The Greek word, like “pinnacle” is the diminutive of “wing,” and seems to have been applied to any pointed roof or gable. Paul said of like spiritual experiences of his own ( 2Corinthians 12:2), so we must say of this, Whether it was in the body, or out of the body, we know not, God knoweth.Ī pinnacle of the temple.-Better, the pinnacle. The analogy of Ezekiel 37:1 Ezekiel 40:2, where the prophet is carried from place to place in the vision of God, leads us to think of this “taking” as outside the conditions of local motion. John uses it in Revelation 11:2 of the literal, in Revelation 21:2 of the heavenly, Jerusalem. Matthew among the Evangelists, and is used again by him in Matthew 27:53. Taketh him up into the holy city.-The use of this term to describe Jerusalem ( Luke 4:9) is peculiar to St. Matthew’s order seems, on the whole, the truest, and the “Get thee behind me, Satan,” fits in better with the close of the conflict. Luke show) protracted, and the temptations therefore recurring. Especially was this likely to be the case, if the trial had been (as the narratives of St. Matthew’s, or the impressions left on the minds of those to whom the mystery had been communicated were slightly different. Luke’s informant was less accurate than St. Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers(5) The order of the last two temptations is different in St.
