Matthew 2:23

23. A city called Nazareth Though Matthew wrote for Jewish readers, familiar with Nazareth, his words seem to imply the contrary. This we shall soon explain. Nazareth A small village embosomed in a valley in the southwestern part of Galilee. It was very obscure; it is not mentioned in the Old Testament. According to Hengstenberg, its name is derived from the Hebrew word Netzer, signifying a branch; or rather sprout, or germ; the place being so called from its insignificance. Its fame has solely risen from the residence of the Saviour there. Indeed, the place is a fit emblem of him. Beginning from a germ, it has risen to a tree in fame, and will fill the earth.

Stanley gives the following account of Nazareth:

“It is one peculiarity of the Galilean hills, as distinct from those of Ephraim or Judah, that they contain or sustain green basins of table-land just below their topmost ridges. Such above all is NAZARETH. Fifteen gently rounded hills ‘seem as if they had met to form an enclosure’ for this peaceful basin; ‘they rise round it like the edge of a shell to guard it from intrusion. It is a rich and beautiful field’ in the midst of these green hills, abounding in gay flowers, in fig-trees, small gardens, hedges of the prickly pear; and the dense, rich grass affords an abundant pasture. The village stands on the steep slope of the southwestern side of the valley.

“From the crest of the hills which thus screen it, especially from that called ‘Nebi-Said,’ or ‘Ismail,’ on the western side, is one of the most striking views in Palestine. There are Tabor, with its rounded dome, on the northeast, Hermon’s white top in the distant north, Carmel and the Mediterranean Sea to the west, a conjunction of those three famous mountains, probably unique in the views of Palestine. And in the nearer prospect, there are the uplands in which Nazareth itself stands, its own circular basin behind it; on the west, enclosed by similar hills overhanging the plain of Acre, lies the town of Sepphorieh, the Roman capital. On the south and southeast lies the broad plain of Esdraelon, overhung by the high pyramidal hill which, as the highest point of the Nazareth range, and thus the most conspicuous to travelers approaching from the plain, has received, though without any historical ground, the name of the ‘Mount of Precipitation.’ These are the natural features which for nearly thirty years met the almost daily view of Him who increased in wisdom and stature’ within this beautiful seclusion. It is the seclusion which constitutes its peculiarity and its fitness for these scenes of the Gospel history. Unknown and unnamed in the Old Testament, Nazareth first appears as the retired abode of the humble carpenter. Its separation from the busy world may be the ground, as it certainly is an illustration, of the evangelist’s play on the word, ‘He shall be called a Nazarene.’ Its wild character, high up in the Galilean hills, may account both for the roughness of its population, unable to appreciate their own Prophet; and for the evil reputation which it had acquired even in the neighbouring villages, one of whose inhabitants, Nathaniel of Cana, said, ‘Can any good thing come out of Nazareth?’ There, secured within the natural barrier of the hills, was passed that youth, of which the most remarkable characteristic is its absolute obscurity; and thence came the name of NAZARENE, used of old by the Jews, and used still by Mussulmans, as the appellation of that despised sect which has now embraced the civilized world.”

Spoken by the prophets Not by any one prophet in express terms, but by several of the prophets, in general substance.

He shall be called a Nazarene The name of Nazarene was but another word for despised one. Hence, although no prophet has ever said anything of the word Nazarene, yet all those prophecies describing the Messiah as a despised one are fulfilled in his being a Nazarene.

