But a very great crowd strewed their own garments on the way, and others kept cutting down branches from the trees and strewing them on the way.
The crowd turns the road into a carpet with whatever it has: the clothes off their backs, branches cut from the trees. Two questions sit under the scene. Who put this welcome into their hearts? And why did it fade within days?
Spreading clothing and greenery on a road was not a random burst of feeling. It was how a people honoured a king.
Many spread their garments on the road He was riding. Others cut down branches of trees to form an avenue of royal welcome for Him. He came in lowly humility, yet the praise given Him is worthy of the King in majesty and glory.
The crowd was also following a known custom:
The people spread their garments on the road. In the East it was the custom to put costly rugs before the feet of kings. The crowds followed this custom by putting their garments down.
No one planned this. Israel's religious leaders would have been the obvious hosts for a Messiah's welcome. They had no part in it.
A very great crowd is moved by the sovereign power of God to lay their garments on the road that He travels. Others cut down branches from the trees to spread them in the way... The Jewish leaders had certainly not arranged any such thing, as you would expect at the arrival of their Messiah. But without any arrangement God worked in men's hearts. So there was a public presentation of the Messiah that the leaders could not ignore, however strongly they disapproved.
But commentators trace the scene deeper than excitement over miracles:
What a wonderful scene! It is not the cold reasoning of man's intellect that is at work here. Nor is it only the effect of His miracles, though it is a fruit of them. It is the mighty working of God on the minds of the crowd, compelling it to give testimony for a short time to the despised Son of God.
The shout that went with the branches was not invented on the spot. The crowd reached for words already written, and said more than it knew:
The crowd waving palms was, as it were, keeping the Feast of Tabernacles. They took their triumphant shouts from Psalm 118. That passage of Scripture pictures the nation of Israel bringing into His glory the Head Stone, the very stone the builders had rejected... Perhaps they neither understood nor intended any of this. But God moved them to take the part they did, so that the whole scene would present their King, in full form, to the city and the nation.
The Feast of Tabernacles was one of Israel's set feasts, kept with branches in hand. Writers see the branch-strewn road as a sketch of it, drawn before the real thing:
This same feast was also sketched out, as it were, with the branches and palms when Jesus entered Jerusalem... when the crowds acknowledged Him as the son of David and as king of Israel... The true feast of tabernacles, the final feast, will not be celebrated until a time yet future.
The road was carpeted, but the city only asked who He was. And Matthew quotes the old prophecy only in part.
Centuries earlier Zechariah had predicted that the Jewish monarchy would be restored (Zechariah 9:9). That prophecy has been fulfilled, but only in part. We say only in part, because Matthew, who quotes it (21:5), deliberately leaves out the words "just, and having salvation." The time of Jerusalem's redemption had not come. Yet the King entered the city in the manner predicted, riding on a colt, the foal of a donkey.
Listen to how the words change between the road and the city:
The crowds might show a temporary enthusiasm, and genuine disciples add their truer homage to the King. The city, however "moved," meets it with a question and nothing more. The "Hosannas to the Son of David" weaken into a very different reply: "This is the prophet Jesus, from Nazareth of Galilee." The King of glory is for them already uncrowned.
The same voices shouted something very different a few days later. Writers read that turn as a warning:
It is a terrible thing to see how fickle the crowd is. They are just the same to this day... The same crowd that cried, "Hosanna to the Son of David!" and applauded Him to the skies cried with one mouth, "Crucify him, crucify him!" within a few days... Their applause was nothing. Applause is only human feeling stirred up at the moment. That feeling may give way to the opposite one, and very quickly.
- Meant — clothes and branches on the road were how people honoured a king. Here they honoured One who came in humility.
- Moved — Israel's leaders did not stage this welcome. God worked in ordinary hearts, so no one could ignore the Messiah's public entry.
- Borrowed — the crowd's shout came from Psalm 118, and the branches echoed the Feast of Tabernacles. They said more than they understood.
- Withheld — Matthew leaves out the words "just, and having salvation." That part of the promise waited for another day.
- Faded — enthusiasm on the road cooled into a question at the gate, then a cry for His death within the week. Feeling stirred up in a moment is not faith.
