Luke:3:14

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rwp @Luke:3:14 @{Soldiers also } (\kai strateuomenoi \). Men on service , _militantes_ rather than _milites_ (Plummer ). Songs:Paul in strkjv @2Timothy:2:4 |. An old word like \strati “t ˆs \, soldier . Some of these soldiers acted as police to help the publicans . But they were often rough and cruel . {Do violence to no man } (\m ˆdena diaseis ˆte \). Here only in the N .T ., but in the LXX and common in ancient Greek . It means to shake (seismic disturbance , earthquake ) thoroughly (\dia \) and so thoroughly to terrify , to extort money or property by intimidating (3Macc . strkjv @7:21 ). The Latin employs _concutere_ , so . It was a process of blackmail to which Socrates refers (Xenophon , _Memorabilia_ , ii . 9 ,1 ). This was a constant temptation to soldiers . Might does not make right with Jesus . {Neither exact anything wrongfully } (\m ˆde sukophant ˆs ˆte \). In Athens those whose business it was to inform against any one whom they might find exporting figs out of Attica were called fig-showers or sycophants (\sukophantai \). From \sukon \, fig , and \phain “\, show . Some modern scholars reject this explanation since no actual examples of the word meaning merely a fig-shower have been found . But without this view it is all conjectural . From the time of Aristophanes on it was used for any malignant informer or calumniator . These soldiers were tempted to obtain money by informing against the rich , blackmail again . Songs:the word comes to mean to accuse falsely . The sycophants came to be a regular class of informers or slanderers in Athens . Socrates is quoted by Xenophon as actually advising Crito to employ one in self-defence , like the modern way of using one gunman against another . Demosthenes pictures a sycophant as one who "glides about the market like a scorpion , with his venomous sting all ready , spying out whom he may surprise with misfortune and ruin and from whom he can most easily extort money , by threatening him with an action dangerous in its consequences " (quoted by Vincent ). The word occurs only in Luke in the N .T ., here and in strkjv @Luke:19:8 | in the confession of Zaccheus . It occurs in the LXX and often in the old Greek . {Be content with your wages } (\arkeisthe tois ops “niois hum “n \). Discontent with wages was a complaint of mercenary soldiers . This word for wages was originally anything cooked (\opson \, cooked food ), and bought (from \“neomai \, to buy ). Hence , "rations ," "pay ," wages . \Opsarion \, diminutive of \opson \, was anything eaten with bread like broiled fish . Songs :\ops “nion \ comes to mean whatever is bought to be eaten with bread and then a soldier 's pay or allowance (Polybius , and other late Greek writers ) as in strkjv @1Corinthians:9:7 |. Paul uses the singular of a preacher 's pay (2Corinthians:11:8 |) and the plural of the wages of sin (Romans:6:23 |) = death (death is the diet of sin ).

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