity of verses 43 and 44. Nestle-Aland’s 28th edition of Novum Testamentum Graece continues to list these verses in double brackets, the indicator that the enclosed words are known not to be a part of the original text. David M. Stanley, in his book Jesus in Gethsemane, reported that the 1966 edition of The Greek New Testament didn’t include the verses, but those had been added by the time the United Bible Society published its third edition. Stanley goes so far as saying that not only are they “almost certainly inauthentic,” their presence disturbs the narrative, Jesus’ reactions are in contradiction to the character presented by Luke, and Jesus had already voiced his acceptance, so he therefore didn’t need an angel to give him strength. Eerdmans Commentary on the Bible called the inclusion of verses 43 and 44 something like a “pious elaboration which later generations delighted in.”
In contrast to the work of Stanley and Eerdmans, Henry Alford argued that the verses may have been removed for a perceived inconsistency with the divine nature of Jesus, but should be included because now “we have reason to be thankful, that orthodoxy has been better understood since.” Stronger yet is Just’s argument that structure and content of the verses fit the narrative.
Jesus is anything but weak or out of character in these verses. He is not only “courageous,” these verses strengthen the divine humanity of Jesus. It should be stressed here: Jesus is fully human, too. We have seen the Christ weep for friends (Jn 11:35), enemies (Lk 19:41), and himself (Heb 5:7). We have seen him rejoice over finding the lost (Lk 15:5-6), the fall of Satan (Lk 10:21), and followers finding faith (Jn 11:15). We have seen him angry (Lk 19:45-46), scared (Jn 12:27-28), weary (Jn 4:6), and compassionate (Mk 6:34), among other human emotions. Now, as Just notes, Jesus is confronted with “one of the most intense moments of his passion.”
ὤφθη δὲ αὐτῷ ἄγγελος ἀπ’ οὐρανοῦ ἐνισχύων αὐτόν — As with most passives in scripture, the aorist verb ὤφθη (appeared) is of divine nature: The Father sent the angel to his Chosen One (Lk 9:35). Although the word ἄγγελος can mean a human messenger (Lk 7:24, 7:27, 9:52), this one in Luke’s account is unmistakably an angel, which was sent to cause the recovery from loss of his strength (ἐνισχύων αὐτόν; BDAG, 337). R.C.H. Lenski says the ancients “objected to the idea that the Son of God should need an angel to give him strength.” But that is exactly one of the missions of the angels in scripture. Both Matthew and Mark describe angels ministering to Jesus amid his fasting (Mt 4:11) and temptation (Mk 1:13). We should find comfort in the fact that the Father answered prayer by sending an angel to give Jesus strength in an hour of crisis.
The appearance of the angel isn’t out of character with Luke’s work either. With exception to the Revelation of John, no New Testament writer talks about angels as much as Luke, who has 47 of the 176 NT references to angels in his Gospel and the book of Acts, and they almost universally appear to strengthen, encourage, and herald good news. Lenski is right in concluding the angel appears to strengthen Jesus physically: “This is the basis of Heb. 2:9, Jesus’ being made lower than the angels, namely by his agonizing human nature; but only in this respect, for the angel gave Jesus strength, not from angelic sources, but from the Father.”
γενόμενος ἐν ἀγωνίᾳ — The aorist middle participle γενόμενος is punctiliar: Jesus was in agony. We have a different understanding of agony than either Luke or, most especially, Jesus. In modern usage, agony is extreme suffering, or the final stages of death. Lenski says what Jesus was feeling is not a “death agony,” even if he is on his way to the cross. Senior argues that the Greek term ἀγωνίᾳ described “victorious struggle of the athlete or warrior.” ἀγωνίᾳ can mean apprehensiveness of mind, especially when faced with impending ills, distress, or anguish (BDAG, 17). It also means inner tension. “This is not a fear of death, but concern for victory in face of the approaching decisive battle on which the fate of the world depends.”
