Vincent's NT Word Studies
25. He needed not (ou creian eicen). Literally, he had not need.Testify (marturhsh). Rev., better, bear witness. The same word is in i. 7, 8, 15, 32 (see on i. 7).
Of man (peri tou anqrwpou). Better, as Rev., concerning man.
He knew (autov eginwsken). The pronoun is expressed, and with a view to emphasis, as Rev., "He himself knew." The imperfect expresses continuance: He was all along cognizant as the successive cases presented themselves; thus falling in with the next words, "what was in the man," i.e., in each particular man with whom He had to do. No such characteristic as this was attributed to the gods of Paganism. "While, then, the gift of anything like general foreknowledge appears to be withheld from all the deities of invention, that of 'the discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart,' is nowhere found; nor was it believed of any member of the Olympian community, as it was said of One greater than they, 'He knew all men, and needed not that any should testify of man, for He knew what was in man,'" (Gladstone, "Homer and the Homeric Age," 2, 366).
