Barnes New Testament Notes

Verse 35. That upon you may come, etc. That is, the nation is guilty Your fathers were guilty. You have shown yourselves to be like them. You are about, by slaying the Messiah and his messengers, to fill up the iniquity of the land. The patience of God is exhausted; and the nation is about to be visited with signal vengeance. These national crimes deserve national judgments; and the proper judgments for all these crimes are about to come upon you in the destruction of your temple and city.

All the righteous blood. That is, all the judgments due for shedding that blood. God did not hold them guilty for what their fathers did; but temporal judgments descend on children in consequence of the wickedness of parents -- as in the case of drunken and profligate parents. A drunken father wastes the property that his children might have possessed. A gambler reduces his children to poverty and want. An imprudent and foolish parent is the occasion of leading his sons into places of poverty, ignorance, and crime, materially affecting their character and destiny. See Barnes "Ro 5:12, also Ro 5:13-19. So of the Jews. The appropriate effects of their fathers' crimes were coming on the nation, and they would suffer.

Upon the earth. Upon the land of Judea. The word is often used with this limitation. See Mt 4:8.

Righteous Abel. Slain by Cain, his brother, Ge 4:8,9. Zacharias son of Barschias. It is not certainly known who this was. Some have thought it was the Zechariah whose death is recorded in 2 Ch 24:20,21. He is there called the son of Jehoiada; but it is known that it was common among the Jews to have two names, as Matthew is called Levi; Lebbeus, Thaddeus; and Simon, Cephas. Others have thought he referred to Zechariah the prophet, who might have been massacred by the Jews, though no account of his death is recorded. It might have been known by tradition.

Whom ye slew. Whom you, Jews, slew. Whom your nation killed.

Between the temple and the altar. Between the temple, properly so called, the sanctuary, and the altar of burnt-offering in the court of the priests. See the plan of the temple, Mt 21:12.

{u} "Abel" Ge 4:8 {v} "Zacharias" 2 Ch 24:20,21