Lange’s Commentary on the Holy Scriptures has served as a standard reference for more than a century. The subtitle “Critical, Doctrinal, and Homiletical” aptly describes the three-pronged approach to the biblical text. This translated version of the German text is often considered by many to be superior to the original.
“—A figurative mode of indicating a desire so intense as to be painful.” (Page 102)
“The expression is evidently metaphorical, denoting the violent bursting forth of the kingdom of heaven, as the kernel of the ancient theocracy, through the husk of the Old Testament. John and Christ are themselves the violent who take it by force,—the former, as commencing the assault; the latter, as completing the conquest. Accordingly, this is a figurative description of the great era which had then commenced.” (Page 206)
“Lord addresses Himself to offenders generally. The passage teaches, 1. That when approaching the sanctuary, we learn to feel our personal guilt. 2. In such case, it is more urgent to pay our brother the debt of love than to discharge our debt to the temple; since an offering presented by one who is chargeable with wrong could not be acceptable to God, and the moral purification of man is the great object of the worship of God: see Matt. 9:13 (the πρῶτον must be connected with ὕπαγε).—In the ancient Church, it was customary for members of a family to ask each other’s forgiveness before going to the table of the Lord.” (Page 114)
“A figure of the element of nourishment and preservation in the kingdom of heaven, preventing corruption, preserving nutriment, giving savor to it, and rendering it healthy.” (Pages 103–104)
“The term ‘earth’ is figurative, denoting, not mankind generally, but society as then existing, both in the theocracy and the Gentile world,—being the definite form which the world had assumed (Ps. 93; John 2:12; Rev. 13:11). The disciples were destined, as the salt of the ancient theocratic world, to arrest the corruption which had commenced, and to impart a fresh and lasting savor.” (Page 104)