Matthew 18:28 - Exposition

Went out —straightway from his lord's presence, where he had been so mercifully treated, while the remembrance of his free and undeserved forgiveness must have been still fresh. Found . Lighted upon by chance, as it were. Here, rather, was providentially offered an opportunity of showing that his lord's goodness was not thrown away, but had entered his heart and controlled his conduct towards others. One of his fellow servants. An official of the king, but probably in an inferior position to that which he himself occupied. Seeing this man, he is reminded of a paltry debt which this person owed him. He remembers this fact; he forgets his late experience. An hundred pence ( denarii ; see on Matthew 20:2 ); equivalent to some £3 of our money, and a sum not a millionth part of his own debt to his master; the proportion, as some say, may be stated more accurately as 1 to 1,250,000. The enormous difference between these two amounts represents the disproportion between the offences of our neighbours against us and those of which we are guilty towards God; and how small is the forgiveness on our side compared with that which God freely accords to our infinite debt to him! We must consider also the parties to whom these debts are owing—on one side, the worm man; on the other, Almighty God. Took him by the throat ( ἐ ì πνιγε ); was throttling him . Thus precluding all prayer and remonstrance. Such brutal treatment was not what he himself had experienced. Pay me that thou owest; ὁ ì τι ὀφει ì λεις : quod debes . Many manuscripts and late editors ( e . g . Lachmann, Tregelles, Tischendorf, Alford, Westcott and Hort) soften the demand by reading εἰ ì τι ὀφει ì λεις , si quid debes, "if thou owest aught," as though the creditor were ashamed of mentioning the paltry sum due; or else it is simply a fashion of speaking, not to be pressed as if any doubt was intimated concerning the debt. It might almost be rendered, "Pay, since thou owest something." Not thus had his lord addressed him in the first instance.