Commentaries:
Jamieson, Fausset, and Brown
PREACHING, BAPTISM, AND IMPRISONMENT OF JOHN. (Luke 3:1-20)
Here the curtain of the New Testament is, as it were, drawn up, and the greatest of all epochs of the Church commences. Even our Lord's own age (Luke 3:23) is determined by it [BENGEL]. No such elaborate chronological precision is to be found elsewhere in the New Testament, and it comes fitly from him who claims it as the peculiar recommendation of his Gospel, that he had "accurately traced down all things from the first" (Luke 1:3). Here, evidently, commences his proper narrative. Also see on Matthew 3:1.
the fifteenth year of Tiberius--reckoning from the period when he was admitted, three years before Augustus' death, to a share of the empire [WEBSTER and WILKINSON], about the end of the year of Rome 779, or about four years before the usual reckoning.
Pilate . . . governor of Judea--His proper title was Procurator, but with more than the usual powers of that office. After holding it about ten years he was ordered to Rome, to answer to charges brought against him, but ere he arrived Tiberius died (A.D. 35), and soon after Pilate committed suicide.
Herod--(See on Mark 6:14).
Philip--a different and very superior Philip to the one whose wife Herodias went to live with Herod Antipas. (See Mark 6:17).
Iturea--to the northeast of Palestine; so called from Ishmael's son Itur or Jetur (1 Chronicles 1:31), and anciently belonging to the half tribe of Manasseh.
Trachonitis--farther to the northeast, between Iturea and Damascus; a rocky district, infested by robbers, and committed by Augustus to Herod the Great to keep in order.
Abilene--still more to the northeast, so called from Abila, eighteen miles from Damascus [ROBINSON].
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