See John 18:1 ff for the passage quote with footnotes. John 19:1. Then therefore Pilate took Jesus and scourged Him [ἕλαβενοὖνὁΠιλ. τὸνἸησ. καὶἐμαστίγωσεν].—The second wretched politic attempt of the Roman, according to John. He took, or received, Jesus and scourged Him. The sending of Jesus before Herod’s tribunal, as also the hand-washing, likewise belong in this category. With this attempt he hopes to satisfy the vindictiveness of Jesus’ foes, perhaps even to excite their compassion—and so much the more, since according to his ideas, Jesus by this ignominious treatment, would be stripped of dignity in the eyes of the people and made of nope effect. On the act of scourging see Comm. on Matthew [p. 512]. As also on the different signification assumed by the scourging according to the Synoptists and according to John. [Pilate probably, subjected Jesus to this disgraceful and horrible punishment in the vain hope of satisfying His accusers and moving them to compassion. The Roman mode of scourging is here meant, which was much more cruel than the Jewish; it was never inflicted upon Roman citizens, but only upon foreigners and slaves whose lives were considered of no account, either as a torture to extort a confession, or as a correction preparatory to crucifixion. The body was stripped, tied in a stooping posture to a low block or pillar, and the bare back lacerated by an unlimited number of lashes with rods or twisted thongs of leather, so that the poor sufferers frequently fainted and died on the spot.—P. S.] John 19:2-3. And the soldiers, etc. [καὶοἱστρατιῶταιπλέξαντεςστέφανονἐξἀκανθῶν, κ. τ. λ.].—See Comm. on Matthew [p. 514]. “The derisive blow on the cheek [ἐδίδουναὐτῷῥαπίσματα] is substituted for the kiss.” John 19:4. I bring Him forth to you [Ἴδεἄγωὑμῖναὐτὸνἔξωἵναγνῶτε, κ. τ. λ.]—According to Matthew, the scourging of the Lord had been consummated before the eyes of the people (not “in the court of the prζtorium”). For after the scourging, the soldiers had led Him into the prζtorium, probably in a mocking procession as though the king were brought into his castle. The scene probably took place in the fortress-court or in a hall. Therefore we read here: “I bring Him forth unto you.”—That ye may know.—The Jews not possessing the right of capital punishment, the return of the person of Jesus to them was a declaration that He was free from the offence with which they charged Him. Pilate, however, utters his testimony unconditionally: no fault [οὐδεμίαναἰτίαν].—The leading forth has been in different ways misinterpreted in regard to its intention,—by Gerhard, for instance: they should see how compliant he would be in punishing Him, if he found any fault in Him. John 19:5. Behold, the man. [Ἴδε, or rather Ἰδοὺὁἄνθρωπος, see Text. Notes].—Ecce Homo! “But from the Lord cometh what the tongue shall speak.” (Proverbs 16:1 [Luther’s Bible. “The preparation of the heart in man, and the answer of the tongue, is from the Lord.” E. V.]). Pilate’s words, unconsciously to himself, assume, like his superscription and the sentence of Caiaphas, a significance corresponding to the great situation. [An involuntary prophecy of heathenism, as the word of Caiaphas (John 11:51-52) was an involuntary prophecy of hostile Judaism.—P. S.] The word seems to express compassion; at all events it is designed to excite that emotion. There is no doubt as to the sense: there ye have Him again, and what a pitiable object! Take Him thus and let Him go. He forebodes not that Jesus is indeed the Man κατ’ ἐξοχήν [the one perfect Man], who, through his wicked pliancy, steps forth so outraged in His outward appearance. John 19:6. The high-priests and the officers.—They cried as leaders—which does not exclude the joint crying of the assembled populace. Take Him yourselves and crucify Him.—Pilate still makes a stand at the present stage, with a feeling of his own authority that causes him to deride the impotence of the Jews. John 19:7. We have a law [ἡμεῖςνόμονἔχομεν].—The political accusation having borne no fruit, they now come out with the religious accusation in pursuance of which Jesus, at least according to their law, must die (as a blasphemer of God, namely, Leviticus 24:16, doubtless also as a false prophet, Deuteronomy 18:20). The ἡμεῖς, etc., defiantly arrayed against the ἐγώ—αἰτίαν of Pilate. They feel confident of Pilate’s obligation to respect their law. See Joseph. Antiq., XVI, 2, 3. John 19:8. When Pilate—he was the more afraid [μᾶλλονἐφοβήθη].—Their saying, in the first place, entirely missed the designed effect; it was productive of the opposite effect. Hitherto Pilate had been restrained by a fear of conscience or of law alone; now religious fear supervened, in connection with a fear of Jesus’ personality itself, of which latter sentiment he now became fully conscious. According to Matthew, the message of his wife has already been received, hence is jointly influential. John 19:9. Again into the pretorium [καὶεἰσῆλθενεἰςτὸπραιτώριονπάλιν]—We must supply in imagination the leading of Jesus before Pilate, in order to a fresh, private examination.—Whence art Thou? [πόθενεἶσύ].—The inquiry after the whence of Christ is indefinitely framed, in accordance with the Jews’ accusation and Pilate’s fear. Meyer: He pictures to himself the υἱὸςθεοῦ after the analogy of the heathen heroes, and fears the vengeance of the Jewish God Jehovah. Religious awe, in a moment of superstitious excitement, pictures to itself all manner of things, however, and nothing quite distinctly. Whether He were a Magus or a hero, an angel, after the religion of the land, or a divine apparition,—it now seemed very possible to him that there might be something super-terrestrial in the appearance of the Man;—and he had so unconcernedly caused Him to be scourged. In any case, celestial vengeance seemed to threaten him. Whether the πόθεν, etc., is timid (Meyer) or cautiously sifting, is difficult to decide; fear and prudence may be united in it. No answer [ὉδὲἸησοῦδἀπόκρισινοὐκἔδωκεναὐτῷ ?].—Luthardt: He would not answer him, in order that He might not step in the way of God’s will. An abstractly supernaturalistic view. If the answer had been a moral duty, no religious duty would have stood in the way of it. God had power, notwithstanding any answer of His, to accomplish His will. Under such a supposition as Luthardt’s, Jesus would in no case have dared answer anything. He was silent, “as also before Herod and Caiaphas, because He had already testified enough for the susceptible; and for him who had turned his back upon the King of truth, neither could another testimony avail.” Tholuck. Jesus could foresee that this transaction led to nothing. Pilate, with his question, abandoned his judicial position, for he was bound to acquit Jesus not on account of His danger-menacing Godhead, but on account of His protection-demanding human innocence. [Alford: “This silence was the most emphatic answer to all who had ears to hear it,—was a reference to what He had said before, John 18:37, and so a witness to His divine origin. Would any mere man, of true and upright character, have refused an answer to such a question, so put? Let the modern rationalist consider this.”—P. S.] John 19:10. Dost Thou not speak unto me? [ἐμοὶοὐλαλεῖς].—Himself full of fear, he exacted considerations of fear from Jesus. He boasts of his power [ἐξουσίανἔχω] instead of remembering his duty, and of his freedom to release Jesus [ἀπολῦαίσε], while the weight of temptation, drives him in his impotence resistlessly forward. Ἐμοί has the emphasis of offended authority [pride of office], making efforts at once terrifying and alluring. Crucify, release, a more probable sequence than the converse. See the Textual Notes. [The opposite order is better attested by external authority (ΰ. A. B., etc.), and more natural, as releasing appeals more to the prisoner, and crucifying follows as the other alternative.—P. S.] John 19:11. No power over Me unless it had been given, etc. [οὐκἔχειςἐξουσίανοὐδεμίανκατ’ ἐμοῦ, εἰμὴἦνσοιδεδομένονἄνωθεν].—δεδομένον. Namely, the exercise of power—if that had not been given thee. [The neuter is more general than δεδομένη, and includes, as Meyer says, τὸἐξουσιάζεινκατ’ ἐμοῦ.—P. S.].—From above.—Not: from the Roman emperor (Usteri), or from the Sanhedrin (Semler), but from God (John 3:3; John 3:31). [Grotius aptly: inde scilicet, unde ortus sum; ἄνωθεν is a precise anwer to the πόθεν of Pilate (John 19:10). It is equivalent to ἐκθεοῦ or ἐκτοῦπατρόςμου, but this Pilate would not have understood.—P. S.].—No power.—Ἐξουσία is interpreted: 1. As judicial authority, by Luther, Calvin, Baur and others. Thus, because thou hast this authority from above, the misuse of it is sin; the authors of this offence, however, the Jews, have the greater guilt. 2. Actual power, Beza, Gerhard, Tholuck: It is the providence of God that I, through the obduracy of My people, have fallen into thy hands. With this interpretation the διὰτοῦτο [on this account, because of the power being given thee] is certainly better explained, yet this actual power rests upon the magisterial authority. He that delivereth Me unto thee; ὁπαραδιδούς [the present, because the act is just going on].—Bengel, Meyer [Lampe, Alford, Ewald, Hengstenberg]: The high-priest [Caiaphas]; Tholuck collectively: The hardened Jewish nation. [Still others the Sanhedrin; some, unaptly, Judas who is now out of sight]. The declaration of Pilate John 19:35 is pertinent: Thy nation and the high-priests have delivered Thee unto me. Wherefore has the deliverer (ὁπαραδιδούς) the greater sin [μείζοναἁμαρτίανἔχει]? Explanations: 1. Euthymius: Pilate’s guilt rests more upon softness and weakness. 2. Grotius: Because he could not know, as well as the Jews, who Christ was. 3. Lampe: Because the Jews had not received this power from God. 4. Meyer: Because thou hast the disposal of Me not from any sovereign power of thine own, but by divine authorization. But the abuse of his judicial authority does not excuse him. Decisive in the first place is the fact that Pilate is an ignorant Gentile, the deliverer Jewish; then, that the Jews claim, with a certain legal title, that he has but to execute their sentence. Pilate found himself in no clear position. He had to do, not with a Roman, but with a Jew, and not with a civil law, but with a religious accusation in regard to which the Jewish tribunal had already decided. This might readily mislead him in his simple judicial duty, and it was his fatality. His guilt would be still less than it really was, had he not been aware that they had delivered Jesus for envy, had not Jesus made so strong an impression on him, and had he not really known it to be his duty to release Him. Even in the case of the Jews there was also taken into account a consideration of excuse because of ignorance, which consideration exhibited the guilt of many of them as other than final obduracy. See Acts 3:17; comp. Luke 23:34. Meyer, in a note [p. 621], has with reason set aside the interpretation of Baur. John 19:12. For the sake of this; ἐκτούτυ.—Not: from thenceforth [E. V. and most commentators], but: for the sake of this saying [Meyer, Stier, Luthardt, comp. John 6:66.—P. S.]. It cast a bright accidental light upon his obscure, fateful, perilous situation, that for an instant marked the path of duty as a path of deliverance.—Pilate sought to release Him.—Ἐζήτει certainly cannot denote simply an increased striving (Lόcke), it being expressive of a distinct act immediately provocative of the most excited outburst on the part of the Jews. But the interpretation: he demanded that He should be released (Meyer), gives rise to the supposition that Pilate must needs ask the Jews’ sanction to the release of Jesus. This word, to which not sufficient regard is paid, means rather: he was really on the point of ordering the release of Christ. Perhaps he caused the guard to fall back, or he may hare stated to the Jews that they might go home, that he would leave Jesus behind in the prζtorium, under his own protection. At all events, here it is that the tragic knot was tied. The liberation of Jesus seems already decided. But the Jews cried out, saying.—Now, in the uproar of the Jews, the whole storm of hell rises. At first the high-priests and officers led the voices,—now the entire mass is full of excitement and needs no starter. The demoniacal syllogism with which they debauch Pilate, scarcely originates, however, in the brain of the populace. The hierarchs take refuge in the political accusation, declaring Jesus is a revolutionist against the emperor, and if thou let Him go, thou comest thyself under suspicion of treason to the emperor. Now the emperor was—Tiberius. The threat of being accused to this man of treason fells the weak courtling. On Pilate as manifoldly guilty, especially of extortions and outrages: Joseph., Antiq. XVIII. 3, 1 ff.; Philo, De leg. ad Caj., 1033, on the suspicious character of Tiberius, Sueton., Tib., 58; Tacit., Ann., III.38. Majestatis crimen omnium accusationum complementum erat.—φίλοςΚαίσαρος, a predicate of honor, since the time of Augustus conferred, by the emperor himself and by others, partly upon prefects and legates, partly upon allies (Ernesti, Suetonius, Excurs. 15).” Tholuck. According to Meyer [and Alford], the term means simply: loyal to the emperor; unfavorable to this view is the technical use of the predicate: amicus Cζsaris. Even if Pilate did not formally possess the title, it is alluded to.—Speaketh against—is at variance with—the emperor (ἀντιλέγει). Meyer: He declareth against the emperor, not: he rebelleth (Kuinoel), etc. But rebelling is exactly what declaring against the sovereign means. John 19:13. When Pilate therefore heard these words.—Pilate’s playing with the situation is past; now the situation plays with him. First he said—not asked—: what is truth? Now his frightened heart, to which the emperor’s favor is the supreme law of life, says: what is justice? “He who fears not God above all things, is condemned to fear man.” Tholuck.—He brought Jesus forth.—Since the last examination, John 19:8 ff., he had left Him in the pretorium.—And sat down in the judgment-seat [ἐκάθισενἐπὶβήματοςεἰςτόπνλεγόμενονλιθόστρωτον].—“Sentence was pronounced sub divo, not ex ζquo loco, but superiore; there stood the judgment-seat on a floor of mosaic: pavimentum, tessellatum (Sueton. Cζsar, chap. 46).” Tholuck. [Such a tesselated pavement Julius Cζsar carried about on his expeditions, Suet. Cζs., c. 46.—But in the Hebrew, Gabbatha.—“The name Ταββ. must not be derived from βִ ?αְ ?ςָ ?δ, hill [so Hengstenberg],—against which derivation the double β would militate (comp. ταβαθᾶ, Jos. Antiq. V. 1, 29), but from βַּ ?α, ridge, hump.” Meyer. Is it not, perhaps, still more probably an Aramaic modification of βָּ ?αֹ ?δַּ, altum, altitudo? [Alford from πָּ ?αָ ?δ, altus fuit, Ewald from the root βָּ ?αַ ?ς with a signification similar to λιθόστρωτον—P. S.] John 19:14. It was the preparation-day,—Παρασκευἠτοῦπάσχα, see Comm. on Matt. [pp 455, 468]; John on chap. 13 [p. 405]. 1. Friday in the passover-season, or paschal week, as a day of preparation for the Sabbath. Wieseler, p 336 f; Wichelhaus, p. 209 f. Only apparently a modification is Tholuck’s explanation: The Paschal preparation-day as the preparation for the Sabbath falling in the Paschal season; since the terms Friday and Sabbath preparation-day were of necessity synonymous to the Jews, just as to the Germans the terms Samstag and Sonnabend are. [This is the correct view, and is maintained also by Olshausen, Luthardt, Hengstenberg, Riggenbach, Robinson (Harmony, p. 219). The term παρασκευή here does not correspond (as Meyer, Lόcke, Alford and others assert) to the Hebrew ςֶ ?ψֶ ?αδַ ?τֶּ ?ρַ ?η, “the vigil of the Passover,” “passover-eve” (mentioned in the Talmud, see Buxtorf, Lex., p. 1765, but nowhere in the Bible), but to ςַ ?ψεּ ?αְ ?ϊָ ?ΰ, eve, as being the ςֶ ?ψֶ ?αδַ ?ωַׁ ?αָּ ?ϊ, eve of the Sabbath (see Buxtorf, Lex., p. 1659). It is equivalent to προσάββατον, fore-sabbath (Mark 15:42; Jdt 8:6), or προεόρτιον, as Philo (De vita contempl., p. 616) calls it. In other words, it is a technical Jewish name for Friday, just as the corresponding terms in the Syriac and Arabic, and as the German Sonnabend (Sunday-Eve) is used for Samstag (Saturday). It was so called from the Jewish habit of preparing the meals (δλιο, παρασκευάζειν) on Friday for the Sabbath, since it was forbidden to kindle a fire on the Sabbath (Ex. xvi.5; Joseph. Antiq. XVI. 6, 2). This is the uniform meaning of παρασκευή in all other passages of the New Testament where it occurs, viz., in this very chapter, John 19:31-32; Matthew 27:62; Luke 23:54; Mark 15:42 (where it is expressly explained for non-Jewish readers, as being=προσάββατον). Why should our passage be an exception? The addition τοῦπάσχα, which John always uses in the wider sense for the whole feast (not for the eating of the paschal lamb), makes no difference: it is simply the Paschal Friday, or Easter-Friday, as we speak of Easter-Sunday, Easter-Monday, Easter-Tuesday. We have here a very significant hint that after all John is in perfect harmony with the Synoptists on the day of Christ’s death, which was not the 14th, but the 15th of Nisan, or the first day of the paschal festival. John, probably chose this very term to expose the awful inconsistency and crime of the Jews in putting the Lord and Saviour to death on the day when they should have prepared for the holy Sabbath—doubly sacred now as being at the same time the first day of the great passover.—P. S.] John 2 : Meyer following Lόcke, Bleek, etc. [p. 623, comp. pp. 600 seq., 5th ed., where the discussions are]: “In order that the παρασκωυή might not be apprehended as the weekly one, referable to the Sabbath (John 19:31; John 19:42; Luke 23:54; Mark 15:42; Matthew 27:62; Joseph. Antiq. XVI. 6, 2 al.), but that it might be regarded as connected with the feast-day of the Passover, John expressly adds τοῦπασχα. Undoubtedly it was a Friday, consequently Preparation-day for the Sabbath also—this reference, however, is not the one to be pointed out here; the true reference is to the paschal feast coming in on the evening of the day,—of which feast the first day fell, according to John, upon the Sabbath.” [So also Alford.] This view is contradicted: (1) By the fact that in that case John would, shortly after, John 19:31 [ἐπεὶπαρασκευήἦν, and John 19:42, διὰτὴνπαρασκευὴντῶνἸουδ.], have used the word παρασκευὴ in another sense. (2) That he then in John 19:31 would have been obliged to write παρασκευὴτοῦσαββάτου in order to distinguish between the two senses. (3) That, therefore, according to John 19:31; John 19:42, παρασκευή had a thoroughly fixed signification and denoted the day of preparation for the Sabbath, in consequence of which fact, therefore, the παρασκευήτοῦπάσχα is also to be interpreted as the day of preparation for the Sabbath of the paschal season. (4) That John elsewhere uses the word πάσχα as a term for the ἑορτή, the paschal season. So, expressly, John 2:23; John 6:4; John 11:55-56; John 18:39. And hence, assuredly, also here. It was going on towards the [es war gegen die] sixth hour [ὤραἦνὡςἕκτη. This is the correct reading instead of ὤραδεὡσεὶἕκτη—P. S.]—See Note on John 1:39 [p. 93]; Comm. on Matthew at this passage [Matthew 27:45, p. 525, Am. ed.]; Mark [John 15:25, p. 152]. According to Jewish reckoning it was on the way to 12 o’clock, i.e., between 9 and 12 o’clock. On the difficulty of this notice, see the passages cited. [The difficulty is this, that according to John the hour of crucifixion was the sixth, i.e., (counting with the Jews from sunrise) 12 o’clock of our time; while according to Mark 15:25 it was the third, i.e., 9 o’clock, A. M., with which the statement of Mat 27:45, and Luke 23:44, agrees, that at the sixth hour or noon, when Jesus had already for some time been hanging on the cross, darkness covered the land for three hours, and that Jesus died about the ninth hour (i.e., 3 P.M.); consequently according to the Synoptists the Saviour suffered for nearly six hours on the cross, according to John only about three hours.—P. S.] Solutions of the apparent contradiction: 1. Assumption of a writing-error (Euseb. and others): ς [6], instead of γ [3]. [So also Theophylact, Severus, Beza (ed. 5th), Bengel, Alford, Robinson, Harmony, p. 226, where Robinson says: “The ὥρατρίτη of Mark, as the hour of crucifixion, is sustained by the whole course of the transactions and circumstances; as also by the fact stated by Matthew, Mark, and Luke, that the darkness commenced at the sixth hour, after Jesus had already for some time hung upon the cross. The reading ἕκτη in John is, therefore, probably an early error of transcription for τρίτη (ς for Γ). Indeed, this last reading is found in Cod. Bezζ and Cod. Reg. 62, as well as several other authorities; so that its external weight is marked by Griesbach as nearly or quite equal to that of the common reading, while the internal evidence in its favor is certainly far greater.” But ἕκτη is undoubtedly the correct reading as far as external authority goes. See Text. Note, and Tischend. ed. VIII. in loc.—P. S.] 2. Roman reckoning is employed=6 A. M. (Rettig, Tholuck, Hug, and others). [So also Olshausen, Wieseler, Ewald, Townson, Wordsworth.—P. S.] But after the examination before Caiaphas, the first examination before Pilate, the examination before Herod (Luke 23:9), the further proceedings in Pilate’s presence, the scourging and mocking, it is impossible that it was only approaching or about 6 o’clock in the morning, since the final session in presence of Caiaphas did of itself presuppose the dawn of day, to make it legal. [Besides, this view creates the difficulty of too long a period (three hours) intervening between the sentence of death and the crucifixion. It is also very unlikely that John, with the Synoptical statements before him, should without any notice have introduced a different mode of reckoning, and with it an element of confusion rather than rectification.—P. S.] 3. It was about the sixth hour of the paschal feast, reckoned from midnight (Hofmann, Lichtenstein). The passover, however, did not begin at midnight, but on the previous evening at about 6 o’clock; irrespective of the fact that this “would be an unprecedented way of reckoning hours, namely as belonging to the feast, not to the day (in opposition to John 1:39; John 4:6; John 4:52).” Meyer. 4. “Again a difference from the Synoptists, according to whom (see Mark 15:25, with which Matthew 27:45; Luke 23:44 agree) Jesus is crucified as early as 9 o’clock in the morning.” (Meyer and others.) 5. The third hour of Mark is the third quarter of the day (Aret., Grot. [Calvin, Wetstein], and others), against which Mark 15:33. [“And when the sixth hour was come, there was darkness over the whole land until the ninth hour. And at the ninth hour Jesus cried,” etc.] 6. An indefinite computation of hours, according to which the sections of time between the third, sixth and ninth hours are indefinitely stated. Thus the third hour in Mark may mean: nine o’clock was past,—it was between nine and twelve o’clock when the crucifixion of Christ began; and this is the more probable since Mark regards the scourging as the prelude to the crucifixion, which, when the former took place, was really already decided (see John 19:15). And so the words of John: it was towards the sixth hour: it was past nine o’clock and approaching noon when Pilate—the scourging being accomplished, and the Scourged One having been presented to the populace—spoke the final words upon which the procession to Golgotha immediately followed. John’s employment of the later indefinite hour-date is accounted for by the thought; they now hastened to the close, because, with noon, the second, already more Sabbatic, half of the παρασκευή was approaching. Mark’s choice, on the other hand, of the earlier indefinite hour-date is accounted for by the significant antithesis which he wishes to institute between the third and the sixth hour. [This solution of the difficulty has been adopted by Godet, who remarks that the apostles did not count with the watch in their hands. So also Hengstenberg, who, however, very mechanically splits the difference and fixes the crucifixion at half-past ten! In this case the statements both of Mark and John would be wrong. Meyer rejects all attempts at reconciliation and gives John the preference over the Synoptists. But Lange’s view has a strong support in the ὡς or ὡσεὶ of John, which excludes strict accuracy on his part and leaves room for some approach at least towards the third hour of Mark. At noon Christ must certainly have been already hanging on the cross; for this is the unanimous testimony of the Synoptists.—P. S.] Behold, your king [Ἴδεὁβασιλεὺςὑμῶν]!—Pilate, inwardly overcome, designs, by this mocking of the Jews, not only to mask his disgrace but also to avenge it; it may be that these words unfold even this threatening thought: your King, then, shall first be crucified, and after Him, yourselves. At all events, he shifts the guilt to their shoulders. John 19:15. Away with Him, away with Him, crucify Him [Ἆρονἆρον, σταύρωσοναὐτόν]!—The words: ἆρον, ἆρον! present to us something more than the meaning: Away with Him! away with Him! At this last moment there is still a mutual effort to shuffle off the legal responsibility upon each other. Pilate’s meaning is: if He is to be executed, ye may execute Him. The meaning of the Jews is: thou shalt have Him, thou shalt crucify Him! It was only in this way that they could be assured of Pilate’s inability to institute later a review of the proceedings. The Hierarchs make the same claim again at the present day: the rude State, the Pilate of the Middle Ages, adjusted the terrors of the Inquisition in accordance with the laws then existing. The brief, passionate exclamation is likewise expressive of the bitterness called forth by the word of Pilate: Behold, your King! Shall I crucify your king?—This question of Pilate is an intimation of his last wavering in resolve—a wavering in all probability particularly induced by the message of his wife. See Comm. on Matthew. Not merely a “reverberation” of the preceding derisive words, but also a distincter expression of the same idea: If He is to be crucified as your King in your sense, He must, according to your law, die as a religious criminal. Hence the high-priest’s reply. We have no king but the emperor [ΟὐκἔχομενβασιλέαεἰμὴΚαίσαρα].—i.e. He shall and must die as a political seditionary. At the same time it is the consummation of the godless perfidy with which they disclaim their own Messianic hope, deny the Messianic claims, traduce the Lord as a seditionary, whilst they themselves feign a zeal of the most loyal fidelity demonstrable by subjects, with which they would fain shame and terrify even the Roman governor. [Some of these very men who here made a hypocritical show of loyalty to carry their point and to make a tool of Pilate, perished afterwards miserably in rebellion against Cζsar. Bengel: Jesum negant usque eo, ut omnino Christum negant. Alford: “A degrading confession from the chief priests of that people of whom it was said, ‘The Lord your God is your King,’ 1 Samuel 12:12.”—P. S.] John 19:16. Then therefore he delivered Him up unto them, to be crucified.—The repeated threatening hint of the high-priest completes the conquest of Pilate. A compromise results, in pursuance of which Christ is delivered (παρέδωκεν not simply yielded, after Grotius and others) to the high-priests, to be taken to their place of execution, and is, nevertheless, crucified by Roman soldiers, according to Roman criminal law. It is to be presumed that Pilate combined the delivery of Jesus to the Jews with the symbolical act of washing his hands (according to Matthew). This compromise is one of the many legal contradictions in the history of the crucifixion, by means of which contradictions the summum jus of the ancient world is converted into the summa injuria. Comp. Comm. on Matthew, Matthew 27:22 [pp. 512, 514, Am. Ed.]. Other contradictions: Declared innocent, and yet sent before another tribunal, and yet scourged. Scourged in order that He might be released, and yet afterwards crucified. Contradictions of the forum, of sentence, of cognizance, of the degree of punishment, of the form of punishment. They therefore took Jesus [παρέλαβονοὖντὸνἸησοῦν. John 19:16 ought to close with σταυρωθῇ, and παρέλαβον begin the next section. So Tischendorf, Alford, Westcott and Hort.—P. S.] The high-priests, not (as De Wette thinks) the soldiers.—And led Him away [καὶἀπήγαγονVery doubtful, see Text. Notes.—P. S.] The taking was also consummated with the declaration: His blood be upon us, etc. (see Comm. on Matt.). On the site of Golgotha, outside of the city, see Comm. on Matt. [520 ff.] “The site of the place, without the city, is likewise attested by Hebrews 12:12.” Tholuck. AND ETHICAL1. By many supplementary touches John presents us with the clearest view of the incidents of the secular trial undergone by Jesus. To these supplementary traits belongs, above all, the gradation of the Jews’ accusation. (1) They charge Jesus with being an ecclesiastical criminal whom they have already sentenced, and whose sentence Pilate has but to confirm. (2) In the most ambiguous sense: With making Himself the King of the Jews. (3) With being an ecclesiastical criminal,—because He had made Himself the Son of God. (4) With being a political revolutionist,—because He claimed to be the King of the Jews. These form two accusations which they alternately bring forward: a Jewish one and a Roman political one. The first time each is couched in ambiguous and innuendo-like terms; the second time each is formulated in calumnious audacity. Another of these supplementary traits is the conflict maintained between Pilate and the high-priests throughout the entire procedure—a conflict in which the personal character of Pilate, as well as that of the high-priests, is most clearly reflected; as is also the more general character of a vain, worldly state-craft in its haughty and nevertheless impotent struggle with a crafty hierarchical power and its fanatical tools in the popular life. Then those moments also stand out clearly, in which Christ is, as a delinquent, by the Jews delivered to, or pressed upon, Pilate; by Pilate delivered to, or pressed upon, the Jews,—down to the moment when a kind of compromise is effected. From John 18:28-31 Pilate refuses judgment. From John 18:32-38 he receives the Accused, granting Him a pre-examination; then, however, he does not simply acquit Him, but seeks to entrap the Jews and, by the offer of presenting Jesus to them for their paschal procession, which was annually graced by some recipient of governmental pardon, to move them to acquit Him with ιclat. Pilate then for the second time receives Jesus, in order, for the gratification of the Jews, to perpetrate upon Him a police execution that was destitute of all judicial grounds,—viz. the scourging. The expression Ecce Homo contains another return of the person of Jesus to the Jews. For the third time Pilate enters into judgment with Jesus upon the accusation: He made Himself the Son of God. He now designs setting Him free himself, but the Jews weaken his purpose by a threat accompanied with tumult; and he is now inwardly so discomfited that the last time he does not simply deliver the Accused to the Jews—he delivers Him under sentence of crucifixion, purposing a formal participation in the affair himself, while the Jews are to assume, and really do assume, the actual execution and responsibility of it. Both these facts are summed up in the words: “He delivered Him unto them that He might be crucified.” As regards the contrasts of conduct, the stately, artificial repose of Pilate is overcome by cringing sub-missiveness; his political calculation by demoniacal craft and pertinacity; his effort of conscience by audacious menace; his attempt to turn the accusers into ridicule by treating them scornfully and mocking them, by fanatic popular agitation and a revolutionary, tumultuous petition, masking itself in pure zeal for the authority of the emperor. The individual items for which, as new disclosures, thanks are due to John, are a. The competence strife in regard to the trial; b. The analysis of the ambiguous expression, King of the Jews, by the wisdom of the Lord—making manifest the vileness of the high-priests and the felony to the Messianic idea, of which they are guilty; c. The antithesis of the Kingdom of Truth and the kingdom of this world, and the utterance of Pilate; d. The circumstance that it is pre-eminently the Jews who are guilty of bringing the Lord into juxtaposition with Barabbas; e. The real purpose of the scourging; f. The effect which the charge that Jesus made Himself the Son of God, produced upon the soul of Pilate—the anguish of superstition, following hard upon the self-upliftment of unbelief; g. The innuendo-like threat of the Jews to accuse Pilate to the emperor—as the weapon that prostrates him (Pilate); h. The double masking: The rebellion of the Jews against their King and against the emperor’s governor, in the mask of the most faithful Jewish piety and Roman subjection; Pilate’s dejection, in the mask of a stately session for judgment, and a derisive treatment of the accusers and the whole Jewish nation; i. The share of both—Pilate and the Jews—in the crucifixion. John, in the close unity of his presentation, has however passed over, together with minor features, the trial in the morning (Matthew 27:1); the dream of Pilate’s wife (Matthew 27:19); Pilate’s washing of his hands, and the self-execration of the Jews (Matthew 27:24-25); the reed (Matthew 27:29); and the bespitting on the part of the soldiers (Matthew 27:30). Similarly, the sending of Jesus to Herod, and the resultant friendship of Herod and Pilate (Luke 23:6-12); finally, the notice that Barabbas had perpetrated a sedition in the city (Mark, Luke). 2. The joint implication of a hierarchical Church and a despotic State in the guilt of Christ’s execution under pretext of His being a religious criminal: (1) In losing the right of inflicting capital punishment, the hierarchs should have recognized the fact that their discipline could extend no further than to excommunication (Matthew 18:17). (2) With the assumption of rule over different national religions, the Roman State should have been constrained to penetrate to a purely political position and a distinction of matters religious and political,—to a principle of which the better men already had a presentiment (Acts 18:14-15). The two principles, however, the religious and the political, continue, on the one hand, involved, and, therefore, on the other hand, strained, because the Jewish hierarchy has not purified itself to a pure conception of the Church, nor the Roman power to a pure conception of the State. This mingling of State and Church has been repeated from the time of Constantine, increasing more and more in the Middle Ages until the arrival of the Reformation. It still continues in the Greek economy of State and Church (Cζsaropapism), likewise in the Roman Ecclesiastical State, as, partially, in the other Catholic States (Papal-Cζsarism). Christ and Christianity have always had to suffer under this confusion, the ground of which is a want of respect for the religious conscience. (2) In taking for granted that disagreeable religious tendencies are to be punished, the hierarchy is fain to shuffle off the execution of punishment upon the despotism, the latter to shift the responsibility of punishment upon the hierarchy. (3) Afterwards they both seek to excuse themselves; Pilate writes: “The King of the Jews,” i.e. a religious motive has brought Him to the cross. The hierarchs wish the inscription to read: “He said that,” i.e. He is a misleader of the people, and a disturber;—the motive is a political one. In a similar manner ultramontane authors now try to impute the execution of heretics to the State of the Middle Ages. (4) Pilate constituted himself and his Roman authority constable of the hierarchy, and from this time forth he rushes to perdition. Similar was the fate of the Maccabean house, and, since then, of several European dynasties. The clean sunderment of Church and State is a vital impulse of the spirit of Christianity, one of the greatest tasks of Christian times. See the author’s essay: Ueber die Neugestaltung des Verhδltnisses zwischen Kirche und Staat. Heidelberg, 1. 3. The fearful treason of the Jews to their Messianic idea, consummated in the ambiguous accusation: “Jesus is the King of the Jews.” A similar felony was committed by Josephus in applying the Messianic predictions of the Old Testament to Vespasian, De Bello Jud., VI. 5, 4. See Gieseler, p. 47. 4. The world-historical encounter of the Spirit of Christ with the genius of the Roman nation on the occasion of the discourse concerning His kingdom (see Exeg. Notes; and my Leben Jesu, II. 1508); analogous to His encounter with the genius of the Greek nation, John 12:20 ff. 5. Christ’s kingdom not of this world, but in this world, for it and over it. Christ the King in the Kingdom of Truth. 6. The question of Pilate no question, but a frivolous, unbelieving utterance. Characteristic of the Grζco-Roman world-culture of his time. 7. Pilate surrendered truth first, and afterwards justice,—in consequence. 8. Ecce Homo. The scourging of Christ is intended by Pilate to save His life and, hence, to be an act of humanity. But as that governor’s official administration is without consistency, his justice without any foundation of truth, his wit without wisdom, so his humanity is destitute of the fear of God, of strength and of blessing. Such a humanitarian idea gave issue to the African slave trade. 9. Pilate’s superstitious fear at the saying: “Jesus made Himself the Son of God,”—a characteristic trait of the unbeliever. The indissoluble connection between unbelief and superstition. But after all, unbelieving Pilate is more believing than the superstitious high-priests in the consummate unbelief with which they reject Christ. Of the threefold terror of Pilate: his terror at the law, his terror of conscience, his religious terror—there appears no trace in these practical atheists, who have donned the mask of the holiest zeal. 10. The greater sins of the high-priests. Christ’s sympathy with the judicial fate of the weak Pilate. In this, Christ’s sentence upon Pilate, there lies a stronger Ecce Homo! than in the exclamation of Pilate. Ecce Homo—who believes he is administering divine government and justice, and stands impotent—the tool of divine judgment, destined himself to be the prey of judgment. 11. Ecclesiastical and political masks. See No. 1. 12. The hierarchy here begets a revolution and allies itself to the same, with a view to shaking the political authority. Hierarchy, popular insurrection, and political authority, in wicked alliance, sentence the King of the Kingdom of God and Protector of all holy order and authority, the High-priest and true Friend of the people, to death upon the cross, as a kindler of rebellion. See Leben Jesu, II. 1533. 13. No King but the Emperor. In that hour the besotted nation did, with hypocritical fanaticism, renounce, not its Messiah only, but also its Messianic hope, cherishing in its heart meanwhile rebellion against the emperor and the hope of a political Messiah. Yet even this judgment of hardening must, according to Romans 9, redound to the salvation of the world—the Gentile world, primarily. AND See the Doctrinal Notes, and Comm. on Matthew, Mark and Luke.Christ at once being judged by, and judging, the world.—Christ at the bar of the Roman State.—Christ before Pilate, and Pilate before Christ.—How Christ’s glance pierced through all the mazes of judgment: 1. Through all entanglements, to the right; 2. through all concealments and misrepresentations, to the bottom; 3. through all ambiguities, to the purpose; 4. through all waverings, to the issue.—How the judgment upon the Lord judgeth itself: 1. In its accusations; 2. in its examinations; 3. in the motives for its sentence.—The grave sign in the fact that the great prospect that existed of Christ’s acquittal was immediately blighted: 1. The great prospect: a. Pilate at first repulses the accusers. b. He nevertheless holds the examination and declares the innocence of Jesus, c. He tries to adjust the matter with the scourging. d. He is convulsed with religious awe and already proceeds to release Jesus. 2. Blighted: a. By the stratagem of hypocrites; b. the audacity of fanaticism; c. the impotence and guilty consciousness of Pilate; d. the rule of Tiberius; e. the plots of Satan; f. the providence and judgment of God. 3. The grave sign: a. Of the depravity of the world; b. of the magnitude of human unrighteousness; c. of the majesty of divine righteousness; d. of the fixedness and depth of the Redemption.—As Roman State-spirit delivered the Lord Christ Himself to the will of the Hierarchy, so it subsequently pursued the same course with Christianity.—The light of the calm majesty of Christ alone illumines the dark scene of His condemnation. Section First—John 18:28-40. The cunningly calculated appearing of the accusers: 1. Hypocritical: they keep the legal Passover holy, to the end that they may the more surely deliver up the true Paschal Lamb to the Gentiles; 2. Dissembling, naοve: they make as if the sentence were already decided; Pilate has nothing to do but to set the great seal to it; 3. Truckling: “we may not put any man to death;” 4. Slanderously and disclaimingly shameless: they design to entrap Pilate with the ambiguous phrase: “the King of the Jews;” 5. Crafty, bold: they choose a mob-hero, Barabbas, who has made a sedition (probably against the Roman authorities).—The competence conflict, or the embroilments between the Hierarchy and the despotic State, and the ultimate, wicked peace.—The counter-question of Christ (John 18:34) a word of the heavenly Judge (for instruction): 1. For the elucidation of the matter; 2. for the warning of Pilate; 3. for the illumination of the accusers.—The Roman interrogation: What hast Thou done?—The declaration of Jesus: My kingdom is not of this world: 1. As defence; 2. as accusation.—The kingdom of Christ in its spiritualness and heavenliness: 1. How it differs from the kingdom of the Romans 2. but also from the government of the Priests.—The royal confession: A King Amos 1.—The royal Kingdom of Truth: l. The Kingdom of the King: Truth in its profoundest essence, as a revelation of God; in its highest power, as the Gospel; in its broadest extent, as the uniting bond of all life; in its bodily appearance, as the Person of Christ. 2. The King of the Kingdom: Christ personal Truth itself, as the light centre of all life, thoroughly at one with itself, and therefore the Light of the world. 3. The title of the King: Perfect agreement of His birth and His mission (His office); His ideal and His historical vocation. 4. His government: The faithful Witness, with His testimony; the Host-leader of all faithful witnesses (martyrs). 5. Increase of the Kingdom: The Word received as His voice by all who are of the truth.—The word of Pilate: What is truth? 1. How word might have become the saving of his life (if he had spoken inquiringly and submitted himself to the answer); 2. How it became the judgment of his life (because he spoke it triflingly and scornfully, going out immediately.—What is truth? This question may be considered according to its divine meaning; 1. As the sneering exclamation of the impious scoffer; 2. as the mere declaration of a frivolous worldling (Pilate); 3. as the doubting question of an earnest investigator; 4. as the vital question of a longing heart.—The Pilate-question of the Roman spirit of tradition. (We must abide by the tradition, cried the Roman pagans to the Christians. How can ye think of such a thing as proclaiming new truths?) Pilate’s declaration without: I find no fault in Him; in connection with the preceding utterance: What is truth?—Pilate’s testimony to the innocence of Jesus. First attempt to release the Accused.—But it is your custom; How Pilate, with the first deviation from the right, had entered upon the road of calamity. Barabbas, see the Synoptists. Section Second, Chap, John 19:1-16. The scourging of Christ, in respect to its two-fold signification: 1. In respect to Pilate’s intention (made prominent by John), it was to avert the crucifixion. 2. In respect to the actual result, it formed (according to the statement of the Synoptists) the beginning of the crucial sufferings of Christ.—Second attempt to release the Accused.—Lo there, the Man! 1. The word in the sense of Pilate. 2. The word in respect of its higher signification.—The second accusation in respect to its contradiction of the first in the sense of the accusers.—Pilate’s fear. Close connection between unbelief and superstition.—Second examination by Pilate, by reason of the charge: He made Himself the Son of God.—Jesus’ silence in the second examination by Pilate compared with His silence before Caiaphas.—The haughtiness in Pilate’s reproof (John 19:19), and the august-ness in the answer of Christ.—Christ sees even in the power of Pilate and its misuse, pre-eminently an instrument and a work of Divine Providence.—The greater and the less great sinners, or Jesus Himself in judgment, the holy Judge in righteousness and clemency.—Pilate’s resolution to release Jesus; or the last attempt, frustrated by the bold menace of the Jews. Why was it possible for this menace so to disturb him? 1. Because he was Pilate (on account of his extortions, destitute of a good conscience and of trust in God, and setting his earthly self-preservation above all things). 2. Because his sovereign was the emperor Tiberius (the cruel and suspicious tyrant who lent a ready ear to denunciations of all kinds). 3. Because he knew the Jewish priests (their deceitful cunning and fanatical boldness).—The priestly revolutionists with the bugbear of revolution in their mouths: 1. Revolutionists against the emperor (in their hearts;—against the authority of the governor). 2. Declaring Christ to be a revolutionist; And Pilate himself to be open to suspicion of this crime.—Gabbatha and Golgotha.—Pilate wraps himself in all the pomp of a judge, while his judicial dignity is drabbled in the dust.—The priests put on the mask of devotion to the emperor while they condemn their King to the cross.—The scoffs of a Pilate cannot break the power which the priests exercise over the blind populace.—Gentile-Roman policy overcome by the Jewish hierarchy.—The glory of Jerusalem and the glory of Rome sink away in one ordeal in which they judge the Lord of the world;—and with them the glory of Judaism and the glory of heathenism—the glory of the whole old world.—Agreement (concordance) of Pilate and the priests.—The suffering of the Lord in Pilate’s tribunal: 1. In view of Pilate tottering to his fall; 2. in view of the priests of His nation in their obduracy and craftiness; 3. in view of the delusion of the infatuated, raging people.—The temptation of Christ in these sufferings, and His victory. Starke: To John 18:28-40. The Most Holy, in suffering Himself to be delivered into the hands of the uncircumcised, did thereby (take upon Himself the shame of our spiritual foreskin and) purpose to procure for us poor Gentiles a right to the citizenship of Israel.—How stiff-necked men still are in their superstition; and on the contrary, how secure and careless about that which is really in accordance with God’s word.—Hall: It is the way of all hypocrites to be exceedingly conscientious about things concerning which they really need have no scruples; but for things of which they should make scruple, they keep an accommodating conscience.—Cramer: It is a rickety proof—the pledging of one’s own authority in human affairs: We say so, therefore ‘tis true. Such are the vain-glorious,—they speak great blasphemy—slanders;—what they speak, must be spoken from heaven; what they say, must have weight on the earth, Psalms 73:8-9 [another variation in translation].—Quesnel: Judges should examine everything—and their own hearts more than all other things.—Christ’s kingdom and the emperor’s can well exist together. Worldly order and government are serviceable to the Church, and the Church, by her prayer and intercession, preserveth police and kingdom. Certainly: the better Christian, the better magistrate! the better Christian, the more blessed teacher! the better Christian, the more loyal subject!—True servants of Jesus must fight manfully for their King and His kingdom.—Bibl. Wirtemb.: Dear Christian, what if thou be poor, despised, rejected in the world? for all that, thou art a king; thy Saviour hath made thee one, Revelation 1:6; Revelation 5:10. The kingdom is prepared thee from the beginning of the world, Matthew 25:34—with this thought breast the devil and the world.—Zeisius: Let all thy words and works proceed from truth, if thou wilt be Christ’s subject, for thy King Christ is a King of Truth, Zechariah 8:19.—Ibid.: Politicians of the present day think with Pilate: What is truth? and hold such as suffer for its sake, to be fools, and, on the contrary, such as stoutly simulate, they account very clever and lucky.—Ibid.: So raging mad is the foolish and hardened world that it condemns the good and preserves the lives of the veriest knaves, preferring them, honoring them, and endowing them.—O what insane choice! a refractory subject is preferred to the King of Glory; a murderer, to the Prince of Life; a ravening wolf, to the Good Shepherd.—Cramer: As it is an abomination to God to wrong the righteous, so it is in like manner an abomination in His eyes not to punish archknaves. Gerlach: The true King and the true Kingdom are the King and the Kingdom of Truth, Truth in the fullest, deepest sense (comp. John 1:14), according to which this word includes perfect essentiality, agreement with itself, holiness. Every king except the King of Truth, has a limited dominion, is at the same time a subject and servant; but God’s Truth and therefore His King and His Kingdom, are finally victorious over all opposition. On this very account, however, this dominion of Truth is no purely internal one, else it would not exercise sway over things external, and consequently it would itself be untrue, and not a thoroughly true, perfect dominion. All the kingdoms of the world shall servo this King when His testimony of the Truth shall have made all His foes His footstool. But every other weapon would itself be of falsehood and darkness. Christ was born such a King—in Him person and office are one—in this respect also He is nothing but Truth; and for this end He came into the world (of which He and His Kingdom arc not. John 18:36); His appearance, life and ministry have no other aim.—With the mid-day Sun in his face, Pilate shut his eyes and thought there was nothing but darkness about him. Christ stood before him, Himself the Truth, and he unbelievingly despaired of men’s ever being able to know the truth. Pilate’s question is no scoff, but the expression of the superficial, hopeless unbelief of a man of the world. Braune: My kingdom, etc.; It twines its blessing around all kingdoms, all circumstances; it is the flying bee, clinging with quiet diligence to the fast-fading flowers and their perishable glory, that it may extract honey from them for its kingdom of the future, creating, meanwhile, not the slightest disturbance in the garden of the world. But it is likewise the great power that in all the migrations of nations, in great wars, and the ruins of the kingdoms of the world, proves itself active in advancing the eternal kingdom of peace. It will not be confined to the heart and the world of thought, but will be set up in the living spirit which gives proof of itself in all situations and which ought to prove itself Christian.—It is founded upon truth—God’s promises; it is erected by truth—testimony concerning them; it is enjoyed in truth—obedience towards them; truth is universally disseminated by it; in doctrine and life, ideas, feelings, words, deeds, relations, impulses, truth comes; vanity and falsehood are overcome.—“In the kingdoms of the world, the vanity, ambition and weakness of man are misused, roused and cherished, while truth in the conscience is hindered by unrighteousness. But in the kingdom of God, man’s conscience, his sense of truth, and the truth active in that sense, are aided as a drawing to eternity” (Rieger).—There are minds that ring loud and clear when the truth touches them, while others brought into contact with the truth continue dead and soundless. Purity of heart is the condition whereon depends clearness in the knowledge of God. The light-minded worldliness and dull skepticism of so-called culture lead to a despair of truth. Gossner: They wish to make Christ a male-factor by means, simply, of their authority and office, which, notwithstanding, they had from Him alone. And He was constrained, and did will, to suffer it so to be. We will invert their proposition and say: Friend Pilate, if we were not malefactors, we would not have delivered the Innocent and Righteous One unto thee.—If we were not sinners, such things could and must never have befallen Christ.—With truth,—thought Pilate, like so many other men—a man does not get on in the world. The world shrugs its shoulders, saying: “Truth? Bah! A fellow can’t be so particular.” Heubner: God’s people delivers up its Saviour, its Crown, the sum of all the promises, to the Gentiles to be executed. What a spirit is this in comparison with the spirit of the waiting, hoping fathers! It happens in the morning, at the approach of the holiest of feasts,—at a time when the spirit should clearly see the right. The priests were moved, we doubt not, with the desire to cover Jesus with infamy in the sight of the people.—Lavater: “Whenever a righteous person is sentenced and judged by an uncalled man, there stands a Jesus before Pilate.”—Rambach says of Pilate: It is laudable in him that he examines Jesus according to the rule: audiatur el altera pars,—that he himself makes the investigation, conversing undisturbedly with Christ alone.—The Kingdom of Christ is not worldly, but the kingdom of the world becometh Godly and Christly (Bengel).—The truth that Christ gives, is “truth unto a knowledge of the Father, truth unto an assurance of the forgiveness of sins, truth unto everlasting comfort through grace, truth and strength in godliness” (Rieger).—Truth’s seat is least of all at the courts of the great in this world. A king of France complained that though he had all things else in his kingdom and at his court, he yet did lack truth, people to tell him the plain, unvarnished truth (the same).—But what was the innocence which in Pilate’s eyes Jesus possessed? The innocence of a good-hearted fanatic. Starke: On John 19:1-16. Bibl. Wirt. We must not do evil that good may come of it, Romans 3:8.—Zeisius: Let this: Lo, what a man! never depart out of thy thoughts; but let it be to thee a monition penitently to recognize the enormity of the sins wherewith thou broughtest thy Saviour to such a pass; a warning earnestly to guard against them henceforward, and a word of consolation, partly in view of the hideous picture of thine approaching death, partly for the time when the world shall make a spectacle and a monster of thee.—Quesnel: A judge must not terrify others with his power; but must be in fear himself on account of the power which he hath received from God, and look to it that he use it aright.—Zeisius: When we must suffer wrong, there is no better means of calming our souls and inspiring them with patience and consolation than by turning our eyes utterly away from secondary causes and fixing them on God, 2 Samuel 16:10; Luke 21:18-19.—One sin is indeed more grievous than another, and hence deserving of heavier punishment and condemnation, Ezekiel 16:51-52.—A frank confession of the truth hath great power and is never without blessing, Acts 24:25.—Satan knows how to take hold of every man in the place where he is weakest, 2 Samuel 11:2; John 13:2.—Satan understands making a masterly use of honor, consideration, favor, grace with great lords—with them he blinds the eyes of men and ensnares their hearts, thus bringing or keeping them under his dominion, John 12:43.—Hall: A carnally-minded man is more anxious for his bodily prosperity and temporal honor than for his soul.—Zeisius: It is a sorrowful fact that the servants of great lords are far more afraid of their masters, than of God’s displeasure; but cursed is the man that trusteth in men and, etc., Jeremiah 17:5 : Acts 5:29.—Truth is often made a mere laughing-stock,—yet the mocker must be defeated and truth victorious. Gerlach: The heathen even, struck by the divine majesty of Jesus, must gain some inkling of the fact that He was really the Son of God—a fact, the presage of which augmented the sin of the high-priests and that of Pilate also.—Pilate nevertheless did not escape the fate that he here, by his sinful yieldingness, sought to avoid; three or four years after he was deposed by Vitellius, governor of Syria, and sent to Rome to answer to the charges of tyranny preferred against him by the Jews.—On John 18:15. With which they most solemnly renounce God, their King, and the Messiah whom they looked for from Him.—Lisco: Hence the question: Whence art Thou? i.e., art Thou really of divine descent? Jesus is silent, not willing to deny His divine origin and yet unable to instruct the unreceptive Pilate concerning the truth.—In mockery of their rebellious tendencies that longed for a king of their own, yet now rejected Him whom God sent them, Pilate asked: Shall I crucify your King? Whereupon the Jews, feigning devotion and loyalty, say: none but the emperor do we recognize as our king. Braune: Thou art but the instrument of a supreme will—saith the Condemned unto the judge. It is the self-same thought of the Redeemer that He thus expressed to Peter (John 18:11)—Shall I not drink the cup My Father hath given Me? Here the Redeemer taketh His stand, even in the midst of the turbid tumult of Jewish passion and Gentile dissoluteness; the pure will of God remaineth serene for Him, as the sky letteth its blue be seen through clouds.—In the destruction of Jerusalem the blood of the fathers and the children flowed. And Pilate bore his load still earlier. Gossner: That is a wicked pliancy men manifest when, like Pilate, to win people they yield the half of what they unjustly demand and consider that they discharge their duty inasmuch as they refuse the other half. Duty and fidelity towards God and one’s conscience cannot be divided, else infidelity is already an accomplished fact.—Let him that carrieth his head on high and refuseth to bow his neck beneath the lowly yoke of Christ, look often upon the thorn-crowned and scornιd head of his King.—O thou weak man! thou miserable judge! So oft dost thou publicly attest His innocence, and sufferest Him to be more and more cruelly maltreated, and even committest the innocent Lamb to the wolves again; instead of tearing Him from their clutches. Thou preachest unto deaf ears when thou discoursest to the wolves concerning the innocence of the Lamb.—He who yields once to godless, unscrupulous men and does their pleasure, must and will do it the second time, must do everything until their thirst is quenched.—Behold, what a man! how guiltless! and how wretched! So stood He there, the Only and Incomparable One, before His people! how must the angels have looked into it. And He, whither must He have looked, how must He have gazed up to His Father! how must His soul have prayed that eternal honor and glory might grow out of this, His disgrace.—Behold, that is the Man who restoreth men and maketh them again what man was in the beginning when he came from God’s hands. This entry is longer than a Bible module can hold. The rest is at https://www.sermonindex.net/commentary/lange/ SECOND SECTION The personal Light or Christ in His pre-historical Presence in the World, especially in His Old Testament Advent, testified by the Old Covenant as it is represented by John the BaptistJoh_1:6-13 (1) The Representative Of The Coming Of Christ, John The Baptist, John 1:6-8. (2) The Coming Of Christ Into The World, In Its General Groundwork And Its Historical Genesis, John 1:9 (3) The Relation Of Christ To The World And The Conduct Of The World Towards Him, Or The General Groundwork Of His Advent, John 1:10. (4) The Relation Of Christ To Israel, And Israel’s Conduct Towards Him, Or The Imperfect, Symbolical Advent, John 1:11. (5) Christ’s Gradual Breaking Through In The World In The Contrast Of The Elect To The Less Susceptible, Embodied—(a) In Faith, As The Beginning Of The Real Advent, John 1:12; (b) In The Consecration Of Birth And The Being Born Of God; The Development Of The Real Advent, John 1:13.6There was [became, arose] a man sent from God, whose name was John 7 The same came for a [omit a] witness [testimony, εἰςμαρτυρίαν], to bear witness of the Light, that all men through him might believe: 8He was not that [the] Light, 9but was sent [came, Lange: he was] to bear witness of that [the] Light. That was the true Light, which lighteth every man, that cometh into the world. [The true Light which lighteth (lighteneth, Shineth upon) every man, was coming (ἦνἐρκόμενον) 10into the world.] He [It] was in the world, and the world was made by him [it], and the world knew him not [Lange: did not recognize it in him]. 11He came unto his own [his own possessions or inheritance, τὰἴδια], and his own [his own people, οἱἴδιοι] received him not. 12But as many as received him, to them gave he power to become the sons [children, τέκνα] of God, even to them that 13believe on [in] his name: Which [Who] were born, not of blood [bloods, ἐξαἱμάτων], not of the [natural] will of the flesh, nor of the [moral] will of man, but of God. AND Joh_1:6. There was a man.—Ἐγένετο [fiebat], arose, came into being; not ἦν [erat], was, absolutely [comp. John 8:58, Greek. The Logos was from eternity, Abraham and John began to be in time.—P. S.]—Chrysostom: ἐγένετοἀπεσταλμένος. The life of John, so to speak, was lost in his mission (see John 1:23; comp. Isaiah 40:3). The appearance of John in this place is striking, and has been variously interpreted (see Meyer). In the introduction of the Baptist in this passage we see a representation of the whole prophetic testimony concerning Christ in concentrated, personal form, after the manner of this Gospel. The Baptist was the final recapitulation of all prophetic voices concerning Christ. The Old Testament had two sides—a hidden and a visible. The hidden side was the rise of the genealogical life of Christ itself, His Christological advent; the visible side was the prophetic testimony concerning this advent. And as the verbal prophecy anticipated the real prophecy, in the nature of the case, so the fulfilment of the verbal prophecy in John preceded the fulfilment of the real prophecy in Christ. John therefore here stands in the right place, the auroral radiance of the essential Light; the great witness of the advent of Christ; the forerunner. [Whose name (was) John, i.e., Jehovah is merciful, from the Hebrew ιεֹ ?ηָ ?πָ ?ο for ιְ ?δεֹ ?ηָ ?πָ ?ο, Ἰωάννης ; comp. the Greek Θεόδωρος. This significant name was given to the forerunner of our Saviour by divine direction, Luke 1:13. The evangelist laid stress on his own name, and saw in it a symbol of his relation to Christ as the disciple “whom Jesus loved,” John 20:2; John 21:20. Comp. Lampe and Hegstenberg.—P. S.]. John 1:7. The same came for witness.—Testimony: stronger here than preaching; stronger even than prophecy, as hitherto existing. John appeared first as a preacher, a preacher of repentance. But the preacher showed himself at the same time a prophet, announcing under divine impulse the approach of the Messianic kingdom. And then, in the miraculous manifestation at the baptism of Jesus, through the testimony of God, he became a witness of the person of Jesus of Nazareth, that He is the Messiah; so to speak, an apostle before the apostolate. As a prophet who, by divine commission, pointed to the Messiah, he completed the Old Testament prophecy in testimony. And for this testimony he was come. His mission rose into the office of forerunner. And even his martyrdom in the strict sense is in keeping. He sealed his preparatory preaching of repentance with his death (see John 1:33). That [ἴνα, the aim of John’s testimony] all men through him might believe.—“Through John, not through the Light (Grotius), or through Christ (Ewald):” Meyer. In the divine purpose John was to lead over the faith of Israel to Christ. This Christ also signifies John 5:33 [where he calls John “the burning and shining light,” or candle rather, λύχνος, not φῶς.—P. S.] Through the unbelief of the Jews this gracious design failed; though in the truly devout, first of all in the noblest of John’s own disciples (John 1:35 sqq.) it was fulfilled; through them in all believers. John 1:8. He was not the light.—[ἦν is emphatic and contrasted with μαρτυρήσῃ. The article before φῶς is likewise emphatic, the Light of the world, the Light of lights, comp. ὁπροφήτης, John 1:29; ὁἄρτος, John 6:32 ff.—P. S.] This is certainly not said merely with reference to the unbelieving disciples of John. But in the wider sense the nation itself was an unbelieving disciple of John, contenting itself with the brightness of the Baptist, instead of going through him to the true Light itself, John 5:35. So far, therefore, as it is implied that many, even the leaders, made the Baptist rather a hindrance than a help to faith, the words are written even against the disciples of John. But (he was).—De Wette takes the ἀλλ’ ἵνα but in order to, imperatively; Lόcke supplies ἦν, was; Meyer, ἠλθεν, came Since the preceding verse strongly pronounces that the whole prophetic existence of John was intended to rise into a testimony for the Messiah, we give Lόcke the preference: “He was, that he might bear witness.” [So also Alford and Godet. Baόmlein supplies ἐγένετο, γίνεται, “or the like;” which is not so strong. I prefer with Meyer to supply ἦλθε from John 1:7, since the phrase, εἶναι, ἵνα instead of εἷναιεἰςτό is quite unusual.—P. S.] John 1:9. The true Light—was coming [ἦντὸφῶςτὸἀληθινόν—ἐρχόμενον].—Various interpretations: (1) He (the Logos) or it (the Light) was the true Light; so the older expositors and Luther [E. V., which supplies τοῦτο before ἦν, that was the true light.—P. S.] But τὸφῶςτὸἀληθινόν must be subject, not predicate; for in John 1:8 John was the subject. [So also Meyer.] (2) Ἐρχόμενονεἰςτὸνκόσμον (coming into the world) is connected with πάνταἄνθρωπον (every man), not with ἦν (was); Origen [Syr., Euseb., Chrys., Cyril, Vulg., Aug, [and most of the ancients, Luther, Calvin [E. V.], etc., Hφlemann, Meyer. [This would make either ἄνθρωπον or ἐρχδμ. superfluous.] Meyer observes that it could not be connected with ἦν; for the Logos was already in the world when John appeared. But the Evangelist here evidently goes back to the entire relation of Christ to mankind, especially goes back to John 1:4. He had before spoken of the witness of the advent of Christ—now he depicts the advent itself. This is divided into two parts: (1) The relation of the coming Logos to man in general; (2) His relation to Israel. Hence we interpret: He was (from the beginning and in conflict with the darkness, John 1:5) coming, was on His advent to mankind. Therefore not (a) was come [ἦνἐρχόμενον=ἐλθόν]: Schφttgen, etc.; (b) just came (when John appeared): De Wette, Lόcke [Alford]; (c) future: was on the point of coming [venturum erat]: Tholuck; or (d) was destined to come: Luthardt; desired to come: Ewald; nor (e) was coming then, in the time before His baptism: Hilgenfeld, who even here would mix Valentinian Gnosis into the anti-Gnostic Gospel;—but in a purely historical sense [=ἦλθε, came], instead of the imperfect: Bengel, Bleek, Kφstlin [Hengstenberg, with reference to Malachi 3:1]; and with the peculiar Johannean significance: He was continually coming, continually on his way. Hence the participial form. The essence of this universal advent is to be recognized in the fact, that the Logos shines in every man in his religious and moral nature and experience, as the λόγοςσπερματικός. That the expression “every man” needed not the addition: that cometh into the world, is evident. And the phrase: “to come into the world,” is not used of the natural birth of an ordinary man, but is reserved for Christ. [Which lighteth (enlightens, illuminates) every man—ὃφωτίζειπάνταἄνθρωπον.—There is much force in the singular. Quisquis illuminatur, ab hac luce illuminatur (Bengel). Different interpretations: 1. The light of reason and intelligence (Cyril of Alex.). Better: Both the intellectual and moral light (reason and conscience) given to all men, as distinct from the spiritual light of saving grace given to believers. The former is the basis of the latter. 2. The inward spiritual light given to all (Quakers). 3. The light of grace given to believers only, or to every one to whom Christ was preached (Crosby). 4. Intellectual and spiritual light sufficient for the salvation of Jews and Gentiles, though the majority are so blinded by sin as not to see Him. “Christ enlightens all as far as in Him lies” (Chrysostom, Hom. 8). Christ gives sufficient light to every man to leave him without excuse, but not sufficient to save (Arrowsmith, Ryle).—Comp. John 3:19 : “light is come into the world;” John 12:46 : “I am come a light into the world;” John 6:14 : “that prophet that should come into the world;” John 18:37.—P. S.] The true [veritable, genuine] Light [τὸφῶςτὸἀληθινόν].—The real, essential Light in distinction from the outward, cosmical light, which, nevertheless, is His token and symbol. (See Milton’s Paradise Lost: the greeting to the light. Comp. John 8:12; John 9:5.) [There is a nice difference between ἀληθής (wahr), true in opposition to false, and ἀληθινός (wahrhaftig), true in opposition to borrowed or imitated. This difference is obliterated in the E. V. The one expresses the harmony between thought and reality, word and fact; the other implies a contrast between the perfect original and a copy more or less imperfect. Ἀληθινός is a favorite term with Plato and John to signify that which is genuine, archetypal, original, true to the idea. It occurs eight times in the Gospel, ten times in the Apocalypse, three times in the first Epistle of John, but elsewhere only five times in the N. T. In this passage it stands in contrast not so much to the cosmical light (Dr. Lange), as to the borrowed intellectual and moral light of the Baptist and other human teachers; comp. John 5:35; Matthew 5:14, where believers generally as members of Christ are called the light of the world. It is lumen illuminans, as distinct from the lumen illuminatum.—P. S.] John 1:10. It was in the world.—Not pluperfect (Herder [Tholuck, Olsh.]); nor “in the person of Jesus, when John was testifying” (Meyer); but referring to His infinite presence in mankind (Baumgarten-Crusius). The repetitions of the idea of the world (κόσμος) are to be distinguished thus: In the first case the word combines the material and the moral world in one; in the second, it means the material or visible world alone, up to the roots of its moral conduct; in the third, the moral world alone, but considered as resting upon and representing the visible. Meyer well says: (1) The world might have known Him (constitutional affinity); (2) it should have known Him (according to His claim). [Comp. Romans 1:19 ff., where Paul fully proves the guilt of Gentiles and Jews in rejecting the light of nature and the preparatory revelation of the O. T.—P. S.] Knew him not.—The whole verse strictly reads: “It was in the world, and the world was made by it [or Him, δι’ αὐτοῦ ?], and the world knew Him (αὐτόν) not.” The change of gender is highly significant. In the light of the world, the world should have known the personal founder of the world, the Logos. The gradation in the three clauses is also expressed by the repetition of “and.” The world of heathenism knew not the light, still less Him, the personal character of the light. It took the divine for something impersonal, and sough to heal the wrong by fragmentary personifications, its gods [the altar at Athens “to the unknown God,” Acts 17:23.—P. S.] John 1:11. He came unto his own house or inheritance [τὰἴδια, comp. John 16:32; John 19:27].—Here the discourse is no longer of the universal advent of Christ in the world (Corn. a Lapide, Kuinoel, etc.); but of the theocratic advent in Israel (Erasmus, Calvin, etc., Lόcke, Meyer); yet of this advent considered as intended for mankind. Israel is God’s own people in the special sense, Exodus 19:5; Deuteronomy 7:6; Sir 24:7 ff. It is not, however, the historical New Testament coming of Christ in Israel, which is here spoken of. The expression He came, as denoting the historical moving of the Logos in the history of the world, determines us against the more general conception of the “own.” Yet it must be kept well in mind, that in John particularly Israel stands not for itself alone, but as the medium for the entrance of Christ into the whole world. See John 10:16. And his own people [οἱἴδιοι, comp. John 13:1]—i.e., the Jews. See Isaiah 6; Matthew 13; John 12:41; Acts 7; Acts 23:25; Romans 9 [The transfer of the relation of Jehovah to Israel as His peculiar people upon Christ, implies that, in the view of John, Christ was the Jehovah of the Old dispensation; comp. John 12:41; John 8:56.—P. S.] [Received him not—οὐπαρέλαβον, stronger than οὐκἔγνω, which is said of the world in general, John 1:10. The fact that the Jews were the peculiar inheritance of Jehovah, doubled their guilt in rejecting the Messiah. Comp. the οὐκἠθελήσατε , Matthew 23:37; also Isaiah 1:3; Romans 10:21; and John 12:37. The negative expression here, as John 1:10 and John 1:5, reveals a holy grief on the part of John. Remember the tears of pity which the Saviour shed over unbelieving Jerusalem.—P. S.] John 1:12. But as many as received him—[ὅσοι, whosoever, whatsoever persons, denotes the universality of Christ’s benefit without distinction of race, nationality or condition.—P. S.] No contradiction of the preceding words. His own, His people, as a whole, received Him not, but individuals. See Galatians 3, 4. The antithesis: οὐπαρέλαβον and ἔλαβον should be observed. The Jews should παραλαμβάνειν, take Him in addition to the Old Testament, receive Him in pursuance of the true traditions. This they did not. Thus others’ receiving Him became the absolute λαμβάνειν, contrary to the outward, false tradition. Λαμβάνειν in John and Paul is a strong word, denoting the moral act of faith, comp. Romans 5:11.* To them gave he power.—Opposed to the descent from Abraham and the relative sonship with God, of which the Jews boasted, John 8. ’Ἐξουσία is neither merely [the possibility (De Wette, Tholuck), nor the ability (Brόckner, Heng., Godet), nor] the dignity or advantage, (Erasmus, etc.), nor the right, or privilege (Meyer), but the real power, the spiritual faculty (Lόcke), and, at the same time, the real title. Sonship with God was growing, in its formation-state, in the Old Testament; there were only incipient sons of God, Galatians 4:1, but there were such really, and progressively, according to the advancing inwardness and depth of the Old Testament faith. This sonship with God, too, is connected indeed with a semen arcanum electorum et spiritualium (contrary to Meyer, see John 1:9); but this must be understood neither in a Gnostic sense, nor in a Hegelian, but in a Johannean, John 3:21. This incipient regeneration is also most certainly ethical, but not merely ethical; it is also substantial, though the antithesis between the eternal μονογενής and the regenerate τέκναθεοῦ by all means remains perfect, even after the advance of the latter to υἱοὶθεοῦ. The distinctions: ethical theogony in John (according to Hase), legal adoption in Paul; υἱοθεσία first appearing in the kingdom of the Messiah in the Synoptists (Meyer), are of little use; unless it may be said that John emphasizes the ideal begetting, Paul the historical new creation. The Messianic kingdom begins with the children of God, not they with it. [To become—γενέσθαι.—Christ is the eternal, only begotten Son of God by nature; men become children of God by regeneration or a celestial birth; comp. John 3:3; 1 John 3:9; Galatians 3:26; 1 Peter 1:23. Alford thinks that τέκναθεοῦ is a more comprehensive expression than υἱοὶτ. θ., as it involves the whole generation and process of our spiritual life and our likeness to God (1 John 5:5-7), while the other brings out rather our adoption and hope of inheritance (Romans 8:14 if.)—P. S.] To them that believe in his name.—[Πιστεύουσιν, not πιστεύσασιν; faith being a continued act and habit of the children of God. Mark also the distinction between believing Christ, that He is, and believing in Christ, in His name, His revealed being, in His person, εἰςτὸὄνομα;the former is purely intellectual and historical, the latter is moral and implies trust in and appropriation of Christ as our Saviour. The same difference holds with regard to the existence of God, comp. James 2:19 : καὶτὰδαιμόνιαπιστεύουσιν.—P. S.]—Not “ζtiological” [quippe qui credunt, Meyer], but “explicative;” for faith is not the cause of the gift of Christ, but the organ, causa instrumentalis [the subjective condition]. The clause describes λαμβάνειν. Faith in the name of the Logos [εἰςτὸὄνομααὐτοῦ ?] is faith in Christ, more definitely, in His name (Acts 2:36; Acts 3:16; Acts 4:12); and this definiteness of faith, in the evangelical acknowledgment of the personal truth in Christ, makes it saving, makes it the medium of the saving power of Christ, because the name of Christ denotes the concentrated expression of His nature in His gospel, in which truth and personal fact are one. So the name of God is to be understood: the revelation of God as a personal introduction of Himself to us. So the devout of the old covenant believed in the name of the Logos, in the essential contents and subject of the Messianic promises, John 2:23; John 3:18, etc.John 1:13. Who were born, not of bloods.—It is confusing to ask whether οἴ refers to τέκναθεοῦ or πιστεύοντες. The subject is in both cases the same. It is the πιστεύοντες in the historical sense who are spoken of. The Evangelist introduces the antithesis of the natural generation and regeneration, yet regarding the natural generation itself as advanced from the purely physical to the religiously consecrated theocratic generation. He first states the antithesis in general: οὐκἐξαἱμάτων,not of bloods. Augustine explains the plural from the twofold sex of man and woman; Hφlemann refers it to the successive begettings of the theocratic genealogy; Meyer finds that the plural is the same as the singular. We find in the plural a premonition of an ethical distinction of αἵματα. In ethical matters αἷμα and αἷμα are not one and the same. And this the succeeding climax proceeds to say. According to Augustine [Theophyl., Schott, Olshausen] and others, θέλημασαρκός denotes woman in distinction from man (ἀνδρός). [This would require rather the disjunctive οὔτε—οὔτε, neither—nor, than the adjunctive οὐδέ—οὐδέ, nor—nor yet; besides flesh is never used synonymously with woman.—P. S.] Mosheim distinguishes native Jews and proselytes; others, natural children and adopted (Starke); Lόcke takes ἀνήρ as no more than ἄνθρωπος; Meyer regards the sentence as a rhetorical progress to greater definiteness: the term σαρκόζ referring to the sexual instinct, ἀνδρός to the procreative will of the man.If this distinction be followed up, we must come involuntarily upon the track of the true interpretation. The common sensual desire knows nothing of procreative will, yet it doubtless has its θέλημα. Baumgarten Crusius, therefore, rightly asserts that the progress is from the sensual to the most noble; and we see here a progress from the sensual begettings of the heathen world to the theocratically consecrated begettings, which introduce a sacred theocratic genealogy (see Lange’s Leben Jesu iii. 558, and Posit. Dogm. pp. 514, 532). In this passage is reflected the Scripture doctrine of hereditary blessing. Of course the Evangelist tells us also that the consecrated births may indeed exhibit an approach to regeneration, and be the instrument of it, but that they are not able to effect it, and that regeneration, as a heavenly generation, forms a counterpart to the earthly. [The difference between αἴματα, σάρξ and ἀνήρ is not very clear, but the conjunction οὐδέ—οὐδέ (nor—nor yet), as distinct from οὔτε—οὔτε (neither—nor, comp. Winer, p. 454 f., 7th ed.), indicates a rising climax from the general (αἵματα) to the particular, and here again from the lower and physical agency (δάρξ) to the higher and moral (ἀνήρ), although θέλημα is ascribed to both. In Matthew 16:17; 1 Corinthians 15:50; Ephesians 6:12; Galatians 1:16, flesh and blood together signify human nature in its weakness. In John 3:6 we have the same contrast between the natural birth from the flesh, and the supernatural birth from the Spirit. The threefold denial of all human agency in regeneration gives emphasis to the affirmation of the divine agency, which is expressed by but of God, ἀλλ’ ἐκθεοῦ. This does not exclude mediate instrumentalities, through which, ordinarily, men are regenerated and converted. The affirmation may be analyzed so as to correspond to the three members of the negation: 1) not of blood, but of the seed of God (1 John 3:9), which is the word of God (1 Peter 1:23 : ἀναγεννημένοι … διάλόγουζῶντοςθεοῦ; James 1:18 : ἀπεκύησενἡμᾶςλόγῳἀληθείας; 2) nor of the will of the flesh, but of the Spirit (John 3:6 : γεγεννημένονἐκτοῦπνεύματος; 3) nor yet of the will of man, but of the will of God (James 1:18 : βουληθεὶςἀπεκύησενἡμᾶςὁθεός; Ephesians 1:5 : κατὰτὴνεὐδοκίαντοῦθελήματοςαὐτοῦ. Bengel analyzes differently: 1) ex c�lesti Patre; 2) ex amore divino; 3) ex Spiritu sancto. Grace does not descend through the channel of nature in any form, but a new creative act of God is necessary in every regeneration. Barnes, in his notes on John 1:13, confounds regeneration with conversion. Regeneration is an act of God, and may take place in infancy (think of John the Baptist leaping in the mother’s womb); conversion or change of mind (μετάνοια) is the act of man, by which, under the influence of the Holy Spirit, he turns, in conscious repentance and faith, from sin and Satan to God.—P. S.] AND ETHICAL1.The fact that a man (John) was designated the messenger of God even, so to speak, in his origin, Luke 1:15; Luke 1:44, announced the coming of another, in whom no issue between birth and new birth should exist. Yet the distinction is as clear as the connection. John, as man, became the messenger of God; the Logos, as messenger of God, John 3:31; 1 Corinthians 15:25, became man. In John and Mary appear the two summits of the Old Testament spirit, the highest aspiration of human nature in the train of the Spirit of God; in Mary the summit of fervent, humble, receptive piety; in John the summit of energetic, prophetic piety in the official service of the law. Yet in them the higher spirit works from below upward under the drawing from above. In Christ the divine is before, and in Him the nisus is from above downward under the drawing of the human longing, the need of life and salvation below. The Baptist is strongly conscious of this distinction, Matthew 3:11; John 3:31. And in accordance with this nature of Christ is the nature also of Christianity, the righteousness of faith in a righteous life. 2. The same came for witness, John the Baptist, the last, most distinct form of the Old Testament prophecy, and as such the witness of Christ in the history of the world, at the same time in his freedom from jealousy a witness to the Holy Ghost in the Old Testament. The death of John a martyrdom (witness-bearing) to his fidelity as forerunner. 3. Through John His noblest disciples came to believe, through them all succeeding disciples and Christians, (See Schleiermacher, Predigten I., p. 18.) 4. He was not the Light. An antithesis applying not only to the Old and New Testaments, but also to Christ, the fountain of light, and the Apostles and Christians, with the prophets, as receivers and bearers of the light. 5. The true Light was coming. The pre-Christian Advent. (1) Founded (a) in the nature of Christ: “The true Light, which lighteneth every man,” i.e., shines into him from within through the fundamental laws of personal, mental life, from without through nature and history; (b) in the nature of the world: Made by the Logos, standing by His presence. (2) Unfolding itself (a) in a general invisible force: The shining in the darkness, the lighting of every man; Christ’s being in the world [primordial religion]; (b) in historical theocratic form: Education of Israel for His possession, and His coming to His own (the Old Testament religion in its development). 6. Received Him not. The obduracy, a self-estrangement, as well as a hostile bearing towards the admission of the yearning Householder. The obduracy of Israel in its historical development and completion; the great warning to the Christian world; warning, and alas, still more, Matthew 24:38. 7. That believe in His name.—Respecting the name, see above in the exegesis of this passage. Appearance of the name of the Logos, in the more definite sense, with the Old Testament revelation (the Angel of the Lord and the Messiah). Faith in the objective Messiah was in the subject, incipient sonship. In the righteousness of faith lay a point of union between the word of God and the heart of man, a quickening germ of personal children of God, therefore the power to become sons. But this could be brought to decision and contemplation only by the historical appearance of Christ and by the redemption accomplished in Him. As the revelation of God strove from the first towards concentration in the Name, the making Himself personally, perfectly known, so true faith strives from the beginning after the concentrated receiving of a distinct personal life. Centripetal faith, living faith; centrifugal faith, dying or dead faith. 8. Who were born not of blood. The truth and the insufficiency of inherited privilege. The Biblical doctrine of covenant grace not yet duly received in the church. Its antagonism to the unchurchly conception of the relation between nature and spirit, and even to the Augustinian overstatement of original sin. Its antagonism to Pelagianism. (See Posit. Dogmatik., p. 514 sqq.) 9. But of God. First the righteousness of faith present; then circumcision as the symbol of regeneration. The idea of real regeneration develops itself with the idea of the personal Messiah. Its development or genesis is reciprocal with that of repentance, faith, the experience of grace, in the saving process as it advances from the outward to the inward. AND John the Baptist, the Old Testament Evangelist of the Light. (1) In his mission and his name; (2) in his testimony and his work; (3) in his retirement and disappearance before the Light itself.—The Old Testament Advent of Christ: 1. In its ultimate basis (He was in the world); 2. in its historical manifestation (He came to His own); 3. in its earnest of victory (As many as received Him); 4, in its last attestation (There was a man).—John and Christ, or the personal manifestation of the saving Light: 1. John, the attester of the Light; 2. Christ, the attested Light.—The Old and New Testaments, one light of revelation: 1. The Old in the day-light of the New; 2. The New in the dawn-light of the Old.—John and Christ, or the kernel of revelation, personal life.—The Son of God as the nameless Name: 1. The namelessness of the name, (a) in the world in general, (b) in Israel in particular; 2. the name of the nameless, (a) in its silent development (He was in the world; He came), (b) in its great works.—The Advent of Christ in the world, mistaken and yet perceived: Mistaken (a) by the heathen, (b) by the Jews. Yet perceived (a) by the yearnings of the devout in all the world, (b) by the hope of the faithful in Israel.—The name of the Light, its complete personal revelation in Christ.—Christ the name: 1. The name of the life in the world; 2. the name of the light in mankind; 3. the name of the salvation in the children of God.—Those who are becoming believers, are becoming children of God.—The power to become, or the freedom of the spirit, the groundwork of the new birth and nature.—The being born of blood and born of God considered: 1. In their antagonism; 2. in their essential distinction; 3. in their congenial connection; 4. in the Mediator of their union.—He who believes in the pollution of birth according to the Scriptures, must believe also according to the Scriptures in the consecration of birth.—The beginnings of the regeneration in the Old Covenant, a fore-shadowing of the eternal new birth of Christ from heaven. Starke: Jesus alone had a fore-runner.—Like the aurora before the sun, so John, according to the word of prophecy, must bear himself before Christ.—Hedinger: Teachers and all Christians are indeed lights also, in virtue of their divine calling, fellowship with God, and holy living, yet their main object is to bear witness of the light in Christ, to lead to it by precept and example.—O glorious nobility! to be born of God, His child and heir!—Behold, what manner of love! 1 John 3:1.—Osiander: What is due to Christ alone, must not be attributed to any man.—The eternal light sends forth rays in the hearts of all men. He who is not enlightened, must ascribe it to himself and the dominion of darkness.—Canstein: Noble family helps not to sonship and salvation, but only the being born anew of God.—Mosheim : Men in the state of nature are not children of God, and therefore have no right to salvation. Gerlach, after Augustine: Corrupt men are called the world, because they love the world more than its Creator. By love we dwell in a thing with the heart, and we have therefore deserved to bear the name of that wherein we dwell by love. Heubner: John must prepare the way for the reception of the Light.—The light must came gradually, else it blinds.—The nobility of the children of God is attained only through the Spirit, through birth from God, through a proper spiritual generation. [John 1:6. John the Baptist, the greatest of men before Christ, because he was nearest to Christ, and comprehended all the light of the preparatory revelations of Moses and the prophets. John 1:7. Every minister only a borrowed light to lean men to Christ, the true Light. John 1:8. Christ is the sun of the soul, the source of spiritual light, life and growth.—P. S.] [John 1:9. Arrowsmith: Christ is the true Light; 1. The undeceiving Light, in opposition to all the false lights of the Gentiles ; 2. The real Light, in opposition, to ceremonial types and shadows; 3. The underived Light, in opposition to all borrowed light; 4. The supereminent Light, in opposition to all ordinary light. John 1:10. Hengstenberg: The creature should shout for joy, if its Creator comes to redeem it. John 1:11. It is disgraceful if the creature despises the creature; it is doubly disgraceful if the people of the Covenant despise the Lord of the Covenant.] [John 1:13. The new (celestial, divine) birth constitutes the true nobility of grace, as contrasted with the aristocracy of natural birth, the aristocracy of money, the aristocracy of merit, the aristocracy of fame.—Regeneration: 1. Its origin; 2. Its growth; 3. Its manifestation; 4.Its end (the final resurrection).—The children of God the salt of the earth, the light of the world, the benefactors of the race.—Comp. the admirable description of Christian life in the Epistle to Diognetus, ch. v. and vi., composed soon after the Apostolic age. Christians in the world are there compared to the soul in the body: they are scattered through the world and dwell in the world, yet are not of the world: they are hated by the world, yet love and benefit it; they are imprisoned in the world, yet preserve it from corruption, they are sojourners in the perishing world, looking for an incorruptible dwelling in heaven.—P. S.] Footnotes: John 1:6. [The Greek here is ἐγένετο (became), which differs from ἦν (was), John 1:1, as the German ward (or geworden) does from war, but it cannot be well rendered in English. It is the antithesis between temporal or created existence which has a beginning, and implies previous non-existence, and eternal or uncreated existence, which has neither beginning nor end. The same distinction—John 8:58 : πρὶν̓Αβραὰμγενέσθαι, ἐγώεἰμι.—P. S.] John 1:6. [ἀπεσταλμένος does not belong to ἐγένετο=ἀπεστάλη (Chrysostom, Hom. 6 p. 42, and Hengstenberg), but to ἄνθρωπος.—P. S.] John 1:9. [So Lange, Ewald somewhat differently: Ja das wahrhaflige Licht, welches jeden Menschen erleuchtet, kam stets in die welt. Others translate: that was the true Light which, coming into the world, lighteth every man. ἐρχόμενον may be connected with ἄνθρωπον Vulg.: hominem venientem, Luth., E. V.), or better, with ἦν (Lange, Ewald). See the Exeg. Notes. In the latter case a comma should be made after ἄνθρωπον, as is done by Tischendorf, eighth ed.—P. S.] John 1:10. [δἰαν̓τον͂ ?. Cod. ΰ* read δἰαν̓τόν, probably an error of the copyist.—P. S.] John 1:11. [The E.V. obliterates the distinction between the neutral τὰἴδια, das Seine, his own things, possessions, inheritance, and the masculine οίἴδιοι, die Seinen, his own people, servants, subjects.—P. S.] John 1:13. The difficulty of the passage has occasioned the omission of ον̓δὲἐκθελ. σαρκ. in Cod. E and others; and of ον̓δὲἐκθελ. ἀνθρ. in Cod. B. and others. Others, as Augustine, have transposed the clauses. [See Tischend. Oct. VIII. p. 743. [Hengstenberg adopts the construction of Chrysostom, which would have been more naturally expressed by ἀπεστάλη, and defends it by referring to Malachi 3:1; Malachi 3:13 : “Lo, I am sending my messenger,” etc., compared with the words of the Baptist, John 3:28 : ἀπεσταλμένοςεἰμὶἔμπροσθεναν̓τοῦ. I prefer the usual connection of ἀπεσταλμένος with ἄνθρωπος.—P. S.] [The Baptist is mentioned in the Prologue to confirm the reality of the historical appearance of Christ: Brόckner; as a brilliant exception from the terrible darkness spoken of Joh 1:5 : Ewald; to explain the rejection of Christ by His own people, John 1:10-11 : Meyer; to introduce the historic manifestation of the word: Alford. He is mentioned rather as the personal representative of the whole O. T. revelation in whom the law and the promise, Moses and Isaiah, were united and pointed directly to Christ. See Lange in the text.—P. S.] [In the fifth edition of Meyer the reference to Ewald is omitted. In his Commentary, Ewald translates δἰαν̓τοῦ durch ihn without explaining whether ihn is meant of John or of Christ.—P. S.] [Ryle: “One of those texts which show the immense importance of the ministerial office through which the Holy Spirit is pleased to produce faith in man’s heart.—P. S.] [Meyer denies the reference to the disciples of John entirely. Godet, on the contrary, defends it, and justly so, in view of Joh 1:20; John 3:25; and in view of the Gnostic sect of the Disciples of John in the second century, who held that John the Baptist was the true Messiah. (Clementis Rom. Recognitiones l. I. c. 54 and 60. Comp. the articles of Petermann, Mendόer and Zabier, in Herzog’s Encyclop. Vols. IX. p. 318 and XVIII. p. 341.) Only we must not suppose either that John wrote expressly, or exclusively against this error. See Dr. Lange above.—P. S.] [In the first ed. Luther translated: “Das war ein wahr-haftig Licht, welches alle Menschen erleuchtet durch seine Zukunft in die Welt,” i.e., “which, coming into the world, lighteneth all men.” In the later editions he followed the Vulgate.—P. S.] [Meyer, however, lays the emphasis on ἧν aderat, which is put first, and translates: “Vorhanden war das Licht das wahrhaftiqe, welches erleuchtet jeden Menschen, der in die Welt kommt,” the true light was in existence, etc. But there is no good reason why ἧν should be emphasized rather than ἀληθτνόν, and then ἐντῷκόσμῳἡν, John 1:10, would be a repetition of Joh 1:9. The old usual interpretation is preferable to Meyer’s, but both are to be rejected, because the phrase to come into the world for to be born, though Rabbinical (αָּ ?ςεֹ ?μַ ?ναֹּ ?μαָּ ?ΰֵ ?ι=all men), is not Scriptural, as applied to common men, but is reserved exclusively for the Messiah with the implied sense of prζ-existence, John 3:19; John 3:3; John 6:14; John 11:27; John 12:46; John 18:37. Bengel: “Apud Hebrζos frequens est periphrasis hominis, δαִ ?ΰαִ ?ςεμν veniens in mundum, sed in N. T. et. prζcipue in in hoc libro id at solo Christo dicitur, sublimi significatu. Erat enim, ante etiam, quam veniret.”—P. S.] [In his Commentary Ewald explains somewhat differently. He connects John 1:9 with John 1:4 : es kam damals immer in die Welt, it was at that time always coming into the world, so that every mortal, if he would, might have been guided by the light.—P. S.] [Keim: “er war in stetem Kommen in die Welt.” Similarly Ewald, see preceding foot-note. ἦνἐρχόμενον is stronger than ἦν, and implies a continued action, like the English, was coming, as distinct from came. Comp. ἦνβαπτίζων, John 1:28. Hengstenberg accounts for this circumlocution of the simpler imperf. by the emphasis laid on ἐρχόμενος as a term of the Messiah; comp. Matthew 3:11 : ὁὀπίσωμονἐρχόμενος; John 11:3; John 1:15; John 1:27; John 1:30.—P. S.] [Comp. the lines of Gφthe: “War nicht das Auge sonnenhaft, Wie kφnnten wir das Licht erblicken?Lebt’ nicht in uns des Gottes eigne Kraft, Wie kφnnt’ uns Gφttliches entzόcken?”—P. S.] [There is no Scripture proof that ἴδια (viz., δώματα, οἰκήματα) means the world, and ἴδιοι mankind in general; both expressions refer to Israel as the peculiar people of God, ἴδια to the nation as a whole, ἴδιοι to the individuals. George Campbell (on the Gospels). Alford and Barnes would understand ταἴδια of Palestine or Judea, and οίἴδιοι of its inhabitants.—P. S.] [Something of this feeling of sadness, in view of the ingratitude of the world to Christ, pervades the hymn of the noble Novalis: Wenn alle untreu werden, So bleib ich Der dock treu,” especially the second stanza: I could weep night and morning That Thou hast died, and yet So few will heed Thy warning, So many Thee forget. O loving and true-hearted, How much for us didst Thou! Yet is Thy fame departed, And none regards it now.—P. S.] [Godet translates: “elle (la Parole) les a mis en position de devenir enfants de Dieu” and explains ἐξονσὶα to mean essentially the same with the Pauline νἱοθεσὶα, the filial relation to which man is restored by faith, yet not identical with regeneration, but a condition to it. “Car Dieu ne peut communiquer sa propre vie par le πνεν͂μα qu'ὰ ?un homme avec qui il est reconciliι.… Mais une fοie que l' adoption a eu lieu, la regιnιration doit suivre… et c ιst la le second privilθge, resultant, du premier, que saint Jean exprime dans ces mots: ‘Devenir enfants de Dieu.’” But the second is rather explanatory of the first (ἐξονσὶα).—P. S.] [In the fifth ed. Meyer explains: er ermδtchtigte sie, he empowered them. Comp. John 5:27; John 17:2.—P. S.] [Arrowsmith, quoted by Ryle: “The word ‘name’ in the Scripture is often put for person. The receivers of Christ are said to believe on His name, because the direct object of their faith is the person of Christ. It is not the believing that Christ died for all, or for me, or for the elect, or any such proposition, that saveth. It is believing on Christ. The person, or name of Christ, is the object of faith.”—P. S.] [So Meyer, constructio κατασύνεσιν, as in 2 John 1:1; Philemon 1:10; Galatians 4:19. But Lange is right.—P. S.] [“Ex sanguinibus enim homines nascuntur maris et feminζ ?” Tract. II. § 14. Ewald translates the plural aus Blut und Blut, and explains: durch blosse Missching voun Zeugungs-stoffen. Wordsworth: human commixtures.—P. S.] [The plural usage of αἶμα in the sense of this passage occurs only in Euripides, Ion John 705: ἄλλωντραφεὶςἀφ̓αἱμάτων, but often in the sense of murder, in the classics and in the LXX. See quotations in Meyer.—P. S.] [Augustine, In Joh. Tract. II. § 14, quotes Genesis 2:22 and Ephesians 5:28-29 to show that caro may be used for uxor; bur these passages (as also Judges 7) are not to the point. Flesh here means human nature, male and female. “What is born of the fiesh is flesh,” John 3:6.—P. S] [So Albert Barnes; “adopted by a pious man.” Without a shadow of proof. Ryle and Crosby refer “flesh” to man’s own and “man” to any foreign human agency. But this could have been much more clearly expressed.—P. S.] [So also Alford, who quotes, with Lόcke, the Homeric πατὴρἀνδρῶντεθεῶντε. But Meyer denies that ἀνήρ is ever generalized into ἄνθρωπος, least of all here where the act of generation is spoken of.—P.S.] [Similarly God t: The will of the flesh is la volontι dominιe par p imagination sensuelle, the will of man la volontι plus independante de la nature, la resolution virile.—P. S.] [Nature (αἵματα), desire (σάρξ), will (ἀνήρ). But the difficulty is that θήλημα is used in the second as well as the third clause.—P. S.] John 1:14. [Or, pitched his ten; Meyer, Ewald: zeltete; Godet: a dressι sa tente. The verb ἐσκήνωσεν (from σκηνή, tent), which John uses also of God’s dwelling with His people on the new earth (Revelation 21:3), was chosen in allusion to the Shekinah (ωׁ ?αִ ?ιπָ ?δ, or ωְׁ ?αִ ?ιπָ ?ΰ, a Rabbinical theological term from ωָׁ ?λַ ?ε to dwell), i.e., the indwelling or glorious presence of Jehovah in the holy of holies of the tabernacle and the temple, which typically pointed to the incarnation. This allusion is evident from the correspondence of the letters (Bengel: “eζdem literζ in ωλιδ et σκηνὴ ?"), and from the following ἐθεασάμεθατὴδόξαναὐτοῦ comp. Exodus 25:8 (where Aquila, Symmachus and Theodotion translate ωָׁ ?αַ ?πְ ?ϊִּ ?ι by σκηνώσω; Exodus 40:34; Leviticus 26:11-12; Ezekiel 37:27; Haggai 2:8; Revelation 7:15; Revelation 21:3. In the Apocryphal books the Shekinah was especially ascribed to the Sophia (Sir 24:8 : ἐν̓Ιακὼβκ́ατασκήνωσον), and the Logos. The humanity of Christ became the Shekinah of His divinity—P. S.] THRID SECTION The Incarnation of the Logos, the Appearance of the real Shekinah among the FaithfulJoh_1:14-18(1) Incarnation Of The Logos, Or The Absolutely New Birth. Appearance Of The Real Shekinah, John 1:14. (2) Testimony Of John In General, John 1:15. (3) Experience Of Believers, Or Grace, John 1:16. (4) Antithesis Between Moses And Christ, The Law Of The Old Testament And Christianity, In Their Authority And Work, John 1:17. (5) Antithesis Between The Whole Old World And Christ In Their Relation To God, John 1:1814 And the Word was made [became, ἐγένετο] flesh, and dwelt [sojourned, tabernacled, ἐσχήνωσεν] among us, (and we beheld his glory [the real Shekinah], the glory as of the [an] only-begotten of [from, παρά the Father,) [omit parenthesis] full of 15grace and truth. John bare [beareth] witness of him, and cried [crieth], saying, This was he of whom I spake [said], He that cometh after me [behind me] is preferred 16[hath come to be] before me; for he was before me [lit. first of me]. And [For] of his fulness have all we received [did we all receive], and [even] grace for grace. 17For the law was given by [through] Moses, (but) grace and truth came [came to pass] by [through] Jesus Christ. 18No man hath seen God at any time [No one hath ever seen God]; the only begotten Son [God], which [who] is in [toward] the bosom of the Father [of the nature of the Father and in his full confidence and service] he hath declared him [hath interpreted all). AND [John 1:14 contains the central idea of the Prologue, the Gospel, and the system of Christianity, yea, central idea of the whole history of the world; for ancient history before the incarnation was a preparation for Christ as the fulfillment of all types, prophecies and nobler aspirations of men; history after that event is subservient to the spread and triumph of Christianity till Christ be all in all. The theology of John is Christological throughout (comp. 1 John 4:2-3); that of Paul, in the Romans and Galatians, is anthropological and soteriological, but the Colossians and Philippians are likewise Christological, and in 1 Timothy 3:16 Paul makes the incarnation the central fact of our religion. But the idea of the incarnation, the great mystery of godliness, should not be confined to the mere birth of Christ, but extended to His whole divine human life, death and resurrection; it is “God manifest in the flesh.” Bengel discovers a threefold antithetic correspondence between vers.1 and John 4 : THE WORD Was in the beginningbecameGodfleshWith Godand dwelt among us.—P. S.]John 1:14 And.—This καὶ has been explained in very different ways: as equivalent, for example to γάρ (for) or οὖ (therefore), or as signifying the condition of Christ’s becoming man. But it denotes an actual historical advance not, however, as De Wette takes it, upon John 1:9, but, as Lόcke, upon John 1:11. First, the universal advent was spoken of; then the theocratical advent in the Old Testament; now, after indicating the transitional distinction of consecrated human birth and birth from God, which were continually approaching each other, the Evangelist comes to the point of incarnation, where birth and new or divine birth coincide. The Word became flesh.—In this finishing sentence the subject is again named. Not a life only, or a light, from the Logos, was made flesh, but the whole Logos as Life and Light (see Colossians 1:19; Colossians 2:9). He became σάρξ; the strongest expression for becoming veritable man. [This grand sentence: ὁλόγοςσὰρξἐγένετο, stands alone in the Bible; but the same idea in somewhat different forms of expression occurs repeatedly, viz.: 1 John 4:2 (ἐνσαρκὶἐληλυθώς, Christ having come in the flesh); 1 Timothy 3:16 (ἐφανερώθηἐνσαρκί, God was manifested in the flesh); Romans 1:3 (γενόμενοςἐκσπέρματοςΔαυεὶδκατὰσάρκα, born from the seed of David according to the flesh); John 8:3 (ἐνὁμοιώματισαρκὸςἁμαρτίας, in the likeness of sinful flesh); Philippians 2:7 (ἑνὁμοιώματιἀνθρώπωνγενόμενος, being made in the likeness of men); Hebrews 2:14 (where it is said that Christ, like other men, partook of αἵματοςκαὶσαρκός, of blood and flesh). Flesh (σάρξ) is a strong Hebraizing term (αָּ ?ωָׂ ?ψ) for human nature in its weakness, frailty and mortality. Comp. the English, mortal (the German, der Sterbliche), for man. When used of man, the idea of moral weakness or sinfulness is also often implied, but not necessarily. In the passages where it is ascribed to Christ, sin must be excluded in view of the unanimous testimony of the Apostles to the sinlessness of Jesus. The term is more, comprehensive than body (σῶμα), which is used in distinction from soul (ψυχή) and spirit νοῦς or πνεῦμα), while flesh sometimes includes both; it is more concrete and emphatic than man (ἄνθρωπος), and expresses more strongly the infinite condescension of the Logos, the identity of His human nature with our own, and the universalness of His manhood. Yet it is as correct to speak of Christ’s becoming man (ἐνανθρώπησις, Menschwerdung) as of His becoming flesh (ἐνσάρκωσις, incarnatio, incarnation, Fleischwerdung). The Logos assumed, not an individual man or a single human personality, but human nature into union with His prζ-existent divine personality. He moreover assumed human nature, not apparently and transiently (according to the Gnostic Docetic view), but really and permanently; nor partially (as Apollinaris taught), but totally, with all its essential constituents as created by God, body, soul and spirit. For Christ everywhere appears as a full man (comp. John 8:40 : “Ye seek to kill me, a man who,” etc.), and He is emphatically called “the Son of Man;” John speaks expressly of the soul (ψυχή) of Christ, John 12:27, and of His spirit (πνεῦμα), John 11:33; John 13:21; John 19:30; comp. Matthew 27:50. In the O. T., too, flesh often includes the moral or spiritual nature of man, comp. Leviticus 17:11; Deuteronomy 12:15; Job 12:10. It is not the flesh as opposed to the spirit, that is here intended, but human nature, as distinct from the divine. The flesh is the outward tabernacle and the visible representative of the whole man to our senses. Finally Christ assumed human nature, not in its primitive state of innocence, but in its fallen, suffering, mortal state, yet without sin (which, does not originally and necessarily belong to man); for He came to save this fallen nature. He was subject to temptation, or temptable, and was perfected through suffering (Hebrews 2:14-18; Hebrews 4:15), but He was neither σαρκικός (Romans 7:14), nor ψυκικός (1 Corinthians 2:14). He appeared not “in the flesh of sin,” but only “in the likeness of the flesh of sin” (Romans 8:2). He bore all the consequences of sin without a share of personal sin and guilt. This amazing miracle of His love is best expressed by the term: The Logos became flesh. Comp. 2 Corinthians 8:9 : “Ye know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ that, though He was rich, yet for your sakes He became poor, that ye by His poverty might become rich.” At His second advent Christ will appear as man indeed, yet no more in the likeness of sinful flesh, nor in weakness and poverty, but in glory and immortality (comp, Hebrews 9:28, χωρὶςἁμαρτίας). P. S.] It imputes a Judaistic [and Apollinarian] nonsense to the Evangelist, to represent him as saying that the Logos took only the human σάρξ, and not a reasonable human soul (Praxeas, Kφstlin, Zeller). The evidence of the contrary lies not only in the impossibility of conceiving a human σάρξ without ψυχή and such a ψυχή without πνεῦμα (see Meyer, p. 65), but especially in the Old Testament usage of the term flesh to denote human nature (Isaiah 40); to say nothing of John’s express designation of the ψυχή of Christ in John 12:27, and the πνεῦμα in John 11:33; John 13:21; John 19:30. But while the half-Baur school thus construes John’s statement of the incarnation Judaistically, Hilgenfeld construes it Gnostically: giving Christ (according to the Valentinian system) a real σάρξ, indeed, but such as was exalted above material limitations. Meyer (against Frommann and others) contests without good reason the anti-Docetic force of this expression; though certainly the main force of it is rather anti-Gnostic; for the incipient Gnosticism first asserted an external connection of σάρξ and λόγος, against which the verb ἐγένετο would be more emphatic than the substantive σάρξ. With the idea of the σάρξ comes also the idea of passibility, but by no means the idea of any weakness of the flesh arising from sin; for Scripture recognizes the flesh in three stages: (1) pure in paradise; (2) weakened by sin; (3) sanctified by the Spirit; and the Logos could become flesh only in the latter sense. All this carries in it the antithesis between His incarnation and His eternal, immaterial existence; yet neither in the sense of Pantheism, which makes His incarnation an accident (Baur), nor in the sense of the mediζval scholasticism, which sees in it, even as incarnation, a humiliation of the Logos even into an incongruous, heterogeneous nature. The historical humiliation of Christ coincides indeed with His historical incarnation; yet the two are to be distinguished. The supernatural birth of Christ is unquestionably implied in this passage, in that the origin of Christ as God-Man stands in opposition to the natural births previously described, all which, as such, needed to be completed by the birth from God (contra Meyer). [Became, ἐγένετο.—Not was, ἦν, as in John 1:1, nor ἐγένετοἄνθρωπος, as is said of John, John 1:6, who had no existence before his birth, but the prζ-existent, personal Logos became flesh. Comp. LXX., Genesis 2:7 : ἐγένετοὁἄνθρωποςεἰςψυχὴςζῶσαν. The word denotes a single and completed act. The Logos was not converted or changed into flesh, nor simply associated with flesh, but endued with human nature, which He assumed once for all into personal and perpetual union with Him. The Logos was henceforth Christ Jesus, the God-Man (θεάνθρωπος), and this not only for a transient purpose, but He continues so forever.—P. S.] Tabernacled among us.—God dwelt as Jehovah in Israel, hidden in the most holy place of the tabernacle (σκηνή); now in the Logos He has tabernacles (ἐσκήνωσεν) among the disciples in the midst of the people, thus making the disciples themselves His tabernacle. (On among us, ἐνἡμῖν, see John 1:16. The disciples and witnesses of Christ are meant, but as the central point of the people, and of all mankind). The expression evidently alludes to the Old Testament dwelling of God in Israel. The idea of that dwelling of Jehovah in the holy tabernacle (Exodus 25:8; Exodus 29:45) is enlarged even in the prophets (Isaiah 4:5; Isaiah 57:15). Now the Lord has taken His dwelling among His own people themselves. This reference is confirmed by what follows. “The Targums likewise represent the Word (ξιξψΰ) as the Shekinah (ωּׁ ?αιπΰ), and the Messiah as the manifestation of the latter” (Meyer).And we beheld his glory.—Meyer rightly maintains, against Lόcke, De Wette and Tholuck, that this main thought cannot be read as a parenthesis. Such reading has been occasioned by the nominative πλήρηςχάριτος, at the close of the verse, referring to λόγος. According to Baumgarten-Crusius and Meyer [Brόckner, Alford], this nominative refers, by a solecism, to αὐτοῦ, and serves to give more independent prominence to the descriptive clause. But the clause may also be read as a declaration prompted by the contemplation; ἦν being understood.We beheld.—The beholding has faith for its organ; it is not a merely outward vision, still less merely inward; nor does it perceive the glory of Christ only in single miracles or in a transfiguration, but in His whole life (comp. 1 John 1:1). [θεάομαι moreover is richer than ὁράω, and means properly to behold or contemplate with admiration and delight. John speaks here in the name of all the Apostles and eye-witnesses of the life of Christ. The plural adds force to the statement, as in John 21:24; 1 John 1:1; 2 Peter 1:16. Faith lifts the veil of Christ’s humanity and worships His divine glory, while to unbelief He is a mere man. Hengstenberg refers to several passages from Isaiah (Isaiah 40:5; Isaiah 66:2; Isaiah 66:18), in which the beholding of the glory of Jehovah is promised. John recognized Jehovah in the incarnate Logos (John 12:41).—P. S.] His glory, δόξα, λָּ ?αεֹ ?γ.—The real appearances of the divine glory in the Old Testament must be distinguished from its symbolical signs. Its signs are the cloud and tempest on Sinai, the pillar of smoke and the pillar of fire, the cherubim over the ark of the covenant in the most holy place. Its real manifestations are, from the nature of the Old Testament, transient, and given in visions: manifestations of the Angel of the Lord (see above), or of the Lord Himself attended by a host of angels, Daniel 7. The manifestation of the Angel of the Lord is, in its nature, connected with the manifestation of His glory. The later Jewish theology has designated these manifestations as the Shekinah. In Christ the Shekinah appears in full reality. [We must distinguish four stages of this glory: 1) the prζ-existent divine glory of the Logos with the Father, John 17:5; John 2) the preparatory shadowy manifestation of His glory in the Old Testament, as seen by the prophetic eye of Isaiah 12:41; Isaiah 3) its visible revelation in human form in the life and work of the incarnate Word, which shone from every miracle, John 2:11; John 4) the final and perfect manifestation of His divine-human glory in eternity in which the believers will share, John 17:24.—P. S.] When Meyer, with Hofmann (Schriftbew. II.1, p. 21), makes the incarnation of Christ itself equivalent to His humiliation, and so conceives even theanthropic existence as distinct from simple divine, he has no Scripture for it, either in John 12:41; John 17:5; John 17:22; John 17:24, or in Philippians 2:6. Unquestionably the human δόξα of Christ in His earthly life was to be relatively conceived; but only (1) in that He entered into the historical conditions of humanity, especially into subjection to the law, (2) in that the life of the first man waited in Him for its completion in the higher, imperishable manifestation of the second. The glory [emphatically repeated] as of an only begotten [δόξανὡςμουογενοῦςπαρὰπατρός].—A closer description of the δόξα. It was alone in its kind, and could be characterized only thus: as of the only begotten. The ὡς expresses literally not the reality (Euthym. Zigabenus: ὄντως), but in similitude, the idea of the only begotten, to which the appearance of Christ corresponded, while assuredly it first awakened that idea and brought it to view. Only the μονογενής could manifest Himself so (John 1:18; John 3:6; John 3:18; 1 John 4:9). That John has the term from Christ Himself, is shown by John 3:16; John 3:18. Paul’s πρωτότοκος, first begotten [Colossians 1:15; Hebrews 1:6], is a parallel. Both terms denote not only the trinitarian relation, of the Son of God, but also His theanthropic relation. In the expression of John, however, the incommunicable relation of Christ to God predominates; in that of Paul, His incommunicable relation to the world. In the one, the ontological idea of the Trinity rules; in the other, the economic and soteriological. The notion of the only begotten is closely akin to that of the beloved (ἀγαπητός), not identical with it as Kuinoel holds. The word denotes indeed, according to Meyer, the only begotten; but it thereby makes Christ also the peculiarly begotten (Tholuck), who is the principle of all other births and regenerations. The reference of μονογενοῦς to δόξα (Erasmus and others) is wholly without support. From the Father [belongs to μονογενοῦς, not to δόξαν.—Origen: ἐκτῆςοὐσίαςτοῦπατρός. His origin and issue is from the essence of the Father. His coming forth from the Father (John 6:46; John 7:29; John 16:27) does not exclude, however, His continuance in the heaven of the Father (John 3:13; comp. John 1:18). His human relations do not supersede His divine. Full of grace and truth.—Comp. John 1:17. The result of the beholding, uttered in an exclamation of astonishment, expressing the main forms in which the δόξα was seen in Him. He was full of grace and truth. Not only did He seem all grace and truth, but grace and truth seemed concentrated in Him. And this was His glory, for grace and truth are the main attributes of Jehovah in the Old Testament, since the Messianic spirit recognized Him as pre-eminently the God of redemption (ηֶ ?ρֶ ?γεֶ ?ΰֱ ?ξֶ ?ϊ [in the LXX.: πολυέλεοςκαὶἀλμθινός], Exodus 34:6; Psalms 25:10; Psalms 36:6). This reference to the Old Testament is groundlessly doubted by Meyer; for though ΰֱ ?ξֶ ?ϊ denotes also faithfulness, yet faithfulness and truth are one in the divine nature; and the rendering of ηֶ ?ρֶ ?γ by ἔλεος in the Septuagint decides nothing, since ἔλεος finds its more precise equivalent in ψַ ?ηֲ ?ξִ ?ιν. But Meyer well observes that ἀλήθεια answers to the light-nature (φῶς), χάρις to the life-nature (ζωή) of the Logos. Of course the life is as much concerned in the truth of Christ, as the light in the grace; the latter notions are more soteriologically concrete, than the former. Christ, as absolute redemption, was pure grace; as absolute revelation, pure truth. [Christ is the personal Truth, John 14:6, and is in the Apoc. called the ἀληθινός, John 3:7; John 19:11, is whom there is a perfect harmony between appearance and reality, claim and being, promise and fulfilment.—P. S.] John 1:15. John beareth witness of him.—Having described the advent of Christ to its consummation in the incarnation, the Evangelist comes to the testimony of John concerning Christ. He first introduced John’s mission to bear witness of Christ, John 1:6; now he comes to his actual testimony concerning Christ, and that as a testimony even to His prζ-existence and His higher nature. Afterwards follows the testimony of the Baptist concerning the Messianic (John 1:19) and the soteriological (John 1:29 sqq.) character of Jesus. Beareth witness.