5A Repellent Questions Indicating Objection

Matthew 8:29—“What have we to do with you, Son of God?”

This question of the demons to Jesus is an ancient idiomatic form of question that is found in the Hebrew Scriptures in eight places, namely, in Joshua 22:24; Judges 11:12; 2 Samuel 16:10; 19:22; 1 Kings 17:18; 2 Kings 3:13; 2 Chronicles 35:21; Hosea 14:8. In the Christian Greek Scriptures as well as in the Syriac version a literal translation is made of the ancient Hebrew expression, and it occurs six times, namely, in Matthew 8:29; Mark 1:24; 5:7; Luke 4:34; 8:28; John 2:4. Literally translated, the question in Matthew 8:29 reads: “What is there to us and to you?” and means, “What is there in common between us and you?” “What do we and you have in common?” or, as rendered above, “What have we to do with you?”

In every case in the Scriptures, Hebrew and Greek, it is a repellent form of question, indicating objection to the thing suggested, proposed or suspected. This is supported by the positive form of putting the matter in Ezra 4:3 (1 Esdras 5:67, LXX): “You have nothing to do with us in building a house to our God.” Literally, “It does not pertain to you and to us to build a house to our God.” The same form of expression in the imperative mood is the request made to Pilate by his wife concerning Jesus, who was up before her husband for trial, in Matthew 27:19: “Have nothing to do with that righteous man.” Literally: “Let there be nothing between you and that righteous man.”

Couched in that very common form, Jesus’ question to his mother in John 2:4 cannot be excluded from the one category. It bears all the features of repellency or resistance to his mother in proposing his course for him. So in his case we have rendered it the same as in all other cases of the like question: “What have I to do with you, woman? My hour has not yet come.”