ἐκτενέστερον προσηύχετο — More eagerly, earnestly, constantly coupled with imperfect of προσεύχομαι. The imperfect is going to change the meaning here. He began to pray more earnestly, because he already had been praying, when the angel showed up, giving him the renewed strength.
ὁ ἱδρὼς αὐτοῦ ὡσεὶ θρόμβοι αἵματος καταβαίνοντες ἐπὶ τὴν γῆν — There aren’t many ways to mince these words. ἱδρὼς is sweat (BDAG, 469), θρόμβοι are drops (BDAG, 460), and αἵματος is blood (BDAG, 26-27). However, caution needs to be exercised in repeating this verse. ὡσεὶ is just as certain in its definition: It means like, as, or about (BDAG, 1106), and context eliminates the third option. Therefore, Jesus’ “sweat became like drops of blood falling to the ground.” Luke is the only writer reporting this. Nevertheless, Matthew Henry finds theological significance in Luke’s use of the sweat like drops of blood:
“Sweat came with sin, and was a branch of the curse, Gen. 3:19. And therefore, when Christ was made sin and a curse for us, he underwent a grievous sweat.”
That said, medically speaking, we know Jesus could have actually sweated drops of blood. There are documented cases of people being under such duress and stress that blood vessels feeding sweat glands rupture, causing them to bleed, a condition known as Hematohidrosis.
45-46. “And after arising from prayer and coming to the disciples he found them sleeping with sorrow, and he said to them, “Why are you sleeping? Rise and pray that you may not go to trial.”
Luke’s parallelism persists with the opening words of the final two verses. Perhaps in a follow up to the darkness of verse 39’s ἐξέρχομαι, with its departing in death nuance, Luke uses ἀναστὰς, which has a secondary meaning of “bringing back to life.” The angel had just given Jesus renewed energy to carry on his mission, and now he comes back to life, after agonizing in prayer, to find the disciples “sleeping with sorrow.” The disciples have already begun failing Jesus, whom they witnessed as being in agony. Here, after facing one of his greatest temptations, Jesus shows himself faithful to all that he has taught the disciples about prayer. As Senior concluded: “Jesus’ words on the necessity of prayer to survive the ‘test’ surround his own example of urgent prayer.”
εὗρεν κοιμωμένους αὐτοὺς ἀπὸ τῆς λύπης — Jesus “found the disciples sleeping with sorrow.” It’s an unusual phrase that may escape the modern mind. Lenski explains it this way: “It is well known that great and continued heaviness of soul brings on an inner dullness of mind and thus the physical reaction of sleep; the soul yields to its burden and no longer rallies against it.”
Perhaps most importantly, it is through Luke that we learn how to pray. Luke had opened his narrative with the richness of Mary and Zechariah’s prayer, and followed it with the passion of Jesus’ prayers on the mountain. Then Luke carries the theme much further into Acts, where we witness the church becoming bold in prayer (Acts 4:24), even to the point of death, by a stone’s throw nonetheless (Acts 7:60).
Every reader and hearer of this text can learn about how poor our prayer lives actually are, as Jesus continues to model his faithfulness in unceasing prayer. The text illustrates that our Father does indeed answer our prayers in profound ways, providing angels who strengthen us against temptation in our darkest hours. It even shows us through challenges of textual criticism how much stronger our faith can become in the truthfulness of God’s Word.
Aland, Kurt, et al, eds. The Greek New Testament, 3rd ed. New York: United Bible Societies, 1975.
Alford, Henry. Alford’s Greek New Testament: An Exegetical and Critical Commentary. Grand Rapids, Mich.: Guardian Press, 1976.
Dunn, James D.G., and John William Rogerson. Eerdmans Commentary on the Bible. Grand Rapids, Mich.: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 2003.
Friedrich, Gerhard, ed. Theological Dictionary of the New Testament, Vols. I and VI. Grand Rapids, Mich.: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 1968.
Henry, Matthew. Matthew Henry’s Commentary on the Whole Bible, Vol. V–Matthew to John. Fleming H. Revell Company, 1991.