—Present. John’s testimony is perpetually living, active and valid. Its continued validity in the present rests upon the past fact that he cried only in Israel, and uttered what he had to say of Christ (κέκραγελέγων). Hence Christ could appeal to his testimony, John 5:33; Matthew 21:24. Κράζειν, elsewhere also, John 7:28; John 7:37, etc., for loud public proclamation. There is no reason for taking the perfect in a present sense. [Comp. Text. Notes 3 and 4.—P. S.] This was he of whom I said.—Οὖτοςἦν. He it was. Not because John is conceived as speaking in the present. In the testimony of John two periods must be distinguished: before and after the baptism of Jesus. Before the baptism, he preached the Messiah in His higher characters, as approaching, but knew not yet the Messianic individual; after the baptism he could point to Jesus and say: This was He, of whom I declared that prζ-existence. Thus this second stage of his testimony is here in hand. He that cometh after me.—[ ὁὀπίσωμουἐρχόμενος, ἔμπροσθένμουγέγονεν. A pithy oxymoron exciting attention and reflection, repeated John 1:27; John 1:30, and probably suggested by the prophetic passage, Malachi 3:2 : “Lo, I am sending My messenger, and he hath prepared a way before Me.” The following words, ὅτιπρῶτόςμουἦν, which must be referred to the prζ-existence of Christ (comp. ἦν, John 1:1; John 1:9-10), not to the superiority of rank (which would require ἐστί), contain the clue to the enigmatic and paradoxical sentence. The meaning may be thus explained: My successor (in time) has become (or has come to be) my predecessor (in rank); for He is before me (even in time), being absolutely the first, viz.: the eternal Son of God; while I am only a man born in time and sent to prepare the way for Him.—P. S.] “He that comes after me, has come before me.” Meyer. But it means: was made, has become(γέγονε) before me. John appeared before Christ as His fore-runner and herald; as to his progressive approach in His Old Testament advent, Christ was before him. His coming forth pervaded the Old Testament, and was the impelling power and cause of all prophecy, even the prophecy of John. And this earlier coming had its ground in His earlier (absolutely early, eternal) existence; hence ὅτιπρῶτόςμουἦν. These are, indeed, primarily antitheses of time. But the designation of the one coming after, as being before, implies at the same time a deeper and higher principle of life. According to Aristotle, the posterius in the real development is the prius in the idea or the value of the life. This is true of man in relation to the animal world, of the New Testament in relation to the Old, of Christ in relation to the Baptist. The ἐντιμότερόςμουἐστί of Chrysostom, therefore, is involved in the clause; while Meyer is right, against Lόcke, Tholuck and others, in not taking this for its primary sense. Theἔμπροσθένμουγέγονεν, of course, means not was before me (Luther and others), but: has become [or come to be] before me (against Meyer). Commentators have not been able to reconcile themselves to this γέγονεν, because they have not yet fairly reconciled themselves to the Old Testament incarnation of Christ. Hence Meyer: it is equal to προέρχεσθαι; Luthardt: He who at first came after me, as if He were my disciple, is since come before me, that is, become my master. Baumgarten-Crusius: of the ideal prζ-existence of Christ in the divine counsels. This interpretation lies in the right direction, but misses the fact that the prζ-existence of the Logos was personal and real, and that the ideal prζ-existence of the God-Man was from the first dynamically real, the power of the creation, the central force and the core of the Old Testament (the “roct” of Isaiah), and in Israel was in a continual process of incarnation, which was objectively represented beforehand in the Angel of the Lord. For he was before me [ὅτιπρῶτόςμουἦν].—The eternal prζ-existence of Christ is the ground of His theocratic manifestation. Here again Meyer [on account of the ἦν] emphasizes the temporal sense, against the reference of the πρῶτος to rank [which would require ἐστίν], contrary to Chrysostom, Erasmus [Beza, Calvin, Grotius] and many others. He would take the merely temporal conception (i.e., the prζ-existence of the Logos); hence πρῶτος in the sense of πρότερος. The comparative, however, could hardly stand here. Such prζ-existence itself involves the higher, even divine dignity.Meyer justly holds, against Strauss [De Wette, Scholten] and others, that the Baptist could certainly have from Malachi 3:1; Isaiah 6:1 ff. and Daniel 7:13 ff., the idea of the prζ-existence of Christ, which even the Rabbins attested. [Besides, we must assume a special revelation given to John at the baptism of Christ, John 1:33.—P. S.] John 1:16. For [text, rec.: And] of his fulness did we all receive.—Undoubtedly the testimony of the Baptist continued, as Origen, Chrysostom [Erasmus, Luther, Mel.] and others take it. We adjust the ἡμεῖςπάντες by referring it to the Old Testament saints (John 1:12), and particularly to the prophets, whose line John closed. From the fullness of Christ have we all drawn our supply, says the last of the prophets, and (even) grace for grace. The last, best, highest, which each one in the end received from His fulness, was grace. Thus the Old Testament experience of salvation looked to its completion in the New Testament. Comp. 1 Peter 1:11-12.Of his fulness.—See John 1:14, πλήρης [also Colossians 1:19; Colossians 2:9, according to which the whole fulness of the Godhead dwelled in Christ bodily; Ephesians 1:23, where the church as the body of Christ is called “the fulness of Him that filleth all in all.”—P. S.].—That the idea of the πλήρωμα does not necessarily originate in Gnostic soil (as Schwegler and others [of the Tόbingen School] hold), to pass thence into a pseudo-Johannean Gospel, a more thorough knowledge of the history of religion might abundantly teach. The heathen philosophy knows only an ideal pleroma as the basis of things; in the actual world all proceeds in broken emanations in infinitum, upon the premises of pantheism. But the idea of the real pleroma was an essential principle of the Old Testament religion and promise. In the Messiah the old piece-work was to become a whole, shadows were to become reality, revelation was to be finished. See Isaiah 11:1; [comp. Hebrews 1:1-2] Hence even Matthew, at the outset, speaks repeatedly of positive fulfilment, John 2, etc. Likewise all the Evangelists and Apostles in their way; Ephesians 1:10; Colossians 2:9; Colossians 2:17; Colossians 1:19. The pleroma of Christ in the world corresponds with the pleroma of the Trinity in heaven; it is absolute revelation and religion concluded and consummated in His personality; and it is patent that this idea could be only borrowed by the Gnostics, to be altered and corrupted. The πλήρωμα of Christ is His fullness of being in its revelation, ontologically present, actively demonstrating itself. He had already partially opened Himself in the Old Testament, so that all the prophets might draw from Him. Comp. John 10:6 sqq.; 1 Peter 1:11-12. And (even) grace for grace.—And even; not: and that, or: to wit.—Grace for grace[ηֵ ?οςַ ?μηֵ ?ο gratiam super gratiam]. Variously interpreted: (1) Starke: The grace of restoration, for the grace lost in paradise. (2) Chrysostom, Lampe, Paulus and others: The grace of the New Testament instead of or after that of the Old. (3) Augustine: First justification, then eternal life. (4) Bengel and most moderns: One grace after another [ever growing supplies of grace] from the fullness of Christ.—At the same time, however, the Baptist doubtless thought of the different developments of religious experience in the course of the Old Testament prophecy. Grace was continually assuming new forms. [This remark loses its force if John 1:16 gives the words of the Evangelist, not of the Baptist.—P. S.] John 1:17. For the law, etc.—[Antithetic demonstration of Joh 1:16] The antithesis of the Old and New Testaments, as in Paul (Romans 6:14; Romans 7:3; Galatians 4:4, etc.]. It must be remembered that both Apostles (and all the Apostles) recognize likewise the unity of the Old and New Testaments. This unity, even according to our text, is Christ Himself, and it is elsewhere in John [ch. John 8:56], as well as in Paul (Romans 4:4), represented by Abraham, or by promise and prophecy, also by the prophetic, typical side of the Mosaic law itself. The law, however, as law, constitutes the opposition of the Old Testament to the New. But the law is here placed in a twofold opposition to the New Testament. (1) As against grace, it is the binding commandment, which cannot give life, but by its demand of righteousness works the death of the sinner, either unto life in repentance, or unto death in the judgment, while it is incapable of giving life, expiating, justifying, sanctifying. Romans 7; 2 Corinthians 5; Galatians 3. (2) As against truth or the reality of salvation and of the kingdom of God, it is first only type, prefiguration, symbol; and then, when the reality is come, shadow, Colossians 3:17; Hebrews 10:1. Notice also the further antithesis, that the law was given, set forth, laid down (ἐρόθη), as a lifeless statute; grace and truth came, became (ἐγένετο), unfolded themselves as life.Grace and truth.—Grace as the complete New Testament grace of redemption, “in the distinct and solemn sense” [Meyer, p. 93], yet according to its historical progress, which began with Abraham’s righteousness of faith, Genesis 15:6.—Truth, as the full truth of life and the full life of truth, the reality and substance of salvation, in contrast with the shadow. [Redeeming grace is opposed to the condemnation, truth to the typical and shadowy character, of the law, of which Bengel says: iram parans et umbram habens.] Came through Jesus Christ.—In the historical synthesis: Jesus Christ, who is here for the first time called by His full [historical] name [in harmony with the instinctively artistic arrangement of the Prologue], the development of the grace also culminates in the absolutely efficient grace of redemption, But as Christ the Logos was from eternity, so also was the grace, as the power of the love and righteousness of God over the foreseen guilt of the world. Development is therefore no more to be ascribed to the grace in itself, than to the Logos in Himself; but the eternal grace, with the eternal Logos, entered into historical development towards incarnation, and the consummation: Christ in Jesus, was also the consummation of the grace. The thing here expressed, therefore, is the historical completion and operation of grace, not as a mere work of Christ (Clement of Alex.), or of God (Origen), but rather as the vital action of God in Christ. Dorschδus: “ἐδόθη et ἐγένετο eleganter distinguuntur, Ebr. III., prius enim organicam causam, posterius, principalem notat,” Yet leaving the Father the first principle. John 1:18. No man hath seen God at any time.—That these words also might have been spoken by John the Baptist, appears from John 3:31-32; and that they are to be actually attributed to him, from the fact that the Evangelist evidently distinguishes the testimony concerning Christ which, from John 1:15, the Baptist gave in general, and particularly among His disciples, from his next following testimony, John 1:19, before the rulers of the Jews. Our verse, however, not only particularizes respecting the ἀλήθεια, John 1:17 (Meyer), but at the same time enlarges the preceding thoughts. Christ is so truly the fulfiller of grace and truth, that He stands in contrast not only to Moses, but also to the prophets and to the Baptist himself (see John 3:31). No man hitherto has seen and revealed God in the sense in which He has seen and revealed Him. Christ, therefore, as fulfilment, is the first veritable revelation.—God is emphatically put first. God, in His interior essence, and in His fulness and full glory, no man hitherto hath seen.—No man—i.e., not only: not even Moses, but also: none of all the prophets, not even the Baptist.—Seen (ἐώρακε). Not merely perfecte cognovit (Kuinoel); nor does the term refer to intuition without visions (Meyer); still less to such a seeing on the part of the Logos, as was suspended by His incarnation. For as to Christ’s seeing of God, this was in its nature at once internal, intuitive beholding and external seeing. When the prophets beheld, they saw not with the outward eye; when they saw, they beheld not in the prophetic way; and all that they in their prophetic moments beheld, was piece-work, which they beheld in its symbolical image. In Christ the prophetic vision became one with the ordinary external vision. He saw in all the outward works of God His Spirit, His personal love; and what He saw in the Spirit, He saw not merely as idea, but as actual divine operation. To Him all sensible seeing was permanently a sublime seeing of the majesty of God, a blissful seeing of the love of the Father. And of this vision of Christ, though it was grounded in the eternity of the Logos, Brόckner justly observes that it was not interrupted by the incarnation. See John 3. [The same perfect knowledge of God, Christ claims for Himself alone, Matthew 11:27,—a passage which strongly proves the essential harmony of the Christ of the Synoptists with the Christ of John.—P. S.] The only begotten Son [God] who is on (or toward) the bosom of the Father.—With the prζ-existence of the Logos before His incarnation, His co-existence during His incarnation, is so simply put, that we can find in these words nothing too high for the theology of the Baptist. [?] If the Baptist elsewhere called Him the One who baptized with the Holy Ghost and with fire (Matthew 3), the Bridegroom of the church (John 3:29), the One who cometh from heaven, in contrast with all prophets, he thereby designated Him also as the only begotten Son. We may then leave it entirely undecided, how far he actually understood the Sonship of Christ from Psalms 110 and other passages, and whether the term μονογενής does not belong rather to our Evangelist.—Who is on the bosom of the Father [ὁὤνεἰςτὸνκὸλπον—not ἐντῷκόλπῳ ?—τοῦπατρός. The preposition εἰς expresses a leaning on, or direction towards, the bosom of the Father, the union of motion and rest in the love of the Only Begotten to the Father. Comp. the notes on πρὸςτὸνθεόν, John 1:1. The phrase to be (leaning) on the bosom, like the Latin, in sinu or gremio esse, sedere, and the German, Schoosskind, bosom-child, expresses a relation of the closest intimacy and tenderest affection. Compare what is said of the Wisdom (the Logos) in Proverbs 8:30 : “Then I was near Him as one brought up with Him; and I was daily His delight, rejoicing always before Him.” Bengel remarks: “The bosom here is divine, paternal, fruitful, mild, sweet, spiritual. Men are said to be in the loins (in lumbis) who are yet to be born; they are in the bosom (in sinu) who have been born. The Son was in the bosom of the Father, because He was never-not born (non natus, ἀγέννητος). The highest unity, and the most intimate knowledge from immediate sight, is here signified.”—P. S.].—Acccording to Hofmann and Meyer, the Evangelist is speaking here, and speaking of Christ exalted. From this the εἰςτὸνκόλπον is supposed to explain itself as expressing the exaltation. But this would deprive the clause of all force, and reduce it to a pointless, self-neutralizing announcement. If it means: The only begotten Son, who has now ascended to the bosom of the Father, who once preached to us when He was with us,—the relative clause, besides being unmeaning, would be inaccurate; it should read: Who is again in the bosom of the Father. The passage John 1:50 does not prove that during the earthly life of Christ such an εἶναιεἰςτὸνκόλποντοῦπατρός did not belong to Him. The antithesis between His being on earth (John 1:51) and His being in heaven (John 3:13), between His being with the Father (John 8:35), representing the Father (John 14:9), and being one with the Father (John 10:30), and His coming forth from the Father (John 16:28), His being alone with the Father in His passion (John 16:32), and His being forsaken by God (Matthew 27:46), as well as between His glory (c. John 1:14) and His being not yet glorified (John 7:39),—is to be explained neither by a dualistic separation between the consciousness of the Logos and the consciousness of Jesus, nor by a pantheistic admission of human limitations into the Logos (Thomasius), but by the alternation of Christ’s moods between His self-subsistent relation to God and His self imposed compassionate relation to the world, or between the predominance of self-limiting grace and that of heaven-embracing omnipotence; between the states of humiliation and exaltation in their essential principle and positive spirit. We therefore, with De Wette, take ὤν as a time- less present, and εἰς, after the analogy of the πρὸςτὸνθεόν in John 1:1, as expressing the eternal direction of the Son towards the Father, Lόcke rightly refers the being in the bosom of the Father, or for the Father, to the incarnate Logos, as He here appears in the definite character of the only begotten Son. Following the common acceptation, Tholuck considers the figure as borrowed from the place of fellowship at table, at the right hand, John 13:23 [ἦνἀνακείμενος …. ἐντῶκόλπῳτοῦἸησοῦ ?]. Meyer thinks this unsuitable, but refers the expression to the paternal embrace, Luke 16:22 [ἐντοῖςκόλποις]. But the common acceptation is supported by the kindred expression of Christ, that He will come with the Father to His own, to make His abode with them, John 14:23; comp. Revelation 3:20; Revelation 19:9. He hath, etc.—Ἐκεῖνος [“an epithet of excellency and of distance,” as Bengel observes] is certainly very emphatic [He, and none else]; yet not as looking to the local superiority of heaven, but to the majesty of the Son of God. Interpreted.—Ἐξηγήσατο is hard to explain. Lόcke refers it to the grace and truth which Christ has seen in God; Meyer, to the substance of His view of God; [the E. V. (which supplies: Him), Alford, Owen, Godet, to God Himself in the beginning of the verse.—P. S.] Lόcke translates: He hath revealed it; De Wette: He hath proclaimed (declared) it, told it; Meyer: He hath explained, interpreted [viz.: the contents of His intuitions of God]. The New Testament parallels, Luke 24:35; Acts 15:12; Acts 15:14, etc., admit both renderings, but favor that of De Wette; the passage Leviticus 14:57 (LXX.) seems rather to favor Meyer, especially since the word, in classic usage, is applied particularly to the explaining of divine things. As we attribute the word to the Baptist, we conceive that it contains an allusion to the obscure beginnings of revelation in the Old Testament. The Baptist has not understood the historical predictions of Jesus, but has no doubt recognized in Christ the key of the ancient time, the perfect interpretation of the rudiments of revelation. We therefore take ἐξηγήσατο absolutely, with respect to the old covenant. In virtue of His seeing of God He has cleared up the law in grace and truth, brought the Old Testament gloriously to light in the New. He has brought and made solution. [This very verb argues against Dr. Lange’s view of the authorship of Joh 1:18, which must be as cribed to the Evangelist. The Baptist never came into close personal intimacy with Christ, and died before He had fully revealed the counsel of God and the meaning of the Old Testament. But the Evangelist, in full view of the atoning death and glorious resurrection, could use this term in its most comprehensive sense. With it the Prologue returns to the beginning, and ἐξηγήσατο suggests the best reason why Christ is called the Logos, since He is the Revealer and Interpreter of the hidden being of the Godhead in all that relates to our salvation.—John puts the supreme dignity of Christ, as the eternal Word, the Author of the world, the Giver of life and light, the Fountain of grace and truth, the only and perfect Expounder of God, at the head of his Gospel, because without this dignity Christianity would sink to a position of merely relative superiority above other religions, instead of being the absolute and therefore final religion for all mankind. Luther observes on the Prologue: “These are indeed brief words, but they contain the whole Christian doctrine and life.”—P. S.] AND ETHICAL1. See the preceding exegesis. 2. The Word was made flesh. He was God, He became flesh. What He was, He was not merely in idea (Hegel), but in personal divine subsistency; what He became (ἐγένετο), He became not merely in appearance (Gnosticism), nor in a partial way (joining Himself to the flesh, or veiling Himself in it, according to Nestorianism, or depriving the flesh of its genuineness, and transforming it into a divine manifestation, according to Eutyches), nor only for a particular need and purpose (Anselm), but perfectly and forever. As Word, He was the full expression of the essence of the Godhead, and therefore was also pure eternal being and personal life; in His coming forth, He entered into veritable, integral human nature in its pure essence. The Word could not be changed by the flesh (contrary to modern attempts to carry change into the essence of God), but the flesh was to be perfected by the Word in His coming in it, carried from conditional potentiality to determinate actuality, made the glorified organ of the eternal Spirit. The prosecution of the doctrine of the Communicatio idiomatum lies not on the side of the divine nature, but on the side of the human. As regards the doctrine of the incarnation, the Logos, as eternal Logos, became man, without change in Himself; that is to say, the incarnation was not occasioned by the sin of man. The doctrine of the flesh must, according to our passage, be so constructed that the flesh shall be as penetrable (and more) to the Spirit as to sin. The union between the divine and human natures is the great mystery of life, and to think of it rightly we must keep the distinction, that the divine being unfolds itself in a conscious way, like a work of art from a human mind, while the human becoming effects itself in an unconscious way, after the manner of the development of a plant. The pure contra-distinction appears in the work of art, which unfolds itself synthetically, subjecting to its service the material originally belonging to it, and the metamorphosis of the plant, which reveals spirit analytically, without attaining any power over itself. In the life of the natural man (in the pure sense of the term) nature predominates, but the spirit comes more and more to power (1 Corinthians 15:45); in the life of the spiritual man, who is from heaven, spirittual consciousness predominates, appropriating, pervading, and ruling the human organism. So the Logos, with the absolute master power of His essence as Logos, entered into human nature. He is not only voluntary in His incarnation in general; He is voluntary in each act of His human nature, i.e., of His human self-limitation for the sake of a higher spontaneity. He is voluntarily born (Luke 1:26 sqq.), voluntarily a child (Luke 2:51), voluntarily sleeps (Mark 4:38), is voluntarily ignorant as to the day of judgment (Mark 13:32-33), voluntarily suffers (Matthew 26:53), voluntarily dies (John 10:18); but all in order that He may truly live (John 5:17; John 9:4), truly unfold Himself (John 10:15-16; John 12:24), truly watch (Matthew 26:38), truly know (Mark 3:12), truly act and triumph (John 12:12), and eternally live (John 17). In other words, Christ entered into the entire life of man, sin excepted, to raise it to the second, higher life of glorified humanity. This opposition is illustrated by the suspensions of consciousness in our natural life itself; and before we decide respecting the divine mystery of the Logos entering into sleep, we must be clear respecting the human mystery of our own mind’s sleeping. He goes to sleep. Weakness must be transfigured by freedom into rhythm, or determination of power. In the ideal incarnation of Christ, His historical incarnation, His subjection to law, is actually involved. 3. And we beheld His glory. The humiliation of Christ in the form of a servant did not hinder the Evangelist from seeing His glory. The omnipotence which, in the strength of love, puts limits upon itself (Matthew 26:53-54), is not entered into an absolute humiliation, but into a humiliation to our human vision, in order to reveal Himself in a higher glory. It remained κρύψις, inasmuch as it remained at every point free; it became κένωσις, inasmuch as it made earnest of the self-humiliation. But it did not leave its riches of power and honor behind in heaven; it yielded them up to the world, 2 Corinthians 8:9. The world had the honor of judging the universal Judge; it had the power to put omnipotence to death; the wisdom to judge concerning him; the omnipresence of the Roman empire to bring him down to Golgotha, the grave and Sheol; but it thereby only gained the power to judge itself, that it might be the medium of that revelation of omnipotence in the impotence of Christ whereby it was overcome, judged and reconciled. Full faith in the cross must feel that Christ has humbled Himself by surrender of Himself to the world, not in heavenly reservation towards the world, and that here has taken place on the full scale what occurs elsewhere on smaller scales, or here in one central fact what appears otherwise every where in history: God makes Himself weak, and stands, as bound, in His government, over against the freedom of the sinner, to let him feel in the judgment that physical power is nothing of itself, and that truth, righteousness and love are all. 4. Christ is the Only Begotten (μονογενής), inasmuch as He is the one Word, in whom all things were ideally and virtually included, in distinction from the universe in its development; He is the First Born (πρωτότοκος), inasmuch as He has entered, as a principle, into development. 5. And of His fulness. If John could bear witness of the prζ-existence of Christ, he could also testify that the prophets had all drank of His fulness, and that their highest, fairest experience had been the experience of grace. 6. Grace for grace. The reciprocal forms of grace in the Old Testament, and in the whole history of the world. 7. The distinction between the Old and New Testaments: (1) Moses, the servant, serving; Christ, the Son and Lord, reigning in the obedience of the Father; (2) Given, laid down; come; (3) Law; grace and truth (see above). AND The combined testimony of the Old Testament John and the New to the incarnation of the Son of God: 1) The agreement of the two testimonies; 2) their difference; 3) their copiousness.—The Old Covenant and the New: 1) In contrast: Moses and Christ; 2) In harmony: John and Christ.—The Old Covenant in its relation to the New: 1) The advent of the New (Christ in the Old Testament); 2) the discipline for the New (Moses and the Law); 3) a shadow vanishing before the New (“No man hath seen God at any time”).—Twofold testimony of the Baptist concerning Christ: 1) Concerning the near approach of Christ, whose person he yet knew not; 2) concerning Jesus, that He is the Christ.—The Incarnation for our salvation: A great mystery in its nature (“the Word was made flesh”); 2) a historical fact in its demonstration (“dwelt among us”); 3) an assured sight of blessed eyewitnesses (“we beheld”); 4) a blessed experience of all believers (“full of grace and truth”).—The consummation of revelation: 1) The revealing Word, which had appeared in the Angel of the Lord, now become man; 2) the glory of God above the most holy place, now bodily manifested in the dwellings of men; 3) the entranced vision of divine tokens, now become the blessed seeing of the divine glory; 4) the law transformed into the fulness of grace and truth.—“The Word was made flesh:” a gospel of the highest knowledge; being 1) a view of Christ; 2) the key of philosophy; 3) a prophecy for Christianity.—The announcement: The Word was made flesh: 1) a preaching of repentance (sin therefore does not belong to the flesh, Romans 8:3); 2) a preaching of faith. Our flesh should be transformed through the Word.—Christ has explained all: 1) The mysteries of the Old Testament; 2) the mysteries of humanity (the Word was made flesh); 3) the mysteries of nature (the Word entered into the process of growth); 4) the mysteries of God. Starke: O the mystery! God is become man; the Son of God the Father, a son of man; the Word, a child; the Life, a mortal man; the eternal Light is in the midst of darkness, Romans 9:5.—How deeply the Most High has abased Himself, and how gloriously the Humbled has exalted us.—Canstein: Christ has pitched His tent in our nature, that He might make His abode in each one of us, and He will still more gloriously pitch His tabernacle among men, and more peculiarly manifest His glory, Revelation 21:3; Revelation 21:11.—Jesus is ever, in His whole office, full of grace and truth. In His prophetical office He preaches [and actually presents] grace and truth; in His priestly office He procures them; in His kingly office He gives and maintains them.—Seest thou how the Word is made flesh? Give diligence that thou mayest be made like Him according to thy measure in glory.—Zeisius: Christ, the one inexhaustible fountain of all graces, from which all believers from the beginning have drawn.—Canstein: The true use of grace received fits us for more grace, so that one grace becomes the reward of another, yet remains grace, Hebrews 10:1. Christ is the end of all the Mosaic system of shadows, and in Him we have the substance itself, which the shadows only prefigured, Hebrews 10:1; Colossians 2:17.—Ibid.: Grace and truth belong together. Where grace is, in the forgiveness of sins, there appears also the truth of a holy and upright nature in Christ. And where the latter fails, grace also is wanting.—Hedinger: Christ a prophet and interpreter of the divine will. Mosheim: The second word: “Truth” is contrasted with ceremonies. Moses set forth only types and shadows; the Saviour has preached [acted in His life] pure truth, the grace and love of God towards men without figure.—Von Gerlach: “He that cometh after me is preferred,” etc. One of the many sacred enigmas in this Gospel, in which the literary sense gives a paradox to incite us to seek a higher.—From Augustine: The same God who gave the law, has also given grace; but this law He sent by His servant; with the grace He has Himself come down.—Heubner: This sentence [“the Word was made flesh”] contains all: (1) The divinity of Christ—He is the Logos; (2) His true humanity—He is made flesh. This dwelling denotes His true human life, and is a pledge of our future dwelling with Him.—There is no stopping, no limit, in grace, but ever new growth in insight, power, joy and peace.—Schleiermacher: Grace for grace. It is properly equivalent to grace in reward for grace; i.e., for our receiving one grace from Him, another grace is in turn imparted.—Only the One who is from the Father, hath seen the Father (John 6:46); only in Him and through Him can man know God the Father, and draw from His fulness grace and truth. [Schaff: John 1:14. The Incarnation the central truth of Christianity and of all religion.: 1) The end of the reign of separation from God, or the reign of sin and death; 2) the beginning of the reign of union and communion with God, or the reign of righteousness and life.—The Incarnation: 1) Its nature: (a) not a change or conversion of the Godhead into flesh, but an assumption of manhood into abiding union with the second person of the Godhead; the two natures remaining distinct, yet inseparably united for ever; (b) not an assumption of a part of human nature, but of the whole, body, soul and spirit; Christ being perfect God and perfect Man in one person; (c) not an assumption of sin, but only of its consequences, in order to remove and destroy them; sin being no part of human nature as originally constituted, but a corruption of that nature by a foreign poison and an abuse of freedom. Christ was tempted, and suffered and died as we, but He never submitted to temptation; He “knew no sin,” and remained “holy, harmless, undefiled, and separate from sinners.” 2. Its effects: (a) the redemption of human nature, or of the whole race, from the curse and dominion of sin and death; (b) the elevation of human nature to abiding union with the Godhead.—The Word became flesh: 1) really and truly (against Gnosticism, docetism, Arianism); 2) totally and perfectly (against Apollinarianism); 3) undividedly and inseparably (against Nestorianism); 4) unmixedly, without confusion or absorption of substance (against Eutychianism and Monophysitism).—The incarnation the end and aim of all religion; for religion (religio, from relegare, to rebind, to reunite) implies: 1) an original union of man and God in the state of innocence; 2) a separation of the two by sin and death; 3) a reconciliation and reunion which was effected by the atonement of Christ.—The mystery of the incarnation reversely repeated in every true regeneration by which man becomes a child of God, a partaker of Christ’s “divine nature,” and a “new creature in Christ Jesus.”] [Burkitt, John 1:14 : Christ’s taking flesh implies that He took not only human nature, but all the weaknesses and infirmities of that nature also (sinful infirmities being excepted), such as hunger, thirst, weariness. As man, Christ has an experimental sense of our infirmities and wants; as God, He can supply them all.] [M. Henry (abridged) on John 1:16 : As of old, God dwelt in the tabernacle of Moses, by the Shekinah, between the cherubim, so now He dwells in the human nature of Christ, the true Shekinah, the symbol of God’s peculiar presence. And we are to address God through Christ, and from Him receive divine oracles. All believers receive from Christ’s fulness; the greatest saints cannot live without Him, the weakest may live by Him. This excludes boasting and silences perplexing fear.—Grace is the good will of God towards us, and the good work of God in us. God’s good will works the good work, and the good work qualifies for further tokens of His good will.—As the cistern receives from the fulness of the fountain, the branches from the root, and the air from the sun, so we receive grace from the fulness of Christ.—Grace for grace speaks the freeness of grace; the abundance of grace; the promotion of grace by grace; the substitution of the N. T. grace for the O. T. grace; the augmentation and continuance of grace; the conformity of grace in the saints to the grace that is in Christ, the saints being changed into the same heavenly image. (A combination of different interpretations of χάρινἀντὶχάριτος, which may do for a sermon, but not for exegesis.)] [Augustine on John 1:17 : The law threatened, not helped; commanded, not healed; showed, not took away, our feebleness. But it made ready for the physician, who was to come with grace and truth.—Olshausen: The law induces and elicits the consciousness of sin and the need of redemption; it only typifies the reality; the gospel actually communicates reality and power from above.] [J. C. Ryle, John 1:18 : After reading this Prologue, it is impossible to think too highly of Christ, or to give too much honor to Him. He is the meeting point between the Trinity and the sinner’s soul. “He that honoreth not the Son, honoreth not the Father who sent Him” (John 5:23).—Quesnel calls the Prologue, especially John 1:1, “the gospel of the holy Trinity.” Our knowledge of this mystery of mysteries begins with the knowledge of the Son, who reveals and expounds to us the Father, and who is Himself revealed and applied to us by the Holy Spirit.—P. S.] Footnotes: John 1:14.—[The parenthesis marked in this verse in the text. rec. appears to be, like the division of chapters and verses, only conventional; though it serves us the good purpose of showing the true reference of “full” (πλήρης) to “the Word” (ὁλόγος) rather than to “glory” (δόξα), which could not be otherwise indicated in the English version. The clause itself is not properly parenthetical. See the Exegesis.—E. D. Y] John 1:15. [μαρτνρεῖ, present; the testimony of John goes on. Meyer: “Vergegenwδrtigung, als tφnte das Zeugniss noch for.”—P. S.] John 1:15. [The perfect κέκραγε likewise implies continuation of the action in its effect. Meyer: “Das Perf, in gewφhnlicher, classischer, prδsentischer Bedeutung.” Alford: “the voice is still sounding.” Κράζω (also used of Christ, John 7:28; John 7:37; John 12:44) is an onomato-poλtic word, imitating the hoarse cry of the raven, like the German, krόchzen, the English, to croak; here to call aloud with the confidence and solemnity of a herald. Bengel: “Clamat Joh. cum fiducia et gaudio, uti magnum prζconem decet.”—P. S. ] John 1:16, in most codd. [ΰ. B. C* D. L. X], begins withὅτι, instead of καί: For of his fulness, etc. Griesbach, Lachmann, Tischendorf. [Hengstenberg and Godet prefer καί, and conjecture that on was occasioned by the preceding and succeeding ὅτι.—P. S.] John 1:18. B. C* L. Codd. Sin. et al. read θεός for νἱός; probably from John 1:1. [So also Meyer.] [This is the first important difference of reading which occurs in the Gospel of John, and which, on account of its theological character, deserves a fuller notice than it has received from Lange or any other commentator, except Alford, in his sixth edition. The ancient authorities are almost equally divided between θεός, the (an) Only-begotten God, and υἱός the Only-begotten Son. A minor difference relates to the article which is omitted by most of the authorities favoring θεός. The reading θεός is supported by the two oldest MSS., the Sinaitic (which has ΘC, the usual abbreviation of θεός, a prima manu, but which, in this very verse, by omitting the words ὁὤν, before εἰςτὸνκόλπον betrays the carelessness of the transcriber), and the Vatican (both from the 4th century), also by C.* L.; the Syr. Peshito; Clemens Alex, (once or twice), Excerpta Theodoti (a full quotation), Epiphanius (three times), the Second Synod of Ancyra, Didymus of Alex, (twice). To this must be added that Gregory of Nyssa and other Greek fathers repeatedly call Christ ὁμονογεὴςθεός, where they do not quote from John 1:18. The reading υἱός is favored by a larger number of manuscripts, A. (Cod. Alex, of the 5th cent.), C. (the Ephrζm MS. corrected) 10. Δ and nearly all other MSS.; the Curetonian Syriac Vers., the Lat. Vers. (Itala and Vulgata); Tertullian (Adv. Prax. c. 15), who is older by at least 120 years than the oldest known MSS., Eusebius (in six passages, in one, however, with the significant addition ἢμονογενὴςθεός after ὁμονογενὴςυἱός, for which reason Tregelles claims him for θεός, though unjustly; see Abbot, Bibl. Sacra, 1861, p. 859), Athanasius (four times), Chrysostom (eight times), Ambrose, Augustine and other fathers, also the emperor Julian (twice). Hilary, in seven places, supports Filius, but in one (De Trin., xii. 24) he reads “unigenitus Deus in sinu Patris.” The evidence from Irenζus, Origen, Basil and Cyril of Alexandria is contradictory and uncertain. Irenζus, the oldest witness in this case (A. D. 170), quotes the passage three times, twice in favor of Filius (Adv.hζr. IV. c. 20, §6), or Filius Dei (III. xi., 6), once in favor of Deus (IV. xx., John 11 : “unigenitus Deus, qui est in sinu Patris, ipse enarravit”). Origen reads θεός twice (In Joh. Tom. II. c. 29; XXXII. c. 13, Opp. ed. Delarue 4. p. 89 and 438), υὶός once (Contr. Cels. l. II. c. 71, Opp. 1 p. 440, in a full quotation), besides υἱὸςτοῦθεοῦ once (In Joh. Tom. vi. 2, Opp. iv. 102, with a different reading, υἱὸςθεός), and Unigenitus Dei Filius once (in Rufinus’ version of Com. on Son 1:4 Opp. iii. 91). Cyril of Alexandria, as edited by Aubert, has υἱός three times, θεός four times, and favors the latter in his Commentary, as printed. For a fuller statement of patristic testimonies see an elaborate article of Ezra Abbot (the learned librarian of Harvard University) in the Andover Bibliotheca Sacra for Oct. 1861, pp. 840–872. I have verified several of his quotations. He has corrected many errors of former critics and disproved the assertion of Tregelles that θεός is “the ancient reading of the Fathers generally. ” The authorities for υἱός cover a much larger territory than those for θεός, which seem to be almost confined to Egypt. For internal reasons, θεός, being the more difficult reading, has the preference, according to the usual canon; for μονογενής naturally suggested υἱός, while the designation of Christ as “the only begotten God,” stands isolated in the Bible. On the other hand, a change of the abridged form ΥC to ΘC, which is usual in the uncial MSS., was as easy as the change from the latter to the former. There is moreover an inherent propriety for the use of υἱός in connection with μονογενής and with the mention of the Father; while θεός is hardly in place immediately after θεόν at the beginning of the verse, and introduces a harshness without a parallel in the style of John. The Scripture argument for the Divinity of Christ is strong enough, even from the first verse of the Prologue, without the reading θεός in John 1:18. This entry is longer than a Bible module can hold. The rest is at https://www.sermonindex.net/commentary/lange/ II THE GOSPEL OF THE OF CHRIST, ON HIS SELF- AND HIS VICTORY IN WITH THE OF THE WORLD John 1:19 to John 20:31FIRST SECTION The Reception which Christ, the Light of the World, finds in His Life of Love among the men akin to the Light, the ElectJoh_1:19 to John 4:54I. John the Baptist, and his public and repeated Testimony concerning Christ. Jesus accredited as the Christ, attested the Son of God, the eternal Lord, and the Lamb of God.John 1:19-34(John 1:19-28 : Pericope for the 4th Sunday in Advent.) (1) Testimony Of John The Baptist Before The Rulers Of The Jews. Jesus The Messiah Coming After The Baptist, The Eternal Pre-historical And Super-historical Lord Before Him19And this is the record [testimony] of John, when the Jews sent [to him] priests and Levites from Jerusalem, to ask him, Who art thou? 20And he confessed, and denied not; but [and he] confessed, I am not [Not I am] the Christ. 21And they asked him, What then? Art thou Elias [Elijah]? And he saith, I am not. Art 22thou that prophet? And he answered, No. Then [in official demand] said they unto him, Who art thou? that we may give an answer to them that sent us. What sayest thou of thyself? 23He said, I am the voice of one crying in the wilderness, Make straight the way of the Lord, as said [Isaiah] the prophet Esaias [ch. John 40:3]. 24And they which were sent were of the Pharisees [And they had been sent by the Pharisees]. 25And they asked him, and said unto him, Why baptizest thou then, if thou be not that [the] Christ, nor Elias [Elijah], neither that [the] prophet? 26John answered them, saying, I baptize with [in] water; but there standeth one among you [in the midst of you there standeth one], whom ye know not: 27he it is [This is he] who coming after me, is preferred [taketh place, or, hath come to be] before me, whose shoe's latchet I am not worthy to unloose. 28These things were done in Bethabara [Bethany] beyond Jordan, where John was baptizing. (2) testimony of the baptist before his disciplines, the historical lamb of god; upon him the dove29The next day John [he] seeth Jesus coming unto him, and saith, Behold the Lamb of God, which taketh away [taketh away by bearing, or, beareth away] the sin of the world! 30This is he of whom I said, After me cometh a man which [who] is preferred [taketh place, or, hath come to be] before me; for he was before me. 31And I knew him not; but that he should be made manifest to Israel, therefore am I come 32[for this cause came I] baptizing with [in] water. And John bare record [witness], saying, I saw the Spirit descending from heaven like a dove, and it abode upon him. 33And I knew him not: but he that sent me to baptize with [in] water, the same said unto me, Upon whom thou shalt see the Spirit descending and remaining [abiding] on him, the same is he which [who] baptizeth with [in] the Holy Ghost [Spirit]. 34And I saw [have seen, ἑὠραχα,] and bare record [have borne witness, μεμαρτύρηχα] that this is the Son of God. AND [Now follows the historical narrative. The testimony of John the Baptist, and the call of the first disciples form the historical introduction or the portico of the public life of Christ. John omits the birth, early history and discourses of the Baptist, as being sufficiently known from the Synoptists, and confines himself to his testimony after the baptism (alluded to as a past fact in John 1:33-34) and the temptation of Christ in the wilderness, when He stood already in the midst of the Jews (John 1:26). The testimony is threefold, 1) before the deputies of the Sanhedrin from Jerusalem (19–28); 3) a day afterwards, before a larger public and His disciples, as it would seem (29–34); 3) again a day afterwards, before two of His disciples, who now joined Jesus (35–37).—The examination of John the Baptist by the official messengers of the Sanhedrin, who had the supervision of the public teaching of religion among the Jews (Matthew 21:23), displays the prevalence and confusion of the Messianic expectations, and the hostility of the leaders of the hierarchy to the approaching new dispensation. The five questions of the priests represent a descending climax (the Messiah; Elijah; an anonymous prophet; why baptizest thou?); the short, laconic answers of the Baptist, in striking contrast, are rising from negation to affirmation, and turn the attention away from himself and towards Christ.—P. S.] John 1:19. And this is.—The gospel history itself begins with the testimony of John the Baptist. Comp. Matthew 3; Mark 1; Luke 3. The question is whether the same testimony is meant here, as in John 1:15. Origen supposed this to be another testimony; Meyer thinks it the same. Evidently in John 1:15 a general testimony, with μαρτυρεῖ, is distinguished from a special, καὶκέκραγε. This most public testimony concerning Jesus before the rulers is undoubtedly meant here. It is a definite pointing of the rulers of the Jews to the person of the Messiah, not related so distinctly by the Synoptists, but of the highest importance for the history of the temptation. This: αὕτη, the following [it is the predicate, ἡμαρτυρία the subject. A verbal testimony is meant. Record now refers to written evidence.—P. S.]. "Οτε points also to a particular event, which took place at a particular time. That this event must have followed the baptism of Jesus is clear; because, according to John 1:31-33, it was that which gave the Baptist himself his first certainty respecting the person of Jesus; and this certainty he expresses here, John 1:26-27. Likewise John 1:29. Olshausen, Baumgarten-Crusius, and others, place the baptism between the two testimonies, John 1:19 and John 1:29; Ewald, between John 1:31 and John 1:32; all against the testimony of the section before us. That John knew of the existence of the Messiah earlier, and with human reverence presumed that he found Him in the person of Jesus, Matthew 3:14, is not inconsistent with his still needing a divine attestation. As regards the history of the temptation, its termination coincides with the present testimony; for Jesus, the next day, comes again behind the Baptist, and soon afterwards (not forty days after) returns to Galilee. When the Jews from Jerusalem.—[The Synoptists, who wrote before the destruction of Jerusalem, seldom use the term Jews as distinct from Christians (Matthew five times, Mark seven times, Luke five times); John, who wrote after the destruction of Jerusalem and after the final separation of the Synagogue from the Christian church, uses it very often (over seventy times in the Gospel and twice in the Apoc.).—P. S.] Ἰουδαῖοι, probably as yet primarily in the neutral sense, though already conceived as about to become a hostile body, on the way to apostasy from true Judaism in opposition to the Messiah. The conception is the historical one of the Jews as the theocratic people, as in John 2:13; John 3:1; John 5:1, then branching into a friendly one (John 4:22; John 18:33) and a hostile (John 5:10; John 7:1; John 8:31; John 10:24, etc.), which in the sequel prevails. In the latter sense the term therefore denotes the Jews as Judaists. Meyer therefore is not perfectly accurate when he says: “John, in his writing, lets the Jews, as the old communion, from which the Christian has already entirely withdrawn, appear steadily in a hostile position to the Lord and His work, the ancient theocratic people as an opposition party to the church of God and its Head.” The Jews do certainly appear in this character predominantly in John, and with good reason Meyer observes that this can furnish no argument, against the genuineness of His Gospel (against Fischer and Hilgenfeld). The expression, The Jews, as he also remarks, varies according to the context; here it is the Jews from Jerusalem, the Sanhedrin. Priests and Levites.—[The two classes of persons employed about the temple service, Joshua 3:3. In the wider sense, Levites designates the descendants of Levi; in a narrower sense, as here, the subordinate officers of the Jewish hierarchy, as distinct from the priests of the family of Aaron.—P. S.] The Levites as an attendant body were designed, under certain circumstances, to arrest the Baptist, and at any rate to add state as a convoy of police, or to enhance the official dignity of the priests. It is a touch of historical accuracy. Who art thou?—i.e., in thy official, theocratic character. That they supposed He might lay claim to the Messiahship, is evident from the answer of John. They had official right, according to Deuteronomy 18:21, to inquire into his character and his credentials as a prophet. They had occasion to do so in his baptism (John 1:25), not only because the baptism connected itself with the kingdom of Messiah (Ezekiel 36:25; Ezekiel 37:23; Zechariah 13:1), but also because the baptism was a declaration concerning the whole congregation of the people, that it was unclean (Haggai 2:14), which could easily offend the pride of the Pharisees. Besides, the people were already inclined to take him for the Messiah, Luke 3:15. According to John 1:24, the delegates were of the party of the Pharisees. These had probably moved in the Sanhedrin, that the deputation be sent, because the Messianic question was of much more importance to them than to the Sadducees, and because they, with their sensuous Messianic hopes, took the matter of the credentials of the Messiah more strictly in their more external sense. John 1:20. And he confessed, and denied not.—Should this mean only; He denied not his own real character? he confessed in this matter the truth? The double expression, positive and negative, would be rather strong for this. The question of the Sanhedrin set before him the temptation to declare himself the Christ. But in so doing he would have denied the Christ whom he already knew, and denied his own better, prophetic knowledge. We suppose, therefore, that his confessing and not denying in regard to himself imply at the same time his confessing and not denying in regard to Christ. This is indicated also by the emphatic order of the words: ἐγὼοὐκεἰμί, which is supported by the best authorities as against οὐκεἰμὶἑγώ. Meyer: “I for my part,” implying that he knows another, who is the Messiah.—The reserve of the Baptist towards the deputation shows the mighty prophet, who understood them. He leaves each successive development of his deposition to be drawn from him, till the moment for his testimony arrives. This mysterious bearing is no doubt intended also to humble and press the self-conceited spirit. John 1:21. What then? Art thou Elijah?—The question is a half inference. He who comes with such pretensions must be, if not the Messiah Himself, at least the Elijah who precedes Him. They refer to the Messianic prophecy, Malachi 4:5. The pure sense of this prophecy, that an ideal Elijah should precede the Messiah, which John actually was (Luke 1:17; Matthew 11:14; Matthew 17:10), had early become corrupted among the Jews, as is shown by the very translation of the passage in the Septuagint. Ἠλίαντὸνθεσβίτην(Elijah the Tishbite). Thus these messengers understood the word entirely in a superstitious sense, taking it literally for the actual Elijah. Hence John answers categorically: I am not [not the Tishbite, whom you mean.] But he adds no explanation; for this would have involved him in an exegetical controversy, and turned him from his main object, which was to testify of Christ. Art thou the prophet?—The next question in the spirit of their theology; hence occurring immediately. The prophet, with the article; the well-known prophet; a personage in their Messianic theology presumed to be familiar. According to Chrysostom [Bengel], Lόcke, Bleek, Meyer, [Alford], the prophet meant would be the one spoken of in Deuteronomy 18:15; but this we must certainly, with Hengstenberg and Tholuck, deny, for this prophecy was at least in Acts 3:22; Acts 7:37 referred to the Messiah. It is a question whether the passages, John 6:14; John 7:40, refer to the passage in Deuteronomy. From Matthew 16:14 it is sufficiently evident that an expectation of Jeremiah or some one of the prophets as the forerunner of the Messiah was cherished. Probably this expectation was connected with the doctrine of the woes of the Messiah, that is, with what was known of the suffering Messiah, The wailing Jeremiah, or one of the later prophets of affliction, seemed better fitted for the fore-runner of the suffering Messiah, than the stern, judicial Elijah. The gradual shaping of this expectation of Jeremiah as a guardian angel in the theocratic day of suffering, appears in 2Ma 2:7; 2Ma 15:13. This particular prophet, therefore, is meant, who should complete the forerunning office of Elijah, and probably precede him. This expectation also was here literally and superstitiously taken. Hence again: No!—the short answer οὔ Luthardt quite falsely refers to the prophets in the second part of Isaiah (c. 40.). Against this see Meyer [p. 101, note]. John 1:22. Then said they unto him, Who art thou?—Now they come out with the categorical official demand of an explanation. Yet we must notice that they do not yet say: Thou art unauthorized. They distinguish the prophetic appearance of the Baptist in general from his baptism. They wished primarily that he should explain himself concerning his prophetic mission. [Alford: “They ever ask about his person: he ever refers them to his office. He is no one—a voice merely: it is the work of God, the testimony to Christ, which is every thing. So the formalist ever in the church asks, Who is he? while the witness for Christ only exalts, only cares for Christ’s work.”—P. S.] John 1:23. I am the voice of one crying.—Isaiah 40:3. As Christ, when He calls Himself the Son of Man, applied to Himself as Messiah a passage of prophecy which had been unnoticed and obscured by the Jewish Messianic theology, Daniel 7:13, so did the Baptist when he called himself the voice of one crying in the wilderness. By this the same subject was meant, as by the Elijah of Malachi, but the passage had not been corrupted by a carnal interpretation, and was perfectly fitted to denote the unassuming spirit of the Baptist, who would be wholly absorbed in his mission to be a herald of the coming Messiah. The quotation is after the Septuagint, except εὐθύνατε instead of ἐτοιμάσατε. It appears from this passage that the Synoptists (Matthew 3:3), following John’s own declaration respecting himself, have applied that passage of the prophet in its direct intent to him. John 1:24. Were of the Pharisees.—This conveys primarily the explanation that they did not understand a Scripture for which they had no distinct exegetical tradition; at least they knew not how to apply the passage cited to John. Then, that they were disposed to allow the right to baptize only to one of the three persons named: the Messiah Himself and His two fore-runners. Baptism was the symbol of the purification which should precede the Messianic kingdom. The tract Kiddushin says (see Tholuck): “Elijah comes, and will declare clean and unclean.” John 1:26. I baptize in water.—In this answer Heracleon, and Lόcke and De Wette after him, have missed the striking point. According to Meyer, John now explains himself more particularly respecting what he has said. To the question: Why baptizest thou? he answers: I baptize only with water; the baptism of the spirit is reserved to the Messiah. To the reminder: Thou art not the Messiah, etc., he answers: The Messiah is already in the midst of you, therefore is this baptism needful. The matter resolves itself simply into John’s declaration: The Messiah is the proper Baptist of the prophets; and his implied assertion: Your interpretation of Eze 36:25 is false. But because this true Baptist is here, I with my water-baptism prepare for His baptizing with the Spirit. It is at the same time implied that it is rather the Messiah who accredits him, than he the Messiah. In water. See Matthew 3:11. But there standeth one among you.—If the ἔαὐτόςἐστιν and the ὅς̓ ?́μπροσθένμουγέγονεν be omitted, as they are in Codd. B. C. L., the clause would proceed: One whom ye know not, cometh after me, etc. We retain these words, which are doubted by Tholuck and Meyer; because John in John 1:15 has noted this formula as the most public testimony of the Baptist.—Whom ye know not.—A reproof: Ye ought to have known him already: a hint: Ye must now learn to know him. The words: Standeth, or hath come, among you can hardly refer only to the birth of Jesus in Bethlehem and His obscurity in Nazareth. They look to the baptism of Christ as the beginning of His public appearance. The objections of Baur and Baόmlein to this are groundless. John 1:27. He it is, who coming after me [behind me].—See John 1:15.—Whose shoe’s string, etc. [In the East, people wore only sandals, or the soles of a shoe, bound fast to the foot by strings]. See Matthew 3:11. That is: Whom I am not worthy to serve as a slave. It is a parallel, or a concrete form, of the expression, John 1:15 : on ὅτιπρῶτόςμονἦν. John 1:28. In Bethabara beyond Jordan.—Rather Bethany, see the Textual Notes. But not the Bethany on the Mount of Olives, John 11:18. The place seems to have been a ford on the further side of the Jordan in Perζa, not otherwise known under this name of Bethany. Origen explored that region, and found a Bethabara (see Judges 7:24) about opposite Jericho. The conjecture of Possinus and Hug, that the name αֵּ ?ιϊΰֲ ?πִ ?ιָ ?δ, domus navis, expresses the same as αֵּ ?ιϊςֲ ?αָ ?ψָ ?δ, domus transitus (ford-house), is not invalidated by the suggestion (of Meyer) that this etymology does not suit Bethany on the Mount of Olives; for the name of Bethany might have arisen in different ways. Bolten and Paulus, by a period after ἐγένετο, made out the Bethany on the Mount of Olives; Kuinoel made the “beyond,” this side; Baur invented the fiction that the author would make Jesus begin, as well as finish His ministry in Bethany.—The statement that the deputation received their answer from the Baptist at Bethany, beyond Jordan, leads to the inference that on their return through the wilderness they already came unintentionally into the neighborhood of Jesus at Jericho. John 1:29. The next day John seeth Jesus coming unto him.—The Evangelist finds the days now following so important that he enumerates them in order; the first, John 1:29; the second, John 1:35; the third, John 1:43. Hereupon Luthardt observes, p. John 76: The Evangelist begins and closes with a week; on the third day those disciples come to him, on the fourth Simon, and on the fifth Philip and Nathanael join the others, on the sixth Jesus is journeying with His disciples, on the seventh in Cana. If this exact reckoning of a week were designed (so that Jesus, according to Luthardt, would, as it were, keep a Sabbath in Cana), the fourth day would have to be made distinct, and the third (John 2) marked as the seventh. It is much more natural to let the three days come so that the calling of Peter falls late in the evening of the day of Joh 1:35. The third day (John 2:1) is, according to Origen, Baur and Meyer, the third from the day of Joh 1:43. Baur gives as a reason for this (which is a change from a former view of his) a silly fancy, that the six days should correspond to the six water-pots in John 2. Meyer better: If it were the third day from that of Joh 1:35, or the day following that of Joh 1:43, we should have τῇἐπαύριον again. Against his longer reckoning (John 2:1 : the third day from that of Joh 1:43) we must, however, observe that the proper starting-point of the reckoning thus far is still the day of the accrediting of Jesus as the Messiah on the part of John. It is important to the Evangelist to set forth what a life from day to day was then begun. On the first day, the pointing of the disciples to Jesus; on the next, three or four disciples gained; on the clay after, two more. If now we suppose that the third day is the same with the ἐπαύριον of John 1:43, or is reckoned from the accrediting of Jesus, John 1:19, this explains the fact that the marriage-feast had already continued nearly three days when Jesus arrived, and that the wine was exhausted. The line between the day in the wilderness and the day of Joh 1:43 still remains somewhat uncertain.—Our first date, John 1:29, denotes the day after that declaration of the Baptist to the deputation from Jerusalem, not one of the days following. Jesus returns from the temptation. The reason why He returns to John is not given; yet it is at hand. John must know that Jesus intended to disappoint the chiliastic Messianic hopes of the Jews. He must also bear witness of the course which Jesus intended to take; he must be guarded to the utmost against the vexation of imagining that Jesus would adopt a different course from what he might have expected in the Messiah accredited by him. And then this also was what led to John’s transfer of his disciples to the discipleship of Jesus, though the outward attachment of the Baptist himself to Jesus was not to be expected. Behold the Lamb of God.—The Baptist knew from three sources the appointment of the Messiah to suffering: (1) The experience of suffering by the pious, especially the prophets, as well as the import of the sacrificial types and the prophecies of the suffering Messiah. (2) The baptism of Christ, which indicated to him that Christ must bow under the servant-form of sinners, or which was an omen of His suffering, see Matthew 3:14. (3) A decisive point, which has not been noticed: The Baptist has directed the deputation from Jerusalem to the Messiah, who was in the vicinity. He may therefore suppose that they have come to know him, And now he sees Christ coming back from the wilderness, alone, in earnest, solemn mood, with the expression of separation from the world. He could not have been a man of the Spirit, without having perceived in the Spirit that an adversity, or a sacrificial suffering of premonitory conflict, had taken place. This accounts also for his first exclamation being: Behold the Lamb of God!—and the supposition that the Evangelist has put his own knowledge into the mouth of the Baptist (Strauss, Weisse), loses all support. That the subsequent human wavering of the Baptist, Matthew 11:3, is not inconsistent with his present divine enlightenment and inspiration, needs no explanation; the opposition between the divine and human elements is nowhere entirely transcended in the Old Testament prophets. And Matthew 11:3 itself proves that John had till then depended with assurance upon Christ, and even then could not give Him up under temptation. The Baptist, says Meyer in explanation, had not a sudden flash of natural light, or a rising conviction, but a revelation. But sudden flashes produced by rising convictions can hardly be separated from revelations, unless we conceive the latter as immediate, magical effects. With a natural light we have nothing to do. Now comes the question: What is meant by the Lamb of God? By the article it is designated as appointed, by the genitive as belonging to God, appointed for Him for a sacrifice. Isaiah 53.; Revelation 5:6; Revelation 13:8. The phrase implies also, selected by God. The question arises, however, whether the expression is to be referred to the paschal lamb (with Grotius, Lampe, Hofmann, Luthardt [Bengel, Olshausen, Hengstenberg], and others), to the sin-offering (with Baumgarten-Crusius and Meyer), or to the prophetic passage, Isaiah 53:7 (with Chrysostom) [Origen, Cyril, Lόcke, Thol., De Wette, Brόckner, Meyer (5th ed.), Ewald]. For it is clear that we are not, with Herder, to suppose it a mere figure of a religiously devoted servant of God. We are evidently directed primarily to that passage of Isaiah 53; for John had taken the description of his own mission from the second part of Isaiah, and the Messianic import of the passage named cannot be evaded (see Lόcke, I. p. 408 sqq.; Tholuck, p. 90; my Leben Jesu, II. p. 466), and the particular features suit. [To the same chapter in Isaiah reference is had Matthew 8:17; Acts 8:32; 1 Peter 2:22-25.—P. S.] The Septuagint reads ἀμνός for the Hebrew ψָ ?ηֵ ?μ, John 1:7. It is said in John 1:10, He made “His soul an offering for sin,” ΰָ ?ωָׁ ?ν. It is said of Him in John 1:4 : “He hath borne (πָ ?ωָׂ ?ΰ, Sept. φέρει) our griefs.” Specially important is John 1:11 : “By his knowledge shall my righteous servant justify many; for he shall bear (ιִ ?ρְ ?αֹּ ?μ) their iniquities.” And the bearing, in connection with the idea of the offering for sin and the vicarious expiation, involves the idea of taking away, carrying off; it is therefore of no account that the Baptist says αἴρειν, and the Septuagint φέρειν (see 1 John 3:5), for it is the way of the Seventy to express the bearing of sin by φέρειν. The interpretations: put away (Kuinoel), support (Gabler), abstractly considered, deviate from the notion of atonement, though they are included in the concrete term αἴρειν: suffer—endure—piacularly bear —take away and blot out. Latterly the term has been emptied of its element of expiation again by Hofmann and Luthardt, and referred to the then beginning suffering of Christ through the sins of men in His human weakness, without reference to His death (sea against this Meyer and Tholuck). Of course, on the other hand, the word of the Baptist is not to be referred, as a mature dogmatic perception, to the future death of Christ. Yet a germ-perception of the atoning virtue of the holy suffering even the ancient prophets had, Isaiah 53. And how powerfully the thought had seized the Baptist, appears from his naming sin (τὴνἁμαρτίαν) in the singular, as the burden which Christ has to bear, and besides as the sin of the world.—But if the prophet, Isaiah 53., evidently himself went back to the notion of the expiatory sacrifice, then the Baptist also did the same. Lambs were by preference taken for the sin-offering, Leviticus 5:6; see Tholuck. Christ, as the Lamb appointed by God, is a sin-offering, which atones for the guilt of the world. The fact that men have made Him, over and above this, even a curse-bearer, and that under the direction of God, is not included in the idea before us, yet neither is it excluded by it. But as regards the further step backward, to the paschal lamb, which Justin Martyr, Clement of Alexandria, and others combined with the reference to Isaiah 53., it is contested by Tholuck and Meyer. Justly, so far as the paschal lamb in the stricter sense served as a meal of thank-offering; but unjustly, so far as the paschal lamb in the wider sense formed the root of the whole system of sacrifice, and pointed by the blood on the door-posts to the atoning offering, nay, even ran back to the curse-offering, the extermination of the Egyptian first-born.—Mark further the rapt manner in which the Baptist utters the great word: Behold the Lamb of God! The sequel shows that he speaks thus to his disciples.John 1:30. This is he of whom I said.—Meyer properly observes: These words refer not to the testimony in John 1:26-27, but to all that John had previously said of the coming Messiah. John had described the divine mark of the Messiah, before he knew the particular person; now he joyfully shows that he rightly described Him, and said none too much. John 1:31. And I knew him not.—(Not: Even I knew him not.)—That is, I did not with divine certainty, by revelation, know Him;—though in his human feeling he reverenced Him in unrestrained foreboding (against Lόcke, Ewald). Hence no contradiction to Matthew (against Strauss, Baur). But now he shows how he came to this knowledge. As he was to introduce the Messiah in official authentication, he must have a token from above. This was given him. But that he should be made manifest.—The ultimate and highest object of his baptism did not exclude the tributary purposes of preparing a people for the Lord. According to the Jewish tradition in Justin (Dial, cum Tryph., ch. viii.) the Messiah was to remain unknown [ἄγνωστος] till Elijah should anoint Him, and thereby make Him known to all [φανερόνπᾶσιποιήσῃ ?].—Baptizing in water [ἐν (τῷ) ὕδατι].—“An humble description of himself in comparison with Him who baptizes with the Spirit.” Meyer. John 1:32. And John bare witness, saying.—We might expect the mark of the Messiah given to John to come before his testimony, i.e., John 1:33 before John 1:32. Hence Lόcke and others read this verse as a parenthesis. But this exhibition of the testimony of John is in two parts. The Evangelist distinguishes the first exclamation of John respecting Christ as the Lamb of God from the then following testimony of the way in which he came to know Him. Thus we have to make a new paragraph at John 1:32. John bears witness of the way in which he came to know Jesus in His baptism as the Messiah. I saw the Spirit descending.—Here we must (1) assert against Baur, that the Baptist is speaking of the actual event of the baptism; this is clear from the connection of Joh 1:32 with John 1:31; (2) dispute [Theodore of Mops.], Tholuck, [Alford] and others in the idea that the Baptist had the manifestation alone, and that it was an inward transaction, excluding externality (though not excluding all objective element). “Even the αωματικῷεἴδει in Luke 3:22, cannot prove the outwardness of the phenomenon; for it rather expresses only the unusual fact that the dove served as the symbol of the Spirit.” Tholuck. Against this are (1) the fact that the event was given by an inward voice to the Baptist as the token. On the supposition of mere inwardness the inward voice alone would have sufficed; at all events it must have come at the same time with the token. (2) The mention of the appearance of the Spirit, ὡςπεριστερά, as a dove. Merely inwardly seen, this would be only an apparition, not a token. (3) θεάομαι is used, as in John 1:14, of a seeing which is neither merely outward, nor yet merely inward. (4) The participation of Christ; according to the Synoptists, in the seeing of the phenomenon; to which must be added the voice: “Thou art my beloved Son!”—showing that Christ was the centre of the whole appearance. (5) The analogy of the signs (rushing wind and tongues of fire) at the outpouring of the Holy Ghost on the day of Pentecost. See this Comm. on Matthew 3:13-17; p. 77. Tholuck: “The point of comparison between the symbol (symbolical phenomenon, we should say) and the Spirit, Theodore of Mopsuestia takes to be the affectionate tenderness and attachment of the dove to men; Calvin, its gentleness; Neander, its tranquil flying; Baumgarten-Crusius, a motherly, brooding virtue, consecrating the water (Genesis 1:1); most, from Matthew 10:16, purity and innocence. This last is certainly to be taken as the main point, yet it is connected with the gentle, noiseless flight of this particular bird. In the Targum on Son 2:12, the dove is regarded as the symbol of the Spirit of God.” We suppose that the phenomenon and the symbol are to be distinguished; the phenomenon we take to have been a soft, hovering brightness, resembling the flashes from a dove floating down in the sunlight (Psalms 68:13 : “Yet shall ye be as the wings of a dove covered with silver, and her feathers with yellow gold;” see Acts 2:3); and the symbol, no one virtue of the dove, but her virtues, as a of spiritual life, which, as such, never consists in a single virtue (see Matthew 10:16); hence purity, loveliness, gentleness, friendliness towards men, and vital warmth. On the reference of the dove to the church see the Comm. on Matthew 3:13-17; p. 78. Hence the “abiding upon him” [καὶἔμεινενἐπ’ αὐτόν, ὲπί, with the accusative signifies the direction to—] is part of the sign; in the continuance of the radiance the Baptist received assurance that the Spirit abode upon Christ. Misinterpretations of this event: (a) The Ebionitic: An impartation of the Spirit, beginning with the baptism, (b) The Gnostic: The Logos uniting Himself with the Man Jesus;—a view dragged in again by Hilgenfeld. (c) Baur: The λόγος and the πνεῦμαἅγιον are, according to John’s representation, identical. Attempted interpretations: (1) Frommann: The preparation of the Logos for coming forth out of his immanent union with God: (2) Lόcke, Neander, etc.: The awakening of the divine-human consciousness. (3) Hofmann, Luthardt: The impartation of official powers. (4) Baumgarten-Crusius, Tholuck: The impartation of the Spirit for transmission to mankind. (5) Meyer: Not an impartation to Jesus, but only an objective sign (σημεῖον) divinely granted to the spiritual intuition of the Baptist. We find in this occurrence not merely the full development of Christ’s consciousness of Himself personally as the God-Man, but also of the accompanying consciousness of His Messianic mission, as a calling, in particular, to self-humiliation in order to exaltation;—a development produced by a corresponding communication of the Holy Ghost without measure, which should make Him, in the course of His humiliation towards exaltation, the Baptist of the Spirit (Geistestδufer) for the whole world (see Isaiah 11; Joel 3; Matthew 28) This consciousness is (1) that of being the Son of God, and (2) that of the divine good pleasure blessing the path of humiliation upon which in His baptism He entered. John 1:33. And I knew him not.—Looking back to the earlier stage, and strongly emphasizing the ignorance by the repetition. Then the Baptist tells us how the miraculous appearance became to him the sign. In the nature of the case, this mark must have been given him before the occurrence itself. The description of Christ as the true Baptist, the Baptizer with the Holy Ghost, corresponds with John’s humble sense of the impotence of his own baptism of water. John 1:34. And I have seen.—In the perfect. Plainly this cannot be understood of a mere internal process.—And have borne witness.—Not: I consider myself as having now testified (De Wette); nor: I have testified and do now testify (Lόcke). The Baptist undoubtedly looks back with joyful mind to the testimony which he bore before the rulers of the Jews. He has borne it, and that a plain, straight-forward testimony: borne witness to this Man, Jesus of Nazareth, and testified that He is not merely Messiah, but also the Son of God. As if he would say: I have lived. My mission is in its substance accomplished (see John 3:29). Hence from that moment forth he points his disciples to Jesus. AND ETHICAL1. Who art thou? Starke: “Whether this question (of the Sanhedrin) was put sincerely, or hypocritically and with evil intent, is uncertain; but the latter is more probable. Others, however, think the former, since there are no indications that the delegation was sent out of mere envy, or with the design of questioning his office. Causes of the embassy: (1) John’s unusual sort of official work, in the wilderness preaching and baptizing, and the great gathering of the people to him. (2) The conviction, from many signs, that the time of the Messiah must be at hand. (3) The vehement longing of the Jewish people everywhere for the advent of the Messiah, especially by reason of their great oppression under the Roman power, etc., because they hoped the Messiah would erect again their fallen commonwealth, and because they did not yet imagine that the kingdom of the Messiah would turn to the prejudice of their prestige. Furthermore they must either not have known the origin and family of John, or must have been entirely foolish to suppose the Messiah could be born of the tribe of Levi.” 2. The two testimonies of the Baptist form the contents of this section: Christ the Lord (the Old Testament manifestation of God, the Angel of the Lord, Jehovah): (1) Christ the Lamb of God (the Servant of God); (2) Christ the Son of God. 3. From the first testimony it is evident that Christ was accredited by John in an entirely official manner; in the second we see how Christ was accredited by John himself most distinctly by God. Likewise, that John points his disciples to Christ, and that every genuine fore-runner does the same, while the spurious fore-runners, the chief priests, keep their disciples to themselves. 4. On the import of the baptism of Jesus see the exegesis under John 1:32, and Com. on Matth. John 3:13, p. 76. 5. Between the 28th and 29th verses falls the close of the history of the temptation of Jesus, and with it the settlement of His Messianic calling or, as Reinhard puts it, His plan. He comes out of the wilderness with the clear sense of His destiny and His willingness to become the Lamb of God. This then the prophetic Baptist perceives in His appearance through the Spirit. 6. It is noticeable that the temptation of John by the Sanhedrin, and that of the Lord by Satan, coincides in time. The Baptist says: I am not the Christ; Jesus says: I am not the Christ according to the perverted antichristian hopes of the hierarchy, according to the notion of the ungodly world. 7. Gerlach: “In the fact that he alone knew the Messiah, while the entire people and their rulers knew Him not, John would give them the credentials of his own prophetic mission.” 8. The ultimate object of the mission of John the Baptist: To make Christ known by official, attestation according to the Old Testament law before the rulers of the Jews, by a testimony of the New Testament Spirit among His disciples. Malachi pointed to John (Elijah), John points to Christ, and thus the Messianic prophecy converges at last to the distinctness of an index finger. AND See the Comm. on Matthew 3:13-17; Mark 1:1-8; Luke 3:1-22. The temptation of John and the temptation of Christ. The first and last temptation of John, and the first and last temptation of Christ.—Who art thou? or, the perfect ignorance of a hardened, formal spirituality before living spirits.—No, and again no! or, how the spirit of John refuses to suit the forms of the Pharisees.—The great two-fold testimony of the Baptist concerning Christ: (1) The same both in public and in the confidential circle; (2) varying in form: in its legal office before the Jewish rulers describing Christ as the eternal Lord, and in its spiritual office in the circle of disciples describing Christ as the Lamb of God.—The denials of John and the denials of Christ as against the current notions of Elijah and Christ, a proof that between the spirit of Holy Scripture itself and the exegesis of a traditional hierarchical theology there is an immense difference.—The lessons of the connection between John’s humble knowledge of himself and his knowledge of Christ.—John, as a witness of his own knowledge of Christ, free and open, yet also wisely reserved (1) in reference to what he knew of Christ (speaking to the unsusceptible only of the Lord, to the susceptible, of the Lamb of God); (2) in reference to how be knew it: showing to the one company only that he knows Christ, to the other, how he came to know him.—The self-denial of John the true confession, as an example to us: (1) The true confession of Christ; (2) the true confession of himself.—John and the Pharisees, or the servant of the law of God and the men of human commandments (the man of the law and the men of traditions).—The Baptist, as God’s prophet, consistent with himself, and therefore one thing to the Pharisees, another to his disciples.—The glory of Christ in the light of the human and the divine nature: (1) High as heaven above the Baptist; (2) one with the Father in the Holy Ghost,—The word: I have borne witness, is equivalent to: I have lived: (1) In the mouth of the Baptist; (2) in the mouth of the Lord (the “true witness”); (3) in the mouth of every believer.—The Lamb and the Dove, or, the sensible signs of the kingdom of heaven (1) in the lamb and in all silent, devout passiveness of nature; (2) in the dove and in all pure, beautiful joyousness of nature.—[The lamb, the pure and gentle beast of earth; the dove, the pure and gentle bird of heaven: Psalms 85:10-11.—Christ the Lamb of God, who bears the sins of the world: (1) bears; (2) bears with; (3) bears away.—The testimonies of the Baptist concerning Christ, at first apparently without effect, and afterwards of immeasurable, permanent power.—Christ the centre of all testimonies of God: (1) The inexhaustibly and strongly Attested; (2) the inexhaustible and true Witness.—The Pericope, John 1:19-28. The spiritual position of things at the advent of Christ in its permanent import: (1) The spiritual leaders of the people understand not the Baptist and know not Christ; (2) the Baptist preaches and testifies of Christ as a voice in the wilderness; (3) Christ fights out His victory in secret.—John a pure prophetic character, the standard of value between the Pharisees and Christ: (1) As compared with the Pharisees, grandly exalted; (2) as compared with Christ, small, even to the deepest self-humiliation.—The mysteriousness of the testimony of the Baptist: (1) The mysteriousness in the testimony itself; (2) the mysterious features in the attested One; (3) the mysterious intimation of his work. Starke:—Before persons whose candor and fear of God we should most trust, we are many a time most on our guard.—Wo to the city and to the country whose watchmen are blind.—Canstein: Christians in general, and preachers in particular, should not arrogate to themselves what belongs to Christ, but point their hearers away from themselves and to Christ, to look for all their salvation from Him.—Hedinger: No one may take to himself credit, or receive praise beyond due measure and contrary to humility, 2 Corinthians 10:13.—In calling himself a voice, he not only hints that his preaching is from heaven, but also that in him nothing is to be honored save his voice, nay, that all he is, is, as it were, nothing but voice.—Canstein: We have to do not with the person (humanly taken), but with the matter itself.—Cramer: Spare neither friends nor foes to confess the truth.—Jesus is in the midst of us, though we see Him not.—Osiander: To the minister of the church it belongs to preach and to administer the sacraments, but Christ gives the increase, and pours out the Spirit.—Zeisius: A true teacher should, after the example of John, be well instructed, authenticated, and established. Gerlach:—The decisive self-denial of John in his relation to Christ gave and still gives the greatest weight to his testimony. This self-denial was and still is, to unbelief, incomprehensible; in this, that a man could so clearly know his mission and its limits.—Braune: Whom John had announced as coming with axe, winnowing-fan, and fire, Him he now commended as the Lamb of God which taken away the sin of the world. Heubner:—On the rights of the magistracy in regard to religion.—What privileges has the spiritual power?—The limits of obedience.—Who art thou? as it were the: Who is there? demanded of every one in the ministry of the kingdom of God.—Tycho Brahe’s symbol: Esse Polius quam haberi.—Christian self-valuation.—Persius: Quem deus esse jussit, disce.—Christian choices of calling.—Assurance of an eternal mission.—In John the testimony of the best and noblest of his time and of the ages before is set forth.—Schleiermacher: The baptism of John stood in a manner between the law and the Gospel.—John’s testimony concerning Christ a type of ours.—Couard: An evangelical preacher will and must bear witness only of Christ.—To what the question: Who art thou? would lead us, if put to ourselves.—Rieger: John the model of an evangelical preacher.[Schaff:—Behold the Lamb of God, John 1:20 (repeated John 1:36). (1) The person who speaks: John the Baptist, in the name of the whole Old Testament, responded to by the experience of the Christian believer. (2) The person spoken of: Christ, (a) compared to a lamb for His innocence and purity (“a lamb without blemish and without spot,” 1 Peter 1:19), meekness, gentleness, and quiet submission, (“as a lamb led to the slaughter,” Isaiah 53); (b) called the Lamb foretold by the prophet Isaiah in that remarkable passage on the suffering Messiah, Isaiah 53:7. Comp. also the paschal lamb, the blood of which, being sprinkled on the door-post, saved the Israelites from the destroying angel (1 Corinthians 5:7), and the lambs of the daily sacrifices, Exodus 29:38; (c) the Lamb of God, appointed and ordained by God from eternity, dedicated to God, and approved by God. (3) The office of Christ: to bear, and by bearing, i.e., by His propitiatory sacrifice, to take away the sin, the accumulated mass of the sins, of the world, i. e., of the entire human race (1 John 2:12), consequently also my sins. (4) The exhortation Behold, with the eye of a living faith, which appropriates the atoning sacrifice of Christ.—Augustine: How weighty must be the blood of the Lamb, by whom the world was made, to turn the scale when weighed against the world.—Olshausen: The sacrificial lamb which bears the sin, also takes it away; there is no bearing of sin without removing the same.—Ryle: The Lamb of God has made atonement sufficient for all mankind, though efficient to none but believers.—Matthew Henry: John was more industrious to do good than to appear great. Those speak best for Christ that say least of themselves, whose own works praise them, not their own lips.—The same: Secular learning, honor and power seldom dispose men’s minds to the reception of divine light.—J. C. Ryle, (abridged): The greatest saints have always been men of John Baptist’s spirit.; “clothed with humility” (1 Peter 5:5), not seeking their own honor, ever willing to decrease if Christ might only increase. Hence God has honored and exalted them (Luke 14:11).—Humility is the beginning of Christian graces.—The learned Pharisees are examples of the blindness of unconverted men.—Christ is “still standing” among multitudes who neither see, nor hear, nor believe. It will be better on the last day to never have been born, than to have had Christ “standing among us” without knowing Him.—P. S.] Footnotes: John 1:19.—Codd. B. C *., Lachmann add πρὸςαὐτόν. Not decisive. [ΰ. C.3 L. al., text, rec., Tischend., 8th ed., omit it. Alf., with Lachm., inserts it.—P. S.] John 1:20).—ὅτιἐγὼοὐκεἰμὶὁχριστός is the reading of the best MSS., ΰ. A. B.C*., L. X., Orig., Chrys., Cyr., Lachm., Tisch. (VIII. ed.), Alf., instead of οὐκεἰμίἐγώ. The former reading emphasizes ἐγώ, I for my part, and implies that John knew another who was the Messiah, while the latter reading emphasizes the negation: It is not I who, etc.—P. S.] John 1:22.—The ου̇ ?͂ν after ει̇ ?͂πον here is significant. Not, as by Lachmann according to B. C., to be omitted. [Cod. Sin. has it.] John 1:24.—Tischendorf, after several codd. (A. B. C.* L.), omits the article before ἀπεσταλμένοι. As Origen supposed a second embassy, the omission may have arisen with him. [The Cod. Sinaiticus has a gap here, indicating the original presence of the article.—E. D. Y.] John 1:26.—A. B. C. L. [Cod. Sin.] read οὐδέ both times, instead of οὔτε. The latter is probably exegetically the more accurate particle. John 1:27.—The words αὐτόςἐστιν and ὄςἔμπροσθένμουγέγονεν are wanting in B. and C. [Cod. Sin.] and in Origen. Bracketed by Lachmann, omitted by Tischendorf [and Alford]. The Johannean style is in favor of the first words; the connection with ὁὀπίσω., etc., is in favor of the others. Cod. A., etc., and the similar expression in John 1:15, are in favor of both. John 1:29.—The Recepta reads Βηθαβαρᾷ, after Origen. Authorities decisive against it. [Comp. the note of Alford in loc.—P. S.] John 1:29.—Against the addition ὁ̓Ιωάννης are A. B. C., etc. Meyer: “Beginning of a church lesson.” [Cod. Sin., a gap.—E. D. Y.] John 1:28.—[The E. V. follows the Vulgate: qui tollit. The Gr. verb αἴρειν has the double meaning to take up (to bear the punishment of sin in order to expiate it, comp. Isaiah 53.: he bore our griefs and carried our sorrows), and to take away (=ἀφαιρεῖν). Both may be combined (as is done by Olshausen) and expressed by the German verb hinwegtragen, to bear away, to take away by taking upon one’s self, or to remove the penalty of sin by expiation: See the Exeg. Notes. The present ὁαἴρων is used in prophetic vision of the act of atonement as a present and continuous fact.—P. S.] John 1:31.—[Some authorities insert here and in John 1:33 the article τῷ before ὕδατι, “in the water (of Jordan) in which you see me baptize.” Alford brackets, Tischend. (ed. VIII.) omits, Meyer (p. 112) defends it.—P. S.] John 1:32.—Most codd. read ὡς, not ὡσεί, which comes from Matthew 3:16; Luke 3:22. [So also Lόcke, De Wette, Meyer, Wieseler, Ebrard, Luthardt, Godet, Alford, etc. Bengel infers from this passage that the preaching of the Baptist began not long before the baptism of Jesus; otherwise the embassy would have been sent earlier. Alford argues that it was absolutely necessary to suppose that John should have delivered this testimony often, and under varying circumstances, first in the form given by Luke: ἔρχεταιὁἰσχυρ. μουκ. τ. λ., and after it in this form, ου̇ ?͂τοςη̇ ?͂νὂνει̇ ?͂πον, where his former testimony is distinctly referred to.—P. S.] [Chrysostom, Jerome, Augustine and other fathers distinguished two Elijahs, corresponding to the two advents of Christ, 1) a man of the spirit and power of Elijah, i.e., John the Baptist; 2) Elijah the Tishbite, who shall precede as a herald the second or judicial coming of Christ. ‘This view is adopted by Ryle, who thinks that John could not well have answered in the negative, if there is no literal fulfilment of Malachi’s prophecy in prospect. Trench (Studies in the Gospels, p. 214) leaves the question undecided.—P. S.] [Bengel: Omnia a se amolitur, ut Christum confiteatur et ad Christum redigat quxrentes. “He turns all from himself, that he may confess Christ and bring the inquirers to Christ.” This expresses the true character and mission of the Baptist. Comp. John 3:30.—P. S.] [The absence of a name is urged in favor of this interpretation.—P. S.] [Grotius, Kuinoel, Olsh. refer ὁπροφήτης to Jeremiah.—P. S.] [Meyer (p. 108), on the contrary, takes αἴρειν here in the sense to take away, to abolish, but admits that this idea presupposes the idea of bearing (Das Hinwegnehmen der Sόnde von Seite des Lammes setzt das Aufsichnehmen derselben voraus). Dr. Lange’s view is more correct. In Isaiah 53., to which also Meyer refers the passage, the idea of expiatory bearing (πָ ?ωָׂ ΰ, LXX.: φέρει, ἀνήνεγκε, ἀνοίσει) prevails. By assuming and bearing our sin, Christ has abolished it. His blood cleanseth from all sin, 1 John 1:7.—P. S.] [This, with the article, forcibly presents the sins of the race as one fact. Christ bore the whole. “Sin and the world,” says Bengel, “are equally wide. In Isaiah 53:6; Isaiah 53:8; Isaiah 53:12 the same singular number is used in the midst of plurals.”—P. S.] [Comp. on this important and difficult passage Lόcke, I. 401–416, and Alford, who likewise refers the Lamb of God to the prophetic announcement in Isaiah 53:7, where it is connected with the bearing and taking away of sin. But this does not set aside the fact that Christ was indeed the true Paschal Lamb slain for us, 1 Corinthians 5:7. The passage is strangely misunderstood by the author of Ecce Homo. Ch. 1, who endeavors to explain it from the 23d Psalm, as describing a state of quiet and happy repose under the protection of the Divine Shepherd. The exegesis is the poorest part of this book—P. S.] [Κἀλώ, or as ΰ. reads, καὶἐγώ. Alford explains: I also, like the rest of the people, had no certain knowledge of Him. But καί here reassumes ἐγώ, John 1:30, and continues the narrative. See Meyer. John knew Jesus far better than the people (Matthew 3:14), but in comparison with his divine knowledge of inspiration received at the baptism of Christ, his former human knowledge of conjecture dwindled into ignorance.—P. S.] [Augustine urges simplicity as the tertium comparationis. “The Holy Ghost,” he says (as quoted by Wordsworth who does not refer to the place), “then manifested Himself as a Dove,—and, at the day of Pentecost, in tongues of fire: in order that we may learn to unite fervor with simplicity and to seek for both from the Holy Ghost.”—P. S.] After the martyrdom of Polycarp a dove arose from the ashes of the martyr. [The last view is sufficiently refuted by σὰρξἐγένετο, which could never be said of the Spirit. Comp. Meyer, p. 115.—P. S.] [Several commonplace extracts or mere repetitions and themes of sermons have been omitted in this section.—P. S.] II The Disciples Of John And The First Disciples Of Jesus. Jesus Ackonwledged As The Messiah, The King Of Israel, Who Knows His Israelites, And Also Knows “the Jews;” Signalized By Miraculous Discernment Of Spirits, Personal Characters Becoming Manifest In His Personal Light.John 1:35-5135 Again the next day after [omit after] John stood, and two of his disciples; 36and looking [fastening his eye] upon Jesus as he walked, he saith, Behold the Lamb of God! 37And the two disciples heard him speak, and they followed Jesus. 38 (39)Then [And] Jesus turned, and saw them following, and saith unto them What seek ye? They said unto him, Rabbi, (which is to say [which means], being interpreted, 39 (40)Master), where dwellest [abidest] thou? He saith unto them, Come and [ye shall] see! [Then] They came and saw where he dwelt [abode] and abode [for their part] with him that day: [.] for [omit for] it was about the tenth hour. 40 (41)One of the two which [who] heard John speak, and followed him, was Andrew, 41 (42)Simon Peter’s brother. He first findeth his own brother Simon, and saith unto him, We have found the Messias [Messiah], which is, being interpreted, the 42 (43)[om. the] Christ [Anointed]. And he brought him to Jesus. And [om. And] when Jesus beheld him, he [Jesus looking on him] said, Thou art Simon the Son of Jona [John] thou shalt be called Cephas, which is by interpretation, 43 (44)A stone [Peter]. The day following [the next day] Jesus [he] would go [ῆθέλησεν, intended, was minded, to go] forth into Galilee, and findeth Philip, 44 (45)and saith unto him, Follow me. Now Philip was of [from] Bethsaida, the 45 (46)city of Andrew and Peter. Philip findeth Nathanael, and saith unto him, We have found him, of whom Moses in the law, and the prophets, did write, Jesus 46 (47)of Nazareth, the son of Joseph. And Nathanael said unto him, Can there 47 (48)any good thing [have] come [εἶναι] out of Nazareth? Philip saith unto him, Come and see. Jesus saw Nathanael coming to him, and saith of him, Behold 48 (49)an Israelite indeed, in whom is no guile! Nathanael saith unto him [answered him], Whence knowest thou me? Jesus answered and said unto him, Before that [om. that] Philip called thee, when thou wast under the fig tree, I saw 49 (50)thee. Nathanael answered and saith unto him, Rabbi, thou art the Son of 50 (51)God; thou art the King of Israel. Jesus answered and said unto him, Because I said unto thee, I saw thee under the fig tree, believest thou? thou shalt see 51 (52)greater things than these. And he saith unto him, Verily, verily, I say unto you, Hereafter [om. hereafter or henceforth], ye shall see heaven open [opened], and the angels of God ascending and descending upon the Son of man. AND [The gathering of the first disciples of jesus, 35–52. The humble beginning of mighty results. The cradle of the Christian Church. This call is Judea on the banks of Jordan was merely a preliminary acquaintance, which John supplies from his personal experience, while the final call to the permanent discipleship, as related by the Synoptists (Matthew 4:18 ff.; Mark 1:16 ff.; Luke 5:1 ff.), took place at a later date in Galilee. We must assume that these disciples (two of them at least, viz., Andrew and John, were formerly disciples of the Baptist), after becoming acquainted with Jesus on the banks of Jordan, and accompanying Him to Galilee to witness the miracle at Cana, returned for a while to their occupation as fishermen (as they did after the resurrection, John 12:1 ff.), until, before His journey to the passover in Jerusalem, He called them to the Apostolate. The readiness with which they followed, and the confidence of Peter in the miraculous powers of Jesus (Luke 5:5), are more readily explained from the previous intercourse related by John. The section has two divisions: 1) The calling of Andrew and John, and, through Andrew, of Simon Peter, 35–43; 2) The calling of Philip, and, through him, of Nathanael, 44–52. Christ finds disciples, they find their friends, and report how they have been found by Christ and have found Him (John 1:41; John 1:45). Bengel observes on εὐρίσκει (John 1:41): “With the festive freshness of those days beautifully corresponds the word findeth, which is used here more frequently than elsewhere.” Trench appropriately calls this “the chapter of the Eurekas.” Christ used no outward compulsion, held out no worldly inducements of any kind; it was simply the force of spiritual attraction which draws “the brave to the braver, the noble to the noblest of all.”—P. S.] John 1:35. Again the next day.—[ΤῇἐπαύριονπάλινεἱστήκειἸωάννης.]—The day after the first testimony of John [John 1:29] or after the day of Christ’s return from the wilderness, which followed the day of John’s testimony concerning the Messiah before the Jewish rulers; to the Evangelist ever memorable. He counts these never to be forgotten days one by one. Upon the testimony of the first day the two disciples of John did not follow Jesus. They doubtless felt that this must involve departure from their old master. The next day was the day of their calling and decision. And two of his disciples.—One was Andrew, we know from John 1:40 (see Com. on Matthew John 10:1-4); the other was certainly John. We judge thus from (1) John’s manner of mentioning himself, either not at all, or indirectly (chs. John 13:23; John 18:15; John 19:26; John 20:3; John 21:20); a manner which he seems to have extended also to his mother (John 19:25; comp. Introduction, p. 5), and to which we might cite analogies in Mark (Mark 14:51) and Luke (Luke 24:18). 2) The giving of one name, suggesting a personal reserve in regard to the other. 3) The very lifelike character of the subsequent account. 4) The more distinct calling of the sons of Zebedee immediately after, with the sons of Jonas, on the sea of Galilee, Matthew 4. As the calling of the latter is introduced here, so is doubtless the calling of the former. John 1:36. And looking upon Jesus.—His eye rests upon him, is steadily and continuously directed towards him, ἐμβλέψας, see John 1:42, et al. [John 1:43; Mark 10:21; Luke 20:17]. As he walked.—The day before, Jesus had returned to John out of the wilderness. Probably He then took leave of him, after coming to an understanding with him respecting their conduct towards each other. We may suppose that Jesus expects the transfer of the disciples of John. To-day He comes no more to John, but after an excursion returns to His abode. That He comes within sight of the Baptist, is wholly natural, yet at the same time designed. Behold the Lamb of God.—As the disciples of John had yesterday heard the same word, and no doubt some explanation of it, no more than this repetition of the exclamation was now necessary, to cause these two disciples to go personally after the Lord; no more extended discourse (so Meyer, rightly, against Lόcko and Tholuck. And of a multitude standing by, to whom he spoke in presence of the two, there is not a word). John 1:37. And they followed Jesus [with profound reverence and in expectation of great things].—The ἀκολουθεῖν being immediately repeated, must mean more than: went towards Him to see Him (Nonnus, Euthymius [Alt.]). They went towards him, in any case, with the thought of discipleship, though their decision to be disciples must have been afterwards wrought by Christ. Bengel: “Primζ origines ecclesiζ Christianζ.” John 1:38 (39). What seek ye?—Anticipating, yet meeting their seeking. That they are seeking, He acknowledges. But in the impersonal τί He couches a sort of testing. That they were now quite timid, as Euthymius Zigabenus proposes, is evident from their embarrassed answer. They do not express themselves directly respecting their seeking; yet they plainly say that they seek not something from Him, but Himself.Rabbi, where abidest thou?—An acknowledgment that He was a master [a travelling Rabbi]; an intimation that they wish to speak with Him in quiet; an implication that He has a hospitable house [with a friend] near by; an inquiry, when they may meet Him there. John writes for Greeks, and therefore explains the term Rabbi.John 1:39 (40). Come and ye shall see.—An unmistakable allusion to the rabbinical formula of requiring one to convince himself: Come and see! (αΰεψΰδ, according to Buxtorf and Light-foot), which Meyer groundlessly rejects. [Come and see, afterwards used by Philip, John 1:47 (48), in reply to the objection of Nathanael, occurs Psalms 66:5 (6).with reference to the great works of God (μְ ?λεּ εּ ?ψְ ?ΰεּ, LXX.: δεῦτεκαὶἴδετετὰἐργατοῦθεοῦ); comp. John 1:16 (δεῦτε, ἀκούσατε Come and hear… and I will declare what He has done for my soul). It is often the wisest answer we can give to honest skeptics on matters of Christian faith. Bengel calls it optimum remedium contra opiniones prζconceptas. Personal experience is the best test of the truth of Christianity, which, like the sun in heaven, can only be seen in its own light. It was Pascal, I believe, who said, that human things must be known to be loved, but divine things must be loved first before they can be known.—P. S.] And abode with him.—Ἔμειναν receives its significant sense from the preceding ποῦμένεις. It was about the tenth hour.—[The first hour of his Christian life was indelibly fixed upon the memory of John, as a great and glorious turning point, as a transition from darkness to light. Such days will be remembered in eternity, when their fruits will fully appear.—P. S.] According to the Jewish computation, four o’clock in the afternoon; according to the Roman (from midnight to midnight), ten o’clock in the morning. The expression: abode with Him that day [τὴνἡμέρανἐκείνην), seems to favor the latter computation. For this are Rettig [Studien und Kritiken, 1830, p. 106 f.], Tholuck, Ebrard, Ewald. For tho Jewish, Lόcke, Meyer, [Alford, Hengstenberg]. Decisive arguments for the Jewish are: 1) The Greeks of Asia Minor, for whom John wrote, had with the Jews the Babylonian reckoning, from sun-rise to sun-set. 2) The Romans also used the natural day besides the other computation. 3) In John 4:6 the sixth hour is far more probably noon, than six o’clock in the morning or evening (see Leben Jesu, II. p. 474); in John 4:52 the seventh hour is most probably the first hour after noon; John 11:9 implies the Babylonian reckoning; and in John 19:14 the sixth hour cannot be six o’clock in the morning, though to place it at noon causes difficulty (see Comm. on Mark 15:25, and Matthew 27:45). 4) Even of a late part of the afternoon it may be said in popular speech, that they abode with Him that day, especially if the conversation extended into the night. Reference of the hour to what follows further on (Hilgenfeld, Lichtenstein; sea Meyer), is unwarranted. John 1:40 (41). One was Andrew, etc.—The form of the statement leads us to inquire after the other. Andrew is more particularly described as the brother of Simon Peter, on account of the subsequent distinction of Peter. He no doubt influenced the decision of John, as well as of Peter, and afterwards of Philip (who “was of the city of Andrew and Peter”). He appears again as mediator and pioneer in John 12:22 (comp. Mark 13:3). On Andrew see Matth. on John 10:1-4, and the word in Winer [Smith, and other Bible Dictionaries]. John 1:41 (42). He first findeth.—For this finding Luthardt supposes a separate day, without support from the text. The text in fact leads us to suppose that this finding occurred on the same day that the disciples were with Jesus (Meyer, against De Wette, etc.) We may easily imagine, too, that Andrew found his brother on returning in a common lodging-place. The supposition that the disciples then brought Peter to Jesus still on the same evening, is more difficult. But even this has a parallel in the nocturnal visit of Nicodemus, and it makes the whole procedure uncommonly animated, showing the intense excitement of the disciples. Meyer thinks the emphatic statement that Andrew is the first to find his own brother, an intimation even that John next found his brother James, and brought him to Jesus. John is silent about it, indeed, after the manner of his peculiar, delicate reserve respecting himself and his kindred (even the name of James does not occur in his Gospel); but the πρῶτος betrays it, and the Synoptical account confirms it, Mark 1:19. This opinion is certainly more strengthened by the ἴδιον (which is not merely possessive), than the opinion of De Wette and others, that the two together sought out Simon. We have found the Messiah [ΕὑρήκαμεντὸνΜεσσίαν.—Bengel: “A great and joyful εὔρηκα, and expected by the world for about forty centuries.”—P. S.]—“With the stress on the first word, implying a longing search”: Meyer. And the name Messiah, used by the Aramaic-speaking disciple, the Evangelist interprets to his readers. [Xριστός, from χρίω to anoint. The article is omitted because the author wishes simply to identify the two words ξָ ?ωִׁ ?ιηַ and χριστός, not the two titles. See Meyer and Alford. Anointing with oil in the O. T. is a symbolical act that signifies the communication of the gifts of the Holy Spirit and the solemn consecration to the service of God. It was performed on the three officers of the theocracy, the kings, priests and prophets, especially the kings (comp. 1 Samuel 10:1; 1 Samuel 16:13-14); hence kings were called emphatically the anointed, or the anointed of the Lord (1 Samuel 2:10; 1 Samuel 2:35; 1 Samuel 12:3; 1 Samuel 12:5; 1 Samuel 16:6; 1 Samuel 16:10; 2 Samuel 1:14; 2 Samuel 1:16; 2 Samuel 19:21; Lamentations 4:20; Zechariah 4:14). The term in its fullest sense was applied to Him who should be endowed with the Holy Spirit without measure (Isaiah 11; comp. John 1:32-33; John 3:34), realize the typical significance of the kingdom of Israel (Psalms 2:2; Daniel 9:25) and combine the offices of prophet, priest and king in His own person for ever. P. S.] John 1:42 (43). Beheld him.—Ἐμβλέψας. The penetrating look of the Lord, introducing one of those mental miracles of immediate discernment of characters which here follow in rapid succession, and of which the knowledge of Nathanael is especially signalized. Jesus is the knower of hearts, John 2:25. It is characteristic that John first brings out this power of the Lord: in keeping with his Gospel of the ideal personality. Thou art Simon.—This calling him by name is not necessarily through miraculous knowledge (Chrysost., Luthardt), for Andrew had introduced him to Jesus; but is doubtless intended to put Simon as the son of Jonas in contrast with Peter. ωִׁ ?ξְ ?ςεֹ ?κ, heard, ιεֹ ?πָ ?δ, dove, λֵּ ?ιτָ ?ΰ, rock. The sense is: What thou art not, and canst not be, as Simon, son of Jonas, but what thou art adapted to be, that shalt thou become. [Christ says not: “Thou art Cephas,” as He says to Nathanael: “Thou art truly an Israelite,” but “thou shalt be called Peter.” It was therefore a prophecy of the future work and position of Peter in history, as the Apostle who, above all others, laid the foundations of the church, among the Jews on the day of Pentecost, and among the Gentiles by the conversion of Cornelius. Cephas (αּ ?ιτΰ), Peter, Rock, is a symbol of firmness; comp. the contrast of rocky and sandy foundation, Matthew 7:24-26, and the promise of indestructibility given to the church as founded upon the rock, John 16:18.—P. S.] On the more particular sense of the antithesis see Comm. on Matth., Matthew 16:17 [and the notes in the Am. ed., pp. 292, 293, 295]; on the different calls, Matth. on John 4:19, p. 93. In Matthew 16:18 this previous naming is evidently pre-supposed. It is characteristic of Judaism as the religion of personal life, that persons were commonly designated by names significant of their peculiarities. See the citation in Tholuck. According to Tholuck the rock, the emblem of firmness, would refer to the choleric temperament of Peter. But none of all the temperaments suffices to describe a concrete direction of character. A recent assurance, that the name Peter refers not at all to his stamp of character, but entirely to the work of grace in him, can be accounted for only by want of insight into the nature of a charism.[The calling of Philip and Nathanael, John 1:43-51. Comp. on this passage Archbishop Trench, Studies in the Gospels, N. Y. ed., 1867, pp. 66 f.—P. S.] John 1:43 (44). The next day Jesus.…to go forth.—Had therefore not yet gone forth. Was intending to set out.—And findeth Philip.—He was by this circumstance again detained. The acquaintance may be accounted for by two facts. Philip had been also at the Jordan; probably, like others, a disciple of John. He was a townsman of Andrew and Peter, of Bethsaida (John 4:5; John 12:21), and perhaps just then on his way home. Philip, one of the earliest apostles of the Lord. His characteristic, according to John 6:5; John 12:21 sqq.; John 14:8, seems to have been a striving after ocular evidence in the nobler sense, a buoyant and resolute advance to the object in view (see Comm. on Matth., p. 183). Tradition, contrary to the fact of his earlier calling, has made him the disciple to whom Christ spoke the words in Matthew 8:22 (Clement of Alex., Strom. III. 187). More probable is the tradition that he preached in Phrygia (Theodoret, Nicphorus), and died at Hierapolis (Euseb. III. 31, etc.) The accounts of his marriage and his daughters have confounded him with Philip the deacon, with whom he is in general frequently interchanged (see the art. in Winer and in Herzog’s Real Encycl.) Follow me.—This cannot mean merely: Join the journeying company [Alford]; yet neither is it the call to the Apostolic office. It is the invitation to discipleship, in the form of a travelling companionship. The rest of the interview (how Jesus knew Philip, and Philip knew the Lord) is not mentioned; only the decisive word of the call. Probably the Evangelist would tell us that the quick, active character of Philip did not need many circumstances. [Trench: “This ‘Follow Me’ might seem at first sight no more than an invitation to accompany Him on that journey from the banks of Jordan to Galilee, on which He was just setting forward. It meant this (thus compare Matthew 9:9; Luke 5:27); but at the same time how much more. It was an invitation to follow the blessed steps of His most holy life (Matthew 16:24; John 8:12; John 12:26; John 21:19; Revelation 14:4), to be a partaker at once of His cross and His crown. How much of this Philip may have understood at the moment it is impossible to say; but whether much or little, he is not disobedient to the heavenly calling.”—P. S.] John 1:44 (45). [Bethsaida of Galilee was on the western shore of the lake of Galilee, not far from Capernaum and Chorazin, but like these two towns, it is entirely obliterated from the face of the earth, so that even the memory of its site has perished. Robinson (III. 359) places it a short distance north of Khϋn Minyeh, which he identifies with Capernaum; while other travellers, perhaps more correctly, find the ruins of Capernaum in Tell Hϋm. Comp. Matthew 11:20 and the notes in Matthew, pp. 210, 211.—It is remarkable that none of the Apostles was from Jerusalem, the capital of the nation. Christ Himself proceeded from an insignificant town and an humble carpenter-shop, and selected His Apostles from among the illiterate fishermen of Galilee. This is the way of God who made the world out of nothing. Comp. 1 Corinthians 1:27.—P. S.] John 1:45 (46). Philip findeth Nathanael (Theodore, gift of God).—The same with Bartholomew (see the Comm. on Matth. p. 182), and, according to John 21:2, of Cana in Galilee. He was probably, therefore, going in the same direction. The calling of Nathanael also is represented as occurring at the outset of the journey, not (as Ewald makes it) on nearing Cana. Nathanael seems also to be one of the devout (Luke 2:38), who had been with John the Baptist; and Philip’s having to find his friend (we find him afterwards paired with Nathanael, Matthew 10:3, etc., except in Acts 1:13), may be explained by Nathanael’s having forgotten himself in devout meditation apart under a fig-tree. Of whom Moses in the law.—The promises in Genesis and Deuteronomy 18:15, recognized as verbal and typical prophecies. Jesus of Nazareth, the son of Joseph.—[Literally: Jesus the son of Joseph, of Nazareth.] The distinguishing of the person first by his father, then by his residence, was usual among the Jews. Utterly groundless is the inference from these words, that John knew nothing of the miraculous birth of Jesus (De Wette, Strauss); this would not follow, even though the words were those of John himself, instead of Philip. [John, as a faithful historian, reports not what Philip ought to have said and would have said from his subsequent higher knowledge, but what he actually did say in the twilight of his first acquaintance, and in accordance with the prevailing belief. The mystery of the supernatural conception was a pearl not to be thrown before the multitude who would have misunderstood and abused it. That John believed in it as well as the Synoptists, is evident from his exalted view of Christ as the sinless Saviour from sin, and may be inferred also (as Neander suggests) from John 1:14 (the eternal Word became flesh, i.e., man), as compared with John 3:6 (what is born of flesh, i.e., of corrupt human nature, is flesh).—P. S.] John 1:46 (47). Can there any good thing coma out of Nazareth?—[Not so much an objection, as an expression of astonishment and a question frankly but modestly put.—P. S.] Grounds of the prejudice: 1) Nazareth lay in Galilee (Ebrard); yet Nathanael himself was a Galilean. 2) Nazareth too small and insignificant to be the birth-place of the Messiah (Lόcke and others). 3) The village was considered, as is evident from the τὶἀγαθόν, immoral (Meyer, with the remark that Luke 4:16 sqq. also may agree with Nathanael’s opinion). Yet, literally taken, the expression would be absurd: out of the worst town some morally good thing may come. Any good thing, therefore, must here mean: any thing excellent, any eminent person; and Nathanael’s doubt of this must have arisen from the smallness and insignificance of the place in proportion to the greatness of the Messiah. [So also Alford.] Tholuck: The place has no celebrity [is not even named] either in the Old Testament or in Josephus, and seems to have always been but an insignificant market-town, as the etymology of πֵ ?φֶ ?ψ implies (Hengstenberg, Christol. II. p. 127; Clark’s Engl. ed. II. p. 109). The pagan Julian contemptuously called Christ the Galilean [and the Christians Galilζans]; the Jews call Him δַ ?πָ ?φְ ?ψִ ?ι to this day. On Nazareth and its situation see the Comm. on Matth. on John 2:23, p. 64.Come and see.—The second time. [An echo of Christ’s Come and ye shall see, John 1:39. A watchword of the Christian faith. John 1:47 (48). Behold truly an Israelite indeed, in whom is no guile.—[̓ ?́Ιδε, ἀληθῶςἸσραηλίτης (Tischendorf reads—είτης) ἐνᾤδόλοςοὐκἔστιν.—Comp. Psalms 32:2, LXX. μακάριοςἀνὴρ, ῷ ?̓οὐμὴλογίσηταικύριοςἁμαρτίαν, οὐδέἐστινἐντῷστόματια̣ὐτοῦδόλος]—The word of the Lord addressed not directly to Nathanael, but to others on his approach. An Israelite indeed: that is, not merely a Jew, but a Jew of the higher theocratic turn. [Israelite is the theocratic and the most honorable title of the descendants of Abraham, in commemoration of Jacob’s glorious victory of prayer (Genesis 32:28; Acts 2:22; Acts 3:12; Acts 5:34; Acts 13:16; Romans 9:4, etc.). The Ishmaelite and the Edomite were Abraham’s seed as well as the Jews, but not Israelites. That was the exclusive title of the people of the covenant. With many this title was indeed a mere name, or even a contradiction and reproach, as the title Christian (i.e., follower of Christ) is with a multitude of Christians so-called. But Nathanael was not merely a carnal descendant of Jacob, an Israelite after the flesh, but an Israelite in spirit, a genuine son of that new Jacob or Israel who had in faith and prayer wrestled with God and prevailed. Probably he was engaged in meditation and prayer under the fig-tree, and thus truly a wrestler with God, like Israel of old. A reference to that event in the history of Jacob which gave rise to his new name (Genesis 32:28; Hosea 12:4), is as likely, as the reference to Jacob’s ladder in John 1:51 (see below) is certain. Perhaps the scene took place on the very spot which tradition assigned for the wrestling of Jacob. This would give additional force to the passage. Comp. my History of the Apostolic Church, p. 388.—P. S.] The reason why Nathanael is called a genuine Israelite, is his freedom from falsehood. In the Jewish nature there was much guile [as it was the characteristic fault of Jacob, the supplanter.—P. S.]; in the Israelite temper and the lively character it unfolded, there was no guile. [There is an allusion in the name to ιָ ?ωָׁ ?ψ, straight, upright, righteous, the very reverse of the meaning and natural characteristic of Jacob, comp. Numbers 23:10.—P. S.] Meyer’s reference of the expression to the description of Jacob in Genesis 25:27 [ΰִ ?ιωׁ ϊָּ ?ν, LXX. ἄπλαστος, Aquila: ἁπλοῦς Symmachus: ἅμωμος] is not of decisive importance. Christ perceived the man without guile by spiritual distant sight, as Discerner of the heart; an advance, therefore, on the miraculous knowledge of Peter. The frankness with which Nathanael expressed his prejudice against Nazareth, quite agrees with the judgment of the Lord. [The guilelessness of Nathanael must not be pressed too far and identified with sinlessness; on the contrary, it implies a readiness to confess sin instead of hiding it (comp. Psalms 32:1-2). It furnished, as Trench remarks, a kindly soil in which all excellent graces will flourish, but did not supersede the necessity of the divine seed, out of which alone they can spring. Augustine: “Si dolus in illo non erat, sanabilem illum judicavit medicus, non sanum.”—P. S.] John 1:48 (49). The question of Nathanael: Whence knowest thou me? [Πόθενμεγινώσκεις] is a new feature of the straightforward, clear character. He does not hypocritically decline the commendation; he does not proudly accept it; but he wishes to know whereon it is founded. He expresses himself evidently as surprised, but not as overcome; hence as yet without the title Rabbi. According to Jewish etiquette, no doubt, uncivil. When thou wast under the fig-tree.—According to Meyer, Philip cannot have found him under the fig-tree (as the Greek fathers and Baumgarten-Crusius suppose), but in another place; neither the πρὸτοῦφωνῆσαι, nor the ὄνταὑπό, etc., would have force. But if the mood of Nathanael under the fig-tree was the characteristic thing, Philip might have oven found him still there, without the significant element of the Lord’s expression being invalidated thereby. Again, according to De Wette and Meyer, the word of Jesus is intended to indicate only a miraculous vision of the person of Nathanael (beyond the range of natural sight), not a look into the depth of his soul. But in this case Jesus would not have answered the question of Nathanael at all. Jesus must have seen something in the spiritual posture of Nathanael under the fig-tree, which marked the person as the Israelite without guile. “As the Talmud often speaks of Rabbins who pursued the study of the law in the shade of fig-trees, most persons think of a similar occupation here.” Tholuck. According to Chrysostom and Luther, Nathanael was probably occupied with the very hope of the Messiah. [Trench also remarks that our Lord must refer here to earnest prayer, some great mental struggle, or strong temptation which took place in Nathanael’s soul while sitting under the fig-tree; for this of itself was a common occurrence among Israelites (1 Kings 4:25; Micah 4:4; Zechariah 3:10). Wordsworth and Alford find in ὑπό with the accusative (ὅνταὑπὸτῆνσυκὴν instead of ὑπὸτῇσυκῇ) an indication of retirement to the fig-tree as well as concealment there,—probably for purposes of meditation and prayer. It implies: when thou wentest under the fig-tree and while thou wert there.