Luke 9:54

54. His disciples It does not appear that the twelve, besides James and John, were in this company. Nor, if this was a journey to the Feast of Tabernacles, is there anything to indicate that any one of these was there with Jesus. James and John were evidently not of the messengers, for they knew nothing of the opposition of this village till they arrive with Jesus.

Wilt thou that we They did not ask Jesus to command the fire, as if conscious that such would be a strange work for him. Nor do they imagine that they can perform the miracle without his permission. Nor do they doubt their own power, if done by his order.

As Elias did It was in this same Samaria, perhaps in some near locality, that Elijah the Tishbite called fire from heaven and consumed the fifties of the wicked king sent to take him. The suggestion of this example was not, then, as Olshausen says, an after thought, to protect themselves from the reproof expected from Jesus, but a forethought, awakened by both the circumstances and the place. There is a great temptation to suppose that this was a disposition to call down a thunderbolt upon the wicked, and that the name of sons of thunder given to these two apostles was a memento of their zeal. But, first, it may be doubted whether it was lightning or thunder which the words fire come down designate. Second, their name seems not so much to refer to the fire as to the roar of thunder. And, third, as Mark (Mark 3:16-17) gives the surnames of the three principal apostles in connection as being bestowed by Jesus, we must hold the epithets not as bitter mementoes of sin, but as testimonies of honour.