Matthew 8:18 (DBY)

Passage

And Jesus, seeing great crowds around him, commanded to depart to the other side.

Nearby Context

Matthew 8:16 And when the evening was come, they brought to him many possessed by demons, and he cast out the spirits with a word, and healed all that were ill;

Matthew 8:17 so that that should be fulfilled which was spoken through Esaias the prophet, saying, Himself took our infirmities and bore our diseases.

Matthew 8:18 And Jesus, seeing great crowds around him, commanded to depart to the other side.

Matthew 8:19 And a scribe came up and said to him, Teacher, I will follow thee whithersoever thou mayest go.

Matthew 8:20 And Jesus says to him, The foxes have holes, and the birds of the heaven roosting-places; but the Son of man has not where he may lay his head.

Study Lenses

The verse centers on "jesus", "seeing", "great", "crowds", "around", "commanded", "depart", and "other". It is saying that the verse draws attention to "jesus" and "seeing", so its meaning should be read from those terms before moving to application.

The nearby context moves from verse 17's "so that that should be fulfilled which..." into verse 19's "And a scribe came up and said...", so "jesus" and "seeing" belong inside that flow. In Matthew context, the local focus is Christ, faith, and discipleship.

A plain takeaway is to answer the verse's own emphasis on "jesus" and "seeing" with trust shaped by these words, not by a vague optimism outside the passage.