—P. S.] John 1:49 (50). Rabbi, thou art the Son of God.—In joyful certainty Nathanael now gives threefold expression to his hitherto reserved acknowledgment. First, Rabbi, the title, for even this most just due he had not before paid; then, Son of God, because he showed the divine power of the Heart-Searcher to look upon the soul; then, King of Israel, that is Messiah. There is at the same time an extremely fine return of the commendation: An Israelite without guile; Thou art the King of the Israel without guile, that is, my King. Though the ideas Christ and Son of God have become more or less interchangeable, yet it makes a difference whether the confession of the Messiahship precedes that of the divinity, or the reverse. Nathanael reasons from the Son of God, who demonstrated Himself to him, to the Messiahship. [The title the Son of God, was a rare designation of the Messiah, derived from Psalms 2:5; Psalms 2:12 (comp. Isaiah 9:6), and is so used by Peter, Matthew 16:16, the disciples in the ship, Matthew 14:33, Martha, John 11:27, and the high priest, Matthew 26:63. It signifies the divine nature, as the titles the Son of Man, and the Son of David, signify the human nature of the Messiah. (See Excursus after John 1:51). This is evident from the hostile indignation of the Pharisees and Scribes at our Lord when He claimed to be the Son of God (John 5:18; John 10:30-39). It is, of course, not to be supposed that Nathanael or any of the disciples had, during the earthly life of Christ, a clear insight into the full meaning and metaphysical depths of the expression, but their faith, based upon the glimpses of the O. T. and the personal knowledge of our Lord, contained more than they were conscious of, and anticipated the dogma.—P. S.] John 1:50 (51). Because I said unto thee—believest thou?—Not properly a question; still less an intimation of censure for a defective ground of faith (De Wette); but an expression of surprise that he so joyfully believes, upon a single token. Hence, too, a greater is then promised him. John 1:51 (52). Verily, verily.—The Hebrew Amen. ΰָ ?ξֵ ?κ, from ΰָ ?ξַ ?κ, an adjective: sure, true, faithful; also used as a substantive and adverb. When a final word of devout acclamation, Deuteronomy 27:15-26; Psalms 41:13; Psalms 89:52, or of religious confirmation of one’s own word, Romans 9:5; Romans 11:36, it is a sentence: Ratum sit, ita sit. When an initial word, it is an adverbial protestation: verissime, certissime; put singly in Matth., John 5:18; John 16:28 (Luke 9:27 ἀληθῶς), and Luke. In John double: John 3:3; John 5:19; John 8:51; John 12:24; John 14:12; John 21:18. Substantively: Amen, 2 Corinthians 1:20; the Amen, Revelation 3:14.—That the Hebrew word was early familiar in Christian worship, is evident from the fact that John does not explain it. In modern times even a small sect has gathered upon the consecrated word, called the Amen church. For the first time here, the word of the most solemn asseveration. “Only in John, and only in the mouth of Jesus, hence the more certainly authentic.” [The Synoptists use the single Amen more than 50, John the double—25 times, even in parallel passages, as Matthew 26:21; Matthew 26:34; John 13:21; John 13:38. Bengel explains the repetition in John from the fact that Christ spoke both in His and in the Father’s name. Probably it is a more emphatic assertion of the superiority of Christ above all preceding prophets. The double Amen could with full propriety only be used by Him who is the personal truth (John 14:6), the Amen (Revelation 3:14), the God of Truth (in Hebr. Amen, Isaiah 65:16), and in whom all the promises of God are Yea and Amen (2 Corinthians 1:19).—P. S.] I say unto you: to the little company of disciples now already collected. [This formula “I say unto you” differs from the “Thus saith the Lord,” as Christ differs from all the prophets: He is the truth itself and speaks with divine authority His own word; they are only witnesses of the truth and speak the Word of God in the name of God.—P. S.] (Henceforth) ye shall see heaven opened.—[This prospect to the public life of Christ, and uninterrupted communion between heaven and earth in and through Him, is an eminently fit conclusion of this chapter. Whether we retain ἀπάρτι (ἀπ’ ἄρτι) or not, the beginning of His public ministry and the first recognition of His Messianic dignity is meant, as the starting-point of an unbroken communion between God and man, and an exchange of divine grace and human prayers. The open heaven is here, as in the baptism of Christ, a symbolical expression for the ever present, help and grace of God (comp. Genesis 28:10-17; Ezekiel 1:1; Matthew 3:16; Acts vii. 17; John 10:11); while the closed heavens signify the absence of divine help or the impending judgment of God (comp. Isaiah 64:1). The participle ἀνεωγότα implies the act of opening, and the fact that before Christ the heaven was closed. Bengel: “aperlum, prζteritum, proprie, Matthew 3:16, et cum continuatione in posterum,” John 3:13; Acts 7:56; Revelation 11:12.—P. S.] The expression is evidently suggested by the word concerning the Israelite without guile, and the description of Christ as the King of Israel; and stands related to that dream of Jacob, in which his higher Israel-nature decisively came forth (Genesis 28:12), though he did not receive the honorable title of Israel until a later time. The first Israel saw heaven open; but only in dream, only for a while; the ascending and descending of the angels were assisted by a ladder; the Lord stood above the latter in the heavens; and the vision vanished away. Yet the living intercourse between heaven and earth, between God and man, had announced itself and opened in the old theocracy, and was now gloriously to complete itself. The expression can by no means be limited to actual appearances of angels in the life of Jesus [at His birth, in the garden of Gethsemane, at the resurrection and ascension] (Chrysostom and others), nor to His working of miracles (Storr); yet these points are not (according to Meyer) to be set aside, since they are phenomena peculiar to the New Testament intercourse between heaven and earth. On the other hand, the angels are no more to be reduced to personified divine powers (as by De Wette), than the divine powers to angels (as by Hofmann). Meyer rightly emphasizes the terms henceforth (ἀπάρτι) and ye shall see (ὄψεσθε); they show that it is the total Messianic revelation in its actual operation, which is spoken of, and that this is represented in figurative language. The expression, however, is not exactly symbolical, inasmuch as, in a spiritual sense, heaven is really opened, and the living personal intercourse between the Father and the Son also becomes manifest in manifold angelophanies, voices, and spiritual revelations. “The ἀναβαίνοντες stand first in the Old Testament also [Genesis 28:12]; we might, as in fact Philo does (De Somniis, p. 642), think of the reciprocal actings of human wants and prayers and divine powers; but the former are never called messengers of God. More correctly: They return to heaven to receive new commissions.” Tholuck. If we consider that Christ is the incarnate Angel of the Lord, we may refer the ascending unquestionably to His high-priestly intercessions, works, and sacrifice, the descending to the gradual unfolding of the riches of His kingly glory. Luther: “Now are heaven and earth become one thing, and it is just as if ye sat above, and the gentle angels ministered to you.” Calvin: “Quum prius nobis clausum esset regnum dei, vere in Christo apertum fuit,….ut simus cives sanctorum et angelorum socii.” For other explanations see Tholuck, p. 102. [We must here dismiss the notions of space. The incarnate Son of God is the bond of union, the golden clasp between earth and heaven, the mediating centre of all intercourse with God. Where He is, there is heaven and there are the angels, who ascend from Him as the starting-point, and descend upon Him, as the termination point. He spoke while He was on earth, others wise we would expect the reverse order. From the incarnate Saviour as the Alpha and Omega, this spiritual communion with heaven proceeds upon all believers. Ryle weakens the force of the prediction by confining it to the time of the future advent; this is sufficiently refuted by henceforth,—P. S.] Upon the Son of Man.—In John as well as in the Synoptists Christ designates Himself by this term. See Comm. on Matth, John 8:20. “Undoubtedly the precedent in Daniel has suggested the language in the Revelation, John 14:14; John 1:13, in which latter is also μετὰτ. νεφελῶν; and those like passages, in which the Redeemer is mentioned as appearing ἔπὶτ. νεφελῶν, ἐνδόξῃ, in His Messianic and judicial glory, Luke 21:27; Matthew 26:64; Matthew 16:28; so, therefore, Chemnitz, with the joint conception of the humilitas taken from the passages in Ezekiel; Beza, Scholten, Lόcke.” Tholuck. Yet the fact that the Lord applied this name to Himself, and that the people did not recognize it as a designation of the Messiah, John 12:34, itself very plainly shows that the phrase was not current as a Messianic phrase of the Jewish theology, though after the example of Daniel the term itself appears in the book of Enoch and in 4 Esdras, as well as, among the Rabbins, the expression: “He that cometh in the clouds.” The fact that the Apostles abstain from the phrase, Tholuck explains from Hebrews 2:6; that is, because the term referred to the humiliation of the Son of God. As to Hofmann’s hypothesis (Schriftbeweis, II. p. 51) see Tholuck, p. 104. Hofmann lays stress on the point that the phrase in Daniel is not: The Son of man, but: One like a son of man. This manner of interpretation would require that the Old Testament prophecy everywhere have the New Testament idea and phraseology pure and simple, in order to have them at all. Strangely Tholuck thinks the tracing of the expression to Daniel excludes the interpretation proposed by Herder: Man κατ’ ἐξοχήν, the pattern man; that according to this by a son of man must strictly be understood a man who shares the lot of actual mankind, as in Numbers 23:19; Job 25:6. And why not? Christ, as the second man, the Son of mankind, 1 Corinthians 15:47, is as well in His suffering the heir of its judgment, as in His work the heir of its righteousness of faith, and assuredly for this very reason the Son of Man, the supernatural bloom of the race, because He is the Son of God. Luthardt too thinks this latter idea, which he likewise gives, must be vindicated against the derivation of the name from the book of Daniel. But the vision in Daniel must after all have an idea. And it is sufficiently clear why Jesus chose this particular term from Daniel to designate Himself. [Excursus on the Meaning of the Title “The Son of Man.”—The designation of Christ as the Son of Man (ὁυἱὸςτοῦἀνθρώπου), occurs in this chapter, John 1:51 (John 1:52) for the first time, and in the mouth of Christ; while the corresponding title, the Son of God (ὁυἱὸςτοῦθεοῦ), occurs first John 1:49 (John 1:50), in the mouth of a disciple (Nathanael), but had been previously applied to Christ by God in His baptism (Matthew 3:16), and by Satan, hypothetically, in the temptation (Matthew 4:3; Matthew 4:6). The former is found about eighty, or, deducting the parallels, fifty-five times in the Gospels, and is only used by our Lord Himself, except in three cases, viz., once by Stephen when he saw “the heavens opened, and the Son of Man standing on the right hand of God,” Acts 7:56 (in allusion probably to Matthew 26:64), and twice by the apocalyptic seer, Revelation 1:13; Revelation 14:14, with obvious reference to Daniel 7:13-14. Bengel (on Matthew 16:13) urges the circumstance as very significant that Christ, during His earthly life, was never called the Son of Man by anybody but Himself. His followers called Him the Son of David (the Messiah), or the Son of God. The title the Son of God is used sometimes by Christ Himself, but mostly by the Apostles and Evangelists. Christ could use both designations with equal propriety, but He preferred the title of humility and condescension which identifies Him with the human race, while the Apostles chose the title of honor and dignity which exalts Him far above men. The one signifies in general the true humanity, the other the true divinity of Christ, both together give us the full idea of the God-Man (θεάνθρωπος). Both titles are generic. In both titles, when applied to Christ, the definite article is nearly always employed. He is not simply a son of man among other men, nor a son of God on a par with the children of God, but He is emphatically and in a unique sense the Son of Man, and the Son of God. The definite article is as significant in one case as in the other, and suggests a distinction as well as a resemblance. The appellation the Son of Man, when used by Christ of Himself, cannot, like the corresponding Hebrew αֶּ ?οΞδַ ?ΰָ ?γָ ?ν, or αֶּ ?οΞδַ ?ΰָ ?γָ ?ν be simply a poetic designation of man in general, in which sense νἱὸςἀνθρώπου (without the article) is used Hebrews 2:6 (in a quotation, however, from the Messianic Psalms 8.), and υἱοὶτῶνἀνθρώρώπων, Ephesians 3:5. It cannot be supposed for a moment that Christ should have used this term so often of Himself as a mere circumlocution for the personal pronoun. Nobody speaks of himself in this way. In the Saviour’s native dialect, the Syriac, Bar nosho, the son of man, is man generically; the filial part of the compound denotes the identity and purity of the generic idea. This leads to the correct interpretation, as above indicated. Nor does the title, as many suppose (e.g., Justin Martyr, Tertullian, De Wette, Tholuck), express exclusively the humiliation and condescension of Christ, but it denotes at the same time, and chiefly His elevation above the ordinary level, and the actualization, in Him and through Him, of the ideal standard of human nature under its moral and religious aspect, or in its relation to God, (Bengel, Schleiermacher, Olshausen, Neander, Hengstenberg, Trench, Liddon, Godet, and others). Christ Jesus is the centre of the unity of mankind, the recapitulation of humanity, as Paul profoundly indicates (Ephesians 1:10), and as Irenζus taught. He is the true seed of the woman, the second Adam (Romans 5. and 1 Corinthians 15.), who more than restored what the first Adam lost. He fulfils and closes the preceding, and controls the succeeding, history of our race. All men, even the best and the greatest, have their weaknesses and defects, and reflect only a fragment of the idea of humanity. Once in history, and once only, there was born a man who represents humanity in its purity without the demoniac adulteration of sin, and its universality without the limitations of race and nationality. Christ felt more humanly, spake more humanly, acted, suffered and died more humanly than any man before or since His coming. Every word and act of His appeals to universal human sympathies and calls out the moral affections of all without distinction of race, condition, and degree of culture. He is the only ἀληθινὸςἄνθρωπος (as Philo called the Logos), the Urbild, the archetypal or model Man, the King of men, and “draws all men” to Him. He could not have been so perfect a man without being also divine. This interpretation of the title Son of Man, suggested grammatically by the use of the definite article, is confirmed historically by the origin of the term, according to the usual acceptation, in Daniel 7:13 f., where it signifies the Messiah in His heavenly glory, as the head of a universal and eternal kingdom, and perhaps also in Psalms 8. where man is represented in his ideal destination with reference to the Messiah as the true and perfect head of humanity (comp. Romans 5:12; 1 Corinthians 15:27; Hebrews 1:2-8). The Son of David was likewise a designation of the Messiah (Matthew 9:27; Matthew 15:22; Matthew 12:23; Matthew 21:9; Matthew 22:41 ff.), but is not so significant, as it represents Christ, only as the flower and crown of the house of David, not of the whole human family. Our view commends itself, moreover, at one as the most natural and significant, in such passages as, “Ye shall see the heaven open, and the angels of God ascending and descending upon the Son of Man” (John 1:51); “He that came down from heaven, even the Son of Man who is in heaven” (John 6:53); “The Son of Man shall come in the glory of His Father;” “The Son of Man is come to save” (Matthew 18:11; comp. Luke 19:10); “The Father hath given Him authority to execute judgment also, because He is the Son of Man” (John 5:27). Even those passages which are quoted for the opposite view, receive, in our interpretation, a greater force and beauty from the sublime contrast which places the voluntary condescension and humiliation of Christ in the most striking light, as when He says: “Foxes have holes, and birds of the air have nests; but the Son of Man hath not where to lay His head” (Luke 9:58): or, “Whosoever will be chief among you, let him be your servant; even as the Son of Man came not to be ministered unto, but to minister, and to give His life a ransom for many” (Matthew 20:27-28). Thus the manhood of Christ, rising far above all ordinary manhood, though freely coming down to its lowest ranks, with the view to their elevation and redemption, is already the portal of His Godhood. Comp. my treatise on the Person of Christ, Boston, 1865, pp. 113 ff., from which I have transferred a few sentences.—P. S.] AND ETHICAL1. The greatness of the Baptist and the majesty of Christ appear in John’s pointing his disciples to Christ, and Christ’s attaching the best of them immediately to Himself. In these disciples of John the spiritual perfection of the work of the Baptist is seen. 2. It is remarkable, that the first disciples of John who followed Christ, followed Him upon the repeated testimony of the Baptist: Behold the Lamb of God. The testimony to the prζ-existence and glory of Christ does not convince the rulers of the Jews; this testimony which shows a future full of suffering for Christ convinces the disciples of John who here come to view. This of itself shows that they can never have shared the entirely crude, sensuous hope of the Messiah, in its hard, unspiritual form; much as they were still involved in sensuous expectations of a nobler sort. 3. Coming to Christ is here illustrated in every way. Prophetic testimony, office, word, points to him. Then brother brings brother, friend brings friend, towhsman brings townsman. One comes with another, and one after another. 4. These first disciples stand the decisive test-question, whether they seek something from Him, or seek Himself and all in Him. They seek Him, and when they exclaim: We have found the Messiah, they mean: We have found—absolutely. 5. In keeping with this prominence of the personality of Christ, He manifests His glory first in miracles of pure knowledge with the most varied insight into the dark depths of personal life. Thus in our text He sees through, in particular, Peter and Nathanael, and at the close of the chapter the Evangelist celebrates Him as the knower of hearts. So afterwards He reads Nicodemus, the woman of Samaria, Judas, the people, etc.6. The manner in which the Evangelist John, with delicate modesty, has here interwoven the story of his own calling with the gospel history, reminds us of the similar manner of Matthew (John 9:9); and these two analogies might lead us to presume that Mark (Mark 14:51-52) and Luke (Luke 24:13-35) have done likewise. See the exegesis, John 1:35. Christianity, in the light of the person of the Lord, brings to view and into play the worth and warrant of all the personages purified by Him. But evidently these great, sanctified delineators of the life of Jesus and the facts of redemption have wrought in with the utmost modesty their own names, for the most part only by hints in any part of their picture. 7. In this place Israel meets us in its purity, and doubtless is made prominent in its higher import, because the Evangelist sees himself further on compelled to exhibit Judaism so strongly in its hatred of the truth. 8. Christianity, an open heaven over open eyes, and a revelation of ever new and ever greater glories of the Lord, first in His life, then in His church, because divinity is become one with humanity in Christ, and this life communicates itself through the Holy Ghost to believer. AND On both histories together (John 1:35-51). The exuberant beginning of the Church of Christ: a. Its going forth out of the Old Testament; b. Its rising into the New.—The Israel of the Old Covenant, and the Israel of the New.—The effect of the testimony of John: residing (1) in the perseverance (repetition) and emphasis of it; (2) in the matter of it (the Lamb of God).—Three unique days in the kingdom of God (the next day, etc.).—Christ the Lamb of God.—The coming of the disciples to Jesus, a type of our coming to Him.—How quickly Christ and His elect recognize and meet each other.—The spring seasons of the kingdom of heaven.—The unity and the diversity of the Lord’s ways of calling His disciples.—“We have found!”—Working for the Lord.—Christ the heart-searcher.—The three great proofs of the Messiah: (1) From the Old Testament (Moses and the prophets, closed up by John the Baptist); (2) from Christ’s representation of Himself; (3) from the experience of the disciples. On the first history (John 1:35-43). The first two disciples of Jesus: John and Andrew.—The two decisive questions: What seek ye? and, Rabbi, where dwellest thou?—The invitation of Christ: “Come and see,” in its permanent import.—The first word of the Lord and His last respecting Peter, according to the Gospel of John.—How the natural brotherhood becomes transfigured in the spiritual. On the second history (44–51). Philip and Nathanael, or friendship in its relation to the kingdom of God: (1) Its destination for it; (2) its glorification in it.—Honorable prejudice, and how it is overcome by the facts of experience.—The word of the disciple: “Come and see;” an echo of the word of Jesus: “Come and see.”—The preaching of Philip: (1) Infinitely difficult: the connection of the name of Messiah, of whom Moses in the law and the prophets did write, with Jesus of Nazareth, the son of Joseph; (2) perfectly decided: We have found Him! (3) Irresistibly confirmed: Come and see!—One of the rare commendatory words of Christ, on a most rare occasion: (1) Bestowed upon a man who spoke contemptuously of His birth-place; was prepossessed against Himself; had, immediately after an hour of earnest devotion, fallen again under a prejudice; (2) and bestowed for the very reason, that he was without guile.—“An Israelite without guile:” In all nations, as in all men, the essential permanent nature and destiny must be distinguished from the corruption of it (the true Israelite from the false Jew; the intellectual German from the dreamy German; the open, frank Frenchman from the insolent Frenchman, etc.; Peter the rook from Peter the shaken reed, etc.).—The threefold homage of Nathanael: (1) Rabbi (which he had owed from the first); (2) Son of God (which he had denied Him); (3) King of Israel (with which he submits to Him as an Israelite without guile).—Christianity an open heaven over the open eyes and hearts of believers.—The ascending and descending angels; or, the intercourse between heaven and earth, a reciprocity of personal vital functions between the Father and Christ, Christ and His people, the church triumphant and the church militant.—Open hearts, a foretokening of the open heaven (Christ’s look into the soul of Nathanael, a foretokening of all the wonders of revelation). Starke: Preachers must repeat a thing often for the sake of those weak in faith.—Quesnel: To enforce industriously the all-sufficient sacrifice of Jesus Christ, a main duty of the servant of God.—Here the Lord begins to collect a little church, to which John has given up his disciples.—Jesus calls and draws men to Himself; yet without violence.—Zeisius: Experience in spiritual things gives great certainty and firmness in faith.—Regenerate Christians acquire a new name, which no man knows.—Osiander: Every one who truly believes in Christ is a rock, against which all the gates of hell are powerless.—Quesnel: Judge of divine things not by outward appearance, nor under human prejudice.—Zeisius: Uprightness is pleasing to the Lord, 1 Chronicles 29:17.—The omnipresent eye of the Lord.—The opening of heaven the opening of a way whereby the heavenly riches course to the earth, and free way (access) is given from earth to heaven.—Relation of the descending and ascending to the humiliation and exaltation of Christ (?).—Christ the ladder to heaven. Braune: The voice of the preacher prepared the way for Him; in the company of the preacher He must find His first adherents.—The anticipating friendliness of Jesus.—The blessedness of a Christian is ungrudging, and would communicate itself to all the world.—But why the ascending (of the angels) first, the descending after? Because intercourse between heaven and earth is not now first beginning, but has already begun (above all the Angel of the Lord has come down in the flesh).—Gerlach: It seems that John the Baptist always spoke in short, weighty sentences, which he often repeated and deeply impressed.—The Son of God, the King of Israel, Psalms 2.—Lisco: Jesus finds disciples through the testimony of His herald (and here the first two); Jesus finds disciples through the testimony of those who have come to know Him (and here probably again two: Peter and James the elder); Jesus finds disciples through the immediate call of His own word (here the last two). Yet, in the wider sense, (1) the office of the herald, (2) the joint witness of the disciples, (3) the call of Jesus run through the whole formation of discipleship.—The best counsel against all errors: Come and see!—Heubner: The whole service of the teacher consists in pointing to Christ; no man can take the place of Christ, but human aid can help to find Him.—Jesus’ turning, a powerful stroke on the heart; Jesus’ look, an attracting power.—What seek ye? a question which Jesus puts to every one who comes to Him.—The open hearts went straight forward.—There is a great difference between mediate and immediate acquaintance with Jesus.—The more like Jesus, the more inexhaustible a man is.—The more one is conversant with Jesus, the more he finds in Him. In other men one is often disappointed; in Jesus every expectation is exceeded.—Albertini: How does the Saviour enlist disciples?—Schleiermacher: The meeting of Christ and His disciples an example for us in forming earnest social relations.—The deepest corruption is the falsehood of man.—Through the Redeemer alone is made the bond between heaven and earth. [John 1:51 (52). Luther: When Christ became man and had entered on His ministerial office and begun to preach, then was the heaven opened, and remains open; and has from that time, since the baptism of Christ in the Jordan, never been shut, and never will be shut, although we do not see it with our bodily eyes……Christ says this: ‘Ye are now heavenly citizens, and have your citizenship above in the heavenly Jerusalem, and are in communion with the holy angels, who shall without intermission ascend and descend about you.’—Archbishop Trench: Lord would indicate by these wondrous words that He should henceforward be the middle point of a free intercourse, yea, of an uninterrupted communion, between God and man, that in Him should be the meeting place of heaven and of earth (Ephesians 1:10; Colossians 1:19); which should be no longer two, as sin had made them, separated and estranged from one another, but one, now that righteousness had looked down from heaven, and truth had flourished out of the earth. And this, the glory of Christ, they, His disciples, should behold, and should understand, that they too, children of man, were by Him, the Son of Man, made citizens of a kingdom which, not excluding earth, embraced also heaven, From earth there should go up evermore supplications, aspirations, prayers,—and these by the ministration of angels (Revelation 8:3-4), if some still want a certain literal fulfilment;—from heaven there should evermore come down graces, blessings, gifts, aid to the faithful and punishment for them that would hurt them (Revelation 8:5; Acts 12:7; Acts 12:23). Heaven and earth should hence forward be in continual interchange of these blessed angels, ‘And earth be changed to heaven, and heaven to earth; One kingdom, joy and union without end.’ —Bonaventura: The heavenly ladder was broken in Adam, and repaired in Christ.—There is a beautiful hymn on Jacob’s ladder, as a symbol of communion with God, by Mrs, Sarah Flower Adams, John 1848: “Nearer, my God, to Thee.” —P. S.]  Footnotes: John 1:38.—[Lit.: (And) Jesus having turned, and seen them following, saith to them, δέ after στραφείς is omitted by Tischend. (VIII. ed.), but retained by Tregelles, Alford, Westcott.—Tischendorf, Alford and others divide John 1:38 into two, commencing John 1:38 with τίζητεῖτε; hence the difference of verses to the end of the ch.—P. S.] John 1:39.—[The text. rec. reads ἴδετε, see, in conformity with ἔρχεσθε and with John 1:47 : ἔρχονκαὶἴδε. Meyer, Alford, Tregelles, Tischendorf, Westcott, adopt ὄψεσθε, which could be more easily changed into ἴδετε than substituted for it.—P. S.] John 1:39.—[Text. rec. omits οὖν, which is supported by ΰ. A. B. C. L., etc., Tischendorf, Tregelles, Alford, Westc.—P. S.] John 1:38.—[Μἐνειν is used here and twice in John 1:39, and there is no need of varying the transl., as in the E. V.—P. S.] John 1:39.—[The best authorities omit δέ after ὥρα. There should be a full stop after day. If the δέ of text. rec. be retained, it should be translated and instead of for.—P. S.] John 1:41.—[The text, rec. πρῶτος, referring to Ἀνδρέας (he before any other), is supported by ΰ.* L. Epiph. Cyr., etc., and adhered to by Meyer, Lange and Tischendorf (ed. VIII), while Lachmann, Tregelles, Alford and Westcott, on the authority of ΰ.c A. B. M. Orig, give the preference to πρῶτον, which would mean (adverbialiter) either first (before he found another) or (assuming an error of the transcriber for πρωΐ) early (hence the Itala: mane). But the change of ς in ν is easily accounted for by the following τόν.—P. S.] John 1:42.—Cod. B. reads Ἰωάνου [other authorities, Ἰωάννου, with double ν], so Lachmann; Cod. L. 33, and some versions, Ἰωάννου. The same authorities give the same in John 21:15; John 21:17, and besides codd. C. and D. interchange Ἰωάνου and Ἰωάννου. The Recepta [Jona, or better, Jonas] is supported primarily by Matthew 16:17, where all authorities read Ἰωνᾶ. Lόcke observes: The less usual Ἰωνἄ might easily be confounded with the Ἰωάνου or Ἰωάννου more current among the Greeks. Meyer supposes that John gave the form Ἰωάνης to the name, whence it became the more usual Ἰωάννης. [Cod. Sin. Tregelles, Tischendorf, Alford, Westcott and Hort read Ἰωάννου, or the same with one v. Ἰωνἄ is a correction from Matthew 16:17. Ewald, on the contrary, thinks that the reading Johannes here and John 21 originated in a mistake. He reads σύει̇ ?͂ ?, etc. as a question: Du bist Simon Jona’s Sohn?—P. This entry is longer than a Bible module can hold. The rest is at https://www.sermonindex.net/commentary/lange/ III THE KINDRED AND FRIENDS OF THE LORD, AND THE FIRST MIRACLE OF JESUS AT CANA, AS THE EARNEST OF THE OF THE WORLD, AND AS THE FIRST OF HIS GLORY. CHRIST THE EARTHLY FEAST INTO A SYMBOL OF THE . John 2:1-11.(Pericope for 2nd Sunday after Epiphany.) 1And the third day there was a marriage [a marriage feast was held] in Cana of Galilee; and the mother of Jesus was there: 2And both Jesus was called, and his disciples, [and Jesus also was invited and his disciples] to the marriage. 3And when they wanted wine [And wine having failed, or, when wine failed] the mother of 4Jesus saith unto him, They have no wine. Jesus saith unto her, Woman, what have I to do with thee? mine hour is not yet come. 5His mother saith unto the servants, Whatsoever he saith unto you, do it. 6And there were set there six waterpots of stone, after the manner of the purifying of the Jews, containing two or three firkins apiece. 7Jesus saith unto them, Fill the waterpots with water. And they filled them up to the brim [top]. 8And he saith unto them, Draw out now, and 9bear unto the governor [ruler] of the feast. And they bare it. When the ruler of the feast had tasted the water that was made [had become, or, been made] wine, and knew not whence it was, (but the servants which drew [who had drawn] the water knew), the governor [ruler] of the feast called the bridegroom, 10And saith unto him, Every man at the beginning doth set forth good wine, [setteth forth the good wine first]; and when men have well drunk, then that which is worse; but 11[omit but] thou hast kept the good wine until now. This beginning of miracles [signs, τῶνσημείων] did [wrought] Jesus in Cana of Galilee, and manifested forth his glory [his transfiguring power, τὴνδόξαναὑτοῦ ?]; and his disciples believed [the more] on [in] him. Ε AND [Here we have the fulfilment of the promise made in the last verse of John 1., and a startling proof of the presence of supernatural powers in the person of the Son of Man. Christ significantly began His public ministry with a miracle of transformation: His whole mission was to convert sinners into saints, to turn grief into joy, to elevate earth to heaven. It was moreover a miracle of festive joy and gladness, and of more than royal munificence; showing—in striking contrast to the Mosaic law of condemnation and the ascetic austerity and water-baptism of John, and in the presence of his former pupils—that the gospel is life and peace, a religion of true happiness. Christ relieves not only the present need, but provides also an abundant supply for all the future, enough and to spare for every one that thirsteth. It is equally significant that this miracle was performed in the bosom of a, family: for the family is the first institution of God on earth, and the nursery of Church and State, where all moral reforms of society must begin. Christianity restored marriage and the family to their original purity, and elevated them to true dignity by abolishing polygamy, emancipating woman from slavish degradation, and by making the relation of husband and wife a type of the sacred union of Christ to His church.—The miracle of Cana, as it was the first in time, is also the greatest in character, next to the raising of Lazarus which was the last, and which exhibited Christ as the Conqueror of death and the Prince of life eternal. Both belong exclusively to the fourth Gospel, while the miraculous feeding of the multitude is reported by all. The change of water into wine was a proper transubstantiation or qualitative transmutation of an elementary substance. It is not a creative act in the strict sense of the term; for God made the world out of nothing, Christ always operated upon existing substances. But it involves the same creative power, and is strictly above nature and above reason (not against them), and therefore incomprehensible. Yet after all it is not more beyond our present comprehension than the change of the rain from heaven into the juice of the grape, the growth of plants by the transmutation of inorganic matter into organic, and all those miracles of nature, which by their daily occurrence appear to us natural and common.—Like many sayings of Christ, the miracle of Cana is a stumbling-block to the superficial reader, and seems to conflict with the ideal character of the Gospel of John. It is indeed a rebuke to a morbid asceticism and desponding legalism, to which even many good people are given. But it abounds in high moral significance and symbolic beauty. It is altogether unnecessary to resort to the modern figment of an essential difference of the wine of the Bible and usual wine. The wine which Christ made was no doubt pure, good wine, in the proper sense of the term. But to think it even possible that Christ might have encouraged immoderate use of wine or any kind of excess, proves a false posture of mind and utter disqualification to understand the miracle. The piety and sobriety of this God-fearing family, with the Son of God as their guest, was the basis of the miracle; in an intemperate circle it would never have been wrought at all. Procul abeste profani! To the pure all things are pure. See Doctr. and Eth.—P. S.] John 2:1. And the third day,[τῇτρίτῃἡμέρᾳ ?].—Most probably identical [?] with the ἐπαύριον, John 1:43 (44). See the Exeg. ad loc. The marriage-feast had probably been nearly three days in progress, when Jesus, on His arrival, was invited to it. [The third day is probably to be reckoned from the last date mentioned, i.e., Nathanael’s calling, John 1:43 (44), not from the day of John’s testimony, John 1:29, as Dr. Lange takes it, still less from the day of Christ’s arrival in Cana (Ewald); for this was not yet spoken of. Bengel: Tertio die post promissum datum, 1:52. Nunc ostenditur specimen. The journey from Judζa to Galilee required two or three days, the distance in a direct line being over twenty hours.—P. S.] In Cana of Galilee.—In the Galilean Cana; in distinction from another. (So John 2:11; John 4:46; John 21:2). [Or, rather, as the other Cana lies likewise in Galilee, τῆςΓαλιλείας is merely a local notice of John for foreign readers, comp. John 1:28; 44, and Hengstenberg in loc.—P. S.] Not Kef’r Kenna, but Kβna el-Jelξl, according to Robinson, III., p. 443. [Am. ed. of 1858, vol. 2. pp. 346–,49.—P. S.] Galilee was originally only a district (βָ ?μִ ?ιμ) of Upper Galilee, which was divided from Lower Galilee by a line running from Tiberias to Zabulon. Hence in the time of John there was, no doubt, a Galilee in the stricter, ancient sense, to be distinguished from a Galilee in the wider sense. This distinction is important in John 4:45. The other Cana, from which ours is distinguished, has been sought now, according to Josephus (Vita xvii. 1) erroneously in Perζa, now in a Cana in the tribe of Asher (Joshua 19:28), south-east of Type (Robinson III. 657), which, “though also to be counted in Galilee, lay so much in the vicinity of Phenicia, as to justify the designation of our Cana as K. τῆςΓαλιλαίας,” (Meyer). But that northernmost Cana also belonged to Galilee. We can allow this distinction only on the supposition that the region of Cana of Galilee was a Galilee in the narrow sense, in the most provincial terms. As Kef’r Kenna, which tradition has fixed as the Galilean Cana, lies some distance to the south, it might fall in the province of Lower Galilee, and might well form the antithesis. Ewald has made a Kanath, east of Jordan, the other Cana; which is scarcely to be mentioned. Cana lay on a round hill. [The location of Cana is still under dispute. Dr. Robinson’s view has been adopted by Ritter, Meyer, Alford, Trench, Lange, Renan. Trench (On the Miracles, p. 83) numbers this among “the most felicitous and most convincing of Robinson’s slighter rectifications of the geography of Palestine.” Kβna el-Jelξl (i.e., Cana of Galilee) is a mere ruin about seven miles or nearly three hours N. ½ E. from Nazareth, and about three miles N. by E. of Sepphoris (Seffϋrieh). Kef’r (i.e., village) Kenna, is a small village about 4½ miles north-east of Nazareth, where the monks locate Cana, and where the remains of a Greek church and the house of St. Bartholomew are pointed out. Robinson’s arguments in favor of Kβna el-Jelξl are the identity of name, and a notice from Marinus Sanutus about A. D. 1321. But Hepworth Dixon (Holy Land, I865, I. 332) contends again for Kef’r Kenna, as he and Thomson (The Land and the Book) contend for Tell Hϋm, as the site of Capernaum, against Robinson’s conclusion in favor of Khan Minyeh. Hengstenberg and Godet likewise decide for Kef’r Kenna. Grove (in Smith’s Dictionary of the Bible) and Hackett (in a supplementary note to the Am. ed.) leave the question of the situation of Cana doubtful. Although Cana has nearly disappeared, it will always be remembered in connection with the festivity of marriage and the happiness of the family.—P. S.] And the mother of Jesus was there.—The mother of Jesus, John writes; not Mary. [John never names. Mary, as he does not name himself nor his brother James, perhaps on account of his intimate connection with her in virtue of the dying injunction of the Saviour, John 19:26-27. So Alford.—P. S.] Luthardt (with Hofmann and Lampe) holds (p. 420; comp. p. 116) that Jesus entirely dissolved the relation of son to Mary on the cross, with the word: “Woman, behold thy son!” John seems far from this, to speak mildly, rare exegesis. Jesus returned with His disciples to Galilee, their common home. They accompanied Him to Nazareth. But the mother of Jesus had gone to the wedding at Cana, which lay further north in the mountains. Probably they met in Nazareth with the invitation which occasioned their following the mother. [The occasion was evidently a family gathering. Besides the mother of Jesus, His brothers were also present, John 2:12. It was a farewell (un adieu royal, as Godet says) to His earthly relations. He was now leaving the privacy and obscurity of family life to enter upon His public ministry, and marked the transition by an exhibition of His divine power which was well calculated to convince His brothers, sisters, and friends of His Messiahship, and to convert them into His spiritual relations.—P. S.] John 2:2. And Jesus also was invited, and his disciples, [i.e., those five mentioned in John 1., Andrew, Simon Peter, Philip, Nathanael, and John. The evangelist was therefore an eye-witness of the scene, and probably a relative of Jesus.—P. S.] ̓Εκλήθη [is the historical past: was bidden, invited, and] cannot be taken as pluperfect. Where would the inviter have looked for the Lord on the Jordan? And there, too, He had as yet no disciples to be invited with Him. The invitation was rather an after-thought, and from this in part the lack of wine might be explained. Meyer supposes that the invitation was given in Cana itself. But people do not go in search of a member of a family at a feast; at all events this would amount to their inviting themselves. The fact that Nathanael was of Cana might increase the relations of the Lord to the house of friends with which His mother Mary seems to have been closely connected. It may certainly be inferred from this passage and John 2:12, that Joseph was no longer living. (Against Meyer, who unwarrantably cites John 6:42). Of a removal of Mary from Nazareth to Cana, Ewald speaks alone.—If we reckon for the return to Cana, including the stoppage at the calling of Philip and Nathanael, as a three days’ journey, Jesus, according to Origen’s computation of the third day (from the day of Joh 1:43), would have arrived with His disciples in the evening of the first day of the feast. As a wedding generally lasted seven days (among the poorer people, indeed, only three, or even one; comp. Genesis 29:27; Judges 14:14; Tob. 9:12), the supply of wine with but moderate care, would hardly have been exhausted so soon. We are forced to conclude, therefore, that the Lord came with His disciples on one of the later days of the feast; and this works backward to the supposition that the third day dates from the testimony of John, as the day when Jesus was publicly and theocratically accredited as the Messiah in Israel.[The presence of Christ with His mother and disciples, at a wedding-feast, and His performing His first miracle there, is a silent condemnation of monkish asceticism, and a recognition of the marriage relation as honorable and holy. Christianity is no flight from the world, but a transformation of the world, no annihilation of the order of nature, but the sanctification of it, no moroseness of spirit, but joy and gladness. It is the leaven which is to leaven the whole lump of society. But by turning water into wine and revealing His glory at the wedding-feast, Christ gave us an example how to conduct ourselves in society, that is to introduce a higher, nobler element, and to change the water of trifling, frivolous talk into the wine of instructive, profitable conversation. Trench observes: “We need not wonder to find the Lord of life at that festival; for He came to sanctify all life—its times of joy, as its times of sorrow; and all experience tells us, that it is times of gladness, such as this was now, which especially need such a sanctifying power, such a presence of the Lord. In times of sorrow, the sense of God’s presence comes more naturally out: in these it is in danger to be forgotten. He was there, and by His presence there struck the keynote to the whole future tenor of His ministry.”—P. S.] John 2:3. And when wine failed, [Καὶὑστερήσαντοςοἴνου], Gladly had the nuptial family, which undoubtedly belonged to the true waiting ones in Israel, improvised their invitation; but it seemed to fare ill for awhile, in having neglected the usual Jewish calculation. The less could their spirit turn to their mortification. Tholuck adduces the cheapness of wine in the East, to infer that the family was in limited circumstances. But even where wine is cheap, it is not always at hand in abundance, even for the wealthy. In any case the need here existing was not so much that of poverty as that of family honor, especially of festal feeling and joy. [It also reveals the temperance of the family.—P. S.] They have no wine.—No more wine. According to Chrysostom and others, Mary speaks these words, because Jesus had already wrought miracles, and she expects one now. Contrary to John 2:11. According to Lόcke, Jesus has already done extraordinary works in smaller circles, and so given rise to the expectation. According to Bengel and Paulus, Mary would suggest to Him to depart with His disciples; according to Meyer, to provide some remedy, “which in fact might have been done in the most natural way (by fetching more wine)”! Calvin thinks it a hush-word to the guests (perhaps a hint to go). Tholuck: “The object of Jesus’ journey could not have remained unknown to Mary; if, according to the popular faith, she was considering the miracle the test of the Messiah, she might now request even the first exercise of the divine power.” Nothing of all these intentions appears in the words. To tell the need is not necessarily to apply for help. So far as its form is concerned, the expression proves only, that the people let Mary know the lack, and that she told it to the Lord; rather giving up than asking help. Mary had probably a hundred times found in her family life, that the holy Child, during His growth, could tell what to do, when no one else could, though not exactly by miracle strictly so called. A confident expectation, however, must have been couched in her complaint; this is evident from the answer of the Lord. She certainly meant, in general: Tell us what to do; and, if any one please, more specifically, according to Bengel: Bring the feast to a close; though in some other way than by an embarrassed departure. [I take the words of Mary to be an indirect prayer and a modest hint to relieve the difficulty, like the message of the sisters of Lazarus: “Lord, behold, he whom Thou lovest, is sick,” John 11:3. Mary had good reason to expect that her divine Son, now after His solemn inauguration by the baptism in Jordan, and the gathering of His first disciples, would signalize His entrance upon public life by a miraculous demonstration of His Messianic dignity, and she was not shaken in her expectation by His apparent refusal, as is evident from her words in John 2:5 (see my note, p. 106). The announcement of the angel, the supernatural conception, and the whole conduct of Jesus must have long before convinced her of His Messiahship. Lampe properly regards these words as a monument of the faith, humility and modesty of Mary. Yet there was a defect, an untimely haste and improper interference, though from the best motives, with the Messianic prerogative of her divine Son. This is manifest from the reply of Jesus.—P. S.] John 2:4. Jesus saith unto her, etc.—The terms of Luther’s version [identical with those of the English]: Woman, what have I to do with thee? are much too strong. The phrase forms a scale, from the strongest rebuke to the gentlest refusal, according to the tone. The address: γύναι, Woman, has no tinge of contempt. Augustus says to Cleopatra [the Queen of Egypt] in Dio: θάρσει, ὦγύναι. So the address to Mary Magdalene, John 20:15, γύναι, is plainly an expression of compassion. And so, too, is John 19:26 to be taken. [In English the term woman is frequently used in a solemn and honorable sense, as embracing the characteristic traits of the womanly ideal, when we speak of a good woman, a noble woman, a true woman, be a woman. Christ calls His mother woman when on the cross He commited her with tender affection to the charge of His bosom disciple. He does not call her mother, because this would not suit here in connection with τίἐμοὶκαὶσοί and because He had regard mainly to His Father, and subordinated all earthly relations to the heavenly and eternal. Comp. Matthew 12:49-50; Luke 8:19; 2 Corinthians 5:16. The period of His subjection to her as His earthly mother had ceased. Even in His twelfth year He answered to her remark: “Thy father (Joseph) and I,” by “My Father” (in heaven), Luke 2:48-49. Calvin: Sic ergo matrem Christus alloquitur, ut perpetuam et communem seculis omnibus doctrinam tradat, ne immodicus matris honor divinam suam gloriam obscuret. Olshausen: “The Son had now become the Lord also of His mother, who could secure her own happiness only by believing obedience to Him.”—P. S.] The phrase τίἐμοὶκαὶσοί What to me and to thee (in which κοινόν or the like is to be supplied), has not among the Hebrews (ξַ ?δΞμִּ ?ιεָ ?μָ ?κְ), as in the classics, a repulsive, reprehensive sense, as Grotius shows, ad Matthew 8:29. The expression is uttered in Judges 11:12; 2 Samuel 16:10, in friendliness. It readily consists with this, that Jesus would assert the elevation of His divine calling above natural relationship, as in Matthew 12:50 (Tholuck). Ebrard: That is my matter; leave that to me. Hengstenberg: “Was mir und dir, Weib?” Literally correct, but not good German. [As the interpretation of this passage, which derives its true light from Matthew 12:46-50, has a bearing on the subject of Mariology and Mariolatry, I shall quote passages from ancient and modern commentators, who agree (against the Romish) in finding here a slight reproof of Mary for a certain improper interference or impatient haste. Irenζus (Adv. hζr. l. 3; c. 16, §7): “The, Lord, repelling Mary’s unseasonable urgency (Dominus, repellens ejus intempestivam festinationem), said: “What have I to do with thee,” etc. Chrysostom (Hom. XXI. al. XX. in Joh. Tom. VIII. p. 122): “She wished to gain glory through her child (ἐβούλετο…. ἑαυτὴνλαμπροτέρανποιῆσαιδιὰτοῦπαιδός)…therefore Christ answered her with severity (σφοδρότερονἀπεκρίνατολέγων, κ. τ. λ.).” He adds: “Mary had not yet the proper opinion of Christ οὐδέπωγὰρἣἐχρῆνπερὶαὐτοῦδόξανεῖ ?̓χεν ), but because she bare Him, she thought that, after the manner of other mothers, she might in all things command Him whom she ought to have worshipped and adored as her Lord. For this reason He gave this answer.” Such passages are irreconcilable with the belief in the sinless-ness of Mary. As the veneration of the Virgin increased from the time of the Nestorian controversy and the universal adoption of the θεοτόκος, such comments disappear. Even the Nestorianizing Theodoret, though quite full in his notes on the miracle of Cana, says not a word which might reflect in the least on Mary’s conduct. But the reformers and nearly all the Protestant interpreters take the same view of the passage as the fathers. Olshausen says that the words τίἐμοί etc, necessarily imply reproof, although the rebuke is but gentle. Meyer: “Christ, in the consciousness of His higher wonder-working power and will, as one without a mother (ἀμήτωρ), repels the interference of womanly weakness, which here confronted Him, even in His mother.” Hengstenberg: “It lies in the nature of the case that the phrase always implies censure.” Godet agrees with Hengstenberg. Ewald: “He reproves her expectation with severe words.” Trench: “There is more or less of reproof and repulse in these words;” but he adds very properly that any harshness of the reply was mitigated by the manner in which the Lord suffered a near compliance with the request to shine through the apparent refusal. Alford: “The answer of our Lord is beyond question one of reproof, and disclaimer of participation in the grounds on which the request was made.” St. Bernard, Maldonatus and other Romanists try to escape the force of the usus loquendi by saying that Christ spoke those words not for Mary’s, but for our sakes, to teach us that He performed His miracles not from regard to human relationship, but from love and regard to God’s glory. Very true; but He taught Mary first, and taught us through her.—P. S.] Mine hour is not yet come.—Euthym. Zigab.: The hour for working miracles. Ewald: Of my full sense of Messianic power. Lόcke and others: For the revelation of my glory. Meyer: The juncture for help. [Trench: Till the wine is wholly exhausted. Flat.—P. S.]. According to Bruno Bauer, His hour must always mean the hour of His death.—According to Tholuck, it is the ὤρα for the manifestation of His δόξα, as determined by the object of the miracle and the circle of witnesses. In this regard this scene seemed not so suitable as Jerusalem, yet the affectionate Son would also fain please His mother. Hence οὔπω refers to the precise moment. The right time of publicity, the right moment—two different ideas: His hour is His time for acting or suffering, as the Father appoints it to Him by the occasion and in His spirit, in distinction from the hour which is assigned Him by the opinion of men. Comp. John 7:6; John 8:20; John 13:1; Luke 22:53. The “not yet” opens the prospect of help to come at the right time. John 2:5. Whatsoever he saith unto you.—Meyer thinks she means, He will require your service, perhaps in bringing wine. Meyer says: Whatsoever He saith unto you, without qualification; yet doubtless with the presentiment that He might say something very strange and striking, at which they were in danger of being startled. [These words reveal the unbounded faith of Mary in her Son, whose gentle rebuke did not discourage her, and a confident expectation of some miraculous help at the proper time. She seems to have anticipated even the manner, viz., that it was to be brought about by the aid of the servants. She may have inferred from some previous hint of Christ not related here, or from the gentle manner with which He apparently refused her desire, with the qualifying οὔπω (not yet), His disposition to grant it. Precisely the same words: ὁἐὰνεἴπῃὑμῖνποιήσατε (Genesis 41:55, LXX.), Pharaoh, at the time of the famine, addressed to all Egypt with regard to Joseph. Hengstenberg thinks that this coincidence is scarcely accidental in view of the similarity of the occasion, and the typical character of Joseph.—P. S.] John 2:6. There were set [κείμεςαι, positζ] there six water-pots of stone [ὑδρίαιλίθιναι made of stone, stone-ware].—There; in the wedding-chamber, says Meyer. The washing of hands hardly took place in the wedding-chamber, rather in the court of the house. And the pots were too large for this, being doubtless not portable in the ordinary way: “large stone fonts” (Starke).—Six water-pots there were. Whether according to Jewish custom, can hardly be ascertained; at all events, the number, as symbolical, is the number of work, toil and need. See John 12:1 : six days before the passover Christ came to Bethany. Rev. John 4.: the opening of the first six seals. John 13:18 : the number of the beast, 666. Nork (Etymol. Symbol. Mythol. Real-Wφrterbuch): “Six is threefold discord (Dyad), hence 666 is the number of Antichrist. On the evening of the sixth day of creation, according to the Rabbinical tradition, Satan was created at the same time with woman. The Cabbalistic book Sohar warns against the threefold six as the number of punishment. On its face this number bespeaks an accurate reporter.After the manner of the purifying [κατὰτὸνκαθαρισμὸντῶνἸουδαίων]—The washing of hands and vessels before and after meals, Matthew 15:2; Mark 7:3. Probably the supply of water in them was already mostly consumed; at all events, they were emptied for their new use. Containing two or three firkins apiece [χωροῦσαιἀνὰ ?—not approximately, circiter, but in the distributive sense, singulζ, as in the E. V.—μετρητὰςδύοἤτρεῖς].—The Attic metretes was equal to the Hebrew αַּ ?ϊ (Joseph. Antiq. VIII. 2. 9), and twenty-one Wόrtemberg or thirty-three Berlin quarts [about nine gallons English; so that the word “firkin” in the E. V. is almost exact. Accordingly, if all the water was changed into wine (see below), the quantity of wine thus produced was 6 times 18 or 27 gallons, i., e., from 108 to 162 gallons.—P. S.] The Roman amphora was also called metretes, and was still smaller than the Attic; the Syrian Babylonian, on the contrary, was larger. “In view of this (total) quantity of from 252 to 273 quarts [over 100 gallons], the miracle is styled by De Wette [and Strauss] a ‘miracle for luxury’ [Luxuswunder), and found offensive. The circumstances already cited (abundant supply for a poor family; an expression of benevolence) remove this difficulty; in the miraculous feeding also the quantity exceeds the bare necessity.” Tholuck. The truth of the miracle, however, forbids us at the outset to trespass upon the ground of the miraculous. Hence also we raise no question whether the water was made wine after it was drawn out, or before, in the pots themselves (Meyer, Tholuck). John 2:7. Fill the water-pots.—Not only is the water in the pots necessary, but also the obedience of faith. So also in the drawing. The pots being full, precludes all thoughts of the possibility of a natural process or a mixture. According to Meyer, this feature is intended to denote the abundance of the wine which Jesus produced; Gerlach [and Barnes] on the contrary: Only what was drawn became wine. [The miracle took place between John 2:7-8, but its actual process lies wholly beyond the region of sense and imagination. The same may be said of the process of growth in nature; we see only the results. It is not stated whether the miracle took place in the water-pots or in the act of drawing, and whether the whole amount of water was turned into wine or only so much of it as was drawn by the servants. But the former view is much more probable, yea, almost certain. It seems to be implied in the exact statement of the number and size of the vessels, John 2:6, in the order to fill them with water, and in the strict compliance of the servants who “filled them up ἔωςἄνω, to the brim,” John 2:7. This view agrees also best with the object of the miracle as a manifestation of Christ’s Divine glory, in imitation of the boundless munificence which God Himself displays from year to year in the plentiful harvests, that in the midst of plenty we should be temperate and grateful.—P. S.]John 2:8. Draw out now, and bear.—Expressing full confidence that they would, in virtue of His word, draw wine and carry wine. Unto the ruler (master) of the feast [τῷἀρχιτρικλίνῳ, a word of late and rare occurrence, lit. the ruler of the triclinium or dining-room with three couches.—P. S.].—Not the superintendent of the guests, συμποσίαρχος [or συμποσιάρχης, βασιλεύς, modimperator, magister, or rex convivii, arbiter bibendi], whom the guests chose as their president (Xenoph. Anab. VI. John 1:30), but the superintendent of the servants, who as such also tested the meats and drinks, as a taster. Tholuck distinguishes the warden of the drinking from the warden of the table, and remarks that the presence of the latter does not necessarily yield the inference of wealth. He may have been of the friends of the family. At all events, a number of servants were present.—And they bare it.—Meyer: “But knew not that what they carried was wine.” But they must have believed it to be; else we should be left to suppose a tone of mind in the people, which would ill correspond with the elevation of the miracle. The drawing and bearing by the servants was an act of faith, like the sitting down of the multitudes in the wilderness to receive the miraculous feeding. John 2:9. [When the ruler…tasted (ἐγεύσατο).—Here the Romish argument in favor of transubstantiation drawn from this miracle, breaks down. The water had been made wine in form as well as in substance; it looked like wine and tasted like the best of wine; but the pretended change of bread and wine in the Eucharist contradicts all the senses and is a complete delusion.—P. S.] That had become wine.—Not: That it became (was made) wine. In the perfect [had been made, and consequently was now]. And knew not whence it was.—It at first seems to give a better sense, to make the parenthesis of the 9th verse, according to Meyer, begin not with these words, but with: οἱδὲδιάκονοι, ending with ὔδωρ. Meyer observes that the construction continues with οὐκᾔδει, and this supplies the motive of the consequent φωνεῖτὸννυμφίον. But the ruler calls the bridegroom, not to ask whence he has the wine, but to remark to him that he has reversed the usual order of things with this supply of wine, which he seems to suppose the bridegroom has reserved. And John elsewhere begins a parenthesis with καί, as in 1 John 1:2. A decisive consideration might be this: If we put the πόθεν before the parenthesis, it indicates in the ruler the impression of the natural origin of the wine; in the parenthesis it emphatically expresses the thought of the Evangelist, that he knew not the miraculous origin of the wine. The ἐστίν, as in John 1:40, is the usual intermixing of direct description in dependent clauses (Winer, p. 239). Called the bridegroom.—The wedding took place in the house of the bridegroom, and he gave the banquet. As to the custom here mentioned, there is little other evidence (see Lόcke, p. 473). Wetstein: Pliny, H. N. XIV. 14. Cato, when he embarked for Spain, said of the rowers (remiges): Qui etiam convivis alia (referring to wine), quam sibimet ipsis ministrant [“who even give their guests other wine than they drink themselves, or bring it in as the banquet proceeds”]. Two other citations (from Martialis and Cassius) Lόcke himself considers entirely unimportant. The passage, seems, however, to have some sense different from that commonly supposed, which gives a mild interpretation to μεθύσκεσθαι, madere, “have drunk enough” (Tholuck, after De Wette and others); on the contrary Meyer: When they are intoxicated. The softening of the word gives the idea of a dishonorable custom: first to give good wine, then, at the height of the feast to give poor. The custom meant is probably that universally dictated by moral instinct, of at last pouring water into the wine for those who are intoxicated, or giving no more, or even, where courtesy requires the offer to be continued, giving poor wine. This custom the master of the feast applies to the case in hand, without expressing any judgment respecting the condition of the guests. His “until now” refers only to a later period of the feast.—There is likewise a question, whether we must take the word, with Meyer, as a pleasantry, or, with Tholuck, as a half-jocular reproof. Lόcke’s hypothesis of an expression of surprise seems more fitting. Pleasantly as the words may have been spoken in the expression: “Thou hast kept the good wine until now,” the ruler in any case conveys great astonishment. And strongly as this, on the one hand, attests the objective fact of the miracle, it as strongly, on the other hand, shows a special quality in this wine. The wine seemed to the ruler the good, in contrast with what had been used. John 2:11. This wrought Jesus as a beginning of the signs [ΤαύτηνἐποίησεἀρχὴντῶνσημείωνἸησοῦς].—̓Αρχήwithout the article, hence: This sign wrought Jesus as His first in Cana of Galilee. [It was not only the first miracle wrought by Jesus in Cana—for no other is reported as having been wrought there—but the first of all His miracles. This is conclusive against all the reports of the apocryphal Gospels to the contrary.—P. S.]—Scholastic fancies respecting the bridegroom and the bride by Bonaventura, etc., see in Heubner, p. 235. [The signs, τῶνσημείων. The N. T. employs three terms for the miracles or supernatural works of Christ, σημεῖον, δύναμις and τέρας, sometimes also ἔνδοξον, παράδοξον, θαυμάσιον. The word σημεῖον, the Hebrew oth (ΰεֹ ?δ), signum, has reference to the moral aim of the miracle as intended to exhibit the presence of the divine power, and to produce faith in it; it is “a kind of finger-post of God,” as has been said. The term τέρας, prodigium, wonder, which is often combined with σημεῖον (John 4:18), expresses the subjective effect, the emotion of astonishment and amazement which the miracle produces; and hence it is used also of strange and startling phenomena in heaven and on earth. All miracles are signs and wonders, but not all signs and wonders are miracles. The term δυνάμεις, virtutes, denotes the origin of miracles, as manifestations of divine power. The E. V. is by no means consistent in the translation of these words. Trench (Synonyms of the N. T., Second Part, p. 204, Am. ed.) says: “It is to be regretted that in our Version this word (δυνάμεις) is translated now ‘wonderful works’ (Matthew 7:22); now ‘mighty works’ (Matthew 11:20; Luke 10:13); and still more frequently ‘miracles’ (Acts 2:22; 1 Corinthians 12:10; Galatians 3:5); in this last case giving such tautologies as ‘miracles and wonders ’ (Acts 2:22; Hebrews 2:4); and always causing something to be lost of the true energy of the word—pointing as it does to new forces, which have entered and are working in this world of ours. With this is closely connected the term μεγαλεῖα=magnolia (Luke 1:49), in which in like manner the miracles are contemplated as outcomings of the greatness of God’s power.”—His glory. The δόξα of the incarnate Logos, John 1:14, by whom all things were made, and who transforms all things. The miracles of Christ are manifestations of His own glory, of His wonderful person, while the miracles performed by Moses and the prophets revealed not their glory, but the glory of Jehovah.—And his disciples believed on him, ἐπίστευσαν. This is a higher degree of faith than the one spoken of Joh 1:35-51, which was initial and introductory, while now they were strengthened in their belief by this startling evidence of His divine Messianic power and dignity. Faith is a continuous growth, and every increase of faith is a new beginning of faith.—P. S.] AND ETHICAL1. John’s accounts of the miracles. We have already called attention to John’s putting strongly forward the miracles of knowledge together with those of act; that is, the insight of the perfect personality into the dark recesses of personal life and of nature, in keeping with the character of this Gospel. As in John 1:38; John 1:42-43; John 1:47 (comp. John 2:25); John 3:21; John 4:17; John 5:6; John 6:70; John 11:11; John 13:3; John 13:38; John 19:11; John 19:28; John 20:27; John 21:6; John 21:17-18; John 21:22. The miracles in the development of the life of Jesus Himself, John rather takes for granted, after his general testimony concerning the δόξα of Jesus; particularly the miraculous birth (which, however, follows from John 1:13); the transfiguration (to which, however, John 12:23 sqq.; 17 look back, and which the voice from heaven, John 12:28, in some measure repeats); and the ascension (which is announced in John 20:17). Even the miracle of the glorification of Jesus at the baptism is here only related incidentally by the Baptist, John 1:32; the walking of Jesus on the sea is but briefly touched, John 6:16; and the resurrection of the Lord the Evangelist presents mainly in its noblest bearings, as a victory over doubt, weak faith, and unbelief. On the other hand John intimates by the prominence he gives to the voice from heaven (John 12:28) in the temple, that Christ was always very near, and drawing nearer, His estate of glorification; and in the account of the flowing of water and blood from the side of Jesus’ body, he undoubtedly points to the mystery of the transformation in the body of Christ after His death (John 19:34; comp. Leben Jesu, II., 3, p. 1608). Now as regards the miraculous works in the stricter sense, John entirely omits the expulsions of devils. According to Meyer he significantly relates seven miracles of Jesus, “mentioning one of each of the main kinds, viz., a transformation, John 2:1; a healing of a fever, John 4:47; a healing of a cripple, John 5:1; a feeding, John 6:4; a walking on the sea, John 6:16; a healing of the child, John 9:1; a raising of the dead, John 11:1.” We distinguish, in the first place, these miracles in the stricter sense from miracles in a wider sense, among which we count the purification of the temple (John 2), the moral enchaining of the officers (John 7:45), and like things, especially the miracles of knowledge. Furthermore, we distinguish the miracles in Galilee and those in Judea, insomuch as the miracles of Jesus have opposite effects in the two different spheres. After the first miracle in Galilee, His disciples believed on Him, John 2:11; after the second He found faith in the imperial officer at Capernaum and in all his house, John 4:53; after the third (wrought indeed on the east side of the sea, yet no doubt mostly on Galilean people), the people proposed to make Him king, John 6:15; and the fourth could but enhance their reverence, John 6:25. After the first miracle in Judea, on the contrary, which Jesus performed at the feast of Purim, healing a cripple whom the Jewish supernatural fountain and the angel had not healed, process was at once begun by the Jews against Him for excommunication and death, John 5:16; comp. John 7:32. After the second, the healing of the blind man at the feast of tabernacles, in which He brought the temple-fountain and the pool of Siloam into service, to show that He was the God of the temple, the ban was pronounced on His followers, and therefore doubtless upon Him at least in so far as He acknowledged His Messianic dignity, John 9:22. Upon the third, the raising of Lazarus, the decree to put Him to death was passed by the Sanhedrin (John 11:47), the edict for His apprehension was issued to the people (John 2:57), even the death of Lazarus was consulted (John 12:10), and in the sequel, on the passover itself, Jesus was crucified. Thus Judaism celebrates its feasts, and opposes to the life-miracles of Christ plots of death, the sentence of death, and the death of the cross. The miracles recorded by John we divide, according to their kinds into three miracles of healing: the healing of the man sick of a fever, of the cripple, of the blind man; three miracles of the mastery and glorification of nature: the miraculous supply of wine, the feeding, the miraculous draught of fishes, John 21 (Christ walking on the sea, related without the addition of Peter’s, belongs with the miracles of the unfolding of the life of Jesus Himself); finally three symbolical miracles of the judicial majesty of Christ: the purification of the temple (John 2), which in its first performance was much more wonderful than in its repetition at the close of the life of Jesus; the moral enchaining of the officers, who were sent to arrest the Lord (John 7:45; comp. John 8:59; John 10:39); and the striking down of the soldiers in Gethsemane with His word. The greatest of the miracles related by John is the raising of Lazarus from the dead, the premonition of the resurrection of Christ, the foretokening of the resurrection, the glorification, and the judgment of the whole world, the great development of miracle which begins with His resurrection. 2. The first miracle of Jesus. Not only in John, but in the Gospel history in general, the changing of the water into wine is the first miracle of Jesus. But as the first in John it has a peculiar significance. As the portal of the Gospel of the absolute transfiguration of the world by the glorious spiritual personality, and the redeeming operation of Christ, this miracle is the typical, symbolical token of the glorification of the world (see Leben Jesu, II., p. 479). Explanations of this miracle: (a) Natural [low rationalistic] explanations by Venturini, Paulus, Langsdorf, Gfrφrer. Paulus: A wedding joke; Jesus had caused a quantity of wine to be brought into the house and to be put, mixed with water, into the pots at the table. Gfrφrer: A wedding surprise-gift on the part of Mary (similarly Ammon). (b) Mythical. [A religious poem or legend unconsciously produced and honestly believed by the primitive Christian community as if it had actually occurred.—P. S.] Strauss: Mythical basis: the changing of bitter water into sweet, in Exodus 15:23 ff.; 2 Kings 2:19. Weisse: A parable misunderstood. (c) Symbolical [and fictitious, not historical]. Baur: A demonstration that the time had come when Jesus, the true Bridegroom, should lead off from the water of the provisional level of the Baptist to the wine of the higher Messianic glory. (d) Historical. Various modifications. (1) An absolute miracle of the [immediate] transformation of substance regardless of conditions; the older supernaturalism (Meyer even refuses to recognize any elevation of the spirit of the company). (2) Historical in a still stricter sense, as a miracle admitting some conditions; change of substance under conditions; Augustine (ipse fecit vinum in nuptiis, qui omni anno hoc facit in vitibus), Chrysostom, Olshausen: acceleration of a natural process (which, however, must have included an acceleration of an artificial process, and in this the main factor, the vine, was wanting. Objections of Strauss, Meyer).(3) Change of accidents under conditions. Neander: instances of mineral springs which have the taste of broth, intoxicating wines, etc. (instances from the classics in Lampe and Neander). Meyer puts Tholuck also on this ground; but Tholuck at present says: “These are still no help towards understanding the miracle, inasmuch as the inorganic or hard matter of the mineral springs would only come in the place of the vegetable. (Yet Neander mentions those facts only as analogies, showing how water can be modified.) In that which gives the offence here—the change of substance—natural science, however, till very lately has believed, with its generatio equivoca (i.e., the change of substance by changes of form—erroneously), and now chemistry would see everywhere only change of form (but through change of substance—again erroneously).” (4) Transfiguration of the substance in actu. [Lange.] Tholuck states with strange incorrectness: “J. P. Lange (Leben Jesu, II. 1, p. 307) falls back upon the view that the elevated frame of mind in the master of the feast and in the guests caused the water to taste like wine.” Meyer represents the thought more carefully, though he can make nothing of it. “In the element of an elevated frame of mind, to which the guests, like the disciples on the mount of the transfiguration, were raised, the transfiguration took place.” But I had even said: “Thus Christ transported to heaven a company of devout and submissive men, and gave them to drink from the mysterious fountain of His divine life-power” (Leben Jesu, II., p. 479). The operation of Christ, furthermore, I described as threefold: (a) The creative substitution of the wine, sympathetically communicated to the guests in their contemplation of Christ; (b) influence upon the drinkers through faith; (c) influence upon the element of the drink itself (p. 308). I cannot consider it an advance in exegesis, that Meyer comes to such an emphasizing of the change of substance as seems virtually to make the conditions of Augustine and others unsuitable; and that Tholuck appeals in fine to two systems of natural science which he himself considers false. As the abstract supernaturalism takes the simple, immediate change of substance for the gist of the miracle, I pointed to the central point of all miracles, and this among them, suggesting that all are rooted in the heavenly birth of Christ, and are conditioned upon the beginnings of regeneration, as the continuous development of the eternal central miracle, therefore also upon frames of the human heart. That such frames of heart existed here, is shown by the faith of the disciples, the confidence of Mary, the submissiveness of the drawers, the enthusiasm of the master of the feast. For this very reason, moreover, we have emphasized the act, in opposition to an abstract computation of the quantity of wine: as, for example, the Protestant orthodoxy emphasizes the presence of the body and blood of Christ in the substance of the act, in distinction from the magical representations of the body of Christ in the material substance (without deciding concerning the material left unemployed in the act; as Gerlach, for instance, see the exegesis on John 2:7). Then in the third place the analogy of similar instances of transfiguring mastery of nature was taken into account. Through the communion of the spirit of Christ the feedings become wonderful; through the communion of the spirit of Christ alone Peter walks on the water; in the hearts of the believing lay the conditions of the miracles of Christ throughout. In thus tracing the miracle to its Christological centre, the principle of the glorification of the world, we suppose, however, that Christ here brought also a latent, mysterious susceptibility of the water to an instantaneous development, in which, with regard to the quantity, it must certainly be considered that the very filling of the water-pots was done at His word and in the obedience of faith. Thus the δόξα of Christ in His first self-manifestation is to us the main thing.(e) The miracle , and at the same time of TYPICAL, import:(1) Older expositors, Lampe, Baumgarten-Crusius, Luthardt: Exhibition of the contrast between the Old Testament and the New.(2) Christ sets forth in the miracle at the same time the contrast of His new covenant with the severe ascetic spirit of the Baptist (Flatt, Olshausen).(3) Prefiguration of the communion of the Lord with His people on the height of the glorified world (Leben Jesu, pp. 307, 479). (4) Hofmann, Luthardt (with a simultaneous reference to the ancient covenant): Prefiguration of the heavenly marriage-supper, Revelation 19:9 (translation of the ideal conception just given (3) into realistic terms). (5) De Wette: The distribution of wine a counterpart of the distribution of bread, and both together analogies of the Holy Supper (of which again Meyer finds nothing in the record. Comp. Leben Jesu, p. 310. On Hilgenfeld’s explanation of it into a Gnostic element, comp. Meyer). 3. The symbolical import of the miracle. All the miracles of Jesus are to be considered as signs; that is, not merely facts, but also mirrors of the Christian idea, the Christian principle and its universal operation. But John has reason for marking this sign as the first which Jesus did, and as a manifestation of His glory. The description of it as a manifestation of His δόξα announces the wide symbolical significance of the miracle. (a) The Old Testament pots of water, of purification, of statute, are changed into New Testament vessels of wine, vivification, free, festive life. (b) The want, in which the feasts of the old, natural life end, is changed by the grace of Christ into the fountain of the higher joys of the kingdom of heaven. (c) Mary, as the highest representative of the Old Testament faith, with the servants and the master of the feast, are changed into instruments of the manifestation of the New Testament glory of Christ. (d) The earthly nuptials are changed into the basis of a higher festivity, the marriage of Christ with His own in their now established faith. (e) The gift of the wine is made a token of the δόξα of Christ: which, as grace, converts all need into supply, and, as truth, gives every thing symbolical, even earthly wine, in heavenly reality (He Himself the real vine). (f) The gift of wine a token of the Supper of Christ, as the constant type of the progressive glorification of life and its ultimate perfect glorification in the heavenly world. [4. The miracle of Cana and the Temperance question. Albert Barnes (in loc.), in his zeal for total abstinence, labors to show, contrary to all exegetical tradition, that the wine which Jesus made and the wine generally used in Palestine was the unfermented juice of the grape, and hence without any alcoholic admixture, or intoxicating quality. Jacobus, in his Notes on John, takes the same view. The arguments on this side are collected in a tract by the Rev. W. M. Thayer: Communion Wine and Bible Temperance, published by the American National Temperance Society, New York, 1869. But they are not convincing. The wine of the Bible was no doubt pure and unadulterated, and so far unlike that poisonous article which is frequently sold as wine in our days, especially in Northern countries; but it was genuine and real wine, and, like all wine in wine-growing countries, exhilarating, and, if used to excess, intoxicating. The grape, says an Italian proverb, has three fruits, pleasure, intoxication, and grief. Pure water is no doubt the safest and most wholesome beverage. Ἄριστονμὲνὔδωρ, says Pindar, in his first ode. We honor zeal against the fearful scourge of intemperance; but even a good thing may be undone by being over-done. Total abstinence from wine, or from meat, or other things in themselves innocent and lawful, can be sufficiently defended as a moral duty under certain circumstances, on the ground of expediency and charity, from regard to our weak brethren or the good of the community at large. This is the position taken by Paul, 1 Corinthians 8:13; Romans 14:13-23. Considerations of health, climate, nationality and condition of society must also be allowed due weight in this question. But to lay down the principle that the use of intoxicating drinks as a beverage is a sin per se, is to condemn the greater part of Christendom, to contradict the Bible, and to impeach Christ Himself, who drank wine (He was slanderously called a ‘wine-bibber’), who made wine by a miracle, who instituted the holy communion under the symbols of bread and wine, and commands us to commemorate the shedding of His blood by drinking of the fruit of the vine until we shall drink it anew with Him in His Father’s kingdom. There can be no higher and safer rule than the command and example of our Saviour; while, on the other hand, every principle of morals or rule of conduct which reflects on Him, must be unsound and mischievous.—P. This entry is longer than a Bible module can hold. The rest is at https://www.sermonindex.net/commentary/lange/ IV Jesus, The Guest In Capernaum, And The Pilgrim To The Passover. The Purification Of The Temple, As A Prelude Of The Redeeming Purification Of The World And Reformation Of The Church. Christ The True Temple. The Sign Of Christ: The Destruction Of The Temple And The Raising It Again. The First Spread Of Faith In Israel, And Christ The Knower Of Hearts.John 2:12-2512 After this he went down to Capernaum [Kapharnaum], he, and his mother, and his brethren [brothers], and his disciples; and they continued there [and there they abode, χαὶἐχεῖἔμειναν] not many days. 13And the Jews’ passover [the passover of the Jews, τὸπάσχατῶν ’I.] was at hand 14[or, near, ἐγγίς], and Jesus went up to Jerusalem, [.] And [he] found in the temple those that sold oxen, and sheep, and doves, and the changers of money [money-changers] sitting [established]: 15And when he had made [having made, ποιήσας a scourge of small cords, he drove them [omit them] all out of the temple, and [both] the sheep, and the oxen; and poured out the changers’ money [the money of the exchangers], and overthrew the tables; 16And said unto them that [to those who] sold doves, Take these things hence; make not my Father’s house a house of merchandise 17[a market]. And his disciples remembered that it was [is] written, The zeal of [for] thine house hath eaten me up [will eat me up]. (Psalms 69:9.) 18Then answered the Jews [The Jews therefore answered] and said unto him, What sign shewest thou unto us, seeing that thou doest these things? 19Jesus answered and said unto them, Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up [again]. 20Then said the Jews, Forty and six years was this temple in building, and wilt thou rear [raise] it up in three days? 21But he spake of the temple of his body. 22When therefore lie was [had] risen from the dead, his disciples remembered that he had said this unto them [omit unto them]; and they believed the Scripture, and the word which Jesus had said [spoken]. 23Now when he was in Jerusalem at the passover in the feast day [at the feast, ἐντῇἑο̣ρτῇ, many believed in hi3 name [ἐπίστευσαν, trusted in his name], when they saw the miracles [his signs, αὐτοῦτὰσημεῖα] which he did [wrought]. 24But Jesus did not commit himself unto them [οὐχἐπίστευεναὐτύναὐτοῖς, did not trust himself to them], because he knew all men, 25And needed not [had no need] that any [one] should testify of [concerning] man; for he [himself, αὐτύς] knew what was in man. AND [The Messianic purification of the temple was the first, and, according to the Synoptists (Matthew 21:12-13; Mark 11:15-17; Luke 19:45; Luke 19:40), also the last public act of Christ in Jerusalem. It very appropriately opens and closes His labors in the sanctuary of the theocracy. It was foretold by the prophet Malachi 3:1 ff., that immediately after the forerunner the Messiah Himself “shall suddenly come to His temple,” for the purpose of cleansing it: “He shall purify the sons of Levi and purge them as gold and silver, that they may offer unto the Lord an offering in righteousness.” The gross scandal in the Court of the Gentiles represented the general profanation and corruption of the theocracy (as Tetzel’s and Samson’s sale of indulgences revealed the secularization of the Latin Church in the 16th century). Christ commenced the reformation at the fountain-head, in Jerusalem and the temple where it was most needed. The expulsion was a judicial act of the Lord of the Sabbath and the temple. He acted here not simply as a prophet or Zealot, but as the Messiah, as the Son of God; and hence calls the temple the house of His, not our, Father (John 2:16). Some infidels have misrepresented it as an outburst of passion and an argument against the sinless perfection of Christ. But the result conclusively shows that it was an exhibition of superhuman power and majesty, which so overawed the profane traffickers, that, losing sight of their superiority in number and physical strength, they submitted at once, and without a murmur to the well deserved punishment. Their bad conscience, which always makes men cowardly, and the conceded right of prophets like Elijah, to rebuke scandulous profanations of religion, would not sufficiently account for this complete victory. A similar instance is recorded, John 18:6, where Judas and his band of men and officers shrunk back and fell to the ground before the defenceless Jesus.—P. S.] John 2:12. After this he went down [κα̇τέβη] to Capernaum.—No doubt not directly from Cana, but from Nazareth. Not that, as Meyer says, the brethren here mentioned were not with Him at the wedding (this is not necessarily to be inferred from the silence respecting them), but that Nazareth was still the residence of Jesus and of the family of Mary, who no doubt returned home before they all went together to Capernaum, that they might thence join the nearest festival caravan for Jerusalem. He went down from the hill country towards the sea, on the coast of which Capernaum lay. On Capernaum, see the Matth. at John 4:13. [Am. ed. pp. 90, 91. The question of the site of Capernaum, or properly Kapharnaum (i.e., the Village of Nahum), is still unsettled between the rival claims of Tell Hϋm (i.e., the hill of Nahum) and Khβn (i.e., lodging-place) Minyeh (with a near fountain called Ain-et-Tin, i.e., the spring of the fig-tree), two heaps of ruins on the Western shore of the sea of Galilee about three miles apart. Robinson (Researches ΙΙ. 403 ff.) and Porter (Handbook of Syria, ΙΙ. 425) decide for Khβn Minyeh, but Van de Velde, Ebrard, Thomson, and Dixon, for Tell Hϋm, at the head of the Lake. For this view speaks the similarity of name. (Hϋm is a mutilated πδεν=ναούμ), and the far greater importance of the ruins. The English explorers, Captain Wilson and his associates, are reported to have discovered in 1866, among the ruins of Tell Hϋm, a synagogue of elegant architecture dating from a time before the Christian era. See, besides Robinson, ΙΙ. 403–405, the article Capernaum, by Grove, with the additional note of Hackett, in Smith’s Dictionary, Ι. p. 382; the Land. Athenζum, Feb. 24, and Mar. 31, 1866; and an essay of Prof. Ebrard in the Studien and Kritiken, for 1867, No. IV. pp. 723–740.—P. S.] He, and his mother, and his brothers, and his disciples,—The singular (κατέβη) is explained by the fact that Jesus was the leader of the train. That the family had already settled in Capernaum (which, according to Ewald, is here stated, according to De Wette presupposed), is contradicted by the distinct indications that this removal did not take place till after the return of Jesus from Judea, and His appearance in Nazareth (Matthew 4:13; Luke 4:31; John 4:43); though Meyer, maintains that there also the removal is neither intimated nor supposed. But no doubt the removal had already been virtually induced by the connection with the disciples from the sea. The brothers of Jesus are distinguished from the disciples. Even though now His brothers, James, Judas, and Simon, had been called to be disciples, which is not at all probable, a separate category had still to be made, because there were yet Joses and the sisters, Matthew 13:55-56. And that they had already attached themselves to the company of Jesus, shows that the usual exaggerated and extreme pressing of the statement in John 7:5 is false. See Hengstenberg: Das Evang. John , 1 p. 149 sqq. [The gradual transition from Christ’s private to His public life is here indicated. At Cana and at Capernaum His earthly relations are still with Him, but in the next verse He appears alone with His disciples or spiritual relatives. As to the vexed question of the brothers of Jesus, I have given my views in full in my German work on James, the brother of Christ, Berlin, 1842, and in a note on Matthew 13:55, pp. 256–260. Comp. also the notes on Matthew 1:25, and John 7:3; John 7:5. Meyer, Godet (I. 368 ff.), and Alford take ἀδελφοί here in the proper sense, as brothers, i.e., sons of Joseph and Mary. Hengstenberg (in loc.) revives the R. Catholic cousin-theory which dates from Jerome in the 4th century, and owes its origin and spread mainly to an ascetic overestimate of the perpetual virginity of Mary, as expressed in the words of Augustine: Maria mater esse potuit, mulier esse non potuit. Dr. Lange’s hypothesis is an ingenious, but somewhat artificial modification of this view, and assumes that Mary, though in the full sense the wife of Joseph, could bear no children after giving birth to the Messiah, and that the brethren of the Lord were both His cousins (as the sons of Clopas, a brother of Joseph, not as the sons of a supposed sister of Mary), and His foster-brothers (having been adopted, after the death of their father, into the holy family). To my mind the only alternative lies between the Epiphanian or old Greek view, which makes them elder sons of Joseph from a former marriage, and the view held by Tertullian and Helvidius, that they were younger children of Mary and Joseph, and so half-brothers of Jesus. Ancient tradition favors the former, an unprejudiced exegesis the latter view. Prof. J. B. Lightfoot, of Cambridge (in a learned excursus on Galatians, Lond., 1866, pp. 247–281, where much use is made of my book on James), elaborately defends the Epiphanian theory, mainly on account of Joh 19:26-27, which he regards as conclusive against the Helvidian hypothesis; but if this passage is allowed to decide the controversy, it overthrows also the Epiphanian theory. It receives its true light from the peculiar intimacy of Christ with John, and the fact that His brothers were still unbelievers when He entrusted His earthly mother to the care of His bosom disciple, who was probably also His cousin according to the flesh.—P. S.] Not many days.—Depending solely on the preparation for the approaching passover, which Jesus attended in company with His disciples, v. 23. But that during these few days Jesus wrought miracles in Capernaum, must be inferred from Luke 4:23. John 2:13. And the passover of the Jews was at hand.—On the passover see the Matth., p. 459. And Jesus went up.—Besides the attendance of Jesus at the feast when He was twelve years old, mentioned by Luke alone (John 2.), and the last attendance on the passover in the year 783, related by all the Evangelists, John gives the remaining occasions of this kind. Here the first attendance on the passover, in the year 781; then a visit to another feast, not named, most probably the feast of Purim of 782 [ch. 5]; then the feast of tabernacles [ch. 7], and the feast of the dedication [ch. John 10:22], in the same year. See the Introduction,§ 8. John 2:14. And found in the temple.—In the fore-court of the temple. On the temple and the fore-court see the Matth. on John 21:12 [p. 375], and Winer, sub. v. Also Braune: Das Evangelium von Jesus Christus, p. 45, The first act of the Lord, in the confidential circle of susceptible disciples, was an act of positive glorification, coming into the place of the symbolical purification; His second act, in the bosom of the corrupted religious life of the people, was an act of negative purification, significant at the same time of His glorification. That this deed was looked upon by the better people as a miraculous sign also, and that besides this Jesus wrought other miracles in Jerusalem, may be inferred from John 3:2. But John relates the purging of the temple alone as the first characteristic work, the signal-miracle of the Lord on His public appearance. To him the first cleansing of the temple was more important than the second. But the fact that John mentions only this cleansing at the opening of the Lord’s official life, and the Synoptists mention only the similar act at its close, proves nothing against the truth of either or both the occurrences. See the Matth. on John 21. [The market in the Court of the Gentiles (the ἔξωθενἱερόν) was introduced, we know not when, from avaricious motives, in violation of the spirit of the law and to the serious injury of public worship, though it was no doubt justified or excused, as a convenience to foreign Jews for the purchase of sacrificial beasts, incense, oil, and the sacred shekel or double drachma in which the temple-tax had to be paid (Exodus 30:13). Similar conveniences and nuisances, markets, lotteries and fairs, are not seldom found in connection with Christian churches. The most striking analogy is the traffic in indulgences, which made the forgiveness of sin an article of merchandise and became the occasion (not the cause) of the Reformation in Germany and Switzerland.—P. S.] John 2:15. He drove all out.—Referring grammatically not to the animals, but to the men. But He drove the men out by raising the whip against their animals; precisely after the analogy of His method with the money-changers, whose tables He overthrew. To drive the men themselves, by themselves, from the temple, was not His design. Grotius: The whip, a symbol of the divine wrath. Meyer rejects all typical import. Yet even about the whip of an actual ox-driver there is somewhat typical; and the whip in the hand of Christ is at least a type of the punitive, reformatory office of discipline in the theocracy and the church. And poured out the money of the exchangers, and overthrew, etc.—That is, He first dashed upon the tables hither and thither and then overturned them. The right of free motion in the temple-space, where tables of money-changers did not belong. John 2:16. Unto them that sold doves.—Because the doves were in baskets, they must be carried away (Rosenmόller, Schweizer). His command now sufficed for this, after the dove-traders had seen His earnestness. Showing, that even the ox-traders also He had not driven out with the lash; and showing likewise that He intended no injury, else He would have let the doves go. De Wette: He dealt more gently with the dove-merchants, because the doves were bought by the poor. Stier: Because He saw in the dove the emblem of the Holy Ghost. Both groundless. The difference in the mode of expulsion arises simply from the nature of the articles: doves in baskets. That the dove-sellers came last, may have been determined by the modesty of their business, which generally makes also modest people. These people were doubtless not so much traders properly speaking, as they were poor farmers or farmers’ boys. As to the doves being emblems, so were also the sheep and oxen. My Father’s house.—See Luke 2:49. The temple was still His Father’s house, because He was still waiting for the repentance of the people. The moment He takes His departure from the temple on account of their obduracy, He calls it: Your house, given over to desolation, Matthew 23:38. Our Father’s, even a prophet might perhaps have said; My Father’s, Jesus says in the consciousness of His divine dignity and authority, as it were betraying Himself, without their understanding immediately the full sense of His word. The Pharisees, however, have doubtless already reflected upon the word as very suspicious (see John 10). A house of merchandize.—The term here is not so strong as at the second purification. It denotes the entire secularization of the system of worship. The term “den of thieves” [σπήλειονλῃστῶν], in Matthew 21:13, on the contrary, denotes the prophet-killing and spirit-killing fanaticism, into which this secularization at last ran out. John 2:17. And his disciples remembered.—Olshausen: After the resurrection. Meyer, [Godet, Alford], on the contrary, rightly: At the occurrence itself. The passage is Psalms 69:9, (10): “For the zeal of thine house hath eaten me up; and the reproaches of them, that reproached thee are fallen upon me.” Whether the Psalm be by David (Tholuck; comp. v. 31; Psalms 51), or by Jeremiah (Hitzig, see John 5:14?), or by some other theocratic sufferer, it belongs at all events, like Psalms 22., to that class of typical passages, in which the passion of Christ miraculously reflects and foreshows itself. Hence also Peter, Acts 1:20, applies to Judas the words of v. 25 (“Let their habitation be desolate”), and Paul applies the Psalm several times to the conduct of the Jews towards Jesus, Romans 11:9; Romans 15:3. When Bengel, Olshausen, etc, and Luthardt refer the words: hath eaten me up, to the death of Jesus, and Meyer says, on the contrary, that the word is to be understood of the inward attrition of zeal (so that the disciples would mean, His zeal will yet consume Him from within), we may freely march over this difference of schools, and suppose (against Meyer) that the disciples, with anxious forebodings for the future of Christ, were smitten with the remembrance of that passage of the Psalm. For it is not necessary to suppose they had made out a clear idea of the sense of those words; any more than that Mary, with her words, meant: “Make wine!” or: “Go home!,” The school always reaches after fully expressed ideas or thoughts; actual life has also vague presentiments, anxious forebodings, dim, confused ideas; that is, life is subject to the fundamental law of gradual development. That the disciples did not connect a distinct expectation of the death of Jesus with their application of the verse of the Psalm to this action of their Lord, is proved by John 2:22; after Psalms 22:6-8, etc., they could not confine their thoughts to an exclusively internal self-attrition; probably they did not think of it at all in the Old Testament sense, though the metaphorical use of ἐσθίειν is clear, and consuming passions too (see Meyer, with a reference to Chrysostom, Lampe, Wolf) are not wholly excluded. But here for the first time met and struck them the conflict of the spirit of Christ with the spirit of the people, the terrible life staking earnestness in the appearance of Christ, which threatened to bring incalculable dangers after it. We may no doubt further suppose that this remembrance indicates great apprehensiveness in the disciples respecting the Lord. Though the future καταφάγεται may occur in the sense of the present, it does not follow that, according to Tholuck, it is to be read as present here. In this case the Evangelist might better have used the κατέφαγε of the Septuagint. John 2:18. Then answered the Jews.—Ἀπεκρίθησανοὐν. Here the Jews already begin to appear in opposition to Jesus; accordingly the Pharisaic and Judaistic Jews are intended, particularly the rulers. They regarded the act of Christ as a reproach to their religious government; therefore their interruption was an answer. And from their spirit it was to be expected; hence οὖν.—What sign she wrest thou unto us?—They did not see that the majestic and successful act itself was a great moral, theocratic sign, which accredited him; they intended therefore a sign after some magical, chiliastic sort. It should be noticed that they did not venture to dispute the theocratic propriety of the act itself. The right of zealotry against theocratic abuses was legalized in the example of Num 25:7; yet the prophets were accustomed to support great acts of zealotry by special miraculous signs, 1 Kings 18:23. The idea of such signs, however, particularly of the sign with which the Messiah should attest Himself, had gradually passed into the magical and monstrous. At all events, the challenge of a sign from heaven, Matthew 12:38; Matthew 16:1, is here already put forth. John 2:19. Destroy this temple.—[One of those paradoxical and mysterious sayings which, though not understood at the time, stuck in the memory as seed thoughts for future sprouting. Comp. Christ’s word on the sign of Jonah, Matthew 12:39-40, in which He likewise mysteriously and typologically predicts His resurrection.—P. S.]—This is the sign which He would give them. The imperative is permissive. (Glassius: est Imperat. pro Futuro permissive). The Jews took the words of Jesus in an entirely literal sense, as John 2:20 proves, yet hardly without design. From this conception gradually arose the malignant perversion, slander, and accusation: This fellow said, I am able to destroy the temple of God, and to build it in three days, Matthew 26:61; Mark 14:58; comp. Acts 6:13. This conception John corrects in John 2:21 : He spake of the temple of his body [for His humanity]. The fathers universally acknowledge this interpretation. It has been supposed, He pointed to His body as He spoke. Of this there is no indication. Since Herder, Henke, and Paulus, down to Lόcke [De Wette], Bleek, Ewald (see Meyer, in loc.), it has been suggested, on the contrary, that John misunderstood the Lord; that Christ spoke of the temple as the symbol of the Jewish system of religion. Destroy this edifice of religion, and in three days, i.e., in a short time, proverbially (with reference to Hosea 6:2) represented by three days, I will set it up again renewed. Kuinoel, Tholuck, Meyer, and many others have maintained the correctness of John’s interpretation. And with all reason ; for an error of the Apostle and the whole company of disciples in respect to so important a word of the Lord is utterly inadmissible (see the several, not absolutely irrefragable arguments in Meyer).A third view adheres to John’s interpretation, but holds likewise an element of truth in the second view, and puts them in connection. The temple on Zion was the symbolical dwelling of God; the body of Christ was the real dwelling of God [and hence more than the temple, comp. Matthew 12:6]. The word of Christ, therefore, underneath its immediate reference to the external temple, has a deeper meaning: Destroy this temple and worship, as ye have already begun to do by your desecration,—destroy it entirely, by putting the Messiah to death, and in three days I will build it new, i.e., not only rise from the dead, but also by the resurrection establish a new theocracy (Theodore of Mopsuestia, Olshausen, Lange, Leben Jesu, I., p. 200; simultaneously Ebrard, Kritik, p. 325; later, in similar manner, Luthardt).This combination is supported (1) by the actual connection. The crucifixion of Christ was the desecration, the spiritual dissolution of the temple, which must be followed by its outward destruction (see Matthew 23:38; Matthew 27:51), because the body of Christ was the real temple of God. (2) Christ, on this account, has repeatedly represented His death and resurrection as the one great sign which was to be given to the Jews instead of the required sign from heaven (John 3:14; Matthew 12:39; Matthew 16:4), and this sign too always connected with an antecedent Old Testament type. (3) A word concerning His death, without connection with an intelligible figure, would have assuredly been as yet wholly unintelligible to the Jews. (4) John gave the inmost and ultimate significance of the expression of Christ for the sole reason, that it was the main matter, and that the figurative sense was self-evident. (5) In Matthew 26:61 Christ puts in the true explanation, 2:64, immediately upon the false interpretation, besides perversion, of His utterance. In three days, a round number, 1 Samuel 30:12; see the Matth. on John 12:40, p. 226. I will raise it up (again).—“It is only apparently contrary to John’s explanation, that Christ, according to the New Testament doctrine, did not raise Himself, but was raised by the Father.” Meyer. And besides, the resurrection of Jesus was in one view as much His own act [John 10:18; Revelation 5:5], as, in another view, the act of His Father, especially in its results, 1 Corinthians 15:57; Ephesians 4:8. That Jesus was already familiar with the thought of His death, appears from the conversation which soon followed, John 3:14. The explanation of Athanasius, quoted by Tholuck, is an ingenious modified form of our third: With the putting to death of the body of Christ the Jewish system of types and shadows also is dissolved, and the real church thereby (by means of the resurrection) established. John 2:20. Then said the Jews.—With an οῦ ?̓ν; it was to be expected that they would finish their malicious misunderstanding consistently.—Forty and six years.—They mean the renovation and enlargement of the temple of Zerubbabel, which begun in the eighteenth year of Herod’s reign, 20 B. C. (Joseph. Antiq. XV. 11, 1), and was finished under Herod Agrippa II. in A. D. 64 (Joseph. Antiq. XX. 9, 7). According to Wieseler, it. appears, therefore, that in this computation of forty-six years since the work was begun, the passover of the year 781 is the occasion on which it is made (Chronol. Synops. p. 106). John 2:21. The temple of his body.—Genitiv. Apposit. John 2:22. His disciples remembered that he had said this.—This remembrance does not exclude former remindings; but the right remembrance came now with the right understanding of it. [Remarks like this impress upon the reports of the discourses of Christ the stamp of historical fidelity. A later falsifier would have made the reference to the resurrection much plainer.—P. S.]—And they believed the Scripture.—[Faith in Christ is the key to the understanding of the Scriptures of the O. T.; comp. John 7:38; John 7:42; John 10:35; John 13:18. The singular τῇγραφῇ indicates the unity and harmony of the canonical books from Genesis to Malachi, which, considering the great number of authors, the long period of time, and the variety of circumstances in and under which they were composed, is a strong evidence of their divine origin.—P. S.] Comp. Luke 24:26 : “Ought not Christ to have suffered these things,” etc. As they now found the death of Christ foretold in the Old. Testament, so they found also His glorification, which included His resurrection, Psalms 16:10; comp. Acts 2:27; Acts 13:35; 1 Peter 3:19; Psalms 68:18; comp. Ephesians 4:8; Isaiah 53:7; comp. Acts 8:35. [Alford: “At first sight it appears difficult to fix on any passage in which the resurrection is directly announced: but with the deeper understanding of the Scriptures which the Holy Spirit gave to the Apostles and still gives to the Christian church, such prophecies as that in Psalms 16. are recognized as belonging to Him in whom alone they are properly fulfilled: see also Hosea 6:2.” This is not satisfactory. The O. T. indeed does not expressly prophesy the resurrection, as a separate fact, but very often the exaltation and glorification of the Messiah after His humiliation and suffering, and this implies the resurrection, as the intervening link or the beginning of the exaltation itself. Hence we may count here in a wider sense, with Hengstenberg (I. 171), the prophecy of Shilo as a ruler, Genesis 49:10; Psalms 110, where the Messiah is represented as sitting at the right of God and ruling over all His enemies; Daniel 7:13-14, where He appears at the head of a universal Kingdom; Isaiah 53, where, after His atoning death, He is raised to great glory; Zechariah 9:9-10, where Zion’s King appears first lowly and riding upon an ass, yea, as dying (comp. John 12:10; John 13:7), but afterwards speaking peace to the heathen and having dominion from sea to sea and from the river to the ends of the earth; comp. also Isaiah 9; Isaiah 11; Micah 5; Psalms 16. It is quite in keeping with the character of prophecy to behold the various stages of the exaltation as one continuous panorama. It is under this view that the Scripture of the O. T. is said to have foretold the resurrection; Luke 24:26 (“to enter into His glory”); John 20:9; 1 Corinthians 15:4; 1 Peter 1:11 (“the sufferings of Christ and the glory that should follow”).—P. S.] John 2:23. Now when he was in Jerusalem at the passover.—The Evangelist thus distinguishes the stay of Jesus in Jerusalem during the passover from His first appearance there.—On the feast.—Meyer justly says, this addition is not intended to explain the term pass over for Greek readers; that must have been done by John 2:13. The expression signifies participation in the celebration of the feast. We suppose the feast days themselves are set off against the day of His entrance. On the day of the symbolical castigation He wrought other miracles, probably miracles of healing; and the first surprise of the Jews was followed by a demonstration of faith on the part of many attendants of the feast. The signs.—Evidently implying a multiplicity of signs, and such as determined those people to believe. He must therefore have done many miracles in Jerusalem. John 2:24. Did not commit himself unto them.—The second πιστεύεινἑαυτόν is evidently connected with the first πιστεύειν. He believed not in their believing, to such a degree as to commit or deliver up Himself to them. Various interpretations: (1) He withheld His doctrine (Chrysostom, Kuinoel); (2) He did not yield Himself to personal intercourse with them (Meyer). Without doubt simply: He did not yet entrust Himself to them as the Messiah, did not offer Himself as the Messiah, though they seemed inclined to recognize Him as such. It is the Lord’s determination, not to appear publicly under the title of Messiah; and He follows it henceforth till the triumphal entry into Jerusalem; in full accordance with Matthew 4:1-11. Because he.—He Himself, in distinction from indirect knowledge through others. How He knew them all, is in part shown by what has preceded. He knew in general that the secular spirit predominated in them; but He also saw through each one, as He met him, with a divine physiognomic discernment. In both cases is intended not only the general prophetic illumination, but the penetrating spiritual eye of the God-Man. John 2:25. And needed not.—Explanatory of αὐτός in the previous clause.—Of man.—Of man as to his sinful nature in general, and of man in particular, as He encountered each individual.—For he knew.—The positive expression for: He needed not.—What was in man.—Not only the special, miraculous, physiognomic knowledge (Meyer cites John 1:48; John 4:18; John 6:61; John 6:64; John 11:4; John 11:14; John 13:11; John 21:17), but also the general knowledge of the constitution of human nature (John 3), of the order of the universe (John 19:11), and of the situation of the Jewish people in particular. Result: In the familiar circle of His disciples Jesus manifested His glory; in public He preserved His mysterious anonymousness as to the Messianic office. [Christ knows us better than we know ourselves. He sees the end from the beginning, we the beginning from the end. He, says Calvin, knows the roots of the tree, we know the tree only by its fruits.—P. S.] AND ETHICAL1. The different meanings of the two purifications of the temple. According to Meyer, no essential difference should be perceived between the two acts. Vet the difference between the expressions “house of merchandize” in John, and “den of thieves” in the Synoptists, “the house of My Father” (ὁοῖ ?̓κοςτοῦπατρόςμου) in John, and “My house” (ὁοῖ ?̓κόςμου) in the Synoptists, as well as the greater rigor in the second case as described by Mark (cot suffering any man to carry any vessel through the temple), is plain enough. According to Hofmann, Lichtenstein, and Luthardt, Christ in the Synoptists appears as a prophet to protect the place of prayer, in John as the Son to execute His domestic right. But this would lead to an entire reversal of the order of things in the self manifestation of the Lord. The case is just the reverse. Christ performed the first cleansing of the temple, as an anonymous prophet in the right of zealotism and the right of a prophet (see the Matth. on John 21:12, p. 376); the second, as the Lord of the temple, publicly introduced by the people to the holy city and temple as the Messiah. 2. The body of Christ, the most real temple of God. The crucifixion, the destruction of the temple in the strictest sense (Romans 2:22); the resurrection, the building of the eternal temple. Meaning of the sign: He who builds the eternal, essential temple, has power also to purge the symbolical. The truth, that Christ is perpetually building greater, more glorious the temple of God, which the sin of man demolishes. The centre of this truth is the death and resurrection of Christ; its first tokens, the fall of Adam and the first promise (the protevangelium), the flood and the rain-bow, etc.; its unfolding, the destruction of the theocracy and temple in Jerusalem, the rise of the church, the ruin of the mediζval church by the hierarchy, and its rebuilding in the Reformation, the inducing of the judgment of the world by anti-christianity, and the erection of a new heavens and a new earth. The wedding at Cana before the purification of the temple, the token of the transfiguration of the world before the judgment of the world. 3. The first and second purifications of the temple: when once the temple is made a house of merchandize (John 2), it has also become in effect a den of robbers or of murderers, Matthew 21. First the selling of indulgences, then persecution and reformation. 4. Christ entrusts Himself to no one in Jerusalem; i.e., He does not as yet come on the stage in His office as Messiah. Comp. the Com. on Matth. on John 4. 5. The supernatural knowledge of Christ, the source of His miracles of knowledge, and in fact everywhere divine human; i.e., on the one hand not merely divine, nor on the other merely human, but both at once; divinely immediate, humanly exercised through means and organs. Η AND See Comm. on Matthew, on John 21:12-22, p., 377; Mark, on John 11:12-26; Luke, on John 19:41-42.—The visit of Jesus the youth to the temple, and the visit of the man matured for the execution of His Messianic office.—The first, second, and last solemn appearance of Jesus in the temple (the last, Matthew 21-23).—As the crucifixion of Christ completed the desecration of the temple, so the resurrection of Christ completed the restoration of the temple.—Out of His word of holiest zeal for the temple, they made a word of blasphemy and deadly sin against the temple.—The purification of the temple, the perpetual charter of reformation.—What sign shewest thou, etc.? The spiritual blindness which demands a sensible sign for the holiest sign of the Spirit.—How Judaism, by overdoing itself, falls back into heathenism, in asking a sign for the sense, when the sign of the Spirit gloriously stands forth.—So also the Judaism of legality in Christendom.—The scourge in the hand of Jesus, or the anger of personal gentleness itself. (1) The overpowering sign of the highest zeal (against sin); (2) the humbling sign of the highest majesty (against frivolity); (3) the ocular sign of the highest assurance (against doubt).—The Old Testament spirit in which the disciples viewed the matter, indicated by their word: The zeal of Thine house hath eaten me up; the New Testament watchword of Jesus: My meat is to do the will, etc., John 4:34.—To the temple of a Herod the hierarchs had even a right; in the temple of Christ they found themselves utterly out of place.—The token which Christ gives the Jews for the truth of His divine mission.—This token, the token also of reformation: Commit the utmost abominations in the temple, the more gloriously will the ruined temple be restored!—The conduct of the Jews on Christ’s purifying of the temple, in its permanent import.—The destroyers of the temple would be its restorers, and the restorers must pass for destroyers.—From this first day of the public appearance of Christ, enmity calumniously laid up the word, which was to bring it to naught.—The Lord’s great word concerning His end, at the beginning of His career.—The subsequent remembrance of Christ’s words by His enemies, and the subsequent remembrance of them by His friends.—When He was at Jerusalem, many believed on Him; or, (1) festival believers, believers of festival seasons when things go grandly in the church; (2) yet festival times, also true birthdays of faith.—But Jesus did not commit Himself to them; or, secret disciples, and a secret Saviour (anonymous believers, and an anonymous Christ).—Christ, the knower of hearts.—The first sign of Christ in the pious house, and His first sign in the impious church.—The transformation of water into wine, and of the driver’s whip into a beneficent sceptre (in contrast with those who have turned the sceptre into a whip).—Christ and the hierarchs with reference to the temple of God: (1) He purifies and sanctifies it, they would make its desecrated condition its holiness; (2) He gives a moral and religious sign of the Spirit, they demand a magical, sensuous sign to accredit it; (3) He gives them for a sign the prophecy that they will kill Him, and they make of it a mortal charge against Him; (4) He announces to them a new supernatural temple, and they harden themselves in their old system to their judgment.—The first public Easter festival of Jesus, a foretokening of His future and eternal Easter.—Christ’s observance of the prescribed feasts the dawn of the free festivity of the gospel.—Christ at the feast: (1) As an Israelite, in the spirit of the patriarchs; (2) as a Jew, according to the law of Moses; (3) as a prophet, after the manner of the prophets (my Father’s house not a house of merchandize, the court of the Gentiles not a cattle-market); (4) as the Christ, introducing and indicating the course of His life and work.—Holy zeal and unholy zeal in contrast in the purification of the temple.