Jerajani H R, Jaju B, Phiske M M, Lade N. Hematohidrosis - A rare clinical phenomenon. Indian J Dermatol [serial online] 2009 [cited 2016 Jan 7];54:290-2. http://www.e-ijd.org/text.asp?2009/54/3/290/55645
Just, Arthur A. Luke 9:51-24:53. St. Louis, Mo.: Concordia Publishing House, 1997.
Lenski, R.C.H. The Interpretation of St. Luke’s Gospel. Minneapolis, Minn.: Augsburg Publishing House.
Ribeiro, Luan Henrique Gomes and Wilson Paroschi. The Agony in Gethsemane: A Textual-Critical Study of Luke 22:43-44. Academia.edu, accessed January 7, 2016. https://www.academia.edu/9251082/The_Agony_in_Gethsemane_-A_Critical-Textual_Study_of_Luke_22_43_44
Senior, Donald. The Passion of Jesus in the Gospel of Luke. Wilmington, Del.: Michael Glazier Inc., 1989.
Stanley, David M. Jesus in Gethsemane. New York: Paulist Press, 1979.
Mary and Zechariah get credit for the most beautiful prayers in Luke’s gospel, but no prayer by Jesus is either more intense than the one recorded in Luke 22:39-46. Modeling what he taught us during the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus provides yet one more shining example of exactly how we should all pray: “Father, if you are willing.” And even as we are sweating blood: “Not my will, but yours be done.”
Jesus had entered Jerusalem just a few days earlier as “the whole multitude of his disciples began to rejoice” (Lk 19:37). After cleansing the temple (19:45-48), clashing with the chief priests and scribes (20:19,46-47; 22:2), silencing the Sadducees (20:40), foretelling destruction (21:5-9,20-24) and betrayal (22:21), Jesus eats one last supper with his disciples before leading them to the mountain, once again, to pray.
Matthew (26:36-46) and Mark (14:32-42) both have longer versions of this night. But the additional detail — it happened in the Garden of Gethsemane; Peter and the sons of Zebedee were there; and Jesus had to wake the disciples three times, admonishing them to pray — doesn’t improve the narrative. With fewer words, Luke’s account is far more intense. The most significant addition is what Luke provides: Jesus faced such intense agony that his sweat became like great drops of blood (22:44). Luke also has a significant change in the story. Matthew and Mark describe Jesus as “sorrowful” (Mt 26:37) or “distressed” (Mk 14:33), whereas Luke says it is the disciples who are “sleeping for sorrow” (22:45).
It goes without saying, but prayer is the central theme in this pericope. Employing a chiasm, Luke not only leads off and ends the section with prayer, Jesus’ prayer of supplication it is at the heart of the matter.
Textual notes
39. “And after going out, he journeyed according to custom to the Mount of Olives, and the disciples followed him.”
Καὶ ἐξελθὼν ἐπορεύθη — In the preceding verses, Jesus is the subject. Therefore, the nominative aorist participle ἐξελθὼν, coupled with the καὶ, continues his actions. Beyond the traditional definitions of moving out of, coming out, going out, and retiring (BDAG, 347), ἐξέρχομαι carries a darker sense of “departing in death” (BDAG, 348.2). Of course, Luke knows what happens next: It won’t be long before the mob arrives to arrest Jesus. But it would nonetheless be better to stick with a more traditional rendering of going out.
κατὰ τὸ ἔθος εἰς τὸ ὄρος τῶν ἐλαιῶν — Only three New Testament writers — Luke, John, and the author of Hebrews — use the word ἔθος, which means a usual or customary manner, habit, or long-established usage. More than a half dozen of these references carry a sense of religious practice (Lk 1:9, 2:42; Jn 19:40; Acts 6:14, 15:1, 21:21; Heb 10:25). The custom could be that Jesus was simply retreating to the mountain. Jesus loved to spend his nights, in prayer, on the mountain (Lk 6:12; but also Lk 9:28, 21:37; Mt 14:23, 15:29).
