But I say unto you
The same that he said to the twelve apostles, when he sent them
out, ( Matthew
10:15 ) ,
that it shall be more tolerable in that day for Sodom than
for
that city.
By "that day" is meant, the famous day to come, the last day; the
day of judgment, as it is expressed in Matthew; and so the
Ethiopic version reads here, "it shall be better in the day of
judgment". Sodom was a very wicked city, and was destroyed by
fire from heaven for its iniquity, and its inhabitants suffer the
vengeance of eternal fire: and there was also Gomorrha, a
neighbouring city, guilty of the same crimes, and shared the same
fate; and which is mentioned along with Sodom in Matthew; and is
here read in the Persic version. And the sense of the whole is,
that though the iniquities of Sodom and Gomorrha were very great,
and their punishment very exemplary; yet, as there will be
degrees of torment in hell, the case of such a city, which has
been favoured with the Gospel, and has despised and rejected it,
will be much worse than the case of those cities, which were
devoured by fire from heaven; and than that of the inhabitants of
them in the future judgment, and to all eternity; (See Gill on
Matthew
10:15).