John 16:21. Ὅταν τίκτῃ, when she is about to bring forth) Here there is not yet added, offspring, because the woman is then rather held fast in the throes of actual labour.—ἄνθρωπος, a human being) whether a son or a daughter.—εἰς τὸν κόσμον into the world) How much greater will be your joy, to sec Jesus, restored alive to you, John 16:22.

Verse 21. - The next illustration is very remarkable, and surely cannot be a simple analogy of the supervening of joy on sorrow. The woman (the article does not point to any special γυνή, but refers to a universal fact and law of womanhood, cf. ὁ δοῦλος,John 15:15) when she is in travail hath sorrow, because her hour is come. So now there are the travail-pangs of the new humanity, the new theocracy, bitter and terrible, But as soon as she has brought forth the child, she remembereth no longer the anguish, for the joy that a man is born into the world. The old prophets often compared the grief of Israel or her peril to the pangs of a travailing woman preluding deliverance (Isaiah 21:3;Isaiah 26:17; Isaiah 66:6, 7; Hosea 13:13) and even joy - the joy of bringing manhood into the world and the new consciousness of maternity. Meyer and others rebel against any meaning beyond that of the following of joy upon sorrow; but Tholuck, De Wette, Ebrard, and Moulton see here the obvious reference to those "travail-pangs of death" with which St. Peter (Acts 3:24) said that the Holy One could not be restrained, agonies in which for a while every apostle must have wept and lamented, dying and being crucified with him, and to the glorious deliverance of all who suffered with him, when they live again in newness of life by the power of his resurrection.

A woman (ἡ γυνὴ)

Literally, the woman. The generic article marking the woman as representing her sex: woman as such.  She is in travail, A common Old Testament image of sorrow issuing in joy. See Isaiah 21:3; Isaiah 26:17;Isaiah 66:7; Hosea 13:13; Micah 4:9, Micah 4:10.

The anguish (τῆς θλίψεως)

Commonly rendered affliction or tribulation in A.V. See on Matthew 13:21.

Joy (τὴν χαρὰν)

Properly, the joy which answers to the anguish.

A man (ἄνθρωπος)

See on John 1:30.

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Isaiah 54:13

All your children shall be taught by the Lord, and great shall be the peace of your children

Verse 13. - All thy children shall be taught of the Lord (comp. Isaiah 44:3;Jeremiah 31:33, 34; Ezekiel 11:19; Joel 2:28; Acts 2:17, 18, etc.). Christians are all of them "taught of God" (John 6:45 1 Thessalonians 4:9). The "anointing," which they have from the Holy Ghost, "teaches them, and is truth, and is no lie" (1 John 2:27), and causes them to "know all things" (1 John 2:20). And great shall be the peace of thy children. Messiah was to be "the Prince of Peace" (Isaiah 9:6). His birth heralded the coming of "peace on earth" (Luke 2:14). So far forth as men are true Christians, does peace reign in the conscience and show itself in the life. Externally there may be persecution, tumult, wars, fightings; but internally, in each heart, there will be a "peace that passes all understanding" (Philippians 4:7). God "keeps in perfect peace" those" whose minds are stayed on him" (Isaiah 26:3).