The Mount of Olives also is known as Olivet and The Olive Grove (BDAG, 313). Luke doesn’t identify the specific location of Jesus’ journey, but other Gospel writers do in their parallel accounts (Mt 26:36; Mk 14:32): the Garden of Gethsemane is located about a half mile from Jerusalem’s walls. The location in Luke’s Gospel is theologically significant. As Dr. Naomichi Masaki put it, “everything important happens on the mountain.” In Luke, not only did Jesus rebuke the devil on the mountain during his first temptation (4:5,29), he was transfigured on the mountain (9:28) before the betrayal by the disciple who didn’t follow him there was finalized.
40. “And having come to the place, he said to them, “Pray you do not go to trial.”
γενόμενος δὲ ἐπὶ τοῦ τόπου — With the articular τόπου, Luke intimates that the disciples would have known exactly where Jesus was going; he often went there (Jn 18:2). This is the place where Jesus likely slept every night after his arrival in Jerusalem (Lk 21:37), a fact that Judas knows (Jn 18:2).
προσεύχεσθε μὴ εἰσελθεῖν εἰς πειρασμόν — The sentence leads off with the present imperative προσεύχεσθε, which provides a distinct directive. Matthew used the same form of the verb in the teaching the Lord’s Prayer (Mt 6:9). The phrase itself is commonly translated as “Pray that you may not enter into temptation” (ESV). But here, πειρασμόν would be better translated as trial, its first definition (BDAG, 793). Jesus knows what the disciples are going to do after his arrest: They will all succumb to temptation by scattering. Therefore, it makes better sense that Jesus urged them to pray they don’t go to trial because he knows Peter will deny him three times, and Thomas will doubt that he would do as he said he would: rise from the dead. Their prayer not to go to trial certainly will be answered by the one who will defend them. As Donald Senor put it in his book The Passion of Jesus in the Gospel of Luke:
“Unprepared, the disciple would be overwhelmed by such ‘tests,’ as Jesus warns in the parable of the sower, where the seeds that fell on rocky soil are interpreted as those ‘who, when they hear the word, receive it with joy; but these have no root, they believe for a while and in time of test (peirasmou) fall away” (8:13).”
An association with temptation isn’t that far off though. Mark’s parallel account adds the additional reasoning that the flesh is weak (σὰρξ ἀσθενής). There is “a close connection with the 6th petition of the Lord’s Prayer; watching consists in prayer in view of our defencelessness (sic) in temptation.”
41. “And he withdrew from them about a stone’s throw, and having fallen to his knees, he was praying, ...”
αὐτὸς ἀπεσπάσθη ἀπ’ αὐτῶν ὡσεὶ λίθου βολὴν — The aorist passive ἀπεσπάσθη, preceded by αὐτὸς, which strongly emphasizes who he is, takes on an active meaning of withdrawing or drawing away (BDAG, 120), in this case “about a stone’s throw.” Luke is the only writer in the New Testament who reckons by the stone’s throw distance, giving some historical critics pause about the authenticity of the passage.
θεὶς τὰ γόνατα καὶ προσηύχετο — The verb τίθημι has a wide variety of definitions, everything from putting or placing, to taking off or giving up, and to making or consigning. Luke continues to show his literary uniqueness by becoming the only NT writer who uses the aorist participial form of τίθημι. In each case of the word (also Acts 7:60, 9:40, 20:36), θεὶς is used in relation to someone falling to their knees and praying. Luke follows it here with the imperfect middle προσηύχετο, which should be used with the continual sense of “he was praying.”
The fact that Jesus is on his knees is noteworthy. Just says: “This is a sign of Jesus’ great humility and the burden of suffering he is about to endure.” Unlike Matthew and Mark, who describe Jesus falling to his face to pray between trips to wake the disciples, the agony in Luke builds with more subtlety here. Whether Jesus was on his knees or falling to his face, it is in contrast with Jewish custom of standing while praying.