—The open, noble indignation of Jesus, and the impure malicious reserve of His opponents.:—Jesus, here as in Cana, a man, and a sinless man.—The keeping holy the temple; (1) The house of God; (2) the body; (3) the church. The rising of the divine above the corruption and ruin of the human; the eternal divine token thereof, the luminous centre of all divine signs: the resurrection of Christ from the death of the cross. Starke: Majus: Though the word and works of God are not bound to place, yet it is right, after the example of Christ, to observe proprieties of place and time.—Osiander: Christ, the Lord of the law, submitted Himself to it, that He might redeem men from it.—Cramer: Christ, not a secular king, but Lord of the temple; therefore He comes into the temple, and there begins His public function, Haggai 2:3; Haggai 2:18.—Hedinger: What has the abomination of usury to do in the temple of God? What the indulgence-monger in the sanctuary?—Ah, our churches to this day are sufficiently profaned by sinful garrulity, proud display of dress, etc. (even by unsanctified discourses).—Nova Bibl. Tub.: The abuses which have crept into the church must be scourged and banished. How much more must traditional abuses call forth our zeal! Hosea 12:8; Zechariah 14:21.—It is incumbent on all Christians, particularly on ministers, to be zealous for the house of God; yet should every one take good heed lest it be not according to knowledge.—Osiander: He who diligently pursues his calling, may fear no danger. The protection of God will be with him.—Majus: The works of God need no miraculous attestation. They shine so brightly upon the eye, that God and His divine glory may be sufficiently recognized in them.—Hedinger: Unbelief demands miracles and signs.—Zeisius: Where we have to do with false, malicious men, we are not called upon to make the truth so clear and bright, to their greater condemnation (dark words for dark men).—A mind occupied only with the earthly, cannot perceive the mysteries of God.—Instruction often serves more for others in the future, than for those to whom it is given at the time.—Ibid: Fulfilment yields the best interpretation.—Quesnel: Truth brings forth its fruits in their season.—Ibid.: Christian prudence requires that we do not lightly judge and condemn any, yet that we do not easily trust ourselves to any who present a good appearance. Gerlach: “As Christ’s kingdom is not a sword, how is it that He deals so hardly and harshly here with the priests of the temple, and concerns Himself with what properly belongs to the secular power? Because the Lord at that time stood between the Old Testament and the New, between what Moses had established in Israel, and what Christ was to establish after His death through His Holy Spirit and the preaching of the gospel; and He shows thereby that He is a Lord who holds both dispensations in His hand” (Luther).—Lisco: A picture of the reformation of a temple-desecration which had arisen from an abuse of Deu 14:24-26.—Heubner: How much is contained in completely trusting one!—We must judge not, yet not hastily open and surrender ourselves to any. The more perfect and noble a man is, the more true and open (and yet the more is he, again, a higher mystery).—Schleiermacher: What a zeal for His Father’s house did the Lord Himself sanctify, in doing that!—But there afterwards came a time, when even the Christian church was a house of merchandize.—Then He again gathered a whip; Luther, Zwingli, Calvin and all the reformers.—It was not the whip that effected what the Redeemer did, but the spiritual power, of which that was only a sign and seal.—Our failure to act in many cases as the Redeemer acted here, is the cause of many evils in the Christian church and in all human affairs. That one is always putting upon another the performance of works well pleasing to God, and no one maintains a fresh and free consciousness of the power which God the Lord has given him, and does all he can do to promote truth and goodness and prevent wickedness,—this is the reason why so many disorders are daily renewed in the smaller and larger relations of men.—Besser: The Saviour (because they stifle the voice of conscience) draws back from them, and veils in a holy riddle the sign which they demand, and flame which was intended to be given them as the sign of all signs, the proper sign of Christ.—From every defeat a victory unfolds to the church; from every shame a glory.—When therefore He was risen, etc. Chemnitz presents the disciples, in their relation to the discourse of Jesus to them, as an example for all Bible-readers: They should not at once despise and reject everything in the Holy Scriptures which they cannot at first glance understand; nor must they despair of understanding, if they cannot at once penetrate the deep mysteries of the word. For the Spirit of knowledge leads us into the truth by degrees.—Christ’s power of trying spirits (Isaiah 11:3. comp. with 1 Samuel 16:7 ; 1 Timothy 5:22). Footnotes: John 2:12. [αὐτοῦ after οἱἀδελφοί, is omitted by B. L., Treg., Westcott and Hort, but supported by ΰ. A. al and retained by Tischend and Alf. (the latter in brackets). Westcott and Hort bracket καὶοἱμαθηταὶαὐτοῦ. The false view about the ἀδελφοί of Christ may have had some influence on these variations.—P. S.] John 2:12. [As ”brethren” is now almost exclusively used in the spiritual sense, it is better to substitute “brothers,” where, as here, kinsmen, i. e., either cousins, or more probably half-brothers of Jesus, are intended. In the Scriptures the term denotes either (1) actual brotherhood, or (2) kinsmanship (cousins), or (3) common nationality, or (4) friendship and sympathy. Where there are no obvious objections, the first sense, being the most natural, must always be preferred, especially when the term, as here, occurs in connection with mother. See the Exeg. Notes.—P. S.] John 2:12. [The singular ἔμεινεν (instead of the plural ἔμειναν) in A. F. G. was occasioned by the preceding κατέβη and the succeeding ἀνέβη.—P. S.] John 2:15. [The words to τάτέπρόβατακαὶτοὺςβόας, “the sheep as well as the oxen,” are merely epexegetical of πάντας (masc. on account of βόας), and imply that the φραγέλλιον was used on the beasts only, although it scared the men away likewise. The them and and of the E. V. convey a false impression.—P. S.] John 2:15.—B. L. X., etc. [Alford, Tregelles] read:τάκέρματα [moneys, small change, instead of the singular, τὸκέρμα (text rec. Tischend). Greek writers generally use the plural. The singular is here collective.—P. S.] John 2:17.—The reading of the Recepta [κατέφαγε] is conformed to the Septuagint. The most important codd., particularly ΰ. A. B. R. besides Origen, etc., read καταφάγεται [the future, contracted from καταφαγήσεται, will consume me, in the Sent, and the Apocrypha.—P. S.] John 2:22.—The addition αὐτοῖς is very feebly accredited. [Omitted by all the modern critical ed.] [The double purgation of the temple is rightly defended by all the older commentators, and by Schleiermacher, Olshausen, Tholuck, Ebrard, Meyer, Lange, Hengstenberg, Godet, Alford. Among those who admit only one, Strauss, Baur and Schenkel defend the report of the Synoptists, while Lόke, De Wette, Ewald decide in favor of John]. [Hieronymus: Igneum quiddam et sidereum radiabat ex occulis ejus et divinitatis majestas lucebat in facie. Comp. the remarks of Godet, I. p. 379, who attributes the effect chiefly to the imposing majesty of Christ’s appearance, and the irresistible force of His consciousness of supernatural power.—P. S.] [So also Godet: a sign of authority and judgment. If Christ had intended physical punishment, the instrument would have been disproportionate to the end.—P. S.] [Alford: The coincidence with Luke 2:49 is remarkable. By this expression thus publicly used, our Lord openly announces His Mossiahship.—P. S.] [Sept.: “Ὅτιὁζῆλοςτοῦοἴκουσουκατέφαγένμε (Vulg.: comedit me), καὶοὶὸνειδισμοὶτῶνὀνειδιζόντωνσεἐπέπεσονἐπ’ἐμέ.—P. S.] [“The καταφάγειν spoken of in that passion Psalm, was the marring and wasting of the Saviour’s frame by His zeal for God and God’s Church, which resulted in the buffeting, the scourging, the Cross.” Alford]. [So also Tholuck, Hengstenberg, Godet, but Meyer contends that καταφάγεται (=καταφαγήσεται) is only used in the sense of the future.—P. S.] [Renan (Vie de Jιsus, p. 354) can see in this profound enigma of our Lord only “an imprudent word spoken in bad humor” (“Un jour sa mauvaise humeur contre le temple lui arracha un mot imprudent)”! Godet, I. 387, well remarks: “La methode de Jesus est de jeter une enigme et de ne rιvιler la vιritι qu’en la voilunt sous un divin paradoxe, qui ne peut κlre compris qu’en changeant de cζur. C‘est lΰ un secret de la profonde pιdagogies”—P. S.] [Meyer, with his usual and at times pedantic philological strictness, takes the imperative λύσατε as strictly provocative, and explains it from a painful excitement of feeling in view of the opposition already manifesting itself. But the apparent harshness is softened by the prophetic character of the word and the double reference to the temple and the person. John 13:27, where Christ calls upon Judas to do quickly what he intended to do, furnishes a parallel. If the fruit is once matured, it must fall.—P. S.] [So Bengel (nutu gestuve) and Meyer. But in the fifth ed., p. 144, note, M. gives up this reference. Such pointing would have been the solution of the riddle, contrary to its intention; but neither the Jews nor the disciples understood Him at the time. The Jews on this and the second purgation referred τὸνναὸντοῦτον to the temple, John 2:20; Matthew 26:61; Matthew 27:40. Meyer now assumes that Christ pointed to the temple (this temple before you), but meant His body as the antitype of the temple and the true dwelling of God, and thus put the image in the place of the thing typified, “so dass diese scharfen lebendigen, ohne Auslegung hingeworfenen Bildzόge wie in einem Bilderrδthsel eine symbolisch prophretische Vorhersagung seiner Auferstehung enthalten, wie Matthew 12:39; Matthew 16:4.”—P. S.] (See Heubner, p. 242. Henke was not the first to take this view, but Zinzendorf has it in his Homil. όber die Wundenlitanei, p. 160.) [Olshausen, Stier, Brόckner (versus De Wette), Alford, Godet.—P. S.] [Meyer, pp. 145–147, raises seven objections against this view. It is plainly irreconcilable with apostolic inspiration. In my Lectures on the Gospel of John, written at Berlin, 1842, I find the remark: “It involves an immense presumption on the part of theologians of the nineteenth century, however respectable, if they imagine that they understand Christ better than His favorite disciple and bosom-friend to whom He revealed the future struggles and triumphs of His Kingdom.” Alford also justly protests against such liberty of interpretation. For we have here not a chronological statement, but a doctrinal exposition of a most important declaration of Christ.—P. S.] [This idea John expresses in ἐσκήνωσεν, John 1:14 (see notes on pp. 71, 73), and Paul when he says that the whole fulness of the Godhead dwelled in Christ bodily. Colossians 2:9.—P. S.] [Comp. also Hengstenberg, I:165. He thinks that no justice can be done to this holy enigma which Christ proposed to the Jews, unless we recognize the essential identity of the temple, the appearance of Christ in the flesh and the church of the N. T. He explains: “If ye once destroy the temple of my body, and with it this external temple, the symbol and pledge of the kingdom of God among you, I shall rebuild in three days the temple of My body and with it at the same time the substance of the eternal temple, the kingdom of God.” The crucifixion of Christ involved as a necessary consequence the destruction of the temple and the O. T. worship; the re surrection of Christ the creation of the Christian church, and worship, of which the temple was the type and shadow. Godet explains: “Destroy this your temple, by killing Me, the Messiah.”—P. S.] V JESUS IN , AND AS A WITNESS OF THE FIRST OF JESUS UPON THE . THE OF CHRIST WITH BY NIGHT THE BIRTH AS THE OF INTO THE KINGDOM OF GOD. OF WATER, WIND, AND THE BRAZEN SERPENT. John 3:1-21(John 3:1-15, Gospel for Trinity Sunday; John 3:16-21, Gospel for 2nd Pentecost) 1[But] there was a man of the Pharisees, named Nicodemus, a ruler of the Jews: 2The same came to Jesus [him] by night, and said unto him, Rabbi [Master], we know that thou art a teacher come from God; for no man can do these miracles that thou doest, except God be with him. 3Jesus answered and said unto him, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born again from above] he cannot see the kingdom of God. 4Nicodemus saith unto him, How can a man be born when he is old? can he enter the second time into his mother’s womb, and be born? 5Jesus answered, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born of water and of the [omit of the] Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God [of heaven]. 6That which is [hath been] born of the flesh is flesh; and that which Isaiah 7[hath been] born of the Spirit is spirit. Marvel not that I said unto thee, Ye 8must be born again [from above]. The wind bloweth where it listeth [will], and thou hearest the sound thereof, but canst not tell [knowest not, οὐχοῖ ?̓δας], whence it cometh, and whither it goeth; so is [it with] every one that is [hath been] born of the Spirit. 9Nicodemus answered and said unto him, How can these things be? 10Jesus answered and said unto him, Art thou a master [the teacher, ὁδιδάσχαλος] of Israel, and knowest not these things? 11Verily, verily, I say unto thee, We speak that we do know [that which we know] and testify that [which] we have seen; and ye receive not our witness [testimony]. 12If I have told you earthly [human] things, and ye believe not, how shall ye believe, if I tell you of [omit of] heavenly [divine] thing?13And no man hath ascended up to heaven, but he that came down from heaven, even the Son of Man which 14[who] is in heaven. And as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness [made it a high signal for the surrounding wilderness], even so must the Son of man be lifted up: 15That whosoever believeth in him should [may] not perish, but [omit not perish but] have eternal life. 16For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should [might] not perish, but have everlasting life. 17For God sent not his Son into the world to condemn [judge] the world; but that the world through him might be saved. 18He that believeth on him is not condemned [judged]; but he that believeth not is condemned [hath been judged] already, because he hath not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God. 19And this is the condemnation [judgment] that [the] light is come into the world, and men loved [the] darkness rather than [the] light, because their deeds were evil. 20For every one that doeth evil hateth the light, neither cometh [and cometh not] to the light, lest his deeds should be reproved [detested, discovered, shown to be punishable]. 21But he that doeth [the] truth cometh to the light, that his deeds may be made manifest, that [for] they are wrought in God. Ε AND [This is one of the richest and most important sections of the Bible. The sixteenth verse alone contains the whole gospel in a nutshell, or “the Bible in miniature,” and is worth more than all the wisdom of the world. The infinite love of the Father, the mission of His Son, the work of the Holy Spirit, the lost condition of man, the necessity of a new birth from above, faith in Christ as a condition of salvation, the kingdom of God, eternal life—all these fundamental doctrines are set forth by the unerring mouth of our Lord in this interview with a timid, yet earnest and anxious inquirer. The central idea of the passage is the new birth, which implies the total depravity of man and the work of divine grace. This great doctrine stands in the proper place at the beginning of Christ’s ministry. The first miracle of Christ was a miracle of transformation, His first public act in Jerusalem an act of reformation, His first discourse a discourse on regeneration. He is not satisfied with mere improvements of the old, but demands a new life, lays a new foundation. True religion in the soul begins with a personal conviction of sin and guilt, and of the necessity of a radical change. Without such a conviction all efforts to convert a man are in vain. The night discourse with Nicodemus is the locus classicus on the new birth, as the indispensable condition of admission into the kingdom of God. It occupies a position in the Gospel of John, similar to that which the Sermon on the Mount does in the Gospel of Matthew. It is characteristic of the idealism and mysticism of John that in his Gospel he gives no account of the institution of the church and the sacraments. But, anticipating the visible rite, he presents in John 3. the idea of the new birth, which is symbolized in Christian baptism, together with the idea of “the kingdom of God,” which is the internal and abiding essence of the church. So in John 6 he gives the general idea of vital union with Christ, which underlies the sacrament of the Lord’s Supper. According to the Synoptists, Christ began His public ministry by preaching to the people: “The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand; repent ye (change your mind, μετανοεῖτε), and believe in the gospel” (Mark 1:15). According to John, He made, at the outset of His ministry,. the same demand, first indirectly, and then directly (δεῖὑμᾶς, John 3:7), upon an individual, a man circumcised, orthodox, honest, unblemished, yea, of the highest rank, a member of the Supreme Council of the theocracy, even favorably disposed to Christ and almost ready to accept Him as the Messiah, in a word, a man endowed with every personal and official claim to membership of the Messianic kingdom, yet lacking one fundamental condition: a new birth from above. Christ answers not so much to the words, as to the thoughts of Nicodemus, penetrating his heart to the very core (John 2:25). With historical faithfulness, John does not state the result of the conversation, because it did not appear at once, but some time afterwards (John 7:50; John 19:39). Regeneration (ἀναγέννησις, παλιγγενεσία) is a creative act of God the Holy Spirit, whereby a new spiritual life from above is implanted in man, through the means of grace, especially the preaching of the gospel; like the natural birth, it can occur but once. Conversion (μετάνοια, which must not be confounded with regeneration) is the corresponding subjective change of heart, whereby man, under the influence of the Spirit, in conscious repentance and faith, turns from the service of sin to the service of God; this may be repeated after a relapse. Regeneration, as to its origin and mode of operation, is a mystery like the natural generation and birth, but a mystery manifest in its effects to all who have spiritual eyes to see; it meets us as a fact in every true Christian, or child of God, who is as sure of the higher life of Christ in his own soul as he is of his natural existence. The difficulties in the exposition of this passage are mainly dogmatical, and arise from the relation of regeneration to baptism, viz., whether water means baptism at all, and, if so, whether it refers to John’s baptism, or the baptism of the disciples of Jesus, or, by anticipation, to Christian baptism (which did not appear till the day of Pentecost), or the general idea of baptism in its various forms as a historic preparation for Christian discipleship; and also from the question as to the necessity of baptism for salvation. These difficulties are fully discussed below.—P. S.] John 3:1. There was a man.—An important incident of the residence of Jesus in Jerusalem, exemplifying what has just been said, and introduced with the continuative δέ. [Comp. however, Text Note 1.—P. S.] Lόcke [and Godet]: An example of the higher knowledge just mentioned; Tholuck: Of the weak faith just mentioned; De Wette: A proof of Joh 3:23-25; Luthardt: Transition from the people to an individual; Ewald: Nicodemus an exception; Strauss: Added through desire to show a believer from the cultivated world; Baur: Nicodemus a typical figure: outwardly believing, inwardly unbelieving Judaism. (On the contrary Luthardt: He is in fact a genuine disciple in disguise, see Tholuck.) The views of Lόcke and Tholuck do not exclude, but meet in, that of De Wette. An example, that is to say, at once of the weak faith to which Jesus cannot entrust Himself, and of His power to discern it. Yet John has especially selected this incident also on account of its great didactic importance, and as an example of the enthusiasm which Jesus at first awakened, extending even into the circle of the Pharisees.Nicodemus.—A current name, first with the Greeks, then with the Jews (πַ ?χְ ?γִ ?ιξεֹ ?ο ,πַ ?χְ ?γָ ?ν Lightfoot and Wetstein). Akin to Νικόλαος. Starke :“If the name be Hebrew, it is equivalent to innocent blood (πַ ?χִ ?ι and γָּ ?ν), but if Greek, conqueror of people (the same as Nicolaus). As the Jews gave not only Hebrew, but Greek and Latin names also, to their children, both meanings at last met in Nicodemus.” The gradual unfolding of his faith appears by stages in this place, John 7:50 and John 19:39. “Tradition adds that he afterwards, having publicly acknowledged the doctrine of Jesus, and having been baptized by Peter and John, was deposed from his office and banished from Jerusalem (Photius, Biblioth., Cod. 171), but was supported in a country-seat by his kinsman Gamaliel, till his death.” Winer. Thus tradition makes him again in an unworthy mariner-keep out of sight with his faith. The Talmud mentions also a Nicodemus, Son of Gorion, properly called Bunni, who was a disciple of Jesus, and survived the destruction of Jerusalem, whose family sank from wealth into great poverty (Delitzsch, (Zeitschr. f. Luth. Theolog. 1854, p. 643). The identity is not proved. Josephus also, Antiq. XIV. 3, 2, speaks of a Nicodemus, who was sent as a legate of the Maccabean Aristobulus to Pompey. The apocryphal literature has completed the biography of Nicodemus in a Gospel ascribed to him.The germ of a genuine faith had to contend in Nicodemus with regard for the polite world, thoughts of his station, fear of men, Pharisaic prejudice, but, on a foundation of sincerity, conscientiousness, rectitude, and a higher fidelity even to his office, issues victorious in courageous confession and joyful offerings; and the closing words of the conversation, John 3:21, are plainly enough a prediction of the Lord respecting him, after a reproof, John 3:20, of his stealthy coming in the night as a suspicious sign. Similar characters, though they probably did not all so decidedly come out, are described in John 12:42. A ruler of the Jews.—Member of the Sanhedrin [comp. Luke 23:13; Luke 24:20; Acts 13:27], like Joseph of Arimathea, John 7:50. Of the party of the Pharisees. [ἐκτῶνφαρισαίων. This is not mentioned as derogatory. Hengstenberg remarks that the Pharisees were specially hostile to the doctrine of regeneration and resolved religion into a self-made holiness. But the Sadducees were even more opposed to spiritual religion. A Paul could proceed from the earnest Pharisees, but not from the frivolous and skeptical Sadducees.—P. S.] John 3:2. By night.—That this is intended for a mark of weakness, is proved by John 3:20; and even by the particular mention of this circumstance itself, as well as by the very gradual appearing of his adhesion to Jesus. Koppe puts him down as a hypocrite (see Lόcke), who came to question the Lord with evil intent, and who feigned simplicity; Niemeyer, on the contrary, represents his shyness as a true caution. “He was an honorable character, rather slow of nature,” says Meyer. Yet no doubt something more. An educated man of age, sitting as pupil to a young, untitled rabbi; a Pharisee, stepping free of the despotic and heresy-scenting spirit of his sect; a Sanhedrist, who soon ventures to oppose the fanaticism of the whole council; a prominent, serene-tempered, mature man of the world, who under the cross of the dead Jesus appears as a disciple, and in a costly burial-gift gives token of his unreserved and joyful devotion, and thus evinces that there were given to him and have continued with him, in his frigid school, a noble vigor of spirit, in his legal dignity a living yearning, in his high age a youthful striving, under all traditional prejudice a large ingenuousness, above all, under the whole system of Pharisaic show a sincere heart, and under all the rust of worldliness the metal of a turn for the faith and devotion of the Christian. Meyer justly observes, against De Wette and others, that the coming of Nicodemus by night does not imply that no disciples were present at the interview; and the directness of the narrative, though bearing the Johannean stamp, leads us to supppose that John was a witness. Rabbi, we know [οἴδαμεν].—First of all, Nicodemus accords to the Lord the dignity of Rabbi, denied to Him by many (John 7:15); and this, considering the importance attached by the scribes to this title, is not without a favorable significance. This “we know” implies that he had kindred spirits in his circle, who acknowledged the high office of Jesus. Yet the word shades off, in a somewhat politic sense, from a Pluralis excellentiζ into a suggestion of an indefinite prospect of recognition by the whole Sanhedrin. It expresses also the self-sufficient scribe-spirit, and unconsciously betrays over valuation of knowledge and under-valuation of faith. A teacher come from God.—Acknowledgment of an indefinite prophetic character.— For no man can do these miracles.—Acknowledgment of a number of accredited, important miraculous signs [ταῦτατὰσημεῖα, hζcce tanta signa], which Jesus had done in Jerusalem, and which, in the judgment of Nicodemus, certified Him to be a new prophet of God. Miracle a test of a prophet, but under qualifications, Deuteronomy 13:1; Deuteronomy 18:20. Except God be with him.—The miracle proves the supernatural power which stands by the worker. False miracles might be performed through Satanic agency, Exodus 7. But the character and greatness of the miracles of Jesus made it certain to Nicodemus that He wrought them in the power of God. And this involved the further inference that He was accredited by the miracles as a prophet sent from God. The ἔρχεσθαι is significant, John 1:6; John 1:15. John 3:3. Verily, verily, I say unto thee.—One of the great cardinal truths of the kingdom of heaven, solemnly introduced. The answer consists of a series of antitheses: (1) The address of Rabbi is answered by an address without Rabbi; (2) the “we know” is met with “verily, verily, I say unto thee;” (3) the word: Thou art come from above, and therefore art a teacher (from the kingdom of God), is met by the word: A man must be even born from above, if he would so much as see the kingdom of God; (4) the sign is met by the kingdom of God itself. And this antithesis runs through all: Thou wouldst know that I am a prophet, but thou still lackest the qualifications for seeing who I am, and seeing in me the personal manifestation of the kingdom of God. Various views of the relation of the answer of Jesus to the address of Nicodemus: (1) Intermediate talk omitted (Kuinoel and others). (2) Jesus would lead him from the faith of miracles to the faith which morally transforms (Augustine, De Wette). (3) Jesus is come not as a teacher, but for the moral transformation of the world (Baumgarten-Crusius). (4) Thou thinkest thou already seest a sign of the kingdom of God; no man can see the kingdom of God, unless he be born anew (Lightfoot, Lόcke). (5) Meyer: The address of Nicodemus is interrupted by Christ, and must therefore be completed from this answer. Nicodemus intended to ask: What must I do, to enter into the kingdom of the Messiah? To this Christ here gives him the answer. But (a) the hypothesis of interruption is unsuitable; better, that of hesitation; best, that of polite, skilful waiting, as if to say: What more? (b) Nicodemus was as yet hardly so far advanced as to ask what Meyer puts into his mouth. The connection is probably this: Thou thinkest that I am come from God. But ho who would even see the kingdom of God, must be more than this; he must be born from above; how much greater must be said of the Founder of the kingdom of God. Jesus gave him to understand that he had not yet reached the forecourt of true knowledge. At least Christ’s answer confronts the proud consciousness of the address with the humbling nature of truth. And when He requires the new birth from above as the condition of seeing the kingdom of God, He means, according to the analogy of the Jewish designation of proselytes as born again (Jeramoth fol. 62, etc.), primarily: Except a man come out from the old system, become a proselyte, publicly commit himself to a new position. And in birth from above the word demands a great transition. Nicodemus would privately assure Him of the adhesion of a party of the Pharisees, implying the presumption that he would attach himself to the old order of things. Jesus demands of him a proselytism wrought by God, a coming forth from the darkness of night and of the old party, if he would have any understanding at all of the kingdom of God which he himself announces. We may still suppose that John relates only the essential, salient words, and omits intervening details; the main progress of thought, however, he has undoubtedly given, though in the color of his own contemplation. Except a man be born from above [Ἐὰνμήτιςγεννηθῇἄνωθεν]. Various interpretations of ἄνωθεν: (1) Locally: from heaven (ἐκτοῦοὐρανοῦ); (2) temporally: afresh, from the very beginning (ἐξἀρῆς). Both views are adduced by Chrysostom [who himself explains the word by παλιγγενεσία]. In favor of the latter, in the sense of iterum, denuo, are the Vulgate [Augustine], Luther [Calvin, Beza], Olshausen, Neander, Tholuck [Alford, Hengstenberg, Godet]. Against it are the verbal criticisms, that ἄνωθεν, taken temporally, means not again, but from the beginning, and that the rendering again has probably arisen under the influence of the expressions of Paul in Romans 12:2; Galatians 6:15; Ephesians 4:23; Colossians 3:10; Titus 3:5; and of Pet. in 1 Peter 1:23. For the local explanation are Origen and many others, down to Bengel [superne, unde Filius hominis descendit], Lόcke, and Meyer [also De Wette, Robinson, Baur, Bδumlein, Weizsδcker, Owen, Wordsworth]. From above, in the sense of from God, ἐκθεοῦ. This is further favored by the consideration “that John conceives regeneration not under the aspect of a second birth, but of a divine birth, John 1:13; 1 John 2:29; 1 John 3:9; 1 John 4:7; 1 John 5:1.” Meyer. The ideas of being born from above or of God and being born anew are, however, in substance interchangeable, and Tholuck’s objections to Lόcke, etc. [Krauth’s trs., p. 114], are untenable. [Often as the fact of regeneration appears in the N. T., the terms for it are rare, and not near as frequent as the terms μετάνοια and others, which signify the corresponding act of man in turning to God under the regenerating operation of the Holy Spirit. The verb ἄνωθενγεννεθῆναι, to be begotten, or born from above, i.e., from God, which is used twice in this ch. (John 3:6-7), occurs nowhere else in the N. T. John also uses once to be born of water and Spirit (γεννηθῆναιἐξὔδατοςκαὶπνεύματος), John 3:5, and twice to be born of the Spirit (τὸγεγεννημένονἐκτοῦπνεύματος, John 3:6, ὁγεγ. ἐκτ. πν., John 3:8, without the water), but the more usual phrase with him is to be begotten, or born of God (γεννηθῆναιἐκθεοῦ), John 1:13; 1 John 2:19; 1 John 3:9; 1 John 4:7; 1 John 5:1; 1 John 5:4; 1 John 5:18. The verb ἀναγεννάομαι, to be begotten, or born again, occurs but once or twice, 1 Peter 1:23 (ἀναγεγεννημένοιοὐκἐκσπορᾶςφθαρτῆςἀλλὰἀφθάρτου, διὰλόγουζῶντοχθεοῦ); 1 Peter 1:3 (ἀναγεννήσαςἡμᾶςεἰςἐλπίδα); comp. James 1:18 (ἀπεκύησενἡμᾶςλόγῳἀληθείας). The noun ἀναγέννησις, regeneration, is not found at all in the N. T. (although often in the Greek fathers), but the analogous noun παλιγγεννεσία occurs twice, once in connection with baptism, Titus 3:5 (ἔσωσενἡμᾶςδιὰλουτροῦπαλιγγενεσίαςκαὶἀνακαινώσεωςπνεύματοςἁγίου), and once in a more comprehensive sense, with reference to the final resurrection and consummation of air things, Matthew 19:28 (ἐντῇπαλιγγενεσία, ὄτανκ. τ. λ.). Paul speaks of a new creature (καινὴκτίσις) in Christ, 2 Corinthians 5:17, and of the new man (καινὸςἄνθρωπος), Ephesians 4:24. The Rabbinical theology had a very superficial conception of the new birth and confined it pretty much to the change in the external status of a proselyte to Judaism. Hence the comparative ignorance and perplexity of Nicodemus who, being a circumcised Jew, did not feel the need of such a radical change.—P. S.] The kingdom of God.—The fact that the phrase “kingdom of God” occurs only here and in John 3:5, and nowhere else in John (except John 18:36, the βασιλεία Xριστοῦ, which Meyer has overlooked), not only proves, as Meyer rightly observes, the independent originality of this Gospel, but also characterizes John’s view of Christianity. From his point of view John sees not the form of a universal kingdom, but the world transfigured in personal being. Lόcke: John seems to have transformed the positive Jewish idea into the more abstract, and to the Greeks more intelligible formula of fellowship (κοινωνία, 1 John 1:3), the unity of believers with God and Christ. The essential elements of the idea of a kingdom, however, come out distinctly in chapters 10 and 17, and are fully developed in the Apocalypse. On the βασιλείατοῦθεοῦ see Com. on Matthew 3:2, p. 69. [The kingdom of God is a deeper and more spiritual conception than the church, which is the earthly training school for the heavenly and everlasting kingdom. We could not with any propriety substitute here: “Except… he cannot see the church.”—P. S.] He cannot see.—Not even see; to say nothing of entering, being at homo therein. Meyer disputes this interpretation; comp. εἰσελθεὶν, John 3:5. That entrance and experience go with the seeing, must of course be understood. John 3:4. How can a man be born when he is old?—Taken literally, this reply of Nicodemus supposes, an absurdity. And so Meyer, after Strauss, would take it. He admits that a Jewish theologian must have been familiar with the Old Testament ideas of circumcision of the heart (Deuteronomy 30:6; Jeremiah 4:4), and a new heart and spirit (Ezekiel 11:19; Ezekiel 36:26; Psalms 51:10; Psalms 86:11); yet Nicodemus may have been limited in other respects; and now on meeting Jesus, become really perplexed. We might rather suppose that the good-humored old man spoke, possibly even wittily, with a double meaning. The first sentence may mean either: How can a Jewish Senator, an elder of the people, become a heathen proselyte? or: How can a physically old man, undergo new, fundamental, spiritual transformation ? The second sentence would then illustrate this impossibility by a physical impossibility: Can he enter the second time into his mother’s womb? The expositor must remember that the Orientals constantly express their thoughts in such similitudes. Meyer: “The ἄνωθεν he understood not as δεύτερον, but not at all.” He assuredly did understand it as an equivalent of δεύτερον, for the total antithesis is evidently implied: ἄνωθενγεννηθῆναι, ἐκτῆςγῆςγεννηθῆαι. Then the idea of being born from above involves that of being born anew. Various interpretations. (1) A Jew is required to make himself the same as a proselyte (wetstein, Knapp). (2) Luthardt: The beginning of a new spiritual life is not to be conceived without a new beginning of the natural. (This could not be said by one familiar with the Old Testament). (3) The demand is as unreasonable as that one should enter a second time into his mother’s womb, etc. (Schweizer, Tholuck). (4) No one can turn in mature age into a different spiritual state (Schleiermacher, Baumgarten-Crusius). Besides the two antitheses here quoted—an old man required to make a new spiritual beginning, a Jewish elder to become a proselyte—the expression contains also the intimation that an old, matured stage of the Jewish spirit could not pass into a new and different youthful life. But we still suppose that Nicodemus employs the sensuous expression in innocent good-nature, to bring out vividly, with rabbinic art, the impossibility of the requirement of Jesus. John 3:5. Born of water and Spirit [γεννηθῇἐξὔδατοςκαὶπνεύματος].—The next answer of Jesus has three noticeable features: (1) The imperturbable confidence expressed in the repetition; (2) The advance of the thought; the explanation of the birth from above as a being born of water and Spirit; (3) The entering into the kingdom of God, instead of seeing it. Whereupon further explanations follow, John 3:6-8. [Before giving the various interpretations, we shall briefly state our own view on this important and difficult passage. The key to it is furnished by the declaration of the Baptist that he baptized only with water, but Christ would baptize with the Holy Ghost, John 1:33 (βαπτίζεινἐνὔδατι—τὸπνεῦμα); Matthew 3:11, and by the passage of Paul where he connects Christian baptism, as “the bath of regeneration” (λουτρὸνπαλιγγενεσίας) with “the renewal of the Holy Ghost” (ἀνακαίνωσιςπνεύματοςἁγίου), and yet distinguishes both, Titus 3:5. Comp. also Ephesians 5:26 (καθαρίσαςτῷλουτρῷτοῦὔδατος); 1 John 5:6 (“that came by water and blood,” after which ΰ. B. insert καὶπνεύματος, “not by water only, but by water and blood”); John 3:8 (“three that bear witness on earth, the Spirit, and the water, and the blood”). The term ὔδωρ then is closely related to, and yet clearly distinguished from, πνεῦμα, and in such connection always refers to baptismal water. It is water in its well known symbolic significance, as representing purification from sin by the cleansing blood of atonement. So water appears often already in the O. T., especially in Messianic passages. Psalms 51:2 : “Wash me thoroughly from mine iniquity, and cleanse me from my sin.” Isaiah 52:15 : “So shall He sprinkle many nations.” Ezekiel 36:25 : “Then will I sprinkle clean water upon you, and ye shall be clean;” to which is added, John 3:26, the promise of a new spirit and a new heart. Zechariah 13:1 : “In that day there shall be a fountain opened in the house of David and to the inhabitants of Jerusalem for sin and for uncleanness;” comp. John 12:10, where the outpouring of the Spirit of grace is promised at the coming of the Messiah. Nicodemus, though ignorant of Christian baptism, which did not appear till the day of Pentecost, was familiar with these passages, with Jewish lustrations, with the baptism of John unto repentance, probably also with the baptism of the disciples of Jesus (mentioned soon afterwards, John 3:22; John 4:2), and the baptism of proselytes which Jewish tradition traces back to remote antiquity. The idea which underlies all these baptisms is essentially the same. We would therefore not confine ὔδωρ to any particular form of baptism, but (with Lange, see below, No. 5) extend it to all preparatory lustrations; nor would we refer it directly to the sacrament as an external act or rite, but (with Olshausen) to the idea rather of which the cleansing with water is the symbolic expression; just as in John 6. we have an exposition of the general idea of the holy communion before the sacrament was instituted in which it comes to its full embodiment. The idea underlying all forms of baptism, is the forgiveness of sins on condition of repentance. This is the negative part of regeneration, while the new life communicated by the Holy Spirit is the positive part, or regeneration proper. So Peter in his pentecostal sermon represents the matter when he calls upon his hearers: “Repent and be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins, and ye shall receive the gift of the Holy Ghost” (Acts 2:38). The chief matter is, of course, the positive part, the gift of the Holy Spirit, who is the efficient cause, the creative and vivifying agent of regeneration, and who alone can make the word and the sacrament effective. Hence the Spirit alone is mentioned John 3:6; John 3:8. The omission of water here is as significant, as the omission of baptism in the negative clause of Mar 16:16, where the condition of salvation and the reason of damnation are laid down. This is a sufficient hint that the necessity of water baptism to salvation is not absolute, but relative only. The penitent thief passed into paradise without water baptism. Cornelius was regenerated before he was baptized, and many martyrs in the early ages died for Christ before they had a chance to receive the sacrament. It is possible to have the substance without the form, the baptism of the Spirit, without the baptism of water; as it is quite common, on the other hand, to be baptized with water and have the Christian name without the Christian spirit and life. The Apostles themselves (except Paul) never received Christian baptism, for Christ Himself who alone could have administered it to them, did not baptize (John 4:2). In their case the pentecostal effusion of the Spirit was sufficient. We are bound to God’s appointed means of grace, but God is free, and the Spirit “bloweth where it listeth.”—P. S.] Different interpretations of water. (1) The water signifies [Christian] baptism (fathers, and older Lutheran divines, Meyer, Tholuck, De Wette). Baptism is λοντρόνπαλιγγενεσίας as the means of cleansing, Titus 3:5; 1 Peter 3:21; Ephesians 5:26; Hebrews 10:22;’ 1 John 5:6; 1 John 5:8. With baptism the gift of the Holy Ghost is joined, Acts 2:38. Tholuck: “The water is (John 7:39) the symbol of the communication of the Spirit.” Yet probably in another sense. Calvin’s objection: The words would then have been unintelligible, because the baptism of Christ had not yet begun. Strauss: This very thing proves a later insertion [a proleptic fiction] of the Evangelist. (2) The older Reformed divines (except Beza, Aretius), also Arminians, Socinians: ὕδωρ is a figurative term for the purifying power of the Spirit; therefore ἔυδιὰδυοῖν.(3) Piscator, Grotius, Episcopius, Neander, Baumgarten-Crusius: the baptism of John.(4) Schweizer: the proselyte baptism, with: not only, but also—to be supplied.(5) Baptism in the comprehensive sense as a theocratic historical lustration in its various phases according to the degree of the development of the kingdom of God. Thus the flood even is represented as a prototype of Christian baptism [1 Peter 3:20-21], Lόcke alone brings forward the universal idea of baptism in its symbolical import. “Water is here, as in the baptism of John, the symbol of purification, of μετάνοια, of the essential but negative beginning of the being born of God.” It is only to be observed, first, that a merely negative beginning is inconceivable; and secondly, that the μετάνοια in question is one which completes itself by entrance into a new, higher fellowship by means of the corresponding lustration. And this lustration, of course, was not yet before Nicodemus in the Christian form, but only in the form of the baptism of John. The word refers, therefore, primarily to the baptism of John. But to this, as the lustration of its time. The word found its fulfilment in the Christian baptism, which actually asserts its character as a dividing lustration between the old world and the new. The passage is therefore to be explained from the words of John: “I baptize with water, etc.;” except that Christ makes of the antithesis a synthesis. Concretely: One must become a divinely begotten proselyte, through the medium of discipleship under John and discipleship under Christ. It cannot be objected, that John’s office is only temporary (against Meyer). As the transition is through the Old Testament into the New, so it is also through the person who closes the Old Testament to him who opens the New, to Christ. One must first become historically a Christian, receiving the lustration of Christian discipline; then, spiritually a Christian. As the condition of salvation, the two things are a concrete unit; the first not without the second, the second not without the first; yet the second, the baptism of the Spirit, the chief and decisive thing according to John 3:6. Of water and Spirit.—The relation of the two.—Olshausen: The water denotes the soul purified in simple repentance, as the feminine principle, the Spirit, the masculine. (Is this a remnant of theosophy?) Meyer: The passage shows the necessity of baptism to participation in the kingdom of the Messiah, but only to those passing over to Christianity, not to Christian children (for which he quotes, without warrant, 1 Corinthians 7:14). Tholuck: According to the Lutheran doctrine the communication of the Spirit is not absolute, but only ordinarie dependent on baptism. The ἐκ, according to the Lutheran doctrine, denotes the causa materialis, according to Musζus, instrumentalis. Tholuck himself proposes a middle view, making ἐκ denote the visible source, the operating cause. This, however, is not a middle view, but a still stronger form of the causa materialis. Unquestionably the ἐκ with water denotes the historical means, with Spirit, the vital.—The water is the predominantly negative medium of the birth, the Spirit, the predominantly positive. In general, the birth from water might be intelligible to the Israelite from his usual lustrations, and particularly from the promises in Isaiah 1:16; Malachi 3:3; Jeremiah 33:8; Ezekiel 36:25; and the birth from the Spirit, from circumcision, and such promises as Ezekiel 36:26; Joe 2:28; Zechariah 12:10. He cannot enter.—Lόcke: In the nature of the case εἰσελθεῖν must be the same as ἰδεῖς; that is, have a share in the presence of the kingdom of God. [So also Meyer], Still ἰδεῖν denotes this rather in the aspect of perceiving as an object, εἰσελθεῖν, of entering into it. And this makes the expression a further development of the idea of the participation, corresponding to the further definition of the being born from above, as a being born of water and of the Spirit. [It is from this expression mainly (οὐδύναταιεἰσελθεῖν, etc.), that the fathers inferred the doctrine of the absolute necessity of baptism for salvation, which is still taught in the symbols of the Greek, Roman, and Lutheran churches. Clement of Alexandria assumed that even the saints of the O. T. were baptized in hades before they could pass into heaven, and Augustine went so far as to exclude all unbaptized infants who die in infancy from heaven,—an inference against which all our nobler feelings instinctively rebel. Baptism no doubt is the ordinary and regular way to Christ’s church, as circumcision was to the Jewish church. But on the other hand it has always been maintained by judicious divines in all churches, that it is not the want, but the contempt of the sacrament that condemns (non defectus , or privatio, sed contemptus sacramenti damnat), and that under certain conditions the baptism of desire (baptismus flaminis), and the baptism of blood in martyrdom (baptismus sanguinis), may be a full equivalent of baptism proper (baptismus fluminis). The omission of water in John 3:6; John 3:8, implies that the Holy Spirit may produce regeneration without baptism, as He undoubtedly did under the Jewish dispensation and in the case of Cornelius; while on the other hand the example of Simon Magus proves that baptism may take place without being accompanied by spiritual regeneration. The necessity of regeneration and faith to salvation is absolute, the necessity of baptism, or any thing else, is merely relative. Only unbelief, i.e., the rejection of the gospel, with or without baptism, condemns. This is clearly taught, Mark 16:16 : ὁδὲἀπιστήσας (without the addition καὶμὴβαπτισθεὶς) κατακριθήσεται. Comp. my remarks on p. 127.—P. S.] John 3:6. That which is born of the flesh.—The σάρξ; here is the designation of human nature in its sinful tendency, antithetic to spirit. Generally John uses σάρξ for human nature as a whole. He now, at the outset, views human nature as sinful σάρξ in contrast with the Spirit (John 1:13, and here). But that he can conceive it also as regenerate σάρξ, appears from John 1:14; John 6:51 sqq. From this alone it follows, that he must have an idea of an original pure σάρξ; and this is evident also from John 17:2. Σάρξ, absolutely, therefore, is not “the material nature of man, ethically determined by sinful inclination of which it is the seat, with the principle of the sensuous life of the ψυχή” (Meyer) Σάρξ is here, as in John 1:13, the whole human nature, body, soul, and spirit, but under per verse dominion of the σάρξ, in the narrower sense in contrast with the ruling of the human spirit by the Spirit of God. The neuter stands for the personal, to make the expression as general as possible (Winer, p. 160). There is thus the same antithesis as in John 1:13. All men are flesh, in so far as they have proceeded from the natural, carnal generation, stand opposed to the kingdom of God, and need the birth from the Spirit. What, therefore, is born of the flesh is flesh, and would be flesh again, though a man could be born the second time of his mother, Besser says: “Not something in us is carnal, but everything” (see Flacius.) That which is born of the Spirit.—The water in John 3:5 is omitted as less decisive, but is implied, especially in so far as the office of the water is to abnegate that which is sinful in the birth from the σάρξ in order to mediate the birth from the Spirit. The passage relates not only to a proceeding of the moral nature and life from the Spirit of God (Meyer), but to a transformation of the whole person himself by the operations of the Spirit.—Is spirit. That is: Is determined in its whole nature by the Spirit as its principle, growing towards entire spiritualization, as that which is born of the flesh is determined by the flesh as its principle, and in its abnormal development sinks into carnality, Romans 8:5. Evidently the whole sentence applies to the whole human race (not, as Kuinoel holds, to the Jews alone), and expresses: (1) The contrast between the old man and Christ as the Son of Man; (2) The contrast between the unregenerate and the regenerate (see Romans 5). Meyer: “In the conclusions respectively, the substantives σάρξ and πνεῦμα stand significantly and strongly [comp. 1 John 4:8] for the adjectives σαρκικός and πνενματικός, and are to be taken qualitatively.” John 3:7 Marvel not.—The expression of Jesus reflects the astonishment of the aged hearer. His confusion seems to pass into waiting admiration. Christ then shows him why he should not wonder, by illustrating the spiritual mystery by a mystery of nature. With great force He here brings out the word: Ye must, etc. Bengel: Te et eos, quorum nomine locutus es.John 3:8. The wind bloweth where it listeth.—The comparison of the one πνεῦμα with the other, as well as the verb πνεῖ, satisfies us that the subject here is the wind, not the Spirit, as Origen and Augustine took the word. Not alone the double sense of the word (πνεῦμα, ψεּ ?δַ), but the symbolical import of the wind also occasions the illustration of the spiritual case by the natural analogy. With John, concrete, graphic circumstances always reflect themselves in high thoughts; and thus we may suppose the figure here to have been furnished by a storm or roaring wind in the night. Now first comes the question: What does the figure say? Then: What does it mean? The wind in its blowing, the air in its motion, is a type of the Spirit, because it is in fact the element of the unity and union of the diversities of the earth. It bloweth where it listeth. The personification of the wind is suggested by its unconfined, apparently free motion, as unaccountable as original, personal will. Where? Meyer presents an example of ποῦ with a verb of motion; but here the where is emphatic, the place where the wind whistles and roars in its strength. [There are three points of comparison between the wind and the Spirit in the work of regeneration: 1) the freedom and independence: ὅπουθέλοιπνεῖ; 2) the irresistible effect: τήνφωνὴναὐτοῦἀκούεις; 3) the incomprehensibility: οὐκοἶδας, both as to origin (πόθεν) and termination (ποῦὑπάγει). To these might be added a fourth analogy, which, however, is not stated in the text, viz., the different degrees of power; the Holy Spirit acts now like the gentle breeze upon minds as tenderly constituted as John, Melanchthon, Zinzendorf, now like a sweeping storm or whirlwind upon characters as strong as Paul, Luther, Calvin, Knox. Hence the presumption and folly to make our own experience the measure and rule for all others. We should rather adore the wisdom and goodness of God in the variety of His operation.—P. S.] And thou hearest the sound thereof, but canst not tell.—Though perfectly manifest, the deepest mystery. And first in reference to the whence. Even if the general conditions of its origin be known, as they were only in part to the ancients (locality, season, heat, etc.), yet the particular actual conditions, and the precise origin of a given current, are not known. No more the end of the current, its particular actual effects. So with the Spirit, both as to its origin and its effects, in the matter of regeneration. The origin of the rustling wind of the new life-word of Christ, which stirs him, Nicodemus does not know. The wind comes down mysteriously through the Old Testament with ever increasing strength. Nicodemus has marked many things in the Old Testament, but not the rising motion of the Spirit. Still less knows he whither this mighty Spirit-current leads, out over Israel into the Gentile world, and out over the earth into the eternal heaven. Yet the Lord immediately gives to the figure a definite application. In whatever soul the Spirit of regeneration would act, there he is present all at once in his untrammelled power. The beginnings are a mystery. So the issues in the eternal life. This, too, Nicodemus did not yet know; how the Spirit had seized him, and whither it would go with him, 1 Corinthians 15:28. How some of the older theologians used this passage for the doctrine of gratia irresistibilis, while others denied this use of it, and how Calvin interpreted it, not for his system, but only as presenting the incomprehensible and mysterious in the work of the Spirit, see in Tholuck. The words concerning the wind and regeneration would evidently say: Regeneration is a thing which, both as to its origin and its goal, is a mystery of faith, but in its manifestation, especially under the preaching of the Gospel and under awakening miracles, is a mighty, unmistakable life. Faith as life is plain: life as faith is a mystery. The wind a type of divine operation; Xenoph. Memorab., 4, 3, 14. Comp. Psalms 135:7; Ecclesiastes 11:5. So is every one.—Popular phrase for: So is it with every one. John 3:9. How can these things be?—Luther: “Nicodemus becomes more foolish and gets no idea of the parable.” Stier: “He now really asks, instead of contradicting.” If the question be interpreted from the advance of the discourse of Jesus, it says far more, and the πῶς is not hζsitantis, as Grotius takes it. Nicodemus asks now with the wish that such a regeneration may be possible by a power which makes water and Spirit operative. Though the wind so mysteriously comes and goes, it yet has its sufficient cause; where lies the sufficient cause for the mysterious regeneration of water and the Spirit? The δύναται having been already treated, the emphasis now is not on it, but on πῶς. John 3:10. Master of Israel, and knowest not these things?—Not now a rebuke for want of faith in the power of the divine Spirit (Tholuck), but a reminder that he, as Master of Israel, ought to know the ground for the outpouring of the Spirit, to wit, the doctrine of Christ the Son of God, and His sufferings and His redeeming work.—Master of Israel. According to Scholl (see Lόcke, I. p. 527) three men stood at the head of the Sanhedrin: The president (δַ ?πָּ ?ωִׂ ?ιΰ), who was called, by eminence, the public teacher of the law; the vice-president, or pater domus judicii, sive Synedrii (ΰַ ?ααֵּ ?ιϊγִּ ?ιο); and the wise man (ηָ ?λָ ?ν), sitting on the left of the president. Now Nicodemus could hardly have been the president of the Sanhedrin: but he might have been “the wise man.” Yet, as Lόcke remarks, this last office is doubtful, and the ideas of wise man, teacher, etc., do not coincide. Lόcke, after Erasmus: “Ille doctor, cujus tam Celebris est opinio.” Nicodemus took the lead of those who desired to know concerning Jesus; so far he was the teacher of Israel. He wished to know what he was, and did not know that he was the Messiah, or what the Messiah was, as the basis of the sending of the Spirit and of regeneration. This he might know from Isaiah 11, 61. John 3:11. Verily, verily, We speak that which we know.—The introduction of another cardinal truth of the doctrine of Christ the Son of God, His sufferings and His work. An intimation that it is He himself, without the declaration that it is He. That we do know. The personal certitude of Christ meeting the ignorance of Nicodemus. A plural of personal dignity, veiled in the plural of the new Christian community. The plural, therefore, does not mean simply: (1) Christ and John the Baptist (Knapp, Luthardt); (2) Christ and the prophets (Luther, [Calvin], Tholuck); (3) Christ and God (Chrysostom, and others); (4) Christ and the Holy Ghost (Bengel); (5) Men (Baumgarten-Crusius); (6) The universal Christian consciousness (Hilgenfeld); (7) Jesus alone (Meyer). “We speak that which we know,” has reference to the consciousness of Christ alone. “Testify that which we have seen,” relates to Christ and his associates, the Baptist and the disciples, who recognized in him the glory of the Son of God, [Hengstenberg and Godet include the disciples in both plurals. Godet makes some good remarks here (I p. 420), and says that the plural gives to the passage a festive rhythmical character in the consciousness of standing no more alone. It reminds one of Mat 11:25, where our Lord thanks His Father that He had revealed the mysteries of the kingdom to babes, while they are hid from the wise and prudent.—P. S.] Meyer refers ἑωράκαμεν to Christ’s having seen with God in his prζ-existence. But here the prζ-existence and the life of Christ form a concrete unit. And ye receive not our witness.—The Sanhedrin had not admitted the testimony of John or the manifestation of Christ; Nicodemus himself acknowledged only the prophet in Him, and had objected to the doctrine of regeneration. John 3:12. If I have told you earthly (human) things.—̓Επίγεια, in antithesis with ἐπουράνια. According to the context, the Lord evidently means by ἐπίγεια the doctrine of regeneration and its conditions, as He afterwards means by ἐπουράνια the doctrine of the Son of God, the suffering Christ, the redemption of the world. But why these terms? By ἐπίγεια we understand the truths and facts already having place on earth (ἐπίγειον, that which is found on earth), by ἐπουράνια (ἐπουράνιον, that which is found in heaven), new heavenly revelations and things. The doctrines of regeneration, of baptism, of the outpouring of the Holy Ghost, were more distinctly expressed in the Old Testament than the doctrine of their cause, the Son of God, etc.; they were in some sense already at home in Israel. For though the ἐπουράνια, before God and in idea, form the prius, and are the basis of the ἐπίγεια, yet here, as every where, the posterius comes to view before the prius in its whole, essential glory. It should be noticed that further on γῆ and οὐρανός come in the same sort of antithesis. In a theological point of view the ἐπίγεια might be compared with anthropological truths, the ἐπονράνια with the strictly theological, Christological, and soteriological. Various interpretations. (1) Luther, Beza, Grotius: The ἐπίγεια, are the preceding figurative expressions; therefore the ἐπουράνια, what they mean. (2) Lόcke: ἐπίγεια, synonymous with τὰἐνχερσίν, as in Wis 9:16; tangible things, lying near to men at hand [easily understood]; those ἐνοὐρανοῖς, unsearchable, remote from men (Tholuck: the divine counsels). (3) De Wette, Baumgarten-Crusius: Moral things, in which the man has a receptive activity, and heavenly things, in which he bears himself with receptive faith.(4) Meyer, somewhat more uncertainly: What Jesus had hitherto presented, among other things the doctrine of regeneration, in distinction from what He would present in future, heavenly mysteries.(5) Lampe, more clearly: The earthly things, that which had hitherto been presented, because (a) the work of grace is wrought upon earth; (b) Israel had been already instructed concerning it under the economy of the law. The heavenly things, the new things which were to be presented concerning the heavenly origin of that work and the nature of the divine decree, etc., as dark things, and for the most part sremaining yet unknown. How will ye believe, etc.—Expressing apprehension of finding Nicodemus still more obtuse to what he had yet to say. It should be observed that in both cases Nicodemus is regarded in his connection with the Jews. Just this connection makes it so hard for him to believe. The singular also should be noticed, which here comes in with great strength in contrast with the previous plural: If I tell you,—introducing what follows. John 3:13 And no man hath ascended.—Now follows first the doctrine of the Son of God Himself, yet in deep, obscure hints corresponding to the indecision and incredulity of Nicodemus. The καί here must be noted at the outset. Olshausen makes it adversative (yet), Beza demonstrative (for), Baumgarten-Crusius concessive (indeed), Meyer continuative, that is unmeaning, Lόcke corroborative of the preceding. Correctly, “And yet He alone can tell, ἐπουράνια, who is Himself ἐπουράνιος.” That is: And yet you must be told heavenly things by Him who, being the heavenly One, is Himself the first subject of this revelation. Next must be observed the three significant tenses: Perfect, ἀναβέβηκεν, aorist, καταβάς, and present, ὁὤν. Evidently, the first proposition is founded on the second, the second on the third; therefore, conversely the third is proved by the second, the second by the first. If now the whole amounts to: The Son of Man hath ascended into heaven, the perfect cannot be taken for future, referring to the future adscensio (Augustine, Bengel, and others); nor as denoting an ecstatic raptus in c�lum, according to the Socinians; nor tropically, for the immediate knowledge of divine things, which Christ as it were brings down from heaven (Beza, Lόcke, referring to Proverbs 30:4); still less does it say, according to Jansen, Meyer, Tholuck, and others: “Nullus hominum in c�lo fuit, quod adscendendo fieri solet, ut ibi c�lestia contemplaretur, nisi;” that is: No man hath been in heaven, but He, etc. This would reduce the matter to a mere assurance. From the miracles, which Nicodemus himself acknowledged, it should be concluded that Jesus has perfectly ascended to heaven, that is, in virtue of His moral perfection He is a new revelation, and that, the new one, which brings the kingdom of heaven down from heaven. And again from this should be inferred that He came from heaven, that is, has constitutionally a heavenly origin, became man from heaven. From this should further be inferred that He Himself in His incarnation continues one with God, in the presence of God, and thus in heaven. And from this root we pass back again. From the Godhead of Christ, and from the divine consciousness of Christ as the Son of Man, results His incarnation, and from this the new revelation which He, in virtue of His moral perfection, brings from heaven. Then the οὐρανός explains itself. “Lampe, in opposition to the doctrine of the c�lum empyreum of the Reformed theology: Generatim c�lum est symbolum rerum omnium supra nos et extra conspectum nestrum in altum evectarum. Corresponding to this is the Lutheran conception: non τοπικῶς, sed τροπικῶς sumendum, of the status majestatis divinζ (comp. Flacius, Clavis). Yet Quenstedt (III. p. 395) thinks that in the third ἐνοὐρανῷ the status beatitudinis is meant. It accords with John’s use of language simply to suppose, according to rabbinic usage, a metonymic transfer of οὐρανός, the sedes divina, to God Himself; so ἐξοὐρανοὐἑρχόμενος, John 3:31; ἐκτ. ον̓ρ. δεδόμενον, John 3:27,” Tholuck. Yet different elements are to be distinguished in the one conception: (1) The world of heavenly spiritual revelations; (2) the world of heavenly life, origin, centre, and goal; (3) the world of the heavenly glory of God, of the omnipresence. The idea of the heaven to which Christ ascends, and which expressly is to be conceived τοπικῶς, attaches itself to the second of these elements. ̔Οκαταβάς, Hunnius and others: “Descendit ratione divinζ naturζ, non quidem motu locali, sed humanζ naturζ assumtione, et voluntaria exinanitione.” The ὁὤυ was referred by the older theologians to the omniprζsentia, or the status beatitudinis. Erasmus, the Socinians, Semler, Luthardt quite gratuitously substitute an imperfect: ὅςἦν. Nor does it denote, according to De Wette and Tholuck, the abiding, real manifestation of God in Christ; for the being of the Son of Man in God is to be distinguished from the being of God in Him.—The Son of Man. Intimating that those characteristics belong to the Messiah; that the Son of Man is the Messiah; and the Messiah is the Son of Man; without more particular explanation.John 3:14. And as Moses in the wilderness.—The dark expression of the divinity of Christ and His Messiahship is followed by a dark expression of the appointment of the Messiah, to suffering, and to exaltation through suffering. The connection (the καὶ) is variously taken. Meyer: The transition is “neither from the being able to communicate heavenly things to the being obliged to communicate them (Lόcke), nor from the theoretical to the practical (De Wette), nor from word to fact (Olshausen), nor from enlightenment to salvation (Scholl), nor from present lack of faith to the future origin of it (Jacobi), nor from the subjective condition of the kingdom of God, regeneration, to the objective redemption (Tholuck), nor from the work of Christ to His person (Baumgarten-Crusius). Nor, we add, “from the ground for believing to the blessedness of him who believes” (Meyer himself). According to Tholuck, 7th ed., it is the transition to the communication of the ἐπουράνιον; which, however, he too evidently began in John 3:12. It is clearly the transition from the Son of God to the work of redemption. The serpent in the wilderness.—Christ attaches His doctrine to the event in Numbers 21:8 : Moses, at the command of God, set up a brazen serpent as a standard of salvation for those who were bitten by the fiery serpents in the camp. Glossa ord.: “Magistrum legis ad significationem legis invitat.” Meyer recognizes only two points of comparison: (1) The lifting up of the brazen serpent, and of Jesus on the cross; 2) the being restored to health by looking on the serpent, and to eternal life, by faith in Christ. He unwarrantably rejects Bengel’s further point: Ut serpens ille fuit serpens sine veneno contra serpentes venenatos, sic Christus homo, homo sine peccato contra serpentem antiquum. But we should go still farther. As the brazen serpent, the image of the deadly serpent, was changed into an image of the remedy, so Christ, the crucified, made in the likeness of the sinner (so Luther, Bengel, Olshausen, Jacobi, Stier, Lechler,), of the deceiver of the people (Matthew 27:63), of the false Christ and Antichrist (Matthew 12:24; John 18:33), a curse (Galatians 3:13) and image of sin itself (2 Corinthians 5:21), as if He were the very manifestation of the murderer of men (John 8:44), was made with His cross the sign of salvation, by looking upon which in faith men should be saved. The contrasts: Bad appearance, good reality; apparently poisonous, in reality wholesome; apparently overcome, made powerless, in fact victorious; lifted up apparently as a reproach, in fact as an honor. Ethical idea at the bottom of these paradoxes, and the same in both cases: Reconciliation with the image of the evil, and infinite calmness resulting therefrom through the believing look, through the πίστις. The serpent bites Him who is lifted up, who destroys it; sin has power over him who has not reconciled himself to the judgment of God, to the evil, as a remedy against the sin. The believing look upon the brazen serpent healed by calming and elevating the soul. Faith in the Crucified is the faith that Christ in the form of one condemned has transformed the judgment of God into deliverance, and the consequent, willingness to suffer the cross with Him. Wis 16:6 : σύμβολονσωτηρίας. Of course the ὑψωθῆναι primarily means a being lifted up under suffering and shame, not, as Paulus makes it, a being glorified outright; and it darkly points to the lifting up of malefactors on the post; yet the passages John 8:28; John 12:32 involve also glorification in the death of the cross. And this is also probably (as Lechler, Tholuck, and others think) included here. Hofmann wavers between the wholly opposite ideas of elevation for exhibition (Weissagung und Erfόllung, ΙΙ. p. 143), and for putting away (Schriftbeweis, ΙΙ. p. 198). Tholuck: “A word must have been used in the Aramaic, which admitted both conceptions; and this is the case with ζχσ (against Bleek’s Beitrδge, p. 231), which means in the later Chaldaic, as in the Hebrew, to ‘set up,’ in the Syriac, to ‘crucify,’ but also to ‘lift up,’ Targum Jeremiah 3:2 : ζְ ?χεּ ?τִ ?ιςֵ ?ιπָ ?κְ.” This secondary sense Bleek and, according to the impression of Hofmann (II. 1,198), also Luthardt would make in fact the only one, excluding from the passage all reference to the cross, and taking it only as saying that Christ will be, not only as humble, but also as exalted, the object of faith. But both John 8:28, and John’s own interpretation, John 12:33, put this out of the question. On the contrary the double sense is plainly suggested by the way in which Christ conceives His death as His essential δοξασμός (John 13:31-32); according to the sentence of Hamann, “the cross is the star with the rays taken off.” Tholuck’s exposition: “The comparison primarily offered is: Ignominious elevation made saving to believers.” The ignominious, however, does not come first in the imago of the serpent, but the appearance of the hostile and destructive. Even so must.—The preparation of this remedy rests upon the divine counsel (δεῖ, comp. Luke 24:46). It is evident also from this passage, that Christ was from the beginning conscious of the necessity of His dying for the salvation of mankind, and of dying an ignominious death under the condemnation of men (see John 2:19), and that He from the beginning spoke of it; but at first only in mysterious hints. His unveiled utterances, especially to His disciples, came later. Lόcke justly suggests that the must (δεῖ) does not say the death of Christ was rendered necessary by that type of the brazen serpent; still the lifting up of the serpent was made a type only because it really was a type, if not in the mind of the bitten Israelite, at least in the mind of the ordaining Spirit. In Moses, too, must have already flashed the presentiment that evil, the consequence of sin, must become the remedy for evil, the serpent’s bite be healed by the serpent’s image. The οὕτως here has peculiar force: expressing the feeling and contemplation of the infinite contrast between the glory of the Son of Man and His suffering on the cross. Works: Buxtorf, Dissertat., the treatise: Historia. serpentis ζnei; Vitringa, Observat. I. 2, John 11; Rambach, Geheimniss der chernen Schlange; Menken, Ueber die cherne Schlange, 1812. In Menken’s Works, Bremen, 1858, Vol. VI. p. 353 sqq. [Erskine, on the Brazen Serpent.] The serpent, primarily the type of the devil, is supposed to have been, in the form of the brazen serpent which was attached to the sacred banner of Israel (?), a figure of the sanctification of the human nature of Christ perfected on the cross, and thus the brazen serpent was a symbol of salvation. The fiery serpents in the wilderness, however, were primarily the form of a divine punishment, presented in a form elsewhere denoting sin. The elevated serpent-standard was thus the type of punishment lifted in the phantom of sin, and transformed into a means of salvation. This is the nature of the cross. The look at the cross, is a look at the curse-laden One, who is not a sinner, but a divine token of evil and penalty, and of the suffering of penalty, which is holy and therefore transformed into deliverance. Reconciliation by the suffering of penalty becomes in the believing heart reconciliation with the suffering of penalty, and so salvation. This entry is longer than a Bible module can hold. The rest is at https://www.sermonindex.net/commentary/lange/ VI jesus in the judean country, and the spread of his baptism, with the faith of the people. last testimony of john the baptist concerning christ. christ the true baptist. the brideroom of the church, who comes from heaven. (The Real Song of Songs.) John 3:22-3622 After these things came Jesus and his disciples [came] into the land of Judea; and there he tarried with them, and baptized. 23And John also was [still] baptizing in Ζnon near to [omit to] Salim, because there was much water there: and they 24came and were baptized. For John was not yet cast into prison. 25Then there arose a question between some of [on the part of] John’s disciples and the Jews 26[a Jew] about purifying [religious washing]. And they came unto John, and said unto him, Rabbi, he that was with thee beyond [the] Jordan, to whom thou barest [hast borne] witness [didst serve as a witness], behold the same baptizeth, and all men come [are going] to him. 27John answered and said, A man can receive nothing, except [unless] it be given him from heaven. 28Ye yourselves bear me witness, that I said, I am not the Christ, but that I am sent before him. 29He that hath the bride is the bridegroom: but the friend of the bridegroom, which [who] standeth and heareth him rejoiceth greatly [lit., rejoiceth with joy, χαρᾷχαίρει] because of the bridegroom’s voice: [.] this my joy therefore is fulfilled [is made full, complete]. 30He must increase, but I must decrease. 31He that cometh from above is above all: he that is of the earth is earthly [is of the earth], and speaketh of the earth: he that cometh from heaven is above 32 all. And [omit And] what he hath seen and heard, that he testifieth; and no man receiveth his testimony [and his testimony no one receiveth]. 33He that hath received his [his emphatic, αὐτοῦτὴνμ.] testimony hath set to [omit to] his seal that God is true. 34For he whom God hath [omit hath] sent speaketh the words of God: for God [he] giveth not the Spirit by measure unto him [omit unto him]. 35The Father loveth the Son, and hath given all things into his hand. 36He that believeth on [in] the Son hath everlasting life: and he that believeth not [disobeyeth, ὁδὲὰπειθῶν] the Son shall not see life; but the wrath of God abideth on him. AND Joh_3:22. After these things.—Μετὰταῦτα. Probably not only after the interview with Nicodemus (Meyer), but after all that is related of His stay in Jerusalem. Into the land of Judea.—Judea here, of course, not in the wider sense of Palestine, but in the narrower sense, as distinguished from Samaria, Galilee, and Perea; Southern Palestine, on this side the Jordan, having Samaria on the north, the Jordan and the Dead Sea on the east, Idumea on the south, Philistia and the Mediterranean on the west. And here, too, not the province of Judea itself is meant, to which in fact Jerusalem especially belonged, but the Judean country; Ἰουδαία being here used adjectively [χώραἸουδαία, Mark 1:5; Acts 16:1]. From the baptizing Meyer infers a sojourn on the Jordan towards the north-east. And there he tarried with them.—From the time of His return to Samaria (probably about seeding time, see John 4:35) we may infer that He continued in the Judean country from the month of March till perhaps November or December, at least half a year (see the place referred to). And baptized.—According to John 4:2 Jesus Himself did not baptize; but as John remarks this only in a passing and supplemental way, he evidently intends to designate this baptism as a baptism of Jesus Himself. [Virtually (according to the maxim: quod quis per alium facit, id ipse fecisse dicitur), but not literally; for the testimony of Joh 4:2 is explicit, that Jesus Himself did not baptize. His work was to preach and to baptize with the Holy Spirit; water baptism was a subordinate ministerial office, and could as well be performed by others. For the same reason Paul did not baptize except in a few cases, 1 Corinthians 1:14-16. The baptism of the disciples of Jesus, which is only mentioned here and John 4:2, was still essentially the baptism of John, but it prepared the way for Christian baptism, which was instituted after the resurrection, Matthew 18:19, and first performed on the birth-day of the Christian Church, Acts 2:41. Before Christ had finished His work on earth, the Holy Spirit was not yet in full regenerative operation (John 7:39), nor could baptismal water signify the cleansing blood of atonement (John 19:34; 1 John 1:7). This baptism then had a prophetic character, and was subsequently not repeated, but completed by the pentecostal baptism of the Spirit.—P. S.] John 3:23. And John also was baptizing.—This statement serves to explain what follows.—In Aenon; ςֵ ?ιπεֹ ?ο ,ςֵ ?ιπָ ?ο, adjective of ςַ ?ιִ ?ο, “place abounding in springs.” Meyer makes out of it ιεֹ ?οςַ ?ιִ ?ο “dove-fountain,” without arguing the matter. According to Eusebius and Jerome: [Onomasticon under Aenon and Salem] Aenon lay in octavo lapide Scythopoleos ad meridiem juxta Salem et Jordanem; and Salem: in octavo lapide a Scythopoli in campo Vicus Salamias. From this it is inferred that both places were in Samaria; which Epiphanius (Hζr. lvii. 2) confirms. This has been thought so inconsistent with our passage, that two places of similar names, Shilhim and Ain, which, according to Joshua 15:32, lay on the southern border of Judea, have been substituted. According to others the places in question might have lain in Judea hard by the Samaritan border (see Meyer). Robinson (III., p. 322) found a Salem near Nablus, remote from the Jordan. According to this it has been held improbable that Aenon was on the Jordan, and Lόcke thinks it was a place of springs. We suppose that John might very probably have been baptizing temporarily on Samaritan ground. Elijah, his prototype, dwelt long with a Phenician widow; Elisha healed the Syrian Naaman by directing him to wash in the Jordan. John, on his appearance, preached: God is able of these stones to raise up children unto Abraham. If John was to execute his office as fore-runner of Christ in His universal character, he must hare come to Samaria, and even to the Galilean court (see the direction of the angel, Luke 1:17; Luke 1:76). He might have had, moreover, special reasons for this. He could not give up his work, because he felt himself appointed to die in his official service; yet he wished also to give way to the Lord, and, not as compelled by events, but voluntarily, to decrease by the side of Him. This purpose would be exactly served by his retiring into a small place, and especially by his beginning to labor in Samaria. It is further noteworthy, that immediately after this Christ begins to teach in Samaria, though only in passing, and that the passage before us relates to the disciples of John who were involved in a controversy with a Jew concerning purification. If this Jew seems to have given the preference, as a Jew, to the baptism of Jesus. it is natural to suppose that he based his preference on the fact that Jesus was baptizing on Judean soil, John in Samaria. Enon at all events lay this side the Jordan. The objection that John was still baptizing in his old way, is solved by his calling. As to the objection that he was not baptizing “into Jesus,” he had only to baptize into Christ; to point out the Christ in Jesus was the business of his testimony. Meyer remarks, against Bretschneider and others, that he did not baptize into Jesus because Jesus had not yet appeared at all as the Messiah. Yet John had designated Him as the Messiah, and now did so again with the utmost clearness. But his office as fore-runner had not ceased with a public appearance of Jesus as the Messiah. There was much water.—This can be mentioned to define only the spot, not the region. John 3:24. John was not yet thrown into prison.—This, according to De Wette, Meyer, etc., is intended to be a correction of the Synoptical tradition. But it is only a completion of it; for the Synoptists open the ministry of Jesus with His labors in Galilee, not because these were the “very beginning” (Tholuck), but because this was the current tradition, and because their method of construing the history, particularly with regard to the contrast between John and Christ, required it. At the time of the return of Christ from the country of Judea to Galilee in the winter of 781 John had been cast into prison, according to Mark 1:14; during his first great tour in Galilee He received the embassy from the Baptist in the spring of 782; after His return from the feast of Purim in March of 782, however, He received the intelligence of the execution of the Baptist, according to Matthew 14:12; comp. John 6:1. John 3:25. A question.—Ζήτησις, disputation. Not with the Jews, but with a Jew. [See Textual Notes.] The one Jew, who disputes with the disciples of John concerning purification (περὶκαθαρισμοῦ), that is, concerning the religious washing for purification, which must precede the kingdom of heaven [Ezekiel 36:25; Zechariah 13:1], or concerning the baptisms of John and Jesus as to their purifying virtue and Messianic validity, gives exegetical trouble. According to Tholuck the controversy was begun by disciples of John, and yet the Jew on his part contentiously extolled the baptism of Jesus, to provoke the disciples of John; in other words, with not the best design. This evil design is more strongly represented by Luthardt: An intent to make the Baptist untrue to his office, in order to operate the more effectually against Jesus, Chrysostom and Semler, on the contrary, have supposed that the Jew had been baptized by Jesus, which seems also implied in the complaint of John’s disciples in the next verse. [The first sacramental controversy, and the forerunner of a good many.—P. S.] John 3:26. He that was with thee, to whom thou hast borne witness.—Jealousy is at the out-set betrayed by the avoidance of the name of Jesus (comp. Luke 10:37; Luke 15:30); then it is implied that Jesus had been at first Himself dependent on him, that is, as one baptized by him; though it is not asserted, as by the modern criticism, that He had been a pupil of John. To whom thou barest witness, etc. A reproach against John and Jesus at once (“behold, the same”). Yet expressed only in the tone, in the choice of words, while nothing is literally ventured beyond historical statement. But that they, themselves irritated, wished to provoke the Baptist to see in Jesus an unauthorized rival in the matter of baptism, no matter how much He may be in other respects, is manifest. Every expression, in this view, is pregnant. Even the words: “beyond Jordan,” might imply that they had known better baptism-days on a better soil. Finally their displeasure expresses itself in the exaggeration: “all men come to Him.” Nevertheless they cannot be considered decidedly hostile; they show an uncertainty, a wavering, in the issue of which the mass of John’s disciples afterwards split into two branches, one friendly, the other hostile. The Baptist was to express himself on this distinction of two baptismal communions existing together. John 3:27. A man can receive nothing (take nothing upon himself).—A general principle of religion, applied to the kingdom of God. Gifts and positions in the kingdom of God rest upon the free grace and investiture of God Himself. Here lies the obligation of humility before God, reverence for the gifted, freedom from envy, modesty, self-respect. The form of the expression silences by its universality, the spirit of the expression purifies by its repression of human nature, its emphasizing of the divine. The reference of the maxim: (1) To the Baptist, according to many ancients and moderns (Lόcke). Wetstein: Non possum mihi arrogare et rapere, quζ deus non dedit. (2) To Jesus; De Wette, Meyer: The greater ministry is given by God to Him. (3) To John and Jesus (Kuinoel, Luthardt; Tholuck doubtful). The last view is no doubt the true; for the maxim is the general superscription of the following contrasts: Christ and John; (1) Christ and the forerunner; (2) the Bridegroom and the Bridegroom’s friend; (3) the increasing One, and the decreasing; (4) He who is from heaven, and he that is of the earth. God is above the distinction, and gives to each one his own. John 3:28. Ye yourselves bear me witness.—Ye yourselves, so jealous, bear witness to my modesty, in that ye recall how I bore witness to Him. But that.—Ἀλλ’ ὅτι seem only a transition to the discourse dependent on it (Meyer, Winer). Yet the expression might also point back to the Baptist’s description of himself (John 1:23), with the sense; τοῦτοεἰμί, ὅτιἀπ.—Ἐκεῖνος refers to Jesus, of whom they had been speaking. De Wette. John 3:29. He that hath the bride.—The Old Testament theocratic figure of the marriage-union between Jehovah and His people, Isaiah 54:5; Hosea 2:19; and the Song of Songs, according to Bengel and Luthardt; which Meyer doubts, because that book is not quoted in the New Testament; yet it is manifestly an example at least in favor of the view here mentioned.—This figure passed over to the relation between Christ and the renewed and adorned theocratic people, Ephesians 5:32; Revelation 21:2; Revelation 21:9. He that hath the bride, is therefore he to whom she is given from above, and who is thereby distinguished as the supremely Gifted. He is the bridegroom (De Wette: Comp. the proverb: Wer das Glόck hat, fόhrt die Braut heim).—From him is here distinguished the friend of the bridegroom, a distinct personage in the Jewish wedding usage. Lόcke: Φίλοςτοῦνυμφίου answers to the Hebrew ωׁ ?εֹ ?ωְׁ ?αֵ ?ο, in which, however, the ideas of φίλοςτοῦνυμφ. and παρανύμφιος or νυμφαγωγός are combined. According to the Hebrew custom, the Shoshben, a friend of the bridegroom, was a necessary mediator both in the formation and in the conclusion of the marriage. In behalf of his friend he made suit with the bride, and was the indispensable negotiator between the bride and bridegroom in relation to the wedding. At the wedding itself he was a chief manager of the feast, a necessary functionary at the inspection of the wedding-chamber, and even after the close of the marriage a mediator in misunderstandings and dissensions.—In a passage Keluvoth (fol. 12, 1) it is expressly said: Duos ωεωαπιν constituebant, unum sponso, alterum sponsζ (Schφttgen, Horζ. Hebr. et Talm.). Another name is ΰֹ ?δֵ ?α (tr. Sanhedrin f. 27, 2). Doubtless John has especially in his eye the business of the wooing, to which he was appointed. And then besides his subordination to the bridegroom, and his unenvious service in relation to the bride, he expresses also the honor and satisfaction he has in his position. Standeth and heareth him.—(1) Interpretation according to rabbinic passages: customary listening of the shoshbenim at the door (ἐπὶτῇθύρᾳ) of the bride-chamber. For the particulars see Lόcke, Ι., p. 564. Probably only isolated apocryphal instances suggested by apocryphal accounts (Tobias. Something like it here and there perhaps in the history of Jesuitism and Herrnhutism). Hard to imagine as general custom. (2) Baumgarten-Crusius, Luthardt: He waits for him that is to come, and hears his voice as he approaches, bringing his bride home. Against this Meyer: The παρανύμφιος does not stand waiting for the bridegroom, but accompanies him on the way to the house of the bride. Such waiting is the part of the bride’s-maid, Matthew 25:1. (3) Eckermann, Meyer: He stands at his service, waiting his bidding, and meantime rejoices in his conversation and gladness in general. (4) Tholuck: The conversation of the bridegroom with the bride preceding the wedding. (5) Lόcke: The voice of the bridegroom has in the Old Testament almost the tone of a proverb, Jeremiah 7:34; Jeremiah 16:9; Jeremiah 25:10. The friend stands at his side and hears the happy voice of the bridegroom. More accurately Grotius: ςָ ?ξַ ?γ, stare est ministrare, ut Genesis 41:46; Deuteronomy 1:38; Zechariah 3:7 : audiens blandimenta ad sponsarn. Vide Cant. Cantic.: Hζc est vox φωνὴνυμφίου. The reference is no doubt to affectionate and tender greetings to the bride, not commissions (Meyer: bidding) to the friend. The friend stands (back) and hears in silence how the bridegroom himself talks to the bride of his love, contrasted with his own business-like talking of it to her in urging the suit. The voice of the bridegroom is therefore the New Testament words of love, the gospel of Christ, and that even in distinction from the now ceasing lispings of prophecy concerning the new covenant. De Wette also: Of the gladness of the bridegroom. When Tholuck observes that φωνή must not be referred to the rejoicings at the wedding, since the wedding begins later with the inauguration of the kingdom, and thus far only the conversation of the bridegroom is introduced, it must be remarked that the figure of the wedding is not intended to be pressed. According to the word of Christ, Matthew 9:15, the wedding had already in one view begun with His appearance. In another view it began with His resurrection and the founding of the church, Matthew 22:9. In still another view it is to come at the second appearing of Christ, and meantime the Apostles are the wooers of the bride, 2 Corinthians 11:2; Revelation 21:19. These aspects might perhaps be distinguished by the three stages of going for and saluting the bride (the act primarily meant here), the wedding-feast, and the final nuptials; denoting the preaching of the gospel, the outpouring of the Holy Ghost and founding of the church, and the manifestation of the kingdom. Yet we cannot apply this distinction of periods to the words of the Baptist. To his prophetic view the wedding was begun. Rejoiceth with joy.—Χαρᾷχαίρει, see Luke 22:15, [and ωεωΰωιω, Isaiah 61:10. A Hebraizing mode of intensification: pure joy, joy and joy only.—P. S.] The διά, as in 1 Thessalonians 3:9, which is unusual, in place of the classical ἐπί, etc., adds emphasis to the voice in itself. He finds that voice a compensation to his position. Contrast of this unenvious joy with the jealous tones of the disciples of John. This my joy.—This his share in the wedding. Hath been made full (πεπλήρωται, perfect tense).—In the happy meeting of the bridegroom and bride in the house of the bride the wedding itself is, to him, as good as come. He has happily completed his task as wooer of the bride. He has done the work of his life. See the analogous perfect: μεμαρτύρηκα, and the exegesis, John 1:34. Is fulfilled, has become perfect. Yet only in its kind, as the joy of the friend of the bridegroom; therefore to be distinguished from the perfection of the New Testament joy of faith, John 15:11; John 16:24; John 17:13 (which places Meyer cites). He meant not by this the ceasing of his work, but the decreasing and diminishing of it before the increasing glory of the word and work of Christ. John 3:30. He must increase.—The true description of the relation between John and Christ, and between the Old Covenant and the New, in the primitive church, in the mediζval church, in this modern age, in the life of every evangelical community, and of every individual Christian. Increase: In labors, in authority, in disciples. Decrease: ἐλαττοῦσθαι, be diminished. Noble freedom from envy. An admonition to His disciples. St. John Baptist’s day in the calendar, the longest day [June 24th], after which the days decrease; the birth-day of Christ [Dec. 25], one of the shortest, from which the days grow longer. John 3:31. He that cometh from above is above all.—The relation of the section now following to the preceding. Different views [of the authorship of Joh 3:31-36]: (1) A meditation of the Evangelist (Wetstein, Bengel, Kuinoel, Schott, Paulus, Olshausen, Tholuck, etc.), as supposed to be indicated by the John-like strain, an assumed contradiction between John 3:32; John 3:26, and the disappearance of all reference to the Baptist. Against this it is observed, that there is no break at any point, and the present in John 3:31-32 indicates the time of John the Baptist. (2) A middle view (Lόcke, De Wette, Hofmann): The discourse of the Baptist is continued indeed, but the subjective reproduction of the Evangelist makes it almost a reflection of his own. (3) Continuation of the address of the Baptist, like John 3:16-18 in John 1, and as in John 3:16-21 continue the discourse of Christ; my Leben Jesu, II., 2, p. 521, Ebrard, Kritik, p. 294; also Meyer, [p. 180]; the Johannean character and coloring being also admitted even here. The stately conclusion of the prophetic testimony of the Baptist concerning Christ is not at all inconsistent with his subsequent expression of human feeling, Matthew 11. According to Strauss and Weisse this passage in particular is supposed to prove, that the discourses in John are not historical, but composed by himself. From this passage then, on the contrary, a clear light may be shed upon the exquisite, far-reaching, teeming historical truth of the whole gospel. Ὁἅνωθενἐρχόμενος. Present, referring to the, mission of Christ, which is just unfolding itself. See the testimonies of the Baptist concerning the divine dignity of Jesus, John 1:15-18; John 3:27; John 3:29; John 3:34.—Above all.—With respect to Christ all men are put in the category of the need of salvation. He that is of the earth, etc.—Not a tautology, but signalizing the difference of origin and of consequent quality. From the origin of the person, his nature appears, and from this his mode of speaking. But how could John say this of his testimony (Hofmann)? Tholuck argues; Therefore the Evangelist says this, not the Baptist. But the thing said must nevertheless be true, and then it might even better be said by the Baptist in his humility, than by the Evangelist respecting his former teacher. The Baptist himself therefore must have said it. The question is in what sense? We have a parallel at John 1:18. In full comparison with the full glory of Christ no one, not even of the prophets, nor the Baptist, has ever seen God; in this comparison every man, even of the prophets, the Baptist not excepted, is of the earth. Then does this mean: of the earth, in the sense of Joh 1:13; John 3:6, belonging to the old, sinful world as to his origin, therefore in his kind, therefore also in his speech, since, even as prophet, he can speak the divine but rarely, in fragments, and under the veil of figures; or in the sense of the ἐπίγεια as distinguished from the ἐπουράνια in John 3:12? Exegesis passes by this question, and treats the antithesis as if it had the sense of Joh 3:6; the σάρξ in distinction from the πνεῦμα. We understand, however, by the earth (γῆ) primarily the old economy and Theocracy in distinction from the heaven (οὐρανός), whence the new revelation comes (see on John 3:12). With the idea of the old is then connected unquestionably the idea of the imperfect and defective. The antithesis of earthly and heavenly, or carnal and spiritual descent passes into the antithesis of the old and the new time, and this into the antithesis of mankind needing revelation and redemption, and the Redeemer. Moreover John speaks here of his human λαλεῖν, not of his prophetic εἰπεῖν, or this latter is reduced in his view to a minimum in his human λαλεῖν, in comparison with the divine μαρτυρεῖν of Christ, and it should be observed that John says: λαλεῖἐκτῆςγῆς, not τὰτῆςγῆς. He that cometh from heaven.—A solemn repetition of the preceding, giving it the strong form of a dogmatical statement. John 3:32. What he hath seen and heard.—See John 3:13; also John 1:18. Meyer: In His prζ-existence. Rather, in His whole living divine nature, in virtue of which His testifying is at every moment preceded by a having seen or a having heard. The seeing and hearing denotes not only the directness of His knowledge, but also the full reality, the total scope of it, identifying it with His bodily vision [Leben Jesu II., p. 518). And no man receiveth his testimony.—According to the critics, in contradiction with John 3:26. Unquestionably a contradiction of the noble-minded master to his small-minded disciples. For them it was quite too much to see all running to Jesus; but to him it was quite too little; to him it was as nothing. A hyperbole, therefore, of grief and indignation. A rebuke to the disposition of his disciples; moreover, an admonition to them to go to Jesus, as in John 1:29. He could not send them away by force, because his school was a school of preparation, in which those only had become perfect, who went of their own will to Jesus. The Baptist qualifies his hyperbole (see similar expressions of the Evangelist, John 1:11; John 12:37) by what follows. Tholuck: “John reviews the history as a whole, in the course of which the believers are a vanishing minority.” John no doubt speaks here with the conduct of the Jews chiefly in view. See Romans 9. John 3:33-34. He that hath received his testimony.…for God giveth not the Spirit by measure.—Aorist: ὁλαβών. And this doubtless with special reference to such disciples of John as had gone to Christ; commending them, and recommending imitation. Hath set his seal, hath sealed. A tropical term, denoting generally in the Old Testament fastening up, in the New rather complete authentication; affixing the signature of execution, John 6:27; Romans 4:11, etc. In Christ the truth of God as revelation is completed, 2 Corinthians 1:20; by the believing confession of Him this fact, that the truth of God has proved itself perfect, is attested, sealed. How far? The answer to this question depends on the right interpretation of the two following verses. (a) If v. 34 refer to Christ, the syllogism is this; Christ as the messenger of God speaks the words of God, because God has given to Him the Spirit not by measure, but in immeasurable fulness (Lόcke, De Wette); he, therefore, who acknowledges the word of Christ to be true, acknowledges the word of God himself; he who believes not Christ, makes God a liar. (b) But the 34th verse may refer, to the prophets, summed up and represented in John: The messenger of God speaks the words of God, for God gives his Spirit copiously enough for this; he, therefore, who accepts not Christ, denies, in the Fulfiller of the testimony of the prophets, the word of God also in that testimony itself, or rather he necessitates the inference, that God promised that the Messiah should come, and has not kept His word, or that in His different revelations He has contradicted Himself. (c) Then again these opposite interpretations may be modified. The first interpretation thus, according to Meyer: ‘Whom God hath sent,’ fits not every prophet, but Christ alone, according to John 3:31, in view of His mission from heaven. On the other hand, the οὐγὰρἐκμέτρου, expressing a general truth, should not be referred primarily to Christ; else αὐτῷ must have been added. The statement is, that God gives the Spirit in general, not ἐκμέτρου, but regardless of μέτρον, to one more, to another less, yet to every one enough for inspiration; whence it follows that Christ is the most richly endowed (ἐκ denoting the norm). Yet the more to one and less to another may be given in limited measure, and it is a preliminary question whether the μέτρον should mean a general proportion for all, or a limited measure for each individual. The passage in Vajikra rabba Sectio 15 (cited by Lόcke and others): “Eliam spiritus sanctus non habitavit super prophetas, nisi mensura quadam (αξωχμ); quidam enim librum unum, quidam duos vaticiniorum ediderunt”—speaks not of a proportion, but of limited portions for different individuals. If now the expression be referred to the prophets, it cannot mean; God gives the Spirit immeasurably. If we would refer it directly to Christ, αὐτῷ is wanting. But we may take the expression as a motto of the New Testament age which has now opened. God, now gives the Spirit, and gives it not according to a limited measure (Joel 2; Acts 2).—Not by measure. Gerlach: “Perhaps this is an allusion to the fact that the priests were only sprinkled with the anointing oil, while upon the head of the high-priest the whole of the oil was poured, Exodus 29:7; Psalms 133:2.” From this it is clear that He whom now pre-eminently God hath sent, Christ, speaketh τὰῥήματα (not only ῥήματα), τοῦθεοῦ i. e., all the words of God, the entire revelation, which has hitherto been spoken only piecemeal (see John 1:17-18; Hebrews 1:1). This the believer seals. He attests it with the confidence of the confessor and martyr, as it is attested to him in his heart. The second interpretation is modified by referring the messenger of God [John 3:34] to the prophetic office, as represented by John, and then taking the sentence about the Spirit thus: In this day, wherein God gives the Messiah the fulness of the Spirit, the Baptist also has his share in the abundance (see the history of the Baptism of Jesus). Then with this John Christ is compared, as described in John 3:35. In favor of this antithesis are the facts, (1) that John here still appears as pre-eminently the ἀπεσταλμένος; [ch. John 1:6], Christ as the ἐρχόμενος; (2) that it is said in John 3:34 : ὁθεὸςἀπέστειλεν, in John 3:35; ὁπατὴρἀγαπᾷ; (3) that here the λαλεῖν (not εἰπεῖν) of the ῥήματαθεοῦ is set against the fact that all things are given into the hands of Christ. The result is, we find ourselves compelled to decide for the second explanation of the difficult passage: The last messenger, in virtue of his participation in the New Testament advent of the Spirit, speaks the prophetic words of God as such (in distinction from fact); the Son presents Himself as the fulfilment of these words in fact. He, therefore, who receives Him, seals that God in His prophetic words (spoken by the Baptist) is true. He who disavows Christ, disavows, therefore, His fore-runner also. A good disciple of John must become a disciple of Christ. John 3:35. Loveth the Son.—Emphatic: in singular manner. This love is the cause of the glorifying of the Son. All things: not to be qualified (Grotius: Omnia mysteria regni; Kuinoel: Doctrinζ partes). Matthew 11:27; Matthew 28:18; John 13:3.—Into his hand.—Strictly: in his hand [ἐντῇχειρὶαὐτοῦ ?] Pregnant diction: so into His hand, that they are in His hand (Winer, p. 385). John 3:36. He that believeth in the Son.—The Baptist concludes his prophetic preaching with the great alternative, which Christ also pronounces in John 3:18, and at His departure from the earth.—Everlasting life, see John 3:15. Hath.—It is noteworthy that this inwardness of the eternal life was already recognized by the Baptist.—He who is not obedient in faith to the Son, άπειθῶν; not: believeth not (Luther [and the E. V.]), but is disobedient; meaning, however, as standing opposed to faith, the refusal of the obedience of faith. In faith lies the moral kernel of obedience veiled in love, peace, joy; hence ὁπιστεύων. Out of unbelief disobedience, or even ἀνομία, as a moral worm comes forth openly; hence ἀπειθῶν. Meyer: “Disobedient to the Son, inasmuch as He requires faith.” Right, but not enough. Tholuck: Ἀπειθεῖν alternates with ἀπιστεῖν, Romans 11:30.—Shall not see life.—With the everlasting life he fails of life in general; he shall not even see it, to say nothing of having it. But the wrath of God.—Neither punishment on the one hand, nor a holy passion on the other, but the righteousness of God combined with His veiled jealousy in its visitation of judgment, Romans 1:18; Ephesians 2:3; Matthew 3:7. Abideth on him; in proportion as his unbelief is incorrigible (strictly: abideth towards him; pressing more and more strongly upon him). The effect of the ὁργή is θάνατος. [The μένει implies, that we are by nature in a state of condemnation; comp. τέκναφύσειὀργῆς, Ephesians 2:3; John 3:6.—P. S.] A worthy closing word of the Old Testament; the last peal of the thunder of the law; the farewell of the Baptist. For what he afterwards says to Herod, he says as teacher, not as prophet; and the question with which he sends his disciples to Christ, is the question of a tempted, believing man. AND ETHICAL1. The first ministry of the Lord in the Judean country, a counterpart of His last public ministry in. the temple on Zion from the triumphal entry to the Tuesday evening (see Com. on Matt. on John 21:12-14, p. 379); in that in the first cases the hostility of the rulers of the Jews had not yet broken out, in the last case it seemed vanquished by the hosanna of a believing people. Hence here a preliminary baptizing finds place, there a teaching and healing in the temple. And the cessation of baptism in the Jewish country is a prelude of the final departure of Jesus from the temple (Matthew 23) 2. The baptizing of Jesus through His disciples a connecting link between the New Testament baptism of the Spirit and the baptism of John, as John’s baptism was a connecting link between the Old Testament washing and circumcision, and the baptism of Christ. 3. The last prophetic testimony to Christ given by the Baptist in his glory and in elevation above his last struggle [Matthew 11]; the last flash, so to speak, of the Old Testament in the light of the New Testament itself, and a testimony to the higher glory of the New. 4. The symbol of the intimate relation, the betrothal between Jehovah and His people (Psalms 45; Song of Solomon; Isaiah 54; Isaiah 62; Ezekiel 16:8; Ezekiel 23; Hosea 2:19) finds its fulfilment in the bridal relations between Christ and the church coming forth to meet Him. It belonged to the office of the Baptist to complete this prophecy in the most concrete vivid form. Christ on His part has taken up the word in the most varied applications, first to the disciples of John himself (Matthew 9:15), and afterwards throughout the whole New Testament, 1 Corinthians 11:3; Ephesians 5:23; Revelation 21:9, The love of the bride is the symbol of the life of the Spirit. Plato’s Symposion is a heathen parallel to the Song of Solomon. 5. The perpetual force of the maxim: He must increase, but I must decrease. 6. So far as in him lay, John sent all his disciples forward to Christ, and pointed all the Jews to Him. Not only most of the Jews, however, but even many of John’s disciples failed to come up to the word of the prophet, and fell under the condemnation pronounced by him. On the disciples of John see Gieseler, Kirchengeschichte, I., p. 69 [Edinb. ed. I., 58]. 7. Both of the glory of Christ, and of the condemnation, John speaks in a more Old Testament way than Christ Himself (comp. John 3:35; John 3:13; John 3:36; John 3:18); quite in keeping with his mission. His last word is a last thunder-clap from Sinai and a last lightning-flash of Elijah, prophesying of the baptism of fire (Matthew 3) and the flames of the judgment of the world (2 Peter 3:10). AND series of separate themes in the sentences of the Baptist, John 3:27; John 3:29-31 sqq.—The baptism of Jesus by the side of the baptism of John, the gradual transfer of the Old Testament order of things into the church of Christ.—Relation of the baptism of Jesus to the baptism of John: (1) Points in common; (2) points of difference.—.The harmony between John and Christ, and the dissension between their disciples, the living type of a primeval and a constantly repeated history (see Genesis 13:7).—Two divided purification or reformation churches, to be united by being pointed from men to the Lord.—The jealousy of the disciples and the purity of the Master.—The last testimony of the Baptist concerning Christ, an expression at once of the highest, gentlest love and the mightiest wrath.—Christ the Bridegroom of the bride: (1) Adorned to be such by the election of God; (2) recognized as such by the greeting of the bride; (3) honored as such by the wooer and friend; (4) proved such by His fidelity and glory.—The word of the Baptist: He must increase, but I must decrease, in its application to the natural life (1) of the world, (2) of the church, (3) of the Christian.—Christ the Witness from heaven.—Faith in Christ, a sealing of all the words of God in the Old Testament. Truth is the unity of correlative opposites.—Without faith in the truth of God, we cannot perceive the unity in the great distinction between the Old Testament and the New.—With the New Testament the Jews lost also the truth of the Old.—With their acknowledgment of the Old Testament, Christians may also obscure the truth of the New.—The life of faith a moral life on a heavenly scale: (1) Faith, an obedience rising into free, blissful confidence, and veiled in it; (2) Unbelief, a moral disobedience (immorality) in naked, open deformity.—The wrath of God, the jealousy of rejected love, i. e., a full tide of gracious operation, changed by the unbelief of the man himself into judgment. See Romans 2:5.—Jesus in the Judean country, or an effort in hope to lead the people of Israel over by gentle ways into the new covenant (comp. Genesis 5:5).—The two baptizers together.—Religious controversy in its bad and its good operation (the words of the disciples of John, and the words of their master).—The word of the disciples: All men come to Him, and the word of the master; No man receiveth His testimony.—Only what is given him from heaven can a man truly take to himself: (1) What he usurps is given him in wrath, and received to condemnation; (2) what is given to him is forever his own.—He that hath the bride is the bridegroom; or, the life of Christendom a testimony to Christ.—The wedding of the Son.—The friend of the bridegroom, in His behaviour, an example for guidance and warning, to bishops, ministers, divines.—The decreasing of the Baptist, his increase.—The man of the earth, and the Man from heaven above all.—The believer, a witness of God attested by God.—Christ the seal of the word of God, manifest in the burning seal of living Christian hearts, 2 Corinthians 1:20; Revelation 3:14.—The outpouring of the Spirit without measure.—The Father, the Son, the Spirit.—The last word of the Baptist concerning the Son: (1) What the Son is; (2) what He has; (3) what He gives; (4) what He is worth [John 3:34-36]. Starke: Nova Bibl. Tub.: Premature zeal, envy, dependence on human authority, and self-interest: O how much harm they do!—Canstein: Satan and his tools know too well how much depends on the unity of Christians; hence they take special pains to make schism of every kind among them, Galatians 5:20.—Majus: It is dangerous for hearers to flatter their teachers.—People must not hang with sinful passion upon a teacher who is renowned.—As the peace-makers are called the children of God, so the instigators of division are justly called children of the devil.—Hedinger: The office of the preacher and its profitable success come from God.—We men have nothing from ourselves, but everything from heaven; therefore should we ascribe nothing to ourselves, but everything to God alone, and thank Him for it, 1 Corinthians 4:7.—Osiander: He who attempts high things, to which he is not called of God, spends all his care and labor in vain, and comes to shame at last, as the examples of Absalom, Theudas, Judas of Galilee, and others, prove, Sir 3:23.—Hedinger: Let no man thrust himself into an office, without the will of God.—Quesnel: Every calling, every grace (gift) has certain limits above which no man may elevate himself.—He who purely and steadfastly preaches Christ, may appeal to the testimony of his hearers.—A servant of the church, though in high office, has yet more cause to be humble than to be exalted.—Servants of God justly rejoice, when they can lead many souls to the Lord.—Moon and stars, are lost when the sun rises; so with me, when the Sun of Righteousness appears.—Hedinger: Christ, the Alpha and Omega, should be all; we instruments are nothing.—Canstein: Because all ministers are men, their word must be tested by the doctrine of Christ.—Christ’s testimony is the whole counsel of God for our salvation.—Christ spoke the word, or proclaimed the counsel of God, as the personal and independent Word of God.—Majus: The believer may verily be sure of his salvation, because he already has eternal life, though in the world he still is subject to much suffering.—Canstein: Unbelief, the cause of condemnation, because it rejects the means by which the wrath of God might be averted. Gossner: Eternal life is given to the believer from the hour he believes. He need not wait for it; he has it already here.—Braune: As a man stands towards the Saviour, so stands he towards God and the gift of God, eternal life.—Schleifrmacher: It is an old fault, which reappears continually in a multitude of forms, and even in the Christian church,—the strong disposition of men to believe in a man.—And how does God give from heaven, what He gives to a man? Surely not otherwise than through the man’s own conduct and that of other men. So long then as our own conduct is in contradiction with the divine working, we should not console ourselves with the knowledge that a man can receive nothing except it be given him from heaven, but do our utmost to find out what and how much is given us from heaven.—That John must decrease, and the Lord increase,—this is the true relation between the old covenant and the new, between every imperfect worship of God, every other less firmly closed relation of men to Him, and that which is offered in Christ.—Schenkel: Our future welfare rests not on man, but on Christ: (1) Not on the word of man, but on the Gospel of Christ; (2) not on the work of man, but on the atoning work of Christ; (3) not on the name of man, but on the glorious name of Christ. Heubner: True calling comes only from God, from Him alone success; the rise and fall of human names, success and failure, are matters of divine control.—(From Zinzendorf): When souls depend on men, etc., they are in most cases betrayed. Then when one such poor man comes to confusion, they are all confounded; when he is taken suddenly from them, they are all lost.—How rarely are men like John! Often the later exalt themselves over the earlier, pupils above masters; and how men envy, attack, belittle the greater merit! Men will not see others, especially their followers, outstrip them (true, alas, peculiarly of Germany, and to not the least extent of Evangelical theologians and clergy men).—Hath set his seal: Every believer is a living attestation of the true God himself. What honor, to confirm the truth of God to others!—God gives not the Spirit by measure. All, even the most gifted, are capable of growing in the Spirit in infinitum.—The guilt of rejecting divine grace leaves in the heart of the unbeliever nothing but the sense of an angry God. Conscience is the preacher of this wrath (yet the wrath manifests itself especially in swelling judgments against the unbeliever). Footnotes: John 3:23. [The art. ὁ before Ἰωάννης is wanting in ΰ. B. and omitted by Tischend., bracketed by Alf.—P. S.] John 3:25. [ἐγένετοοὖνζήτησιςἐκτῶνμαθητῶνἸωάννπυμετὰἸουδααίου. The singular is strongly sustained by ΰ. c A. B. L., etc., and adopted by Tischend., Treg., Alf,, W. and H., against the text. rec. Ἰουδαίων which is supported by ΰ.* G., etc. Meyer: Der Plural bot sich mechanisch dar, viz., to conform to μαθητῶν.—P. S.] John 3:31 [ὁὤνἐκτῆςγῆςἐκτῆςγῆςἐστίν, is apparently tautological, but the difference lies in the emphasis: to the origin of a man corresponds his character.—P. S.] John 3:31. [The second ἐπάνωπάντωνἐστίν is omitted by ΰ.* D. and Tischend. (ed. VIII), supported by ΰ.c A. B.L. and retained by Treg., Alf., Westc. and H. (in brackets), Meyer, Lange.—P. S.] John 3:32. [The καὶ is wanting in several codd., also in B. L. al. which retain the second ἐπάνωπάντωνἐστίν, and is omitted by Tischend., Alf., Treg., W. and H.—P. S.] John 3:34. O̓θεός is wanting in B. and in other considerable codd. [ΰ. C.1 L., omitted by Tischend, Alf., etc.—P. S.] John 3:34. [The A. V., with many commentators, refers the passage to Christ, and hence supplies αὐτῷ. But the sentence is general in its character, hence the present δίδωσι. Christ had already received the fulness of the Spirit in baptism.—P. S.] [This view is held by Dr. Thomson (The Land and the Book, II., 176). He visited Beisβn (Scythopolis) and the neighborhood, and represents the valley there as abounding in fountains and brooks and as one of the most fertile in Palestine; yet he found no traces of the name. “The lovely valley of Jezreel,” he says, “irrigated by the Jalϋd, and the Ghor Beisan below, watered in every part by many fertilizing streams, are capable of sustaining a little nation in and of themselves. Besides, Beisan is the natural highway from Bashan and the east to the sea-board at Haifa and Acre, and also to southern Palestine and Egypt. The Ghor once teemed with inhabitants, as is evident from ruined sites, and from tells too old for ruins, which are scattered over the plain. I took down their names as now known to the Arabs, but none of them have any historic significance. Of Salim and Enon, which must have been in the ghor at no great distance, I could hear nothing.”—P. S.] [So also Hengstenberg, I., 221. The Alex Codex of the Sept. renders the three names of places in Joshua 15, ΣελεεὶμκαὶἈὶνκαὶΡεμμών. In Nehemiah 11:29 the last two names are combined in En-rimmon. The southern country was very dry, a continuation of the Arabian desert. Hence the remark, “there was much water there,” which would be rather superfluous if applied to a place in Galilee or on the banks of the Jordan, receives its full meaning. Yet this holds good also of Dr. Lange’s view, who, with Robinson, locates Salem near Nablus.—P. S.] [Hengstenberg also (I. 232 f.) sees in the whole passage, and especially in the voice of the beloved, and the friend of the bridegroom, clear allusions to Son 2:8; Son 5:2.—P. S.] [Alford likwise ascribes the last verses to the Baptist, and urges the inner coherence of the discourse itself, in which John explains to his disciples the reason why Christ must increase and throw his own dignity into the shade.—P. S.] [Alford defends the E. V.: “ἀπειθῶν may mean disbelieving. Unbelief implies disobedience.”—P. E.] VII JESUS AT JACOB’S WELL. THE WOMAN OF SAMARIA. CHRIST THE OF LIFE, THE OF PEACE. THE WHITE HARVEST FIELD, OR THE FIELD OF EARTH AND THE FIELD OF HEAVEN. THE SOWERS AND THE REAPERS. THE FAITH OF THE , A PRASAGE OF THE SPREAD OF THE GOSPEL John 4:1-421 When therefore the Lord [Jesus] knew how [that] the Pharisees had heard that 2Jesus made [makes] and baptized [baptizes] more disciples than John (Though 3Jesus himself baptized not [did not baptize], but his disciples), He left Judea, and departed again into Galilee. 4And he must needs go through Samaria. 5Then cometh he [He cometh, therefore] to a city of Samaria, which is [omit which is] called Sychar, near to the parcel of ground [or piece of land] that Jacob gave to his 6son Joseph. Now [And] Jacob’s well [fountain] was there. Jesus therefore, being wearied with his journey, sat thus [simply sat down] on the well: [.] and [omit and] it was about the sixth hour. 7There cometh a woman of Samaria to draw water: Jesus saith unto her, Give me to drink. 8(For his disciples were [had] gone away unto the city to buy meat9[food]). Then saith the woman of Samaria [The Samaritan woman saith] unto him, How is it that thou being a Jew, askest drink of me, which [who] am a woman of Samaria [a Samaritan woman]? for the [omit the] Jews have no dealings with the [omit the] Samaritans. 10Jesus answered and said unto her, If thou knewest the gift of God, and who it is that saith to thee, Give me to drink; thou wouldst have asked of him, and he would have given thee living water. 11The woman saith unto him, Sir, thou, hast nothing to draw with, and the well is deep: from whence 12then hast thou that [the] living water? Art thou greater than our father Jacob, which [who] gave us the well, and drank thereof himself, and his children [sons], and his cattle? 