Lukas 6:12-13

Choosing the Twelve Apostles

6:12 Now ¹  it was during this time that Jesus ²  went out to the mountain ³  to pray, and he spent all night ⁴  in prayer to God. ⁵  6:13 When ⁶  morning came, he called his disciples and chose twelve of them, whom he also named apostles: ⁷ 

[6:12]  ¹ tn Grk “Now it happened that in.” The introductory phrase ἐγένετο (egeneto, “it happened that”), common in Luke (69 times) and Acts (54 times), is redundant in contemporary English and has not been translated.

[6:12]  ² tn Grk “he”; the referent (Jesus) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

[6:12]  ³ tn Or “to a mountain” (εἰς τὸ ὅρος, eis to Joro").

[6:12]  sn The expression to the mountain here may be idiomatic or generic, much like the English “he went to the hospital” (cf. 15:29), or even intentionally reminiscent of Exod 24:12 (LXX), since the genre of the Sermon on the Mount seems to be that of a new Moses giving a new law.

[6:12]  ⁴ sn This is the only time all night prayer is mentioned in the NT.

[6:12]  ⁵ tn This is an objective genitive, so prayer “to God.”

[6:13]  ⁶ tn Grk “And when.” Here καί (kai) has not been translated because of differences between Greek and English style.

[6:13]  ⁷ sn The term apostles is rare in the gospels, found only in Matt 10:2, possibly in Mark 3:14, and six more times in Luke (here plus 9:10; 11:49; 17:5; 22:14; 24:10).