42. “... Father, if you are willing, take away this cup from me. Nevertheless, not my will, but yours, be done.”
Although Luke’s narrative of the night in the garden is much shorter than either Matthew or Mark portray, there is intensity throughout Jesus’ prayer. If you listen to this, the second of four prayers by Jesus that Luke records (also see 10:21, 23:34, 23:46), you can hear the agony building to the course he knows has already been marked out for him.
πάτερ, εἰ βούλει παρένεγκε τοῦτο τὸ ποτήριον ἀπ’ ἐμοῦ· πλὴν μὴ τὸ θέλημά μου ἀλλὰ τὸ σὸν γινέσθω — The sentence is almost framed around two imperatives: παρένεγκε and γινέσθω. The first one, which is in second-person, means to bring up or to take away — in this case, the ποτήριον. Normally, that is just a cup (BDAG 857), but it is often used in language of the Eucharist, too. The word is rare in non-Biblical Greek. The figurative uses include the cup of wrath, suffering, and Lord’s Supper, as well as in eschatological and interpretative sayings. The word clearly doesn’t mean the Lord’s Supper here; Jesus will receive all of God’s wrath and suffer horribly on his way to the cross. In the OT, it is used figuratively to express destiny and death in general, and this is no exception. The concept of the cup of suffering is found throughout OT, notably the cup of wrath (Is 51:17), of staggering (Zec 12:2), and of horror (Ez 23:33). τὸ ποτήριον also was used in relation to matyrdom both in Scripture (Mt 20:23) and outside of Scripture (BDAG 857).
Most prominently, Just identifies, is that the passion of the cup is at the center of the story. Using a chiasm, Luke has positioned the cup in the middle of an ABCCBA arrangement. “The whole purpose of Jesus’ ministry, and of the Gospel, is at stake in this request.” Luke then closes with one last imperative: σὸν γινέσθω (your will be done). The force of the third-person imperative isn’t as strong as the second-person, but the prayer is a perfect example of Jesus’ earlier teaching on how to pray (Mt 6:10).
43-44. “And there appeared to him an angel from heaven, strengthening him. And being in an agony he prayed more earnestly; and his sweat became like great drops of blood falling to the ground.”
Great questions arise with the reading of these two verses, including: Did Luke actually write them? If Luke didn’t write them, do they belong at all? Honestly, the church at large has settled that last question: the passage is a fixture in all the major translations.
Nonetheless, there is reason to doubt the authenticity of verses 43 and 44. Nestle-Aland’s 28th edition of Novum Testamentum Graece continues to list these verses in double brackets, the indicator that the enclosed words are known not to be a part of the original text. David M. Stanley, in his book Jesus in Gethsemane, reported that the 1966 edition of The Greek New Testament didn’t include the verses, but those had been added by the time the United Bible Society published its third edition. Stanley goes so far as saying that not only are they “almost certainly inauthentic,” their presence disturbs the narrative, Jesus’ reactions are in contradiction to the character presented by Luke, and Jesus had already voiced his acceptance, so he therefore didn’t need an angel to give him strength. Eerdmans Commentary on the Bible called the inclusion of verses 43 and 44 something like a “pious elaboration which later generations delighted in.”
In contrast to the work of Stanley and Eerdmans, Henry Alford argued that the verses may have been removed for a perceived inconsistency with the divine nature of Jesus, but should be included because now “we have reason to be thankful, that orthodoxy has been better understood since.” Stronger yet is Just’s argument that structure and content of the verses fit the narrative.
Jesus is anything but weak or out of character in these verses. He is not only “courageous,” these verses strengthen the divine humanity of Jesus. It should be stressed here: Jesus is fully human, too. We have seen the Christ weep for friends (Jn 11:35), enemies (Lk 19:41), and himself (Heb 5:7). We have seen him rejoice over finding the lost (Lk 15:5-6), the fall of Satan (Lk 10:21), and followers finding faith (Jn 11:15). We have seen him angry (Lk 19:45-46), scared (Jn 12:27-28), weary (Jn 4:6), and compassionate (Mk 6:34), among other human emotions. Now, as Just notes, Jesus is confronted with “one of the most intense moments of his passion.”