13Jesus answered and said unto her, Whosoever [Every one that] drinketh [πᾶςδπίνων] of this water shall [will] thirst again: 14But whosoever drinketh [whosoever shall drink, δςδ’ ἅνπίῃ ?] of the water that I shall give him shall [will] never thirst; but the water that I shall give him shall be [become, γενήσεται] in him a well [fountain] of water springing up into everlasting life. 15The woman saith unto him, Sir, give me this water, that I thirst not [may 16not thirst], neither [nor] come [all the way, διέρχωμαι] hither [ἐνθάδε] to draw. Jesus 17[He] saith unto her, Go, call thy husband, and come hither. The woman answered and said, I have no husband [οὐχἕχωἅνδρα]. Jesus said unto her, Thou hast well said, I have no husband [A husband I have not, or, Husband I have none, ἅνδραοὐχἕχω]: 18For thou hast had five husbands; and he whom thou now hast is not thy husband: in that saidst thou truly [in this thou hast spoken truly, or, truth, τοῦτοὰληθὲςεἵρηκας]. 19The woman saith unto him, Sir, I perceive that thou art a prophet. 20Our fathers worshipped in [or, on] this mountain; and ye say, that in Jerusalem is the place where men ought to worship. 21Jesus saith unto her, Woman, believe me, the [an] hour cometh [is coming], when ye shall neither in [or, on] this mountain, nor yet [omit yet] at [in] Jerusalem, worship the Father. 22Ye worship ye know not what [that which ye know not]: we know what we worship [we worship that which we know]; for [the] salvation is [or, comes] of [from] the Jews. 23But the [an] hour cometh [is coming], and now is, when the true worshippers shall [will] worship the Father in spirit and in truth: for the Father seeketh such to worship him [for also (καὶγάρ) such worshippers the Father seeketh], 24God is a Spirit [is spirit]: and they that worship him must worship him [omit him] in spirit and in truth. 25The woman saith unto him, I know that Messias cometh, which 26[who] is called Christ: when he is come, he will tell us all things. Jesus saith unto her, I that speak unto thee am he.27And upon this came his disciples, and marvelled that he talked with the [a] woman: yet no man [no one] said, What seekest thou? or, Why talkest thou with her? 28The woman then left her water-pot, and went her way [went away] into the city, and saith to the men, 29Come, see a man, which [who] told me all things that ever 30I did: is not [omit not] this the Christ? Then [omit Then] they went out of the city, and came unto [to] him. 31In the mean while his disciples prayed [asked] him, saying, Master [Rabbi], eat. 32But he said unto them, I have meat [food] to eat that ye know not of. 33Therefore said the disciples one to another, Hath any man brought him aught [any thing] to eat? 34Jesus saith unto them, My meat [food] is to do the will of him that sent me, and to finish his work. 35Say not ye [Do ye not say], There are yet four months [it is yet a four-month], and then cometh [the] harvest? behold [Lo!] I say unto you, Lift up your eyes, and look on the fields; for they are white already 36to harvest [white for harvest already]. And [omit And] he that reapeth [the reaper] receiveth wages, and gathereth fruit unto life eternal: that both he that 37soweth and he that reapeth [the sower and the reaper] may rejoice together. And [For, γάρ] herein [in this spiritual field] is that saying [fully] true, One soweth, and 38another reapeth. I [have] sent you to reap that whereon ye [have] bestowed no labour: other men [others have] laboured, and ye are [have] entered into their labours. 39And many of the Samaritans of that city believed on [in] him for the saying [because of the word, διὰτὸνλόγον] of the woman, which [who] testified, He told me 40all that ever I did. So when [When, therefore] the Samaritans were come [came] unto him, they besought him that he would tarry with them [to abide with them]: and he abode there two days. 41And many more believed because of his own [omit own] word [ὁιὰτὸνλόγοναὐτοῦ ?]; 42And said unto the woman, Now we believe, not [No longer do we believe] because of thy saying [story, διὰτὴνσὴνλαλίαν]: for we have heard him [omit him] ourselves, and know that this is indeed the Christ [omit the Christ], the Saviour of the world. AND [In this section our Saviour, sitting on Jacob’s well in weariness of body, yet with ever fresh sympathy for man, discourses on the water of eternal life with an ignorant, degraded, semi-heathenish, yet quick-witted, sprightly and susceptible woman, a sort of “Samaritan Magdalene,” and teaches her the sublime truths of the true worship of God which broke down the partition wall between Jews and Gentiles. He saw, by super-natural intuition, the dark spots in her character, but also the deeper aspirations of her soul which had not been extinguished by a life of shame; and when she began to repent and believe, He unveiled to her the future of His kingdom, as He had not done to an orthodox Jew. This scene is in striking contrast with the one related in the third chapter, where He instructed a Jew of the highest respectability in Jerusalem on the mystery of regeneration and the divine counsel of redemption. Christianity touches the extremes of society: humbling the lofty, raising the lowly, saving both. Christ’s intercourse with women, “the last at the cross and the earliest at the tomb,” was marked by freedom from Jewish and Oriental contempt of the weaker sex (comp. John 4:27), by elevation above earthly passion, and a marvellous union of purity and frankness, dignity and tenderness. He approached them as a friend and brother, and yet as their Lord and Saviour, while they were irresistibly drawn towards Him with mingled feelings of affection and adoration. He dealt with them as one who condemned even an impure look (Matthew 5:28), and yet He permitted the sinful woman to wash His feet with tears of repentance (Luke 7:37 ff.). He partook of the hospitality of practical, busy Martha, while gently reminding her of the better part which her contemplative sister Mary had chosen in reverently listening to His instruction (Luke 10:38 ff.), and comforted them both at the death of their brother (John 11); He lent a sympathizing ear to the sorrows of travail and the joy of deliverance (John 16:21); He remembered His mother in the last agony on the cross (John 19:26-27); and He appeared first in His resurrection glory to Mary Magdalene, out of whom He had cast seven devils.[The Samaritans, whether we regard them (with Gesenius and the majority of modern scholars) as the descendants of the remnants of the ten tribes and the heathen colonists introduced by the Assyrians, or (with Hengstenberg, Robinson, and the older writers) as pure heathen in descent, who afterwards adopted certain features of the Jewish religion, such as circumcision, the worship of Jehovah and the hopes of the Messiah (comp. note on John 4:4), were, at all events, in their religion, a mongrel people, at one time more Jewish, at another more heathenish, according to circumstances and policy, much given to deceit and lying, and more cordially hated by the Jews than the pure Gentiles. Christ broke the spell of this long nourished national prejudice. It is true, He forbade the disciples, in their early missionary labors, to go to the Samaritans (Matthew 10:5-6), and this seems to be inconsistent with His own conduct as related in this chapter. But the prohibition was only temporary and well founded in the divine law of order and progress. The Apostles were first sent to the house of Israel; they must lay the foundation of Christianity in that soil which had been providentially prepared for centuries, before it could be successfully planted among Gentiles. At the same time Christ Himself, though in the days of His flesh “sent to the lost sheep of the house of Israel,” incidentally and by prophetic anticipation, as it were, made an exception, not only in this case, but also in the case of the Syro-Phenician woman (Matthew 15:21 ff.), and the heathen centurion of Capernaum (Matthew 8:5 ff.); and, in the parable of the good Samaritan (Luke 10:30 ff.), He rebuked the pride and prejudice of the Jews with regard to that people. His favorable reception among them is confirmed by the report of Luk 17:11 ff., that of the ten lepers whom He healed on a journey through Samaria, only one returned thanks, and he a Samaritan, putting to shame the remaining nine, who were Jews. [The discourse here told has all the artless simplicity, freshness, vivacity and truthfulness of historical reality. No one could have invented it. The portrait of the woman is remarkably life-like—every word and act is characteristic. The whole scenery remains to this day almost unchanged; Jacob’s well, though partly in ruins; round about the waving harvests of a fertile and beautiful valley, with abundance of water; the mountains of Ebal and Gerizim; a heap of stones on the spot where the Samaritan temple stood; the flat roofs of the neighboring town, visible through olive trees; veiled women in oriental costume coming for water, bearing a stone pitcher on the head or the shoulder; the weary traveller thirsting for a refreshing drink; the old bigotry and hatred of race and religion still burning beneath the ashes. How often has this chapter been read since by Christian pilgrims on the very spot where the Saviour rested, with the irresistible impression that every ward is true and adapted to the time and place, yet applicable to all times and places. Jacob’s well is no more used, but the living spring of water which the Saviour first opened there to a poor, sinful, yet penitent woman, is as deep and fresh as ever, and will quench the thirst of souls to the end of time. [On this visit of our Saviour, the seed was sown which, a few years afterwards, as He prophetically foresaw (John 4:35), grew up into a plentiful harvest and resulted in the conversion of the Samaritans, as related Acts 8:5 ff., and this in turn prepared the way for the conversion of the Gentiles. From Samaria hailed Simon Magus with the first doctrinal corruptions of Christianity by the admixture of heathen notions, but also Justin Martyr, the fearless apologist, who was a native of that very Sychar or Flavia Neapolis, where Christ met the Samaritan woman. But of far greater consequence than the result related in the Acts, is the example here set by Christ for missionary operations, and the doctrines laid down for all ages.—P. S.] See the Literature in Heubner, p. 269 et al.; Niedhofer: Jesus und die Samariterin (Homiletic Discourses), Augsburg, 1821. [Archbishop Trench: Christ and the Samaritan Woman, in his Studies in the Gospels, pp. 83–137. Dr. J. R. Macduff: Noontide at Sychar; or the Story of Jacob’s Well. A N. Test. chapter in Providence and grace. N. York, 1869 (pp. 263).—P. S.] John 4:1. When therefore the Lord [Jesus] knew.—The Lord, for the first time in this Gospel. Ἔγνω or γνούς no doubt has in John, after what he has previously said of Christ’s immediate knowledge of men’s hearts, a special signification when it relates to human thoughts and purposes connected with Christ. Οὗν primarily looks back to the preceding account, of the growing labors of Jesus; but it also points to the insight of Jesus into the spirit of the Pharisees, which was well understood, as natural means of knowledge are not excluded. The Pharisees had heard.—Their hearing carries with it the idea of their having sought information, and keeping a jealous watch. Hence Jesus, it is true, avoids a premature hindrance to his labors, or, as Meyer says, a danger. Yet this one motive, which John states, does not exclude another: that the Baptist was about this time cast into prison, after having labored last in Galilee, and that in answer to the special occasion thus arising for a confirming of hearts in that region, Christ appeared in the place of John in Galilee. Besides, enough for the present had been done for Judea. A third motive probably was, that Jesus had now determined for a while entirely to cease baptizing. That Jesus made more disciples.—Literally: “makes and baptizes.” The verbal quoting of what they had heard, expressed by the present tense, indicates a very definite or a very well known report. More disciples than John.—Jesus gave the Pharisaic spirit more to fear: His freer address; more public appearance in Jerusalem; His stronger influence; the purification of the temple: His higher authority; miracles; Himself accredited as the Messiah by John. John 4:2. Though Jesus himself.—Evidently a parenthesis, otherwise it would belong to what the Pharisees had heard. The Evangelist does not correct the report (Meyer), for it was true; he only states the fact more precisely. The observation no doubt means not that it so happened, but that it was a rule, that Jesus Himself baptized not. Why? (1) Because the work of teaching was more important (1 Corinthians 1:17, De Wette [Alford]); (2) because He would have had to baptize into Himself (Tertullian); (3) Bengel: “Baptizare actio ministerialis est … Christus baptizat Spiritu sancto.” [So Godet, Trench. Godet: “Il ιtait le Seigneur, et il se rιservait le baptιme de l’ Esprit.”—P. S.] Nonnus follows this: the Lord baptizes not with water. Tertullian’s explanation, too, has warrant. As Christ is the object of baptism, the centre of the new kingdom, He would obscure the idea of baptism, if He should not have the transition from the old system to the new, so far as the baptism was concerned, administered by others.John 4:3. He left Judea.—At the same time giving up baptizing. Why? Because the imprisonment of the Baptist in the midst of the Jewish people had brought a ban of uncleanness again upon the whole congregation of Israel (see my Leben Jesu, II. 2, p. 515). This settled it, that a new baptism could proceed only from the baptism of blood, which at the same time would give it a deeper significance (as the final ideal consecration of death). Departed again into Galille—As after He was baptized. John 4:4. Through Samaria.—Samaria lay between Judea and Galilee, and through this province, therefore, the usual route of pilgrimage also passed (Joseph. Antiq. XX. 6, 1). The custom of scrupulous Jews, to make a circuit through Perζa, could have no force with Jesus; though afterwards the Samaritans themselves once occasioned His following it. But He then also had probably already come near the boundary of Samaria (see Maier, Commentar., p. 328), Luke 9:52. Samaria, ωׂ ?ξְ ?ψεֹ ?ο; Chald. ωָׁ ?ξְ ?ψָ ?ιִ ?ο, Ezra 4:10; Ezra 4:17, primarily the name of a city. The city lay in the kingdom of the ten tribes in middle Palestine, on a mountain (Robinson [Germ. ed.] III. p. 365); built by Omri about 922 B. C., and made the seat of the kingdom of Israel (1 Kings 16:24, and elsewhere); a chief seat of the worship of Baal during the time of the apostasy, 1 Kings 16:31; as the capital of Ephraim, the counterpart of Jerusalem (Ezekiel 16:46, and elsewhere). Shalmanezer conquered the city and filled it with colonists, 2 Kings 17:5 sqq. John Hyrcanus destroyed it, but it was soon rebuilt. Herod the Great, to whom Cζsar Augustus gave the city, beautified it, strengthened it, planted a colony of veterans in it, and named it Sebaste [Augusta, in honor of Augustus, Joseph. Antiq. XV. 8, 5]. The growth of Sichem [Neapolis] in the vicinity threw back the city to a hamlet, which still exists as Sebustieh, in ruins. From the city of Samaria (Σαμάρεια) the region of Middle Palestine gradually took its name, Σαμαρεῖτις (1Ma 10:30); it is a separate province in the time of the Syrian kings (also Σαμαρίς. Σαμάρεια in Josephus). The description which Josephus gives of the country, see in Winer under the word. Samaria appears more friendly than Judea, rich in vegetation and forest-clad hills. In the same article are the accounts of modern tourists respecting the city of Samaria. By the Samaritans, ωֹׁ ?ξְ ?ψεֹ ?πִ ?ιν, Σαμαρεῖται, Σαμαρεις, history understands the later post-exilian inhabitants of the country, the Χουθαῖοι (Joseph. Antiq. IX. 14, 3, etc.). According to the prevailing view, a mixed population grew up from the heathen colonists of Shalmanezer (and Esarhaddon, Ezra 4:2) from Assyrian provinces (2 Kings 17:24), Babylon, Cuthah, Ava, Hameth, and Sepharvaim, and from the remnants of the Israelites. In the land of Israel they adopted the Israelite religion (2 Kings 17:25; Ezra 6:21; Nehemiah 10:28), and soon went so far as to call themselves the genuine offspring of Israel, or of the house of Joseph (Joseph. Antiq. XI. 8, 6). And now they would still be called Israelites, but not Jews. But as they presumed in pride to boast an Israelite descent, so too they often permitted themselves through policy utterly to deny this extraction, and give themselves out for Persians (Joseph. Antiq. XI. 9, 4) or Sidonians [Ibid. XI. 8, 6]. After Hottinger and others, Hengstenberg in particular [Beitrδge I. 117; II. 3 sqq] has wholly denied to the Samaritans any genealogical connection with the Jews. The document, 2 Kings 17, mentions nothing, it is true, of remaining Israelites, and the Samaritans have often boasted that they were of heathen origin. This last fact, however, can signify nothing; for they likewise boasted, generally, that they were pure Jews (and the ἀλλογενής, Luke 17:18, evidently proves nothing). But it is said in 2 Kings 17:24, that the colonists were placed in the cities; so that the colonization was limited. Besides, the deportations of this kind in history, as Winer observes, are never radical. The Samaritans were also early distinguished from the heathen (1Ma 3:10). Under Hezekiah (2 Chronicles 30:6; 2 Chronicles 30:10) and under Josiah (2 Chronicles 34:9) there were remnants of Israel in Ephraim and Manasseh. And Christ, as well as the Apostles after Him, considered the Samaritans a middle people between Jews and heathen, Acts 1:8; Acts 8:5. A predominance of heathen blood is assumed by many. As might be expected of such a mixed people, adopting Judaism in an outward way, (1) they were not consistent in their national and religious spirit; they professed now to be Jews, now to be Gentiles, as their interest might require. Under Antiochus Epiphanes their temple was dedicated to Jupiter Hellenius. Heresy in the Christian church, which is mainly a mixture of Christianity with heathenism, takes its rise in the Christianity of Samaria. (2) They attained no living development of their religious ideas; so that in their canon (the Pentateuch), their Messianic expectation, and their use of the law, they stopped where they began; whence they in many respects resembled the Sadducees (though the Sadducees had their abridged and stunted Judaism for having gone backwards with a negative criticism, the Samaritans for having gotten fast in the letter, and not gone forwards). (3) For this very reason, however, their Messianic hope remained more simple and pure. (4) After having been refused a share in the re-building of the temple in Jerusalem [Ezra 4:1 sqq.] they fully reciprocated (first of all by hindering the building of the temple, Ezra 4:4, .and the subsequent strengthening of the city, Nehemiah 4:1) the fanatical hatred of the Jews, who looked upon them as heretics, not as heathen [see Sir. L. 27]; and they built a temple of their own on Gerizim. According to Josephus, Antiq. XI. 8, 4, this took place in the time of Alexander the Great. Manasseh, brother of the Jewish high-priest Jaddus, had a heathen lady for his wife. The Jewish rulers demanded his circumcision; whereupon Sanballat induced him to renounce his membership in the Jewish religion, and built the temple on Gerizim, of which Manasseh became high-priest. According to Nehemiah 13:28, a son of the high-priest Joiada, not named, had married a daughter of Sanballat, and was excommunicated for it. We may suppose that the two accounts relate to the same case, and that the chronology of Josephus is here at fault, the case having occurred under Darius Nothus (see Winer, Samaritaner). On the further fortunes of the Samaritans, see Winer, l. c. (comp. Com. on Matthew 10:5, p. 185; Leben Jesu II. 2, p. 539). John 4:5. To a city of Samaria, which is called Sychar [lit. drunken].—Near to the city, into its vicinity: εἰςπόλιν. Συχάρ = Shechem or Sichem (ωְׁ ?λֶ ?ν), Genesis 33:18, etc.; Συχέμ Sept., Acts 7:16; also Σίκιμα; after the time of Christ, Neapolis [Joseph. De bello Jud. IV. 8, 1]; now Nabulus (Robinson, III. p. 336; Schubert, III. p. 136).Its general identity with Sichem is established by the particular statement that Jacob’s well was near. But the name Sychar for Sichem is not otherwise known, apart from the statement in Wieseler, that in the Talmud occurs the name of a place ςιορελψ, well of the grave, literally of the purchased, that is, of the purchased burial-ground. Hug also (Einleitung II. p. 218) supposes the name comes from Suchar, and denotes the place of burial where the bones of Joseph [Joshua 24:32] and, according to the tradition common in the times of Jesus, of the twelve patriarchs of the children of Israel, were deposited, Acts 7:15-16. It is the prevailing presumption that Συχάρ is a popular Jewish nick-name, a contemptuous travesty of Sichem; with allusion, according to Reland, to Isaiah 28:1; Isaiah 28:7 : Samaria the crown of pride of the drunkards in Ephraim, therefore the city of drunkards [ωִׁ ?λּ ?εֹ ?ψ, drunkard]; according to Lightfoot, alluding to ωֶׁ ?χֶ ?ψ, heathenism as falsehood [Habakkuk 2:18], therefore the city of deceit. According to Hug and others, Sychar is to be distinguished from Sichem itself somewhat as a suburb, and then means the city of the sepulchre. This view is favored by the fact that both Schubert and Robinson put the ancient Sichem nearer Jacob’s well, than the present town lies, and that at the time of Eusebius, Sychar and Sichem were distinguished as two places. Consequently the views of Reland and Lightfoot may well be dismissed as ingenious scholastic conjectures (especially since the first view would make the city of Samaria, not Sichem, a Sychar, and since the allusion to Habakkuk is quite too subtile), though it might be some relief to suppose, with Meyer, that John uses the name Sychar only as the vulgar name. Yet then we might have to admit ignorance in reference to the true name; which we could hardly do; still less admit that John made nick-names. The hypothesis of an interchange of the liquidζ (Tholuck) is also inconclusive. We abide, therefore, by the hypothesis that Sychar is distinguished as the city of the sepulchre from Sichem On the situation of Nablus between Gerizim and Ebal, see Schubert, Robinson, and others (comp. Leben Jesu II. 2, p. 525). Near to the parcel of ground that Jacob, etc.—The basis of the tradition is Genesis 33:19. Jacob buys of the children of Hamor a field in Shechem on which to settle. The passage, Genesis 48:22, is to be regarded as a prophecy; he would give Joseph a portion above his brethren, which he (in his posterity) would win (not had won; see Knobel on the passage) from the hand of the Amorites with his sword and bow. Finally, in Joshua 24:32 it is said that the bones of Joseph were buried at Shechem in the parcel of ground which Jacob bought of the sons of Hamor, and the sons of Joseph received them (with the field) for an inheritance. The somewhat inaccurate version of the Sept. is of no importance at all to the estimate of the perfectly correct account (against Meyer). John 4:6. Jacob’s Well.—The well which Jacob, according to the Israelitish tradition, dug; which by this tradition was made highly sacred. It is thirty-five minutes from the present Nablus, sunk in rock to the depth of a hundred and five feet [now only about seventy-five feet.—P. S.], with a diameter of nine. Maundrell found fifteen feet of water in it; Robinson and others found it dry. Probably it was not the well nearest the city. The woman, however, might have had occasion to avoid the conversation of other women at other wells; perhaps for the same reason she chose the unusual hour of noon (other possible reasons, from Robinson, in Leben Jesu, II. 2, p. 526). Sat thus [ἐκαθέζετοοὕτως , a graphic touch].—Simply sat. Probably indicating the absence of all constraint and reserve. About the sixth hour.—According to the Jewish reckoning, noon. Meyer: “Never to be forgotten by John.” [The hour is probably also mentioned to bring more vividly to our mind the weariness of our Saviour at the heat of the midday sun, the burden and toil He suffered for us at the very moment He opened a fountain of refreshment to this poor thirsty woman and to us all. On the dates of John, see note on John 1:39, p. 92 f. There are additional reasons for assuming that he reckoned hero in the Jewish manner from sunrise to sunset. Otherwise he would have noted whether it was six in the morning (as Rettig assumes), or six in the evening (as Ebrard and Wordsworth hold). The former is too early to account for the fatigue of the Lord, the latter leaves no time for what follows, as the night sets in with little or no intervening twilight in Eastern countries. The conversation must have lasted at least half an hour, then the woman goes away to the city, tells her experience to the men, and they come to the well of Jacob; and yet after all this it must have been still daylight, to account for the words of Jesus: “Lift up your eyes and look on the fields” (John 4:35). Considering the oriental contempt for woman and the prejudice even of the disciples (John 4:27), a conversation with a woman late in the evening would have been even more unseemly than at noon-day. The fact that the woman was alone sufficiently explains that she came so early to draw water, instead of the evening as usual. The time of the year—it was at the end of December—permitted travelling till towards noon. Porter, in his excellent Handbook for Travellers in Syria and Palestine, ii. p. 341, takes the same view. “Christ probably came up the plain of Mukhna, and about noon reached the well.” So also Macduff, p. 36.—P. S.] John 4:7. A woman of Samaria.—That is, of the country. The city of Sebaste was two hours [six miles] distant. Tholuck remarks that the characteristic traits of this very highly individualized woman are indifference to higher interests and roguish frivolity. But these are hardly individual traits; and these traits form hardly the whole outline of a deeply fallen character, who shows, however, a considerable versatility of mind and great energy, besides a deeper susceptibility under the veil of a bright, resolute nature. A sort of Samaritan Magdalene. With good reason Tholuck insists on the individuality of the woman against Strauss and Weisse. The striking invalidation of Baur’s fiction respecting the design of this supposed fiction is likewise worthy of notice. Give me to drink.—Points: (1) The truth, of Christ’s thirst; (2) the freedom of His intercourse,—with a Samaritan, and a woman; (3) the higher purpose of His words; (4) the mastery of the great Fisher of souls [Luke 5:10], in having the earthly given to Him in order to give the heavenly.John 4:8. For his disciples.—Immediate occasion: The disciples had gone to the city. Probably they also carried a vessel for drawing water (ἄντλημα, John 4:11) with them To buy food.—Meyer: “The later [Rabbinical] tradition would not have allowed this. But at that time the separation may not have been so rigid, especially for Galileans, whose route of pilgrimage passed through Samaria. Besides, Jesus was above the divisions of the people, Luke 9:52.” John 4:9. How is it that thou, being a Jew, askest, etc.—She recognizes Him in particular by His Jewish dialect and pronunciation [perhaps also from His Jewish physiognomy and the dress of a Rabbi]. Tholuck: The Samaritan tongue is between the Hebrew and the Aramaic. As Jesus Himself spoke Aramaic, this is not quite clear, and probably a medium between Western and Eastern Aramaic is meant. More than one thing might surprise her: not only that a Jew spoke with her, and asked drink from her pitcher, but also that this distinguished Jew condescended to ask of her. In truth we might well suppose that she was moved with a feeling of her unworthiness in the dignified presence: He unconsciously defies Himself on my pitcher; at least she hints at the difference between the man and the always less regarded woman. Though the national enmity could hot wholly prevent her asking water in her turn (Tholuck), yet the breach was wide enough to make her feel the request of Jesus to be a great and free condescension. Then the expression of this feeling may easily have been accompanied or disguised by a certain humor giving vent to her national spirit, as she now, with her pitcher, seems to have the better of the stranger. The addition: The Jews have no dealings, etc., is commonly taken as an explanatory note of the Evangelist. But in that case we should expect: The Jews and the Samaritans have no dealings with one another. The disdain being here ascribed to the Jew alone, the words no doubt, belong to the woman’s reply. [The question of the woman illustrates the intensity and bitterness of sectarian bigotry and hatred as it then prevailed, and sets in stronger contrast the marvellous freedom of Christ from existing prejudices. According to Dr. Robinson and others the ancient hatred is still kept up, and the remnant of Samaritans neither eat, nor drink, nor marry, nor associate with the Jews, but only trade with them. An experienced traveller says, apparently to the contrary: “Never yet, during many years’ residence in Syria, and many along day’s travel, have I been refused a draught of water by a single individual of any sect or race. The Bedawy in the desert has shared with me the last drop in his water-skin. Yet the only reply of the woman to the weary traveller was, ‘How is it that thou, being a Jew,’ ” etc. (Porter’s Handbook for Travellers in Syria and Palestine, P. II., p. 342.) But this courtesy to strangers is not inconsistent with Dr. Robinson’s statement, nor with our narrative, for the woman did not refuse a drink of water to Jesus, but only expressed her surprise at His asking her for it.—P. S] John 4:10. If thou knewest the gift of God.—Tholuck: “This answer indicates that she, instead of hesitating, must have felt herself honored, and made haste.” More pertinently Meyer: “Unquestionably Jesus immediately perceived the susceptibility of the woman; hence His leaving His own want, and entering upon a conversation so striking as to arouse the whole interest of the sanguine woman.” She is surprised that He, the supposed haughty Jew, is the asker; the Lord brings out the opposite relation, that she is the needy one, He the possessor of the true fountain of satisfaction. The gift of God: (1) The person of Jesus (Greek com., Erasmus). [Hengstenberg refers to John 3:16; “God gave His only begotten Son,” and Isaiah 9:5 : “to us a Son is given,” as decisive proofs that Christ designated Himself “the gift of God.”] (2) The Holy Spirit [with reference to John 7:38-39] (Augustine, etc.) (3) Correctly: The singular grace of God in the golden opportunity of this moment (Grotius and others). [(4) Eternal life. So Lampe and Godet; John 4:13-14; comp. Romans 6:23 where eternal life is styled “the gift of God” (χάρισμα, but here we have δῶρον); Revelation 22:17. (5) Living water. in anticipation of what immediately follows: “He would have given thee living water,” So Stier and Trench. Alford regards this as the primary view, but combines with it the first three, like Dr. Yeomans in the preceding footnote.—P. S.] And who it is.—Unfolding the thought of the gift of God. Thou (σύ) wouldest (already) have asked (not: wouldest ask him, Luther) of him.—Expressing the greatness of her need, the greatness of His gift, the urgency her request would have; doubtless also her susceptibility. [Mark the difference between ὁλέγωνσοι which Christ uses of Himself, after the woman had naturally asked: πῶςσὺπαῤἐμοῦαἰτεῖς (John 4:9), and σὺἄνᾕτησας, which assigns at once to the woman a position of inferiority and dependence on Him, the possessor and giver of that living water. “There lies often,” says Trench, “in little details like this an implicit assertion of the unique dignity of His person, which it is very interesting and not unimportant to trace.”—P. S.] He would have given thee living water.—ξַ ?ιִ ?νδַ ?ιִ ?ιν [Sept. ὕδωρζῶν] well-water. Expressing at once the greatness of the gift and the readiness of the giving, in a figure drawn from His own, request, but answering perfectly to her unsatisfied state of mind. The figures of Psa 36:8; Jeremiah 2:13; Jeremiah 17:13. The sense of the words, living water, explained in John 4:14. Various interpretations: (1) Baptism (Justin, Cyril [Cyprian, Ambrose]. But the water of Baptism is not water for drinking, which becomes a fountain in him who drinks it. (2) The evangelic doctrine. Grotius, similarly Meyer: The truth. Shall a man then after that thirst no more? (3) Tarnow; Gratia justificans. Like most of the explanations, too dogmatically exclusive. (4) Institutio salutaris (Semler). (5) Lόcke: Faith. (6) Olshausen: Life (John 6:33). (7) The Holy Spirit, John 7:39 (Maldonatus, Bucer, [Webster and Wilkinson, Wordsworth] and others). The act of giving must no doubt be distinguished from the living water itself: The giving of the water is the gospel, the word of Christ; see John 4:26. The water itself, which quenches thirst, proves itself already operating when the woman sets her pitcher down, [John 4:28]: it is evidently the inner-life as the operation of the life of Christ, conceived predominantly under the aspect of inward peace (no longer thirsting), developing into regeneration, life in the Holy Ghost (the water’s becoming a fountain) and perfection in blessedness (springing up into everlasting life). Tholuck: “The word of salvation the medium of a living power of the Spirit, John 7:38; John 11:26.” [Godet: Living water is the life eternal, which is Christ Himself living in the soul by the Holy Spirit. Donner l’eau vive, c’est pour lui se communiquer lui-mκme; car la vie est identifiιe avec son principe.—P. S.] John 4:11. Sir, thou last nothing to draw with.—Sir. A title of respect usual even at that time among men, John 5:7; John 6:34, etc. Used in the ordinary sense. The spiritual conception was rendered difficult by the lack of the prophets among the Samaritans, and the want of knowledge of the prophetic metaphors (Tholuck). On this presumption the reply is not exactly “saucy” (Tholuck), but no doubt clearly thought, firm, savoring of national pride, exulting again in easy humor. Thou hast nothing. Exactly: Thou hast not even a vessel to draw with. She evidently distinguishes between the water itself standing in the well, and the spring at the bottom of it. Thou hast not even a bucket, i. e., thou canst not even reach down to the standing water. And the well is deep—That is, even with the bucket thou couldest not come to the living spring.John 4:12. Art thou greater.—Σύ emphatic. Μείζων cannot mean nobler, of higher rank, as Meyer thinks; for noble lords, as such, are not exactly masters in water-drawing or well-digging. The question proceeds from a feeling that Jesus assumed some extraordinary character, that He claimed a spiritual power; perhaps claimed to be a prophet, like Moses, who could make a fountain of water by miracle. Than our father Jacob.—Expressing the national jealousy towards the Jew. The Samaritans traced their descent from Joseph [Joseph. Antiq., viii. 14, 3; xi. 8, 6]. Who gave us the well.—This was a simple inference from the tradition that Jacob dug the well and left it to his posterity. The sense is: The patriarch himself knew not what better to give, and this sufficed for all the wants of his entire nomadic establishment. Meyer: “The woman treats the enigmatical word of Christ at first as Nicodemus does, John 3:4, but more thoughtfully [considering the false conception of Nicodemus], and at the same time more pertly and with feminine readiness of speech.” In her last word: θρέμματα, cattle, she finishes her carnal misapprehension of His spiritual words. [The mention of the cattle (which does not necessarily include the slaves, as sometimes on inscriptions (see Meyer, p. 192), completes at the same time the picture of the nomadic life of the patriarch. Stier is wrong therefore in regarding it as a falling off in the lofty language of the woman to descend from Jacob’s sacred person to his cattle. There is in the question of the woman a slight resentment at the seeming intentional disregard of the venerable traditions and memorials of her people by which they connected themselves with the patriarchal history. She had evidently a considerable degree of self-respect, national pride and interest in religious questions, and was a brave upholder of patriarchal succession.—P. S.] John 4:13. Shall thirst again.—[As Christ Himself did, physically, on this occasion, and when He exclaimed on the cross διψῶ.—P. S.]—The excellence of that well Jesus suffers to pass. But in His view of the spiritual water, that has the fundamental defect of every earthly satisfaction: the partaker thirsts again. So it was with all the woman’s enjoyment of life hitherto. [She had by successive draughts at the “broken cistern” of carnal lust only increased her thirst, and the sense of the utter vanity of all earthly pleasures]. Shall never thirst.—[Comp. John 6:35 : “I am the bread of life: he that cometh to me shall not hunger; and he that balieveth in Me shall never thirst.” Revelation 7:16 : “They shall hunger no more, neither thirst any more.” John 21:6 : “I will give unto him that is athirst of the fountain of the water of life freely.” Old Test. passages: Isaiah 55:1; Isaiah 49:10.—P. S.] An opposite word: the sentence of Wisdom in [the apocryphal book of the son of] Sir 24:21 : “Those who drink of me (the Wisdom) shall thirst again” (Οἱπίνοντέςμε, ἕτιδιψήσουσι). Meyer, not clearly: “This figure rests on another aspect of the drinking, as viewed in its particular moments, not in the continuity constituted by them.” Jesus Christ expresses the absolute satisfaction which is given in principle in the peace of the Christian life; Jesus Sirach describes the desire for further knowledge begotten by the first taste of wisdom. Not only is the object viewed on different sides; the object itself is in Sirach imperfectly conceived, with reference rather to quantity than quality. The Old Testament strives after life, the New strives in the life. What Sirach calls a thirsting again, Christ calls an everlasting springing up.Shall be in him a fountain of water.—Not “after the negative operation the positive” (Meyer), for the quenching of the thirst is itself positive; but, after the elemental working of Christianity, coming point by point from without, as a means, its life as a principle continually reproducing and propagating itself as its own object. First water drunken, then water welling up: distinction of the catechumenate and the anointing of the Spirit. A fountain whose stream gushes into eternal life. The decisive word, spoken with the utmost confidence, stirring the soul of the hearer to its depths. The spiritual sense of the whole declaration of Christ appeared in every feature: (1) A water, after drinking which one thirsts no more; (2) a water drunken, which becomes a fountain; (3) a fountain which ever joyously flows (which can rarely be said of wells in the east); (4) a fountain which gushes into everlasting life. Here the spiritual sense was perfectly transparent. By the union of the divine Spirit with the human, the latter becomes an organ of the divine life, and therefore a self-supplying fountain of life. Calvin, in the interest of his doctrine, here emphasizes the thought that the life of the Spirit in the regenerate cannot dry up: Bengel, in the interest of his, that if a man thirst again, it lies not with the water, but with the man. [So also Alford.] Above this doctrinal antagonism stands the concrete unity of the life of faith sealed by the Spirit. Tholuck takes the thought that Christ assumes form in the believer; which does indeed describe the personal and objective side of spiritual life. He observes that some (Origen, Zwingle, and others) have been misled by the analogy of Joh 7:38 to think here also of a flowing for the quickening of others. The woman, at all events, does soon come to quickening others, though the fundamental thought here of course is satisfaction for one’s self. In ἅλλεσθαι, applied to the fountain, are included (1) springing up from a hidden depth within; (2) incessant flow; (3) living, joyous, springing motion; (4) rhythmic life, continually increasing in a steady succession of living acts. That the fountain also, as a fountain, becomes more and more copious, is indicated by its streaming forth into eternal life. Comp. Sir 24:31. It is a question, how into everlasting life (εἱςζωὴναἰώνιον) is to be interpreted. (1) Up into the heavenly life, like a fountain (Origen, Grotius, and others). Tholuck objects that this substitutes οὐρανόν. (2) Redounding to eternal life; affording it (the word being referred to πηγή not to ἁλλομένου, Luthardt). This loses the figure. According to John 3:36, one might indeed take the sense to be, that the spiritual life passes into eternal life; as in Sir 24:31 : My brook became a river, my river a sea.” But there, as in Ezekiel 47, the subject is the immeasurable objective unfolding of the revelation of salvation, or wisdom; here a subjective unfolding of saved life. Though this is eternal life, yet, to be complete, it must pour itself into the objective eternity (Olshausen: The eternal rests not, till it comes to eternity). In view of this, and in accordance with the figure, we understand by the words a flowing on of this well into the eternal life of perfect fellowship with God in the world to come. This eternal life is doubtless conceived in the figure as an ocean [into which all the rivers of life of individual believers empty at last]. The fountain leaps into eternal life (Meyer: ἅλλεσθαιεἰς, to leap into). The water drunk becomes a well, the well a fountain which incessantly flows into the ocean of eternal life. As Jesus engages the stiffened Pharisaic spirit of Nicodemus by the free wind of the Spirit and its transforming power, so He enlists the restless, inconstant woman, whose thirst continually returned, by the offer of an endless satisfaction, which is at once an infinite tranquility and a perfect decision of effort, and soon passes into the enjoyment of the eternal life. John 4:15. That I thirst not, neither come hither.—The sigh of a poor, weary woman, in whom neediness and the burden of toil seem to form a contradiction to spiritual claims, though the sigh is disguised by the air of good humor. The last words betray, to be sure, a misapprehension of the spiritual sense of the words of Jesus. But about her meaning there remains uncertainty. (1) She means, in all earnest, a miraculous water, which might have the effect described by Jesus (Maier, Meyer). Not readily conceivable. Of such water no one would wish to drink. (2) She asks the water, in order to get behind the mystery. Lampe: Tentare voluit audacula, quomodo prζstita petitionis conditione, promissionem suam exsecutioni daturus esset. This is not ironical, as Tholuck thinks. At least it is only half so; according to Lόcke’s interpretation: Her request is half sportive, half earnest. Such water is inconceivable to her, but yet she wishes for what has become to her a dim appearance of a toilless life. (3) Ironical talk. Lightfoot: Verba irrisorie prolata longe apertius concipias, quam supplicatorie. So also Tholuck. (4) The presentiment of something higher which might do her good is awakened in her (Baumgarten-Crusius and my Leben Jesu, II. p. 529). This is more probable, if we suppose that the woman had even journeyed to that sacred well in some sort of religious feeling under a troubled conscience, while there were other wells at least nearer the city of Sichem. Then, too, the third interpretation is accompanied with the view that Jesus breaks off, in order to take an entirely new method; and this involves the unintended, but hazardous presumption that the first method had failed. On the contrary, we suppose that the next word of the Lord was suggested by this request. John 4:16. Call thy husband.—(1) The husband was to have part in the saving gift, and so she was to be brought indirectly to confession of sin (Chrysostom, etc.; Lόcke). (2) Christ would in this way lead her indirectly to a consciousness of her guilt (Calov., Neander, Tholuck, Stier, Luthardt). (3) He intended to give her a sign of His prophetic knowledge in the lower sphere of life, to gain her confidence for disclosures from the higher (Cyril, Schweizer; similarly Meyer). (4) Conformity to custom and to the idea of the law. Hitherto Jesus had influenced her after the manner of a missionary, as man with man. In her last request, expressing spiritual susceptibility, the woman came to the position of a catechumen. But, as a proselyte, she must not act without the knowledge of her husband. Meyer objects: The husband was in truth a paramour. True, they were not legally united. But the highest, most delicate social law lies somewhat deeper; she had given that man the rights of husband. If there was still a moral spark in the immoral connection, Christ had an eye to detect it. Even Stier and Tholuck have not been able to appropriate this interpretation. But it is connected on the one hand with the moral principle, Matthew 3:15; on the other with the principles in Matthew 10:12; 1 Corinthians 7:15; 1 Corinthians 11:10, and with all those principles which distinguish the Evangelical church from the Roman Catholic in the manner of making proselytes. [I must dissent from this interpretation as assuming a relation and a duty which did not exist. The words of Christ: Call thy husband, opened the wound at the tender spot where the cure was to begin, and were the first step in granting the woman’s request: Give me to drink. By a prophetic glance into her private life of shame, which, after five successive marriages, culminated in her present illegitimate relation, He at once effectually touched her conscience and challenged her faith in Him. Conviction of sin is the first indispensable condition of forgiveness, and is the beginning of conversion. She at once understood the intention, and her next word is a half confession of guilt, quickly followed by faith in the prophetic character of Christ.—P. S.] John 4:17. I have no husband [Οὐκἕχωἅνδρα].—She feels the effect of the sudden turn. She is living in a settled, to all appearance exclusive, but illegal relation; and this causes her to deny the correctness of the Lord’s address. This is the summit of her resistance, and the master-hand of Christ must prove itself over her. Call thy husband! This might be a word of conjecture. She supposes this, and so ventures the denial, half true, and half false. Her denial is untrue in that she denies a fact of which she is perfectly aware; true, in that she places herself on the ground of the law, and judges by that. Then in this might be already couched a confession of sin, or even the vow: I renounce him, if I may thereby share thy instruction and thy promise. At all events, we may be sure of this: If she had hitherto answered pertly and ironically in a vulgar way, she would now have departed with her pitcher filled, under an ironical promise to call her husband. If, on the contrary, she had taken Jesus for a magician, from whom she might receive a magical water of life, she would have called her husband, and permitted him to be recognized as such. Thus her denial itself proves (1) that she is bound up by the word of Christ; (2) that she for an instant looks on her relation with new eyes; (3) that she deceives herself in attempting to deceive the Lord; (4) that the confession of her guilt is already almost upon her lips. By some expositors the woman is made far too jovial, saucy, spiritually obtuse, and even vulgar. Thou hast well said, husband I have not [ἅνδραοὐκἕχω].—The emphasis is on husband, [Hence ἅνδρα here precedes, while, in the woman’s answer, it follows the verb,—P. S.] The saying is commended as proper. This is true of her saying in its strict sense, but it has an irony intended to drive out the reservatio mentalis, the untruth lurking behind the true saying; and this it does even by the emphatic placing of the word husband: Husband I have none.John 4:18. For five husbands thou hast had.—Some have concluded from the confession in John 4:29, that those former connections also had been illegitimate. [So Meyer.] Against this is the antithesis: Five husbands, and: Whom thou now hast, etc. Five marriages, therefore, had preceded, “of which at least some had been dissolved through the wantonness of the woman.” Tholuck. Whether the fault lay in sensual wantonness (licentiousness in the narrower sense), or in an antinomian looseness of spirit, does not appear. With Magdalene the latter seems to have been the case; and it is to be considered, that in Samaria, as well as on the sea of Galilee, Greek views of the marriage relation might already have had an effect. “According to the Talmud, the Samaritans did not acknowledge the laws of divorce; probably referring not to the laxer Hillelian view current among the Jews, but only the more strictly Biblical view of Shammai, following Deuteronomy 24:1. Yet even according to this, it was not only adultery that divorced, but any λָּ ?ςεּ ?ψ, as the Talmud calls it: uncovering of the arms, laying off the veil, and the like.” Tholuck. Meyer supposes that she had not been faithful in one or more of her marriages, and was now a widow living with a paramour. But she might have been a divorced woman.The extraordinary disclosure of the Lord. Different explanations: (1) The hypothesis that Jesus had learned the history of the woman from others (Paulus, von Ammon, etc.). Simply contrary to the text. (2) The disciples added what they afterwards learned (Schweizer). The supposition of a forgery needs no refutation. (3) The mythical hypothesis, with reference to the five heathen nations which came to Samaria (2 Kings 17:24 sqq.; Joseph. Antiq. XIX. 14, John 3 : (πέντεἕθνη—ἕκαστονἵδιονθεὸνεἰςτὴνΣαμάρειανκομίσαντες).(4) A providentially ordered representation of the life of the Samaritan people by this woman: the woman is Samaria; the five husbands are five gods, etc.; Hengstenberg, Beitrδge [zur Einl. in’s A. T., 3 vols., 1831–’39] II. p. 23 sqq.To this Meyer objects that in this case the husbands must be six; and Heracleon actually read six. This is disposed of by a more attentive examination of Hengstenberg’s opinion. It may rather be observed that to the five nations, seven gods are reckoned, 2 Kings 17:30 sq. But the chief point is that an actual personal offence of the woman, as here described by the Lord, is the subject, and that the woman would assuredly have understood nothing of such a scholastic allusion of the Lord, if He had intended to make it; and of this there is not the slightest indication. At most, however, the woman would be only an accidental allegory of the history of her people, since the marriage law of the Samaritans was strict; and not at all an allegory in so far as Samaria had at the same time from five to seven gods, and these not merely instead of, but together with, Jehovah. [The woman had her five husbands in succession, and was not guilty of polygamy, consequently she could not represent the polytheism of the Samaritans.—P. S.] (5) “Lange, Leben Jesu II. 2, p. 531, strangely says, that the psychical effect of the five husbands upon the woman had forced out traces in her appearance which Jesus perceived.” So Meyer reports my view. This judgment might be expected from the author. Our reasons are still the same: 1. Every hair casts its shadow. Every marriage relation leaves its psychical mark; only in most cases our weak eyes do not see it. 2. There is a deep communicatio idiomatum in the life of the Lord. What He knew by His divine nature in a divine, immediate way, He at the same time knew in virtue of His human nature, in a human way through means. From the Christological point of view the old false scholastic alternative of merely divine or merely human is done away in reference to the life of Jesus. [Dr. Lange here undoubtedly goes too far in the application of a true principle. It is, indeed, a fact that traits of character and habits, good and bad, especially pride, sensuality and intemperance, express themselves in the countenance and the eye, as the mirror of the soul. But this is very different from the assumption that particular events and relations of the past life, such as the five marriages, leave each a distinct mark on the face which may be read, as the forester reads the age of the tree in the number of its rings. Such details of private history even Christ could not know, except from report, or by special revelation, or by His mysterious union with the divinity. The last is the only proper view we can take of the case in hand. Not that Christ was strictly omniscient in the state of humiliation (He Himself disclaimed this, Mark 13:32); but wherever it was needed for His mission of saving sinners and the interests of His Kingdom, He could, by an act of His will and in virtue of His vital and essential union with the omniscient Father, unlock the chambers of the past, or penetrate, by immediate intuition, to the inmost secrets of the human heart, and read the history which is indelibly recorded on the pages of memory (comp. John 2:25).—P. S.] John 4:19. Sir, I perceive that thou art a prophet.—1 Samuel 9:9. She justly infers this from the miracle of knowledge. [The Samaritans regarded the Messiah mainly as a prophet, see below.] We must note the gradual growth of her respect: (1) Σύ, Ἰουδαῖοςὥν, John 4:9; (2) Κύριε, John 4:11; (3) Κύριε, δόςμοι.—At the same time a concession of her guilt, yet skilfully veiled. John 4:20. Our fathers worshipped.—The Caricaturing estimate of this personage represents her as everywhere frivolously bantering up to this point without intelligence or misgiving, and now also as putting this question to get away under its cover (De Wette and others, Schweizer, Ebrard, Tholuck). Christ would hardly have gone so far to no purpose with such worthlessness. It may be going too far, to find in this sentence an expression of strong personal religious interest, as if: She perceives in Christ the searcher of hearts, perceives her guilt, and wishes to go to the holy place of forgiveness (Zwingli, Luthardt [Besser], and others). According to Chrysostom, Neander and others, an interest in objective religion at least was awakened in her. The case is probably to be thus conceived: Having indirectly owned her guilt, she cannot treat of it much further with the stranger. The need of religious atonement comes home. But with it comes the question: Where is the right place of atonement? And this question takes its precedence probably not merely from an external, superficial spirit, but rather from the preponderance of a reflective turn. In other words, she turns, not hypocritically, in embarrassment or silliness, to religious controversy, but, under a spiritual bias over-ruling her simple womanly feeling, to reflection. Probably also she had, through the same disposition, lost caste in Samaria, like Magdalene in Galilee (a homeless nature in Sichem, as on the sea of Galilee). Furthermore, she might hasten with this question, (1) because the opportunity of asking a prophet concerning it might not occur again; (2) because she could not but wish to agree in reference to religion and the place of worship with the prophetic man who inspired her with reverence, and who was privy to her guilt. On this mountain.—Pointing to Gerizim, which was near. On Gerizim comp. 5 Raumer, Palδstina, p. 38; Winer, s. v.; and the books of travel. But she does not say: We worship here, ye there; the antithesis is of another sort: Our fathers worshipped, and ye say. A decline of the Samaritan system of worship, and a sense of the weight of the Jewish protest in favor of Jerusalem, are expressed in the carefully chosen terms. At the same time, her having the religion of her fathers in any case contained an apology for her position. Our fathers.—Down from the first Samaritans who were rejected by the Jews, and who, from being excommunicate, had become schismatic by setting up a temple on Gerizim. Chrysostom, Kuinoel, and others, suppose she goes back in thought to Abraham and Jacob; but the antithetic ὑμεῖς contradicts this. Even after the destruction of the temple by John Hyrcanus, the pinnacle of the temple continued to be the seat of the Samaritan worship (Joseph. Antiq. XVIII. 4, 1), and is so to this day (Robinson, III. p. 319). “Latterly the Turks have interposed hindrances.” Tholuck. It is very expressive, that the woman merely states the issue, without making a question, which place of worship is the true one. By making a question, she would have somewhat compromised her system, and at the same time disparaged the prophet’s place of worship. Whether she meant anything by saying: In Jerusalem is the place, instead of: On Mount Zion, remains uncertain. She seems, at all events, proud of her holy mountain, as well as of her holy well. It might seem to favor the Samaritans, that Moses had designated Gerizim as the mountain of the benedictions of the law (Deuteronomy 11:29); in fact he seemed to appoint it distinctly as the seat of worship, according to Deuteronomy 27:4, where the Samaritan Pentateuch reads Gerizim instead of Ebal. On the other hand, Jerusalem had now a mighty representative in this prophet, who gave her, moreover, a strong impression of the dignity of the Jewish prophetic office. John 4:21. Woman, believe me, an hour is coming.—[Believe Me, not us. A more familiar and condescending phrase for Verily, verily, I say unto thee. Nowhere else used by Christ.—P. S.] "Εοχεταιὥρα, a Johannean phrase, John 5:28, &c.—Ye shall worship the Father: pointing to a new, more inward mode of worship. [Ye, says Christ, not we, as an ordinary prophet would have done. He refers not only to the future conversion of the Samaritans (Meyer), but to all Christian ages. The Father indicates, as Grotius remarks, suavitatem novi f�deris; for the fatherhood of God is fully known and felt only in Christ, the only begotten Son, and the only Mediator between God and man.—P. S.] To speak of the “stupidity” of the woman on which Jesus wasted a sublime utterance, is utterly without foundation. The sublime utterance teaches the distinction between external and internal worship in a concrete form. The expression evidently contains primarily, in a gentle hint, a preferring of Jerusalem. The progressive grades of worship are: (1) Samaria, (2) Jerusalem, (3) Christianity. It cannot therefore be exactly asserted that Jesus evades a decision: still less that He puts Jews and Samaritans alike under mistake (Baumgarten-Crusius). But the greater prominence is given to the issue which puts Samaria and Jerusalem on one side, and the worship of God in spirit and in truth on the other. This is evident from the advent of Christianity in particular to the Samaritans. The negation of Samaria and Jerusalem only denies that prayer was to continue at all restricted to the places named; that is, it declares the abolition of external, legal cultus, both Samaritan and Jewish. At the same time it marks the woman’s question as one too little concerned with essential things. John 4:22. Ye worship that which ye know not.—The question concerning the where of worship could be resolved only by the what, and this again by the how. The neuter instead of whom is significant. Just because God is not truly known to them, He is a ὅ rather than a ὅς, more impersonal than personal. Meyer supposes that the neuter denotes God in His essence and substance; Lόcke, that it denotes τὰτοῦθεοῦ, which does not suit the term προσκυνεῖν. De Wette: “O refers to the act of προσκυνεῖν; ye worship, and therein do what ye know not. This entry is longer than a Bible module can hold. The rest is at https://www.sermonindex.net/commentary/lange/ VIII Residence Of Jesus In Galilee, And Believing Gailean In Particular. The Nobleman. The Miracle Of Distant Healing, As A Second SignJoh_4:43-54(John 4:47-54. Gospel for 21st Sunday after Trinity.) 43Now after [the, τάς] two days he departed thence, and went [omit and went]into Galilee. 44For Jesus himself testified, that a prophet hath no honor in his own 45country. Then when [When therefore, ἅτεοὖν] he was come [he came, ἦλθε] into Galilee, the Galileans received him, having seen all the things [omit the things] that he did at Jerusalem at the feast: for they also went unto [to] the feast. 46So Jesus [he] came again into Cana of Galilee, where he made the water wine. And there was a certain nobleman [a royal person or officer, τιςβασιλιχός,] whose son was sick [,] at Capernaum. 47When he heard [The same, having heard, ὸὖτοςὰχούσας] that Jesus was [had] come out of Judea into Galilee, he went unto him, and besought him that he would come down, and heal his son: for he was at the point of death. 48Then said Jesus unto him, Except ye see signs and wonders,ye will not believe. 49The nobleman saith unto him, Sir, come down ere my child die. 50Jesus saith unto him, Go thy way; thy son liveth. And the man believed the word that Jesus had spoken [spake, εἶπεν] unto him, and he [omit he] went his way. 51And as he was now going down, his servants met him, and told him [brought 52word], saying, Thy son [his child, παῖςαὐτοῦ ?] liveth. Then [he] inquired he of them the hour when he began to amend. And they said unto him, Yesterday at the seventh hour the fever left him. 53So the father knew that it was at [in] the same hour, in the [omit the] which Jesus said unto him, Thy son liveth: and 54[. And he] himself believed, and his whole house. This is again the second miracle that Jesus did [This again, a second sign, wrought Jesus, τοῦτοπάλινδεύτερονσημεῖονἐποίησενὁ ’Ιησ.], when he was [had] come out of Judea into Galilee. AND [The miraculous healing of the nobleman’s son resembles the healing of the centurion’s servant, Matthew 8:5; Luke 7:1, but must not be confounded with it (see the points of difference in the note on John 4:46). It was the second miracle which Christ wrought in Galilee (John 4:54); the first being the change of water into wine (John 2). John relates a third miracle in Galilee, the feeding of the multitude, which is followed by a long discourse (John 6), and three miracles in Judea, viz.: the healing of the cripple at the pool of Bethesda (5), the healing of the blind (9), and the raising of Lazarus (11). He also relates three appearances of the risen Saviour (John 21:14). Bengel (on John 4:54) notes this threefold trinity with the remark: “Hζc nimirum Johannis methodus est, ut per ternarium incedat.”—P. S.] John 4:43. And went.—The repetition: Ἐξῆλθενἐκεῖθεν, and καὶἀπῆλθεν, should be noted with reference to the next verse. See the Textual Notes (No. 2). John 4:44. For Jesus himself testified.— Himself. Meyer: “Not only other people in reference to Him. For the matter itself, comp. Matthew 13:57; Mark 6:4; Luke 4:24.” Tholuck better: “He had himself acknowledged the correctness of the popular proverb.” [The proverb itself is based upon common experience and needs no explanation. “Familiarity breeds contempt,” while “distance lends enchantment to the view.” The Germans have a similar proverb: “This is not far off” (Das ist nicht weit her), i. e., nothing uncommon. Many of the greatest men were despised or ignored in their native land or city, and made their renown or fortune in foreign lands. The only difficulty is in the logical connection as indicated by γάρ—P. S.] The question is, how is the for (γάρ) to be explained? or how can He go to Galilee because a prophet hath no honor in his own country? for we should expect either the reverse, or although (καίπερ) instead of for (γάρ). Answer: 1. Πατρίς [patria] is not the native country (Vaterland), but the native city (Vaterstadt), even in antithesis to the country of Galilee (Chrysostom, who understands it of Capernaum, Cyril, Erasmus, Calvin, etc.). Against this: The antithesis is not demonstrated. [Nearly all who understand πατρίς of the native town, refer it, not to Capernaum (with Chrysostom and Euthymius Zig.), which is altogether out of the question, but to Nazareth, where Christ was not born, indeed, but raised, and where He lived to the time of His public ministry. (So Cyril Alex., Calvin, Grotius, Bengel, Olshausen, Hengstenberg, Bδumlein, Trench, on Miracles, p. 99, Wordsworth) Nazareth in Galilee then is contrasted here with Galilee in general, as the city of Jerusalem is contrasted with the land of Judea, John 3:22. This view has a strong support in Luke 4:24 (comp. Matthew 13:57; Mark 6:4), where Christ says in the synagogue of Nazareth: “No prophet is accepted in his own country ” (ἐντῇπατρίδιαὐτοῦ). This was soon shown by the action of the Nazarζans who “thrust Him out of the city and led Him to the brow of the hill, that they might cast Him down headlong” (John 4:29); while in Capernaum the people “were astonished at His doctrine” (John 4:32), and, as John relates, received Him well (John 4:45). John may have supposed this event to be already known from the other Gospels. The only objection to this view is, that Galilee, John 4:43, would naturally include Nazareth. It would be necessary to explain the γάρ from John 4:46 : Christ went to Cana in Galilee (which lies north of Nazareth), without passing through His native place, for the reason mentioned. The choice lies between this interpretation and that of Dr. Lange (see below, No. 7), which comes nearest to it. All others are too far-fetched.—P. S.] 2. Πατρίς is Judea, since He was born in Bethlehem (Origen, Maldonatus, Schweizer, Ebrard [formerly], Baur). Against this: a. His acknowledged home was Nazareth, notwithstanding He was born in Bethlehem; b. In Judea He had been well received by the people; c. The construction, that Judea was His country, as being the country of the prophets (Origen, Baur, Baumgarten-Crusius), would be unintelligible. 3. Judea is indeed meant to be understood as His πατρίς, but this just proves the unhistorical character of John’s Gospel (Schwegler, Bruno Bauer; Schweizer: The unhistorical character of the ensuing narrative, which is to be considered an interpolation). 4. For means namely, that is to say, and relates not to what precedes, but to what follows. The sentence is a preliminary explanation of the fact that the Galileans did indeed this time receive Jesus well, but only on account of the miracles they had seen at their visit to the last passover in Jerusalem [which set them the fashion in their estimate of men and things, while the Samaritans believed in Him for His word without signs]. (So Lόcke [3 ed.], De Wette, Tholuck. Contrary to the spirit of the maxim, to the context (for a nobleman from Capernaum meets Him at the outset at Cana seeking help), and to the fact in general. 5. Christ went to Galilee just because He expected not to find acceptance there. (a) Brόckner: To accept the conflict—which, however, was more threatening in Judea; (b) Hofmann, Luthardt [now also Ebrard]: Because He hoped [to avoid publicity and] to find rest and quiet in Galilee—in which, however, He would be disappointed. [Against both these views may be urged also that the text reports neither a conflict, nor a quiet retirement in Galilee, but a miracle of healing.—P. S.] 6. Meyer: “Πατρίς is not the native town, but the native country, viz., Galilee, as is proved by John 4:43; John 4:45, and as usual with the Greeks since Homer. The words contain the reason why Jesus did not hesitate to return to Galilee, but the reason lies in the antithetic relation implied in ἐντῇπατρίδι. For if, as Jesus Himself testified, a prophet is without honor in his own country, he must earn it in another. And this Jesus had done in Jerusalem. He now brought with Him the honor of a prophet from a distance. Hence too He found acceptance with the Galileans, because they had seen His miracles in Jerusalem (John 2:23).” Against this: a. Then the word must have stood at John 4:1. But there another motive stands for His having now left Judea. b. The remark must have been, that He came already full of honor, because He had none to expect in Galilee, c. It must not have been known that He was ill-received in His own πατρίς, in the narrower sense, on this very return. 7. Πατρίς is Lower Galilee, to which Nazareth belonged. We believe we have found the full solution in the fact that now took place, the removal of Jesus from Nazareth, where He had been thrust out, to Capernaum, on the presumption that Capernaum belonged to Galilee in the narrower sense, i.e., to Upper Galilee, to which Nazareth, in Lower Galilee, did not belong. This is supported (a) by the fact that the name Galilee in the narrower sense referred to Upper Galilee (see Forbiger, Handbuch der alten Geographie II., p. 689); (b) by the statement of Josephus, that Upper Galilee was separated from Lower Galilee by a line drawn from Tiberias to Zebulon [De bello Jud. ΙΙΙ. 3, 1), which throws Nazareth into Lower Galilee. If now we consider that John writes with the living, popular view of Palestine thoroughly in his mind; that he knew of an unknown Bethany, a ferry-village on the other side of the Jordan, of an otherwise unknown Salim, near Ζnon, of an elsewhere unknown Syohar, probably a suburb of Sichem, of the pool of Bethesda with its porches, of Solomon’s Porch in the temple,—we may also conceive that John knows of a Galilee in the provincial sense, and that he can say without geographical reflection, Jesus went to Galilee, as the Swiss in Geneva says without reflection: I am going to Switzerland; the Pomeranian: I am going to Prussia. This is further favored by the expression in Luke 4:31 : He “came down from Nazareth to Capernaum, a city of Galilee;” against which it signifies nothing that Galilee sometimes occurs in John, especially in the mouth of another, in the wider sense. (See Leben Jesu, II. 2, p. 542.) John 4:45. The Galileans received him.—Received Him favorably. A general observation concerning His acceptance in Upper Galilee, particularly in Cana, Bethsaida, Capernaum, etc. They received Him; antithetic to an implied rejection. Having seen all the things that he did.—No ignoring of His earlier miracles in Cana and Capernaum. It was to the Galileans a new and higher attestation, that Jesus had made a great impression even in Jerusalem with His signs. It was their countryman who had purified the temple, and filled the holy city with wonder. John 4:46. So Jesus came again.—What means this οὖν, so? The first time Jesus had gone on from Nazareth to Cana. And now He again went first to Nazareth. And if He wished to go thence to Galilee, we might expect He would proceed first to His friends in Cana. In Cana He seems to have tarried several days; at all events the βασιλικός comes hither for Him. And there was a certain nobleman [royal officer, βασιλικός].—An officer of Herod Antipas, the tetrarch (whom the common people considered and called a king, Matthew 14:1; Matthew 14:9), The title βασιλικός combines civil and military dignity; hence some have taken this βασιλικός to be identical with the centurion of Capernaum (Irenζus, Semler, Strauss, Baumgarten-Crusius). The office, the sick boy, the distant healing, are similar features. On the other side are these differences: 1.The time; here before the removal of Jesus to Capernaum, there long after it. 2. The place of Christ at the time; here Cana, there the vicinity of Capernaum. 3.The characters; here excited, weak, feebly believing, there calm, confident, strong of faith. Other differences, by themselves considered, might be more easily wiped away: The υἱός here, the δοῦλος there (a distinction, however, which is not resolved by the common παῖς: here the boy is a small boy, a child (John 4:49), there a stout youth); there a Gentile, here a miracle-believer, probably a Jew. Yet these with the foregoing strengthen the difference. But the most decisive diversity is in the judgment of the Lord. The faith of the centurion He commends with admiration; the faith of the nobleman He must first subject to a trial. [Chrysostom, Trench, Alford: The weak faith of the nobleman is strengthened, while the humility of the centurion is honored.] Accordingly this miracle has been in fact by most expositors (from Origen down) made distinct from the other.John 4:48. Except ye see signs and wonders.—Shall have seen. Ye must first have seen these, before ye come to faith. The stress does not lie decidedly on ἴδητε (Storr), thus censuring the request to go with him. The man’s answer does not agree with this; and ἴδητε must then have stood first. Still the ἴδητε is not without significance; as is indicated by the fact that we here have for the first time in John σημεῖακαὶτέρατα, whereas hitherto he has spoken only of σημεῖα. And wonders (τέρατα) must be emphasized. But the less therefore can we suppose a general reproof of the Galileans, with reference to John 4:45 (Meyer); for it was the way of Jesus Himself to lead through faith in miracles to faith in the word, John 10:38; John 14:11; John 15:24. Christ, therefore, reproves not the faith in miracles in itself (Eckermann), but the craving for miracles or miracle-mania. He intimates besides, that there is a higher grade of faith than that which rests on the seeing of miracles; as appears more distinctly afterwards, in John 14:11; John 20:29. He designates the petitioner and those like him as a class of people who are not set beforehand towards the kingdom of God, but have yet to be brought to faith by signs and wonders (τέρατα); of course presupposing a sensuous spirit with a weak readiness to believe, passion for miracles, personal interest in the miracle (signs and wonders for yourselves), and an inordinate desire for seeing, 1 Corinthians 1:22. We must, however, consider that the reproof is not intended for a rejection, but for discipline, to hush the excitement of the man, and recall him to his inward spirit. Yet the palliation of Maldonatus [Rom. Cath.] is too strong: That the words contain no censure, but only a declaration of the spiritual infirmity of the people now proved by a fact. John 4:49. Sir, come down ere, etc.—The man proves not strong enough, indeed, to take the reproof of Christ, but it is enough that he does not feel wounded and repulsed, and that he persists and grows more urgent in his prayer. The utterance of a father’s love in trouble and anguish: My child is dying; as in Jairus, the Canaanitish mother, and the father of the demoniac under the mount of transfiguration. This distress of love makes him a believer. John 4:50. Go thy way; thy son liveth.—Not only the word of miraculous help, but at the same time also the second and decisive test. He must believe and go at the word. And the man believed the word; he stood the test. Explanation of the miracle: 1. Paulus makes of it a medical prognostication after the account of the sickness given by the father: comp. also Ammon. 2. Others have supposed the operation of a magnetic healing power (Olshausen, Krabbe, etc.). 3. Meyer, on the other hand: By his will. This is of course the main thing, as in the doctrine of creation. God created the world by His will. But if we conceive the will of God abstractly, and exclude all co-operation of His vital force, we are ultra-supernaturalistic (and perhaps ultra-Reformed). The will of Christ is unquestionably the main thing, but it does not work abstractly; without a vital force proceeding from Him. (comp. Mark 5:30) the thing is not apprehended, though the magnetic healing virtue affords only the natural analogy or form for it. Even the miracle of immediate knowledge comes into the account, inasmuch as Christ wrought only where He saw the Father work, John 5:19. And the same instant, in which this saving life-ray flies into the heart of the father, it flies also into the heart of his distant son. For how near this father now was to his son in his inward communication, Jesus alone knew. John 4:52. Then he inquired of them.—The fact alone did not satisfy him; he wished to trace it to its cause. That is, he leaned towards faith. “Not self-interest merely, but a religious interest also in the case, is guiding him.” Tholuck. And then it appeared, (1) that the son suddenly recovered, and (2) at the hour when Jesus spoke the word. Yesterday at the seventh hour.—According to the Jewish division of the day this could perhaps have been said in the evening of the same day, after six o’clock. The healing took place soon after noon, and probably the father set out immediately for home. According to our reckoning of the day, a night must have intervened; which would give a strange length of time for a distance of some eight or ten hours, and Lampe adjusts by supposing that the man, in his firm faith, did not travel festinans, while De Wette thinks it strange that he stopped over night on the way. But the meeting of the servants might very well have occurred the next morning, without the journey having been slow. John 4:53. And he himself believed, and his whole house.—It is palpably the rule, that, with the father, the family also become believers (Acts 10:44; Acts 16:15; Acts 16:32); but here the Evangelist calls particular attention to it by his expression. The members of the family had seen the sudden recovery, but had not heard the word of the Saviour. John 4:54. This sign Jesus wrought as the second, etc., Πάλιν is not to be connected with δεύτερον, nor to be referred to ἐποίησεν by itself, but to the statement that Jesus had returned from Judea to Galilee. Jesus had meantime done many other miracles, even in Capernaum; this miracle marks His second return to Galilee, as the miracle at Cana had marked the first. He brought healing with Him at once, and it went out from Him even in distant results. AND ETHICAL1. In regard to the spirit in which Jesus just now comes to Upper Galilee and performs this miracle, it must be observed that according to Luke 4:14 sqq.; Matthew 13:53 sqq., He had just been thrust out from His city Nazareth. See Leben Jesu, II. 2, p. 541. Experiences of this kind could in Him produce only an increase of His manifestations of love to those who were susceptible. 2. As the first miracle of distant operation this incident bears a close relation to the healing of the servant of the centurion at Capernaum and of the daughter of the Canaanitish woman. In the mysterious manifestation of the divine power of Christ, we must still not neglect the human media, which here lay in the inward connection of an anxious father’s heart with the dying child. As in fact the help of God owns the human intercession. The spiritual roads, streets and paths which human love, distress, and prayer have to make for the divine help in the invisible world, can only glorify the freedom, truth, and miraculous power of this help, as a power which is at the same time the power of a personal Spirit and love, i. e., not abstractly working in a void, but as divine life applied to the human. 3. As the Lord in the case of the Samaritan woman rebuked superstitious trust in a place of pilgrimage, so here He reproves superstitious trust in visible miracles. AND After the two days. The great days of grace, in which the Lord visits us, are numbered, and swiftly pass away.—Jesus departed thence. The itinerancy of Jesus a clear expression of His inner life: (1) of His Israelite fidelity to duty; (2) of His heavenly calling; (3) of His love; (4) of His holy Spirit.—The rapid change of time and place in the life of Jesus a token of His unworldly pilgrim nature.—How the Lord learned and sealed in its highest sense the universal human experience that a prophet has no honor in his own country, in order to make of it a holy maxim of life.—Want of esteem at home, the prophet’s signal to travel.—The closed door a way-mark for the Lord and His disciples to go on to the open door.—A good word finds its place.—It is no question, Whether there be in the world persons susceptible to thy mission; the only question is, Where they are (whether here or far away; whether in the present or in the future); and herein is much to be unlearned and to be learned by the heart of youthful Christian enthusiasm.—How the divine fire of Christ was always only inflamed by the coldness of men.—The two works of Jesus in Cana, the transformation of water and the distant healing, as conspicuous tokens of His heavenly nature: 1. The first, so to speak, leads up into heaven. 2. The second as it were comes down from heaven.—How the nobleman of Capernaum learns to believe. This nobleman compared with the centurion of Capernaum (resemblances, differences, see above).—The deliberation of Jesus with the nobleman, a mark of the elevation of His spirit; (1) Of His freedom from obsequiousness and respect of persons; (2) of His wise reserve and loving compliance.—Except ye see signs and wonders. Or, the distinction between true and false resting of faith on miracles.—Also a distinction between the true and the false miracle.—The marks of each (faith and miracle).—Except ye. Or, the connection between worldly-minded unbelief and worldly-minded superstition in the polite world (at that time the court of Herod).—Yet a nobler germ may lie in the miracle-craving form of faith. (The question is, which is the germ, and which the shell.)—The testing of faith, which the nobleman stands: 1. How he is tested (a) in his humility by a stern word which might wound the pride of a nobleman; (b) in his faith, by being required to trust a word. 2. How he stands the test: (a) in his persistent prayer he passes the test of the humility of his faith; (b) in his confident departure at the word of Jesus he proves the power of his faith.—Only the faith, which is itself a miracle of God can receive the miraculous help of God.—Faith in the divine help must be directed above all to the divine in the help.—How the Lord in granting refuses and in refusing grants.—His refusing, a higher granting.—Necessity and love as handmaids of faith.—Comparison of the nobleman with the Canaanitish woman.—The father and his sick child.—How the upright man in approaching Jesus becomes at once smaller and greater: 1. The nobleman is smaller in his going than in his coming, in that he is humbly satisfied with the healing word of Jesus, and no longer desires that he should go down with him. 2. He is greater in his going than in his coming, in that he returns full of confidence in the word of Jesus. The majesty in trusting the promise of Christ, the power, out of which the greatness in the confidence of the believer grows. Out of the Amen of Christ the Amen of the believer. The divine education of the sensuous believing of miracles into believing of the word: (1) In this incident, (2) in the church, (3) in the life of the individual Christian.—The health-message of Christ and the health-messenger of the servants; or, how the health-messages of heaven by far precede the health-messages of earth.—The echo of the divine word of Christ: Thy son liveth! in the mouth of the servants: Thy son liveth!—The dull echo of earth, and the clear echo of heaven.—The hard ascent and the glad descent in the journey of the nobleman.—Yesterday at the seventh hour; or, in the proper hour the help comes home with power.—Mark the great hours (of extremity, of prayer, of miraculous help).—Remember those hours, and believe!—The distress of the whole house must become also the faith of the whole (this maybe said of the family, of the church, of mankind).—The faith wrought by the miracle at the moment must make itself good in the moral expansion of faith. 1. Through the whole life, 2. Through the whole house.—How the sickness of a child may become the salvation of a whole house; may, under His management, serve to glorify the Lord.—The connection between the faith of the father and the germ of faith in the heart of the child.—He prayed for the healing of his child, and obtained healing for himself and his whole house.—The Lord comes announced by the forerunning miraculous help.—The healing work of Christ in His presence and at a distance: (1) At a distance even when it is in His presence; (2) in His presence even when it is at a distance (susceptible hearts are near to Him, and He is near to them).—Jesus always peculiarly rich when He comes from Judea to Galilee: 1. From enemies to friends; 2. From the great to the small; 3. From the proud to the poor. Starke: The bad manners of men in esteeming nothing which is common and always before their eyes, but highly esteeming what is strange and rare.—Every one is bound, indeed, to serve his own country; but if his own country despise him, any place which receives him is his country.—Hedinger: Jesus comes again (when He has once retired apparently in vexation).—God has a holy seed even among the great. All men, whatever their station, are subject to need and sickness.—The same: Trouble gives feet, humbles pride, teaches prayer.—Lange: To seek Jesus under special distress is indeed good and needful, but it is better that one should not wait so long, but knowing his sin and misery should in spirit be near to Jesus.—Osiander: Parents should interest themselves both bodily and spiritually for their children.—The bodily sickness of children troubles Christian “parents; what an affliction, when-they lie sick in soul! Christ comes always at the right time with His help.—Bibl. Wirt.: Christ rejects not those who are weak in faith, but takes pains, that their faith may grow.—Nova Bibl. Tub.: Faith is [seems] shameless and cannot be rebuffed.—Osiander: It is well to persevere in prayer, but not prescribe the manner or time of help.—Faith has not only grand, but also swift results: almost every hour some form of divine help meets the believer.—As the master, so the servant; good governing makes good domestics.—Canstein: When we duly reflect, not an hour passes in which God does not show us good.—Osiander: Christ’s followers must not be weary of wandering far on earth and doing good in all places.—The more a country has seen and heard of Christ, the heavier judgment will it receive, if it believe not.—Rieger: Much of the teaching and wholesome direction of God comes to us through our children, and what concerns their life and death, their success and hindrances, goes to our heart.—All depends on whether a man will. Besser: It is a wonderfully beautiful example of growing faith, that we have in this nobleman. Methinks John expresses his own joyful surprise, when he pictures to us the suddenly stilled and satisfied man: The man believed the word that Jesus had spoken unto him, and he went his way. Heubner: By the sickness of children God disciplines the parents themselves.—Though he was at the court of Herod (at least as a servant), yet he went to Jesus.—Domestic troubles should drive us to Jesus.—The true sense is: Except ye see signs and wonders. The emphasis lies on see [yet τέρατα also is not unmeaning].—There is a secret inclination [a universal passion of the world] for miracles: 1. Desire for special extraordinary fortune to befall us, while we do not exert ourselves to obtain that which satisfies. 2. Waiting for extraordinary help in exigency, when we will not earnestly use the right means. 3. Desire for extraordinary fruits of our labor, when we will not sow, hoping in faith. 4. Desire of extraordinary violent assistance when we wish to get rid of faults, while we ourselves do not lift a hand. 5. Desire or expectation of honor, etc., while yet we have done or sacrificed nothing at all for the glory of God.—The word of Jesus holds good for us in every conflict and every strait; Go thy way, and believe!—Hours of deliverance in human life.—The more thou searchest, the more plain will the moments of the divine deliverance be to thee.—And he believed. This faith was more than the preceding; it attained to faith in Jesus the Saviour.—This faith was the fruit of trial. For this God sends distress.—The Christian father, as priest in his own house.—(Whitefield): The head of a family has three offices (prophet, priest, king: “the last he does not so easily forget”).—The nobleman as an example of gradual progress in faith. Draeseke: The new house: 1. It has a now attitude outwardly. 2. It has a new manner of spirit. (These two are reversible).—Greiling: To our sufferings we owe the most precious experiences of our life.—Goldhorn: Consolatory reflections on the moral influence of sickness.—Grueneisen: Concerning the growth of faith: 1. Need is its rise; bodily need, less than spiritual. 2. Trust is its second stage; and it must be directed less to the bodily than to the spiritual. 3. Experience is the third stage; experience more of spiritual than of bodily help.—Kniewel: The three stages of faith: 1. Its childhood, the stage of seeking miracle. 2. Its youth, the stage of receiving miracle. 3. Its manhood, the stage of the power of miracle.—Reinhard: How weighty should be to us the thought, that distress is often our guide to truth.—Schulz: How trial and trouble lead men to the fellowship of Jesus Christ.—Bachmann: The Christian calls the Saviour to his sick: 1. He calls Him. 2. In due time. 3. In the right spirit. 4. With the most blessed result.—Lisco: The house of the Christian, when God visits it with trouble: The trouble (1) unites the members in tenderer love, (2) directs their hearts more trustfully to the Lord, (3) awakens them to importunate prayer and intercession, (4) produces at last a joyful and thankful faith.—Kaempfe: The humility and the persistence of the nobleman.—Ahlfeld: The blessing of trial.—Beck: The exigence, the test, the victory, of faith.—Rautenberg: The hard condition of the Christian at the sick-bed of his darlings. [Alford: This miracle is a notable instance of our Lord “not quenching the smoking flax,” just as His reproof of the Samaritan woman was of His “not breaking the bruised reed.” The little spark of faith in the breast of this nobleman is by Him lit up into a clear and enduring flame for the light and comfort of himself and his house.—Wordsworth: Our Lord would not go down at the desire of the nobleman to heal his son, but He offered to go down to heal the servant of the centurion (Matthew 8:7). He thus teaches us, that what is lofty in man’s sight, is low in His eyes, and the reverse.—There are degrees in faith (John 4:53) as in other virtues.—Ryle: The lessons of this miracle: 1. The rich have afflictions as well as the poor. 2. Sickness and death come to the young as well as the old. 3. What benefits affliction can confer on the soul. 4. Christ’s word is as good as Christ’s presence.—P. S.] Footnotes: John 4:43.—[The article refers, of course, to the δύοἡμέρας in John 4:40.—P. S.] John 4:43.—Codd. B. C. D. omit: καὶἀπῆλθεν; but A. supports the Recepta. Tischendorf omits the words. Meyer also rejects them. But it is evident that they have been omitted through failure to perceive their import. The Evangelist would distinguish between the departure for Galilee in the wider sense, and the removal to Upper Galilee, called by him simply Galilee, in the provincial sense. [The received text is in favor of Dr. Lange’s interpretation of πατρίς, see Exeg. Notes, but the latest editions reject καὶἀπῆλθεν on the authority of the oldest MSS. ΰ. B. C. D. Orig. Cyr.—P. S.] John 4:43.—[Dr. Lange here inserts in small type the gloss: from Lower Galilee to Upper, thus anticipating his explanation of πατρίς, John 4:41. See the Exeg. Notes.—P. S.] John 4:46.—This ὁ̓Ιησοῦς, wanting in most authorities, is added by the textus receptus. John 4:51.—[Alford brackets καὶἀπήγγειλαν. Tischend. ed. VIII. reads καὶήγγειλαν with ΰ. D. Westcott and Hort omit it.—P. S.] John 4:51.—Lachmann: ὁπαῖςαὐτοῦ, after A. B. C. etc. [Tischend., Alf., Mey. likewise adopt ὁπαῖςαὐτοῦ for the easier lect. rec. ὁπαῖςσου, which may have been conformed to ὁπαῖςσου, John 4:50.—P. S.] [Augustine, Tittmann, Kninoel and Bloomfield take γάρ here in the sense of καίπερ, which is against all grammar.—P.S.] [Comp. John 1:46; John 2:1; John 7:3; John 7:41; John 7:52.—P. S.] [Dr. Lange mentions Olshausen after Tholuck. But in the third ed. of his Com., Olshausen refers πατρίς to Nazareth. Dean Alford adopts De Wette’s view, but in his sixth edition he combines with it Luthardt’s (see below, sub 5).—P. S.] [Godet pretty nearly agrees with Meyer.—P. S] [Some identify this nobleman with Chuza, Herod’s steward, whose wife Joanna was among the followers and supporters of Jesus, Luke 8:3. A mere conjecture.—P. S.] Among those who have identified the two, Strauss and others would give the preference for accurate narration to Matthew, Gfrφrer and Ewald to John. With Weisse again it is “a misapprehension of a parable.” According to Baur the doctrinal import of the story of Nicodemus and of that of the woman of Samaria is here combined in a third story, teaching: How faith in miracles comes by means of faith in word, and consequently is in reality only such. In other words two critical legends are supposed to be combined in a third, and the Jewish councillor and the Samaritan woman become in this phantasy the Galilean nobleman! SECOND SECTIONOpen Antagonism between Christ, as the Light of the World, and the Elements of Darkness in the World, especially in their proper Representatives, Unbelievers, but also in the Better Men, so far as They still belong to the World.John 5:1 to John 7:9I THE FEAST OF THE JEWS AND THE SABBATH OF THE JEWS, AND THEIR OF IT: KILLING CHRIST. THE FEAST OF CHRIST AND THE SABBATH OF CHRIST, AND HIS OF IT: RAISING THE DEAD. OFFENCE OF THE IN AT THE SABBATH-HEALING OF JESUS, AND AT HIS HIS FREEDOM AND HIS DIVINE ORIGIN . FIRST ASSAULT UPON THE LIFE OF JESUS. CHRIST THE TRUE FOUNT OF HEALING , THE OF THE SABBATH BY HIS SAVING WORK, THE KAISER OF THE DEAD, THE LIFE AS THE VITAL ENERGY AND HEALING OF THE WORLD, BY JOHN, BY THE , BY MOSES. THE TRUE MESSIAH IN THE FATHER’S NAME, AND FALSE Chap. 51. The Healing.1After this [these things, μετὰταῦτα, not τοῦτα] there was a feast of the Jews; and Jesus went up to Jerusalem. 2Now there is at Jerusalem by the sheep market [sheep gate] a pool, which is called in the Hebrew tongue [in Hebrew, Ἐβραἵστι] Bethesda, having five porches. 3In these lay a great [omit great] multitude of impotent folk [of the sick, or diseased persons], of [omit of] blind, halt [lame], withered, waiting for the moving of the water. 4For an angel went down at a certain season into the pool, and troubled the water: whosoever then first after the troubling of the water stepped in was made whole of whatsoever disease he had. 5[Omit all from waiting to had.] And a certain man was there, which had an infirmity 6[who had been in his infirmity] thirty and eight years. When Jesus saw him lie, and knew that he had been now [already] a long time in that case, he saith unto 7him, Wilt [Desirest] thou [to] be made whole? The impotent [sick] man answered him, Sirach , 8 I have no man, when the water is troubled, to put me [carry me quickly, cast me] into the pool: but while I am coming, another steppeth [goeth] 8down before me. Jesus saith unto him, Rise, take up thy bed, and walk. 9And immediately the man was made whole, and took up his bed, and walked. 2. The offence at the healing on the sabbathAnd on the same [on that] day was the sabbath. 10The Jews therefore said unto him that was cured, It is the sabbath day [omit day]; it is not lawful for thee to carry thy bed [to take up the bed]. 11He answered them, He that made me whole, 12the same said unto me, Take up thy bed, and walk. Then asked they [They asked] him, What man is that which [Who is the man that] said unto thee, Take 13up thy bed, [omit thy bed] and walk? And [But] he that was healed wist [knew] not who it was: for Jesus had conveyed himself away [withdrawn him self], a multitude [or crowd] being in that [the] place. 14Afterward Jesus findeth him in the temple, and said unto him, Behold, thou art made whole: sin no more, lest a [some, τι] worse thing come unto thee [befall thee]. 15The man departed, and told the Jews that it was Jesus, which [who] had made him whole. 3. The accusation, a twofold accusation, and the vindication of jesus concerning his working on the sabbath, and concerning his claim to be the son of god16And therefore did the Jews persecute Jesus [And for this cause the Jews persecuted (judicially arraigned) Jesus], and sought to slay him [omit and sought to slay him], because he had done these things on the sabbath day [omit day]. 17But Jesus answered them, My Father worketh hitherto [is working unceasingly even until now, or, up to this time] and I work [am working]. 18Therefore the Jews sought the more to kill him, because he not only had broken [broke, ἔλυεν] the sabbath [according to their opinion], but said also that God was his Father [but also called God his own Father, πατέραἴδιον], making himself equal with God. 19Then answered Jesus [to this second accusation] and said unto them, Verily, verily, I say unto you, The Son can do nothing of himself, but what he seeth the Father do [doing, ποιοῦντα]: for what things soever he doeth, these things also doeth the Son likewise [in like manner]. 20For the Father loveth the Son, and sheweth him all things that [which he] himself doeth: and he will shew him greater works than these, [and greater works than these will he show him], that ye may marvel. 4. The saving operation of the son, his quickening in general21For as the Father raiseth up the dead, and quickeneth them; even so the Son quickeneth whom he will. 22For the Father judgeth no man [Neither doth the Father judge any one], but hath committed all [the entire] judgment unto the Son: 23That all men should [may] honour the Son, even [omit even] as they honour the Father. He that honoureth not the Son honoureth not the Father which hath sent 24[who sent] him. Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that heareth my word, and believeth on him that sent me hath everlasting life, and shall not come [cometh not, οὐχἔρχεται] into condemnation [judgment, χρίσιν]; but is passed from [hath passed out of] death unto [into, εὶς] life.— 5. The spiritual raising of the dead now immediately beginning25Verily, verily, I say unto you, The hour is coming, and now is, when the dead. shall hear the voice of the Son of God; and they that hear shall live. 26For as the Father hath life in himself; so hath he given [gave he] to the Son [also] to have life in himself; 27And hath given [he gave] him authority to execute judgment also [omit also] because he is the [a] Son of man.6. The future raising of the dead28Marvel not at this: for the [an] hour is coming, in the [omit the] which all that are in the graves shall hear his voice, 29And shall come forth; they that have done good, unto the [a] resurrection of life; and they that have done evil, unto the [a] resurrection of damnation [judgment, χρίσεως]. 30I can of mine own self [of myself] do nothing; as I hear [the actual sentence of God], I judge; and my judgment is just; because I seek not mine own will, but the will of the Father [him] which hath sent [who sent] me. 7. Testimony of jesus31If I [myself] bear witness of [concerning] myself, my witness is [according to law of testimony] not true. 32There is another that beareth witness of [concerning] me; and I know that the witness which he witnesseth of [concerning] me is true. 8. Testimony of john the baptist33Ye [have] sent [ὰπεστάλκατε] unto John, and he bare [hath borne] witness [μεμαρτύρηχεν ] unto the truth. 34But I receive not testimony [authentication] from [a] man: But these things I say [I speak openly of this matter], that ye [who know of the circumstances] might [may] be saved. 35He was a [the] burning and a shining light [lamp]: and ye were willing for a season [a little while, an hour, πρὸςὥραν] to rejoice in his light.9. Testimony of the father in the works of jesus and in the scriptures36But I have greater witness than that of John for the works which the Father hath given me to finish, the same works that I do [the very works or, the works themselves which I am doing], bear witness of me, that the Father hath sent me. 37And the Father himself, which hath sent [who sent] me, hath borne witness of me. Ye have neither heard his voice at any time, nor seen [spiritually] his shape. 38And ye have not his word [Old Testament word] abiding [with living power] in you; 39for whom he [himself] hath [omit hath] sent, him ye believe not. Search [Ye do search] the Scriptures; for [because] in them [in the several books and letters] ye 40think ye have eternal life: and they are they which testify of me. And [yet] ye will not come to me; that ye might [may] have life [the life of those Scriptures themselves]. 10. Incapacity of the jews to know the true messiah, and their disposition to receive false messiahs in spite of the testimony of moses, whose accusation they incur41I receive not [do not appropriate to myself] honour [glory, δόξαν] from men. 42But I know you, that ye have not the love of God in you [are not inwardly directed 43towards God]. I am [have] come in my Father’s name, and ye receive me not: if another shall come in his own name, him ye will receive. 44How can ye believe, which [who] receive honour [glory] one of another, and seek not the honour that cometh from God only [the glory that is from the only God, or, from him who alone is God]? 45Do not think that I will [shall] accuse you to the Father: there is one that accuseth you, even Moses, in whom ye trust [ye hope, or, have placed your hope, ὴλπίχατε]. 46For had ye believed [if ye believed] Moses, ye would have be lieved [ye would believe] me; for he wrote of me. 47But if ye believe not his [not even his] writings, how shall [will] ye believe my words? AND [Preliminary Remarks.—The healing of a helpless and hopeless cripple at the House of Mercy is the first miracle of Jesus in Judea related by John, although He had performed signs there before, which are only alluded to, 2:23; 3:2. It forms the basis of a lengthy and most important Christological discourse, which opens the conflict of Jesus with the unbelieving Jewish hierarchy, and reveals the contrast between His positive fulfilment of the spirit of the law and their negative observance of its letter, as also between His living theism and their abstract monotheism. His doing good on the Sabbath was made the ground of a charge of Sabbath-breaking, and His claim to be in a peculiar sense the Son of God was construed as blasphemy deserving of death. Christ here proclaims all those grand truths, which John had announced in the Prologue. He reveals Himself as one with the Father, who never ceases doing good, as the Lord of the Sabbath, as the Giver of life, as the Raiser of the dead, and the Judge of the world, and claims divine honor. He supports these astounding claims, which no mere man could make without being guilty of blasphemy or madness, by the united testimony of John the Baptist, of God the Father through His works, and of the O. T. Scriptures, and drives this threefold testimony with terrible earnestness into the conscience of the Jews. He then traces their unbelief to the secret chambers of their self-seeking hearts, and completely turns the tables by presenting their own Moses, in whom they boastfully put their hope, as their accuser for not following his lead to Christ, to whom he pointed in all his writings. Thus the mouths of these hypocritical worshippers of the letter and enemies of the spirit and aim of the law were stopped, but their hearts continued in opposition and longed for an opportunity to carry out their bloody design. The significance of this discourse is well brought out by Dr. Lange in his analysis (see the headings) and in the Doctrinal remarks. Comp. also my concluding note on John 5:47.—P. S.] John 5:1. After these things.—On the distinction between μετὰταῦτα and μετὰτοῦτο, see Lόcke on this passage. Here closes the first great ministry of Jesus in Galilee (see Leben Jesu, II., 2, pp. 556–745). A [The] feast of the Jews.—[Which feast? This point is still under dispute, but the controversy is now narrowed down to a choice between the Passover and the Purim. The decision has a bearing on the chronology of the gospel history. If the feast here spoken of be the Passover, then our Lord’s public labors continued during three and a half years, since John notes three other passovers as falling within His ministry, 2:13; 6:4; 12:1 and 13:1. If not, then the time must in all probability be reduced to two and a half years. On the bearing of the definite article on the question, and the various readings, see Text. Notes.—P. S.] Meyer: “Which feast is meant, appears with certainty from John 4:35; comp. 6:4. For John 4:35 was spoken in the month of December; and from John 6:4 it appears that the passover was nigh at hand; hence the feast here intended must be one falling between December and the passover, and this is no other than the feast of Purim, which was celebrated on the 14th and 15th of Adar (Esther 9:21 ff.), that is, in March [one month before the passover], in memory of the deliverance of the nation from the massacre projected by Haman. So Keppler, [who first suggested this view], d’Outrein, Hug, Olshausen, Wieseler, Neander, Krabbe, Anger, Lange, Maier and many others.” Meyer justly adds: The feast is not designated, because it was a minor festival, whereas the greater feasts are named by John: not only the passover, but also the σκηνοπηγία, 7:2, and the ἐγκαίνια 10:22. [The chief objections to this view are: 1. The feast of Purim was no temple feast, and required no journey to Jerusalem. But Christ may have attended this feast as He attended other festivals (7:2; 10:22) without legal obligation, merely for the purpose of doing good. 2. The Purim was never celebrated as a Sabbath. But the Sabbath spoken of, John 5:9, may have preceded or succeeded the feast.—P. S.] Other views of the feast: (1) The passover: Irenζus, Luther, and many more; (2) Pentecost: Cyril [Chrysostom, Calvin], Bengel, etc.; (3) the feast of tabernacles: Cocceius, Ebrard [Ewald]; (4) the feast of dedication: Petavius; (5) a feast which cannot be determined: Lόcke, De Wette, [Brόckner], Luthardt, Tholuck (7th ed.)The feast of Purim [ιְ ?ξֵ ?ιδַ ?τεּ ?ψִ ?ιν , or simply τּ ?εּ ?ψιν lot, from the Persian], Esther 9:24; Esther 9:26; ἡΜαρδοχαἴκήἡμέρα, 2Ma 15:36; Joseph. Antiq. xi. 6, 13. On the 13th of Adar a fast preceded the feast; in the festival itself the book of Esther (called ξְּ ?βִ ?μָ ?δ by eminence) was read in the synagogues. As a popular festival it was distinguished, like the feasts of tabernacles, and dedication, by universal rejoicings. Fanaticism in the people naturally sought to make it a festival of triumph over the Gentiles (subsequently over the Christians also). And on this account was this particular feast of Purim so pre-eminently the feast of the Jews (with the article), and the article in the Cod. Sinait. in this place cannot be made to speak exclusively, as Hengstenberg proposes, for the passover. We must no doubt mark a difference between the simple expression, feast, and the expression: feast of the Jews.John 5:2. Now there is at Jerusalem.—The ἔστι has been interpreted with reference to the porches, as indicating that, at the time of the composition of this passage, Jerusalem had not been destroyed. On this see the Introduction. Eusebius writes in his Onomast. s. v. Βηζαθά: καὶνῦνδείνυται [but he does not mention the locality]. Yet the ἔστι may also be attributed to rhetorical vivacity. By the sheep gate.—Ἐπὶτῇπροβατικῇ sc. πύλῃ.| According to Nehemiah’s topography of the restored city it was what is now Stephen’s gate in the north-east quarter of the city, leading out over Kidron to Gethsemane and the Mount of Olives (Bβb Sitty Merijam, ‘Gate of My Lady Mary;’ also ‘Gate of the Tribes,’ or ‘Porta vallis Josaphat.’ Comp. Winer, Art. Jerusalem, I. p. 548; Krafft, Die Topographie Jerusalems, p. 148; Robinson, I. p. 386; 2:74, 136, 148; Von Raumer, Palδst. p. 255. [If the Pool of Bethesda is identical with the Fountain of the Virgin (see below), the Sheep Gate cannot well have been St. Stephen’s Gate, which is too far off.—P. S.] A pool, which is called in Hebrew Bethesda.—αֵּ ?ιϊηֶ ?ρְ ?γָ ?ΰ, house of kindness, grace, gentleness, house of mercy. Tholuck: Institution of charity, Charitι. Five porches.—Tobler (Denkblδtter von Jerusalem, 1853, p. 62): So late as the fifth century five porches were still shown. According to his (medical) hypothesis there were five arched compartments for the separation of the patients. Tholuck: Colonnades, porticoes, to shelter the patients from wind and rain; probably the rear one having a wall. Theodore of Mopsuestia imagined one central hall (probably inclosing the pool), and four halls on the circumference of it (perhaps crosswise); this would have been, at all events, the most convenient arrangement for the sick. The outer portions must doubtless have been protected on more than one side. As to the location of the pool, there is on the outer side of the gate of Stephen a small fishpond or reservoir, and inside the gate the very large, deep reservoir, to which the name of Bethesda is usually given; probably without foundation. It is perfectly dry, and on the bed of it grow large trees, the tops of which do not even reach to the level of the street. In this pool Robinson sees the remains of an old trench which belonged to the fortress of Antonia. He supposes, on the other hand, that the Fountain of the Virgin may have been the pool of Bethesda. Robinson says [Am. ed. of 1856, vol. I. p. 337]: “On the west side of the valley of Jehoshaphat about twelve hundred feet northward from the rocky point at the mouth of the Tyrop�on, [or the valley of the Cheesmongers] is situated the fountain of the Virgin Mary; called by the natives’, ‘Ain um ed-Deraj, Mother of Steps. In speaking of Siloam I have already brought into view the singular fact, that there is no historical notice later than Josephus, which can be applied to this fountain, before near the close of the fifteenth century, and have also mentioned the more modern hypothesis, which regards it as the fountain of Siloam, in distinction from the pool of that name. Others have held it to be the Gihon, the Rogel, and the Dragon-well of Scripture; so that in fact it has been taken alternately for every one of the fountains, which anciently existed at Jerusalem. It is unquestionably an ancient work; indeed there is nothing in or around the Holy City, which bears more distinctly the traces of high antiquity. I have already alluded to the reasons which make it not improbable, that this was the ‘King’s Pool’ of Nehemiah, and the ‘Pool of Solomon’ mentioned by Josephus, near which the wall of the city passed, as it ran northwards from Siloam along the Valley of Jehoshaphat to the eastern side of the temple.” This spring is connected with the well of Siloam by a passage [of about 2 feet wide, 1750 feet long, and cut through the solid rock], through which Robinson and his companions [for the first time] laboriously passed. “The water in both these fountains, he relates [I. p. 340], is the same; notwithstanding travellers have pronounced that of Siloam to be bad, and that of the upper fountain to be good. We drank of it often in both places. It has a peculiar taste, sweetish and very slightly brackish, but not at all disagreeable. Later in the season, when the water is low, it is said to become more brackish and unpleasant. It is the common water used by the people of Kefr Selwβn. We did not learn that it is regarded as medicinal, or particularly good for the eyes, as is reported by travellers; though it is not improbable that such a popular belief may exist.” At the upper fountain (the Fountain of the Virgin) Robinson observed a sudden bubbling up of the water from under the lower step. “In less than five minutes it had risen to the basin nearly or quite a foot; and we could hear it gurgling off through the interior passage. In ten minutes more it had ceased to flow, and the water in the basin was again reduced to its former level….Meanwhile a woman of Kefr Selwβn came to wash at the fountain. She was accustomed to frequent the place every day; and from her we learned, that the flowing of the water occurs at irregular intervals; sometimes two or three times a day, and sometimes in summer once in two or three days. She said, she had seen the fountain dry, and men and flocks, dependent upon it, gathered around and suffering from thirst; when all at once the water would begin to boil up from under the steps, and (as she said) from the bottom in the interior part, and flow off in a copious stream.” [I. p. 342]. [For these reasons Dr. Robinson merely suggests, without expressing a definite conviction himself (I. p. 343), that this Fountain of the Virgin may have been Bethesda, the same with the “King’s Pool” of Nehemiah and the “Solomon’s Pool” of Josephus. T. Tobler, during frequent visits to the Fountain of the Virgin in the winter of 1845, early in the morning and late in the evening, confirms the observations of Robinson as to its intermittent character which bring it into striking resemblance with the Pool of Bethesda. Neander (Leben Jesu, p. 282), and Tholuck (in loc.) are inclined to Robinson’s view Tholuck, who frequently visited the springs of Kissingen in Bavaria, speaks of a gaseous spring of this kind in Kissingen, which after a rushing sound about the same time every day commences to bubble and is most efficacious at the very time the gas is making its escape. Comp. also an article on the miracle of Bethesda by Macdonald, in the Andover Bibliotheca Sacra, for Jan. 1870, pp. 108 ff. According to Wolcot and Tobler, the water of the Fountain of the Virgin and the Pool of Siloam, as well as that of the many fountains of the Mosque of Omar, proceeds from a living spring beneath the altar of the temple. This spring was, as Dean Stanley says, (Sinai and Palestine, new ed., Lond. 1866, p. 181), the treasure of Jerusalem,’ its support through its numerous sieges—the ‘fans perennis aquζ’ of Tacitus (Tac. Hist. v. 12)—the source of Milton’s ‘Brook that flowed Hard by the oracle of God.’ But more than this, it was the image which entered into the very heart of the prophetical idea of Jerusalem. ‘There is a river (a perennial river), the streams whereof shall make glad the city of God, the holy place of the tabernacle of the Most High’ (Psalms 46:4). ‘All my fresh springs shall be in thee’ (Psalms 87:7). ‘Draw water out of the wells of salvation’ (Isaiah 12:3). In Ezekiel’s vision (Ezekiel 47:1-5) the thought is expanded into a vast cataract flowing out through the Temple-rock eastward and west ward into the ravines of Hinnom. and Kedron, till they swell into a mighty river, fertilizing the desert of the Dead Sea. And with still greater distinctness the thought appears again, and for the last time, in the discourse, when in the courts of the Temple, ‘in the last day, that great day of the feast (of Tabernacles), Jesus stood and cried, saying, If any man thirst, let him come unto Me,…out of his belly shall flow rivers of living I water’ (John 7:37-38).”—P. S.] Other hypotheses see in Meyer [who, however, thinks that the exact situation of Bethesda, cannot be fixed with certainty; see p. 219]. What leaves the theory of Robinson in need of further investigation is the assumption that here, contrary to the usual order, the bathing pool or fish pool must have been placed above, and the B spring below on the same fountain stream or flume. This difficulty may be obviated by distinguishing between the point of the spring itself and a bathing pool situated somewhat aside. But the distance of the Fountain of the Virgin from the Sheep Gate invalidates Robinson’s theory. [Or rather it may invalidate the identity of the Sheep Gate with St. Stephen’s Gate, which is of more modern origin.—P. S.] It is more probable that, according to Krafft (Topographie Jerus. p. 176), the now dry Struthion pool in the church of St. Anna was the pool of Bethesda, “To attribute the healing virtue of the water, which, according to Eusebius, was of a red tinge, and was perhaps impregnated with mineral substance, to the sacrificial blood from the temple, and to derive the name from ΰַ ?ωְׁ ?γָ ?ΰ, effusio (Calvin, Arret., and others, after Eusebius), is unfounded, and contrary to John 5:7. The usual interpretation of the name is found even in the Peshito.” (Meyer). “Struthion is an alkali. This alkali, together with particles of iron, mixed with the water, may have given it its red color and medicinal effect.” (Krafft). John 5:3. Blind, lame, withered.—Three kinds of sick folks [τῶνἀσθενούντων] are specified: The blind first; comp. John 9; the lame, those disabled in their limbs; the withered, those who were fallen away, emaciated, consumptive, (comp. Matthew 12:10; Luke 6:6; Luke 6:8). [Also paralytics, as this man was, to judge from his lameness and the κράββατος paralylicorum, Mark 2:4; Acts 9:33.—P. S.] Waiting for the moving of the water.—See the textual note above. On this passage together with the next verse, criticism has four theories: 1. All is spurious; a later interpolation of the popular belief for the explanation of Joh 5:7. This is favored by (a) the omission of the whole locus in B. C.,* 157, 314, and in the Coptic and Sahidic V.; (b) the many variations in the several expressions, see Tischendorf; (c) the many ἅπαξλεγόμενα as κίνησις, ταραχή etc.; (d) the stamp of popular tradition upon the statement; (e) “If the passage were genuine, it would not have been omitted.” Lόcke, Olshausen, Tischendorf, Meyer. [Tregelles, Alford, Westcott and Hort.—P. S.] 2. The whole doubtful passage is genuine, (a) In favor of the close of Joh 5:3, Cod. D., etc.; in favor John 5:4, Cod. A., etc. Tertullian, the Peshito (b) The insertion could not well be accounted for, Baumgarten-Crusius, Brόckner, Lachmann, [Reuss, Lange, Hengstenberg]. 3. The close, of John 5:3, ἑκδεχ.—κίνησιν, is genuine, John 5:4, a later addition. This is favored by (a) the omission in D., where the close of Joh 5:3 remains; (b) the consideration that without this passage John 5:7 would be unintelligible. Ewald, Tholuck, [Godet]. 4. The close of Joh 5:3 is spurious, John 5:4 is genuine; being more strongly supported by A. C.* So Hofmann. It is of great weight, (1) that Tertullian stands so early a witness for the whole text. He ought not to be estimated here according to his realistic view elsewhere, but as reporting a document which was sacred to him. (2) that John 5:7 would be in fact unintelligible without John 5:4. (3) that John 5:4 is more strongly attested than the close of Joh 5:3, particularly by Code A. (4) that the close of Joh 5:3 might have been carried away with John 5:4, when the latter was omitted. (5) that the silence of Origen leaves us to suppose that the Alexandrian school found the passage offensive for its realism. On the other hand John 5:4 cannot be sustained (a) by Hofmann’s doctrine of angels, which makes angels the agents in all second causes, or natural phenomena; (b) by Tholuck’s observation that John himself would no doubt have explained that natural phenomenon, as the Christian and the general religious popular opinion explained it in the second century, especially after what the Apocalypse says of the angel of the waters and of fire (John 16:5; John 14:18). The Revelation, like the book of Daniel, is a symbolical book. The matter is no doubt to be thus explained: According to the Jewish popular conception there was a personal angel who produced the moving of the water. John found the conception and admitted it in his narrative, translating in his own mind the personal angel into a symbolical angel, or a distinct divine operation, i. e., in reference to such facts, for in a higher sphere he well knew the personal angels. He could leave the reader to adjust the passage according to John 1:51.John 5:4. Troubled the water.—According to Wolcott on Arabian substituted for the angel in the fountain of the Virgin “the convolutions of a dragon at the bottom.” Tholuck, p. 161. [The common legend is that a great dragon lies within the intermittent Fountain of the Virgin; when he is awake, he stops the water; but when he sleeps, it flows. See Robinson, I. p. 342; Porter, I., 140.—P. S.] First after the troubling.—The popular religious idea of the periodical moments of healing efficacy in the spring. John 5:5. Thirty-eight years [τριάκοντακαὶὀκτὼἔτηἔχωνἐντῇἀσθενείᾳαὐτοῦ ?].