And they said, Some say that thou art John the Baptist. — The passage is of the greatest possible interest as one of the very few that indicate the impressions shaped into beliefs that were floating among the people as to our Lord’s character and mission. They were based, it will be seen in each case, upon a popular doctrine of transmigration, to which the Pharisees had given a place in their system of teaching. The great actors of the past were still in existence. They might, at any great national crisis, reappear to continue and complete their work. Each of the answers has a further special interest of its own. (1.) The identification of our Lord with the Baptist has already met us as coming from the lips of the tetrarch Antipas, adopted, but not originated, by him as explaining our Lord’s mighty works (Matthew 14:2; Luke 9:7). (2.) The belief that Elijah had reappeared was of the same nature. He was expected as the forerunner of the Messiah (Malachi 4:5). The imagination of the people had at first seen in the Baptist the reappearance of the Tishbite, but he, though working in the spirit and power of Elijah, had disclaimed the character which was thus ascribed to him, and it was natural that the imagination of the people should now turn to One who appeared to them as simply continuing his work. The character of our Lord’s recent miracles, corresponding as it did to that which was recorded as wrought by Elijah for the widow of Sarepta (1 Kings 17:14), had probably strengthened that impression. (3.) The name of Jeremiah introduces a new train of legendary thought. The impression made by that prophet on the minds of men had led to something like a mythical after-growth. It was said that the spirit of Jeremiah had passed into Zechariah (see Note on Matthew 27:9), and on that assumption another reappearance might well seem probable. He, it was believed, had hidden the ark, and the tabernacle, and the altar of incense in a cave in “the mountain where Moses climbed up and saw the heritage of God” — i.e., in Nebo, or Pisgah (2MMalachi 2:1-7) — and was expected to come and guide the people in the time “when God should gather His people together” to the place of concealment. He had appeared to Judas Maccabeus in a vision as “a man with grey hairs, and exceeding glorious,” and as the guardian prophet of the people, praying for them and for the Holy City, had given him a golden sword as the gift of God (2Ma. 15:13-16). As the prophet who had foretold the new covenant and the coming of the Lord our Righteousness (Jeremiah 23:6; Jeremiah 31:31) he was identified, as thoroughly as Isaiah, with the Messianic expectations of the people. Something, we may add, there may have been in our Lord’s human aspect, as a Man of sorrows and acquainted with grief, which may have helped to suggest this identification with the prophet who was, above all others of the goodly company, a prophet of lamentations and tears and woe. (4.) The last conjecture was more vague and undefined, and was probably the resource of those who were impressed with wonder at our Lord’s words and works, and yet could not bring themselves to acknowledge Him as what He claimed to be. All the four conjectures, it will be seen, fell far short of the recognition of the Christ.
Interpreted in connection with the vision of Daniel 7:13, the words of the question, “Whom do men say that I, the Son of Man, am?” did, in fact, assume His claim to be the Christ. But it remained to be seen whether the disciples had risen to their Lord’s meaning in thus speaking of Himself, and would, on their part, adopt that interpretation. The report which they made of the belief of others shows how little, at this time (whatever may have been the case earlier or later), He was regarded as the Messiah by the mass of the people.