The Seventy Sent out to Preach.

(Luke 10:1-16).

At that time i.e. when the Lord decided to leave Galilee permanently, as the hour of His sufferings on the cross had drawn close, He chose 70 disciples — additional to the 12 He chose previously — and sent them out in pairs into areas that He would visit. This was done, so that the witness of Christ would be stronger in the eyes of the people, and that they would be prepared for His arrival. The number 70 was held in high esteem by the Jews, as did the numbers 40 and 7. The Sanhedrin consisted of 70 members. The names of these 70 disciples are not known with full certainty. “The harvest truly is great, but the laborers are few” — Samaria and Judea were not resounding a great deal with Christ’s sermons, while there were souls there that had ripened like ears of corn, ready for Christ’s granary, for His Church. The instructions given further on by the 70 disciples, remind us in many ways the instructions given by the 12 Apostles beforehand, about which Saint Matthew narrates in the 10^th chapter of his Gospel. The prohibition of greeting people along the road is repeated.

The explanation for this prohibition is that with people of the East, greetings were not expressed like they are with us, a slight bow or a handshake, but with bowing to the ground, embracing and kissing, coupled with expressions of various good wishes — all requiring a reasonable amount of time. Through this prohibition, the Lord tried to instill into His disciples the urgency that they should apply in visiting the towns and villages. These exact instructions were given in his day by the Prophet Elisha to his disciple Gehazi, when he sent him with his staff to resurrect the son of a widow (2 Kings 4:29). “Son of peace” means a human being, ready to accept that peace into his heart, with which he will be greeted by the messengers of peace — the Lord’s disciples. Directing them to eat what is offered, the Lord prescribes to His disciples to be decorous, non-demanding and non-choosy. He also tells them to disregard that squeamishness, which the Jews maintained toward the Samaritans, as this was unworthy of preachers of peace and love. The Lord concludes His preceptorials with warnings of God’s punishment to those cities, where His power was evident, yet they did not repent. He also points out how important His disciples’ sermons are for everyone: in rejecting them, they reject He Himself, and in rejecting Him, they reject the One Who sent Him i.e. Father God.