—It is a question whether ἕχων is to be referred to the thirty-eight years, or to ἐντῇἀσθ [that is, whether the exact expression is, he had so many years in his infirmity,=ἔχωντριάμκοντακ. ὁ. ἐ., or had his infirmity for so many years=ἀσθενῶςἕχων], The usage of John is in favor of the former (John 5:6; John 8:57; John 11:17; comp. Lόcke, II. p. 25). He had lived thirty-eight years in his impotency. [He had been sick thirty-eight years—not at Bethesda all that time. The long disease makes the cure appear all the greater. Hengstenberg allegorizes here again, and discovers in the sick man of Bethesda a symbol of the Jewish nation, and in the thirty-eight years of his sickness a symbol of the thirty-eight years which Israel spent under the bane in the wilderness (I. 300 f.). So also Wordsworth in loc.—P. S.] John 5:6. And knew.—Γνούς when He perceived. We cannot venture to assert, with Meyer, that this does not intend supernatural knowledge. A natural medium there might have been; the insight into the whole situation partook of the supernatural. The indefinite πολὺνχρόνον also indicates this. [So also Hengstenberg, Godet and Alford.—P. S.] Desirest thou to be made whole?—Meyer: “The question is asked to excite the attention and expectation of the suffering man. Paulus falsely: The man had been a malicious beggar, who represented himself as sick; wherefore Jesus asked him with reproving emphasis, Desirest thou to be made whole? Art thou in earnest? Similarly Ammon; whereas Lange takes him only for a man of faint will, whose slumbering energy of will Christ here aroused again (?); of which the text gives as little sign, as that the question was intended for the whole people of whom this invalid was a type (Luthardt).”But the following points are clearly implied in the narrative, as Meyer himself must admit: (1) that in this miracle of healing alone an unasked offer occurs, though in John 9. there is an unasked healing (yet every honest beggar virtually asks the greatest possible alms); (2) that, besides, the man always allows himself to be anticipated by all others, though he is still able feebly to walk; (3) that he complains in a feeble manner without point; (4) that he lets his benefactor slip away, without learning his name, or even eagerly asking it, and then, against the Jews, appeals only to the command of Jesus; (5) that he receives from Jesus in the temple a warning, which implied a fickle character; (6) that immediately after his recognition of Jesus he goes to the Jews and gives the name of his miraculous healer, though he must have observed their evil designs. All this is in the test. Yet malevolence properly so called cannot be asserted. His continuance at the pool of Bethesda leads us to recognize in his indolence a spark of spiritual patience; in his helpless and forlorn condition he appears a very peculiar object of sympathy; his visiting the temple seems to bespeak a sense of gratitude; even in his giving of the name of Jesus a mistaken obedience may have had a share; but exegesis cannot make him a valiant confessor. [The question of Jesus, addressed to the cripple’s desire for health, was a proof of sympathy with his sufferings, and kindled a spark of hope when on the brink of despair, and thus naturally prepared the way for his cure.—P. S.] John 5:7. Another goeth flown before me.—Meyer: “The brief motion must be conceived as limited to a particular point of the pool, so that only one at a time can receive the benefit.” But there is nothing of this in the text; and motion in a pool cannot possibly be confined to a particular point, Rather might the stairs have been constructed on the presumption that only one bather would receive healing. In John 5:4 Meyer, without warrant, sees the apocryphal expression of a superstitious popular opinion. [Alford: “The man’s answer implies the popular belief, which the spurious but useful insertion in John 5:3-4 expresses.”—P. S.] John 5:8. Rise, take up thy bed, and walk.—Three words of power in one wonderful work, or even three thunder strokes of the might of the divine healing will, which awaken at once the faint will and the worn-out energy of the deceased man. The words of healing addressed to the paralytic in Matthew 9, are similar indeed, in Mark (John 2) the very same, yet they have here a different import; they are intended to give threefold vividness to the outward visibility of the power of Jesus in proof of His invisible work of grace on the heart of the sufferer. The criticism of Strauss and Weisse, which can make of this story a legendary exaggeration of the healing of that paralytic, shows more than mere indifference to place, time, and circumstances, and all connected with them; it confounds a true heroic faith with the most weak-minded inclination to faith, and a man who causes his friends to break through the roof with a man, who can find no one even to put him into the water. Critical opinions of this sort themselves lie like blind, lame, and withered about the pool of Bethesda. [Against Baur and Hilgenfeld see Meyer, p. 221 f.] John 5:9. And on that day was the Sabbath.—A twofold scruple might arise, one against the healing, another against the carrying. In reference to the healing, the principle universally prevailed: “All danger or preservation of life removes the Sabbath restrictions” (Omne dubium vitζ pellit Sabbatum); though this principle was so encumbered with casuistic distinctions and exceptions that in most cases it was not possible for the laity duly to distinguish the lawful and the unlawful, the forbidden and the allowed (Lόcke, II., p. 29). So too the carrying of articles on the Sabbath is, according to the Talmud, not indeed absolutely forbidden, but was at most allowed only under many restrictions; for one thing it could not be done on the open street (see Tholuck). John 5:10. The Jews.—[Not the people, but those in authority who misrepresented the people in their rejection of Christ]. In such cases the matter goes quickly through fanatics, informers, and subordinates to the chiefs. Here the hierarchical chiefs already seem to speak; according to Meyer and Tholuck, the Sanhedrists. Yet it is possible that the matter only gradually reached them. At first they attack only the man himself for his carrying, which was the most palpable. John 5:11. He that made me whole.—Beyond the word ἐκεῖνος, no trace again of individual energy appears in the answer, nothing but historical statement. Unquestionably the words seem to say: One who made me whole, a wonder-worker, must certainly have had the right to heal me. Hence Meyer: They savor of defiance; Tholuck: The man puts the authority of the Wonder-worker as in John 9:30 against theirs. But the character of the blind man in John 9. is at least an entirely different one from this. That man makes bold to draw inferences, this one does not, and the sentence before us, according to the connection, may be taken as well for an excusing of himself by the strange injunction of the strange man, as for anything else. At all events this man seems not to make head against the Jews. It must be remembered, too, that he could not otherwise designate Jesus, since he did not know His name. John 5:12. Who is the man that?—Not only is the contemptuous expression the Man characteristic, but also the fact that they seem entirely to ignore the miraculous healing itself. [They do not ask: ‘Who is he that healed thee?’ but they carefully bring out the unfavorable side of what had taken place, as malicious persons always do.—Alford.] John 5:13 f. And he that was healed knew not.—Bengel’s apology: “Grabbato ferendo intentus et judaica interpellations districtus,” says less than the rest of the verse itself, for Jesus had withdrawn himself, Meyer incorrectly: He withdrew “when this collision with the Jews arose.” This would be at least a very equivocal course, to forsake one who was attacked on His account; this Jesus never did. He turned aside because a multitude was there, whose demonstrations He wished to avoid; perhaps the treatment of this invalid also required it. John 5:14. Jesus findeth him in the temple.—Chrysostom, Tholuck, Meyer: The healing made a religious impression upon him, Yet the evangelist seems intentionally to imply that this meeting did not immediately follow; he writes μετὰταῦτα, not μετὰτιῦτο. And the address of Christ to him does not indicate a man thoroughly possessed with gratitude. Sin no more, lest, etc.—An unusually earnest injunction upon one whom He had healed, notwithstanding He finds him in the temple. Hence, too, it cannot be supposed that no more is intended here than merely the general connection of sin with evil (Iren. Adv. hζr., v. 15; Bucer, Calov, Neander). This interpretation on the contrary, is no doubt a false application of Joh 9:3. Here a special connection between a particular kind of sin and the particular disease must have existed, according to Chrysostom, Bullinger, Meyer, and others. Neither the special sin nor the special disease is known; which magnifies the penetrating knowledge of the Lord. But a sin which produced disease thirty-eight years before, may be designated in general even in an old man as a sin of youth. Lest something worse befall thee.—Bengel: “Gravius quiddam quam infirmitas 38 annorum.” [Trench: The χεῖροντι “gives us an awful glimpse of the severity of God’s judgments.” Comp. Matthew 12:45. John 5:15. The man departed.—Strictly: Then departed the man; ὁἄνθρωπος. Chrysostom concludes that it was not ingratitude which moved him to this; that he had spoken before the Jews not of carrying his bed, but of that which they cared least to hear: that Jesus had healed him. This apology falls, when we consider his former declaration. There he described the unknown man by the words, He that made me whole. For this reason he now says in giving his information: He that made me whole is Jesus. Meyer explains: the motive is neither malice (Schleiermacher, Lange [incorrect citation; Comp. Leben Jesu, II. p. 769], Paulus, etc.), nor gratitude wishing to get Jesus acknowledged among the Jews (Cyril, Chrysostom), nor obedience to the rulers (Bengel, Lόcke, De Wette, Luthardt), but his authority (Jesus) is to him forthwith higher than that of the Sanhedrists, and he braves them with it. (Thus this man would be a hero, while Nicodemus is supposed to be hampered.) According to Tholuck the man is somewhat stupid and without suspicion of the rulers. Probably he added to weakness of heart and ignorance a fear of the Jews, in which he sought to shield himself from their reproach without perceiving that he might be prejudicing. It is worthy of notice, that they probably let his case drop, while the blind man in chap. 9. they in the end excommunicate; that here in fact they even base upon the statement of this man a process against Jesus. John 5:16. For this cause the Jews persecuted Jesus.—What follows evidently refers to a trial (Lampe, Rosenmόller, Kuiuoel; against Meyer [and Alford]; comp. Luke 21:12, διώκειν used of judicial process), though the terms are so chosen as at the same time to express the continuance of the persecutions after the failure of the process. Probably Jesus was arraigned before the little Sanhedrin. Winer: “There were smaller colleges of this name (Sanhedrin, the little Sanhedrin), consisting of twenty-three counsellors (according to Sanhedrin, 1, 6) in every Palestinean city which numbered more than one hundred and twenty inhabitants; in Jerusalem even two (Sanhedr. 11, 2).” But of these, as also of the courts of three, to which the cognizance and punishment of lighter offences pertained, Josephus knows nothing; whereas he mentions a court of seven (Antiq. iv. 8, 14) in the provincial cities, which always had among its members two from the tribe of Levi (Matthew 5:21; Matthew 10:17). The variations in the form of the little Sanhedrin amount, however, to nothing; enough that it existed. Because he did these things; ταῦτα.—They craftily combine the two charges: (1) the healing of the invalid on the Sabbath, and (2) the commanding him to carry his bed, in the single indictment for breaking the Sabbath in various ways: thus covering the main fact that He had wrought a miracle. Concerning the restriction of healing by the Sabbath regulations of the Pharisees, see above on John 5:9. [On the Sabbath, ἐνσαββάτῳ.—This was the cause of offence and brings out, in connection with John 5:17, the difference between the then prevailing Jewish and the Christian idea of Sabbath observance. The former is negative and slavish, the latter positive and free. The Pharisees scrupulously adhered to the letter of the fourth commandment as far as it forbid any (common) work, and hedged it around with all sorts of hair-splitting distinctions and rabbinical restrictions, but they violated its spirit which demands the positive sanctification of the Sabbath by doing good. The rest of the Sabbath is not the rest of idleness or mere cessation from labor, else God Himself who is always at work (John 5:17), would be a Sabbath-breaker as well as Christ. It is rather rest in God, a rest from ordinary work in order to a higher and holier activity for the glory of God and the good of man. We must cease from our earthly work, that God may do His heavenly work in and through us. The Sabbath law, like the whole law, is truly fulfilled by love to God and love to man. Christ refutes the false conception of Sabbath rest, as a mere cessation from labor, in various ways, now by the example of David eating the show-bread, now by the example of the priests working in the temple, now by the readiness of the Jews to deliver an ox out of a pit on the Sabbath. Here He takes higher ground and claims equality with the Father who never ceases doing good. God’s rest after creation was not a rest of sleep or inaction, but a rest of joy in the completion of His work and of benediction of His creatures. “God blessed the seventh day and sanctified it.” (Genesis 2:3). His strictly creative activity ceased with the Hexaλmeron, but his world-preserving and governing, as well as His redeeming activity continues without interruption, and this is properly His Sabbath, combining the highest action with the deepest repose. In the case of man while on earth abstinence from the distracting multiplicity of secular labor and toil is only the necessary condition for attending to his spiritual interests. Acts of worship and acts of charity are proper works for the Christian Sabbath, and are refreshing rest to body and soul, carrying in themselves their own exceeding great reward. The eternal Sabbath of God’s people will be unbroken rest in worship and love, as Augustine says, at the close of his Civitas Dei: “There we shall rest and see, see and love, love and praise.” Christ never violated the fourth or any other commandment of God, in its true divine meaning and intent, but fulfilled it by doctrine and example (Matthew 5:17). He emancipated us from the slavery of the negative, superstitious and hypocritical sabbatarianism of the Pharisees, and set us an example of the true positive observance of the Sabbath by doing good; the Sabbath being made for man (Mark 2:27), i. e., for his temporal and eternal benefit. This was its purpose when God instituted it, together with the marriage relation, in the state of man’s innocence, and this Christ has restored, as He restored the marriage relation to its original purity. The commentators pass too slightly over this point, and some of them misconstrue Christ’s and Paul’s opposition to the Jewish sabbatarianism of that age into a violation or abrogation of the fourth commandment. Trench, in his work on Miracles, p. 206 (Am. ed.), has some good remarks on John 5:16, which I shall transfer here: “ ‘The Jews,’ not here the multitude, but some among the spiritual heads of the nation, whom it is very noticeable that St. John continually characterizes by this name, (1:19; 7:1; 9:22; 18:12, 14) find fault with the man for carrying his bed in obedience to Christ’s command, their reason being because ‘the same day’ on which the miracle was accomplished ‘was the Sabbath;’ and the carrying of any burden was one of the expressly prohibited works of that by Hero, indeed, they had apparently an Old Testament ground to go upon, and an interpretation of the Mosaic law from the lips of a prophet, to justify their interference, and the offence which they took. But the man’s bearing of his bed was not a work by itself; it was merely the corollary, or indeed the concluding act of his healing, that by which he should make proof himself, and give testimony to others of its reality. It was lawful to heal on the Sabbath day; it was lawful then to do that which was immediately involved in and directly followed on the healing. And here lay ultimately the true controversy between Christ and His adversaries, namely, whether it was most lawful to do good on that day, or to leave it undone (Luke 6:9). Starting from the unlawfulness of leaving good undone, He asserted that He was its true keeper, keeping it as God kept it, with the highest beneficent activity, which in His Father’s case, as in His own, was identical with deepest rest,—and not, as they accused Him of being, its breaker. It was because He Himself had ‘done those things’ (see John 5:16), that the Jews persecuted Him, and not for bidding the man to bear his bed, which was a mere accident and consequence involved in what He himself had wrought.”—P. S.] John 5:17. My Father worketh until now [ἔωςἄρτι “inde a creatione sine intervallo sabbati” Bengel], and I work also.—A difficult answer. It undoubtedly asserts (1) Christ’s exaltation above the Sabbath law, like Mark 2:28; (2) the conformity of His working to the law of the Sabbath, in other words His fulfilling of the Sabbath law, Matthew 12:12; (3) the relation of the working of God to His own working as its pattern, John 5:20; (4) His working out from God and with God, which makes their charge a charge against God Himself, John 5:19. The last idea has special emphasis. According to Strauss the sentence is Alexandrian. [Philo of Alexandria, in his Treatise on the Allegories of the Sacred Laws, chap. vii. says with regard to the institution of the Sabbath after creation: “God never ceases to work (ποιῶνὁθεὸςοὐθέποτεπαύεται), but when He appears to do so, He is only beginning the creation of something else; as being not only the Creator, but also the Father of everything which exists.”—P. S.] But Alexandrianism explained only the law of the Sabbath by the eternal working of God. There is a distinction between the creative work of God at the beginning which originates the world, and looks like human effort, and His subsequent festive working in the created world. This way of God, working on the Sabbath the works of the Spirit, works of relief, and love, in incessant divine agility, as it manifests itself in the objective world, must manifest itself also in the Son. According to Tholuck, modern expositors (Grotius, Lόcke) stop with the idea that human activity is allowed on the Sabbath. We substitute: Divine activity. According to Luthardt the words are uttered with reference to the future Sabbath: First the working of the Father, then that, of the Son, then that of the Holy Spirit. A correct idea, but not here in place, for according to our text the Father and the Son work simultaneously and together. Meyer: “The subject is not the preserving and governing of the world in general, but the continued activity of God for the salvation of mankind in spite of His Sabbath resting after the creation” (Genesis 2:1-3). But this is in fact the work of preserving and governing, providentia. Olshausen and De Wette explain: the working of God is rest and activity together, and so it is in Christ. Meyer on the contrary: of rest and contemplation there is not a word. The subject, however, is a divine working which as such is also repose, combining at once activity and festive contemplation. Grotius: It is a relation of imitation. Meyer denies this, contrary to John 5:19; it is only the necessary correlation of volition and execution. The Father’s having the initiative brings in the element of imitation which by no means exhausts the idea of co-operation (so as to reduce it to a mere working side by side after the same manner, as of one God with another). On Hilgenfeld’s discovery of the demiurge, see Meyer [p. 223 f., 5th ed.]. [Godet compares with this ver. Luke 2:49, and justly remarks that it virtually contains the whole following discourse. It asserts the mysterious union of Christ with God, which Christ had already expressed in His twelfth year to His parents. It is rightly understood by the Jews (John 5:18), though wrongly construed by them into blasphemy, since they saw in Him a mere man. It is at the same time the most triumphant refutation of the charge of Sabbath-breaking. What a sublime apology this! In charging Me, He says to His adversaries, with breaking the law of God, you charge the Law-giver, my Father, with breaking His own law: for my activity continually and in each moment corresponds to His. Owen remarks on this verse: “There is not the shadow of a doubt, that Jesus did here claim, and intended to claim, absolute equality with the Father. What is here most logically inferred, is distinctly stated, John 1:1; Colossians 1:15-17; Hebrews 1:2-3.”—P. S.] John 5:18. The Jews sought the more to kill him, etc.—The one complex charge (of Sabbath-breaking) now becomes two, and the second is the greater. He has ascribed to Himself a singular relation to God. By this He is supposed to have blasphemed God and incurred the death of the blasphemer, Leviticus 24:16 (Bengel: “Id misere pro blasphemed habuerunt”). They had already hated Him unto death on the could not easily under the circumstance make out of the Sabbath-breaking, and in their second charge their real intention becomes also the formula one of finding Him guiltu of death. Hence nunc amplius,to interpret for the μὰλλον [Bengel], is more suitable than the magis of Meyer. Amplius means not only insuper, but also appertius. Tholuck incorrectly: the murderous wish still remains informatta. The matter still depended on the inquisition only in so far as the pretended blasphemy seemed to be not sufficiently established by Christ’s expression: My Father. “The name of father, except in the much disputed passage, Job 34:36, and in Psalms 89:26 where it is descriptive, is not used in the Old Testament as a personal name. In the Apocrypha the individual use of the word first begins to develop itself, Wis 14:3; Sir 23:1; Sir 23:4. Otherwise God is only in the national (theocratic) sense Father of the people, and even in the use of the term in this sense there still appears in the century after Christ a certain reserve, etc. Thus this specific calling of God his Father (comp. ἴδιος, Romans 8:32) must have been very striking in his mouth.” Tholuck. [The Jews correctly understood ὁπατήρμου (instead of ἡμῶν) to assert a peculiar and exclusive fatherhood (πατέραἵδιον, patrem proprium) in relation to Jesus such as no mere man could claim, and a peculiar sonship of Jesus such as raised Him above all the children of God and made Him equal in essence with God. (Comp. the μονογενἠςυἱός of John and the ἵδοιςυἱός of Paul, Romans 8:32). But regarding Jesus as a mere man, and evidently a man in His sound senses, the Jews charged Him with blasphemy. This is inevitable from their premises. The only logical alternative is: Christ was either a blasphemer, or equal with God. Comp. 10:33. Alford remarks: “The Jews understood His words to mean nothing short of peculiar personal Sonship, and thus equality of nature with God. And that this their understanding was the right one, the discourse testifies. All might in one sense, and the Jews did in a closer sense, call God their, or our, Father; but they at once said that the individual use of ‘My Father’ by Jesus had a totally distinct, and in their view a blasphemous meaning: this latter especially, because He thus made God a participator in His crime of breaking the Sabbath. Thus we obtain from the adversaries of the faith a most important statement of one of its highest and holiest doctrines.” Augustine says (Tract. 17): “Ecce intelligunt Judζi, quod non intelligunt Ariani.”—P. S.] John 5:19. The Son can do nothing of himself, but what he seeth the Father doing, etc.—introduced with Verily, verily; thus opening a new truth. He retracts nothing that He has said, but now, that the question of the Messiah comes up, plants Himself on general ground, and speaks alternately now objectively of the Son and the Father, John 5:19-23; John 5:25-29, now subjectively of Himself and the Father, John 5:24; John 5:30-47. By this changing of the grammatical person, with the perfect identity of the real person, so that the objective sentences assert universal Christological relations, and the subjective His relation to the Jewish rulers,—by this master stroke of self-vindication, not noticed by expositors, He sustains His wisdom, without prejudicing in the least the steadfastness of His confession, and He puts their inquisition in the issue utterly to shame (or makes it a mandatum de supersedendo). Luther: “A beautiful excusatio, making the matter worse.” Tholuck: “Jesus strengthens that which gave offence.” But the turn, with which He does this ought not to be overlooked. The time of His unveiled revelation of Himself as the Messiah was the time of His death: this was not yet come. On the different views of the fathers as to the ensuing discussion, whether it presents the revelation of the Father to the Son in the internal trinitarian aspect, or in the economic, see Tholuck, p. 165. Tholuck remarο (p. 97): “In the Gospels, as in Paul, the predicate υἱός is not to be understood of the λὸγοςα1σαρλος, but of the ἕναρλος (Nitzsch, System, § 83; Hofmann, Schriftbeweis, I., p. 173): yet like the Pauline, the Johannean view also regards the Incarnate Word in continuity with the λόγοςἅσαρλος, and hence applies to Him what is said of the former.” It is to be observed that the opposition between eternity and time is not so ,abstractly carried out in the Scriptures, as in scholastic theology. Can do nothing, nothing at all, denotes not only the dependence of the Son on the Father in His working, the negative side of obedience, nor only His imitation of the Father, the formal side of obedience, but also His working at the motion of the Father. The Father is the limit or the law, the Father is the example, and the Father is also the motive, the impulse of His action. The action of the Son is at every point begotten by the action of the Father. The negative side of the obedience of Christ consists in His being unable to do anything of Himself; the positive side consists in His seeing, His intuitive perception of the initiative of the Father (βλέπειν, comp. John 8:38, and ἁφ̓ἑαυτοῦ John 16:13). [Meyer: “In ἀφ’ ἐαυτοῦ we must not find a distinction between the human and the divine will (Beyschlag), nor an indistinct and one-sided reference to the human element in Christ (De Wette), but the whole divine-human subject, the incarnate Logos, with whom there can be no ascitas agendi, no self-determination independent of the Father; otherwise He would be exclusively divine or exclusively human. Hence there is here no contradiction with the Prologue.”—P. S.] [In like manner, ὁμοίως, excludes the idea of imitation and the analogy of master and servant, or teacher and pupil; it points to the equality of the Son with the Father. The Son does the same things with the same power and in the same manner. He is as the Nicene Creed has it, “God of God,” “very God of very God.”—P. S.] The human analogy of the child doing like the father, is here only distantly alluded to; the main thing is the original priority of the Father even in the Trinity, a point which the Greek church rightly asserts, but falsely exaggerates. [A priority of office and dignity, but not of substance, for this is the same in the three Persons of the Trinity.—P.S.] John 5:20. For the Father loveth the Son.—Not merely the ethical foundation of what precedes (Meyer), but more than all the substantial. The term φιλεῖν [which always expresses the affection of love] is more personal or individual [and tender] than the more general ethical term ἀγαπᾶν. This φιλεῖν with respect to the Son not merely proceeds from the eternal relation of the Father to the Son, it is the foundation of this relation itself. And it manifests itself in the Father’s showing the Son all things. The showing of the Father answers to the seeing of the Son. It is the absolute self-revelation of God in His acting, in its teleological working. The Son sees the Father in all His works, and sees what He intends by the works. And the Father shows Him in all things Himself and His works, and therein impels the Son to carry out and finish those works in redemption and judgment. The seer has momentary visions, shown him by the Lord (Revelation 1:1; Revelation 4:1); in Christ the whole view of the world is an insight of the working of God, in which spiritual intuition and sensible vision are one. Christ moves in this living symbolism of the infinite, which in its essential elements the fourth Gospel opens to us; He hears and understands all the words of God, He sees and knows all the signs of God, and His total view of things concentrates itself in the guiding ἐντολή of the interior aim and spirit of His life. And greater works than these will he show him.—[The theme of all that follows to John 5:30. Comp. here the striking parallel, 14:12: “Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that believeth in Me, the works that I do shall he do also; and greater works than these [μείζονατούτων] shall he do; because I go unto the Father.”—P. S.] Tholuck: “Here appears for the first time that use of ἕργα which is peculiar to John’s reports of the discourses of Christ. In John Christ designates as ἕργον, for the fulfilment of which He came, the communication of life to the world (John 4:34; John 17:4); all actual operations for this object he calls ἕργα, such as the miracles (John 10:32; John 10:38; John 15:24; John 9:4), and His ordinary labors for salvation, as here. It is further to be considered that just these ἕργα here named were proofs of the Messiah, for the doctrine of the Messiah and raiser of the dead, in its external positive shell, the people possessed.” The greater works of which Christ here speaks, lie in the same line with the work which Christ has just performed. The fundamental thought is the restoration of a life mortally damaged. This entry is longer than a Bible module can hold. The rest is at https://www.sermonindex.net/commentary/lange/ II The Passover Of The Jews, And The Manna Of The Jews. The Passover Of Christ, And Christ The Manna From Heaven. Miracle Of Feeding In The Wilderness. Miracle Of The Flight And Escape Over The Sea, Wherein Christ Withdraws Himself From The Chiliastic Enthusiasm Of Earthly-Minded Admirers, And Hastens To The Help Of His Disciples. Decisive Declaration Of Christ. Offence Of His Galilean Admirers And Many Of His Disciples At His Refusing To Give Them Bread In The Sense Of Their Chiliasm, And Presenting Himself In His Spirit With His Flesh And Blood As The Bread Of Life. John 6:1-65(John 6:1-15, Pericope for Lζtare Sunday. Parallels: Matthew 14; Mark 6:14-56; Luke 9:7-17; John 6:1-21.) 1.The Miraculous Feeding1After these things Jesus went over the sea of Galilee, which is the sea of Tiberias. 2And a great multitude followed him, because they saw his [the] miracles which he did on them that were diseased. 3And Jesus went up into a [the] mountain, and there he sat with his disciples. 4And the passover, a [the] feast [ἡξορτή] of the Jews, was high. 5When Jesus then lifted up his [the] eyes, and saw a great company come [coming] unto him, he saith unto Philip, Whence shall [are we to] we buy bread 6that these may eat? And [But] this he said to prove him [proving him, πειράζωναὐτόν]: for he himself knew what he would do [was going to do]. Philip answered him, Two hundred penny-worth [denβries’-worth] of bread is not sufficient for them,that every one of them [each one] may take a little. 8One of his disciples, Andrew, Simon Peter’s brother, saith unto him, 9There is a [one] lad here, which [who] 10hath five barley-loaves, and two small fishes: but what are they among so many? And [omit And] Jesus said, Make the men sit [lie] down. Now there was much11grass in the place. So the men sat [lay] down in number about five thousand. And Jesus [therefore] took the loaves: and when he had given thanks, he distributed (to the disciples, and the disciples) to them that were set [were lying]down; and likewise [in like manner] of the fishes, as much as they would [desired]. 12When they were filled, he said unto his disciples, Gather up the fragments that13remain [over], that nothing [may] be lost. Therefore [So] they gathered them together, and filled twelve baskets with the [omit the] fragments of the five barley loaves, which remained over and above unto them that had eaten. 2. The Miraculous Withdrawal Over The Sea14Then those [the] men, when they had seen [seeing] the miracle [sign] that Jesus [he]did, said, This is of a truth [truly, ἀληθῶς] that [the, ὁ ?] Prophet that should come [is coming, or, is to come] into the world. 15When Jesus therefore perceived [Jesus therefore, knowing] that they would come and take him by force, to make him a king, he departed [withdrew] againinto a [the] mountain himself alone. 16And [But]when even was now come [when evening came], his disciples wentdown unto the sea [or, lake] 17and entered into a ship, and went [having entered a ship, they were going] over the sea toward Capernaum. And it was now dark18[darkness had now come on], and Jesus was not [yet] come to them. And the sea arose by reason of a great wind that blew [And as a strong wind was blowing, 19the sea began to rise]. So when [When therefore] they had rowed [in vain] about five and twenty or thirty furlongs, they see [behold] Jesus walking on the sea, and drawing nigh unto the ship: and they were afraid. 20But he saith unto them, It is I; be not afraid. 21Then they willingly received him [they were willing to take him]into the ship: and immediately the ship was at the land whither they went [were going]. 3. Decisive Declaration Of Christ, And Offence Of Many Disciples22The day following, when [omit when]the people which stood on the other side of the sea sawthat there was none [no] other boat there, save that one [but one], whereinto his disciples were entered [omit wherein to his disciples were entered], and that Jesus went not with his disciples into the boat, but that his disciples were gone [went] away alone [so that they for a time supposed that Jesus was still somewhere in their23vicinity]; (Howbeit [And though the disciples had been seen to go away without Jesus] there came other boats [among which they might have returned] from Tiberias nigh unto [near] the place where they did eat [ate the] bread, after that [when] theLord had given thanks:)24When the people therefore saw [at last perceived] that Jesus was not there, neither his disciples, they also took shipping [they themselves entered into the boats] and came to Capernaum, seeking for Jesus. 25And when they had found him on the other side of the sea, they said unto him,Rabbi, when camest thou hither? 26Jesus answered them and said, Verily, verily, I say unto you, Ye seek me, not because ye saw the [omit the] miracles [signs], but because ye did eat [ate] of the loaves, and were filled. 27Labour not [Work not, Busy not yourselves] for the meat [food] which perisheth, but for that meat [the food] which endureth unto everlasting life, which the Son of man shall give [giveth] unto you: for him hath God the Father sealed [for him hath the Father sealed, even God]. 28Then said they unto him, What shall we do, that we might [may] work the works of God? 29Jesus answered and said unto them, This is the work of God, that ye believe on him whom he hath [omit hath] sent. 30They said therefore unto him, What sign showest [doest] thou then, that we may see, and believe thee? whatdost thou work? 31Our fathers did eat [ate] manna in the desert [wilderness]; as it is written, ‘He gave them bread from heaven to eat.’ [Psalms 78:24. 32Then said Jesus unto them, Verily, verily, I say unto you, Moses gave you not that [the] bread from heaven; but my Father giveth you the true bread fromheaven. 33For the bread of God is he [that] which cometh down from heaven, and giveth life unto the world. 34Then said they unto him, Lord, evermore give us this bread. 35AndJesus [therefore] said unto them, I am the bread of life: he that cometh to me, shall never [not]hunger; and he that believeth on me, shall never thirst.36But I said unto you, That ye also [omit also] have [even] seen me, and believe not. 37All that the Father giveth me, shall [will] come to me; and him that comethto me, I will in no wise cast out. 38For I came down [have, or, am come down, καταβέβηκα] from heaven, not to do mine own will, but the will of him that sent me.39And this is the Father’s will which hath sent me [the will of him that sent me],hat of all which he hath given me, I should lose nothing, but should raise it up 40again at the last day. And [For]this is the will of him that sent me [the will of my Father], that every one which seeth [who looketh on] the Son, and believeth on [in] him, may [should] have everlasting life: and I will [and that I should] raise him up at the last day. 41The Jews then [therefore] murmured at him, because he said, I am the bread which came down from heaven. 42And they said, Is not this Jesus, the son of Joseph, whose father and mother we know? how is it then that he saith [how then doth this man say], I came [have come] down from heaven? 43Jesus therefore answered44and said unto them, Murmur not among yourselves. No man [no one] can come to me, except the Father which hath sent [who sent] me draw him: and I will45[shall] raise him up at the last day. It is written in the prophets, ‘And they shall be all taught of God’ (Isaiah 54:13). Every man therefore that hath heard, and hath learned of the Father [or, that heareth from the Father and learneth], cometh unto me. 46Not that any man [one] hath seen the Father, save he which is of God [but he who is from God], he hath seen the Father. 47Verily, verily, I sayunto you, He that believeth on me hath everlasting life. 48I am that [the] bread of life. 49Your fathers did eat [ate the] manna in the wilderness, and are dead [died].50This is the bread which cometh down from heaven, that a man may eat thereof,and not die. 51I am the living bread which came down from heaven: if any man [one] eat of this [of my] bread,he shall live forever: and the bread that I will give is my flesh, which I will give for the life of the world.— 52The Jews therefore strove [contended] among themselves, saying, How can this man give us his flesh to eat? 53Then Jesus said unto them, Verily, verily, I say unto you, Except [Unless] ye eat the flesh of the Son of man, and drink his 54blood, ye have no life in you. Whoso [He that] eateth my flesh, and drinketh my blood, hath eternal life; and I will [shall] raise him up at the last day. 55For my flesh is meat indeed [true food, ἀληθὴςβρῶσις],and my blood is drink indeed 58[true drink, ἀληθὴςπόσις]. He that eateth my flesh, and drinketh my blood,dwelleth in me, and I in him. 57As the living Father hath [omit hath] sent me, and I live by [by reason of, or, because of] the Father: [even] so he that eateth me, evenhe shall live by. [by reason of] me. 58This is that [the] bread which came down from heaven: not as your [the] fathers did eat [ate] manna, and are dead [died]: he that eateth of this bread shall [will] live forever. 59These things said he in the synagogue, as he taught [while teaching] in Capernaum. 60Many therefore of his disciples [themselves], when they heard this, said, This is anhard saying [This saying is hard]; who can hear it? 61When Jesus knew [But Jesus knowing] in himself that his disciples murmured at it [were murmuring at this],62he said unto them, Doth this offend you? What and if ye shall see [What then if ye should behold] the Son of man ascend up [ascending, ἀναβαίνοντα] where he was before? 63It is the Spirit that quickeneth [giveth life]; the flesh profiteth nothing: the words that I speak [have spoken, λελάληκα] unto you, they [omit they] arespirit, and they [omit they] are life. 64But there are some of you that believe not. For Jesus knew from the beginning who they were that believed not, and who 65[it was, τίςἐστιν, that] should betray him. And he said, Therefore said I unto you [For this cause I have told you], that no man can come unto me except it were [be] given unto him of my Father. 1. The Miraculous FeedingE AND See the parallels in Matthew, Mark, and Luke, and the comments in the first two vols. [The double miracle of the feeding of the multitude, and the stilling of the tempest, is the only miracle which John has in common with all the Synoptists (Luke alone omits the stilling of the tempest). But he relates it chiefly as the occasion and basis of a lengthy discourse of Jesus, which is omitted by the other evangelists, and which brings out the symbolical meaning of the miraculous feeding. He represents Himself here as the Bread of Life, as in the 4th chap. He exhibits Himself as the Water of Life. Thousands upon thousands in all ages and countries of the world have satisfied their spiritual hunger by feeding on Him, and yet He remains to this day, and will remain to the end of time the same inexhaustible source of supply. The miraculous feeding bears also a striking resemblance to the miracle of the change of water into wine in chap. 2. The nearness of the typical paschal feast (John 6:4) gives the discourse a bearing on the great paschal sacrifice of the Lamb of God for the life of the world. Chap. 4. develops the national unbelief or false belief in the people of Galilee, as chap. 5 reveals the national unbelief of the leaders in Judea; but both chapters bring out the crisis. Alford says: “In chap. 5 Christ is the Son of God, testified to by the Father, received by faith, rejected by unblief; here He is the Son of Man, the incarnate Life of the World, and the unbelief of the Jews and His own disciples is set in strong contrast with the feeding on Him as the Bread of Life.” But He is this Bread of Life by virtue of His descent from heaven, as the incarnate Son of God, and by sacrificing His flesh and blood, i.e., His whole human life on earth, in holy obedience and atoning suffering for the life of the world. The discourse of the sixth chap. bears the same relation to the Lord’s Supper as the discourse with Nicodemus (chap, 3) does to baptism, i.e., it expresses the general idea which precedes and underlies the sacramental rite as subsequently instituted. See remarks on John 6:27 and the Excursus at the close of the Exeg. Notes.—P. S.] The history of the miracle. The time, place, and essential features are those of the first of the two miraculous feedings which Jesus performed (Matthew 14:13; Mark 6:30; Luke 9:10. See the Comm. on Matt.). The historical connection of it in John is not, as Meyer asserts [p. 249], different from that in the synoptical Gospels. In John the miracle is preceded by a voyage over the sea to the eastern side from the vicinity of Tiberias, and followed by the miraculous walking upon the sea. In Matthew also Jesus “departed by ship into a desert place,” because Herod had executed John and was curious to see Jesus; and the feeding is followed by the walking on the sea. In Mark it is further specified that the sending out of the twelve, in other words Christ’s setting out towards Jerusalem (to the feast of Purim), had occurred shortly before, and that the apostles had just gathered themselves together again to Jesus. The order is exactly the same in Luke, though Luke gives not the walking on the sea.—The single external difference, therefore, in regard to the cause of the voyage is, that John gives the attempts to ensnare Jesus in Jerusalem as the cause of His return to Galilee, and the synoptical Evangelists mention the more immediate occasion of His going over the lake, to wit: Herod’s intention to bring Jesus before him. The two motives are manifestly akin, and might easily coexist. See Com. on Matt., chap. 14. John 6:1. After these things Jesus went away over the sea of Galilee.—[Μετὰταῦτα, i.e., after the transactions related in chap. 5. Christ probably returned to Galilee soon after the feast of Purim (John 5:1), which took place in March, and performed this miracle between the feast of Purim and the next passover, which was celebrated a month later, but which Jesus did not attend for the reason mentioned in John 7:1. He continued in Galilee till the feast of Tabernacles, which occurred in October, and which He attended (John 7:1-2; John 7:10). This gives us seven consecutive months in Galilee during this year, including the last month of the first and six months of the second (or, third, according to the view taken of the ἑορτή in John 5:1, see remarks there) of our Lord’s public ministry. John relates in chap. 6 only the most salient events of this period, and takes much for granted and well understood from other sources.—P. S.] Ἀπῆλθεν is not to be referred, as by Baumgarten and Meyer, to the departure of Jesus from Jerusalem.After the return of Jesus to Galilee, which of course took place very soon after the feast of Purim, since Jesus was no longer safe in Judea, one more circumstance came in, which the synoptical Evangelists record (see Leben Jesu, II. 2, p. 779). Yet Tholuck groundlessly supposes a long intervening ministry in Galilee, because the passover came not long after the feast of Purim, and the passover was now just at hand (John 6:4). Meyer disputes the view of Brόckner and earlier interpreters, that the ἀπῆλθεν must be referred to some place in Galilee, and the view of Paulus, that the genitive,τῆςΤιβερ., indicates that He crossed the sea from Tiberias; following John 5:1, the phrase must amount to: ἀπολιπὼνΙεροσόυμαἦλθεπέραν. This is undoubtedly right so far as it represents the crossing of the sea as occasioned by the experiences in Jerusalem; and John also calls the sea of Galilee in John 21:1, θάλασατῆςΤιβεριάδος, after the manner of the Greeks (λίμνηΤιβερίς, Pausan. v. 7, 3). But in the verse before us the first designation, τῆςΤαλλαίας, certainly was not necessary in addition to the second; for any one would understand the second, though it differed from the expression of the synoptical Evangelists (Matthew 4:18). The second designation, therefore, must be taken as an additional specification. Thus large seas often have particular names from particular districts on their coasts; the Bodensee is also the Lake of Constance, and the Vierwaldstδtter See, or Lake of the Four Forest Cantons, the Lake of Lucerne. After all is said, the Evangelist of course does not intend to make the Lord embark at Jerusalem. And the interest which Herod Antipas was just now taking in the appearance of Christ, and the Lord’s own rapid escape, as well as the straggling ships from Tiberias mentioned immediately after (John 6:23), imply that Christ embarked from the part of the coast about Tiberias. Respecting the lake, see note on Matthew 4:18.We must further consider that if Jesus, returning from Jerusalem, wished to pass as soon as possible over the sea, He must rather sail from the region of Tiberias, than from Capernaum. Respecting the eastern coast (Matt. chap. 14) comp. von Raumer’s Palδstina, p. 60 and 205 sqq. “The ancient Bashan, about the time of Christ, embraced five provinces: Gaulanitis, Trachonitis, Auranitis, Batanζa, and Iturζa. Gaulanitis corresponded nearly to the present Tsholan, and lay between the upper Jordan, the sea of Tiberias, and the lower Mandhur.” The eastern shores of the sea (chalk, interspersed with basalt) rise to a height of from eight hundred to a thousand feet, and spread into a table-land cut up with wadys; the western mountains are about half as high. The eastern coast was an asylum for the Lord on account of its solitude, and on account of its being under the jurisdiction of Philip, a son of Herod the Great, and a mild prince, who after his father’s death had become tetrarch of Batenζa, Gaulanitis, Trachonitis, and Paneas. He died childless at Julias, A. D. 34, and his dominions were attached to the province of Syria (not to be confounded with the Philip whose wife Herodias was married to Herod Antipas; see on Matt. chap. 14.) Tiberias.—A city in Galilee, and in the most beautiful part of it, on the western shore of the lake, south of the middle, oil a narrow plain (Joseph. Antiq. xix. 8, 1; xviii. 2, 3), a then modern, Herodian city of Palestine, adorned with a royal palace and a race-course, inhabited mostly by heathens, named by Herod Antipas in honor of the emperor Tiberius. Herod seems to have usually resided here; and this, according to Bachiene, was the reason why Jesus never visited this city. From Herod Antipas to the accession of Herod Agrippa II., it was the capital of the province. Fishing and lake transportation were the chief employment of the inhabitants. After the dissolution of the Jewish state, for several centuries, it was the seat of a renowned Jewish school (Lightfoot), and one of the four sacred cities of the Jews. In the vicinity, at the village of Emmaus, were warm baths (sulphur, salt, iron; medicinal). Some, without sufficient reason, identify the place with Cinneroth (Joshua 19:35, belonging to the tribe of Naphtali), with Hammath (Ibid.), and with Rakkath (Ibid.). Now Tabaria, with about three thousand inhabitants, Jews. An earthquake in the year 1837. See Von Schubert III, 233, Robinson III, 500. [Boston ed. of 1856, vol. II, 380–394. Robinson describes the present town, called in Arabic Tϋbarξyeh, as “the most mean and miserable place” in Palestine, “a picture of disgusting filth and frightful wretchedness.” It suffered much from an earthquake in 1837, when about 700 persons died out of a population of 2500.—P. S.] John 6:2. And a great multitude followed him.—It seems not to be a multitude which has just now gathered (ἠκολούθει); it possibly consisted in part of the remnants of the Galilean caravan returning from the feast of Purim, but certainly for the most part of the beginnings of the Passover caravan; without doubt Galileans. Many might have attached themselves to the returning disciples, who also wrought miracles. Yet the text implies that new miracles of the Lord, performed on the western shore, were the particular attraction. John 6:3. Into the mountain.—This standing phrase is accounted for (1) by the character of the Palestinian landscape, affording every where heights on which Christ could withdraw from intercourse with the people in the plain; (2) by the Lord’s habit of retiring upon a mountain; (3) by a symbolical view which has insensibly connected itself with this habit: taking the solitude of a high mountain for the stillness of prayer. The region is more particularly stated by Luke (John 9:10); it was near the eastern Bethsaida in Gaulanitis. John 6:4. And the passover, the feast of the Jews, was nigh.—The feast, i.e, the principal feast. The passover of the same year, 782. Lόcke groundlessly supposes that Jesus attended this feast. The absence from the principal feasts was nothing inconceivable, as may be inferred from the questions in John 7:11; John 11:56. (Paulus, contrary to the usage of the language, John 2:13; John 12:2., etc., renders: not long past.) [The nearness of the passover accounts for the multitude of people ready for a journey to Jerusalem, and suggested in part the subject of the following discourse on the sacrifice of Christ’s life for the life of the world, which was typically foreshadowed in the Jewish passover.—P. S.] John 6:5. A great company come unto him.—Meyer: “It was a new company [pilgrims to the festival], not that of Joh 6:2, which had followed Him on His way to the sea.” The contrary is plainly stated by the synoptical Gospels, Matthew 14:13; Mark 6:33; Luke 9:11. According to Lampe, Bruno Bauer, Baur, and Luthardt [Hengstenberg], the subsequent discourse of Jesus concerning the eating of His blood relates to the passover, and reveals the antitype of that type. Meyer disputes this, because the discourse lacks the slightest hint of it. Some hint, however, lies in the very choice of the striking terms and in the subsequent words of institution. To Philip.—To this disciple the question must have been a peculiar test. See the note on John 1:45. It is possible, however, that Philip was the one who first solicited the Lord to send the people away, Matthew 14:15.—According to Bengel, Philip had charge of the res alimentaria. Meyer urges against this that Judas was the treasurer [John 13:29], which is not a sufficient reason; with better reason he refers also to the individuality of Philip, as exhibited in John 14:8, which, however, he calls verstandesmδssig [jejune and calculating, and somewhat skeptical, like Thomas. Chrysostom also infers from John 19:8, that Philip was weaker in faith or tardier in spiritual apprehension than the rest. Alford takes the circumstance as simple matter of fact, implying perhaps that he was nearest the Lord, at the moment .—P. S.] John’s omission of the circumstance that Jesus had previously been teaching this multitude and healing their sick (see on Matt.), making the Lord ask immediately: “Whence shall we buy bread [ἀγοράσωμεν, conjunct. deliberat.]?” is of course only an abridgment of the history sustained by many examples (see John 6:1; Lόcke, Neander), not a difference, as Meyer holds, nor a sign of defective testimony, according to Baur. By the circumstance that Andrew had already made the acquaintance of a baker’s errand boy, or bread vender in the caravan, John himself indicates that the scene did not occur abruptly. Also by the aorists. [John represents the Lord as first suggesting the question how to feed the multitude; the Synoptists relate that the disciples came to the Lord and asked Him to dismiss the multitude from this desert place into the villages where they might buy themselves food. John’s narrative is abridged. But in every important point the agreement is complete. See the remarks of Alford in loc.—P. S.] John 6:6. To prove him.—Plainly a test of faith; which Meyer without reason denies, and then himself confirms; Philip must be more ready to experience the power of faith. But it was also a test of love which the disciples stood bitter than the test of faith. [For he himself knew.—Jesus did not need the counsel of Philip.—P. S.] John 6:7. Two hundred denaries’ worth.—A hundred denβries were equivalent to about fourteen dollars and a half. Comp. on Mark 6:37. Grotius supposes, this was the contents of the treasury. John represents it as the prompt calculation of the quick-minded Philip. The representation in Mark is not inconsistent with this; yet seems to imply that the disciples are ready to apply all their fund to the feeding of the people. Yet, according to Philip, even the high estimate of two hundred denβries would not suffice. John 6:8. Andrew … saith unto him.—Here again, as in John 12:22, Andrew appears near Philip and in like manner in an act of friendly interest and assistance.—Andrew seems to be a master in mediation and advice, John 1:40 sqq., and John 12:22. On that other occasion also he supplements Philip. But why is it said: “One of His disciples?” Wassenbergh considers the apparently superfluous and disturbing words to be a gloss. But John intends to mark that it was one of the disciples who first, though with trembling heart, directed his eye to that little store with which Jesus wrought the miracle. John 6:9. There in one here. ΙΙαιδάριονἕν. One little boy; one young slave; one little apprentice. The last, most likely a bread vender or sutler accompanying the caravan. The sense is: there is only one little trader here, and he has only so much. Barley-loaves.—The food of the poorer classes. Tr. Pesachim [fol. III. 2]: “Rabbi Johannan said the barley is fine. He was answered: say this to horses and asses [nuntia hoc equis et asinis].” Two small fishes.—O̓ψάριον [Lat. opsonium], a diminutive of ὅψον [from ὀπτάω, or ἔψω, to cook, to roast], any thing cooked or roasted, to go as a relish with bread (προσφάγιον): generally fish [little fish], as here. [Of later Greek usage. In the New Testament ὀψάριον is peculiar to John who employs it five times (John 6:9; John 6:11; John 20:9-10; John 20:13). The Synoptists use here the word ἰχθύες.—P. S.] John 6:10. Much grass in the place.—A mark of the eastern spring about the time of the passover. [After the rainy season.]—The men. Constituting, no doubt, according to the idea of the festival caravans, the great mass. They appear here as heads of families, around whom in many cases women and children were grouped. [οἱἅνδρες, a touch of accuracy; the men alone were arranged in companies and numbered, while the women and children were served promiscuously. (See Meyer and Alford in loc.) According to Mark the multitude reclined on the green pasture ground by parties or in groups of hundreds and fifties. They probably formed two semicircles, an outer semicircle of 30 hundreds, and an inner semicircle of 40 fifties. A wise symmetrical arrangement for the easy and just distribution of the food.—P. S.] John 6:11. Given thanks.—Matthew 14:19. According to the best authorities, the distribution by the disciples, which is in the Textus Rec. supplied here from Matthew, is left by John to be supposed. See the Textual Note. [Εὐχαριστήσας, for which the other Evangelists use εὐλογεῖν, is in accordance with the blessing or grace of the father of a Jewish family at meals, and has here a special bearing on the miracle. John describes the distribution (διέδωκετοῖςἀνακειμένοις) as being the act of Christ, without, however, excluding the intervention of the disciples as mentioned by Matthew, Mark and Luke. John 6:11 is the place for the miracle, but the exact moment and manner of its performance eludes the grasp of the senses. It must have taken place immediately after the prayer of Christ as He distributed the bread through the apostles to the eaters. The evangelists show their good sense in omitting a description of what is indescribable. Augustine’s and Olshausen’s ingenious idea of a divinely hastened process of nature (to which must be added an accelerated process of art, or the combined labors of the reaper, miller and baker, by which wheat or barley is changed into bread) does not help the understanding of the matter, and has only the value of an analogy. We cannot conceive, philosophically, of supernaturally, yet visibly growing loaves, and of supernaturally growing or multiplying fishes. A miracle, like the primitive creation, can only be apprehended by faith, which, is the organ of the supernatural. It is, indeed, not a strictly creative act by which things non-existing are called into existence, for a miracle is always performed on matter already existing, but it is as great and difficult as a creative act, and is produced by the same divine power which, in one case, originates nature, and, in the other, acts from above and beyond nature upon (not against) nature. Comp. my notes on the miracle at Cana, chap. 2, pp. 106 f., 109 f., and the notes on Matthew pp. 267.—P. S.] John 6:12. The gathering of the fragments here appears as directed by the Lord. [A lesson of economy, which is consistent with the greatest liberality. “Make all you can, sate all you can, give all you can.” κλάσμαα (from κλάω, to break, as fragments from frango), broken pieces, not crumbs. More fragments were left than the original supply of five loaves, which would not have filled five baskets.—P. S.] John 6:13. Filled twelve baskets with the fragments.—[Probable reference to the twelve apostles, each of whom gathered the fragments and brought his basket full. Basket, the ordinary furniture of a travelling Jew for carrying his food. Some commentators refer the number to the twelve tribes of Israel as the type of the church which is fed by the bread of life to, the end of time.—P. S.] Meyer urges that the twelve baskets were filled only with the fragments of the bread, and adds: Mark 6:43, states otherwise. Yet he would conceive the miracle only as a creative act, which operates here on quantity, as it operated on quality in the changing of the water into wine. AND ETHICAL1. On the miracle and the different explanations of it, see the Com. on Matt., chap. 14. [Am. ed., pp. 266, 268, where the rationalistic, the mythical, the symbolic, and the orthodox views of the miracle are fully noticed. Comp. also my remarks on John 6:11 (p. 210), and Prof. van Oosterzee in the Com. on Luke, p. 146.—P. S.] Not simply “a miracle of satisfying would Lange consider it,” as Tholuck inaccurately states. [Dr. Lange admits an actual increase of the substance and nourishing quality of the bread by a power which went forth from the Logos, but assumes at the same time a modal or mystic medium in a corresponding moral and religious disposition awakened by Christ among the eaters, so that it was a heavenly feast of the soul as well as a literal meal for the body. See his remarks below, and in Matthew, p. 267, also his Leben Jesu, III. p. 786, where he says: “Christ fed the people with His bread, His faith, His divine power and the blessing of His love.”—P. S.] Meyer: “A creative act.” But we have here, by all means, a miracle of the Son, the Redeemer, not an absolutely creative act [ex nihilo]. If we know what creative is, we also know that all the days of creation were applied to it, till there was first the herb, not to say bread; therefore (1) a miracle of the increase of force in the element of divine power; then (2) of the increase of substance in the element of love; the whole being (3) a miracle of the heavenly kingdom, in which one fares very ill if he leaves the heart out of account. 2. In John this miracle gains a peculiar significance from its relation to the miracle of the turning of water into wine. Wine and bread. It receives further light from the history which follows. [3. The miracle of the miraculous feeding an illustration of the truth that Christ is the bread of eternal life to His people in the “desert place” of this world, on their journey to the “feast” of the heavenly Jerusalem. In this spiritual sense the miracle is continued from day to day. On its relation to the Lord’s Supper, see the Excursus at the close of the Exegesis of this passage.—P. S.] AND See the Com. on Matthew, Mark, and Luke, on this passage. Jesus hastens from the tribunal of the Jews away beyond the sea into the mountain of God.—So the pious heart has a right to betake itself, from the pain which legalistic jealousy has ready for it in human schools and temples, to the great temple of God. (But to find refuge and elevation in nature is one thing, and to run wild in nature is another.)—Over the sea and upon the mountain: the great, bold course of Christ: In His life; in history; in the leading of His people.—The passover-feast, the passover-journey, and the passover-sermon of Christ before the passover of the Jews; the Lord ever in advance of His people. (The whole chapter.)—The trial of Philip’s faith.—What he saw, and what he did not see.—The character of Philip.—The arithmetic of Philip and the arithmetic of the Lord.—In the reckoning of men there is always a deficit, in the reckoning of Christ there is always a surplus.—How the Lord has led His apostles to interest themselves even in the bodily wants of men.—How He has trained His ministers and messengers to care also for the poor and sick.—The sentiment of Andrew, compared with the sentiment of Philip. (The one would begin with much, the other seems at least inclined to begin with little.)—How in a Christian consultation we gradually come nearer the right.—The little bread vender; Christ founds His great miracle on a small, every day incident.—“Make the men sit (lie) down:” a word of perpetual application.—When once a Christian people sit down together in peace and quietness, then the Lord works His wonders.—So He still works His miracle when the people sit down at His bidding (in the church, at the holy Supper, etc.).—Christ’s giving of thanks, the seal of His confidence.—The wonder-working table-blessing of Christ.—The divine miracles of faith at the supper in the desert.—The miraculous feeding; miraculous 1, in the sitting down of the people at the bidding of Christ; 2, in the thanksgiving of Christ before the feeding; 3, in the distribution and breaking of the bread according to the appetite of all; 4, in the satisfaction of all; 5, in the surplus (more at the end than at the beginning).—Even the superfluity of God we should carefully economize.—The effect of the miraculous feeding on those who were fed: 1. Their true interpretation (that this is that Prophet, i.e., the Messiah); 2, their false application of it (desiring to make Him a king to their mind).—The Lord must withdraw Himself as often from the homage of men, as from their persecution.—Christ escaped to the mountain, and He alone: 1, the humble One, who offers up to the Father His miracle-working blessing; 2, the self-possessed One, whom no fanaticism of men excites; 3, the exalted One, above the ambition of the world; 4, the holy One, who mingles not His affairs with human doings.—“They would make him a king:” in the midst of this temptation, in which nobles fall by thousands, He stands erect, because He is the King. Starke: Hedinger: God uses all sorts of means, most rarely curiosity, for the conversion of sinners.—The nearer a feast, the more the children of God seek to dress their hearts for Him; they keep the feast in honor of Him.—Jesus is so high that He can overlook all His children, and can know what each one wants.—Cramer: The Lord cares for all, and is kind even to the unthankful.—Nova Bibl. Tub.: It is the weakness of our unbelieving heart, that, in our necessities, we always consider only their greatness and the slenderness of the means of relief, and not the infinite wisdom, power, and goodness of God. If we have possessions, we have heart; but lack of money brings lack of faith.—Quesnel: We sin as well when we think that God will pass by the ordinary means of His providence as when we limit the providence of God to outward means.—Zeisius: Christ can make bread in the desert, and abundance in want.—Canstein: Whenever we eat, we ought to pray and thank God.—Cramer: Every creature, and therefore food, is sanctified by prayer and the word of God, 1 Timothy 4:5.—Happy are those ministers of the word who receive from the Lord what they deliver to their hearers.—He to whom God in trusts temporal blessings, should not keep them to himself, but share them with others.—To eat and be filled, is the blessing of God; and to eat and not be filled, is His curse, Hag. 1:16.—Osiander: The common mass is unintelligent; now it will exalt one to heaven, and soon after it will thrust the same one down to hell. Let no one intrust himself to the favor of the multitude.—Hedinger: In the beginning of illumination, in the first glow, a man usually falls to extravagant undertakings, not according to the rule of divine prudence.—Zeisius: Flee, according to the example of thy Saviour, from that which the world, with its carnal mind, holds high, and seek that which is above.—Gossner: Jesus purposely caused the bread to pass through the hands of the disciples, that they might grasp it in their hands, who in their unbelief had seen it to be too little. Braune: The creative power of God which every year makes much grow from little, the harvest from the seed, even to superabundance, here also works. As it wrought in the beginning of the world, and works yearly in secret, here it comes forth openly.—The gathering frugality, which saves at the right time, belongs to the art of beneficence.—Jesus is the Redeemer from the sin which man loves, from the devil in whom man does not believe, from the death of which man does not think, from the hell which man does not fear; therefore He is not a Redeemer for all. Were He but a Redeemer from hunger and from labor for a living (by means of material abundance), then He would be acceptable to all. The people wished to make Him a king; He was to be their work; they wished to have their hand in everything, even where they did not understand, and nothing should have honor which they did not give,—not even Jesus, the Prophet, the Messiah.—Lisco: Philip and Andrew both looked at the visible; the one at the insufficient money, the other at the insufficient food. Heubner: The power of Jesus to draw men to Himself. The power to do good draws more than the power to punish.—Unbelief everywhere looks at the small means and the feeble power. But God can accomplish much with little.—The purpose and the wonderful help of God are ever revealing themselves to the astonishment and shame of unbelief.—Jesus has regard for order and division, by means of orderly arrangement the multitude was easily viewed. So everywhere in the kingdom of God. Men are divided, every one in his place.—In the hand of Jesus everything becomes blessing.—The disciples were hodmen of Jesus; and so are we.—To cover political plans under the cloak of religion, is scandalous abuse of religion.—The Christian should strive to keep clear of worldly distinction. John 6:1-15, the pericope for Lζtare Sunday. How Jesus performs His miracles: 1. With holy design. 2. In love, only to relieve the actual stress of want and suffering. 3. With divine power. 4. With quietness and dignity. 5. With earnest precaution. Schleiermacher: The Lord even feeds and nourishes those who truly gather round Him.—Draeseke: It is not we that make Him king, but He that makes us kings, because citizens in His kingdom.—Reinhard; Thoughts on the constancy with which Jesus holds to the great end of His life.—Marheineke: The Christian insolitude.—Greiling: We should learn from Jesus to do much with little.—Schultz: On the earthly blessing which God diffuses among men. Schuderoff: The earthly mind always miscalculates.—Lisco: The gospel for the day, a history of the feeding, seems to have been appointed for this Sunday not so much on account of the incidental remark that “the passover, a feast of the Jews, was nigh,” as because Jesus was called by the people, whom He had miraculously fed, “the Prophet that should come into the world;” for it is plainly the design of the last three Sundays of Lent to hold before us the threefold office of our Mediator, the suffering Jesus, as Christ: Prophet, Priest, and King.—Ibid: In Christ is full satisfaction for us.—The behaviour of Jesus towards weak and insincere friends: 1. He condescended to the necessities of their weakness. 2. He avoided their well-meant, but impure homage.—Bachmann: How urgently the Lenten season invites us take the bread of life.—Ahlfeld: The Lord makes everything come out gloriously: (1) Where man is at his wits’ end, (2) God goes right on.—Kraussold: Our daily bread a guide-board to heaven—Ibid.: How faithfully the Lord cares for His people.—Rautenberg: The eating of the bread from heaven: (1) How it is performed; (2) how much it includes.—Ibid.: Christ’s kingdom is not of this world: This (1) brings Him suffering in this world; (2) draws my heart from this world; (3) remains my comfort, when all things fail—Harless: The need, which receives the blessing of the Lord: 1. The need. 2. The testing. 3. The confirming. 4. The blessing.—Rautenberg: The miracle at the table of the Lord: 1. The love which prepares the table. 2. The food which it offers. 3. The satisfaction which it gives.—Jaspis: Jesus, ever the helper of the poor.—J. J. Rambach: The victory of faith in the exigencies of life.—Ahlfeld: How goes it with the Christian who goes with Christ? 1. He cleaves to his Lord, and forsakes Him not. 2. The Lord may hide from him His face for the time, till 3. He at last breaks to him the bread of grace.—Wiesmann: The miraculous feeding shows us that Christ has for His people: (1) A warm heart; (2) a clear eye; (3) an open hand.—See the next section. [Hilary: There is no catching by eye or touch the miraculous operation; it only remains for us to believe that God can do all things (consistent with His nature and character).—Augustine [Tract. in Joh. 24; Serm. 130, 1): Christ multiplied in His hands the five loaves, just as He produces harvest out of a few grains: there was a power in His hands; and those five loaves were seeds, not indeed committed to earth, but multiplied by Him who made the earth. (The same idea is revived by Olshausen, but the comparison is only serviceable as a remote analogy. See the Exegesis.)—Trench: Here is a miracle of creative accretion, by which Christ proclaimed Himself the bread of the world, the inexhausted and inexhaustible source of all life for the spiritual needs of hungering souls in all ages.—The twelve baskets, an apt symbol of Divine love which after all its out-goings upon others, abides itself far richer. Comp. 2 Kings 4:1-7; Proverbs 11:24 : “There is that scattereth, and yet increaseth.”—Analogies of this miracle: the manna in the wilderness; the multiplying of the widow’s cruse of oil and her barrel of meal by Elijah, 1 Kings 17:16; Elisha satisfying a hundred men with twenty loaves of barley, 2 Kings 4:42-44.—Ryle: Learn from this miracle: 1) Christ’s almighty power; 2) a lesson about the office of ministers—to receive humbly and to distribute faithfully what Christ provides and blesses; 3) the sufficiency of the gospel for the wants of mankind.—P. S.] Footnotes: John 6:2.—[Two readings, but the same sense, ἐθεώρουν and ἑώρων. john uses ὁρᾶν only in the perfect. See Tischend. and the crit. Note of Meyer.—P.S.] John 6:2.—αὐτοῦ is wanting in the principal MSS. John 6:5.—The subjunctive aorist ἀγοράσωμεν [instead of the indicative future of the Recepta, ἀγοράσομεν is established by A. B. D. [Cod. Sin.], etc.John 6:7.—[διακοσίωνδηναρίωνἄρτοι. Denarius is a Roman silver coin, at first equal to ten asses (hence the name), afterwards increased to sixteen, and equivalent to the Greek drachm. From the parable of the laborers in the vineyard it would seem that a denarius was then the ordinary pay for a day’s labor, Matthew 20:2. Its value was about equal to 7 English pence, or 15 American cents. The E. V. should have retained the Latin term, as the Evangelists did in Greek, or it should have rendered it shilling, rather than penny, which is too far below the value.—P. S.] John 6:7.—[The rec. inserts αὐτῶν after ἕκαστος. Omitted by ΰ. A. B. L., and the recent edd.—P. S.] John 6:9.—The ἕν [of the Recepta: a single lad], omitted by B. D. L., might have more easily dropped out [after the preceding παιδάρι—ον] than crept in. It is wanting also in the Cod. Sin., thrown cut b4 Tischend., bracketed by Lachm. and Alford.—P. S.] John 6:10.—[The rec. inserts δέ after εἶπεν, without good authority.—P. S.] John 6:10.—[The verbs ἀναπίπτω (f. ἀναπεσοῦμαι, aor. 2. ἀνέπεσον) and ἀνάκειμαι signify in the N. T. the ancient custom of reclining at table, upon the couch or triclinium, which was usually higher than the low table. The English equivalent is to sit at table or at meat. In this case they lay upon the ground. Mark and Luke describe the manner. See Mark 6:39-40.—P. S.] John 6:11.—[οὖν, therefore, is much better supported than δέ of the text. rec., and is adopted by Lachm., Tischend., Alf. (Lange, in his version, follows here the text. rec., but usually the readings of Lachm. Probably an oversight.)—P. S.] John 6:11.—The words: “the disciples, and the disciples to” [τοῖςμαθηταῖς, οἱδέμαθηταί, text. rec]. are wanting in A. B. L. [and in the Cod. Sin.], etc., and in almost all the Versions. They have been supplied from Matthew 14:19. John 6:14.—[The text. rec. inserts ὁἸησοῦς after σημεῖον,—beginning a church lesson, omitted by the critical editors.—P. S.] John 6:15.—Πάλιν (omitted by Tischendorf), with reference to John 6:3, is sufficiently supported by A. B. D. [In the 8th crit. ed., Tischendorf has restored πάλιν, probably influenced by Cod. Sin. He also now reads φεύγει instead of the usual ἀνεχώρησεν with the remark that the latter is a correction from Matthew, and φεύγει was thrown out as not being consistent with the dignity of Jesus. Certe φεύγει alienissimum est a correctors.—P. S.] John 6:16.—[Dr. Lange puts a period here, and several editions of the Greek a semicolon, instead of the comma of the Recepta.—E. D. Y.] John 6:17.—The reading οὔπω, not yet, in B. D. L., etc., and in the Versions and the fathers [and Cod. Sin., instead of the οὐκ of the rec. adopted] by Lachmann [Tischend., Alf.], is hardly an explanatory gloss (Meyer), but was more probably dropped on account of its difficulty. See the Exegesis. John 6:21.—[Cod. Sin. reads ἦλθον for ἤθελον. See the Exeget. Notes.—P. S.] John 6:22.—[This “when” is simply an anticipation of the ὅτε at the beginning of Joh 6:24. It is the English Version’s solution of the grammatical difficulty of the whole sentence, John 6:22-24. The Vulgate and Luther avoid the difficulty by following the reading εἶδον or εἶδεν, instead of the participle ἰδὼν (see below). Lange’s ingenious construction I have not attempted to represent in the text. It will be found in full in the Exegesis. But the substance of it may be carried along in the very words of the English Version, as I have indicated.—E. D. Y.] Ibid.—Cod. A. [B. L.], Chrysostom, the Versions, Lachmann [Tischend., Alf.] read εἶδον; D. [ΰ.]: εἶδεν. A grammatical conjecture. [Meyer defends the text, rec. ίδών, and says that the definite tense was inserted to ease the grammatical structure.—P. S.] Ibid.—The words ἐκεῖνοεἰςὁἐνέβησανοἱμαθηταὶαὐτοῦ [text. rec. ΰ.* D.] are wanting in A. B. L., the Vulgate and the Itala, and appear as an elucidation with many variations. [Omitted by Lachm., Tischend., Alf.] John 6:23.—[The parenthesis of this verse in the Text. Rec. is removed by Dr. Lange, or rather is extended to the whole passage from ὁἑστηκώςπέραντ. θ., John 6:22, to the end of Joh 6:23. See his construction in the Exegesis. Meyer entirely obliterates the parenthesis.—E. D. Y.] John 6:24.—The καὶ before αὐτοί is lacking in the best MSS. [and in Cod. Sin.]. Ibid.—[ Αὐτοὶ ?]. John 6:27.—[For the future δώσει Cod. ΰ. D. Syr., Chrys. and Tischend. (ed. 8) read the present δίδωσιν—P. S.]. John 6:35.—[Text. rec. inserts οέ, and, after εἶπεν, ΰ, D. Tischend. οὖν. Omitted by B. L. T., Alf.—P. S.] John 6:35.—[The E. V. connects πώποτε with οὐμὴπεινάση as well as with οὐμὴδιψήσει.—P. S.] John 6:36.—The με, wanting in Cod. A., bracketed by Lachmann, is sufficiently attested. [It is wanting in the Cod. Sin., and omitted by Tischend., but retained by Afford. Lange translates καί in this verse correctly sogar, even.—P. S.] John 6:39.—According to the best Codd. πατρός is an addition. [In the Cod. Sin. the whole clause Τοῦτο—πατρός is wanting (homζotel.)—E. D. Y.] John 6:40.—Γάρ, according to A. B. C., etc. [and Cod. Sin.], instead of the δέ of the Recepta. Ibid.—Most Codd., B. C. D. [Cod. Sin.], etc., Clement and other fathers, and some versions read πατρόςμου, instead of the πέμψαντόςμε. A third reading, M. Δ., etc., πέμψαντοςπατρός, aims to adjust the two. The text. rec. comes from John 6:39. John 6:42.—The second οὖτος has several MSS. against it, but could have more easily dropped out than crept in. [The Cod. Sin. has the οὖτος, and reads: οὖτοςλέγει’ Ἐγώἐκ, instead of the text. Rec.: λέγειοὐτος’ “Οτιἐκ’—E. D. Y.] John 6:45.—Οὖν, therefore, after πᾶς is not sufficiently supported. Ibid.—The readings ἀκούσας and ἀκούων are both strongly attested; the former somewhat the more strongly, while the latter is favored by the probability that the tense of μαθών following would react. [The Cod. Sin. has ἀκούσας.—E. D. Y.] John 6:47.—[The words εἰςἐμέ are omitted by ΰ. B. and other ancient MSS., and by Tischend., but inserted by other MSS. and the Versions, and retained by Lachm., bracketed by Alf.—P. S.] John 6:51.—[Tischend., ed. viii., reads with Cod. Sin., etc., ἐκτοῦἐμοῦἄρτου (Hil. ex meo pane; Cypr. de meo pane), instead of ἐκτούτουτοῦἄρτου with B. C. L. The latter looks like a correction.—P. S.] John 6:51.—On the omission of these words: which I will give,—in Codd. B. C. L. D., etc., see the Exegesis. [In the Cod. Sin. the whole clause: ἣνἐγὼ ?—κόσμουζωῆς, is wanting.—E. D. Y.] John 6:55.—Lachmann and Tischendorf read ἀληθής [true] both times (according to B. C. K. L., etc.) instead of ἀληθῶς [truly, indeed]; the latter is probably explanatory, since ἀληθινή (Cyril, Chrysostom) is the word to be expected. [Tregelles, Alford, Westcott and Hort unanimously adopt ἀληθής. So also Tischend., 8th ed., Meyer, 5th ed., and Lange, who renders: wahrhafte, i.e., real, substantial, Speise, Trank. Cod. Sin. has here several corrections which Tischendorf notes: ΰ* ab αληθως priore ad posterius transiluit; ΰc supplevit omissa ac bis αληθης dedit, nisi quod alterum (a.cb?) rursus in αληθως mutatum.”—P. S.] John 6:58.—The omission of ὑμῶν by important MSS., B. C. L., etc. (adopted by Lachmann and Tischendorf), may be due to theological reasons. Likewise the omission of τὸμάννα in C. T., etc. (adopted by Tischendorf). The former reading is supported by D., etc., the latter by B. [The Cod. Sin. lacks both ὑμῶν and τὸμάννα. Tischend., 8th ed., Tregelles, Alford, Westcott and Hort do the same, and read simply: καθὼςἔφαγονοἱπατέρεςκαὶἀπέθανον, as the fathers ate and died.—P. S.] John 6:60.—[Tischend., Alf., etc., read: σκληρόςἐστινὁλόγοςοὖτος. which is supported by ΰ. B. C. D., etc., against the text. rec. which putsοὺ ?͂τος beforeὁλόγος.—P. S.] John 6:63. [Lange inserts after flesh the gloss: as such, separately considered, and after nothing: doeth nothing towards it. See Exeg.—P. S.] John 6:63.—The perfect λελάληκα is supported by decisive authorities, B. C. [Cod. Sin., Tischend., Alf., etc.]. The Recepta [λαλῶ ?] generalizes the word. [Meyer arbitrarily supplies: “having left Jerusalem.” All older commentators, as also Brόckner, Hengstenberg, Godet, refer ἀπῆλθν to Capernaum or some other place in Galilee. Alford, agreeing with Lόcke, says that ἀπῆλθενὁἸησ. πέραντῆςθαλάσσης, if connected with the preceding discourse, would be unintelligible, and can only be understood by the fragmentary (?) character of John’s Gospel as relates to mere narration, and the well known fact being presupposed, that His ministry principally took place in Galilee.—P. S.] [Ewald, with his usual oracular self-assurance, as if he had been present at the composition of the Gospel of John, asserts that by a sad accident a whole sheet (he does not specify the precise number of chapters and verses) between chap. 5 and 6, was lost before the Gospel came into general circulation. Die Johanneischen Schriften, I, p. 221.—P. S.] [This would require ἀπό or ἑκΤιβεριάδος.—P. S.] [Τιβεριάδος is a geographical genitive, inserted for the easier understanding of Gentile readers (comp. John 21:1), who knew the lake best by that name (Pausan. v. 7, 3; αὑτὸςοἶδαἸόρδανονλίμνηνΤιβερίδαὀνομαζομένηνδιοδεύοντα), though Matthew and Mark always call it θαλ. τῆςΓαλιλαίας, Luke once (John 5:1), λίμνηΓεννησαρέτ, Josephus (De bello Jud., III. 10. 8, etc.), usually Γεννησάρ or Γεννησαρῖτις. Hence the Vulg. and Beza correctly translate: “mare Galilζζ, quod est Tiberiadis;” so also the E. V.—P. S.] [Dr. Robinson (Lex. sub Γεννησαρέτ, p. 141) thus describes the sea of Tiberias: “It is about 12 miles long, and 5 or six broad, and is still celebrated for the purity and salubrity of its waters and the abundance of its fish. It presents, indeed, a beautiful sheet of limpid water in a deep depressed basin, with a continuous wall of hills on the sides; but the hills are rounded and tame; and although after the rainy season the verdure of the grass and herbage gives them a pleasing aspect, yet later in the year they become naked and dreary. Its position exposes it to gusts of wind.” Comp. his Researches, Boston ed. of 1856, Vol. II, 380, 386, 415–417.—P. S.] [Wordsworth: One person, and he a child; and he has only five loaves, and they of barley; and two fishes, and they small. Then Dr. W. goes on allegorizing about the elements of the sacrament.—P. S.] [Wordsworth: A beautiful figure of the ‘green pasture’ (Psalms 23), in which Christ feeds His people in the ministry of His word and sacraments, whore He prepares a table for them in the wilderness. This may do for homiletical application.—P. S.] [The Fourth Sunday in Lent.—E. D. Y.] 2. The Miraculous Withdrawal Over The SeaJoh_6:14-21 AND See the parallels in Matthew 14:22-33; and Mark 6:45-56. [Omitted by Luke. Alford: “An important and interesting question arises, Why is this miracle here inserted by St. John? That he ever inserts for the mere purpose of narration, I cannot believe. The reason seems to me to be this: to give to the Twelve, in the prospect of so apparently strange a discourse respecting His Body, a view of the truth respecting that Body, that it and the things said of it were not to be understood in a gross corporeal, but in a supernatural and spiritual sense. And their very terror and reassurance, tended to impress that confidence in Him which kept them firm, when many left Him, John 6:66.”—P. S.] John 6:14. The Prophet that is to come.—This denotes here not the fore-runner, but the Messiah, referring to Deuteronomy 18:15; as is proved (1) by the addition: “that should come into the world;” (2) by the inclination to make Him a king. John 6:15. Take him by force.—Carry Him forcibly into their circle, and conduct Him in triumph—in order to make Him a king; as festival pilgrims, lead Him to Zion in triumphal procession. The arbitrary, confused, and premature idea of the subsequent triumphal entry. He withdrew again into the mountain. The πάλιν denotes not only return to the mountain, but also a second withdrawal of Himself from the pressure of the people. He sought solitude, to escape the people; but this of course does not exclude His sanctifying the solitude by prayer. John 6:16. And when evening came.—It would not appear from John 6:17, but it certainly does from the parallels, that this was the “second evening,” i.e., the later even-tide, from the decline of the day till night. John 6:17. Having entered a ship.—The ἐμβάντες before ἤρχοντο is hardly intended to repeat once more that they had already gone to sea which had been said in John 6:16, but to express that, after embarking, they took an involuntary course, driven by a fearful storm. See Com. on Matthew and Mark on the passage. According to Mark the disciples were to go before the Lord in the direction of Bethsaida. This must mean the eastern Bethsaida, not the western, because the return itself was to Capernaum; therefore a coast-wise passage northerly is intended. Christ wished to embark in a solitary place, unseen by the people. The storm intervened; the disciples were driven out into the midst of the sea. Then Jesus came to them on the sea; i.e., He met them as a helper in their distress under a contrary wind; not merely went after them as they were driving with a favorable wind. [Dr. Thomson (The Land and the Book, 2 p. 30) maintains, in opposition to the usual view, that there was but one Bethsaida, and that it was situated at the entrance of the Jordan into the lake, a few miles north-east of Tell Hϋm, the supposed present site of Capernaum. The disciples would naturally sail from the southeast toward Bethsaida in order to reach Capernaum.—P. S.] And Jesus had not yet come to them.—As the disciples were not expecting Jesus to walk on the sea, the “yet” has been found troublesome, and has been dropped. But the sentence means: They had not yet been able to take up Jesus according to the original plan of the voyage. [See Text. Notes.] John 6:18. And the sea began to rise.—An explanation of their misfortune. We repeat: A violent gale, by which they would have come immediately twenty or thirty furlongs westward, could not have been to them a contrary wind, if they had intended to go westward without Jesus. John 6:19. Five and twenty or thirty furlongs.—The lake was forty stadii wide (Joseph. De Bell. Jud. III., 10, 11). The indefinite measure is very graphic; it reflects the situation: Darkness and an angry sea, in which accurate measurement of distance was impossible at the time. Matthew says “the midst” of the sea, John 14:24; denoting, however, an earlier moment, when Jesus was still on the shore. John marks the later moment, at which the disciples saw the Lord. The στάδιον is a Greek measure (Luther: Feldweg, furlong). Eight stadia made a Roman mile. A stadium is the fortieth part of a geographical or German mile [a little less than an eighth of an English mile, and nearly equal to the English furlong; so that the twenty-five or thirty stadia would come between three and four miles.—E. D. Y.]. Of the full two leagues’ breadth of the lake the ship had therefore already passed a league and a quarter or a league and a half. They behold Jesus.—Graphic present. And they ware afraid.—Moderate expression of a powerful feeling. Compare the synoptical Evangelists. So little had they expected His coming to them in this way. John 6:21. Then they desired to receive him.—They still desired to take Him into the ship; that is, they still stood to their purpose. In the effort to take up the Lord on the eastern shore, the ship had already gone nearly to the western. The Evangelist finds it superfluous to state that the Lord now embarked, and sailed the small remaining distance with the disciples. He likewise passes over the falling of the wind. According to the usual view of the event, in which Jesus went after the disciples, instead of meeting them, the expression of John is very hard to be explained. And here again Meyer (after the example of Lόcke and De Wette) brings out a collision with the synoptical Evangelists. “They wished to take Him into the ship, and immediately (before they carried out the ἐθέλειν) the ship was at the land.” He seems even to introduce here a wondrous agency of Jesus bringing the ship immediately to land, notwithstanding its distance of five or ten stadia and the “surging ” of the sea. “An unfortunate attempt at harmony [it is then said by Meyer, p. 255, 5th ed.]: They willingly received Him (Beza, Grotius, Kuinoel, Ammon, and many others; see against it Winer, p. 436); which is not helped by the assumed antithesis of a previous unwillingness (Ebrard, Tholuck).” The sentence says simply this: They were still occupied with the effort to take Him up on the eastern coast, when by this miraculous intervention of Christ they at once reached the western side. The ὑπῆγον, in the versions and expositions, to a great extent fails of its full force. It often denotes a secret, skilful or mysterious removal, escape, or disappearance. And so especially here, where the Lord was put upon extreme deliberation, and could properly use a miracle to rid Him of the multitude. If they still followed Him in spite of all, we must consider that certainly all could not follow Him in the boats which had come from Tiberias, and that Christ still found it necessary in the synagogue at Capernaum to put off the people by meeting them sternly and with the boldest declarations. AND ETHICAL1. The culmination of the enthusiasm of the Galilean populace for Jesus is here brought out, and by John alone, with great distinctness. The great popular mass, a host of five thousand chiliastically excited men, would violently lift a Messianic standard with Him and for Him. But because Jesus cannot yield Himself to this project, the culmination of their enthusiasm is at the same time its turning-point. 2. In respect to the miracle of Christ’s walking on the sea; compare the Com. on Matthew and Mark. AND The misinterpretation of the divine sign of Christ by the perverseness of earthly-minded men.—They draw from the sign a correct conclusion (a true doctrine) and a false application (a false moral).—So with orthodox faith a false (ecclesiastical or secular) morality is often associated.—The flight of Jesus before the revolutionary design of the people: It occasions (1) His retiring in solitude to the mountain; (2) His sending the disciples before Him with the ship; (3) His hastening in the night, ghostlike, over the sea.—Jesus on the mountain above the political designs of men; He alone: 1. He alone the free One, who is more a king than any prince of earth. 2. He alone the clear-sighted One, who sees far above all craftiness of policy. 3. He alone the silent but decisive Disposer of all things.—The flight from the sedition and tumult: 1. The flight of Christianity (Christ). 2. The flight of the Church (the ship).—The disciples in the ship, driven from east to west, a foreshadowing of the fortunes of the church.—The miracle of the walking on the sea, as to its holy motives: Occasioned (1) by a holy flight; (2) by a holy solicitude.—Christ’s superiority to nature.—Christ the sea-king (He, not Mary, the true Stella Maris).—Christ as master of the water—the helper in perils of the sea (not the holy Nepomuc).—Christ the helper in perils of water and of fire.—While they were wishing to take Him up on the eastern shore, they were ready to land on the western.—The hour when the Church becomes perfectly joyful in the presence of her Lord in this world, is the hour when she lands on the shore of the other.—How the Lord suddenly puts an end to the reverses of His people.—Every new necessity of the Christian, a new revelation of the glory of Christ. Every new necessity of man, a new revelation of the miraculous help of God.—Perils of the night; perils of storm; perils of the sea. Sufferings from night, from storm, and from sea; Christ, the Deliverer. Starke: God’s wonders among them that go down to the sea in ships. Psalms 107:23.—Proverbs 30:19.—Wis 14:3.—Be not troubled when thou must journey from one place to another, etc. The goal is all rest.—Comest thou into a dark night of tribulation, etc.: Jesus is there.—The perils of one’s calling.—Good fortune is followed again by ill; but to believers all is for the best.—Canstein: Christ lets His people come almost to extremity, but then loses not a moment. —In our troubles we commonly set God before us in a different character from the true; as an object of terror.—Zeisius: What a mighty hero is thy Saviour and mine!—Quesnel: Christ’s word and presence make everything good and tranquil again.—Cramer: Christ has more ways of helping than one.—Zeisius: Thus the saints come through great storms and trouble to the haven of eternal peace and safety.—Gossner: When Christ is in the ship, the ship receives more help from Him than He from it. So is everything which we call the service of God more profitable to the servant than to the Lord whom he serves.—Heubner: Distance, mountain, and sea cannot separate Him from His.—Schleiermacher: We see here at first a certain dependence on an immediate and bodily presence, which is always united with a certain want of faith in the spiritual, and of a sense of spiritual power and agency.—Schenkel: How do we stand towards Christ? (1) So as to have Him flee from us? (2) Or so as to have Him come to us? [Wordsworth: John 6:20. “I am (Ἐγώεἰμι), the Ever-living One, Jehovah, the Author of Life. I am always at hand and never pass by you, therefore be not afraid, but trust in Me. Our Lord allows us to be in trial and danger, to struggle in the storm, to endure for a long time, in order that our patience and perseverance and faith may be proved, and that we may resort to Him who alone can save us. We are often in darkness and in storms, and the devil and evil men assail and affright us: but let us listen to Christ’s voice, Ἐγέεἰμι, μὴφοβεῖσθε, and when human help fails, then divine aid will come. Terrors pass by, but Christ never passes by. He ever says, ‘It is I.’ I am He who always am, who ever remain; therefore have faith in Me. And if we are rowing in the Apostolic Ship of the Church, doing our duty there in our respective callings, and if we desire to receive Christ into the Ship, He will not only quell the storm, but give us a fair breeze, and we shall soon be at the harbor where we would be—the calm harbor of heavenly peace. They who are in the Ship, and are rowing in the storm; they who labor in the Church, and continue in good works to the end, will receive Christ, and will at length arrive at the waveless haven of everlasting life.”—A fine Greek poem of Anatolius on Christ in the tempest, translated by J. M. Neale: “Fierce was the wild billow” (see Schaff’s Christ in Song, p. 451).—P. S.] Footnotes: [According to Robinson, the lake is about twelve English miles long, and five or six broad.—P. S.] 3. Decisive Declaration Of Christ, And Offence Of Many DisciplesJoh_6:22-65 AND [After a brief historical introduction, John 6:22-25, John gives that wonderful discourse which unfolds the symbolic meaning of the miraculous feeding of the multitude, namely, the grand truth that Christ is the Bread of everlasting life, which alone can satisfy the spiritual wants of men. It may be divided into four parts, each of which is introduced by an act of the audience and determined by their moral attitude. 1) The first part is introduced by a simple question of the Jews; “When and how didst Thou come hither?” It exhorts them not to busy themselves about perishing food, but to seek food which endures forever, and which the Son of Man alone can give, John 6:25-35. 2) The Jews asking for this imperishable bread, Jesus declares Himself to be the Bread of life that came down from heaven, John 6:35-40; John 6:3) The Jews murmured at this extraordinary claim; whereupon Jesus repeats the assertion with the additional idea, that His flesh which He was to give for the life of the world, is that Bread of life, John 6:41-51. 4) This causes not only surprise but offence and contention among the Jews (John 6:52), but Jesus, instead of modifying and explaining, declares in still stronger language that eating His flesh and drinking His blood, i.e., a living appropriation of His person and sacrifice is the indispensable condition of spiritual life reaching forward to the resurrection of the body, John 6:52-58. 5) The rest, from John 6:59-65, describes the crisis produced by this discourse and furnishes at the same time, in John 6:63, the key to the proper understanding of the same.—The authenticity of this discourse is sufficiently guaranteed by its perfect originality, sublimity, and offensiveness to carnal sense, as well as its adaptation to the situation and the miracle performed. No writer could have invented such ideas and dreamed of putting them into the mouth of Jesus. Nor could any mere man in his sane mind set forth his own flesh and blood as the life of the world. We are shut up here to the conclusion of the divinity of Christ. As to the difficulty of the discourse, we must always keep in mind that Christ spoke for all ages, and that history furnishes the evidence of the wisdom and universal applicability of His teaching. The disciples and the hearers were prepared for it by the two preceding miracles which raised them, so to say, to a supernatural state. The sacramental interpretation will be discussed below in an Excursus.—P. S.] John 6:22-24. The construction of these verses is a matter of great difficulty. [Such complicated sentences are exceedingly rare in John. Two other instances occur in John 13:1, and 1 John 1:1 ff. In this case the parenthetical and involved construction is, as Alford remarks, characteristic of the minute care with which the evangelist will account for every circumstance which is essential to his purpose in the narration.—P. S.] De Wette: “As regards the construction, the sentence is interrupted by the parenthesis of Joh 6:23, and resumed in John 6:24 (ὅτεοὗνεἶδεν = ἱδών, John 6:22), except that while ἰδών, John 6:22, relates to the circumstances under which the departure of Jesus seemed impossible, and the resumptive ὅτε—εἶδεν expresses the certainty nevertheless reached, that he was no longer there.” Meyer: “The construction resumes ὁὄχλος, the subject of the whole, with ὅτεοὖνεἶδενὁὄχλος, John 6:24; and John 6:23 is a parenthesis which prepares the way for the following apodosis. The participial sentence ἰδὼν, ὁτι to ἀπῆλθον is subordinated to ἐστηλὼςπέραντ. θαλ., and explains what made the people linger there and stand again the next day in the same place: They thought Jesus must still be on the eastern side of the sea, since no other ship had been there except the one in which the disciples had gone away alone, John 6:22, and even the disciples might again be there, since other boats had come from Tiberias, in which they might have returned.” [Somewhat modified in ed. 5th, p. 256.—P. S.] We suppose that here, as often elsewhere in the New Testament a supposed clumsiness and irregularity of expression arises in the sphere of exegesis from our overlooking the conciseness resulting from the vividness of the oriental style. The present passage may be elucidated by the remark that Christ made His escape from the people with extreme deliberation and care, and that the people pursued Him with intense expectation; and the sentence takes this shape: And immediately the ship (in which they were escaping) was at the land whither they were going (for escape from the people); the day following the people (also) which stood (still remained standing, like a wall) on the other side of the sea, because they saw (in the first place) that there was none other boat there, save that one, and that Jesus went not with His disciples into that, but that His disciples were gone away alone (whence it seemed to follow, that Jesus was still in the neighborhood); but (in the second place) that other boats had come from Tiberias nigh unto the place where they had eaten bread by the power of the Lord’s thanksgiving (boats in which the disciples also might have returned). When the people therefore, etc. John 6:24. They themselves entered into the boats.—Took those boats which had come from Tiberias. As these vessels are called πλοιάρια [small boats], and besides were probably not very numerous, having accidentally arrived, it is not to be supposed that the whole five thousand came across. Tholuck supposes that the festival-pilgrims would have left, probably finding it necessary to go immediately on to the temple at Jerusalem. This mistakes the point of their extreme excitement. The αὐτοί is not antithetic to a previous passive behaviour of the people (Meyer), but to their wrong supposition that the disciples had been in the ships, and had returned by them. They sought the Lord in the place of His residence, Capernaum. John 6:25. On the other side of the lake.—With reference to the eastern point of departure. According to John 6:59, they find Him in the synagogue at Capernaum. Meyer correctly: “The πέραντ. θάλ. is intended to suggest that the object of their wonder was their finding him on the western side.” When camest thou?—[ΙΙότεὦδεγέγονας; In Greek this implies the double question of when and how, as Bengel remarks: Quζstio de tempore includit quζstionem de modo. When didst Thou come hither? and how didst Thou get here (perf. γέγονας) so unexpectedly, like a ghost?—P. S.] The question how seemed the more natural. Yet they appear to suppose immediately that He went round the sea, or crossed at some other point. They ask, when He arrived just here. Meyer thinks they suspected some miracle, and Jesus did not enter into their curious question; but the passage leads rather to the opposite inference. The Lord must expect, not that they had been led by the feeding to think of the walking on the sea, but undoubtedly that they expected of Him so much of the miraculous as to make the question of when superfluous. This triviality is the very thing that betrays the sensuous confusion of their enthusiasm itself. John 6:26. Verily, verily, I say unto you, Ye seek me.—The term here is particularly strong, because it emphasizes a severe personal judgment. Considering this strength of the expression, the interpretation of the correlatives οὐχ’—ἀλλ’ by non tam—quam, in Kuinoel and others, entirely obliterates the thought. Not because ye saw the miracles.—Lόcke explains the plural by the healing of sick before the feeding (see the other Evangelists); Meyer groundlessly rejects this, observing that the antithesis is simply the eating of the loaves; that the plural is a plural of category, and goes no further than the feeding. But if they had waited for the kingdom of God as true believers in the Messiah, they would have perceived the spiritual glory in all the miracles. On the contrary, the sensuous expectations of the Messiah fastened selfishly on the eating of the loaves. (Comp. Matthew 4:3-4.) John 6:27. Work not for the food.—We think the first word must be emphasized. It is aimed at the chiliastic inclination to laziness in the enjoyment of miraculous food, and resembles the word of Paul in 2 Thessalonians 3:11-12. But the injunction immediately takes a turn designed to lead their mind to the essential point. Direct your labor not to the food which perisheth, but, etc.—The radical meaning of ἐργά́ζεσθε it is difficult here to preserve in its precise force; and yet we are led to do so by the spirit of the transaction. Luther: wirket, work, produce; De Wette: erwirket, work out; Van Ess: mόhet euch, trouble yourselves. Luther also translates ἐργαζόμενος, Ephesians 4:28, by schaffen, work. There is a double oxymoron or paradox: (1) that they should not labor for the perishable food, which is the very thing they must get by working; (2) that they should labor for the heavenly food, which is not to be earned by labor. The solution lies (1) in the position of the exclamation: Labor, at the beginning of the sentence: Be earnest workers; (2) in the addition of the next words to elucidate the first. Work not for the earthly food, which perisheth; even work for daily bread should not aim at mere material support and sensual enjoyment, but at the eternal in the temporal; (3) in the doing away of all thought of human production in matters of faith by the further words: “Which the Son of Man shall give unto you.”—The food that perisheth; or rather, which spoils, corrupts. Earthly nourishment enjoyed in idleness, without sanctification of the Spirit, is not merely perishable. This word is too weak for ἀπολλυμένην (comp. Matthew 9:17 : οἱἀσκοὶἀπολοῦνται); the food goes to destruction, and with it the man who seeks his life in it. It therefore leaves not only hunger, but also loathing (Numbers 21:5, in regard to the manna). Decaying food loses not only (1) its efficiency, but (2) its healthful nature, and (3) its very nature itself. On the contrary food which endureth unto everlasting life has (1) eternal efficiency; (2) eternal freshness; (3) eternal durability.—The difference between this and the water which quenches thirst, John 4:14. That passage concerns the life of Christ refreshing, quickening, and satisfying the soul; this describes the life of Christ refreshing, nourishing, and supporting the whole being of the man.—Everlasting life;—viewed here in the main as an outward object, but including the internal operation of it. Which the Son of man shall give unto you.—Undoubtedly based on the figure of laborer and employer, as in John 4:36, and in the parable of the laborers in the vineyard, Matthew 20:1 sqq. In His service they must work only for the eternal food, and this He would give them. And as the eternal food can come from God alone, He declares that He is sealed as steward of the Father; appointed and accredited with commission and seal (σφραγίζειν also denotes confirmation, appointment with a seal). He is sealed (accredited in particular by the miraculous feeding as a sign) as the Son of His Father’s house, commissioned or sent from God. He thus seems to appoint them as laborers of God; and hence the question that follows. John 6:28. What shall we do, that we might work the works of God?—They seem ready to consent to the requirement of Christ. They wish to be in a general sense the servants of God, and do His work. But that their spirit in the matter is rather chiliastic than moral (Meyer) is shown (1) by their asking about works in the plural; (2) by their stress on their doing. The case is like that in John 8:30 : an apparent or conditional readiness, arising from chiliastic misconception. Not exactly a merely moral legalness of mind, though it includes this. Two interpretations: 1. The works which God requires, has commanded (De Wette, Tholuck). [Alford: the works well pleasing to God, comp. 1 Corinthians 15:58.—P. S.] 2. The works which God produces (Herder, Schleiermacher). The former interpretation is true to the mind of the people. John 6:29. This is the work of God, that ye believe in him whom he sent.—Jesus meets the plural with the singular, and their proposal to do with the demand of faith in Him whom God sent. The connection of ideas is close: As servants of God they must yield themselves with unreserved confidence to the messenger of God; through Him alone do they become capable of doing anything, John 6:50; John 17:3; 1 John 4:17. Bullinger, Beza: Faith is called a work per mimesin. Tholuck, on the other hand: Faith is itself a work. It is the decisive work of the man, in which resides the decisive work of God. [Mark the distinction between believing Christ, which is simply an intellectual assent to an historical fact and which may be ascribed to demons and infidels, and believing in Christ as an object of confidence and hope, which implies vital union with Him. This is both a work of Divine grace and the highest work of man. Godet finds here the germ of the whole Pauline theology and also the bond of union between Paul and James. Faith is the greatest act of freedom towards God; for by it he gives himself, and more man cannot do. In this sense James opposes works to a faith which is nothing but an intellectual belief; and in an analogous sense Paul opposes active living faith to dead works of mere outward observance. The faith of Paul is in fact the work of James, i.e., the work of God. Schleiermacher calls this passage the clearest and most significant declaration that all eternal life proceeds from nothing else than faith in Christ,—P. S.] John 6:30. What signs shewest thou then?—i.e.: To prove that Thou art the one sent of God? For that He professed Himself to be this messenger, is evident from what He had said. The term Messiah is indeed not used, but it is implied. Some have considered the question strange, because the people had just yesterday been miraculously fed. Grotius supposed it to be put by persons who had not been present at that feeding; the negative critics found in it a contradiction of the preceding account (Bruno Bauer, and others): De Wette considers the conversation as having no reference to the feeding. But we must bear in mind, that the people presumed that Jesus, if He were the Messiah, must have accepted their acclamation and their proclamation of His royalty; and that, instead of doing so, He had, to their great chagrin, eluded their design. They therefore demanded that He more satisfactorily attest Himself than He did by that feeding. A sign from heaven they probably did not, like the Sanhedrists and Pharisees, intend; but no doubt a perpetual miraculous supply of bread under the new kingdom now to be set up. This is indicated by the explanatory addition: “What dost Thou work?” τίἑργάζῇ. What dost Thou produce? Ironically pointed at His demand that they should work. The chiliastic Messiah must take the lead of all the people as the greatest master-workman. The expression is doubly antithetic: putting His working against theirs, and especially putting a working in testimony of His Messiahship against His declaration of it. John 6:31. Our fathers did eat manna.—Meyer: “The questioners, after being miraculously filled with earthly bread, rise in their miracle-seeking, and demand bread from heaven, such as God gave by Moses.” What they wanted was, no doubt, primarily continuance; though not this alone. The thought is: If Moses perpetually fed his people with bread from heaven, it is too little that the Messiah, the greater than Moses, should give His people only one transient miraculous meal, and as it were put them off with that, He ought to introduce the Messianic kingdom by giving every day a miraculous supply, and that by all means finer than barley loaves, superior manna. Comp. Matthew 4:3. As it is written, He gave them bread from heaven. (Exodus 16:4; Psalms 78:24; Psalms 105:40). Meyer: The Jews considered the manna the greatest of miracles. As Moses was the type of the Messiah (Schφttgen, Horζ Talm., II., p. 475), a new manna was expected from the Messiah Himself: “Redemptor prior descendere fecit pro iis Manna; sic et redemptor posterior descender faciet Manna.” Midras Coheleth. Fol. 86, 4. (Lightfoot, Schφttgen, Wetstein.) The manna (ξָ ?ο), which miraculously furnished the Israelites in the Arabian desert [for forty years] the means of support, Exodus 16; Numbers 11, etc., fell during the night, and in the morning lay as dew upon the earth, Exodus 16:14, in small grains (like coriander-seed, Exodus 16:31), sweet, like honey, to the taste. It had to be gathered [every day except the Sabbath] before the sun rose, or it melted, John 6:21. “The quantity divided daily to each person, Exodus 16:16, Thenius (Althebrδische Masse) estimates at somewhat over two Dresden quarts” [about three English quarts.—P. S.]. On the well-known oriental (medicinal) manna of natural history, see Winer, sub v This appears even in southern Europe on various trees and shrubs; then in the east (manna-ash, oriental oak, especially the sweet-thorn), likewise tarfa-bush; abundant in Arabia, particularly in the vicinity of Sinai. A resinous exudation, resembling sugar, appearing sometimes spontaneously, sometimes through incisions made by insects or by men; appearing specifically on leaves and twigs. Several travellers assure us that in the east the manna falls as dew from the air. Even in this case a vegetable origin must be presumed. Our idea of the miraculous manna must be formed after the analogy of the Egyptian plagues: A natural phenomenon miraculously increased in an extraordinary manner by the power of God for a special purpose. At present scarcely six hundred-weight are gathered on the peninsula of Petrζa in the most favorable years.—According to Chrysostom and others the manna came from the atmosphere, and so from just below the real heaven. John 6:32. It is not Moses [οὐ before Μωυσῆς] that gave you the bread from heaven.—Introduced with a: Verily, verily. Not questioning the miraculousness of the manna (Paulus), but denying that the manna of Moses was from the real heaven, and was real manna. The question is not of a manna in an ideal sense, but of the real, true manna. Tholuck: “The negation is to be taken not absolutely, but only relatively.” It is relative, of course, considering the affinity of the symbol to the substance; but it is also absolute considering the infinite difference between them. According to Meyer the words “from heaven” in both cases (and in John 6:31) relate not to the bread (for then the phrase would be τὸνἐκτ. οὐρ.), but to δέδωκεν and δίδωσιν; and “in like manner in Exodus 16:4, ξִ ?οδַ ?ωָׁ ?ξַ ?ιִ ?ν belongs not to μֶ ?ηֶ ?ν, but to ξַ ?ξְ ?θִ ?ιψ.” But we must not forget that the nature of the bread is described with the source of it: Bread of heaven, Psalms 78:24; Psalms 105:40. Just on account of the former of these two passages, to which the words before us refer, and where the Septuagint has ἄρτουοὐρανοῦ, Tholuck, not without reason, prefers the usual interpretation. [My Father giveth you; δίδωσιν, now and always, opposed to δέδωκεν, which is said of Moses. Bengel: Jam aderat panis, John 6:33.—P. S.] The true bread from heaven.—[ἀληθινός, genuine, veritable, essential, as opposed to derived, borrowed, imperfect, while ἀληθής, true, is opposed to false. Comp. note on John 1:9, p. 66.—P. S.] Exactly parallel with the true light (John 1:9); the true vine (John 15:1); and to the same class of expressions: the true well of water, the true medicinal fountain, the true shepherd, etc., substantially belong. John 6:33. For the bread of God is that which cometh down from heaven.—The decisive declaration by way of a description of the bread of God; ὁκαταβαίνων referring to ἄρτος, not to Christ (against Paulus, Olshausen). Without this bread there is no substantial life, and no substantial nourishment of life. [Unto the world, i.e., all mankind; in opposition to the Jewish particularism which boasted in the manna as a national miracle. Bengel: Non modo uni populo, uni ζtati, ut manna cibavit unum populum unius ζtatis.—P. S.] John 6:34. Lord, evermore give us this bread.—Comp. the request of the woman in John 4:15. The people presume that Christ is the agent of the Father’s gift. Interpretations: 1. Dim suspicion of the higher gift [perhaps the heavenly manna which, according to the Rabbis, is prepared for the just in heaven; comp. Revelation 2:17] (Lόcke, Tholuck, and others). 2. They think the bread something material, separate from Christ (De Wette, Meyer, [Godet]). And in any case their prayer is more decidedly sensuous and chiliastically perverted, than the prayer of the woman of Samaria. [Some take the prayer as an irony based on incredulity as to the possibility of such bread. Not warranted.—P. S.] John 6:35. I [Ἐγώ] am the bread of life.—[Transition from the indirect to the direct form of speech, as in John 6:30, and a categoric answer to the request of the Jews: “Give us this bread,” together with the indication of the way how to get it. Here is this bread before you, and all you have to do is to come unto Me. I am the bread, and faith is the work or the means of getting it.—P. S.] Most emphatic and decisive assertion. Still stronger than that in John 4:26, since it was more open to contradiction; though here it is not the profession of Himself as the Messiah by name. (Philo, Allegor. legis, lib. III.: λόγοςθεοῦψυχῆςτροφή)—He that cometh to me.—Is willing to believe, and uses the means of faith that he may believe. Conversion in its Christian aspect. Not, as Meyer makes it, only a different phrase for πιστεύων. According to Meyer the expression: “Shall never thirst,” is a confusion of the figure, and anticipates the drinking of the blood of Christ, which follows. But it is rather an introduction to Christ’s further declaration of Himself. As faith is developed, it brings, besides the importation and sustenance of the spiritual life, the satisfaction also of having drunk. It is less natural to make this addition, with Lόcke [and Alford], a description of the excellence of the heavenly bread over the manna [which was no sooner given, than the people began to be tormented with thirst and murmured against Moses, Exodus 17:1 ff.—P. S.] John 6:36. But I said unto you.—He said this to them not, as Lόcke and De Wette have it, at John 5:37; for there He was speaking to the Sanhedrists in Jerusalem; but, as Grotius [Bengel] Luthardt and others, [Stier, Olsh., Hengstenberg, Godet] make it, at John 6:26; though He there said it to them in other words. [Christ quotes Himself here, as He often quotes the Old Testament, more after the spirit than after the letter.] According to Euthymius Zigabenus [and Alford] the Lord refers to some utterance not recorded; according to Meyer it means: I wilt have said [εἶπον=dictum velim] to you just now; which it can mean, as to the letter, but must not mean here. That ye have even seen me.—They have already seen Him in a Messianic function at the feeding, and yet did not see the sign in His miracle, and so did not truly see Him. So near were they to salvation; but they lacked faith. A paraphrase of Joh 6:26. [The two καί are correlative and bring out the glaring contrast of the two facts of even seeing the Son of God in His glory, and yet not believing in Him.—P. S.] John 6:37. All that the Father giveth me.—As to the connection: The judgment just uttered is true of the body of those who were before Him. It is not intended to exclude the thought that there were some among them, whom the Father had given to Him. It is, therefore, not in absolute antithesis to what precedes (as Meyer makes it). All. Neuter. The strongest expression of totality, as in John 3:6, [totam quasi massam, as Bengel has it; comp. also John 17:2, where πᾶν is likewise used of persons in this emphatic sense of totality.—P. S.] That the Father giveth me. [The same as whom the Father draws, John 6:44.