1. It seems not to have been without reason that the wider formula of quotation: τὸ ῥηθὲν διὰ τῶν προφητῶν is here chosen, although _Jerome_ infers too much from it when he remarks: "If he had wished to refer to a distinct quotation from Scripture, he would never have said: 'As was spoken by the prophets,' but simply, 'as was said by the prophet.' By using prophets in the plural, he shows that it is the sense, and not the words which he has taken from Scripture." No doubt St. Matthew has one passage chiefly in view--that in Is. xi. 1, which, besides the general announcement of the Messiah's lowliness, contains, in addition, a special designation of it which is found again in the _nomen_ and _omen_ of his native place. This appears especially from the circumstance that, if it were otherwise, the quotation: in ὅτι Ναζωραῖος κληθήσεται, would be inexplicable, since it is very forced to suppose that "Nazarene" here designates generally one low and despised.[2] But he chose the general formula of [Pg 112] quotation (comp. _Gersdorf_, _Beiträge zur Sprachcharacteristik_ 1. S. 136), in order thereby to intimate that in Christ's residence at Nazareth those prophecies, too, were at the same time fulfilled, which, in the essential point--in the announcement of Christ's lowliness--agree with that of Isaiah. But it is just this additional reference which shows that, to Matthew, this was indeed the essential point, and that the agreement of the name of the town with the name which Christ has in Isaiah, appears to him only as a remarkable outward representation of the close connection of prophecy and fulfilment; just as, indeed, every thing in the life of Christ appears to be brought about by the special direction of Divine providence. 2. The phrase ὅτι κληθήσεται likewise is explained from the circumstance that Matthew does not restrict himself to the passage Is. xi. 1, but takes in, at the same time, all those other passages which have a similar meaning. From among them, it was from Zech. vi. 12: "Behold a man whose name is the Sprout," that the phrase ὅτι κληθήσεται flowed. There is hence no necessity for explaining this circumstance solely from the custom of the later Jews,[3] of claiming as the names of the Messiah all those expressions by which, in the Old Testament, His nature is designated, inasmuch as, in doing so, they followed the custom of the prophets themselves, who frequently bring forward as the name of the Messiah that which is merely one of His attributes. This hypothesis is inadmissible, because otherwise it would be difficult to point out any case in which the Evangelists had not admixed something of their own with a quotation which they announced as a literal one. [Pg 113] Ver. 2. "_And the Spirit of the Lord resteth upon Him, the Spirit of wisdom and understanding, the Spirit of counsel and might, the Spirit of knowledge and of the fear of the Lord._"