Luke 22:31

22:31 “Simon, ¹  Simon, pay attention! ²  Satan has demanded to have you all, ³  to sift you like wheat, ⁴ 

Luke 12:18

12:18 Then ⁵  he said, ‘I ⁶  will do this: I will tear down my barns and build bigger ones, and there I will store all my grain and my goods.

Luke 3:17

3:17 His winnowing fork ⁷  is in his hand to clean out his threshing floor and to gather the wheat into his storehouse, ⁸  but the chaff he will burn up with inextinguishable fire.” ⁹ 

[22:31]  ¹ tc The majority of mss (א A D W Θ Ψ Ë^1,13 Ï as well as several versional witnesses) begin this verse with an introductory comment, “and the Lord said,” indicating a change in the subject of discussion. But this is apparently a reading motivated by the need for clarity. Some of the best witnesses, along with a few others (Ì⁷⁵ B L T 1241 2542^c sy^s co), do not contain these words. The abrupt shift is the more difficult reading and thus more likely to be original.

[22:31]  ² tn Grk “behold” (for “pay attention” see L&N 91.13).

[22:31]  ³ sn This pronoun is plural in the Greek text, so it refers to all the disciples of which Peter is the representative.

[22:31]  ⁴ sn Satan has demanded permission to put them to the test. The idiom “sift (someone) like wheat” is similar to the English idiom “to pick (someone) apart.” The pronoun you is implied.

[12:18]  ⁵ tn Here καί (kai) has been translated as “then” to indicate the implied sequence of events within the narrative.

[12:18]  ⁶ sn Note how often the first person pronoun is present in these verses. The farmer is totally self absorbed.

[3:17]  ⁹ sn A winnowing fork is a pitchfork-like tool used to toss threshed grain in the air so that the wind blows away the chaff, leaving the grain to fall to the ground. The note of purging is highlighted by the use of imagery involving sifting though threshed grain for the useful kernels.

[3:17]  ¹⁰ tn Or “granary,” “barn” (referring to a building used to store a farm’s produce rather than a building for housing livestock).

[3:17]  ¹¹ sn The image of fire that cannot be extinguished is from the OT: Job 20:26; Isa 34:8-10; 66:24.