—P. S.] Not only the gratia prζveniens, operating through nature and history, conscience and law, (comp. John 6:44), but also the effectual call to salvation—the gratia convertens—itself, is the work of the Father. The conversion, the coming to Jesus, is the answer to the call. Tholuck: It runs through the Gospel of John as a fundamental view, that all attraction towards Christ presupposes an affinity in the person for Christ, and then this affinity is the operation of the Father; and so here the un-susceptibility of the people is traced to this want of inward affinity. The phrase δίδοσθαιπαρὰτοῦπατρός is also in John 10:29; John 17:2; John 17:6; comp. in the Old Testament, Isaiah 8:18 : “I and the children whom the Lord hath given me.” The Predestinarians refer this passage to the eternal election [Augustine, Beza], the Arminians to the gratia generalis, the ability to believe [Grotius: pietatis studium], the Socinians to the probitas, natural honesty and love of truth, etc. We consider that in the “giveth” the three elements of election, predestination (fore-ordination), and calling are combined, Romans 8:29. But undoubtedly fore-ordination is very especially intended. [Shall come unto me, πρὸςἐμὲῆξει. By an act of faith. Comp. the following τὸνἐρχόμενον. Godet distinguishes ἥξει from ἐλεύσεται, and explains it: will arrive at Me, will not suffer shipwreck, but infallibly attain the goal. He calls the usual interpretation tautological, in as much as the gift consists in the coming, but this is not correct; the δίδωσι is the act of God, and the ἔρχεσθαι the act of man, i.e., faith in actual motion towards Christ.—P. S.] And him that cometh to me, I Will in no wise cast out.—Every one who comes to Him is welcome. The only criterion is the coming or the not coming; no matter what the previous condition or guiltiness; the coming bespeaks the will of the Father, which it is the office of Christ to fulfil. [Οὐμὴἐκβάλωἐξω does not refer to Christ’s office as Judge at the resurrection, but to the present order of grace, and is a litotes, i.e., it expresses in a negative form more strongly the readiness of Christ to receive with open arms of love every one that comes to Him.—P. S.] John 6:38. For I came down from heaven, etc.—Expressing the complete condescension and humiliation in the estate of the Redeemer. But how could His will be different from the Father’s? The ideal will of the Son of man, in and Of itself, must continually press towards the perfecting of the world and of life, and therefore legitimately lead to judgment. But in the spirit of redemption Christ continually directs this current of rightful judgment by the counsel of that redemption which is in operation till the end of the world; and this is His humiliation to the death of the cross, and this His patience, in the majesty of His exaltation. John 6:39. And this is the will of him that sent me [according to the correct reading instead of the Father’s will] that of all which he hath given me.—The decree of redemption. Hence the perfect: Which He hath given me. Spoken not from a point of view in the future (as Meyer says); nor with reference to election, but with with reference to the perseverance of the divine purpose of salvation, to which the perseverance of the patience of Christ and the perseverance of believers correspond (see Romans 8:29 ff.). I should lose nothing.—Let nothing be lost by breaking off before the final decision of persistent unbelief in every case. But should raise it up.—Evidently meaning the resurrection to life. The Son is not only to continue, but to carry to its blessed consummation the work of resurrection. It is not, therefore, the day of death (Reuss), nor specifically the first resurrection (Meyer), which is intended. The last day, ἐσχάτηἡμέρα.—The period of judgment and resurrection from the second coming of Christ to the general resurrection, Revelation 20. [The resurrection of the body is the culmination of the redeeming work beyond which there is no more danger. Bengel: Hic finis est, ultra quem periculum nullum. Citeriora omnia prζstat Salvator. This “blessed refrain,” as Meyer calls it, is three times repeated, John 6:40; John 6:44; John 6:54; comp. John 10:28; John 17:12; John 18:9. What stronger assurance of final resurrection to life everlasting can the believer have than this solemnly repeated assurance from the unerring mouth of the Saviour: “I shall raise him up on the last day.” But true faith is no carnal confidence, it is always united with true humility. The more we trust in Christ, the less we trust in ourselves. All is safe if we look to Christ, all is lost, if we look to ourselves alone. Christians should pray as if all depended upon God, and watch and work as if all depended upon themselves.—P. S.] John 6:40. That every one that seeth the Son.—A stronger putting of the gracious will of God in its final intent. Hence again naming the Son in the third person. “What John said to his disciples, Jesus now says openly to the Jews: Faith in the Son has everlasting life. Who the Son is, He gives them to know by declaring that He will raise up these believers. John 6:41. The Jews therefore murmured at him.—A new section of the affair, occasioned by the Jews’ taking decisive offence at the preceding discourse. The οὖν is again very definitive. The verb γογγύζω, of itself, denotes neither, on the one hand, a whispering, nor, on the other, a grumbling or fault-finding; but the murmuring is here the expression of fault-finding, and is made by the context (“among yourselves,” and by the antagonism (“at Him”) synonymous with it.—The Jews. In the ὄχλος itself the Jewish element was aroused (De Wette); but no doubt the Pharisaic members of that synagogue are here especially concerned; and even Judas, whose very name is Jew, here seems to have already become soured (see John 6:64). The bread which came down from heaven.—This declaration transcended their idea of the Messiah; and that in it which, unconsciously, most offended them was its offer of a suffering or self-sacrificing Messiah. Hence the Lord afterwards brought this out with special prominence. But they seized the declaration in another aspect. When, without directly claiming it, He indicated His divine sonship by saying that He came down from heaven, they considered Him as contradicting His known origin. A sensuous, narrow, literalistic apprehension. John 6:42. Is not this Jesus.—The οὖτος, primarily, strongly demonstrative. The same person, of whom we know that He sprang from Nazareth and rose to be a Rabbi, pretends to have come down from heaven. This contrast and the skepticism of the people add a contemptuous tone to the pronoun. The son of Joseph.—These words do not imply that both the parents were still living (Meyer), but that the people considered both (whom they once knew) to be His parents. Of Joseph, whom the tradition represents as advanced in years at the time of his marriage to Mary, we have no trace in the Gospels after the childhood of Jesus (comp. Matthew 13:55). [John introduces here the Jews as speaking from their own stand-point. They, of course, knew nothing of the mystery of the supernatural conception, and would not have appreciated it, if Jesus had corrected them. This was a truth for the initiated, and was not revealed even to the disciples before they were fully convinced that Christ was the Son of God.—P. S.] John 6:43. Murmur not among yourselves.—Jesus intended not to draw out their thoughts, but goes on to expose their defect. John 6:44. No man can come to me.—Here: reach Me; in particular: reach an understanding of My nature, apprehend the Spirit in the flesh, Deity in humanity, the Son of God in the Nazarene. Except the Father draw him.—Ἑλκύειν denotes all sorts of drawing, from violence to persuasion or invitation. But persons can be drawn only according to the laws of personal life. Hence this is not to be taken in a high predestinarian sense (Calvin: It is false and impious to say non nisi volentes trahi; Beza: Volumus, quia datum est, ut velimus; Aretius: Hic ostendit Christus veram causam murmuris esse quod non sint electi). Yet on the other hand the force of the added clause, denoting a figurative, vital constraint, subduing by the bias of want, of desire, of hope, of mind, must not be abated. The drawing of the Father is the point at which election and fore-ordination become calling (the vocatio efficax), represented as entirely the work of the Father. Meyer: “The ἑλκύειν is the mode of the διδόναι, an internal pressing and leading to Christ by the operation of divine grace (Jeremiah 30:3, Sept.), though not impairing human freedom.” The element of calling is added through the word of Christ. Hence: The Father who sent Me. As sent of the Father, He executes the Father’s work and word. The congruence of the objective work of salvation and the subjective operation of salvation in the individual. [Ἑλκύειν (or ἕλκω, fut. ἕλξω, which is preferred to έλκύσω by the Attic writers), to draw, to drag, to force, almost always implies force or violence, as when it is used of wrestling, bending the bow, stretching the sail, or when a net is drawn to the land, a ship into the sea, the body of an animal or a prisoner is dragged along, or a culprit is drawn before the tribunal (comp. John 18:10; John 21:6; John 21:11; Acts 16:19, and the classical Dictionaries, also Meyer, p. 266). It is certainly much stronger than δίδωσι, John 6:37, and implies active or passive resistance, or obstructions to be removed. Here and in John 12:32, it does, of course, not mean physical or moral compulsion, for faith is in its very nature voluntary, and coming to Christ is equivalent to believing in Him; but it clearly expresses the mighty moral power of the infinite love of the Father who so orders and overrules the affairs of life and so acts upon our hearts, that we give up at last our natural aversion to holiness, and willingly, cheerfully and thankfully embrace the Saviour as the gift of gifts for our salvation. The natural inability of man to come to Christ, however, is not physical nor intellectual, but moral and spiritual; it is an unwillingness. No change of mental organization, no new faculty is required, but a radical change of the heart and will. This is effected by the Holy Ghost, but the providential drawing of the Father prepares the way for it.—P. S.] John 6:45. It is written in the prophets, etc.—[This verse explains what kind of drawing was meant in the preceding verse, viz., by divine illumination of the mind and heart.] Prophets, i.e., the division of the Holy Scriptures called the Prophets. Yet the phrase is no doubt intended to assert that the particular passage, Isaiah 54:13, (quoted freely from the Sept.), is found in substance throughout the prophets (which Tholuck calls in question; comp. Isaiah 11; Jeremiah 31:33; Joe 3:1). Taught of God.—Taught by God; the genitive with the participle denoting the agent. The promises of universal illumination in the time of the Messiah. In the prophet the point of the passage quoted lies in the “all” in contrast with the isolated enlightenment under the Old Testament. And here, too, this universality is not denied, though it is to be limited to all believers. The children of the Messianic time are the “all” from the fact that an inward, immediate divine illumination gives them faith in the word spoken by Christ. Cyril, Ammonius, and the older Lutheran expositors: Taught of God, per vocem evangelicam; the mystics: by the Spirit working with the outward word, by the inner light; Clericus, Delitzsch, and others: by the prevenient grace.—It is the calling provided for by election and fore-ordination; but it is this calling considered inwardly, as the operation of the Father by the Spirit;—an operation distinct from the spiritual life which proceeds from the Son, but not separate from it. Effectual calling, on its intellectual side: the enlightening of the mind. Every man that hath learned of the Father.—According to the reading ἀκούων, we suppose the hearing the Father is to be conceived as continuous. As soon as the having learned is thereby effected, the man, as one taught of God, comes to Christ. The reference is of course to the whole discipline of the Father, which proceeds from His election; but it is to this (1) as becoming manifest in the effectual calling, and (2) as therein reaching its goal. Hence it is not the elect simply in view of this election (Beza), that are intended; still less the elect in a predestinarian sense. John 6:46. Not that any one hath seen the Father.—Explaining, that those who are taught of God in the Messianic age, still have need of the Messiah. Different interpretations: (1) The Lord would contrast His true seeing of God with that of Moses (Cyril, Erasmus). (2) He would forestall the spiritualistic view, that the inward manifestation of God supersedes the historical Christ (Calovius, Lampe). (3) He would mark a difference in degree and kind of revelation (Bengel: Videre interius est, quam audire; Tholuck). The third interpretation does not, as Tholuck thinks, set aside the second. The same fact, that the historical Christ is the positive fulfilment of all previous revelation and knowledge of God, and is therefore indispensable, is expressed in a different way; but all such facts as that He is Reconciler, King, Redeemer, are rooted in the fact that, being the Son; He is, in His perfect vision of God, the absolute Prophet (comp. John 1:18). Save he who is of God.—The full divine nature was necessary to the full view of God. John 6:47. He that believeth on me hath everlasting life.—Here again it must be observed, (1) that Christ has put His previous Messianic statements in a general form, not in the first person, but that He connects His soteriological statement, His declaration of salvation, directly with His person; and (2) that He asseverates: Verily, verily. This is, therefore, Christ’s positive offer of Himself as the personal Saviour; and now follows the declaration. [Mark the present tense hath (ἔχει), not shall have. Eternal life is not confined to the future world, but is ever present and becomes ours as soon as we lay hold of Christ who is eternal life Himself. The resurrection of the body is only the full bloom of what has begun here. Mark also that faith, and nothing else, is laid down here, and in this whole discourse (comp. John 6:40; John 3:15-16,) as the condition of eternal life. The eating of Christ’s flesh and the drinking of His blood, to be consistent with this, is only a stronger form of expressing the same idea of a real personal appropriation of Christ by faith. This refutes all forms of ecclesiasticism which throw any kind of obstruction between the soul and Christ, as an essential condition of salvation, whether it be the authority of pope or council or creed or system of theology, or the intercession of saints, or good works of our own. Salvation depends solely and exclusively upon personal union with Christ: all other things, however important in their place, are subordinate to this. Without faith in Christ there can be no salvation for any sinner: this is the exclusiveness of the gospel; but with faith in Christ there is salvation for all of whatever sect or name: this is its charity.—P. S.] John 6:48. I am the bread of life.—Tholuck (like Meyer), on John 6:47-51 : “After repelling the objection of the Jews, Jesus returns to His former theme in John 6:32-40, and in the first place repeats the same thought.” We find here not a return, but an advance, carrying the thought forward from the person of Christ to His historical work. This appears from what follows. “Of the life.” Referring to the preceding promise of eternal life. “Τῆζζωῆς. Genitiv. qual. and effectus.” Or probably, conversely, the genitive of form or mode of existence. [That is, not: “the bread which has the quality and effect of life, the bread which is and which gives life;” but: “the life which is bread; the life existing and offered in the form of bread, and operating as bread.”—E. D. Y.] Previously the bread was the subject, with various predicates (the person); now the bread becomes an attribute of the life (the giving and the effect of the person). The life as bread, not the bread as life. That Jesus is the life, follows from John 6:46-47. This thought is expanded further on. John 6:49. Your fathers did eat manna.—The manna gave no abiding life, because it was not essential life. John 6:50. This is the bread.—By this the bread may be known as the true bread: that it comes down from heaven for the purpose and to the effect that whosoever eateth of it shall not die; or, more precisely: It cometh down from heaven, in order that men may eat of it (the μὴἀποθάνῃ affecting this first clause), and that he who eateth of it may not die. The definition of the true bread by its origin, its design, and its effects. The μὴἀποθάνῃ is more exactly expressed in the κἂνἀποθάνῃ of John 11:25. John 6:51. I am the living bread.—I am the bread living. The life is now the logical subject. The Vulgate: Ego sum panis vivus (,) qui de c�lo descendi; the bread living, who [1st pers.] have come down from heaven. If any man eat of this bread.—Because Christ is the living bread, He offers Himself as bread, and communicates by the eating of this bread a living forever. Christ, therefore, now distinguishes Himself as life from the bread of life as a gift. And the bread that I will give.—No longer: The bread which I am. The καί—δέ, [atque etiam] is to be noted [i.e., καὶὁἄρτοςδέ, ὃνέγ. δ.: “And the bread, now, which I will give.”] See Tholuck. Is my flesh.—The bodily, finite, historical form of Christ, which He yields up for the world in His death, and thus gives to the world for its nourishment, John 2:19; John 3:14. Not only the sacrifice of Christ in His atoning death to procure the eternal life of the world (Meyer), but also the renewal and transformation of the world by its participation of the sacrificed life of Christ; as, in John 2:19; John 3:14, death and resurrection are combined. It seems strange that the second ἣνἔγὼδώσω [after ήσάρξμουἐστίν] should be wanting in Codd. B. C. D. L. T. [and ΰ.], the Itala, the Vulgate, and three times in Origen; so as to be stricken out by Lachmann and Tischendorf [Tregelles, Alford, Westcott and Hort—P. S.] Tholuck accordingly says, with Meyer: “A pregnance like this: The bread which I will give, is my flesh, for the life of the world,—would be as contrary to the style of John as the repetition ἣνἐγὼδώσω is agreeable to it.” And he conjectures: “The omission may have been caused by the preceding δώσω.” But the addition, too, may very easily have been made for doctrinal elucidation, to make the sentence point more distinctly to the atoning death. If, therefore, we let the above manuscripts decide, the death and resurrection are united; the point of the sacrificial death by itself is not yet so distinctly brought, out in this place; and this seems more congruous with John 3:14 (and with the conception of the Jews in the sequel). Therefore: My flesh for the life of the world. The manifestation in the flesh is necessary to the full life. The flesh of Christ will be the life of the world. That is, the giving up of His flesh in death and the distribution of His flesh in the resurrection will be the life of the world. Yet in the giving up of His flesh, His sacrificial death is mainly intended, and in the eating of it, faith in the atonement; and as this element in the conception is to be distinguished, on the one hand, from the fact that Christ is the bread in His person, in His historical life itself, so, on the other hand, it is to be distinguished from the fact that He, in His flesh and blood, prepares His life, glorified through death, for a eucharistic meal for the world. John 6:52. The Jews therefore strove among themselves.—Here a dispute arises concerning the sense in which the Lord could give men His flesh for the life of the world. And this dispute is described as a dispute of the Jews. Yet it is not a question of the interpretation of Christ’s word, but of the offensiveness of it, which here sets the Jews at strife. The skeptics and cavillers lead, saying: How can this man, etc. They seem disposed to charge the word with an abominable meaning, taking it literally. John 6:53. Unless ye eat the flesh of the Son of man, and drink his blood.—Jesus recedes not for the offense, but with a verily, verily, He goes further, and now divides the flesh into flesh and blood, and to the eating adds drinking, which He had first introduced at John 6:35. Mark further: (1) This truth, enforced with verily, verily, is now expressed in four different forms; four times the Lord speaks of eating and drinking His flesh and blood. (2) The first time in a conditional injunction on the Jews with reference to the Messiah, in the negative form of threatening: “Unless ye eat, etc., ye have no life in you.” The second time in a positive statement referring to Jesus Himself, in the form of promise. The third time, in a statement of the nature and substantial effect of the flesh and blood of Christ, on which the preceding practical alternative is founded: “For my flesh is meat indeed,” etc. The fourth time, in explication of all these three propositions: “He dwelleth in Me, and I in him.” For the interpretation, we must remember that elsewhere flesh (σάρξ), by itself, denotes human nature in its full concrete manifestation (John 3:6); hence the flesh (σάρξ) of Christ, likewise, is the manhood of Christ, His personal human nature. But flesh and blood (σὰρξκαὶαἶμα) elsewhere denotes inherited nature; in Peter (Matthew 16:17), for example, his old, hereditary Jewish nature, with its associations and views; in Paul (Galatians 1:16), his Pharisaic descent, spirit, and associations; in Christians (1 Corinthians 15:50), the mortal, earthly nature and form, received from natural birth, which cannot inherit the kingdom of God. Accordingly the flesh and blood of Christ are the peculiar descent and nature of Christ in historical manifestation; the historical Christ. As the flesh and blood of historical mankind are reduced to the material and nutriment of its culture and development, its humanity; so the flesh and blood of the historical Christ are given to be the nutriment of mankind’s higher spiritual life, its divinity. And when the partaking of His flesh and blood is made the indispensable condition of salvation, the meaning is: The life of man proceeds only from the life of Christ completed in death; only by Christ’s actual person being made the especial vital element of mankind, the nourishment and refreshment of the real life of man,—by this means alone does man receive true life. The four sentences of this passage may be arranged in the following system: (1) The flesh and blood of Christ are really the food and drink of man; i.e., the sacrifice and the participation of the actual, divine-human Christ are for mankind the only escape from death, and the only way to the higher, spiritual life. (2) Because nothing but the full reception of the historical Christ can effect full communion with Him, consisting in the believer’s dwelling in Christ (justification), and Christ’s dwelling in the believer (sanctification). (3) Therefore he that eats, takes the nutriment of eternal life, which works in him to resurrection. (4) He who takes not this nourishment, has no true life, and can attain to none. Note: (1) the phrase flesh and blood (σὰρξκαὶαἶμα) in our passage differs from body and blood (σῶμακαὶαἷμα) in the words of institution of the holy Supper: the former applying to the whole historical, self-sacrificing Christ, the latter simply to His individual person just coming forth from the sacrifice. (2) In the preparation of the σὰρξκαὶαἷμα for food, the life, death, and resurrection of Christ are blended in one, the leading element being the death; as in σῶμακαὶαἷμα the two are blended under the leading aspect of the new life.—Tholuck: “The addition of αἷμα to σάρξ abates nothing from the notion (Matthew 16:7; Ephesians 6:11; 1 Corinthians 15:20), but only expresses still more definitely, that is, by its two main constituents, the sensible human nature.” This, therefore, in its earthly manifestation (John 6:50; John 6:58), is to be spiritually received, and John 6:50, continuing to qualify the succeeding verses, shows that it is to be received especially in its atoning death, to which also the αἷμα may perhaps particularly point. The addition of αἷμα, however, denotes primarily the generic life in the individualized σάρξ. The flesh and blood of Christ are the historical Christ in His entire connection with God and man (as the “Son of God and of Mary”), as made by His death the eucharistic meal of the world;—certainly, therefore, a new point, with death as the most prominent aspect. [It should be added that the blood of Christ in the New Testament always signifies His atoning death for the sins of the world, comp. Romans 3:25; Colossians 1:14; Colossians 1:20; Hebrews 9:14; Hebrews 9:20; Hebrews 10:10; 1 Peter 1:2; 1 Peter 1:19; 1 John 1:7; Revelation 1:5. It must refer to the same sacrifice here, and flesh must be interpreted accordingly. Flesh and blood are the whole human life of Christ as offered on the cross for the propitiation of the sins of the world, and thus become the fountain of life for all believers.—P. S.] Various Interpretations: 1. The atoning death of Christ: Augustine, Luther, Melanchthon, Calvin, Beza, [Grotius, Calov.] Lόcke, and many other modern expositors (see Meyer).2. The entire human manifestation of Christ including His death (Paulus, Frommann, De Wette, etc.) 3. The deeper self-communication of Jesus, faith eating and drinking in the human nature of Jesus the life of God (Hofmann, Schriftbeweis, [ΙΙ. 2, p. 245 ff.]. “Not the giving of His flesh, but His flesh itself Jesus calls food.” (Delitzsch). 4. A prophetic discourse in anticipation of the Lord’s Supper (Chrysostom, most of the fathers [Cyril, Theophyl., Euth. Zigab., Cyprian, Hilarius, perhaps also Augustine, but see p. 228,] and Roman Catholics [Klee, Maier], Calixtus [a moderate Lutheran, strongly opposed by the high Lutheran Calovius], Zinzendorf, Bengel, Michaelis, Scheibel, Olshausen, Kling, etc., Kahnis, Luthardt [Wordsworth]; according to Heubner, the Reformed Church [he should say the Reformed theology] with the exception of Calvin). 5. A mythical discourse here anticipating the Lord’s Supper, as John 3 anticipates baptism. (The negative critics, Bretschneider, Strauss, Baur, etc.). 6. The Lord does not speak here of the Supper itself, but expresses the idea on which the Supper is founded. (Here Meyer names Olshausen, Kling, Lange). As to the first interpretation: Unquestionably the atoning death is in view, but in connection with its antecedent (the historical fact of Christ) and its effect (the historical gospel). As to the second: The subject is no longer only the living person of Christ itself, but that which it will yield by its sacrifice of itself. As to the third: The further pressing of the words themselves takes us to the very mode by which the life of Jesus is changed into the food and drink of mankind (death). As to the fourth: The Lord’s Supper itself cannot be the subject. (Heubner quotes the Lutheran church as denying this hypothesis, especially Luther. Yet it is plain from the foregoing that this exegetical antagonism is not confessional.) (a) The discourse would anticipate too much, and be unintelligible. (b) John 6:53 would teach the absolute necessity of taking the communion rather than of evangelical saving faith. (“Even the Lutherans consider the Supper not absolute but only ordinarie necessary.”) (c) The expression σὰρξκαὶαἷμα; is not equivalent to σῶμακαὶαἷμα. (d) A manducatio spiritualis is here intended; for the partaker is assured of eternal life, which is only conditionally the case in the fruitio oralis. (e) The eating here described is perpetual. As to the fifth: It is disposed of with the assumptions of that school of criticism in the Introduction. (The σὰρκαφαγεῖν of Ignatius and Justin can prove nothing. It has its origin here.) As to the sixth: As the specific ordinance of baptism is, in chap. 3, lodged in germ in the general idea of baptism as already known to history, so the specific ordinance of the Lord’s Supper is here present in germ under the general idea and historical forms of the evening meal. The hearers of Jesus were on their way to eat the paschal lamb; He says to them: Ye must eat Me, the real paschal lamb now offered in the history of the world. This then unquestionably contains a prophecy of the holy Supper, though it is not the Supper itself that is directly described.—The emphasizing of the person is the decisive point. Personal reception of the historical person of Christ in its communication and sacrifice of itself (through the medium of the word and sacrament) is the fundamental condition of personal eternal life.Respecting the copious literature of this section, see Tholuck: Meyer [p. 273]. The dissertations of Kling, Mόller, Tischendorf [De Christo pane vitζ, 1839], the works on the Lord’s Supper by Ebrard, Kahnis, Lindner, [Rόckert, Nevin], Dieckhoff, the Excursus of Lόcke, etc., are of mark. John 6:53-54. Unless ye eat [φάγητε] … and drink. … He that eateth [τρώγων] my flesh and drinketh my blood.—Eating and drinking denotes full, actual faith, full, actual appropriation by faith. According to Hofmann, faith is not the thing directly in view, but is presupposed. The reception here meant is distinct from faith. Against this see John 6:40; John 6:47, and the many passages in which the πιστεύειν is represented as the sole condition of the ζωὴαἰώνιος. Τρώγειν [to gnaw, to crack, to chew, repeated four times, 54, 56–58.—P. S.], though in its general meaning equivalent to φαγεῖν, is a stronger expression (De Wette, et al., against Tholuck); and to it πίνειν is added. The tropical phrase is interpreted not so well by Ephesians 3:17 and Sir 24:21, as by the institution of the paschal lamb, and from the eating and the manna from which the discourse started. It is the strongest assertion of the personal aspect of salvation. In you, ἐνἑαυτοῖς; see John 5:26. John 6:55. My flesh is true food [ἀληθὴςβρῶσις].—Ἀληθής is better attested than ἀληθῶς. [See Text. Notes.] Tholuck considers it the antithesis of the real to the pretended, and disputes the sense ἀληθινός [genuine, veritable] (Origen, Lόcke, etc.). Rightly, if it be understood that the ἀληθινός, as opposed to the symbol (in this case, e.g., the manna), is strengthened to ἀληθής, and the symbol falls to nonentity and falsehood, the moment men put the symbol against, the reality for which it stands. And my blood, etc.—“The life of the flesh is in the blood,” says Leviticus 17:11. Here it is said, in ver John 63: “It is the Spirit that quickeneth;” and in 1 Corinthians 15:45. If, now, as we have said on John 6:53, the flesh denotes rather the individualized nature of man, and the blood rather the general, then the blood of Christ also bears a reference to His generic life as Christ in distinction from His flesh, His personal manifestation in history. The connecting notion between His blood and His flesh is His life. We must eat His distinct historical form in believing, historical contemplation, but His life we must drink in spiritual contemplation and in the appropriation of fervent faith. John 6:56. Dwelleth in me, and I in him.—A Johannean phrase (John 15:4; John 17:23; 1 John 3:24; 1 John 4:16). Denoting personal community of life with Christ in its two correlative fundamental forms which appear singly in Paul: We in Christ, is the first (Galatians 2:17); Christ in us, the second (Galatians 2:20). From this effect of the heavenly food the reception of it may be more precisely defined: The vital appropriation of the whole person of Christ. This is not a unio mystica (Meyer, Tholuck) in the stricter theological sense, though the living faith contains the basis for it. That an effect like this cannot be claimed for the reception of the Lord’s Supper in and of itself, is plain. Yet the reception of the holy communion is the most efficient and copious medium, and the appointed seal; the believing participation is the highest specific act and form of this vital communion; and for this reason the unbelieving participation forms the most violent collision with this vital communion to judgment. John 6:57. And I live by the Father.—Here also the vital correlation is the main thing; Christ lives in the Father; that is, by the contemplation of the living, almighty Father, who is life absolute, and pure life, Christ is living and is sent by the Father. The Father lives in Him; that is, Christ has His own life by the Father’s living in Him for the Father’s sake, i.e., He lives for the Father. (Διά with the accusative denotes not the cause: by the Father, and hardly the ground: because the Father has life; but the entire purpose and direction. “The Father will and must have such, He seeks such,” John 4:23. Angelus Silesius: “I am as much to Him as He is to me”). So he … shall live by me.—Here the eating is again the eating of Christ Himself. He to whom it is the nourishment of His life to sink Himself in the personal presence of Christ, as Christ has sunk Himself in the contemplation of the Father,—he is sent forth by the life of Christ, and lives for Him, as Christ is sent forth by the life of the Father, and lives for the Father. (“He shall divide the spoil with the strong” [German version: “He shall have the strong for a prey”]. Isaiah 53. John 6:58. This is that bread. Conclusion of the whole matter. As Christ had passed from the bread which He in Himself presents, to the bread which He gives, He here returns to the bread which He Himself is. Yet not merely in the same sense as before is He now Himself the bread. There it was Christ in His historical manifestation; here it is the eternal Christ, by the eternal intuition (τρώγων) of whom we live forever. John 6:59. These things said he in the synagogue, as he taught in Capernaum.—A historical note, accounting, in particular, for the fact that not only the Judaistic spirit in the popular mass which followed Him, but also many of His old adherents and disciples in Capernaum itself took offence at His words. From this locality of His discourse the sensuous construction of the eating of the body of Christ has been styled a Capernaitic eating.John 6:60. Many therefore of his disciples, when they heard this.—Many of His adherents in Capernaum and the vicinity. Μαθηταί in the wider sense. See the woe of Christ on Capernaum, Bethsaida, and Chorazin, Matthew 11:20 ff. Hard; σκληρός, harsh, stern, rigorous; opposed to μαλακός, soft, tender, gentle. γִּ ?αַ ?ψΞςֶ ?φֶ ?α, Proverbs 15:1. Hard to solve, hard to do, hard to bear. The interpretation is contained in the next words: Who can hear it? i.e., bear it. Hence not: hard to understand (Chrysostom, Grotius, Olshausen). According to Tholuck and others: presumptuous, for its making life depend on a scandalous eating of His flesh and blood (on man-eating). De Wette (Kuinoel, Meyer): Because they would not admit the thought of the death of the Messiah; not because they understood literally the eating of His flesh (Augustine, Grotius, Lόcke). Unquestionably in the sequel, the suffering Messiah and His death on the cross were, as Meyer observes, the standing and specific σκάνδαλον of the Jews (John 12:34; 1 Corinthians 1:23). This entry is longer than a Bible module can hold. The rest is at https://www.sermonindex.net/commentary/lange/ III Apostacy Of Many Disciples. Incipient Treason In The Circle Of The Twelve. Confession Of Peter John 6:66-7166 From that time [upon this] many of His disciples went back, and walked no 67more with him. Then [Therefore] said Jesus unto the twelve, Will ye also [do ye 68also wish to] go away? Then [omit Then] Simon Peter answered him, Lord, to whom shall we go [go away, ὰπελευσόμεθα]? thou hast the [omit the] words of eternal life. 69And we believe and are sure [we have believed and have known] that thou art that Christ [the Christ], the Son of the living God [the Holy One of God]. 70Jesus answered them, Have not I chosen you twelve, [Did I not choose 71you the twelve?] and one of you is a devil? [!] He spake of Judas Iscariot the son of Simon [Judas, the son of Simon Iscariot]John : for he it was [it was he] that should [was about to] betray him, being one of the twelve. AND Joh_6:66. Upon this many of his disciples.—Ἐκτούτου. (1) From this moment (Lόcke, De Wette). (2) Meyer, more correctly, according to c. John 19:12 : On account of this discourse, “which disappointed their carnal messianic hopes.” And in addition had become the strongest positive offence. Went back; εἰςτὰὀπίσω.—Comp. c. John 18:6; John 20:14. John 6:67. Will ye also, etc.—So Luther, Baumgarten-Crusius [and the English version], not accurately. Rather, “But ye will not go away, will ye?” Expressing confidence mingled with suspicion in reference to the traitor. Giving occasion for a volutary decision. [The Lord asked the question in order to test their faithfulness, to elicit their confession, and to attach them more closely to Himself, but not, as Alford suggests, for His own comfort and encouragement; for as He knew the future treason of Judas (John 6:64; John 6:71), so He foresaw also the faithfulness of the eleven. In this place, John first mentions the Twelve, without a word about their previous calling.—a clear proof that he took for granted a general knowledge of the gospel history.—P. S.] John 6:68. To whom shall we go.—So also Luther’s version. More accurately: To whom shall we go over, go away from Thee? Meyer: ἀπελευσόμεθα, future, ever go away. [Denying the future possibility.—P. S.] No second Messiah will appear. [Augustin: Da nobis alterum Te]. Prelude to the confession of Peter in Matthew 16:16. [Peter quickly, resolutely and emphatically speaks and acts here as elsewhere in the name of the Twelve. He is the mouth-piece of the apostolic college. This gives him a certain primacy and priority down to the day of Pentecost and the calling of Paul, who was the independent head of Gentile Christianity by Christ’s own appointment. The Romish Church turns the temporary and personal primacy of Peter into a permanent and official supremacy of the Bishop of Rome. This, and the identifying of the church of Rome with the Kingdom of Christ, is the πρῶτονψεῦδος, the fundamental error and the fundamental sin of the papacy.—P. S.] Words of eternal life. And we.—The objective and subjective grounds of cleaving to Him. Words which come forth from, possess, and lead to, eternal life. See John 6:63.—And we: [καὶἡμεῖς] the answer of faith to the object of faith. Not excluding, of course, the other “antithesis to the deserters.” (Meyer.) [John 6:69. And we have believed and have known.—The perfect: πεπιστεύκαμενκαὶἐγνώκαμεν, expresses the completed action and permanent result: assured faith and firm knowledge. Fides prζcedit intellectum, “faith precedes knowledge.” This Augustinian and Anselmic maxim (which Schleiermacher also adopted; see the motto of his Dogmatics) may be derived from the order of πίστις and γνῶσις in this verse. But the reverse maxim: Intellectus prζcedit fidem (Abelard), is also true, though not in a rationalistic sense, and is supported by the order, John 10:38 (that ye may know and believe) and 1 John 5:13. We must first be made acquainted with Christ before we can believe in Him (“faith comes by hearing,” Romans 10:17), but we must believe in Christ in order to attain an experimental and saving knowledge of Him. Faith itself is an intellectual as well as a moral and spiritual act.—P. S.] The Holy One of God [see Textual Notes.] The One consecrated by and for God. Comp. John 10:36; Mark 1:24; Luke 4:34; Acts 4:27; Revelation 3:7. [The coincidence of the original text with the testimony of the demoniacs (Mark 1:26), who with ghostlike intuition perceived the higher character of Jesus, is remarkable.—P. S.] More indefinite designation of the Messiah. The full, matured confession, born of the Spirit, we find first in Matthew 16;—a fact mistaken by Weisse, when he makes this passage a variation of that in the Synoptical account. Peter’s answering here in this complete way for all the twelve could not be entirely of the Spirit, [as the later confession Matthew 16 was]. It unconsciously served to sustain Judas in his false and cold self-command, and to cover the aversion which was in him at the very time; and thus it gave occasion for the severe words of Jesus. John 6:70. Did I not choose you the twelve?—A more definite exposition of the words of Joh 6:67. Meyer: “Not the language of reflection, but of sudden pain over the tragic result, in contrast with that joyful confession which Peter was convinced he could give in the name of all.” It probably refers not to the “tragic result,” but to the moral alienation, the germ of apostasy, which from this time forth developed itself in Judas. The distribution of the emphasis is very significant. “I” is first; then “you;” then “the twelve.” I, as the Holy One of God; have chosen you, to the highest honors. And now the fearful contrast: One of you is a devil!—Interpretations: An informer (Theophylact, [DeWette]); an adversary or betrayer (Kuinφl, Lόcke, et al.); devil, devilish, of a diabolical nature (Meyer). In New Testament designations, however, an ideal meaning is always lodged; the word is not a mere nomen; as Matthew 13:39; Revelation 12:10 prove. And this is the more sure to be the case in this figurative designation. In Matthew 16:23 the term “Satan” is chosen, because Jesus intends to describe a tempter instigated by the devil; so here also “devil” denotes an actual traducer instigated by the devil. We must by all means abide by the term. The expression: “sons, or children of the devil,” (John 8:44; 1 John 3:10), is not so strong. The mention of the number twelve shows that the brothers of the Lord also were by this time in the circle. [? See below, p. 241.—P. S.] John 6:71. He spoke of Judas.—That is, He meant him. See the Textual Notes. On Judas Iscariot see the Com. on Matthew, John 10 [p. 182. Not to be confounded with the other Judas (son of James), John 14:22. For it was he that was about to betray him.—Ἤμελλεν is hard to translate. Traditurus erat. The betrayal germinated in him from this time forth. Meyer, groundlessly: “Not that he was already meditating the betrayal, (see, on the contrary, John 13:2), but that the betrayal was the divinely appointed result.” John 13:2 speaks of the final resolution; this passage of the first swerving of the temper and inclination. One of the twelve.—Showing up the monstrous, diabolical character of this incipient infidelity. The silence of Judas is in keeping with his character. It now firmly lodges the seed. On the Lord’s choosing of Judas see Meyer [p. 285, 5th ed. See also the Literature quoted below in Doctr. and Ethical No. 3.—P.S.] [The call of Judas is only one of the innumerable mysteries in God’s moral government, which no system of philosophy can solve at all, and which even Christianity solves but in part, reserving the final answer for a higher expansion of our faculties in another world. It involves the whole problem of the relation of God to the origin of sin, and the relation of His foreknowledge and foreordination to the free agency of man. The question why Christ called and received Judas into the circle of His chosen twelve, is more dogmatical than exegetical, yet cannot be passed by unnoticed. It admits of three answers, none of which, however, is entirely satisfactory: 1. Christ elected Judas an apostle, not indeed for the very purpose that he might become a traitor (which no sensible divine ever asserted, at least not directly); but that, through his treason, as an incidental condition or a necessary means, the Scriptures might be fulfilled (comp. John 13:18; John 17:12), and the redemption of the world be accomplished. So Augustine (electi undecim ad opus probationis, electus unus ad opus tentationis), supralapsarian Calvinists, also Daub who (in his speculative treatise: Judas Iscariot) represents the traitor as an incarnate devil, predestinated to exhibit wickedness in its worst form in contrast with the highest manifestation of goodness in Christ. This view, although it contains an element of truth, seems after all to involve our blessed Lord in some kind of responsibility for the darkest crime ever committed. 2. Jesus foresaw the financial and administrative abilities of Judas (comp. John 12:6; John 13:29), which might have become of great use to the apostolic church, but not his thievish and treacherous tendencies, which developed themselves afterwards, and He elected him solely for the former. This explanation is rather rationalistic and incompatible with the prophetic foresight of Christ, as well as the express remark of John ἤδειἐξἀρξῆς, John 6:64, and John 6:70-71. 3. Jesus knew the whole original character of Judas from the beginning, before it was properly developed, and elected him in the hope that the good qualities and tendencies would, under the influence of His teaching, ultimately acquire the mastery over the bad. So Meyer, Park and many others. This implies that Jesus was mistaken, if not in His judgment at the time, at least in His expectation, and is likewise at war with His perfect knowledge of the human heart. Alford despairs of solving the difficulty. Wordsworth and other English commentators pass it by in modest or prudent silence. I must add that the fall of Judas does not necessarily interfere with the doctrine of the perseverance of saints. For by his election is evidently meant the external historical call to the apostleship which was confined to the twelve, (ὑμᾶςτοὺςδώδεκαἐξελεξάμην, John 6:70), not the eternal election of the Father and the drawing of the Father to the Son, which applies to all true disciples who persevere to the end (Romans 8:28 ff.; John 10:28-29; John 13:18). With this important distinction we may endorse Bengel’s remark: “There is therefore a certain kind of election from which man may fall away (Est igitur aliqua electio ex qua aliquis potest excidere),” but we must add: there is another kind of election which is as certain and unchangeable as God.—P. S.] AND ETHICAL1. The turning-point in the life of Jesus which John here brings to view is of the highest importance in the history. It accounts for the falling away of the majority of the Galilean followers of Jesus, and that in a way perfectly agreeable to the Galilean character, which was inclined to boisterous insurrectionary projects. Because Jesus refused Himself to the fanatical proposal of these people to make Him a king, and demanded in stringent terms an inward, submissive faith in His person, instead of an outward hoping for the things of an earthly kingdom, many began to fall back. 2. Undoubtedly also the first disaffection now formed itself in the mind of Judas; since after the explanation of Jesus, he must have felt that he had been deceived in his glowing expectations. How little the disciples in general noticed this, appears from the protestation of Peter. Yet, besides the all-seeing eye of Christ, the feeling of John seems also to have caught an impression of this alienation. (See Leben Jesu, II p. 609.) 3. On the calling [and character] of Judas, comp. Matthew, p. 183; Meyer in loco [5th ed. p. 285]; Lόcke II p. 182. [Also Schaff’s treatise on the Sin against the Holy Ghost (Halle, 1841), pp. 35 ff., the article Judas in Winer and in Smith, especially the analysis by Prof. Park of Andover in Hackett’s edition of Smith, Vol. II pp. 1495–1503.—P. S.] 4. The protestation of Peter forms a beautiful contrast to the sullen silence of Judas, in whose apostasy three periods are to be marked: 1. The beginning of alienation from this time forth; 2. The thought of betrayal and the dalliance with it after the anointing in Bethany; 3. The full purpose and the execution of it after the pass-over. And yet the beautiful contrast is not perfect, because Peter indiscreetly and without misgiving answered for the whole company, including Judas himself. Even the grand sentence: “Thou hast the words of eternal life,”—does not fully reach the deep meaning of Jesus in His discourse, if it refers to it. The word of the disciple falls something short of the self-presentation of the Master. The confession in Matthew 16:16 is an expression of purer and riper faith. Hence Jesus answers here with the stern word: “One of you is a devil,” while after that other confession he blesses him. Even in the latter case it is true, that the sharp rebuke, “Get thee behind me, Satan,”—follows the benediction; for in that case also the divine enthusiasm of faith had not yet matured in Peter into a firm spirit of faith; Peter was not yet free from all sympathy with Judas in chiliastic ambition. 5. It is not to be supposed that the disciples in general received any definite idea as to whom the Lord meant. Least of all do they seem to have fixed on Judas, who, on the contrary, appears from the account of the anointing at Bethany in Matthew and Mark to have enjoyed high consideration among them. That Judas felt himself in some way hit, is very probable; and also that John was led to suspect who the forbidding fellow disciple was (see John’s account of the anointing). The stern word of Christ must therefore have burdened the minds of the disciples as a heavy riddle, giving them continuous warning, even amidst the great successes of His subsequent ministry. The turn we here mark in the history of Jesus now comes fully to view in His subsequent conduct as depicted in the next chapter. AND The first apostasy from Christ in its solemn and typical import: 1. Its motives; 2. Its extent; 3. Its consequences.—The majestic calmness of the Lord in the apostasy of false disciples, as revealed in His stern dealing with those who remain.—The deep grief of the Lord visible even through His free and tranquil conduct, 1. His calmness: He begs not, flatters not, makes no terms; He remains sure of Himself and of His word. 2. His grief: He sees a danger to all His disciples; seems even to miss hearing the fair words of Peter; declares with a shudder that one of the chosen twelve is a devil.—The first apostasy, the first sifting of the hosts of Christ’s disciples, 1 John 2:19.—However great the apostasy may be, it never can be universal.—The stages of apostasy: 1. Retention of the earthly mind in discipleship, Matthew 13:5. 2. Development of unbelief, of rupture with Christ. 3. The actual apostasy itself.—Apostasy: a total view of the mournful thing: 1. Its main features in the gospel history. 2. Its preludes in the Old Testament history. 3. Its development in the history of the Christian church. 4. Its final form as depicted in the prophecies of the Bible. The affinity of the apostasy in Galilee with the hostility in Judea.—The apostasy of the Jews a prelude to the traitorous apostasy of Judas.—The malignant silence of Judas a bad sign.—Falsehood of the diabolical nature. “Nothing more grimly holds thee back Than falsehood of thy being.” —The silence of Judas and the out-speaking of Peter.—The striking contrast in the circle of the twelve: Peter and Judas: 1. Honest loyalty and false adherence. 2. Fresh, clear openness and dark obduracy. 3. Happy confession and unhappy reserve.—Peter, Judas and John.—The declaration of Peter in its light and shade.—“Lord, to whom shall we go?”—We must continue with Jesus our Lord, because (1) no other Christ will come; (2) no one will bring a better word; (3) there remains no other faith; (4) there remains no brighter knowledge.—The solemnity and dread with which Jesus answered the declarations of Peter.—The fearful contrast: To be chosen to a higher service than angels, and to prove a devil.—The terrible omen, that from among the twelve arose a traitor to the Lord, and a betrayer of the Lord Himself.—The depravity germinates slowly, but ripens rapidly to judgment.—The second turn in the life of Jesus (in Galilee), compared with the first (in Judea).—Because Christ presented Himself to His disciples as the bread of eternal life, many feared they should starve, and fell away.—They wish only things, things, things (worldly things, spiritual things, ecclesiastical things), and so come not to personal life in the beholding and partaking of the glorious personality of Christ.—As a man’s ideal is, so is he: he who wishes only idols and stocks, is like idols and stocks; he who wishes only creatures and things, is himself but creature and thing; and this leads to apostasy. [comp. Psalms 115:8.—Tr.]—Hence apostasy is from Christianity to Judaism, from gospel to law.—It needs courage to trust oneself to Christ, the focus of life, and let the world go; but a believing courage which the Lord gives to him who asks. Starke: Quesnel: A preacher may lose his hearers through no fault of his own.—Majus: As Jesus unkindly thrust no one away, so He will forcibly retain none. Let those go who wish not to stay. He who forsakes Christ, the Life, follows Satan to death.—Canstein: Christ needed none, but no one can do without Him.—It often fares with faithful teachers as with Christ (in the history here before us).—There is hardly a company, but the devil finds one or another in it.—Preachers may certainly rebuke the sins of their hearers, yet with care that they call no one by name; for this embitters without edifying.—In unbelievers Satan so nestles, that they themselves are as it were the devil. Ephesians 2:2.—Trouble thyself not and doubt not for the truth of the gospel, when one of the most distinguished ministers becomes a Mameluke and proves faithless to Christ.—Osiander: Even those who are adorned with excellent gifts, may still forfeit the grace of God.—Beware of presumptuous security! False brethren give more pain to the faithful servants of God, than open enemies.—Bengel: Christ is concerned not for the number, but for the purity of His disciples.—Gossner, on John 6:67 : By this He would show that He forces no one, but would have all voluntary disciples.—Heubner: There is a gross apostasy from Jesus; this is rare; but there is also a subtle apostasy, which is the more frequent.—The voluntary departure of spurious disciples is no loss, but a gain. John 6:67 : Jesus pours out His whole heart in this question, His sorrow and His love.—He still puts this question continually to all believers (i.e. in every solemn test) for the trial of their fidelity.—Upon the least likelihood that Jesus might doubt their fidelity, Peter breaks out the louder; so the Christian will attach himself the more fervently to Jesus at the faintest trace of apostasy.—Have believed and known. A hint that the believing, child-like posture of mind must precede the attainment of knowledge.—Jesus still knows all the faithful and the faithless (“The Lord knoweth them that are His”).—Christ bore with Judas; the hardest test of His love. Bear cheerfully with men, in whom thou canst not find thyself.—Not to be upright towards the most upright One, betrays a wicked heart. The richest grace of intercourse with the most holy One can turn to perdition with a wicked heart. Judas wont out of the school of Jesus far worse than he went in.—Besser: Unbelief towards this single article (the eating and drinking of His flesh and blood) brought on a complete renunciation of Christ. [More accurately: Offence at being required to find all salvation in His whole self-sacrifice and self-imparting person itself, led them to separate from His person. Offence also at the last utterance of Jesus, John 6:65, which runs as a companion thought through the whole discourse, must in some way come into the account. As the doctrine of the divine person of Christ and its impartation of perfect life through a sacrificial death which made it a sacrificial meal was an offence to them, so was the doctrine of a distinction made by a gracious spiritual drawing of God between the small election of the spiritual Israel and the mass of the theocratic Israelitish church.]—Judas represents what is befallen to the Jewish people as a whole. How immeasurably deep must be the grief of love, that what was intended for Israel’s salvation became its hardening! He chose Judas. He turned upon him the full earnestness of His saving love, and He endured that one of the twelve should do the service of the devil to Him, that the Scripture might be fulfilled, John 17:12; Psalms 109—Schenkel: Why we are resolved not to go away from Jesus Christ. We answer, with Peter, to the question of the Lord: 1. Whither would we go? 2. The Lord has the words of eternal life. 3. We have believed and known that He is Christ, the Son of the living God. [Themes for discourses: The sifting power of truth. The sin of backsliding (John 6:66).—Peter the Confessor.—The first and fundamental Christian confession.—Christ, the best of teachers, the truest friend, the only refuge of the sinner. —Words of everlasting life.—Christ and Peter,—Christ and Judas.—It is better, with Peter in regard to Judas, to err on the side of charity than severity of judgment.—Christ, the purest of the pure, and the holiest of the holy, bore the traitor in His company to the close of His public ministry! What self-denial, what condescending mercy, what a rebuke to our intolerance and pride,—The mercy and severity of Christ in dealing with Judas.—The unknown sufferings of Christ in foreseeing the betrayal of one, and the treason of another disciple.—Peter called “Satan” for his human weakness (Matthew 16:23), Judas, a “devil” for his lurking treason.—Christ’s wisdom and mercy in withholding the name of Judas, while giving him a clear hint of his danger.—A hypocrite may for a long while deceive all men, but he cannot deceive Christ.—Judas an involuntary instrument for the greatest good.—The overruling power and wisdom of God.—Christ, the true prophet of human nature who knows and reveals the secrets of the heart.—P. S.] Footnotes: [For a somewhat similar division see Godet, II. 97. [Strauss unnecessarily creates this difficulty.—P. S.] [So Bengel “Jesus singularem numerum opponit plurali Judζorum, qui dixerant, opera Dei, John 6:28.” Alford: “Because there is but this one work, properly speaking, and all the rest are wrapt up in it,”—P. S.] [Josephus called it θεῖονκαὶπαράδοξονβρῶμα.] [Others regard the Scripture manna as wholly miraculous, and not in any respect a product of nature. So the writer of the article Manna in Smith’s Dictionary of the Bible, who thus sets forth the difference between the natural and this supernatural manna: “The natural products of the Arabian deserts and other oriental regions, which bear the name of manna, have not the qualities or uses ascribed to the manna of Scripture. They are all condiments or medicines rather than food, stimulating or purgative rather than nutritious; they are produced only three or four months in the year, from May to August, and not all the year round; they come only in small quantities, never affording any thing like 15,000,000 of pounds a week, which must have been requisite for the subsistence of the whole Israelitish camp, since each man had an omer (or three English quarts) a day, and that for forty years; they can be kept for a long time, and do not become useless in a day or two; they are just as liable to deteriorate on the Sabbath as on any other day: nor does a double quantity fall on the day preceding the Sabbath; nor would natural products cease at once and for ever, as the manna is represented as ceasing in the book of Joshua.”—P. S.] [Alford: “The words ὁκαταβ … are the predicate of ὁἄρτος, and do not apply, in the construction of this verse, to Christ personally, however truly they apply to Him in fact, The E. V. is here wrong: it should be, The bread of God is that (not He) which Cometh, etc. Not till John 6:35 does Jesus first say, ‘I am the bread of life,’ The manna is still kept in view, and the present participle, here used in reference to the manna, is dropped when the Lord Himself is spoken of.” The note of Wordsworth on John 6:33 is a curious specimen of the wild allegorizing of this learned and devout patristic and Anglican antiquarian. He sees here everywhere allusions to the sacrament. Even the meaning of the word Manna, “what is it,” is made to indicate the wonderful double nature of Christ and the mystery of His presence in the eucharist.—P.S.] [So also Godet: “Les deux termes, venir et croire, expriment, avec et sans figure, une seule et meme idιe: le joyeux et confiant empressement avec lequel le c�ur affamι et pressι de besoins spirituels s’empare de l’aliment cιleste qui lui est prιsentι en Jesus Christ.” Coming to Christ is faith indeed, yet not in repose as mere trust and confidence, or as a state of mind, but in active exercise and motion from the service of sin to the service of Christ; comp. 37, 44, 45, 65; John 7:37-38.—P. S.] [In classical usage (see Kόhner, II. § 443, 1, and Hermann Ad Viger., p. 746) but not in New Testament unless it be the εἶπον in John 11:42.—P. S.] [Yet the absence of a connecting particle seems to indicate a pause of reflection intervening between the preceding reproof (οὐπιστεύετε), and the following description of the true children of God.—P. S.] [Bengel’s observation on πᾶν is longer than is usual with this epigrammatic commentator, but well worth quoting: “A most weighty word, and, in comparing with it those things which follow, most worthy of consideration; for, in the discourses of Jesus Christ, what the Father hath given to the Son Himself, that is termed, both in the singular number and neuter gender, all (omne): those who come to the Son Himself, are described in the masculine gender, or even the plural number, every one (omnis), or they (illi). The Father hath given to the Son, as it were, the whole mass, in order that all whom He hath given, may be a unit (unum): that whole (universum) the Son evolves individually (one by one), in the execution of the Divine plan. Hence that expression, John 17:2, that all which (πᾶνὅ, omne quod) thou hast gives Him, he should give them (αὐτοῖς, eis) eternal life. In the Greek style of the New Testament, especially of John, wheresoever fastidious minds would say the construction was a solecism, an elegance truly divine, which to the Hebrews never seemed harsh, is usually found to lie beneath. That remark especially holds good of this passage.”—P. S.] [Against this false interpretation of Reuss (Hist, de la thιol. Chrιtienne, II p. 462), comp. Godet 2 p. 114.—P. S.] [In John 6:37 Christ had declared that the totality (πᾶν which is to be taken collectively as of one integral whole) of those whom the Father giveth Him, shall come to Him; in John 6:44 He declares that no one can come in any other way except by the drawing of the Father. The effect follows in every case from a certain cause, but this effect will follow from no other cause.—P. S.] [Calvin, however, says before (ad loc.) that the efficient motion of the Holy Spirit first makes unwilling men willing (“homines ex nolentibus et invitis reddit voluntaries”). So also Augustine who expressly says that faith is inseparable from will (credere non potest nisi volens), and: “Non ut homines, quod fieri non potest, nolentes credant, sed ut volentes ex nolentibus fiant.” He quotes from Virgil: trahit sua quemque voluptas, to show that the drawing is that of choice not of compulsion. Calvin expressly guards in this connection against the abuse of his doctrine. “They are madmen,” he says ad. John 6:40, “who seek their own salvation or that of others in the labyrinth of predestination, not keeping the way of faith which is proposed to them.… Since God has elected us to this very end that we believe, we destroy the election if we set aside faith (tolle fidem, et mutila erit electio) … If God calls us effectually to faith in Christ, it is of the same force to us, as if by an engraved seal He confirmed His decree concerning our salvation. For the testimony of the Spirit is nothing else but the sealing of our adoption. To every man, therefore, his faith is a sufficient attestation of God’s eternal predestination, so that it is impious and an insult to the testimony of the Holy Spirit to search beyond it.”—P. S.] [Tholuck says: καί—δέ designates a more detailed statement, as in John 1:3, or a correction, as in John 15:27. Zwingli (as quoted by Tholuck), “Dixi diu me panem esse vitζ, sed nondum quo facto id fiat, hoc jam aperiam.” Δέ introduces here something of special importance. Comp. Meyer in loc.—P. S.] [On Augustine’s interpretation see note in the Excursus below, p. 228.—P. S.] [M*ver (p. 270) adds to the above names, as favoring this view, Tholuck, Neander, Jul. Mόller, Lange, Ebrard, Keim, Weiss, Ewald, Kahnis, Godet. But Lange, Ewald, Kahnis, Hengstenberg and Godet should be classed with No. 6 below.—P. S.] [In his work on the Lord’s Supper, p. 104 ff., but later, in his Dogmatics, Vol. I. p. 624, Kahnis denies that John 6 refers directly to the Lord’s Supper, and explains the eating and drinking to be identical with believing for the reason that the same effect is made dependent on both, viz., eternal life. He should be classed with No. 6.—P. S.] [Latin dissertations on the difference between Luther’s and Calvin’s views on the Lord’s Supper, 1853, now reproduced in German by Dr. Jul. Mόller, of Halle, in his Dogmatische Abhandlungen, just published, Bremen, 1870, pp. 404–467.—P. S.] [In the second Excursus to the second edition of his Commentary on John (which is omitted in the third edition), and in the third edition, Vol. II. pp. 149–159.—P. S.] [Alford likewise makes this distinction, which is not sustained by the context. He says: “What is eating and drinking? Clearly not merely faith; for faith answers to the hand reached forth for the food,—but is not the act of eating. Faith is a necessary condition of the act: so that we can hardly say with Augustine, ‘crede, et manducasti;’ but crede et manducabis. Inasmuch as faith will necessarily in its energizing lead to this partaking, we sometimes incorrectly say that it is faith: but for strict accuracy this is not enough. To eat the flesh of Christ, is to realize, in our inward life, the mystery of His Body now in heaven,—to digest and assimilate our own portion in that Body. To drink His Blood is to realize, in our inward life, the mystery of His satisfaction for sin,—to digest and assimilate our own portion in that satisfaction, the outpouring of that Blood. And both these definitions may be gathered into one, which is: The eating of His Flesh and drinking of His Blood import the making to ourselves and using as objectively real, those two great Truths of our Redemption in Him, of which our faith subjectively convinces us. And of this realizing of faith He has been pleased to appoint certain symbols in the Holy Communion, which He has commanded to be received; to signify to us the spiritual process, and to assist us towards it.”—P. S.] [Meyer thinks that the change implies no intention of a stronger expression, since τρώγεινκαὶπίειν is used Matthew 24:38 (τρώγοντεςκαὶπίνοντες), by Demosthenes, Plutarch and Polybius without perceptible difference from φαγεῖν or ἐσθίειν. Τρώγων expresses the present of φαγών, which must be either τρώγων or ἐσθίων. So also Alford: The real sense is that by the very act of inward realization the possession of eternal life is certified. Wordsworth on the other hand presses the difference and, in fanciful sacramentarian exaggeration, says that τρώγειν presents the climax of the difficulty, and shows the need of coming to Christ in the holy communion with devout cravings and earnest longings of a famished soul for heavenly food.—P. S.] [Meyer: ἀληθής expresses in opposition to mere appearance the actual reality (1 John 2:27; Acts 12:9), which the Jews could not comprehend, John 6:52. Alford: “ἀληθής is here not=ἡἀληθινή, nor is the sense, ‘My flesh is the true meat,’ etc., but ‘My flesh is true meat,’ i.e., really to be eaten, which they doubted. Thus ἀληθῶς is a gloss, which falls short of the depth of the adjective. This verse is decisive against all explaining away or metaphorizing the passage. Food and drink are not here mere metaphors;—rather are our common material food and drink mere shadows and imperfect types of this only real reception of refreshment and nourishment into being.” Godet: ““L’adverbe (ἀληθῶς) ou l’adjectif (ἀληθής) exprime la pleine rιalitι de la communication vitale opιrι par ces ιlιments.”—P. S.] [Per Patrem, as the fountain of life. So Beza, De Wette, Alford, etc.—P. S.] [As Meyer takes it: wegen des Vaters, d. i. weil Mein Vater der lebendige ist. He quotes Plat. Conv., p. 203, E.: ἀναβιώσκεταιδιὰτὴντοῦπατρὸςφύσιν.—P. S.] [Comp. also the ὑψωθῆναιἐκτῆςγῆς, John 12:32. To make this interpretation at all plausible, the ἀναβαίνεινὅπουἦντὸπρότερον must be understood from the standpoint of Jesus whose death was a return to the heaven whence He descended, and to the glory which He had before the foundation of the world, comp. John 17:5. But the hearers could not have understood ἀναβαίνειν in this sense.—P. S.] [Aug.: Certe vel tunc videbitis, quia, non eo modo, quo putatis, erogat corpus suum; certe vel tunc intelligetis, quia gratia ejus non consumitur morsibus. Harless and Stier: Then you will understand that, and how my glorified heavenly humanity and corporeity can be food and drink. But this would make Christ speak of a future act. Meyer remarks against Harless: The glorified body of Christ is, as flesh and blood, inconceivable (1 Corinthians 15:49 f.)—P. S.] [Comp. against this assertion of Meyer John 3:13; John 20:17, where the ascension is clearly alluded to. Usually Jesus speaks of His death in John as a going to the Father or to Him that sent Me, John 7:33; John 13:3; John 14:12; John 14:28; John 16:5; John 16:28; John 17:11; John 17:13.—P. S.] [Mark 16:19; Luke 24:51; Acts 1:9.—P. S.] [But Christ may have addressed here some of the apostles. Hengstenberg says, the witnesses of the resurrection were the representatives of all the disciples.—P. S.] [Aug. Tract, in Joh. 27, § 13 (Opera III. 503):’ Caro non prodest quidquam quomodo illi intellexerunt… quomodo in cadavere dilaniatur, aut in macello venditur, non quomodo spiritu vegetatur…Accedat spiritus ad carnem, quomodo accedit caritas ad scientiam, et prodest plurimum. Nam si caro nihil prodesset, Verbum caro non fieret, ut inhabitaret in nobis. Similarly Bengel: Caro mera nil prodest: qualem scil. Judζi putabant esse carnem illam, de qua loquebatur Jesus. Loquitur sub conditione eaque impossibili, si sola caro esset…Caro est vehiculum virtutis divinζ omnis vivificantis, in Chris to et in credentibus: et Christus, carne mortificatus, spiritu vivificatus, virtutem suam maxime exseruit, 1 Peter 3:18; John 12:24; John 16:7.—P. S.] [He and (�colampadius regarded John 6:63 as a ferreus murus of their doctrine of the Lord’s Supper; yet Zwingli, like the other reformers, did not directly understand the passage, John 6:51-58, of the sacrament.—P. S.] [John uses here τρώγειν four times, φαγεῖν once; Matthew, Mark and Luke, in the words of institution, use φαγεῖν only, (which is employed as the second aorist of ἐσθίειν from an obsolete φάγω). On the peculiar meaning of τρώγειν, manducare, see note on John 6:54. It cannot be essentially different here from φαγεῖν, since John uses the latter, John 6:53, in the same sense.] [I say perhaps, for Augustine is not clear and is sometimes (e. g., by Meyer) quoted in favor of the first, more frequently in favor of the second interpretation. In his Tract. 26 in Joh. Evang. § 15 (ed. Bened. III. 500) he says, in expounding this passage, that the sacrament of the body and blood of Christ is received by some ad vitam, by others ad exitium (1 Corinthians 11:29), but he adds: res vero ipsa cujus sacramentum est, omni homini ad vitam, nulli ad exitium, quicunque ejus particeps fuerit. Comp. § 18 in the same homily (III. 501): Qui non manet in Christo et in quo non manet Christus, procul dubio nee manducat (some MSS. insert here spiritualiter,—evidently a Romish correction) carnem ejus, nec bibit ejus sanguinem, licet carnaliter et visibiliter premat dentibus sacramentum corporis et sanguinis Christi. In commenting on John 6:29 (Tract. 25, § 12, Tom. III. 489) he identifies the eating with believing: Crede et manducasti. At all events, Augustine cannot be quoted in favor of either transubstantiation or consubstantiation. Comp. on his doctrine on the eucharist my Church History, Vol. II pp. 498 f.—P.S.] [This third view which I have defended myself in the text, was first clearly brought out by that profound, acute and devout commentator, Bengel, in his Gnomon on John 6:51, where he says: “Jesus purposely framed His words so skilfully that immediately at that time, and at all times subsequently they would indeed apply in their strict literal sense to the spiritual enjoyment of Himself (de spirituali fruitione sui); and yet that afterwards the same words should, by consequence, be appropriate to express the most august mystery of the Holy Supper when that should be instituted. For He applied to the Holy Supper the thing itself which is set forth in this discourse; and of so great moment is this sacrament, that it may be readily thought possible, that Jesus, as He foretold the treachery of Judas at John 6:71, and His own death in this verse, so also foretold, one year before the institution of the Holy Supper, concerning which He most surely thought Within Himself whilst speaking these words: and with this object in order that the disciples might afterwards remember His prediction. The whole of these words concerning His flesh and blood have in view the passion of Jesus Christ, and along with it the Holy Supper. Hence arises the separate mention of one flesh and of the blood so invariably; for in His passion the blood was drawn out of His body, and the Lamb was thus slain.” The same view is substantially held by Olshausen, who says: “The Saviour could indeed not with propriety speak of a rite before it was instituted, so that nobody could understand Him; but He might touch the idea, out of which the rite subsequently grew. This idea is that Jesus is the principle of life and nutriment to the new, regenerate man, not only for his soul and spirit, but also for his glorified body” (which, according to Olshausen is prepared here in germ to appear in full bloom at the final resurrection). Kahnis (Luth. Dogmatik, Vol. I., p. 625): “The discourse of Christ, John 6, does not treat directly of the Lord’s Supper, but of faith which unites us in living union with Christ. But He purposely veiled this faith in the image of eating and drinking His flesh and blood in order to express the mysterious idea embodied in the Holy Supper, just as John 3:5 expresses the idea of baptism.” Alford says: “The question whether there is here any reference to the ordinance of the Lord’s Supper, has been inaccurately put. When cleared of inaccuracy in terms, it will mean, Is the subject here dwelt upon the same as that which is set forth in the ordinance of the Lord’s Supper? And of this there can surely be no doubt. To the ordinance itself, there is here no reference; nor could there well have been any. But the spiritual verity which underlies the ordinance is one and the same with that here insisted on; and so considered, the discourse is, as generally treated, most important towards a right understanding of the ordinance.” Webster and Wilkinson: “What our Lord said at this time He afterwards expressed in a permanent form by the sacrament of His Body and Blood. He is not here alluding to that sacrament; but what He here teaches, and what He afterwards taught by it, are the same.” Godet (II. p. 135): “This mystery of our perfect union with the person of Christ (Ephesians 5:30-32) which in this discourse is expressed in words (en paroles), is precisely the same which Jesus desired to express by an act (par un acte) in the rite of the holy Supper. It is not necessary to say that in this discourse He alluded to the holy Supper; but we must say that the holy Supper and this discourse refer to one and the same idea, expressed here by a metaphor, there by an emblem. Hence in the institution of the Supper, holding and breaking one piece of bread, He used the term σῶμα, body, which as an organism corresponds to the broken bread; in the discourse at Capernaum where He treats only of nourishment in adaptation to the miraculous multiplication of loaves of bread, He represents His body more as substance (σάρξ) than as an organism. This perfect propriety of terms proves the originality and authenticity of the two forms.”] [Luther, Melancthon and the orthodox Lutherans of the 17th century felt this, and for this reason (not, as Tholuck thinks, from fear of transubstantiation) they repudiated the sacramental interpretation altogether. Luther says: “Eating in this passage means believing: he who believeth, eateth, and drinketh Christ.” Melanchthon: “I do not understand this discourse as referring to the Lord’s Supper or the ceremonial manducation, but as the words of Christ which preceded above were about faith, whereby we believe that God’s wrath was propitiated by the death of His Son, who offered His body and shed His blood for us,—so I understand all the rest of the same faith.” This interpretation was sanctioned by the Form of Concord, p. 743. When Calixtus came out in favor of the sacramental interpretation, he was charged with heresy by Calovius of Wittenberg.] [Verknφcherte Handwerksseelen.] John 6:66.—[Ἐκτούτου is causal, and expresses, according to Lange and Meyer, the reason, not the time. Alford and Godet combine the temporal and causal meaning. Alford translates: Upon this. Noyes and Conant: From this time.—P. S.] John 6:68.—[The οὖν of the text. rec. is omitted by the best authorities.—P. S.] John 6:69.—[The text. rec. inserts from Matthew 16:16 ὁΧριστός, which is wanting in the oldest sources, and is omitted by critical editors.—The original text is simply, ὅτισὺεἶὁἅγιοςτοῦθεοῦ, that thou art the Holy one of God. This, however, is equivalent to Christ or the promised Messiah.—P. S.] John 6:69.—Codd. B. C.* D. L., etc., Griesbach, Lachmann, and Tischendorf, read ὁἅγιοςτοῦθεοῦ. The Recepta conforms to Matthew 16:16. [Cod. Sin. supports the ὁἅγ.τ.θ., which also appears to have been a characteristic phrase with Peter; comp. Acts 2:27; Acts 2:31; Acts 3:14; Acts 4:27; Acts 4:30.—E. D. Y.] John 6:71.—The reading Ἰσκαριώτου is here supported by B. C. G. L. (Lachmann, Tischendorf), against Ἰσκαριώτην. Also at c. John 13:26, by decisive authorities. On the other hand at c. John 14:22, after the treasonable decision, Judas himself is distinguished as Ἰσκαριώτης. This evinces a historical delicacy, which Meyer misses when he proposes to read Ἰσκαριώτης in all the places on the strength of c. John 14:22. [Stier and Theile adopt Ἰσκαριώτην in this place and in John 13:26; while the Cod. Sin. has in the latter case Ἰσκαριώτου, belonging to Σίμωνος, and in our passage ἀπὸκαρυώτου, also referring to Σ.—E. D. Y.] John 6:71.—[The ὤν of the text. rec. after εἶς is wanting in the best authorities and probably inserted from Mark 14:43.—P. S.] [Μὴκαὶὑμεῖςθέλετεὑπάγειν. The interrogative μή looks to a negative answer (doch nicht?) comp. John 7:31; John 21:5; Romans 3:5, etc. and Winer’s Gr. p. 476. Godet, discarding this rule, wrongly explains: Si vous le voulez, vous pouvez aller.—P. S.] [So Bengel: Fidem sequitur cognitio, 2 Peter 1:5. Perversi sunt qui cognitionem prius postulant.—P. S.] [Meyer justly remarks against Weisse that in the nature of the case a confession that filled the hearts of the apostles, must have been repeated on similar occasions.—P. S.] [The interrogation stops with τοὺςδώδεκα, and what follows is an exclamation of holy sadness. So Meyer and Lange. Alford follows the wrong punctuation of the A. V.—P. S.] [So also Alford, and rightly, for Christ had in view the treason of Judas which was inspired by the Evil One. The strong term corresponds to the profound indignation at the hypocrisy of the traitor who covered himself under the confession of Peter.—P. S.] [It is more than the mere future (Alford), and yet not quite as strong as intended; it represents the future as an accomplished fact, the germ of which was already in existence at the time, and was detected by the penetrating eye of Christ.—P. S.] IV Approach Of The Feast Of Tabernacles, And Offence Of Even The Brethren Of Jesus At His Refusal To Go To It. Christ’s Time And The Time Of The Worldly Mind. Christ The Object Of The World’s Hatred John 7:1-91[And] After these things Jesus walked in Galilee: for he would not walk in Jewry [Judζa], because the Jews sought to kill him. 2Now the Jews’ feast of tabernacles 3was at hand. His brethren [brothers] therefore said unto him, Depart hence, and go into Judea, that thy disciples also [thine adherents in that country, 4 especially in Jerusalem] may see the [thy] works that thou doest. For there is no man that doeth anything in secret, and he himself [For no one doeth anything in secret and yet himself] seeketh to be known openly. If thou do [doest] these things, shew thyself to the world. (5For neither did his brethren believe in him.) [For even 6his brothers did not believe in him.] Then Jesus said [saith] unto them, My time is not yet come: but your time is always ready. 7The world cannot hate you; but me it hateth, because I testify of it, that the works thereof are evil. Go ye up unto 8this [the] feast; I go not up yet unto this feast; for my time is not yet full [fully] come. 9When he had said these words unto them he abode still [remained] in Galilee. AND “According to Baur this seventh chapter goes to show how the dialectics (criticism?) into which unbelief enters, is only its own dialectical (critical?) refutation.” Meyer. John 7:1. And after these things Jesus walked.—After the occurrences and discourses in Galilee in John 6; a new general date succeeding the μετὰταῦτα of John 6:1. The festival caravan had proposed to take possession of Him and make Him a king. But He had completely delivered Himself from them, and went not with them the Passover. Nor did He join the next train, which went up to the feast of tabernacles. The words “walked in Galilee,” therefore, mean, as their primary antithesis, that He went not up with the caravan to the feast [passover, John 6:4] next following. John mentions only the second antithesis: that He could not walk in Judea, without peril of death. If He had now at once gone about publicly in Judea, and remained there, He would have too seriously embarrassed His exit. In Judea, the main theatre of His ministry, He no longer had room to work; He still had room in Galilee. And His isolated and sudden appearance and His ministry in Judea hereafter take place only under the protection of secresy, or of Galilean and Perean friends and adherents, as well as individual disciples in Judea. The proximate period of the walking in Galilee is from the feast of Purim to the feast of tabernacles of the year 782 (A. D. 29), from the month Adar to the month Tisri. (Wieseler: from the 19th March to about the 12th October.) In this period of Galilean itinerancy fall the charges of heresy against Jesus in Galilee and His contests with the hostile Pharisees there, Matthew 12; most of His parables or sermons on the sea, Matthew 13 (Matthew 14 dates the beginning); His interview with the deputation from Jerusalem, and the great gathering on the mountain, which followed, Matthew 15; the last contest with Pharisean power in Galilee, the retirement of the Lord and His transfiguration, Matthew 16 and Matthew 17:21 (not John 15-18, as Meyer gives it.) John 7:2. The feast … was at hand.—The second occasion and demand to go with a festival caravan, which Jesus declined. Though He went to Jerusalem, He did so not in the full publicity of the festival pilgrimage, nor in the capacity of a festival pilgrim. Feast of tabernacles.—ηַ ?βδַ ?ρֻּ ?λּ ?εֹ ?ϊ, σκηνοπηγία in Josephus, σκηναί in Philo. The third of the great festivals of the Jews (Passover, Pentecost or Weeks, Tabernacles); celebrated in the seventh month or Tisri (in October), for seven days from the 15th, in memory of the dwelling of the Israelites in tabernacles or tents on their journey through the wilderness, and in thanksgiving for the harvest now, with the fruit and grape gathering, entirely finished. Thus: Passover: deliverance from the destroying angel and from Egypt, beginning of harvest; Pentecost: completion of grain-harvest, thanksgiving feast of first-fruits, no doubt also in celebration of some point of the theocratic history (Maimonides: the giving of the law on Sinai); Tabernacles: feast of the wandering and of vintage. It is to be remembered that the eighth day of this feast (23d Tisri) was kept by the Jews as the feast of the joy of the law. The feast of tabernacles formed at the same time the counterpart to the great penitential feast of the day of atonement which occurred five days before, as a sort of preparation for the feast of joy. The feast was distinguished by its grand offerings, as well as its joyful tone; so that it was called by Josephus “the holiest and greatest of the feasts.” [Antiqu. VIII. 4, John 1 : ἑορτὴἁγιωτάτηκαὶμεγίστη).—P. S.] People lived in tents formed of live branches of trees, on roofs, in streets, on open grounds; they carried boughs of fruit, noble, handsome fruits, especially branches of palms and citrons, in their hands, and had merry banquets. The feast of tabernacles had so joyous an appearance that Plutarch could think it a feast of Bacchus. But it is a mistake to try to trace the Israelitish festivals of events of theocratic history to original festivals of nature. As Israelitish feasts they must be primarily historical. They may have attached themselves, however, to existing popular feasts of Asia, absorbing and spiritualizing them, as was confessedly done by Christian festivals [Christmas, Easter, etc.] in reference to existing feasts of heathenism (comp. Leben Jesu, II. p. 941). Attendance on these festivals in Jerusalem was binding upon the male portion of Israel (Deuteronomy 16:16). Respecting the particular practices of the feast of tabernacles, see below. John 7:3. His brothers therefore said unto him.—According to Matthew 13:55 these were James, Joses, Simon and Judas. A disposition on their part to act as guardians and advisers to Jesus appears again, and prominently in Mark 3:21. But they as surely mean well with their counsel here, as they meant in that other case to act in faithful solicitude for Him. Euthymius Zigabenus [also Luther], attributed to them a malicious design (to draw Him into the hands of the Jews), because their unbelief is afterwards mentioned. The speech of His brethren refers to the fact that Jesus did not go to the late passover that in general he seems to wish to avoid Judea, and that, by going about on the mountains and the sea, He makes even His residence in Galilee a half-concealed one. They propose that He should appear publicly in judea and accredit Himself as the Messiah before His adherents there. Evidently the echo of the spirit of Joh 6:15. They were right in assuming that a Messiah could not complete His legitimation of Himself and His work outside of Judea and Jerusalem; they were wrong and frivolous (1) in beginning to think lightly of His quiet ministry in Galilee; (2) in still hoping that by a public appearance in Jerusalem, He might carry the nation with Him, and become a Messiah glorious after an Old Testament sort; (3) in not submitting themselves to His wisdom and His self-determining course of action. And herein chiefly lay their unbelief. John 7:3-4. How important the brothers of Jesus thought it, that He should change His field, appears from the twofold expression: Depart hence and go into Judζa, that thy disciples also may see thy works, etc. μετάβηθιἐντεῦθεν, καὶὕπαγε, κ. τ. λ. In this view we are to understand by the disciples who were to see His works, all His adherents in the land of Judea; chiefly the influential ones in Jerusalem, but not these alone. In contrast with such an appearance His Galilean work, particularly His quiet itinerancy and His withdrawal to the Phenician borders, to the highlands of the Jordan, and across the sea, seems to them an incongruous working in secret (John 7:4). And it presents to them the contradiction of His proposing to be a public personage with a secret ministry. (On the misinterpretations of ἐνκρυπτῷ, by Baumgarten-Crusius, Brόckner, and Luthardt, see Meyer.) Not the least thing which pertains to the authentication of a public character, does such an one perform in secret; much less does he waste such (great) works (ταῦτα) on an obscure region. The εἰ [“if Thou doest these things”] is not intended to throw doubt on the works; it denotes the logical premise. (Meyer, against Lόcke, etc.) John 7:5. Then when John remarks: For even his brothers did not believe in him, it is entirely gratuitous to make of this, as has been done, a disbelief of His Messiahship itself common to all the brothers, and to infer that the brothers of the Lord, James, Judas and Simon, must be distinguished from the apostles of the Lord, James, Judas and Simon, whom He had chosen before the feast of Purim.(Matthew 10) See Com. on Matthew on Matthew 10 and Matthew 12:46 ff., (comp. Mark, at John 3:30; Matthew 13:55).; Leben Jesu, II., p. 139 sqq., and 926; Herzog’s Real-Encyklop., Art. Jakobus, der Bruder des Herrn. It is plain from the connection that the unbelief of these brothers of the Lord was a want of confidence in Him of the same sort, at the worst, as that of Mary in Mark 3:31, of Peter in Matthew 16:22, and of Thomas in John 20:25; that is, while believing in His Messiahship, they lacked in the perfect yielding of a believing obedience, and assumed to prescribe to Him from their own judgment; but they were not unbelieving in the sense in which Caiaphas and the Jewish people were. Tenaciously as the Ebionistic Clementine tradition, distinguishing between the three apostolic brothers of the Lord and the three apostles, James, the son of Alpheus, Judas, and Simon, endeavors to maintain itself, it will not ultimately withstand, with its half-dogmatical, half critical prejudice, the sense of Scripture and the primitive church tradition. [I dissent from this view. See my remarks below on John 7:9, p. 241. The theory here opposed is certainly older and exegetically more natural, than the cousin-theory, which cannot be traced beyond Jerome in the fourth century, and which owes its popularity far more to an ascetic over-estimate of the perpetual virginity of Mary (and Joseph) than to exegetical or critical arguments. It is clearly irreconcilable with the whole tenor of this passage, as I shall presently show.—P. S.] John 7:6. My time is not yet come.—Interpretations: 1. The time for Me to go to the feast (Jansen, et al.); 2. The time to show Myself openly to the world (as they had demanded in John 7:4, Lόcke, et al.); 3. The time of my passion (Chrysostom, et al.). The first interpretation is connected with the second, the second with the third. His first public entrance into Jerusalem was the entrance in the procession with palms; by that He showed Himself publicly to the world, and by that also He brought on His own death. Hence: My time for going to the feast to manifest Myself to the world. His words, therefore, referred primarily to the time of journeying, but in connection with the deeper meaning. The connection lies in the fact that His fixed time (καιρός), like His hour (John 2:4), denotes the time ordained and appointed to Him by God for His public appearance, in distinction from the hours arbitrarily chosen by other men. Hence the other words: But your time is always ready; describing the free, arbitrary disposal of times which sinful men make; with primary reference to their travelling, but with respect also to the safety with which they may show themselves to the world, with which they do not yet stand, like Him, in full and pure antagonism, John 7:7. An intimation of their want of decided faith. John 7:7. The world cannot hate you.—The world considered as unbelieving, in its antagonism to the Lord. It can no more take the internally complete attitude of mortal enmity towards you, than ye have thus far taken this attitude toward its spirit. All chiliastic kinds of faith, (e.g. in the church of the middle ages) have an element akin to the world and open to its sympathy. But me it hateth.—The entire antagonism brought into play by His testimony against the world. John 7:8. Go ye up unto this feast.—This is, after the ritual manner of the Israelitish law, as pilgrims in the festival caravan, to participate in the exercises of the feast. I go not up (yet) unto this feast.—Interpretations with reference to John 7:10 : [omitting the “yet.”] 1. The hostile interpretation of Porphyry, that Jesus proved Himself fickle (Jerome, Contra Pel.) 2. Bruno Bauer’s modification: The Evangelist entangles himself in contradiction in his narrative (see Lόcke, p. 193; kindred constructions by F. Chr. Baur, etc., see in Meyer.) 3. Meyer: “Jesus might alter His plan without being inconsistent, especially since the motive of this change of purpose is not patent. He also changed His purpose with the Canaanitish woman (Matthew 15:26 sqq.).” But He no more changed it there, than here. The entrance of a new motive, must at least have been intimated. 4. The reading οὔπω [which is omitted by some of the oldest MSS., but inserted by others and by the early Versions.—P. S.] or to the same purpose, the emphasizing of the present ἀναβαίνω, inserting a νῦν in thought (Chrysostom, Lόcke, and others). Of the same class is the restricting of the οὐκ by the οὕπω following (De Wette and others). 5. Emphasizing of feast, ἑορτή; Cyril: οὐκοὕτωςἑορτάζων. He took no part ritually in the festal train or the festal scenes, (Leben Jesu, II. p. 927; Ebrard and others). In favor of this is the ensuing: οὐφανερῶς, ἀλλ’ ὡςἐνκρυπτῷ. 6. The explanation: Not with the caravan (Bengel, Ewald, Luthardt), is properly only one part of the preceding interpretation. It is emphatically said, moreover: “unto this feast;” Jesus thus already announcing in a manner His intended decisive observance of the next passover. A glance at that last feast we see in the words: “For my time,” &c. John 7:9. He remained in Galilee.—That is, He let the train pass on, and perhaps His brothers with it. [Remarks on the Brothers of Jesus.—The family dispute which John relates in this section from personal knowledge, with the simplicity and frankness of a genuine historian, gives us an insight into the domestic trials of our Saviour. The unbelief of His brothers need not surprise us any more than the unbelief of the Nazarenes generally, according to the sentence: “A prophet has no honor in his own country” (comp. note on John 4:44). Not unfrequently the nearest relatives throw more obstacles in the way to God’s children than strangers. Christ entered into the condition of fallen humanity with all its daily troubles, temptations and miseries. The unbelief and misconduct of His brothers must have been to Him a deep source of grief and a school of patience and forbearance in order that, being tempted even as we are in all things, He might become a merciful High Priest able and willing to sympathize with His followers in passing through similar experiences. (Hebrews 2:17-18; Hebrews 5:7-8). But the full significance of this passage depends upon the proper view of the brothers of Jesus. And here I must again dissent from the cousin-theory of Jerome, advocated in a modified form by Dr. Lange, which assumes that these brothers were only distant relatives of Jesus, and that three of them, James, Simon and Jude (i.e., all but Joses or Joseph), were identical with the three apostles of that name. I regard this passage (with Meyer, Godet, Alford, Lightfoot) as one of the strongest arguments in favor of the more natural view that the brothers of Jesus were really members of the holy family and under the care of Joseph and Mary in whose company they constantly appear.1. It is perfectly plain that John here, as in John 2:12 and in harmony with the Synoptists, also with Acts 1:13-14, and 1 Corinthians 9:5, distinguishes the brothers of Christ from the apostles. The brothers themselves make this distinction in John 7:3, “That thy disciples also,” etc., on which Bengel remarks: Eo ipso ostendunt se non esse discipulos.2. But what is more conclusive, John represents here the brothers as unbelievers, and as using irreverent, presumptuous and ironical language against our Lord. This is absolutely incompatible with the assumption that they were apostles, especially after the sifting process described in John 6, and the noble confession of Peter in the name of all (John 6:67-68). I readily admit that the brothers were not unbelievers in the sense of the hostile Jews or indifferent pagans, but they certainly were not believers in a sense in which we must suppose all apostles (with the exception perhaps of Judas Iscariot) to have been almost from their first acquaintance with Jesus, and as John expressly says that they were even as early as the miracle at Cana, John 2:11; comp. John 7:22; John 16:17; John 17:8. How, in the name of consistency, could he say that the apostles believed in Him (ἐπίστευσανεἰςαὐτόν), and afterwards, that His brothers, including at least three of the apostles, did not believe in him, οὐδὲοἱἀδελφοὶαὐτοῦἐπίστευον—mark the imperfect which denotes continued and habitual unbelief, in distinction from a momentary act as expressed by the aorist—(ἐπίστευσαν)? Why did he not avoid such flat contradiction by the qualifying words: some of His brothers, or by using a milder term than unbelief? John recognizes indeed different degrees of belief (comp. John 2:23; John 4:39; John 8:31; John 12:42), and different degrees of unbelief, but he never confounds the sharp lines which, in his system especially, distinguish belief from unbelief, light from darkness, truth from falsehood. Moreover the language used by the brothers on this occasion, however mildly we may explain it, is very unbecoming, and strongly contrasts with the profound reverence shown by the apostles to our Lord on every occasion, even where they could not understand or appreciate His conduct (comp. John 4:27). 3. Finally our Lord Himself here characterizes His brothers as men of the world whom the world cannot hate (John 7:7); while He says the very reverse of His apostles, John 15:18 f. comp. Matthew 10:5 ff., Matthew 10:22; Matthew 10:40 ff. We infer then that all the four brothers of Jesus were distinct from the apostles, and were not converted till after the resurrection. James, it would seem, became a believer in consequence of a special manifestation of the risen Lord, 1 Corinthians 15:7. They first appear among the disciples, Acts 1:14. As to the other question, whether the brothers of Jesus were older brothers of Jesus from a former, otherwise unknown marriage of Joseph (the old Greek tradition defended by Epiphanius), or younger children of Mary and Joseph (the view held by Tertullian and Helvidius, and denounced first by Jerome as heretical and profane because of its conflict with the prevalent ascetic belief in the perpetual virginity of Mary), our passage gives no decisive answer. The patronizing tone assumed by the brothers towards Jesus on this occasion seems to favor the former view, but may be found also with younger brothers. Comp. the fuller discussion of this whole question in my notes on Matthew, pp. 256–260, also on Matthew 1:25 and John 2:12. (p. 115 of this vol.)—P. S.] AND ETHICAL1. The heavenly precaution with which Jesus guarded His life from a premature end, that He might sacrifice it with full effect at the right hour, forms a contrast with the heedless boldness with which His brothers would push Him upon the stage of the most glaring publicity; and a contrast with the many premature sacrifices which occur in the lives of worldly heroes and even of Christian missionaries and martyrs. The life of the believer must be in spirit offered up to God at all times; but the actual sacrifice of it must be put with all decision under the law of Christian wisdom. No one should prematurely squander his life; every one should, in the holiest sense, “sell it at the highest possible price.” But for His wise reserve, the life of the Lord would perhaps have fallen before the hatred of Judaism in the very first year of His ministry; certainly at the feast of Purim in the spring of the second year. A ministry of about three years in the midst of Pharisaic Judea could be secured to Jesus only by His heavenly wisdom. 2. The subsequent appearance of Christ at the feast of tabernacles does not contradict this caution. It is an act of consummate psychological mastery. By this oft-repeated sudden appearance, He places Himself as an astounding wonder before His enemies; they themselves are restrained by fear, or at least their servants, and they do not venture to seize Him. They are disarmed not only by the personal impression of Jesus, but also by fear of the powerful popular following which He had, particularly of the fighting Galileans. Not till the continuous stay of Christ among them at the last passover could they carry out a definite plan against Him. 3. It agrees with the nature of human restlessness that the same brothers of the Lord, who with His mother sought to rescue Him some time before from the press of Galilean enemies through fear (Mark 3; Matthew 12), now sought in recklessness to press Him upon the theatre of decision. Apart from the fact that such extremes beget and account for each other, the experience which the brothers of Jesus had had of the uselessness of their fear and of the security of Jesus amidst the strongest probabilities of danger, might urge them now to the utmost risk in His behalf. 4. Jesus, in respect to His time and place is subject to the individual direction (ἐντολή) of His Father. Thus His time at every point is a point of eternity, and His being in every place is a being in heaven. The contrast between the Divine discernment of His time and His hour [in the life of Jesus] and the arbitrary caprice of men in the use of times and hours. 5. The notion of the world which the brothers of Jesus express, differs greatly from the notion expressed by Christ. Judas Lebbζus recurs to this favorable idea of the world in John 14:22. The brothers of Jesus vaguely see a world ready to receive Christ with open arms; Christ sees through a world disposed to kill Him. Undoubtedly Christ Himself also distinguishes between the world as the object of the Divine love (John 3:16), and the world in its decided ungodliness and unbelief. 6. Christ’s word: The world cannot hate you, expresses the truth that there is no deeper, more incisive opposition than that between a godly mind and a worldly mind, faith and unbelief. The world’s hatred comes out completely only in opposition to that which is divine. 7. There is an infinite difference between the delicate precision of the Lord’s form of expression and a made-up reservatio mentalis. But for this reason the words of Christ, and especially His expression here: I go not up to this feast, are also exposed to the ready abuse of men. The abuse is not due to ambiguities on His part, but to the want of discrimination on the part of His expounders. Else it would have been easily seen that between a public Messianic progress of Jesus to the ceremonial observance of a feast, and an incidental appearance of the anonymous prophet at the feast, the difference is wide. AND See under the previous head. The quiet walking of Jesus in Galilee a token also of His glory.—A token of His prudence, His foresight, His wisdom, in His spirit of self-sacrifice.—How Jesus by wisdom preserved and spared His official life till the right, decisive moment, though it was forfeited to death from the first.—The most splendid and joyous feast of the Jews no allurement to the Lord, but an object of holy solicitude and dread.—The want of the obedience of faith in the enthusiastic zeal of faith in the brothers of Jesus.—The contrast between Christ’s knowledge of the world and His brothers’ knowledge of it.—Marks of the worldly element in the belief of the Messiah.—The word of Jesus to His brothers: John 7:6-8.—The declaration in John 7:6-7;—the several words of Joh 7:6-8.—“No guile found in His mouth,” or, Jesus, even in the pure and precise form of His words, hard to understand by the ordinary way of thinking.—The sharp precision of the words of Jesus a reflection of the perfect clearness of His mind.—The lesson of the divine peace in the Lord’s quiet tarrying at home while His brothers go to the brilliant feast.—We also must be able to slay at home.—With what a different eye from that of His brothers did Christ look upon the glories of the world and even of the Jewish people of God (or “church”). Starke: Hasten not after suffering: it will come soon enough.—Cramer: Let every one look well to himself in his office that he may long serve the church of God.—Christians still celebrate their feast of tabernacles when they heartily praise God for His shelter and defence.—Hedinger: Let no one lord it over the wisdom of God.—Canstein: Follow not the voice which urges thee to seek a great name and become renowned in the world. The sole voice of self-love often leads a minister to leave a place where he may do much good, and move to another where he can do none.—Kindred are most commonly the ones who obstruct the godly.—Bibl. Wirt.: A true Christian heart desires not to distinguish itself; the more secret, the happier.—God does everything exactly at the right time, but men do much out of season.—One hawk does not pick out another’s eyes; he who accommodates himself to the world, will be loved by it.—The friendship of the world, James 4:4.—Canstein: It bespeaks humility and prudence for a man to wait God’s time, keeping himself quiet till it come; this does not conflict with the joyousness of faith, which afterwards goes joyfully forward when it perceives its time.—Gossner: I guide myself by the hour-glass of my Father; ye can go according to your pleasure; ye may say what ye will, ye will never be arraigned for it; but I must walk cautiously, that I may not wantonly encounter my suffering. He who follows his own will, who does everything out of his own head, and never consults the divine moment,—his time is always ready. But he who loves God, lets all his moments depend on the will and indication of God.—Braune: Even though they (the brothers) hastened forward to the feast, they after all remained behind.—They who are forward with outward worship, do not therefore worship the Lord in spirit and in truth. With the boisterous (Isaiah 5:19) the Redeemer can have no fellowship.—It is trying indeed to be left alone with one’s Christianity in a good cause, but it is better to be alone than to burden one’s self with precarious companions who rather corrupt than improve. (Rieger).—Circumspection and prudence best become the boldest.—Gerlach: Such an appearance as ye demand would draw upon me not splendor and honor, but death and ruin. Heubner: The world is still challenging: Show thyself, come out, make thyself known to the great rulers, recommend thyself by writings and the like.—Besser: Their time did not coincide with His time. It is the peculiar glory of believers, that in all their actions, God’s time is also theirs.—The more one sees the extraordinary mind develop itself under the common limitations of life, the harder he finds the acknowledgment of it. Footnotes: John 7:1.—καί is omitted by ΰ and ΰcb C. 2 D. text. rec. Tisch. (ed. VIII.), inserted by ΰca (but erased). B. C. L. X. and other uncial MSS. Lachm. Treg. Alf. Westcott &Hort.—P. S.] John 7:1.—The μετὰταῦτα immediately follows the καί in [ΰ.] B. C. D. G. K., etc. [In the text. rec. it follows after ὁἸησοῦς—P. S.] John 7:1.—[Jewry is antiquated. The E. V. uses it twice in the N. T. (Luke 23:5), in all other passages Judζa.—P. S.] John 7:3.—[On the meaning of ἀδελφοί, see Text. Notes on II. 12, p. 114.—P. S]. John 7:6.—[Οὖν, therefore, is wanting in ΰ.* D. and omitted by Tischend., but retained with ΰ.c B. L. etc., by Lachm. Alf., etc.—P. S.] John 7:8.—This first ταύτην is wanting in B. D., etc., and is omitted by Lachmann and Tischendorf. John 7:8.—“Elz., Lachmann: οὕπω, not yet; supported, too, by the preponderance of Codd. (only D. K. M. [ΰ] and three minuscules have οὐκ); but against the weight of versions, most of which, including Vulgata and Itala, read οὐκ. Of the fathers, Epiphanius, Cyril, Chrysostom, and many others, have οὐκ. Porphyry found οὐκ in Jerome, and drew from it the charge of fickleness against Jesus. Just to avoid this offence οὔπω was introduced.” Meyer. [Lange adopts, with Meyer, ούκ, (not, instead of οὔπω, not yet. So also Cod. Sin., Tischend. ed. VIII.) Alf., Treg., while Lachm. and Westcott and Hort retain οὔπω.—P. S.] John 7:9.—Tischendorf reads αὐτός instead of αὐτο͂ς after some undecisive Codd. [The Cod. Sin. D. Vulg. (ipse) support αὐτός.—P. S.] [On the σκηνοπηγία or ἐοπτὴτῶνσκηνῶν (from σκηνή and πήγνυμι, lit. a booth-pitching, tent-pitching) comp. Leviticus 23; Deuteronomy 16; Josephus, Antiqu., III. 10, 4; IV. 8, 12; VIII. 4, 1; Ewald, Jewish Arch�ol., p. 481 f.; Keil, Arch. I, § 85, and the respective articles in Winer, Smith, Kitto, Fairbairn.—P.S.] [The passage of Papias about the four Marys, published by Grabe and Routh from a Bodleian MS., (No. 2397), which Mill, Wordsworth, and two writers in Smith’s Dictionary (sub. Brothers and James) have uncritically quoted in favor of the cousin-theory, is not from the Papias of the second century, but from a mediζval namesake of the bishop of Hierapolis and author of a dictionary. Comp. Lightfoot Com. on Galatians , 2 d ed., 1866, p. 265 f. Lightfoot asserts and proves that the Hieronymian hypothesis is a pure conjecture unsupported by any previous traditional sanction.—P. S.] [This was my conviction nearly thirty years ago when I first carefully examined this vexed question in my German treatise on James the Brother of the Lord. Berlin, 1842. [For a refutation of the various attempts to weaken the force of οὐκἐπίστευον, see my treatise on James, etc. pp. 51 ff. In John 6:64, the μαθηταίοίπιστεύουσι are clearly distinguished from the twelve, and they forsook the Lord (66), while the apostles remained (68). In Luke 12:23, the disciples are called “men of little faith,” but this is very different from unbelief. The γενεάἅπιστος, Matthew 17:17, refers to a particular fact and a single act, not to a state of mind or tendency. The question, John 16:31, ἅρτιπιστεύετε (if it be a question), can in no way contradict the πεπιστεύκατε in John 7:27 and the ἐπίστευσαν John 17:8. THIRD SECTION Ferment in the Contest between the Elements of Light and Darkness. Formation of Parties, as a Prelude to the full Opposition between the Children of Light and the Children of Darkness John 7:10 to John 10:21I Fermentation And Party Division Among The People In General (A) Christ, The Teacher And The One Sent From Cod, In Opposition To The Human Rabbinical Office, And In Agreement With Moses. His Earthly Descent In Opposition To Descent From Heaven. His Opponents, Who Wished To Kill Him, In Contradiction With Moses, The Prophet Of God, Intending To Return To God John 7:10-3610 But when his brethren [brothers] were [had] gone up [to the feast] then went he also [he also went] up unto the feast, not openly [as a festal pilgrim], but as it were in secret [as a private person, a non-participant spectator]. 11Then the Jews [The Jews therefore] sought him at the feast, and said, Where is he [that man, ἐκεῖνος]? 12And there was much murmuring among the people [the multitudes, ἐντοῖςὄχλοις] concerning him: for some said, He is a good man: [but] others said, Nay; but he13deceiveth the people [the multitude, τὸνὄχλον]. Howbeit, no man spake [Yet no one spoke] openly of him, for fear of the Jews. 14Now about the midst of the feast, Jesus went up into the temple and taught. 15And [Then] the Jews marvelled, saying, How knoweth this man letters, having never learned [been schooled as a Rabbi]. 16Jesus [therefore] answered them, and said, My doctrine is not mine, but his thatsent me. 17If any man [one] will do his will [is willing, desirous, anxious to do his will, θέλῃτὸθέλημααὐτοῦ ?], he shall know of [concerning] the doctrine, whether it be of [is from] God, or whether I [in my doctrine] speak [make words, λαλῶ ?]of18[from] myself. He that speaketh of [from] himself, seeketh his own glory: but he that seeketh his glory [the glory of Him] that sent him, the same is true, and no unrighteousness [i.e. no transgression of the law, see John 7:21] is in him. 19Did not Moses give you the law, [?] and yet none of you keepeth the law? [!] Why go ye about [Why do you seek] to kill me? 20The people [multitude—not the rulers] answered and said, Thou hast a devil [a demon, δαιμόνιον, a spirit of melancholy]: who goeth about [seeketh] to kill thee? 21Jesus answered and said unto them, I have done one work, and ye all marvel22[on account of it]. Moses therefore [on this account, for this cause, see note7] gave unto you [the] circumcision (not because [that] it is of [from] Moses, but of23[from] the fathers;) and ye on the Sabbath-day [omit day] circumcise a man. If a man on the Sabbath-day [omit day] receive circumcision that the law of Moses should [may] not be broken; are ye angry at me, because I have made a man every whit whole on the Sabbath-day [because I have made sound, or, restored to health a whole man, ὅλονἄνθρωπον (i.e. the entire body of a man, not only a single member as in circumcision) on a Sabbath]? 24Judge not according to the [omit the] appearance, but judge righteous judgment. 25Then said some of them of Jerusalem, Is not this he whom they seek to kill? 26But [And] lo, he speaketh boldly, and they say nothing unto him. Do the rulers27know indeed that this is the very [omit very, see note 8] Christ. Howbeit, we know this man [Still, as to this man, we know], whence he is: but when [the] Christ cometh, no man knoweth whence he is. 28Then [Therefore] cried Jesus in the temple, as he taught, saying [teaching in the temple and saying], Ye both know me, and ye know whence I am: and I am29not come of myself, but he that sent me is true, whom ye know not. ButI know him; for I am from him, and he hath sent me. 30Then [Therefore] they sought to take [seize] him: but [and yet] no man [one] laid hands on him, because his hour was [had] not yet come. 31And many of the people [But of the multitude many] believed on him, and said, When Christ cometh, will he do more miracles [signs] than these which this man hath done? 32The Pharisees heard that the people murmured such things [heard the multitude murmuring these things] concerning him: and the Pharisees and the chief priests [the chief priests and the Pharisees] sent officers to take [seize] him. 33Then said Jesus [Jesus therefore said] unto them, Yet a little while am I with34you, and then I go unto him that sent me. Ye shall [will] seek me, and shall [will] not find me [me]: and where I [then] am, thither [omit thither] ye cannot come. 35Then said the Jews [The Jews therefore said] among themselves, Whither will he [this man] go, that we shall not find him? will he go unto the dispersed [the36Diaspora] among the Gentiles [Greeks] and teach the Gentiles [Greeks]? What manner of saying is this [What is this word] that he said, Ye shall [will] seek me, and shall [will] not find me [me]:16 and where I am, thither [omit thither] ye cannot come. AND Joh_7:10. Had gone up.—The ἀνέβησαν is pluperfect. Ibid. Not openly.—That is, not in the festal train, not as a festal pilgrim; but not: by another road, De Wette, etc. (On the Docetism which Baur and Hilgenfeld would find in the words, see Meyer)—But as it were in secret.—This expression denotes a solitary journey, a quiet stay near Jerusalem (perhaps in Bethany), and a subsequent appearance at the feast not incognito, and not in the character of a festal pilgrim, but in the capacity of a prophet coming forth out of concealment to the feast, to point out the insufficiency of the festal symbols in contrast with their real fulfilment in His person. And because He did so appear it is said ὡς “as it were in secret.” This was the character in which He went up, not in which He continued. Meyer is incorrect in saying that this was the final departure of Jesus from Galilee. The present departure of Jesus from Galilee was entirely private; the final departure took place under a great convoy (Matthew 19:1-2; Mark 10:1; Leben Jesu, p. 928). More below, at John 10:22. John 7:11. The Jews therefore sought him at the feast.—According to John 7:13 the hostile Jews are, of course, primarily intended here. They thought to continue unto death the persecution opened against Jesus in John 5. Hence also the expression ἐκεῖνος, “Where is that man?” John 7:12-13. And there was much murmuring.—An expressive designation of the ferment in the popular mass, and the powerful working of the hostile rulers upon the sentiment of the people. In the division of opinion the friends of Jesus express themselves with timid reserve: He is a good man (ἀγαθός), kind, benevolent. According to the New Testament usage (see Matthew 20:15; Romans 5:7), the term no doubt means something more than “honest, a man of honor” (Meyer); though the attenuation of the confession of Jesus in the period of rationalism could go so far that some one wrote a pamphlet: Jesus and His Disciples were honest People. The confession is evidently suppressed also here. The others more boldly speak out their opposite opinion: He deceiveth the people. But that the more favorable public opinion concerning Him was already under the terrorism of the hostile party spirit, is told us by the addition: Yet no one [i. e. of the friendly part] spoke openly of him, for fear of the Jews—According to Meyer this last verse includes literally all. “Even the hostile ones were afraid, because, so long as those (the hierarchy) had not yet officially decided, a reversion of their sentiment was conceivable. A faithful picture of bad, Jesuitical domination of the people”. The οὐδείςμέντοι will certainly have a meaning; though the opinion, “He deceiveth the people,” was open enough. The distinction between λέγειν and λαλεῖν must be observed here. Persons on both sides were expressing themselves in a scanty λέγειν; yet did not come to a λαλεῖνπαῤῥησίᾳ a full, free talk, concerning Him, because any expression of acknowledgment could easily be communicated by heresy-hunters, and because an unfavorable opinion also might easily have something contrary to form. The bondage of conscience was such that no one ventured to utter fully the thoughts of his heart, before the hierarchy had spoken. John 7:14. The midst of the feast.—In a seven or eight days’ feast three or four days were now past, and it became clear that He did not intend this time to take part in the observance. If Jesus had come earlier to the place, it is more probable that He lodged in the vicinity than in Jerusalem itself. See above, on John 7:10. Up into the temple.—It might seem as if by this step He passed from extreme caution to extreme boldness. But even by this new manner of appearance He proves Himself the great Master in the knowledge of men. From this time forth He could safely appear in Judea and Galilee only by suddenly entering a great assembly of the people, and working there. The spirit of reverence for Him, which animated the people, still for a time shielded Him in these situations from His enemies. Thus He made the crown or halo of the popular assembly His faithful guard, so long as the better Messianic spirit of the people recognized in Him the Son of David. He was adorned in the presence of His enemies with the wreath of popular veneration, till this wreath too was torn and withered by the poisonous breath of their enmity. (Leben Jesu, II., p. 932). And taught.—From the subsequent narrative we may suppose that His teaching related to the feast of tabernacles. So, in John 2, His teaching connected itself with the symbolical import of the temple, which He was then for the first time officially visiting; His conversation with the theocratic Nicodemus on the need of real regeneration in order to pass from the old theocracy to the new kingdom of heaven connected itself with the proselyte baptism; His conversation with the Samaritan woman took its turn from the holy wells in Israel; His discourse in John 5, from the medicinal spring and the healing; and even in His Galilean discourse in John 6 there is a manifest reference to the approaching passover in Jerusalem. John 7:15. How knoweth this man letters [γράμματαοἶδεν].