Luke 4:19

19 to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.”^[a]

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Luke 4:19 in Other Translations

KJV

19 To preach the acceptable year of the Lord.

ESV

19 to proclaim the year of the Lord's favor."

NLT

19 and that the time of the LORD’s favor has come. ”

MSG

19 to announce, "This is God's year to act!"

CSB

19 to proclaim the year of the Lord's favor.

Luke 4:19 Meaning and Commentary

Luke 4:19

To preach the acceptable year of the Lord.
] The time which he willed and fixed for the redemption of his people, and in which he showed his goodwill and pleasure unto sinful men, in the gift of his Son to them, and for them; and which, as the Arabic and Syriac versions render it, was a time "acceptable to the Lord": the sufferings of Christ were according to his will; his sacrifice was of a sweet smelling savour to him; his righteousness he was well pleased with; and the satisfaction and atonement for sin he made was a plenary and complete one: all Christ did, and suffered, were grateful to God, because hereby his perfections were glorified, his purposes, counsel, and covenant were accomplished, and his people saved. The Persic version renders it, "to preach the law acceptable to God", neither agreeable to the original text, nor its sense; for Christ was sent to preach the Gospel, and not the law. In the Vulgate Latin, and Arabic versions is added, "and the day of vengeance", out of the prophecy in ( Isaiah 61:2 ) but is not in any of the copies, or other versions. Our Lord did not read through all the three verses in the prophet, as it might be thought he would, and which was agreeable to the Jewish canon ^F3:

``he that reads in the law may not read less than three verses, and he may not read to an interpreter more than one verse, and in a prophet three; and if those three are three sections, they read everyone; they skip in a prophet, but they do not skip in the law.''

This last our Lord did, though he did not strictly attend to the former. Indeed, their rule, as elsewhere ^F4 given, obliged to read one and twenty verses; but this was not always observed; for

``if on a sabbath day there was an interpreter, or a preacher, they read in a prophet three verses, or five, or seven, and were not solicitous about twenty and one ^F5''

FOOTNOTES:

F3 Misn. Megilia, c. 4. sect. 4. Massechet Sopherim, c. 11. sect. 1.
F4 Piske Harosh Megilla, c. 3. art. 6.
F5 Massechet Sopherim, c. 12. sect. 7.

Taken from John Gill's Exposition of the Bible

Luke 4:19 In-Context

17 and the scroll of the prophet Isaiah was handed to him. Unrolling it, he found the place where it is written:

18 “The Spirit of the Lord is on me,because he has anointed meto proclaim good news to the poor.He has sent me to proclaim freedom for the prisonersand recovery of sight for the blind,to set the oppressed free,

19 to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.”

20 Then he rolled up the scroll, gave it back to the attendant and sat down. The eyes of everyone in the synagogue were fastened on him.

21 He began by saying to them, “Today this scripture is fulfilled in your hearing.”