Commentaries:
Robertson's Word Pictures (NT)
Pressed upon him (epikeisqai). Luke in this paragraph (Luke 5:1-11; Mark 1:16-20; Matthew 4:18-22) does not follow the chronology of Mark as he usually does. It seems reasonably clear that the renewed call of the four fishermen came before the first tour of Galilee in Luke 4:42-44. It is here assumed that Luke is describing in his own way the incident given in Mark and Matthew above. Luke singles out Simon in a graphic way. This verb epikeisqai is an old one and means to lie upon, rest upon as of a stone on the tomb (John 11:38) or of fish on the burning coals (John 21:9). So it is used of a tempest (Acts 27:20) and of the urgent demands for Christ's crucifixion (Luke 23:23). Here it vividly pictures the eager crowds around Jesus. En tw epikeisqai is a favourite idiom with Luke as we have already seen, en with the articular infinitive in the locative case.
That (kai). Kai does not technically mean the declarative conjunction "that," but it is a fair rendering of the somewhat awkward idiom of Luke to a certain extent imitating the Hebrew use of wav.
Was standing (hn estwv). Periphrastic second past perfect of isthmi which here is equal to a practical imperfect.
By the lake (para thn limnhn). The use of the accusative with para, alongside, after a verb of rest used to be called the pregnant use, came and was standing. But that is no longer necessary, for the accusative as the case of extension is the oldest of the cases and in later Greek regains many of the earlier uses of the other cases employed for more precise distinctions. See the same idiom in verse Luke 5:2. We need not here stress the notion of extension. "With characteristic accuracy Luke never calls it a sea, while the others never call it a lake" (Plummer).
Other Robertson's Word Pictures (NT) entries containing Luke 5:1:
Luke 5:1
Luke 8:11
John 6:1
John 21:2
Revelation 19:13
Revelation 19:20
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