ὤφθη δὲ αὐτῷ ἄγγελος ἀπ’ οὐρανοῦ ἐνισχύων αὐτόν — As with most passives in scripture, the aorist verb ὤφθη (appeared) is of divine nature: The Father sent the angel to his Chosen One (Lk 9:35). Although the word ἄγγελος can mean a human messenger (Lk 7:24, 7:27, 9:52), this one in Luke’s account is unmistakably an angel, which was sent to cause the recovery from loss of his strength (ἐνισχύων αὐτόν; BDAG, 337). R.C.H. Lenski says the ancients “objected to the idea that the Son of God should need an angel to give him strength.” But that is exactly one of the missions of the angels in scripture. Both Matthew and Mark describe angels ministering to Jesus amid his fasting (Mt 4:11) and temptation (Mk 1:13). We should find comfort in the fact that the Father answered prayer by sending an angel to give Jesus strength in an hour of crisis.
The appearance of the angel isn’t out of character with Luke’s work either. With exception to the Revelation of John, no New Testament writer talks about angels as much as Luke, who has 47 of the 176 NT references to angels in his Gospel and the book of Acts, and they almost universally appear to strengthen, encourage, and herald good news. Lenski is right in concluding the angel appears to strengthen Jesus physically: “This is the basis of Heb. 2:9, Jesus’ being made lower than the angels, namely by his agonizing human nature; but only in this respect, for the angel gave Jesus strength, not from angelic sources, but from the Father.”
γενόμενος ἐν ἀγωνίᾳ — The aorist middle participle γενόμενος is punctiliar: Jesus was in agony. We have a different understanding of agony than either Luke or, most especially, Jesus. In modern usage, agony is extreme suffering, or the final stages of death. Lenski says what Jesus was feeling is not a “death agony,” even if he is on his way to the cross. Senior argues that the Greek term ἀγωνίᾳ described “victorious struggle of the athlete or warrior.” ἀγωνίᾳ can mean apprehensiveness of mind, especially when faced with impending ills, distress, or anguish (BDAG, 17). It also means inner tension. “This is not a fear of death, but concern for victory in face of the approaching decisive battle on which the fate of the world depends.”
ἐκτενέστερον προσηύχετο — More eagerly, earnestly, constantly coupled with imperfect of προσεύχομαι. The imperfect is going to change the meaning here. He began to pray more earnestly, because he already had been praying, when the angel showed up, giving him the renewed strength.
ὁ ἱδρὼς αὐτοῦ ὡσεὶ θρόμβοι αἵματος καταβαίνοντες ἐπὶ τὴν γῆν — There aren’t many ways to mince these words. ἱδρὼς is sweat (BDAG, 469), θρόμβοι are drops (BDAG, 460), and αἵματος is blood (BDAG, 26-27). However, caution needs to be exercised in repeating this verse. ὡσεὶ is just as certain in its definition: It means like, as, or about (BDAG, 1106), and context eliminates the third option. Therefore, Jesus’ “sweat became like drops of blood falling to the ground.” Luke is the only writer reporting this. Nevertheless, Matthew Henry finds theological significance in Luke’s use of the sweat like drops of blood:
“Sweat came with sin, and was a branch of the curse, Gen. 3:19. And therefore, when Christ was made sin and a curse for us, he underwent a grievous sweat.”
That said, medically speaking, we know Jesus could have actually sweated drops of blood. There are documented cases of people being under such duress and stress that blood vessels feeding sweat glands rupture, causing them to bleed, a condition known as Hematohidrosis.
45-46. “And after arising from prayer and coming to the disciples he found them sleeping with sorrow, and he said to them, “Why are you sleeping? Rise and pray that you may not go to trial.”