And the crowds who went before him and who followed cried, saying, Hosanna to the Son of David; blessed [be] he who comes in the name of [the] Lord; hosanna in the highest.
Crowds line the road into Jerusalem and shout words from an old psalm at Jesus. Within a week the same city will see Him crucified — so who did they think He was, and why did the welcome collapse?
The crowd was not inventing a slogan. Their words came from a psalm about Israel welcoming the stone the builders threw away.
They spread their garments and scattered branches of trees on the road. These actions showed the honour the crowd had for Him, and the joy with which they greeted Him. The people hailed Him as King (Luke 19:38), called Him "the Son of David," and so recognised His title to the throne of David (Mark 11:10). The crowd with its palms was, as it were, keeping the Feast of Tabernacles. They took their triumphant shouts from Psalm 118. That place in the Scriptures pictures the nation of Israel bringing into His glory the Head Stone, the stone the builders had rejected.
The word itself is a prayer, not a cheer.
This word, which is the same in Greek, is thought to be a compound of two Hebrew words, and means "save now," as in Psalm 118:25. In the New Testament the sense appears to be "bestow blessing." "Bestow blessing on the Son of David: bestow blessing, O You who are in the highest." Matthew 21:9; Mark 11:9-10; John 12:13.
Matthew records this title more often than the other Gospel writers. The crowd at the gate is one of six times.
The Old Testament records those who acknowledged the fugitive David as the anointed king of Israel (2 Sam. 23 and elsewhere). In the same way, Matthew records more fully than the other three writers those who acknowledged Jesus of Nazareth as the Son of David. There are six such instances: (1) two blind men in Galilee (Matt. 9:27); (2) the crowd in Galilee (Matt. 12:23); (3) the woman of Canaan (Matt. 15:22); (4) two blind men near Jericho (Matt. 20:30-31); (5) the crowd at the entrance to Jerusalem (Matt. 21:9); (6) the children in the temple (Matt. 21:15).
Nobody in Jerusalem organised the shouting. Writers trace it to God working in ordinary hearts. He would not let His Son be rejected without this witness.
The power of God influences the heart of the crowds. They greet Him as King, as Son of David, using the language supplied by Psalm 118. That psalm celebrates the millennial sabbath which the Messiah brings in, and which the people will then acknowledge... Happy for them if their hearts had been changed to keep this testimony in the Spirit. But God sovereignly disposed their hearts to bear this testimony; He could not allow His Son to be rejected without receiving it.
The nation's religious leaders had planned nothing of the kind.
The Jewish leaders had not arranged any such thing, though you would expect it at the coming of their Messiah. Without any arrangement, God worked in men's hearts. The result was a public presentation of the Messiah that the leaders could not ignore, however strongly they disapproved.
The crowd used the right words. They meant far less by them than the words hold.
Jerusalem received Him with shouting, and "Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord!" was rightly among the cries. But a little further on it appears that they used the right words wrongly. They used them only in a lesser sense. In their full meaning the words marked out Jesus as the Lord of hosts — and one day people will use them that way. But they used them of Him only as "the prophet of Nazareth," sent by God and so coming in His name. They did not use them of the Lord Himself, present in person in His own character and name.
Jesus knew what the shout was worth. He pointed to a day when the same words will be said and meant.
But that was the result of a sudden burst of enthusiasm, and had no lasting meaning, as what followed showed. Within a week He was crucified. The Lord knew how worthless their excited cry was. A little later He said, "You will not see me again, until you say, 'Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord'" (Matt. 23:39). The Psalm speaks of the moment when they will see Him again, and speak that welcome with full truth and sincerity.
- Cry borrowed. The crowd took its words from Psalm 118, the psalm that pictures Israel welcoming the stone its builders had rejected.
- Cry means save. "Hosanna" is "save now," and in the New Testament it carries the sense "bestow blessing" — asked of the Son of David.
- Cry God gave. No leader organised it. God moved ordinary hearts, and would not let His Son be rejected without this witness.
- Cry too small. The words point to the Lord Himself. The crowd meant only "the prophet of Nazareth," and their enthusiasm died within the week.
- Cry still coming. Jesus said they would not see Him again until they say it — the same sentence, one day spoken with full sincerity.