Such is the ordinary interpretation, and we concur in it; and the reader is welcome to consider it sufficient. But we are convinced, in spite of the denial of most commentators, that, as Hengstenberg has shown, something more than this is intended. The Hebrew word for Nazareth was Netzer, a branch, or rather germ. Matthew wrote for Hebrews, and in his Hebrew the sentence would read thus: He dwelt in a city called Germ, that it might be fulfilled which was spoken by the prophets, saying, he shall be called a Germ, or Germinal One. Thereby would be fulfilled all that cluster of prophecies in which the Hebrew name Netzer, Branch or Germ, or its near synonym, is applied to Messiah. Thus, Zechariah 6:12: Behold the man whose name is Branch, or Germ. The term in prophecy is expressive of the slender origin of the Messiah. This whole circle of prophecies, indeed, is embraced in this of Isaiah 11:1: There shall come forth a rod from the fallen stem of Jesse and (Netzer,) a branch (germ) from his roots shall bear fruit. That is, from the decayed family stock of David, a feeble sprout shall put forth and grow to great final power. A prophecy this by which the evangelical history is wonderfully confirmed. Humble, obscure, and, as it seems to some, mean as the Gospel origin appears, it is by that very fact a fulfilment of stupendous prophecies. In support of this view we may remark:

1 . There is a class of name-predictions in Scripture, of which this is a just specimen. Thus Isaiah gives his sons predictive names, (Isaiah 8:3; Isaiah 8:18; Isaiah 7:3,) which are fulfilled. Melchisedek is a type of Christ by being “King of Salem, that is, King of Peace.” This last is a precisely similar case. Salem, signifying peace, is, like Netzer, a topographical divine name-prediction of Christ’s prophetic character.

2 . This interpretation makes the evangelist affirm that there was a divinely intended correspondence in name between the name of the city Netzer and Christ’s prophetic appellative Netzer; and that to mark this correspondence, Providence directed that the living Netzer should have his residence in the village Netzer. Thus would the popular attention be drawn to the prophecy and to its fulfilment.

3 . The fulfilment does not stop at the mere name. Nazareth is called a germ from its insignificance; yet it shall, through him, fill the earth with its importance. So it is an emblem of Him, the living Nazareth, who at first is but a Germ, but shall fill the earth with his glory. And as there is a correspondence in the name and thing, so they both continue to fulfil the prophetic predictions of the Netzer, so that there is a triple prophetic cord.

4 . By this wise plan of combining an external and audible fulfilment (so customary in prophecy) with the written one, a broad publicity is given to the great fact. It is transferred from the hidden books to the open land, and infused into the common speech. Providence has written a notice of the prophecy on the surface of the earth, as on a map, by the name of Nazareth, and has noted its fulfilment by placing Jesus, the germinal Netzer, there. And he has so contrived that every time a Jew speaks of Jesus as the Netzer, or Nazarene, he reminds himself of a fulfilled prophecy.

5 . This view confirms the interpretation which finds in the name Nazarene a symbol of humble origin. Nathaniel’s question, Can any good come out of Nazareth? shows that as Galilee was the odium of Palestine, so Nazareth was the odium even of Galilee.

6 . We now may see the true import of the phrase beginning this verse, a city called Nazareth. It implies not that the city was new to Matthew’s readers, for that was not the fact. It implies that Jesus was divinely directed to inhabit a city called by that name, in order that a name- prediction might be fulfilled. It so demonstrates our interpretation. The meaning, then, would be: He came to a city called Netzer that by being himself called a Netzer, the prophecies which predict him as a Netzer might be evidently verified. Or: He came to a city called Germ, that the prophecies which, for substance, predict him as a Germ, may be fulfilled in his very name, as well as condition.

Finally, it is worthy to be observed what a number of name-predictions concur in our Lord, as threads to a common knot. As his name Jesus asserts that he is a predicted Saviour, and antitype to Joshua, the bringer of his people to Canaan; as his appellative, Christ, declares him the end of all the Messianic prophecies; as his name Emmanuel proclaims him the Incarnate One of the Edenic prophecy and all ancient expectation, so his civic appellation Netzer, Nazarene, Branch, Germ, reminds us of a whole cluster of germinal prophecies, while the very spot in which he dwells is a type of the very points which the name designates. And finally, the prevalence of that appellation compels men, Jew or Gentile, the world over, to utter a perpetual reminder to themselves of the prophetic fulfilment. Pity if commentators should take much pains to obscure the reminder.