The law and the prophets were until John. — See Notes on Matthew 11:14-15. What had then been said to the disciples of the Baptist is now reproduced to our Lord’s own disciples and to the Pharisees. The latter had closed their eyes to the fact that all previous revelations led up to the work of John, as that in its turn was preparatory for the work of Christ.
Every man presseth... — The fact asserted, that of a “rush,” as we should say, into the Kingdom, but a rush from which the Pharisees had held aloof, answers to the stronger expression in St. Matthew (Matthew 11:12), “the violent take it by force.”