Luke 6:1

Second sabbath after the first. [Plucking Grain on the Sabbath, Luke 6:1-5 = Matt. 12:1-8 = Mark 2:23-28. Major comment: Mark.] Gr. sabbaton deuteroproton, literally, “second-first Sabbath.” The precise meaning of the expression thus translated is uncertain. Textual evidence favors (cf. p. 146) reading simply “a Sabbath.” Some translators feel that the weight of evidence favors the shorter reading, while others hold to the longer reading. Deuteroprotos occurs nowhere else, either in the Bible or in ancient Greek literature. Some have conjectured that it may have meant the second Sabbath after the Passover; others, that it was the first Sabbath of a second year in a sabbatical year series; others, that it was the second Sabbath in a series of Sabbaths in the ritual calendar; still others, that it simply distinguishes the Sabbath here mentioned from the former Sabbaths of ch. 4:16, 31. None of these suggestions seem to have much evidence in their favor. Perhaps it is best simply to admit that we do not know what idea this word conveys.