Mat 9:14-17 | Family

Matthew 9:14-17

The children of the bride-chamber; the companions of the bridegroom during the marriage-feast. Jud 14:10,11.

Then shall they fast; fasting is an expression of sorrow, not suitable for the marriage-feast while the bridegroom is still present. So Christ is the bridegroom of the church. While he was personally present with his disciples, it was not suitable that they should fast. After his removal from them, they would have trials that would make fasting proper. New cloth; or, as the margin, raw or unwrought cloth, not yet dressed or fulled, and liable to shrink upon being wet.

Taketh from the garment; namely, when by shrinking it tears itself from it. Very much of a person's usefulness depends upon the correctness of his judgment as to the time and manner of doing things, and upon his doing things which are not only right in themselves, but adapted to the circumstances in which he is placed, and to the character and condition of those whom he labors to benefit. Into old bottles; bottles were then made, not of glass, but of the skins of animals. Of course, those that were old would be rotten; and new wine, if put into them, would, in the process of fermentation, burst them. By this and the preceding similitude our Lord teaches that the austerities of the old dispensation, under which John lived, cannot be profitably mixed in with the free spirit of the new. Compare chap. Mt 11:18,19.