15:21 The soldiers 10 forced 11 a passerby to carry his cross, 12 Simon of Cyrene, who was coming in from the country 13 (he was the father of Alexander and Rufus).
1 tn Grk “proclaimed, saying.” The participle λέγων (legwn) is redundant in contemporary English and has not been translated.
2 tn Grk “of whom I am not worthy.”
sn The humility of John is evident in the statement I am not worthy. This was considered one of the least worthy tasks of a slave, and John did not consider himself worthy to do even that for the one to come, despite the fact he himself was a prophet.
3 tn The term refers to the leather strap or thong used to bind a sandal. This is often viewed as a collective singular and translated as a plural, “the straps of his sandals,” but it may be more emphatic to retain the singular here.
4 tn Grk “and immediately coming up out of the water, he saw.” The present participle has been translated temporally, with the subject (Jesus) specified for clarity.
5 tn Or “sky.” The Greek word οὐρανός (ouranos) may be translated “sky” or “heaven,” depending on the context. The same word is used in v. 11.
6 sn The phrase like a dove is a descriptive comparison. The Spirit is not a dove, but descended like one in some sort of bodily representation.
7 sn An allusion to Ps 110:1. This is a claim that Jesus shares authority with God in heaven. Those present may have thought they were his judges, but, in fact, the reverse was true.
8 sn The expression the right hand of the Power is a circumlocution for referring to God. Such indirect references to God were common in 1st century Judaism out of reverence for the divine name.
9 sn An allusion to Dan 7:13.
10 tn Grk “They”; the referent (the soldiers) has been specified in the translation for clarity.
11 tn Or “conscripted”; or “pressed into service.”
12 sn Jesus was beaten severely with a whip before this (the prelude to crucifixion, known to the Romans as verberatio, mentioned in Matt 27:26; Mark 15:15; John 19:1), so he would have been weak from trauma and loss of blood. Apparently he was unable to bear the cross himself, so Simon was conscripted to help (in all probability this was only the crossbeam, called in Latin the patibulum, since the upright beam usually remained in the ground at the place of execution). Cyrene was located in North Africa where Tripoli is today. Nothing more is known about this Simon.
13 tn Or perhaps, “was coming in from his field” outside the city (BDAG 15-16 s.v. ἀγρός 1).