Being forty days tempted of the devil. And in those days he did eat nothing: and when they were ended, he afterward hungered.
Parallel translations
- WEB for forty days, being tempted by the devil. He ate nothing in those days. Afterward, when they were completed, he was hungry.
- BSB where for forty days He was tempted by the devil. He ate nothing during those days, and when they had ended, He was hungry.
- NKJV being tempted for forty days by the devil. And in those days He ate nothing, and afterward, when they had ended, He was hungry.
- NASB for forty days, being tempted by the devil. And He ate nothing during those days, and when they had ended, He was hungry.
- NLT where he was tempted by the devil for forty days. Jesus ate nothing all that time and became very hungry.
Scripture taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
Scripture quotations taken from the (NASB®) New American Standard Bible®, Copyright © 1960, 1971, 1977, 1995, 2020 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission. All rights reserved. lockman.org
Scripture quotations are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996, 2004, 2015 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.
Quick answer
For forty days Jesus fasts and is tempted by the devil, ending hungry. He faces real temptation in genuine human weakness.
Overview
The forty days recall Israel's forty years in the wilderness and Moses' fasts, casting Jesus as the faithful Son retracing that path. His hunger shows the reality of His humanity and the genuineness of the temptation. Yet unlike Israel, He will not fail, qualifying Him to be our sympathetic and sinless Savior.
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 15
- Exod 34:28And he was there with the LORD forty days and forty nights; he did neither eat bread, nor drink water. And he wrote upon the tables the words of the covenant, the ten commandments.
- Heb 4:15For we have not an high priest which cannot be touched with the feeling of our infirmities; but was in all points tempted like as we are, yet without sin.
- Heb 2:18For in that he himself hath suffered being tempted, he is able to succour them that are tempted.
- Deut 9:9When I was gone up into the mount to receive the tables of stone, even the tables of the covenant which the LORD made with you, then I abode in the mount forty days and forty nights, I neither did eat bread nor drink water:
- 1 Kgs 19:8And he arose, and did eat and drink, and went in the strength of that meat forty days and forty nights unto Horeb the mount of God.
- John 4:6Now Jacob’s well was there. Jesus therefore, being wearied with his journey, sat thus on the well: and it was about the sixth hour.
- Matt 4:2And when he had fasted forty days and forty nights, he was afterward an hungred.
- Deut 9:18And I fell down before the LORD, as at the first, forty days and forty nights: I did neither eat bread, nor drink water, because of all your sins which ye sinned, in doing wickedly in the sight of the LORD, to provoke him to anger.
- 1 Sam 17:16And the Philistine drew near morning and evening, and presented himself forty days.
- Esth 4:16Go, gather together all the Jews that are present in Shushan, and fast ye for me, and neither eat nor drink three days, night or day: I also and my maidens will fast likewise; and so will I go in unto the king, which is not according to the law: and if I perish, I perish.
- Gen 3:15And I will put enmity between thee and the woman, and between thy seed and her seed; it shall bruise thy head, and thou shalt bruise his heel.
- Matt 21:18Now in the morning as he returned into the city, he hungered.
- Deut 9:25Thus I fell down before the LORD forty days and forty nights, as I fell down at the first; because the LORD had said he would destroy you.
- Jonah 3:7And he caused it to be proclaimed and published through Nineveh by the decree of the king and his nobles, saying, Let neither man nor beast, herd nor flock, taste any thing: let them not feed, nor drink water:
- Exod 24:18And Moses went into the midst of the cloud, and gat him up into the mount: and Moses was in the mount forty days and forty nights.
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Christ at the center
Luke shows Jesus the Savior for all — outsiders, the poor, the nations — the one who, on the Emmaus road, opened all the Scriptures to show they were about himself.
How Luke 4:2 points to him is part of the one story that runs through all Scripture — meet Jesus at the heart of the web, or follow a trail that traces him from Genesis to Revelation.
Original language
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