Luke 19 Footnotes

19:9 Salvation didn’t come to Zacchaeus because of his works. Rather, his encounter with Jesus and subsequent change of heart were exhibited by his actions (3:8). Although we are not told of his faith in Jesus as the Christ, presumably Zacchaeus’s positive response to Jesus indicates as much. Though the crowd thought Zacchaeus had forfeited access to God’s favor because of his greed, Jesus declared he was as much a child of Abraham as they were (Rm 3:1-2; 9:4-5; 11:28).

19:38-40 There is nothing historically implausible about the triumphal entry. It is independently attested by all four Gospels and, with the cleansing of the temple, provides the best justification for Jesus’s arrest and execution. Jesus’s disciples and Galilean pilgrims familiar with his ministry and convinced of his messianic status would hail his entrance into Jerusalem as they thronged to the city for Passover, particularly if Jesus had now encouraged their acclamation after so long deflecting it in Galilee.

19:42-44 Jesus prophesied the destruction of Jerusalem, an event that would occur at the hands of the Romans forty years later. The vague language is typical of any siege (though it has precedents in the OT; e.g., Is 29:1-4), and this argues against a “prophecy after the fact.” One would expect more detail from the actual destruction of the city if the latter were the case.