Luke 6:6-7

Healing a Withered Hand

6:6 On ¹  another Sabbath, Jesus ²  entered the synagogue ³  and was teaching. Now ⁴  a man was there whose right hand was withered. ⁵  6:7 The experts in the law ⁶  and the Pharisees ⁷  watched ⁸  Jesus ⁹  closely to see if ¹⁰  he would heal on the Sabbath, ¹¹  so that they could find a reason to accuse him.

[6:6]  ¹ tn Grk “Now it happened that on.” The introductory phrase ἐγένετο (egeneto, “it happened that”), common in Luke (69 times) and Acts (54 times), is redundant in contemporary English and has not been translated.

[6:6]  ² tn Grk “he”; the referent (Jesus) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

[6:6]  ³ sn See the note on synagogues in 4:15.

[6:6]  ⁴ tn Here καί (kai) has been translated as “now” to indicate the transition to a new topic. In addition, because the Greek sentence is rather long and complex, a new sentence was started here in the translation.

[6:6]  ⁵ tn Grk “a man was there and his right hand was withered.”

[6:7]  ⁶ tn Or “The scribes.” See the note on the phrase “experts in the law” in 5:21.

[6:7]  ⁷ sn See the note on Pharisees in 5:17.

[6:7]  ⁸ sn The term translated watched…closely is emotive, since it carries negative connotations. It means they were watching him out of the corner of their eye or spying on him.

[6:7]  ⁹ tn Grk “him”; the referent (Jesus) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

[6:7]  ¹⁰ tn This is a first class condition in the Greek text; Jesus’ opponents anticipated he would do this.

[6:7]  ¹¹ sn The background for this is the view that only if life was endangered should one attempt to heal on the Sabbath (see the Mishnah, m. Shabbat 6.3; 12.1; 18.3; 19.2; m. Yoma 8.6).