Luke’s parallelism persists with the opening words of the final two verses. Perhaps in a follow up to the darkness of verse 39’s ἐξέρχομαι, with its departing in death nuance, Luke uses ἀναστὰς, which has a secondary meaning of “bringing back to life.” The angel had just given Jesus renewed energy to carry on his mission, and now he comes back to life, after agonizing in prayer, to find the disciples “sleeping with sorrow.” The disciples have already begun failing Jesus, whom they witnessed as being in agony. Here, after facing one of his greatest temptations, Jesus shows himself faithful to all that he has taught the disciples about prayer. As Senior concluded: “Jesus’ words on the necessity of prayer to survive the ‘test’ surround his own example of urgent prayer.”
εὗρεν κοιμωμένους αὐτοὺς ἀπὸ τῆς λύπης — Jesus “found the disciples sleeping with sorrow.” It’s an unusual phrase that may escape the modern mind. Lenski explains it this way: “It is well known that great and continued heaviness of soul brings on an inner dullness of mind and thus the physical reaction of sleep; the soul yields to its burden and no longer rallies against it.”
Text Application
The significance of this pericope certainly can not be measured in density or number of words. The weight of those words have a much greater effect. In short order, after Jesus offers one of the world’s greatest gifts — the forgiveness of sins through his body and blood in the Lord’s Supper — one disciple will complete his betrayal, others will get puffed up in pride, and another will deny he even knows his Lord, before all of them fall asleep as Jesus sweats blood before drinking a cup of wrath.Perhaps most importantly, it is through Luke that we learn how to pray. Luke had opened his narrative with the richness of Mary and Zechariah’s prayer, and followed it with the passion of Jesus’ prayers on the mountain. Then Luke carries the theme much further into Acts, where we witness the church becoming bold in prayer (Acts 4:24), even to the point of death, by a stone’s throw nonetheless (Acts 7:60).
Every reader and hearer of this text can learn about how poor our prayer lives actually are, as Jesus continues to model his faithfulness in unceasing prayer. The text illustrates that our Father does indeed answer our prayers in profound ways, providing angels who strengthen us against temptation in our darkest hours. It even shows us through challenges of textual criticism how much stronger our faith can become in the truthfulness of God’s Word.
Bibliography
Aland, Barbara, Kurt Aland, Gerd Mink, Holger Strutwolf, Klaus Wachtel, Universität Münster, and Deutsche Bibelgesellschaft. Novum Testamentum Graece, Greek-English New Testament, 28th ed. Stuttgart, Germany: Deutsche Bibelgesellschaft, 2013Aland, Kurt, et al, eds. The Greek New Testament, 3rd ed. New York: United Bible Societies, 1975.
Alford, Henry. Alford’s Greek New Testament: An Exegetical and Critical Commentary. Grand Rapids, Mich.: Guardian Press, 1976.
Dunn, James D.G., and John William Rogerson. Eerdmans Commentary on the Bible. Grand Rapids, Mich.: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 2003.
Friedrich, Gerhard, ed. Theological Dictionary of the New Testament, Vols. I and VI. Grand Rapids, Mich.: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 1968.
Henry, Matthew. Matthew Henry’s Commentary on the Whole Bible, Vol. V–Matthew to John. Fleming H. Revell Company, 1991.
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Just, Arthur A. Luke 9:51-24:53. St. Louis, Mo.: Concordia Publishing House, 1997.
Lenski, R.C.H. The Interpretation of St. Luke’s Gospel. Minneapolis, Minn.: Augsburg Publishing House.
Ribeiro, Luan Henrique Gomes and Wilson Paroschi. The Agony in Gethsemane: A Textual-Critical Study of Luke 22:43-44. Academia.edu, accessed January 7, 2016. https://www.academia.edu/9251082/The_Agony_in_Gethsemane_-A_Critical-Textual_Study_of_Luke_22_43_44
Senior, Donald. The Passion of Jesus in the Gospel of Luke. Wilmington, Del.: Michael Glazier Inc., 1989.
Stanley, David M. Jesus in Gethsemane. New York: Paulist Press, 1979.