—First are heard the voices of the adversaries of Jesus. Their first objection is founded on the fact that He is not a promoted Rabbi; the second (John 7:27) on His origin.—The Jews here are evidently the Judaists, and probably, judging from their expressions, scribes, Rabbis. They [the hierarchical opponents, probably members of the Sanhedrin, as in John 11:13.—P. S.] marvelled; they cannot deny that He knows the books and has the gift of teaching; but, full of envy, school-bigotry and statutory zeal, they fall upon the circumstance that He has not studied [μὴμεμαθηκώς], and is not a regular graduate of the Rabbinical schools. The γράμματα without ἱερά (2 Timothy 3:15) denotes not the Holy Scriptures (ἡγραφή, according to the Peshito, Luther, Grotius), but literature, the field of learning (in the Vulgate, litterζ, see Acts 26:24). The passage is “important against the attempts, ancient and modern, to trace the wisdom of Jesus to human education” (Meyer). The words evidently grope in confusion half way between acknowledgment and denial of His wisdom. But the stress lies not on the concession, but on the questioning. Though He seems to know books, yet there must be some deception about it, since He has not, studied and advanced in the regular prescribed way. A young school-enthusiast trusts not his eyes, trusts not his cars, trusts not even his enthusiasm and his intellectual gain, when he meets a teacher who has the prejudice of the school against him; the old school-enthusiast is at once fully decided in his prejudice by the absence of school-endorsement. The point at which the teaching of Jesus came most in contact with Jewish learning, was the relation of His symbolical interpretation to the Jewish allegorizing (of the Old Testament and its types). It was indeed a relation as between a melon and a gourd; but the appearance of similarity must have struck the eyes of these people more than the difference. Yet, after their manner, regardless of the actual teaching of Jesus, they fell upon His want of legitimation. His doctrine is not delivered as the sacred tradition of the schools, not systematized according to the rules and practice of the school, not legalized as the production of a graduate. [This testimony of enemies to a fact well known to them, strongly confirms what we otherwise know or must conjecture concerning Christ’s education, or rather the absence in His case of the ordinary ways and means by which other men receive their knowledge. He was neither school-taught [ἀλλο-δίδακτος), nor self-taught (αὐτο-δίδακτος), nor even God-taught (θεο-δίδακτος like inspired prophets) in the usual sense of these terms. No doubt He learned from His mother, He went to the Synagogue, He heard and read the Scriptures, He studied nature and man, and the Holy Ghost descended upon Him at the baptism in Jordan; yet the secret fountain of His knowledge of God and man must be found in His mysterious and unique relation to the Father and derived from direct intuition into the living fountain of truth in God. He was and continued to be the only begotten Son in the bosom of the Father who explained Him to us as no philosopher or prophet could do. I quote an appropriate passage from my book on the Person of Christ, p. 34 ff.: “Christ spent His youth in poverty and manual labor, in the obscurity of a carpenter’s shop; far away from universities, academies, libraries, and literary or polished society; without any help, as far as we know, except the parental care, the daily wonders of nature, the Old Testament Scriptures, the weekly Sabbath services of the Synagogue at Nazareth (Luke 4:16), the annual festivals in the Temple of Jerusalem (Luke 2:42 ff.) and the secret intercourse of His soul with God, His heavenly Father … Christ can be ranked neither with the school-trained, nor with the self-trained or self-made men; if by the latter we understand, as we must, those who, without the regular aid of living teachers, yet with the same educational means, such as books, the observation of men and things, and the intense application of their mental faculties attained to vigor of intellect, and wealth of scholarship,—like Shakspeare, Jacob B�hme, Benjamin Franklin, and others. All the attempts to bring Jesus into contact with Egyptian wisdom, or the Essenic theosophy, or other sources of learning, are without a shadow of proof, and explain nothing after all. He never quotes from books, except the Old Testament. He never refers to secular history, poetry, rhetoric, mathematics, astronomy, foreign languages, natural sciences, or any of those branches of knowledge which make up human learning and literature. He confined Himself strictly to religion. But, from that centre, He shed light over the whole world of man and nature. In this department, unlike all other great men, even the prophets and the apostles, He was absolutely original and independent. He taught the world as one who had learned nothing from it, and was under no obligation to it. He speaks from divine intuition, as one who not only knows the truth, but is the truth; and with an authority that commands absolute submission, or provokes rebellion, but can never be passed by with contempt or indifference.”—P. S.] John 7:16. My doctrine (or, teaching) is not mine.—That is, I am no self-taught man in such a sense as to be an upstart and pretender; there is another in whose school I have regularly advanced. With cutting irony He off-sets His teaching against their Rabbinical teaching (both as to form and matter); His authority, the Father, against their authorities, the old Rabbinical masters. The first “My” therefore denotes His discourse (His system, the school He teaches); the second, His authority (the school He has learned in). Meyer: “Οὐκ—ἁλλά here also is not equivalent to tam—quam (Wolf, etc.), but is absolutely exclusive.” Hardly “absolutely,” but only so far as His person is regarded in its human aspect. Tholuck: “His human personality is viewed abstractly by itself, as in John 5:31; John 8:16.” The primary distinction is between the Son sent, who both in word and act executes the ἐντολή of the Father, who speaks what He hears of the Father, and does what the Father shows Him,—between this person and the Father Himself. And He so far views His personality abstractly by itself as He yields to their idea of an independent human person distinct from God. But his that sent me.—That is, it is not only directly the doctrine of God, but also more than doctrine, the direct message of God to you, a doctrine of the most decisive words of life. John 7:17. If any one is willing to do his will [ἐάντιςθέλῃτὸθέλημααὐτοῦποιεῖν].—The indispensable condition for understanding the doctrine of Christ. We must be truly turned towards God, in order to recognize the divine, which proceeds from God, as divine. And more particularly, we must be earnestly bent upon the divine in practice, if we would know it in theory as doctrine. Man’s moral θέλειν of the moral θέλημα of God is the condition of man’s intellectual γινώσκειν of the intelligible διδαχή of God. Without the earnestness of doing there is no truth in our knowing; and like cannot know like without a like bent of soul. Plato, Lys.: “Ὅτιτὸὅμοιοντῷὁμοίῳἀνάγκηἀεὶφίλονεἶναι. Comp. Matthew 10:40-42. This condition of willingness to do, that is, of practical effort, has its root in the doing of the truth, or moral sincerity (John 3:21), and develops into the love of God (John 5:42). The point cannot be the doing of the will of God, as against sinners and beginners in knowledge; it is only the θέλειν (which, of course, is the beginning of the doing according to the best of one’s knowledge and conscience, in the form of trying; Romans 7). Meyer: “The θέλῃ is not redundant (Wolf, Lφsner, and many others), but is the very nerve of the matter; in θέλῃ ?—θέλημα the suavis harmonia (Bengel) has been noticed.” His will: 1. The Old Testament revelation (Chrysostom, et al.). 2. The demand of faith in Christ (Augustine, Luther, etc.); or at least 3. In His doctrine (Semler, etc.). 4. Tholuck: “Still further from the truth is the interpretation which makes it even a requirement of faith for proof.” 5. Willing obedience to God in general (Lόcke, Meyer). It is a proposition which, in its universality, certainly refers not merely to believers of revelation; but which, on the other hand, has in view a universal revelation of the divine will. Therefore: He who strives to do the will of God according to the best knowledge he can get on his level of knowledge. This holds even for the heathen; but for the Jews it has special regard to the Old Testament revelation of the will of God (see John 5:38), and now for Christians to the fully developed Christian principles of life; always, however, putting the chief stress on full inward earnestness of moral endeavor (θέλῃ). Meyer: “This passage accordingly contains undoubtedly the testimonium internum, but not in the ordinary theological sense, as applying to persons already believers, but as applying to persons not yet believers, when the divine doctrine addresses them.” The testimonium internum, upon candid consideration, leads on from the subjective testimonium of calm conviction, as well as of unsatisfied doubt and longing, into the objective testimonium Spiritus Sancti, which by all means is promised in the γν̓ώσεταιπερί, κ. τ. λ. It is false to ask whether, in the conflict in Romans 7:7, the unconverted man, abstractly viewed, or the converted, is the subject; and it is equally false to introduce this division here. The subject is the actual living elect in their motion towards God under the drawing of His grace.He shall know concerning the doctrine, etc.—The γνώσεται is emphatic. He shall have not only assurance of faith, but living certainty of discernment. And if the demand was universal, so is the promise in the first instance: “He shall know concerning the doctrine,” indefinitely, of every sort of religious doctrine, whether, and how far, it be from God. But from this the other thing immediately follows: He shall know whether Jesus only speaks (λαλῶ) on His own authority (as an uncalled, self-taught individual), or whether, on the contrary, His word be not absolutely the doctrine (from God). Cameron is right, therefore, in making a distinction here between the moral demand and the theoretical doctrine (which Tholuck disputes); only the theoretical doctrine of Christ is as far from being merely theoretical, as an inward ethical bent or nisus is from being merely practical or in the ordinary sense moral. See John 3:12. John 7:18. He that speaketh from himself seeketh his own glory, etc.—The proof that He does not speak from Himself. The mark of one who speaks from himself is ambition; ho would glorify himself. He, therefore, who would not glorify himself, but God, speaks not from himself; ho is true. The direct applying of the proof Christ leaves to themselves. The argument, however, has not an abstract, syllogistic form; it is enriched by a term of life. In the first place a second proof is inserted into the first. If the person sent seeks only the honor of the prince or lord who sends him, his message is to be trusted; he is true. And he is true, because no unrighteousness, no unfaithful conduct appears in his message. It may be depended upon, that what he says his master has said to him. Freedom from all assumption bespeaks the real teacher; if he had received nothing to teach, he could not possibly have taught. Personal disinterestedness bespeaks the commissioned agent; if he had received nothing to deliver, he would not have appeared. And freedom from all assumption and self-interest evince themselves in the undivided energy with which the one sent seeks the honor of the master who sends him. This therefore constitutes the difference between a false Messiah and the true. The motive and the centre of gravity of the false Messiah lie in self-glorification; those of Christ lie in the glorification of the Father, to whom He attributes everything He says and does. Thus He has proved that He is true in His doctrine; even intellectually true, because there is no moral obliquity in Him, no self-seeking or unfaithfulness to the throne which sends Him. As in men the intellectual knowing of the truth comes as the reward of moral endeavor, so in Christ the truth of His doctrine is founded in the righteousness of His life. Ἀδικία therefore, is not. equivalent here to ψεῦδος (Grotius, et al.); though connected with it, inasmuch as ἀδικία would produce ψεῦδος. Self-seeking darkens knowledge. John 7:19. Did not Moses give you the law?—The sudden transition of Jesus here from the defensive to the offensive has led to the hypothesis of an intermediate conversation (Kuinoel) or act between John 7:18-19; for which there is really no ground at all. We must remember: 1. That since the feast of Purim, at which “the Jews” had already begun capital process against Him, Jesus had not met them, but had on their account avoided Judea, and now re-encountered them for the first time. 2. That all their “assaults and negations” (Meyer), including their last attack on His right to teach, covered the design of bringing Him to a capital conviction. 3. That it perfectly accorded with the openness and wisdom of Jesus to draw out their hidden plan, and to make it a subject of talk before all the people in the temple. The only protection against secret adversaries is to expose their designs with the most relentless publicity. 4. That Christ has already in fact introduced the offensive by the last words of the defensive: “There is no unrighteousness in him” (as they had charged on the ground of the Sabbath cure).—Moses, quoting their highest authority.—Give you the law.—Of course the law in general; for he who breaks one commandment transgresses the whole law. It is not specifically the prohibition of murder (Nonnus), nor Sabbath law (Kuinoel), which is intended here by “the law.” But that the rebuke does particularly refer to the prohibition of killing, is shown by what follows. And yet none of you keepeth the law.—A general address. Because there is in you no true striving to do the will of God, ye cannot know My divine mission. And how truly this is the case with you in general (the “none” representing the spirit of the people and its general aim) appears from the fact that ye (the [hierarchical] Judaists in the first instance) seek to kill Me. Yet the people are unconsciously implicated and included in this charge, because the highhanded conduct of the hierarchs has its occasion in the mental indolence of the laity. The people must know that they hate Him and “persecute Him without cause.” John 7:20. The multitude answered and said, etc.—The [hierarchical] Judaists are speechless under the charge of Christ, because they consider it dangerous to have their plan so soon canvassed before the people. Their silence is a malicious reserve, like that of Judas in John 6:70. The people, however, take the accusation to themselves, thinking it wholly unfounded. As “they of Jerusalem,” who speak in John 7:25, very well knew of the project, which had already become notorious in Jerusalem, it must be the festal pilgrims who speak here, who were still far not only from the design announced, but even from any knowledge of it. Thou hast a demon [δαιμόνιον.]—The term here is figurative, drawn from the belief in demoniacal possession. It was probably a proverbial expression in this general sense, especially to denote gloominess, melancholy, laboring under jealous, brooding suspicions. So it was compassionately said of John the Baptist: “He hath a demon” (Matthew 11:18). Men pitied a man otherwise so able and devout. Here also the reply seems to be not malicious [Hengstenberg and older commentators], but rather sympathizing. “Not an expression of malice, but of surprise that a man who could teach so finely, could think of a thing which they considered morally impossible and a mere hallucination” (Meyer). But the same expression in John 8:48; John 10:20 is shown by the connection to be evil-minded. Chrysostom and others take the ὁχλος to be the rulers, and their question to be a dissimulation. This obliterates the true sense of the transaction. John 7:21. And said unto them, I have done one work.—Jesus, continuing His train of thought, advances as clearly beyond the reply of the people as He did in John 6:70 beyond the answer of Peter. His piercing and foreseeing knowledge contrasts with a stupidity which sets up against it, and which considers Jesus in this case even smitten with a pitiable delusion. It is not an inaccuracy (Tholuck) that John represents the ὄχλος [the multitude] as answering the Lord. Christ intends to bring before the ὄχλος the malicious inquisitorial conduct of the hierarchy. The ὄχλος must be made privy to the secret affair and shown their unconscious complicity in the wickedness. The one work is the healing on the Sabbath, John 5:2. (Olshausen needlessly inserts here the subsequent murderous designs). The Lord cannot here mean that He has done only one miracle in Jerusalem (see John 3:1). The antithesis lies in the καὶπάντεςθαυμ. It is not the miracle, but the work that here bears the stress; and it is not wonder at a miracle that is meant, but surprise at one work, though not terror, as Chrysostom and others have it. And in the surprise of all an indignation (Grotius) on the part of many is also unquestionably implied. Offence at that work had therefore spread at least very generally in Jerusalem and among the people. And their morbid condition was manifest in the very fact that they all stared and made an ado over one act of a man who abounded with divine works. The supposed spot upon the one work threatens to eclipse in their view all that has ever filled them with wonder. And even this spot is only in their own vision. Ye all marvel.—The διὰτοῦτο is referred by Theophylact, etc., Lόcke, [Olsh., De Wette, Stier, Hengstenberg, Ewald, Godet] etc., to the clause preceding (θαυμ.); by Chrysostom, Luther [Grot., Bengel, Luthardt, Meyer, Alford] and others to the clause following. But in the latter connection it has been considered by some redundant, by others elliptical (ye ought therefore to know). Meyer has attempted another explanation, which Tholuck considers “tortured.”John 7:22. (For this cause) Moses gave unto you the (rite of) circumcision, etc.—Jesus now proves to them from their own law that it is good to heal a sick man on the Sabbath. Moses ordained circumcision for you. Parenthesis: Yet he did not introduce it as strictly a Mosaic law, but confirmed it as a patriarchal law (coming down from the fathers, that is to say, a fundamental religious law of the Abrahamic covenant of promise, Genesis 17.) And this patriarchal Mosaic law so outweighs the mere Sabbath-law, that ye not only may, but must circumcise a man on the Sabbath, when the prescribed day (the eighth day, Luke 2:21; Rabbinical passages in Lightfoot; Rabbinical maxim: Circumcisio pellit Sabbatum) falls on a Sabbath. The reason of this higher superiority of the patriarchal law lies in the design of circumcision, to make the man partially (in a symbolical sense) whole. But if this is so, how much more is the Sabbath-law suspended (in the legal point of view suspended, in the higher view fulfilled) by the eternal law of God which enjoins the healing of a man wholly diseased; enjoins it even in legal form in the commandment: Thou shalt not kill. Christ thus sets forth three sorts of laws: (1) Eternal principles of humanity, as enacted formally in the decalogue; among which is the law not to destroy life, but to preserve it, to heal. (2) Patriarchal fundamental laws of theocratic civilization; among which belongs circumcision. (3) Mosaic law in the narrower sense. To this last class belongs, not indeed that Sabbath-law which is the safe-guard of human nature with its need of rest (the humane and moral Sabbath [grounded in the very constitution of man, and hence dating from creation]), yet doubtless the symbolical and ritual Sabbath with its prohibition of every kind of work as a symbol of the legal theocracy. If, therefore, these Mosaic ordinances must be suspended by patriarchal practice, how much more by the primal laws of God. But just so far as they are suspended in the spirit of the law, they are only raised out of a prescribed symbolical meaning to their real truth; they are fulfilled. The Sabbath is fulfilled by doing good, by healing men (Matthew 12:12); circumcision is fulfilled by regeneration, according to the commandment: “Thou shalt not covet,” as it is written on the heart by faith as a law of the Spirit. The observation that circumcision “is of the fathers,” has been interpreted by Euthymius Zig. and others as depreciating circumcision by showing it to be not a Mosaic institution. “It might rather express the superiority of circumcision, by virtue of its higher antiquity (and by virtue of its more fundamental character). Then the gradation is very piquantly expressed by Bucer: ‘Ye rank the fathers above the law, I the Father’ ” (Tholuck).—Circumcision had its origin not in Moses (ἐκτοῦΜ.), but in the fathers (ἐκτῶνπατ). John 7:23. If a man on the Sabbath receive circumcision, that, etc.—Circumcision is emphatic, in antithesis with the healing of the whole man in the next clause; hence placed [in the Greek] at the beginning of the sentence.—It is wrong to weaken the ἵναμή so as to read: without breaking the law (Bengel, et al.). It is just by circumcising a man on the Sabbath, if that be the eighth day, that violation or nullification of the law is to be prevented. The idea in the prescription of the eighth day is that the circumcision should be performed as early as possible, the earlier the better. The higher import of the patriarchal ordinance appears also in the fact that what are called the Noachic commandments continued for a time to be morally binding in the Christian church, while the specifically Mosaic law, even in regard to circumcision, became extinct as a religious statute (Acts 15.) Hence, too, the parallel cited by Luthardt from Galatians 3:17, which subordinates the law to the promise, is not without force. Meyer thinks it is; and Tholuck (p. 216) here again fails to see the precedence given to the patriarchal dispensation, as brought out even by Lampe. He thinks that if that had been intended, the words would have been: ἵναμὴλυθῇἡἐντολὴτῶνπατέρων that the statement is therefore inserted simply as matter of history. But the law of Moses had sanctioned anew even the usage of the patriarchs, and had soared above specific camp regulations. Are ye angry at me because I have restored a whole man to health?—The ὅλος is emphatic in antithesis with περιτομή, which was the healing of a single member. Purport of the antithesis: 1. Wounding and healing (Kling, Stud. u. Kritik., 1836). This is against the notion of the particular healing, or of an argument a minori ad majus. Likewise unsuitable is the reference, by Lampe, etc., to the subsequent healing of the wound of circumcision. 2. The legal observance of circumcision, and the real mercy of the miraculous cure (Grotius). 3. “Circumcision was a sanitary measure, purifying and securing against disease. If ye perform on a Sabbath the wholesome act of circumcision, which after all pertains only to one member, I will have a still better right to heal an entire man on a Sabbath. (Philo De circumcisione, ed. Mangey, Tom. II. Michaelis Mos. Recht, 4, § 186, particularly the article ‘Beschneidung’ [Circumcision] in Winer).” Lόcke.4. Meyer: The sanitary purpose did not lie in the law, but in the religious notion of the people; the circumcision was performed only with a view to making the person pure and holy. (Tholuck also is of Meyer’s opinion. But of a “sacramental healing of the single member” one can hardly form an idea, though Kurtz is for it. Sensual lust has its seat in the heart. Of more account, is the argument of the Rabbi Eliezer quoted by Tholuck, and similar to the reasoning here in question). In support of this Meyer quotes the later sentiment from Bammidbar: “Prζputium est vitium in corpore;” vitium in corpora, however, is put away, not by purification, but by a surgical or medical operation; i.e., the removal of it is an act of healing. And this must be intended; for circumcision in the symbolical sense also made the whole man pure and holy. The literal surgical healing of a part, therefore, which symbolically purified the whole man, is the thing intended. It is manifest that a symbolical act performed on a man in this form must be founded in a presumed need of physical healing, however temporary, local, or peculiar to antiquity this might be (the Lord puts Himself at His adversaries’ point of view, as in the Synoptical Gospels, Matthew 12:12, etc.); which is also true of the Jewish “laws of purity and purification.” 5. We have still to mention the antithesis of a healing performed only on the flesh (σάρξ), and a healing extending to the whole man, body and soul (Euthymius, Bengel, Stier, etc.). This antithesis does not come into view here, although the miraculous cures of the Lord did extend even to the soul. In truth the bodily circumcision also was intended to be the means of circumcision of the heart. John 7:24. Judge not according to appearance [κατ’ ὄψιν]—1. Augustine, etc.: Not according to the person, but according to the fact. 2. Melanchthon, etc.: Not according to the outward form of the work, but according to its motives. 3. Not according to the startling appearance of things, but with a righteous and true judgment, which is expressed in the gradations of the ordinances, and executed in the actual healing of that sufferer. John 7:25-26. Some of them of Jerusalem.—These are better instructed than the ὄχλος; they openly avow that the rulers have laid a plan to kill Jesus; yet cautiously, without directly naming them. The repetition of ἀληθῶς shows that they demanded in the Messiah qualifications which they did not find in Jesus. They seem, as an ultra party, to be solicitous even over the circumspection of the rulers, and to treat it with irony. They follow their ironical expression with their own judgment, which breathes the haughtiness of the citizens of a hierarchical capital. As the Rabbis reproach the Lord with His lack of a regular education and graduation, these Jerusalemites cast up against Him His mean extraction. John 7:27. Whence he is.—This, no doubt, refers both to the despised town of Nazareth and to the family of the carpenter; not, however, by contrast with Bethlehem, as in John 7:42, but by contrast with the purely supramundane or mysterious origin which was claimed for the Messiah. Meyer’s restriction of the “whence” to the father and mother is arbitrary, and proceeds from a confounding of the different views here expressed. As to the origin of the view that men should not know whence the Messiah is, there are different opinions. 1. Lόcke [Alford] and others, referring to Justin Martyr (Dialog. cum Tryph.): According to the Jewish view the Messiah should be ἄγνωστος, even unknown to Himself, until Elijah should have anointed Him. Against this Tholuck, after Meyer: In that case the earthly πόθεν of Christ would doubtless be known, but not His Messiah-ship. This dismisses the passage in question too cheaply; for a man who does not himself know whence he is till he is anointed, must have something mysterious about his origin. 2. Tholuck: From Daniel 7:13 they expected a sudden heavenly manifestation of the Messiah who, according to one of the various popular notions, lived in a secret place or in paradise (Targum Jonathan, Micah 4:8; Gfrφrer, Jahrh. des Heils, II., p. 223). It must be remembered that Daniel’s doctrine of the Son of Man was but little known. On the contrary educated people in Jerusalem might very easily be familiar with Alexandrian ideas (as in cultivated regions gleanings of spiritualistic and rationalistic literature combine in various ways with reigning orthodoxy), and Philo taught (De exsecrat. 8) that the Messiah in the restoration of the people would appear and go before them as an ὄψις. Such people, too, can make up a view ex tempore, for the sake of an impudent denial; and the demand that for every opinion a previous origin must be shown, refutes itself as a scholastic pedantry. At all events these Jerusalemites think that Jesus ought to have at least as noble an extraction as themselves. John 7:28. Therefore Jesus cried, teaching in the temple, and saying.—We do not think, with Meyer, that He raised His voice to a shout. The upstart loses confidence, when His origin is spoken of; Jesus purposely enters very emphatically into what they say of His origin. Even in the temple among the throng of people He makes no reserve. It is not without an ironical accordance that He takes up their own arrogant word (τοῦτονοἴδαμεν, which is with them quite equivalent to knowing πόθενἔστιν). Ye both know me, and ye know whence I am.—He makes a difference, however, between Himself and His origin, because the latter implied in their view the utmost meanness, in His view His supreme dignity. Different interpretations: 1. Grotius, Lampe, and others take the words interrogatively (know ye me? etc.). 2. Calvin, Lόcke, etc, ironically. 3. Chrysostom and others, as charging them that they did certainly know His divine person and origin, but denied them. 4. Meyer (after De Wette), as a concession: “The people really had this knowledge.” But that they had with it nothing, and less than nothing, even an obstacle towards the knowledge of Himself, Christ asserts by the ironical tone of His words, when He says: Ye both know Me (by rote) and ye know (by rote) whence I am.And yet I am not come from myself.—Καί is emphatic and adversative: And yet I am not come, etc. These words briefly designate His higher nature, which these adversaries do not know. An ordinary extraction elevates itself only by ambition, which comes from itself and has no higher descent at all; Christ is, in the first place, simply come, and in the second place not from Himself. This introduces the declaration of His descent from God. But he that sent me is true.—The ἀληθινός is variously explained. 1. In the sense of ἀληθής, a true person, verus, one who speaks the truth (Luther, Grotius). 2. A reliable person, firmus, verax (Chrysostom, Lampe), John 8:26. 3. A real, genuine person, fulfilling the idea (Lόcke, Tholuck, 7th ed.). 4. As used absolutely, for the true, essential God (Olshausen, Kling); against which Meyer observes that ἀληθινός, without a particular subject, forms no definite idea. But certainly we have a particular subject in ὁπέμψαςμε. Still we stop with the idea of the real, the living One. The Jews, in their legalistic spirit, live only in symbols, figures, marks of distinction; the Jews of Jerusalem, doubly so: they have a typical, painted religion, painted sins, painted forgiveness, a painted nobility of lineage, a painted God. The real, living God, who has sent the real living Christ, they do not know.John 7:29. But I know him.—Intensely significant contrast to their ignorance. Founded both on (1) real, ideal descent from Him, and on (2) formal, historical commission from Him. John 7:30. Then they sought to seize him.—As the Jerusalemites previously named show themselves Judaists in the strictest sense, it is unnecessary here to think of Jews distinct from them. Because his hour had not yet come.—John gives the ultimate and highest reason why they could not take Him, passing over secondary causes, like fear of the people and political considerations. John 7:31. And many of the people believed in him.—A mark of the increasing ferment in the people, working towards separation. This believing in Him undoubtedly means faith in the Messiah, not merely in a prophet or a messenger of God; yet we must distinguish between their faith and their timid confession. Hence the words: “When Christ cometh, will He do,” etc.—are to be taken not simply as referring to the doubt of the opposing party (Meyer), but as double-minded. Hence the mention of a “murmuring” further on. That the people regard the miracles as Messianic credentials, accords with the expectation of the Messiah. John 7:32. The Pharisees heard.—Pharisees by themselves alone hear the sly murmuring of the people, which betrays an inclination to acknowledge Jesus as the Messiah. They then get the chief priests to join with them in ordering the official arrest of Jesus. The officers who are sent to take Jesus are to be distinguished from the Jerusalemite Judaists before mentioned as wishing to take Him. Under a despotic system the absolutist party of the people are always in advance of the absolutist government: more royalist than the absolute king, more papist than the pope. There was no need of the Sanhedrin being just now assembled (as at the moment at which the chapter closes). An acting authority which could issue hierarchical warrants, was permanent in the chief priests; and the process for the healing at the pool of Bethesda was here still pending. John 7:33. Jesus therefore said unto them, yet a little while, etc.—To whom? 1. Euthymius Zig.: To the officers. 2. Tholuck: To those Pharisees who gave the information. 3. Meyer: To the whole assembly, but with the chief priests mainly in view. As the officers at first enter the assembly of hearers clandestinely, waiting the proper moment to secure Jesus, and Jesus knows their design, He speaks these words primarily to them; for He fixes them, and they feel themselves hit; while the multitude take His words to themselves. The sentence has evidently a more special and a more general sense. The words: “Yet a little while I am with you,”—uttered with majestic emphasis, mean primarily to the officers: Ye must let Me freely speak a little longer here! (see Luke 13:32-33); and then also to the assembly: My work among you draws to a close. The words “And then I go to Him that sent Me,” mean primarily: I then withdraw into the protection of a mightier One, who has sent Me in a power different from that in which ye are sent; in the more general sense: I go home to God. The words “Ye will seek Me, and not find Me” (John 7:24), were likewise capable of a special and a general interpretation, but in all these cases the two meanings lay in the same line, so that the more general included the special. This explains the conduct of the officers, and their expression, in John 7:46. I go unto him that sent me.—According to Paulus and Meyer this would be an addition of John’s because according to John 7:35 Jesus could not have said definitely whither He was going. But His first expression was made enigmatical to the Jews by the second. To go to God does not necessarily mean to them to die; still less, more definitely, to go to heaven. The Christian heaven of the blessed is first disclosed by the parting discourses of Christ and His ascension. It would have been most natural to them to think of the paradise in Sheol. But if they did suspect this, they did not dwell upon it, because they could not themselves renounce the hope of going into Abraham’s bosom. And hence perhaps the remote evasive conjecture: “Will He go … among the Greeks,” etc. This explanation is confirmed by John 8:22, where the evasion is still more malicious than here. The expression of Christ, therefore, is a dark hint of an unknown ποῦ (Lόcke), the import of which they might feel, but not understand (Luthardt). John 7:34. Ye will seek me, and not End (me).—Comp. John 8:21; John 13:33. Interpretations: 1. A hostile seeking (Origen, Grotius, etc.) This applies only in the immediate reference of the words to the officers. 2. A seeking of the Redeemer for redemption, too late. Two sorts of turning to Him: (a) After the terminus peremptorius gratiζ (Augustine, et al.); which, however, can be known in fact only by the cessation of that seeking, (b) With a false, Esau-like repentance, which only trembles before the damnum peccati (Calvin). 3. A seeking for the saving Messiah, whom in My person ye have rejected, especially in the catastrophe of Jerusalem [Luke 20:16 ff; Luke 19:43] (Chrysostom, Lampe [Hengstenberg] etc.). 4. “And that, Himself, the rejected Jesus, not the Messiah in general.” Meyer.Jesus, however, is found of those who seek. When it is said; “Seek, and ye shall find,” it is implied that seeking without finding proves a vitium in the seeking; though we cannot, with Maldonatus and others, consider the seeking to be placed here merely for an aggravation of the not finding, as if the Lord would say, by a Hebraism: Ye shall be utterly unable to find Me, Psalms 10:15; Psalms 37:10; Isaiah 41:12. The mere inability to find itself points back to a kind of seeking; and seeking is the emphatic thing in John 8:21; John 13:33; but a false seeking, in which Israel has continued through all the centuries since. Of the mass the word is spoken, and to the mass Jesus speaks; individuals, therefore, who turned, even though in a mass, to Jesus after the destruction of Jerusalem, are exceptions, and do not here come into view. That mass of the Jews has incessantly sought its delivering Messiah, but (1) in another person, (2) in a secular majesty, (3) in the spirit of legal religion, and (4) with earthly, political, revolutionary prospects. And where I am.—“To explain the present εἰμί, metaphysically, like Augustine: Nec dicit, ubi ero, sed ubi sum; semper enim erat, quo fuerat rediturus (John 3:13),—there is no reason; like ὑπάγω, it is the present of vivid representation.” Tholuck. The thought that His heaven is not merely local, but also inward, and that He therefore is always at His goal, is not entirely out of sight, though undoubtedly His estate of glory is chiefly in view. John 7:35. The Jews therefore said among themselves.—The mocking malice of their reply (in vain questioned by Meyer) rises in a climax of three clauses: 1. Whither will He go, that we might not follow Him? (into Paradise?) 2. Will He seek His fortune among the Jewish dispersion among the Gentiles, with the less orthodox, less respectable and intelligent Jews? 3. Or will He even teach the Greeks (to whom, indeed, judging from His conduct towards the law and His liberal utterance, He seems rather to belong than to us)? But what they say in mockery, must fulfil itself in truth; they prophesy like Caiaphas (John 11:50-51) and Pilate (John 19:19).—Unto the dispersed among the Greeks.—The διασπορὰ (dispersion, abstract, pro concret.) τῶνἙλλήνων (genitive of remoter relation), not the dispersed Gentiles (Chrysostom), or Hellenists or Greek Jews (Scaliger), but, according to specific usage (James 1:1; 1 Peter 1:1), the Jews dispersed in the Gentile world. John 7:36. What is this saying that he said?—Indicating that they cannot get away from this saying. They seem to feel the dark, fearful mystery in the words, but are inclined to persuade themselves that it is sheer nonsense. AND ETHICAL1. See the preceding exegesis. 2. The whispering concerning Jesus from fear of the Jews is a type of the whole spirit of hierarchy in the Church, and absolutism in the State, with its tyranny over opinion and conscience, its censorship, heresy-hunting, and inquisition; and an example of the fact that under such systems the enemies of the truth always venture to speak rather more boldly than its friends. 3. The appearance of Jesus at the first feast of the Jews (the passover of 781) was a reformation of it. His appearance at the second (Purim of 782) was a completing of it. His appearance at the third (the feast of tabernacles of 782) was a contrast or counterpart to it. (Even His being sent to the people and His going forth to the Father seem to allude to the sending of Moses to their fathers and the pilgrimage of those fathers through the wilderness to Canaan, which they were celebrating.) His appearance at the fourth (feast of the dedication, 782) is the following up of this contrast. His appearance at the last passover (783) was the fulfilling of the typical feast of the passover with the reality, the abolition of it thereby. 4. The two reproaches which the Jews cast upon the Lord, and His answers, in their permanent import. The reproach of Rabbinism that He was not regularly educated, and His answer that He was not self-taught, but taught of God. The reproach of the court aristocracy that He was of mean birth, and His appeal to the fact that His person and His mission are a mystery of heavenly descent; carrying with it the intimation that, as the Messenger of God, He bears the dignity of God Himself. 5. The test of true doctrine, of the true course of study in order to come to the knowledge of the truth, and of the true capacity to judge of doctrine, John 7:16-18. Tradition and originality. The tracing of the wisdom of Christ to the schools of the Essenes or other educational institutions, is also a soulless Rabbinism, which is perfectly blinded to the original resources of His mind. 6. The public appearance of Christ and the unveiling of the secret designs of His hierarchical adversaries before the people, a parallel to His turning to the people in Galilee (Matthew 15:10), a permanent type and a spiritual rule, followed in appeals from the pope to a general council, from the general council under trammels to the Christian people; and yet especially different from all democratic solicitation of the people, Christ treats the laity as accomplices of the hierarchy. The mental indolence of the former supports the mental tyranny of the latter. 7. Heubner: “How is it possible that after so strong and plain a declaration of Jesus, men should continually persist in thrusting human means of education upon Him, as Ammon, for example, does (Fortbildung des Christenthums zur Weltreligion, I. p. 220). Comp. Storr’s explanation in Flatt’s Magazin, I. p. 107 sqq.; IV. p. 220; Sόsskind: In welchem Sinn hat Jesus die Gφttlichkeit seiner Lehre behauptet? p. 25–47; Weber’s Programme: Interpretatio judicii, quod Jesus John 7:14-18 de sua ipsius doctrina tulisse legitur, Wittenb., 1797.” 8. Circumcision as healing; or, the symbolical ordinances in Israel founded on real conditions of life at the time. Gradation of ordinances. Jewish fundamental articles. A hint of the eternal fundamental laws of religious and moral life. 9. Earthly, historical descent and heavenly, personal originality. Contrast of a polite world lost in symbolical mummery, usage, conventionalism, titles, and privileges, and a real, personal life coming from God and standing in God’s word and Spirit, John 7:27; John 7:29. 10. The Jews of Jerusalem sought to take Jesus,—the ultra-hierarchical and ultra-imperial party, which always in its fanatical zeal outdoes the hierarchical and absolutist government. 11. The various Christological systems of the Jews in this chapter (John 7:15; John 7:27; John 7:42), a type of the deep and confused divisions of opinion under an apparently uniting constitution. 12. The officers and their arrest by the word of Jesus, a single point in the line of Christ’s ethico-psychological miracles. See John 2. Discussion of the miracles. 13. The expression of Christ concerning His going to Him that sent Him, the first gleam of the Christian doctrine of heaven. 14. Ye will seek Me and will not find Me. A great prophecy of Christ respecting the tragic retribution of the Jewish people. Seek and not find. To seek salvation and not find it, is the lot of a world lost in vanity; to seek and not find the Messiah, the lot of wretched Israel sunk in the vanity of the letter and of chiliastic worldliness. An ultimate rectification of the false seeking into the true seeking and finding, is not forbidden. See Rom. chs. 9 and 11. AND See the previous heads. Even in the Lord’s wise distinction between His brethren’s legal observance of the feast and His own voluntary appearance at the feast (as the personal truth of the feast), no guile is found in His mouth, 1 Peter 2:22.—The wonderful wisdom with which Christ prolonged His life more than a year (from the feast of Purim in John 5) after it had fallen under the deadly hostility of the Jews.—The ferment of popular opinion concerning the Lord in Jerusalem, a token of the approaching separation between His friends and enemies.—Fear of the Jews, or of the despotism of the letter an ancient and modern hindrance to faith and knowledge.—The gospel’s victorious piercing of the old Jewish hierarchy, a presage of its ever fresh piercing of all hierarchical incrustations.—The fear of man in the adherents of Jesus, over against the fearlessness in Himself.—The example of Jesus in relying on the utmost publicity against the secret plottings of a wicked party spirit.—In the midst of the feast, in the midst of the temple, the Lord appears—appears yet for a long while, though both seem already fallen into the possession of His enemies.—The lion-like spirit of the Lord, in which He seeks His lion enemy in His den: 1. Proved (a) by this incident; (b) by His previous going into the wilderness; (c) by His subsequent surrender to the judgment of the high council. 2. Again proved in the life of His apostles and in the course of the Church (the apostles in Jerusalem, Peter in Babylon, Paul in Rome, missions to the heathen).—The wisdom of the Lord in bringing before the people the secret design of the Jewish court to kill Him.—The offence of Jewish pride at the Lord’s call to teach: 1. The phases of it; (a) Rabbinical offence at His want of a Rabbinical education; (b) Offence of metropolitan people at His obscure birth. 2. Its self-contradiction in its expression: (a) He knows letters; (b) He speaks boldly, though they seek to kill Him. 3. Christ’s declaration in the face of it; (a) As to His school and His doctrine; (b) As to His origin.—The alliance of ecclesiastical and secular party spirit against the Lord.—The fanaticism of the hierarchical party, always in excess of the fanaticism of the hierarchical authorities.—The words of Jesus concerning the heavenly tradition of His doctrine. 1. It, is not a word of man (of human invention), but a message of God, of eternal and heavenly origin. 2. It attests itself by the fact that whosoever desires to do the will of God must find in this doctrine the goal of his effort. 3. It attests the Lord who teaches it, by its looking solely to the glorifying of God, and thereby proving the freedom of Jesus from human ambition and human self-deception.—If any man will do His will, etc.; or: Christ the goal of all really sincere, devout striving.—Sincerity of will, the first and last condition of true knowledge.—The mark of a genuine witness of God, John 7:18.—The true purity of doctrine dependent on the purity of the mind in its endeavors; or, the word of truth dependent on the truth of the word.—Why go ye about to kill Me? So Christ ever turns His defence into attack.—How He unveils to the people the fearful thought of murder against the Messiah, which is germinating in them while yet they themselves think not of it.—“Thou hast a devil (demon);” so unbelief has at all times represented the Lord’s stern, cutting insight into human corruption as a morbid, melancholy conceit of His own mind.—They charge Him now with bright heedlessness, now with gloomy, demoniacal despondency or madness, because they understand not His holy mind.—Jesus often taken for crazy.—How far are the words of Jesus in John 7:21 an answer to the charge in John 7:20? They had taken offence at His work; that is the beginning of the hatred of Christ, which afterwards developed into the murder of Christ.—Christ’s vindication of His healing on the Sabbath by appeal to the circumcision which was lawful on the Sabbath.—They condemned themselves in their judgment of Jesus: 1. They vexed themselves over one work of the Lord on the Sabbath, while in circumcision they continually performed works on the Sabbath. 2. They broke the Sabbath for the sake of a slight necessity, while they charged the Lord’s healing of a whole sufferer as a transgression.—Law contends with law, knowledge with knowledge, letter with letter, when they are not interpreted and reconciled by the Spirit.—Christ, like Paul, overpowered the Jews with their own weapons, with their own art of Rabbinical logic.—Why Jesus did not openly reveal to the people who were troubled over His descent, the mystery of His miraculous human birth and His eternal divine nature.—How He represents the law of circumcision as a law of healing.—How He discloses as the kernel of it, a law of love, of mercy, of liberty.—“Judge not according to appearance;” or, judging according to the letter a judging according to exterior looks.—The proud contempt with which the people of quality in Jerusalem express themselves respecting the Lord, in its spiritual imbecility: (1) More fanatical than the Jewish authorities; (2) more ignorant in regard to Christ’s descent than the people; (3) wholly incapable of appreciating His spiritual greatness.—The mocking wit of the polite adversaries of the Lord in union with gross ignorance.—The testimony of Christ concerning His heavenly origin hardens the proud.—The divine origin of the doctrine of Christ in its connection with the divine origin of His being.—How imagined greatness is embittered and enraged before the evidences of true greatness.—They sought to take Him: but no man, etc.—Impotence of the adversary against the Lord: 1. His impotence in the most diverse designs (they sought to take Him themselves, they sought to take Him through instruments). 2. Its impotence in the presence of true power: (a) of the faithful adherents of Christ; (b) of the Lord Himself; (c) of the overruling of God (His hour not yet come). 3. His impotence fully displayed just when His hour is come, when it seems almighty.—With the enmity of unbelief ripens also the heroism of faith, John 7:30-31.—The first decided attempt of the Jewish rulers upon the life of the Lord, brought on by the whispering of the people that He was the Christ.—This first attempt at the feast of tabernacles in the autumn related to the last attempt at the passover of the next year. The exalted words of Christ to the people, addressed to the servants of the chief priests in particular, John 7:33–35:1. An expression of His security in the full presentiment of His insecurity. 2. The language of simplicity, and yet of double meaning. 3. To the Jews an occasion of mockery, and yet at the same time a momentous riddle. Yet a little while am I with you (John 7:33): the great importance of the little while: 1. The period of grace. 2. The year of grace. 3. The day of grace. 4. The hour of grace.—The death of the Lord and of His people, a voluntary going home.—Killed at last, and yet even thereby escaped from His murderers.—How the Jews cannot get away from the word of Jesus: “Ye shall seek Me,” etc.—The divergent paths which separate the Lord from His despisers: 1. The path upward. 2. The path downward.—Christ perfectly inaccessible to His adversaries: 1. They seek Him and do not find Him. 2. They find Him, and bind Him, and have Him not. 3. They nail Him up, and bury Him, and seal the stone, and keep Him not.—Acts 26:7. The tragical hope of Israel for the Messiah: 1. How noble in its truth. 2. How vain in its perversion. 3. How prophetic in spite of its delusion. Starke: God knows the true and better time to appear and help.—That neither He nor His apostles were instructed by men, shows the heavenly origin of His doctrine.—Cramer: In Christ are hidden all treasures of wisdom; but we must go the ordinary way, go to school, study, ask, etc., that we also may be wise.—His that sent me: 1. Because it [His doctrine] contains the whole counsel and pleasure of the Father, John 6:39-40. 2. Because it was in substance one with Moses and the prophets, through whom the Father had spoken, Hebrews 1:1. 3. Because Christ was filled with the Spirit of the Father, John 17:8. 4. Because His doctrine aimed at the glory of the Father.—Zeisius: The test of orthodox and righteous teachers: 1. Their being able to say with Christ in some measure and truth: My doctrine is not mine, but, etc.; taking their doctrine not from their own reason, but from the holy, revealed word of God. 2. This entry is longer than a Bible module can hold. The rest is at https://www.sermonindex.net/commentary/lange/ (b) Christ as the dispenser of the spirit, the real, siloam with its water of life. increasing ferment in the peopleJoh_7:37-4437[Now] In the last day, that [the] great day of the feast, Jesus stood and cried, saying, If any man [any one] thirst, let him come unto me, and drink. 38He that believeth on [in] me, as the Scripture hath said, out of his belly [body] shall flow rivers of living water. 39(But this spake he of the Spirit, which they that believe on [in] him should [were about to] receive, for the Holy Ghost [the Spirit] was 40not yet given, [omit given] because that [omit that] Jesus was not yet glorified.) Many [some] of the people [multitude] therefore, when they heard this saying 41[these words], said, Of a truth this is the Prophet [This is truly the Prophet.] Others said, This is the Christ. But [omit But] some [Others] said, Shall Christ come out of Galilee [Doth the Christ then come from Galilee]? 42Hath not the Scripture said, That [the] Christ cometh of [from] the seed of David, and out of the town of Bethlehem [from Bethlehem, the town] where David was? 43So there was a division among the people [the multitude] because of him. And 44some of them would have taken him [wished to seize him]; but no man [one] laid hands on him. AND Joh_7:37. In the last day.—Meyer: “As the eighth day (the 22d Tisri according to Leviticus 23:34; Numbers 29:35; Nehemiah 8:18) was reckoned in with the seven days of the feast proper, and as, Succah, fol. 48, 1, the last day (ΰַ ?ηֲ ?ψεֹ ?ο) of the feast is the eighth, John certainly meant this day and not the seventh (Theoph., Buxtorf, Bengel, Roland, Paulus, Amnion); especially as it was customary at a later period to speak of an eight days’ celebration of the feast of tabernacles (2Ma 10:6; Joseph. Ant. III. 10, 4; Gem. Eruvin. 40, 2; Midr. Kohel. 118, 3). To this corresponds, too, the translation ἐξόδιον (finale of the feast), by which the Septuagint expresses the designation of the eighth day, ςֲ ?φֶ ?ψֶ ?ϊ [solemn assembly] in Leviticus 23:36; Numbers 29:35; Nehemiah 8:18. Comp. Ewald, Alterthόmer, p. 481.” Tholuck: “A general jubilee (Plutarch calls it a Bacchanal) and splendid ceremonies of many kinds took place at this feast, so that the Rabbis were accustomed to say: He who has not seen these festivities, knows not what jubilee is. See H. Majus: Diss. de haustu aquarum.” [Alford takes the same view as to the day, and then tries to solve the difficulty which attaches to it. “The eighth day seems here to be meant, and the last of the feast to be popularly used. But a difficulty attends this view. Our Lord certainly seems to allude here to the custom which prevailed during the seven days of the feast, of a priest bringing water in a golden vessel from the pool of Siloam with a jubilant procession to the temple, standing on the altar and pouring it. out there, together with wine, while meantime the Hallel (Psalms 113-118) was sung. This practice was by some supposed—as the dwelling in tabernacles represented their life in the desert of old—to refer to the striking of the rock by Moses:—by others, to the rain, for which they then prayed, for the seed of the ensuing year:—by the elder Rabbis (Maimonides, cited by Stier, iv. 331, ed. 2), to Isaiah 12:3, and the effusion of the Holy Spirit in the days of the Messiah. But it was universally agreed (with the single exception of the testimony of R. Juda Hakkadosh, quoted in the tract Succa, which itself distinctly asserts the contrary), that on the eighth day this ceremony did not take place. Now, out of this difficulty I would extract what I believe to be the right interpretation. It was the eighth day, and the pouring of water did not take place. But is therefore (as Lόcke will have it) all allusion to the ceremony excluded? I think not: nay, I believe it is the more natural. For seven days the ceremony had been performed, and the Hallel sung. On the eighth day the Hallel was sung, but the outpouring of the water did not take place: ‘desidcraverunt aliquid.’ ‘Then Jesus stood and cried,’ etc. Was not this the most natural time? Was it not probable that He would have said it at a time, rather even than while the ceremony itself was going on?” This accords with the view taken by Lange (see below and Doctr. and Ethical No. 1), but Wordsworth, Owen and others defend the usual opinion that on the eighth day as well as on those preceding, and with louder and more general expressions of joy, the priest brought forth, in a golden vessel, water from the spring of Siloam, and poured it upon the altar, and that Jesus at that very time proffered the water of life to all who would come unto Him and drink.—P. S.] The last day of the feast of tabernacles was an especially high day, being the close of the feast (as well as of the festal season of the year), and being a Sabbath, a day on which the congregation assembled according to the law (Leviticus 23:36), and which was therefore distinguished by a special sacrificial ritual. But one thing the day lacked, which distinguished the other days. On each of the seven preceding days, in the morning, occurred the festal water-drawing. A priest drew water daily with a large golden pitcher (holding about two pints and a half) from the spring of Siloam on the temple hill, brought it into the temple, and poured it out mingled with sacrificial wine, into two perforated dishes at the altar. The ceremony was accompanied with the sound of cymbals and trumpets, and the singing of the words of Isa 12:3, which Rabbi Jonathan paraphrased: “With joy shall ye receive the new doctrine from the chosen righteous.” This was the celebration of the miraculous springs which God opened for the people on their pilgrimage through the wilderness. But because the eighth day marked the entrance into Canaan, the water-drawing ceased. On this day the springs of the promised land gave their waters to the people; an emblem of the streams of spiritual blessing which Jehovah had promised to His people. To this symbolical performance the words of Jesus on the last day of the feast evidently refer (Leben Jesu, III. p. 619). It is of no account that, according to Rabbi Juda, the pouring out of the water took place on the eighth day also. This was probably a later supplement, if the statement is not an error. The great day [τῇμεγάλῃ ?].—That is, especially great in comparison with the other days. See the preceding remarks. Philo also [De Septenaris II. 298] observes that it was the close of the yearly feasts; i.e. of the three great feasts, not of all. Cried, saying.—Jesus had not hitherto so openly presented Himself as the personal object of a saving faith. If any one thirst [i.e. whosoever thirsts] let him come to me and drink.—See the observations on John 7:37. The reference of this preaching of salvation under the promise of a miraculous draught and fountain of water to the water-drawing is groundlessly considered by Meyer to be dubious. It agrees entirely with the character of the fourth Gospel, in which Jesus presents Himself in the most varied ways as the fulfilment of the Old Testament symbols. The spiritual import of the water-drawing appears in Isaiah 12:3 [“with joy shall ye draw water out of the wells of salvation”]. This water-drawing must be distinguished from the devotional water-drawing on days of humiliation and fasting, 1 Samuel 7:6. [The invitation first given to the Samaritan woman at Jacob’s well, is here extended to all the people on the great feast in Jerusalem. The N. T. closes with a similar offer of the water of life (Revelation 22:17). There is an inner thirst as there is an inner man, and the former is deeper and stronger than the thirst of the body, and can only be satisfied from the fountain of life in Christ. “Under the imagery of one thirsting for water, which everywhere, and especially in countries like Palestine where the want of water is so frequently experienced, would be well understood, our Lord proffers to all such persons that which will forever satisfy the longings of the soul and give it permanent rest.” Owen. “An allusion to the water drawn in a golden vase from the pool of Siloam and poured on the altar in the temple… as a memorial of the water from the rock smitten in the wilderness, and typical of the living water of the Spirit from the true Rock (1 Corinthians 10:4).” Wordsworth.—P. S.] John 7:38. He that believeth in me, etc.—Explaining the expression: “Come unto me and drink.”—As the scripture hath said.—These words are not to be connected with ὁπιστεύων, as if the meaning were: “He who according to the scripture believeth in Me” (Chrysostom, Calovius, and others). An ἔστι may be understood. Meyer: Ὁπιστεύων is nominat. absol. The question then is, what words of Scripture the Lord means. The expression [which follows: “out of his body shall flow rivers of living water”] does not occur literally in the Old Testament; so that Whiston and others took up the idea that it was from some canonical or apocryphal sources now lost. Against this are (1) the usage of the New Testament, (2) the general reference to “the scripture,” which, as such, seems to be intended to point rather to a promise running through the Old Testament than to any particular passage (see Isaiah 44:3; Isaiah 55:1; especially Isaiah 58:11; Ezekiel 47:1 ff.; Joe 2:23; Zechariah 13:1; Zechariah 14:8). Olshausen fixes particularly on those passages which promise a flowing forth of living water from the temple, the believer being considered as a living temple. And undoubtedly Christ at least would as surely have Himself considered the true temple-fountain, as He in John 2 presented Himself as the true temple. The notions of the temple (John 2) and the fountain (John 4) here run together. The question is whether the believer also will himself be a temple-spring. See the next paragraph. Out of his belly (body)—Ἐκτῆςκοιλίαςαὐτοῦ. That κοιλία (αֶּ ?θֶ ?ο) may denote in Hebrew usage the inward part, the heart, is proved by Proverbs 20:27, and similar passages (see Bretschneider’s Lexicon); hence Chrysostom [his successors] and others have taken κοιλία as equivalent to καρδία. [Augustine: the inner man, the heart’s conscience.—P. S.] The only question is, why the Lord chose the strong term. Meyer [p. 312] thinks it should be strictly understood of the abdomen [Bauchhφhle, as the receptacle of water taken into a man], and then this should be taken figuratively. His body shall give forth living water as a stream of a fountain (through the mouth!); without the figure, the divine grace and truth which the believer has taken from the fulness of Christ into his inner life, remains not shut up within himself, but imparts itself in overflowing abundance to others. This rendering accounts for the striking expression κοιλία no better than that of Chrysostom. Κοιλία, in the wider sense denotes any belly-like cavity [the belly of the sea, of a mountain, of a large vessel, etc.]. If we keep in view the symbolical reference to the “water-feast,” we may refer the expression to the belly of the temple hill (Gieseler [in the Studien und Kritiken, 1829, p. 138 f.]; see Lόcke, II. p. 229), and also to the body of the great golden pitcher with which the priest drew the water (Bengel). We have previously (Leben Jesu, II., p. 945) given the former interpretation. But as Christ Himself is the parallel of the temple hill with the spring of Siloam, so the believing Christian is well represented by the golden pitcher with which the priest drew the water; at least this enters into the choice of the expression. The meaning is: The whole Christian is a vessel of grace emptied of vanity, filled with the Spirit. Of course the pitcher of itself yields no stream of living water; but this is just the miracle of the true life, that, being drunk (John 4:10) or drawn in faith (as in our passage), it becomes a flowing fountain of living water. To refer the ἐκτῆςκοιλίαςαὐτοῦ to Christ (Hahn: Theologie des Neuen Testaments, I. p. 229 [and Gess: Person Christi, p. 166]), jars with the context, especially John 7:39. The living water is explained below. [Shall flow rivers of living water.—Ποταμοί is put first in the original to emphasize the abundance. Chrysostom comments on the plural: “Rivers, not river, to show the copious and overflowing power of grace: and living water, i.e. always moving; for when the grace of the Spirit has entered into and settled in the mind, it flows freer than any fountain, and neither fails, nor empties, nor stagnates. The wisdom of Stephen, the tongue of Peter, the strength of Paul, are evidences of this. Nothing hindered them; but, like impetuous torrents, they went on, carrying everything along with them.”—P. S.] John 7:39. But this spoke he of the Spirit which they that believe in him were about to receive.—[An explanatory remark of the Evangelist similar to the one in John 2:21. Important for apostolic exegesis. Otherwise the Evangelists never insert their own views or feelings to interrupt the flow of the objective narration which speaks best for itself.—P. S.].—According to Lightfoot the Rabbins also considered the water-pouring or libation of the feast of tabernacles as the outpouring of the divine Spirit (haustio Spiritus Sancti). [Comp. the prophetic predictions of the Messianic outpouring of the Spirit, Joe 3:1; Isaiah 32:15; Isaiah 44:3; Ezekiel 36:25; Ezekiel 39:29]. According to Lόcke (II. p. 230) the “living water” is intended to mean as much as “eternal life” [John 4:10; John 4:14], but not the Holy Spirit; and John’s exposition may be indeed “epexegetically correct, but is not exegetically accurate.” His arguments are: (1) “The outflowing, ῥεύσουσινἐκ, is not a receiving (λαμβάνειν).” But the receiving is everywhere identical with faith, and the Spirit, which the believers received, also in fact flowed forth. (2) “The ῥεύσουσιν cannot be an absolute future, excluding the present.” But neither has the gospel history made the outpouring of the Holy Ghost so; for before this, in fact, a certain miraculous power already flowed forth from the apostles [comp. also John 20:22]. (3) “Olshausen, it is true, observes that even in the New Testament the Spirit is conceived under the figure of water, as the description of the Spirit as ‘poured out,’ Acts 10:45, Titus 3:6, clearly shows. But how comes it, that the corresponding emblem of water is never expressly used in the New Testament for the Holy Ghost. We have ὕδωρτῆςζωῆς, but never ὕδωρτοῦπνεύματος.” This is accounted for by the fact that the symbol arose from the contrast, so vivid to Palestinians, between the stagnant water of cisterns and the living water of springs. The legal system gave a certain measure of life, like cistern water, which did not propagate itself, and easily corrupted. The gospel dispensation of faith gave the water of life, which like a fountain replenished itself, increased, and was always fresh. And this was the Spirit. Lόcke says: “The essential affinity of the expressions ζωὴαἰώνιος and πνεῦμα is undeniable.” Here, however, is more than affinity; the two expressions denote the same life of the Spirit, only under different aspects. Meyer rightly adduces for the correctness of the Evangelist’s explanation the strength of the term ποταμοί (to which ῥεύσουσι may be added). But when he goes on to remark, that John does not consider the Holy Ghost Himself to be meant by the living water, but only says of the whole declaration, that Jesus meant it of the Holy Ghost, leaving the Christian mind to conceive the Spirit as the Agens, as the impelling power of the stream of living water,—he runs substantially into Lόcke’s interpretation. We have only to distinguish between the Spirit of the life, as the cause, and the life of the Spirit, as the effect; carefully remembering that the cause and the effect are here not physically separate, but penetrate each other. Assuredly the words of Jesus speak directly of the operation of the Holy Ghost. The Spirit is a self-supplying spring. On the doctrine of the Spirit of God in the Old Testament and of the Holy Ghost in the New, comp. the biblical and dogmatic theologies; Spirit is the uniting formative principle of visible life. So the air, the symbolical spirit of the earth; so the spirit in man. And the Spirit of God is, in the first place, the uniting life and formative principle of the creation (Genesis 1:2; Psalms 33:6); then, of the life of the creature, and in particular of man (Genesis 6:3; Psalms 104:29-30); then, of the theocracy (Numbers 11:25, etc.). Subsequently the promise of a new kingdom (see the Prophets). So in the New Testament, the one life and formative principle of the life of Jesus, of the body of disciples, of the New Testament Church, of the new world. For the (Holy) Ghost was not yet [οὔπωγάρἦνπνεῦμα (ἄγιον).—For the reasons above given we keep the ἅγιον. The Spirit was already always present; the Spirit of God had evidenced Himself even in the Old Testament; but the revelation of God as Holy Ghost was not yet given. In the glorification of Christ the Spirit of God first came to view as the Holy in the specific New Testament sense. The ἦν is therefore emphatic; He was not yet present and manifest upon earth to men. The addition [δεδομένον, given, in the E. V.] in cod. B. (Lachmann) seems to be a gloss explanatory of the difficult term. Christ was conceived, in deed, by the Holy Ghost, and anointed with the fulness of the Spirit; but this was as yet a mystery to the world; the Holy Ghost could not come into the world till after the ascension of Christ, John 16:7. Hofmann (Schriftbeweis I., p. 196): “The outpouring of the Spirit was the demonstration of His super-mundane nature”—and of His intra-mundane existence; the appropriation of His perfect form of life and vital operation to the world (comp. Acts 19:2).—“The Macedonians were unwarranted in applying this passage against the personality of the Holy Ghost. It is metonymia causζ pro effectu.” Heubner. (Or also: metonymia existentiζ pro revelatione), [Because Jesus was not yet glorified (ἐδοξάσθη).—By the atoning death, resurrection and ascension of Jesus to the right hand of God the Father, from whence He promised to send and did send the Spirit, as the Spirit of the gospel redemption. In promising this Spirit, Christ expressly said that He must withdraw His visible presence from the disciples and return to the Father before the Comforter could come (John 16:7). The previous working of the Spirit under the old dispensation was preparatory, prophetic, fragmentary and transitory, like the manifestations of the Logos before the Incarnation. On the day of Pentecost the Spirit took up His abode in the Church and in individual believers, as an immanent and permanent principle, as the Spirit of the God-Man and Saviour, as the Spirit of adoption, as the Spirit of truth and holiness, who reveals and glorifies Christ in the hearts of believers, as Christ revealed and glorified the Father, and abides with them forever.—P. S.] John 7:40-41. When they heard the sayings [instead of this saying].—The reading: “heard the sayings,” has the weight of authorities. The total impression of Christ’s utterances at the feast is therefore intended. The “heard” is emphatic: those of the people who listened to Him with earnestness (ἀκούσαντεςτῶνλόγων), said, etc.—Of a truth this is the Prophet.—Meyer groundlessly says, this means the prophet who was to precede the Messiah, not the Messiah Himself; and yet it means the person promised in Deuteronomy 18:15. That is, these people are all agreed that Jesus is the Prophet in general. After this, however, they divide. Some are decided, others are not. The ἀκούσαντες separate into ἄλλοι, ἄλλοι. The former declare outright, that He is the Prophet of Deu 18:15; He is the Messiah. The latter, who would admit Him to be the Prophet, the forerunner of the Messiah according to the Jewish theology, have a difficulty—the supposed Galilean origin of Christ. The birth of Christ in Bethlehem was unknown to them. John considers it superfluous to show up their error, and hence De Wette has gratuitously inferred that John himself did not know that Christ was born in Bethlehem. John well knew that the conditions of faith had to lie higher and deeper than such a circumstance. Minds which sincerely yield themselves to the impression of Christ, could easily learn His origin, and so be delivered from their error. John 7:42. Hath not the scripture.—Isaiah 11:1; Jeremiah 23:5; Micah 5:1.—Where David was.—1 Samuel 16. John 7:43. So there was a division.—This division or violent split among those who accorded recognition to the Lord in different degrees, must be distinguished from the division between all those who were friendly to Him and the enemies, of whom John 7:44 at once goes on to speak, or the analogous divisions in John 9:16; John 10:18. There were at first but a few among the people, who made common cause with the hostile Pharisees. See below. John 7:44. And some of them.—That is, not of the two preceding classes, but of the people who heard His words. As ἐξαὐτῶν stands after ἔθελον, it is even a question whether the words should not be ἐξἑαυτῶν: would have taken Him of themselves, on their own responsibility. De Wette thinks they might have wished to rally the intimidated officers. But the probability is that the officers, as a secret police, as under-sheriffs, had mingled with the people; for no point is mentioned, at which they showed themselves openly; and such an arrangement would correspond with the scrupulous caution of the Sanhedrists. These hostile people, therefore, felt an impulse to open the summary process of zealotism against Jesus.—But no man laid hands on him.—They were still fettered by the counsel of God, on the one hand, the fear of the adherents of Jesus, on the other, an involuntary awe. And that the servants of the Sanhedrin did not venture to seize the Lord, we first learn in the next section. AND ETHICAL1. It yields an incongruous conception, to suppose (with Tholuck and the older expositors,) that Jesus stood and proclaimed aloud the words of Joh 7:37-38, while the priest was carrying that holy water through the fore-court, and the people were giving themselves up entirely to their jubilations over this symbol. Just then He would have announced that in Him was offered in reality what was there signified in symbol. So public an assault upon the temple-worship, as should assume even the appearance of a vehement rivalry, cannot be expected of the Lord. On the contrary, the eighth day, with its lack of the festal water-drawing, must have brought with it to the attendant people a sense of want, to which Jesus addressed His call with good effect. At that moment, when the symbolical lights of a legally inefficient religion were burning low and going out, the evangelical substance of the symbols appears. The points which determine the symbolical utterance of the Lord are these: (1) The water-drawing was a symbol of spiritual blessing. The redeemed of Israel, on their second return to Canaan, were to draw water on the way with joy out of the wells of salvation, Isaiah 11:12; Isaiah 12:3. (2) Siloam was situated, indeed, on the temple-hill, but it rose not in the temple itself, but outside of it, at the foot of the holy mountain. So the true spirit of life was lacking in the sacerdotal worship of the temple; it appeared most in the prophetic office, symbolized by the fountain of Siloam in Isaiah 8:6. (3) Hence the prophets foretold the future priest-hood and worship of the Spirit under the figure of a stream issuing from the temple, Ezekiel 47; Joe 3:18. All Jerusalem was to become full of fountains, Zechariah 14:8; in fact the whole people was to be like a watered garden, and like a spring of water, Isaiah 58:11. (4) The eighth day of the feast of tabernacles, in its symbolical place, denoted the time of this gushing life of the Spirit; hence it was primarily a day of expectation, of longing, of prayer for the outpouring of the Holy Ghost (see Leben Jesu, II. p. 942). This is the Lord’s opportunity. In Him the miraculous fountain of the eighth day, for the breaking forth of which from the temple they hoped, was given to the people. 2. Out of his belly. Tholuck: “Luthardt’s observation, that ‘even the corporeal nature was to be an abode of the Holy Ghost,’—is irrelevant.” Yet this is, in fact, involved in the idea of regeneration, of the inner man, of the members made instruments of righteousness (see Leben Jesu, II. John 945: “Their new human nature itself will become the ground whence these springs of water shall issue”). Rivers of living water. While in John 4:14, the self-replenishing of the inner life is promised, here the impartation of new life appears in its tendency to issue into the world as a stream for the refreshing of others. Comp. Tholuck, p. 224. 3. On the relation between the Holy Ghost and eternal life, comp. the Exegetical and Critical remarks on John 7:39. 4. For the Holy Ghost was not yet (given). In what sense? since even in the Old Testament the Spirit of God, as the Holy Spirit, inspired the prophets, 2 Peter 1:21, and was the principle of life in the devout, Isaiah 63:10-11; Psalms 51:12; Psalms 143:10. That the prophets of the Old Testament were conscious of a difference between the measure of the Spirit vouchsafed to them and the New Testament revelation of the Spirit, is shown just by the Old Testament predictions of the streams of living water (see above); of the effusion of the Spirit (Joe 3:1); of the anointing of the Messiah with the sevenfold Spirit of God (Isaiah 11:2; Isaiah 61:1); and of the Spirit of the inward law, or of regeneration (Jeremiah 31:33; Ezekiel 36:26). Tholuck: “The majority of ancient and modern commentators consider the difference only quantitative (one of degree). Chrysostom: Ἤμελλετὸπνεῦμαἐκχεῖσθαιδαψιλῶς, etc. Chrysostom, however, gives a qualitative difference (difference in kind(?) not in the πνεῦμα itself, but in the aim of its operations: Εἶχονμὲνοἱπαλαιοὶπνεῦμααὐτοί, ἄλλοιςδὲοὐπαρεῖχον. Such a difference in the πνεῦμα itself Augustine points out, in the fact that the Christian impartation of the Spirit was connected with miraculous gifts; so Maldonatus, the Lutheran expositors Tarnow, Hunnius, Gerhard, Loci, I., 308, Lyser, Calovius, Meyer.” Evidently this would not prove much; for the Old Testament prophets also wrought miracles. Brenz, in singularly arbitrary style: “Not till after Pentecost did the preaching de remissione peccatorum go forth, which was in the strict sense the opus Spiritus.”—This is, after all, of the centre of the thing, though not the whole thing. On the contrary Luthardt regards as the qualitative difference that which is indicated in Romans 8:15 and 2 Timothy 1:7 : “The Holy Ghost was not yet in His office; the old preaching and law were still in force.” That is, correctly, it was not yet the economy of the Holy Ghost. “Cocceius also, in opposition to the identification of the economies which was current in his time, presses this distinction of the tempus promissionis et consummationis. Equidem puto, hic evidentissime dici, adeo multum interesse inter tempus, quod antecessit glorificationem Christi et id, quod consecutum est,” etc. P. 226.—The complete exhibition of Christ and His work in history was the objective condition precedent of the outpouring of the Holy Ghost; the complete spiritual susceptibility of the disciples, as matter of history, and in them the susceptibility of the world, was the subjective condition.” Not until all the elements of the life of Christ and of His redeeming agency had appeared in objective and subjective reality, could the Spirit of the life of Christ enter into believers, and become the Spirit of believers. And not till then could it become manifest and begin an economy of its own as the Holy Ghost, who has His life personally in Himself (Leben Jesu, II. 2, 946). The absolute exaltation of Christ above the world was the condition of His absolute sinking within the world, which made Him the principle of the new life in believers; this first brought into full manifestation that glory of the Holy Ghost which is a new form, and the third form of the personality of God, and at the same time a wholly gracious operation (gratia applicatrix). Yet this blessing of the life of Jesus must be distinguished from His personality itself, and the Spirit imparted to believers is not to be considered, as it is by Tholuck, “the Son of man Himself transfigured into Spirit.” 5. Important as it is that the dispensation of the Spirit he duly appreciated, it is wrong to talk, as the Montanists, the Franciscan Spiritualists, the Anabaptists, and Hegel do, of a separate age or kingdom of the Holy Ghost, supposed to lie beyond the kingdom of the Son. 6. The divisions among the disciples of Jesus themselves, of which the Evangelist tells us, are intimated also in Matthew (John 16:14). In them is reflected the much larger division which was germinating between the friends and the enemies of Christ, and which is the main thing in the section before us. Lόcke’s supposition that the ostensible objection that Jesus was not from Bethlehem, whence the Messiah ought to come, was made in particular by the scribes among the people, is gratuitous. But it could not enter into the Lord’s plan, to work upon the people with the testimony of His birth in Bethlehem; because His way was, to leave the popular notion of the Messiah quite aside, and to have His Messiahship recognized from His spirit and His work. 7. Here at last a knot of fanatical enemies of Jesus, who would fain seize Him, comes to light in a marked manner among the people themselves. It was the murderous intent of which Jesus had before testified: “Ye seek to kill Me.” They fain would, they well might; but involuntary reverence for the Lord, fear from above, and fear of the people, still restrained them. AND Jesus at the feast of His people: 1. At the beginning: staying out of sight. 2. In the middle: appearing and teaching. 3. At the close: standing and calling aloud.—The last day of the feast, the most glorious.—As the hours of grace decline, Christ sounds His gracious call the louder.—How majestically Christ will stand at the last day of the feast of the world, and how loud His call will be then.—Christ the true end of all feasts.—Christ the truth and substance of every sacred feast.—Even of that feast.—As the need of salvation is a thirst, so faith is a drinking (a refreshment) in the highest and holiest sense.—Thirst, as a prophetical pointing: (1) to spiritual thirst; (2) to the spiritual refreshment of salvation; (3) to the destination of the man to be a fountain of life to others.—The call of Christ at the feast of water-pouring: 1. His invitation. 2. His promise.—The measure of the supply which Christ gives to the believer’s thirst: 1. The believer himself shall drink. 2. Out of his belly shall flow streams of living water (he shall give drink to many).—As Christians are to be lights through the light of Christ, and shepherds through the staff of Christ, so they are to be fountains of life through Christ, the fountain of salvation.—“Out of his belly (body):” Even our bodily nature is to be sanctified as a vessel of the Spirit (from mouth and hand, eye and footsteps, it should trickle and stream with blessing).—The promise of the new life a promise of the Spirit.—“The Holy Ghost was not yet:” 1. The declaration. 2. Its import for us.—How the outpouring of the Holy Ghost was dependent on the exaltation of Christ: 1. The world must first be perfectly reconciled, before it can be sanctified. 2. Christ must first transcend sensuous limitation in time and space, before He can communicate Himself to all everywhere according to His essential life. 3. Christ must first be fully the Lord of glory, before He can glorify Himself through the Spirit in all hearts.—In Him the world was offered up to God; therefore through Him God could enter into the world.—All parts of His redemptive manifestation were completed; therefore the Spirit of the whole could come forth.—When the manifestation of the Father was completed, it was followed by the manifestation of the Son. “When the manifestation of the Son was finished, it was followed by the manifestation of the Holy Ghost; while yet this itself was a glorifying of the Son, and of the Father through the Son.—The glory of the dispensation of the Holy Ghost.—The different effects of the words of Christ.—The division over the words of Christ.—The division between the friends and enemies of Christ shades off among His adherents themselves (John 7:41), and among His enemies (John 7:44).—The hand of God overruling the hands of the enemies of Christ: 1. A hand of omnipotence (they can do nothing, so long as He restrains). 2. A hand of wisdom (they can do no harm, when He lets them loose). 3. A hand of faithfulness (they must serve His people, when He lets them prevail). 4. A hand of triumph (they must destroy their own work, and judge themselves). Starke: What it is to thirst. To long after righteousness and salvation, Matthew 5:3; Revelation 22:17, etc.—Nova Bibl. Tub.: We can most nobly keep our feast-days by coming to Jesus.—Majus: The wells of salvation are open to all men who are like dry ground.—Quesnel: In vain do we seek to satisfy our desires and quench our thirst among created things; we only thirst the more, with a thirst unquenchable, till we come to Christ.—According to the breadth and depth of the vessel of our faith will be our portion of the water.—“Rivers,” a type of overflow, Isaiah 48:18; Isaiah 66:12.—Majus: True faith is like a copious fountain; it cannot restrain itself from gushing forth in holy love.—Hedinger: Christianity spreads; it is fain to communicate itself by holy conversation, testimonies of disapproval, patience, etc.—Cramer: The world will never be of one mind concerning Christ; and yet amid a multitude of divisions the true church and the true religion can easily be maintained.—He who loves and seeks the truth, finds it. But he who contemptuously asks, What is truth? falls into error.—Quesnel: We have not so much to fear from the evil will of men, as from our own.—Ibid.: Blessed is he who is in the hand of God, whom no fleshly arm of man can hurt.—It is the method of antichrist always to use force.—Osiander: God upholds those who follow their calling in spite of all the rage and bluster of enemies, till they have finished their course. Braune: “If any man thirst, let him come unto me, and drink.” Faith has three constituents: Longing for the satisfaction of the most stringent wants; turning of the heart to the Saviour who helps; and reception of that which He offers, and which exactly meets the longing.—From Him, from His personality as sanctified by faith, rivers of living water, active, vigorous quickenings in rich abundance overflow to others. The believer came with thirst, with the feeling of want; and he sends forth rivers. Gerlach: While John records the grand words of the yearning invitation and mighty promise, he feels how far they were from being fulfilled to any disciple who came to the Lord at he time he spoke them; and that the day of the outpouring of the Holy Ghost was but the beginning of their true fulfilment. Heubner: Pfenninger: Every good thing in the world must be longed for, thirsted for; else it is not a good.—Bengel: Nothing but thirst, yet sincere thirst, is needed. To him who has a true thirst, nothing is of so great account as the satisfaction of it. Without Christ everything is dry and barren: everything should drive and draw us to Him.—The believer is not only to receive vital force for himself, but also to become a fountain of life for others.—The Spirit of God is a fulness, out of which we are to impart to others.—When Christians can give but little, they prove thereby that they themselves have not much of the Spirit.—What comes from the Spirit tastes, so to speak, like fresh spring-water, not flat like water which has grown stale in a vessel.—We lack in faith, therefore lack in the spirit.—Discord commonly arises wherever Jesus and the gospel attack men.—Thorough inquiry and thorough knowledge would have solved the doubt and discord. The authors of divisions and schisms are swelling smatterers, who have no true knowledge of the Scriptures. Schleiermacher: We see everywhere, that the Redeemer of the old, to which His people ever persist in adhering, points them at every opportunity to the new.—But what else was the fruit which the life of the Lord was to bring forth, than just this: that the fulness of the Godhead which dwelt in Him, should pass thence to the community of believers, the whole congregation of the Lord.—Besser: There is a doubleness in the nature of the church [and of every believer]: like Abraham, she is blessed and she is a blessing (Genesis 12:2).—She is both at once: a garden and a “fountain of gardens” (Son 4:15-16). Footnotes: John 7:37.—[The δέ after ἐν is not without force, and should not have been omitted in the E. V.—P. S.] John 7:38.—[ἐκτῆςκοιλίαςαὐτοῦ. Alford and Conant retain the strong term of the A. V. Noyes translates: from within him; Luther and Lange: body. Κοιλιά properly means belly, abdomen, bowels, stomach, as the receptacle of food, but tropically also, in Hellenistic usage, the inward parts, the inner man, the heart (καρδία comp. the Lat. viscera), and so it is taken here by Chrysostom and others. The LXX. often interchange κοιλία and καρδία. See the Exeg.—P. S.] John 7:39.—Lachmann [Alford] reads πιστεύσαντες [those who believed] instead of πιστεύοντες on the authority of B. L. T. [ΰ. D. rel. Tischend.: πιστεύοντες.—P. S.] John 7:39.—Ἄγιον [Holy before Spirit] is omitted by Lachmann and Tischendorf, after the Vulgate, Itala, most versions K. T. As B. D. and others have the word, we may suppose the omission of ἅγιον to have been occasioned by doctrinal considerations, which, however, have rather made the passage more difficult than easier. Δεδομένον [given] which Lachmann, after Cod. B., retains, stands less firm. [Both ἅγιον and δεδομένον are wanting in Cod. Sin. which simply reads οὕπωγᾶρἥνπνεῦμα (without the article). So Tischendorf in the 8th ed. Alford omits δεδομένον and retains ἅγιον, but puts it in brackets. Westcott and Hort put [ἅγιον] δεδομένον on the margin.—P. S.] John 7:40.—Ἐκτοῦὅχλουἁκουσαντες. The πολλοί [text. rec.] or τινὲς [explanatory] are dropped, according to B. D. L. T. &c. John 7:40.—Τῶνλόγων Lachmann, Tischendorf, according to [ΰ] B. D. E. G. &c. [Cod. Sin., Tischend., Alf.: τῶνλόγωντούτων, Lat. hos sermones, verba illa, hζc verba. The text. rec. reads τὸνλόγον—P. S.] John 7:41.—Instead of ἅλλοιδὲ Lachmann has οἱδέ after B. L., etc. [Tischend. after Cod. Sin.: ἄλλοι—ἄλλοι without δέ—P. S.] John 7:42.—[This is the position of the Greek, ἀπὸΒηθλ. τῆςκώμηςὅπου—P. S.] [Meyer: The μεγαλότης of the eighth day consisted just in this, that it brought the great feast to a solemn close.] [Ὁπιστεύων is an emphatic absolute nominative. The predicate is not expressed, but implied in the words ποταμοί … ῥεύσουσιν. Such irregularity is not unfrequent in the best Greek classics. It is intended to give greater prominence to the noun, hence to the necessity of faith. Similar instances John 6:39 (πᾶν); John 17:2; Acts 7:40; Revelation 2:26 (ὁνικῶν–δώσωαὐτῷ); John 3:12; John 3:21; comp. Buttmann, Neutestamentl. Grammatik, p. 325.—P. S.] [The most remarkable and appropriate of these passages are Ezekiel 47:1-12, where rivers are prophetically described as issuing from under the threshold of the temple eastward (John 7:1), and making alive and healing all that is touched by them (John 7:9); Zechariah 14:8 : “And it shall be in that day, that living waters shall go out from Jerusalem” (ἐξελεύσεταιὕδωρζῶνἐξἸερουσαλήμ); and Isaiah 58:11, where Jehovah promises the thirsty to satisfy his soul in drought and to make him “like a watered garden, and like a spring of water, whose waters fail not.” To these prophetic words the quotation applies in a free and comprehensive way, and the characteristic ἐκτῆςκοιλίαςαὐτοῦ is an interpretation in application to the individual believer. Compare here also the remarks on p. 182 in regard to the fact made almost certain by recent researches that there was a living spring beneath the altar of the temple, from which all the fountains of Jerusalem were fed, the source of the “Brook that flowed hard by the oracles of God,”—the “perennial river the streams whereof shall make glad the city of God” (Psalms 46:1).—P. S.] [So also Olshausen: The believer is here represented as a living temple. Alford: The temple was symbolic of the Body of the Lord (see John 2:21); and the Spirit which dwells in and flows forth from His people also, who are made like unto Him, Galatians 4:6; Romans 8:9; 1 Corinthians 3:6.—P. S.] [This interpretation seems rather far-fetched. The cavity of a small vessel is hardly designated by belly. Besides the Christian is not only an instrument, but a living member, of Christ, and Christ Himself is in him. Godet’s reference to the rock in the wilderness, which Moses smote, so that ἐκτ. κοιλίαςαὐτοῦ corresponds to ξִ ?ξֶּ ?πּ ?εּ, Exodus 17:6, is still mere artificial.—P. S.] [Alford justly remarks that it is lamentable to see such an able and generally right-minded commentator as Lόcke carping at the interpretation of an apostle, especially John, who of all men bad the deepest insight into the wonderful analogies of spiritual things. The difficulties raised by Lόcke rest in his own misapprehension. John does not say that the promise of our Lord was a prophecy of what happened on the day of Pentecost, but of the Spirit which the believers were about to receive. The water of life after all is the life of the Spirit, for the “Spirit is life” and “the mind of the Spirit is life.” Romans 8:6; Romans 8:10. The communication of eternal life always implies the gift of the Spirit of Christ.—P. S.] [The ἦν can, of course, not refer to the essential or personal existence and previous operation of the Spirit, who is coλternal with the Father and the Son, who manifested Himself in the creation (Genesis 1:3; Psalms 33:6) and through the whole O. T. economy, as the organizing, preserving, enlightening, regenerating and sanctifying principle (Genesis 6:3; Exodus 31:3; Psalms 51; Psalms 104, etc.), who inspired Moses and the prophets (Numbers 11:25; 1 Samuel 10:19; 1 Samuel 10:26; Isaiah 61:1; 2 Peter 1:21), who overshadowed Mary at the conception of Christ (Matthew 1:20; Luke 1:35), who descended upon Him without measure at the baptism in Jordan (John 1:32-33; John 3:35), but to the presence and working of the Spirit as the Spirit of Christ with the fulness of the accomplished redemption in the Christian Church, or to the dispensation of the Spirit, which, according to the promise of Christ (John 14-16), commenced after His resurrection and ascension, on the day of Pentecost. The readings δεδομένον, δοθέν, ἐπ’ αὐτοῖς, are all superfluous glosses to guard against a misunderstanding. If anything is to be supplied to ἦν, it should rather be present (aderat), or working (ἐνεργοῦν), or in the believers (ἐνπιστεύουσι) from the preceding.—P. S.] [Alford: “The mention of the question about Bethlehem seems to me rather to corroborate our belief that the Evangelist was well aware how the fact stood, than (De Wette) to ismply that he was ignorant of it. That no more remarks are appended, is natural. John had one great design in writing his Gospel, and does not allow it to be interfered with by explanations of matters otherwise known. Besides… if John knew nothing of the birth at Bethlehem, and yet the mother of the Lord lived with him, the inference must be that she knew nothing of it,—in other words, that it never happened.” Owen argues from this passage in favor of the importance of the genealogical tables of Matthew and Luke to answer Jewish objections like these against the acknowledgment of Jesus as the Messiah.—P. S.] II Fermentation And Pmarties In The High Council John 7:45-5345 Then came the officers [The officers therefore came] to the chief priests and Pharisees; and they said unto them, Why have ye not brought [did ye not bring] 46, 47him? The officers answered, Never man spake [spoke] like this man. Then answered them the Pharisees, Are ye also deceived [led astray]? 48Have any of the rulers, or of the Pharisees believed on [in] him? 49But this people [this multitude, rabble] who knoweth not the law are cursed.50Nicodemus saith unto them (he that [formerly] came to Jesus by night [omit by night], being one of them,) 51Doth our law judge any [a] man before it hear him [unless it first hear from him], and know [learn] what he doeth? 52They answered and said unto him, Art thou also of [from] Galilee? Search, and look [see]: for out of Galilee ariseth no prophet. 53And every man went unto his own house. AND Joh_7:45. Then came the officers, [οἱὑπηρέται].—The inference is: As, in general, no one ventured to lay hands on Jesus, so, in particular, the officers did not. To the chief priests and Pharisees.—The latter without the article. The two are here viewed in the Sanhedrin as a unit. John 7:46. Like this man.—A well-founded addition, expressive of surprise and astonishment. Augustine: “Cujus vita est fulgur, ejus verba tonitrua.” John 7:47. Are ye also deceived?—Even ye officers of the supreme spiritual college? John 7:48. In this view the continuation is characteristic: Have any of the rulers, etc.—For them the authority and example of the rulers must be everything. We should not fail to notice that the testimony of the officers makes not the slightest wholesome impression upon the rulers; or rather, it extremely disturbs and excites them. Or of the Pharisees.—As if they added this out of an evil conscience. Lest ye should not trust your governors alone, see how the whole great orthodox, aristocratic Jewish party is against Him! How inaccurate they are in both points, is immediately afterwards proved by the example of Nicodemus. John 7:49. But this multitude.—As heroes let themselves out before their valets, so the hierarchical rulers with their ecclesiastical servants. The venerable fathers give themselves up to a fit of rage, and curse. They curse the people intrusted to them; they curse the devout among the people. But their curse is at the same time a threat of excommunication. This is, however, a cunning means of intimidating the officers, and of seducing them to exalt themselves likewise in hierarchical haughtiness above the people. Who knoweth not the law.—What genuine hierarchs always think, judge, and in fact expect of the people in all cases—a laic ignorance—that in special cases they cast up against them as a reproach. These are here on the way to put Christ to death, as they pretend according to law, as a false prophet, while the people are on the way to acknowledge Christ as the Messiah. Are cursed.—Not a formula of excommunication (Kuinoel), but an intimation that the ban is impending, which in John 9:22 is hypothetically decreed against the followers of Jesus. The threat is intentionally equivocal. The emphasis assists in this: The people who know nothing, i.e., so far as they know nothing, of the law; or, what is the same, who acknowledge Jesus to be the Messiah. To put the people in general under the ban, could not enter the mind of the chief priests. “The hierarchical insolence and theological self-conceit here bears a genuine historical character (comp. Gfφrer, Das Jahrhundert des Heils, 1 Abthlg. p. 240). The Sanhedrists and the bigoted party of the Pharisees would pass for the supreme authority as to the truth. The common people were called even ςַ ?νδָ ?ΰָ ?ψֶ ?υ, even ωֶׁ ?χֶ ?υ, vermin; even among the nobler sentences in Pirke Aboth, 2, 5, it is said. ‘The illiterate man is not godly.’ ” Tholuck. The Talmudists went so far in their folly as to assert that none but the learned would rise from the dead. See Lόcke II. p. 339. [The aristocratic contempt of the people is found everywhere in Church and State. The pride of priestcraft, kingcraft, and schoolcraft is deeply seated in the human heart. The rabies theologorum also reappears in all Christian churches and sects in times of heated controversy (e.g., the trinitarian, Christological, and sacramentarian controversies in the fourth, fifth, sixteenth and seventeenth centuries). Theological passions are the deepest and strongest, as religious wars (think of the Thirty Years’ War) are the fiercest.—P. S.] John 7:50-51. Nicodemus saith unto them.—The ground seems more and more to sway under their feet. First the officers spoke in favor of Jesus. Now a colleague does so. It is noted that he had come to Jesus, though he was a member of their Christ-hating body. His words are the first public utterance of his courage to testify, though couched only in an impartial admonition from a judicial point of view. Yet they are not without an edge. The other members had cast up to the people their want of knowledge of the law; Nicodemus reminds their fanatical zeal, that it is conducting itself illegally in condemning the accused under passionate prejudice without a hearing. This was contrary to the law, Exodus 23:1 (against false accusation); Deuteronomy 1:16; Deuteronomy 19:15 (the insufficiency of a single witness). They have assured the officers that no one of the rulers or Pharisees believes in Jesus; he intimates the possibility of this being untrue, at least as concerns himself.—Doth our law judge a man, unless, etc.—Does the law do as ye do? This is an ordinance of the law: First hearing, then judgment. The law itself is here designated as the authority which is to hear the case; and probably with a purpose. Nicodemus wishes to bring out the objective nature of a pure judgment. John 7:52. Art thou also from Galilee?—A contemptuous designation of the followers of Jesus; for most of them were from Galilee. The angry humor of the council is not calmed but only further inflamed. A striking picture of fanaticism. Calmness and gentleness, admonition of truth and righteousness, admonition of the word of God itself,—all inflame it, because its zeal (being carnal) includes just the suppression of the sense of truth, the sense of justice, and reverence for the word of God, and is on the path of a wilful diabolical blindness and hardness.—From Galilee.—Mockery and threat combined: We should take thee for a countryman and follower of the Galilean, and not for our honorable colleague. “Galilee was despised for its remoteness from the centre of Jewish culture—‘The Galilean is a blockhead,’ says the Talmud authority—and for its mixture of heathen population.” Search, and see: for out of Galilee ariseth no prophet.—These words again are characteristic of the blind, rushing unconscionable zeal, which despises everything divine and human [and does violence to history]. Not only Jonah, but Elijah of This be also, and [perhaps] Hosea and Nahum were of Galilee. Tholuck: “It is possible, however, that they followed a divergent tradition respecting the origin of the former two prophets.” [Comp. Winer, Herzog, Smith, etc. sub Elias and Jonas.] Heubner: “According to the tradition Elijah and Elisha, Hosea and Amos were Galileans; it is certain that Nahum and Jonah were. In Tiberias even a seminary was (afterwards) founded, in which were renowned Rabbins like Hakkadosh, etc. The Talmud also came from that quarter, so that the Jews now are ashamed of this proverb (see Olearius: Jesus the true Messiah, p. 223).” This gross error, the modern skeptical criticism (since the time of Bretschneider) has absurdly endeavored to use as a mark of the spuriousness of the fourth Gospel. How could the Sanhedrists, with their Scriptural learning, blunder in such fashion? But how often has this criticism held the Gospels responsible for the violent blindness of fanaticism, for the mistakes of Herod, for the stupidity of the devil himself. We must not fail to notice, besides this feature of unconscious or intentional falsification of history in the mouth of the Sanhedrists, the other fact that they make an utterly irreligious point when they say: “Out of Galilee ariseth no prophet.” They deny, in the first place, the Galilean Israel, and in the second place, the freedom of God; and in particular the promise in Isaiah 9:1-2. To these add the third reproach, that they take not the slightest pains to ascertain the real origin of Jesus. John 7:53. And every man went, etc.—This is usually connected with the first section of John 8. But it is a closing word, of great significance, intended to say that the Sanhedrin, after an unsuccessful attempt against the life of Jesus, found themselves compelled to separate and go home, without having accomplished their purpose. For the idea that the words refer to the return of the festal pilgrims, is unworthy of notice. Probably the Sanhedrists were in full session, expecting that Jesus would be brought before them for their condemnation. If this was so, this breaking up of their session was the more mortifying. AND ETHICAL1. The two methods which the members of the council adopted with their officers and with their colleague Nicodemus, a type of obdurate hierarchical fanaticism in its fundamental features: (1) Perfect insensibility to the voice of truth and the dictates of conscience, and a corresponding perfectly fixed prejudice. (2) Haughtiness, rising even to crazy contempt of the people and of an entire division of the country, joined with crafty fawning upon subordinates. (3) Abusive vulgarity, arraying itself in the robe of sacerdotal and judicial dignity in execution of the judgment of God (cursing excommunicators). (4) Browbeating rejection and derision of impartial judgment, joined with impudent, intentional, or half-intentional perversion and falsification of historical fact. Bringing the voice of justice under suspicion of being a prejudiced partisan voice inflamed by partisan hatred. (5) Perpetual frustrations alternating with orders of arrogance. 2. Even in a circle so degenerate as this the Lord has His witnesses. The officers shame their superiors. The minority of one or two voices (Nicodemus, Joseph of Arimathea) outweighs the large majority of fanatical prejudice, and yet a while delays the judgment of God over the high council. 3. Nicodemus. The voice of impartiality and justice in defence of Christ, a prelude of the act and confession of faith. 4. As the Sanhedrin appeals to the Pharisean party as an authority, so the officers refer to their experience, and Nicodemus appeals to the law. 5. “Never man spake like this man:” the testimony of the bailiffs to the superhuman power of the word of Jesus. The victory of His word over the official order of His enemies.6. After victoriously withstanding the Jewish taunt, that the Christians were Galileans, and Christ was a Nazarene, Christianity afterwards again triumphs over the heathen taunt (of Celsus), that it was a vulgar religion. 7. The falsification of fact by the chief priests, continued in Matthew 28:13. The Talmudic imitation of this example. Similar frauds of the mediζval hierarchy [e.g. the Pseudo-Isidorian Decretals]. AND An hour of helplessness, as an hour of visitation: 1. In itself considered: (a) The helplessness. Unmanageable officers. Opposing colleagues. Impotent adjournment, (b) The call to repentance in this situation. The officers: “Never man spake,” etc. Even ye yourselves and the Pharisees speak not like Him. His word is mightier than your order over us. Nicodemus: Ye condemn the people as not knowing the law, and ye yourselves despise the precepts of the law. (c) The impenitency in the helplessness: in the utterance to the officers, in the utterance to Nicodemus. By these their helplessness becomes a deeper inquisition and advising with hell. 2. As a historical type. Similar occurrences in the history of Christian martyrdom, and in the persecution of the Reformation.—The portrait of fanaticism. Contemptuous and fawning towards men. Hypocritical and cursing. Casting suspicion and lying. Threatening and taking cowardly refuge. Helpless and obstinate to the last.—Carnal zeal degenerates. It sinks gradually from intentional ignoring and falsification into actual ignorance. It condemns itself with every word: “Are ye also deceived?” etc.—They went home to their houses, but Christ went to the Mount of Olives. They went, to recover themselves in the selfish comfort of their estates; He prepared Himself for self-sacrifice.—Witnesses of the truth in the camp of Christ’s enemies.—The testimony of the officers concerning the words of Christ: 1. As their own excuse. 2. As an accusation against their superiors. 3. As a glorification of the superhuman innocence of Jesus.—According to the divine appointment, spiritual and temporal despots in the end fail of instruments.—The passive resistance of the officers.—The double measure of the Jewish rulers: 1. To the sound popular judgment of the officers they oppose the authority of their party faith. 2. To the sound regard of Nicodemus for authority, appealing to law, they oppose the grossest popular judgment.—“Have any of the Pharisees believed on Him?” A despotic ecclesiastical government supports itself upon a despotic party.—“Out of Galilee ariseth no prophet.” Falsifications of sacred history: (a) The Talmud. (b) The mediζval tradition (Pseudo-Isidorian Decretals, etc.). Nicodemus: the silent, sure advances of a true disciple of Jesus: 1. A timid but honest inquirer after truth (John 3). 2. A calm but decided advocate of justice (John 7). 3. A heroic confessor of the Lord, bringing his grateful offerings (John 19).—How Nicodemus meets their boastful bluster with the words of calmness and justice: (1) The boast, that no ruler believes in Jesus. (2) The beast, that they were zealous for the law.—Carnal zeal runs deeper and deeper into blindness and obduracy: 1. To shameless reviling of the justice it professes to administer. (2) To shameless denial of the truth and history, for which it imagines itself contending.—“And every man went unto his own house.” Most of them went from a wandering assembly to a wandering house and a wandering heart, not to commune with the Lord upon their beds.—How differently they went home: 1. The enemies. 2. Nicodemus.—They went home, but Christ went unto the Mount of Olives. Starke: Canstein: So the wise God deals with His enemies in the dispensation of grace: He often makes friends among their own people, children, households and servants; and therein the masters may see and should see the finger of God.—Zeisius: No man, however great he may be in the world, is to be obeyed contrary to the word of God and a good conscience.—Quesnel: Those who issue unjust commands from the necessity and demand of their office, without knowing the unrighteousness which pervades them, are not so far from the kingdom of God as those who issue the same from envy, hatred, or other wicked affections.—Zeisius: Unlettered, honest simplicity is much better fitted to know the truth of God, than the swelling, conceited wisdom of the schools.—Hedinger: O wonderful power of a word, which can stop deluded hearts in the current of their wickedness, and convert them. Acts 9:5-6.—Even the means which are intended for an utterly base end, God can turn to the wholesome use of souls.—Bibl. Wirt.: How strangely God works with His enemies; how He makes their schemes miscarry, and confuses the game so curiously that often those who are commissioned to do evil, are compelled to do well to a good man. Numbers 23:11; Proverbs 16:7.—Masters ought to set their servants a good example for imitation, but they are often so ungodly that they rather lead them astray than aright. O what will become of them!—Majus: True conversion and confession of the truth the world calls delusion. Matthew 27:63; 2 Corinthians 6:8.—Quesnel: The world is so corrupt that it even hates those who will not join with it in persecuting the good.—Hedinger: Diabolical pride! Fear of men is less than nothing in matters of faith. Poor souls, which have no other rule of faith than the decrees of blind bishops, etc. The worst is when the state policy prescribes rules of faith.—Shame on the teachers of the law that they have left the people in such ignorance.—Lampe: It is a very small thing to be cursed by men who are themselves under the curse, when God blesses.—Majus: One man may set himself against a whole wicked assembly if only he is equipped with the whole word and Spirit of God.—Zeisius: God still always has His own even among apostate masses. Braune: Have any of the rulers believed on Him? In the haughty exaltation of their own persons there lies a frightful contempt of others.—This is Pharisaism, which holds the external knowledge of the letter and the law of the Scripture, or theology, above religion.—Art thou also of Galilee? As a disgrace they add the falsehood: Search, and look, etc.—The fiendish joy that no ruler or Pharisee had believed in Jesus, here comes to nought. Heubner: The humblest servants shame their masters. Those who are sent to take Jesus are themselves taken. The rulers could here see the finger of God. The Lord reigned in the midst of His enemies. To be deceived here means, to give honor to the truth. So living, simple Christians are always considered deceived.—The judgment of men is set up as the rule of faith: Courts, colleges are to decide concerning the truth. But the truth has not always been laid down by them, as we have seen in the councils.—The first trace of the gentle and timid announcement of adhesion to Jesus. Nicodemus merely insists on fair dealing with Jesus: It is unjust to begin the Processus ab exsecutione.—The opponents of revelation act substantially like these Pharisees. They begin with this: There is no revelation, and can be none; whereas they ought to suppose and investigate at least the possibility of a true revelation.—No tribunals have proceeded more unrighteously than spiritual tribunals. Gossner: They freely confess against their masters, in whose pay they were and whose song therefore (according to the way of the world) they should have sung—it was not the sound which so struck the people, as if He spoke vehemently, thundered and lightened; but a divine authority always lay in His gentle address. His word, in fact His very presence, struck as lightning to the heart. In this no man could speak like Him. Schleiermacher (the officers): This is the first beginning. The ground must first be laid in the soul in a holy awe before the doctrine and the person of the Lord. [The preaching of the gospel sometimes restrains the violence of the hand when it works no change in the heart.—When Christ appeared, the great ones of the world not only refused to believe in Him, but boasted of their unbelief as an argument of their wisdom.—Great in honor and wise in understanding, are a sweet couple, but seldom seen together.—There is no wisdom, nor understanding, nor counsel against the Lord. (From Burkitt.)—Nicodemus an example of the slow but sure work of grace, from the timid seeking of the Lord by night to this manly confession, Different ways to the same Christ, short and long direct and circuitous—Even in high places Christ may have friends of whom we know nothing.—Majorities in counsel may be wrong as well as minorities.—One man with God on his side is stronger than any majority.—One little word spoken in season may avert a persecution.—P. S.] Footnotes: John 7:46.—[Codd. ΰ.3 a B. L. T., etc., Origen, etc., Lachmann, Tischendorf (in former edd.), Westcott and Hort. read only: ἐλάλ. οὕτωςἅνθρωπος, never man spoke thus, omitting ὡςοὖτοςὁἀνθρ., like this man. Tregelles and Alford retain the last words, but in brackets. Tischendorf, in his eighth ed., adopts the reading of ΰ.* in this form: ὡςοὖτοςλαλεῖὁἅνθρωπος. Omission is more easily accounted for (by hom�otel.) than insertion. Meyer and Lange retain the clause.—P. S.] John 7:47.—[The οὖν of the text. rec. after ἀπεκρίθησαν is sustained by B. T. Vulg., but omitted by ΰ.D. Alf. Tischend.—P. S] John 7:48.—[According to the more lively order of the Greek: Hath any of the rulers believed in Him, or of the Pharisees ?—P. S.] John 7:49.—[Ὄχλος, multitude (Pφbelhaufe), is here used evidently with great contempt, not only to designate the persons, but to indicate their character.—P. S.] Ibid.—[Some put a comma after νόμον, some a semicolon, the English V. has no stop. Dr. Lange, in his rendering of the text, adopts the semicolon, and construes thus: “But only this rabble who know nothing of the law (believe in Him); cursed are they!]” Meyer also makes ἐπάρατοίείσι ! an exclamation. The whole sentence is certainly a passionate outburst of the rabbinical rabies theologica, but no decree of excommunication (Kuinoel) which was inapplicable to the mass of the people.—P. S.] Ibid.—Instead of ἐπικατάρατοι, Lachmann and Tischendorf, after [ΰ.] B. T., Origen, etc., read ἐπάρατοι. John 7:50.—[ΙΙρότερον, according to B. L. T. and others, Lachmann, Alford. But Tischendorf, ed. 8., with Cod. Sin.* (prima manu) omits the clause ὁἐλθὼννυκτὸςπρὸςαὐτὸνπρότερον, and reads simply: ΑέγειΝικόδημοςπρὸςαὑτοὐς. Lachm., Alf., Mey. retain the clause with the exception of νυκτός; comp. John 19:39.—P. S.] Ibid.—Νυκτός is only in minuscules [and in ΰ.*]; supplied from John 3. John 7:52.—Codd. B. D. K. S. [ΰ. Vulg.] read ἐγείρεται. So Lachmann, Tischendorf [Alford]. The Coptic and Sahidic Versions have even the future. Meyer: “An inverted attempt to correct a historical error.” Yet ἐγήγερται [text. reel.] seems not sufficiently accredited. It makes no material difference in the sense of the passage; because the word “search” points to the past. John 7:53.—The reading ἐπορεύθη is preferable to the reading ἐπορεύθησαν in D. M. S. John 7:53.—[This verse is usually connected with the following section, John 8:1-11, and subject to the same critical doubts (see Text. and Gram. in John 8); hence I have italicized it.—P. S] [Julian the Apostate, in the fourth century, contemptuously called Christ “the Galilean,” and the Christian “Galileans.”—P. S.] [Involuntary witnesses of the innocence or even divinity of Christ, and the truth of the Gospel: Pontius Pilate and his wife, the centurion under the cross, Judas the traitor, Tacitus (in his account of the Neronian persecution), Celsus, Lucian, Porphyry, J. J. Rousseau, Napoleon, Strauss, Renan, etc. A collection of such testimonies to the character of Christ from the mouth or pen of enemies or skeptics see in the Appendix to my book on the Person of Christ, Boston and New York, 1865.—P. S.] III Christ, The Light Of The World, The Real Fulfilment Of The Jewish Torch-Light Festivities, As Against The Pretended Seers, The False Lights, In Israel. The Adulteress, And Christ’s Sentence. His Ideal Appearance At The Court Of The Jews, And The Two Witnesses. The Judges Shall Come Into Judgement. A Twofold Lifting Up Of Christ At Hand. Appearance Of Yielding; Or, A Great Vacillation Towards Faith (John 7:53) John 8:1-30 John 7:53. And every man went unto his own house. [;] John 8:1 [But] Jesus went unto the mount of Olives: 2And early in the morning lie came again into the temple, and all the people came unto him; and he sat down and taught them. 3And the Scribes and [the] Pharisees brought unto him a woman taken in adultery [or in sin], and when they had set her in the midst, 4They say unto him [The priests say unto him, tempting him that they might have to accuse him], Master, this woman was taken in adultery, in the very Acts 5 Now Moses in the law commanded 6us, that such should be stoned: but what [what then] sayest thou? This they said, tempting him, that they might have to accuse him. But Jesus stooped down, and with his finger, wrote on the ground, as though he heard them not [omit as though he 7heard them not] So [But] when they continued asking him, he lifted up himself, and said unto them, He that is without sin among you, let him first cast [be the first to cast] a stone at her. 8And again he stooped down, and wrote [with his finger] on the ground. 9And they which heard it being convicted by their oivn conscience [And when they heard this, they], went out one by one, beginning at [with] the eldest [or, elders, ὰπὸτῶνπρεσβυτέρων], even unto the last: and Jesus was left alone, and the woman standing in the midst. 10When Jesus had lifted up himself, and saw none but the woman [omit and saw none but the woman], he said unto her, Woman, where are those thine accusers? [where are they?] hath no man condemned 11thee? [Did no one condemn thee?] She said, No man [no one], Lord. And Jesus [he] said unto her, Neither do I condemn thee: go, and [henceforth] sin no more. 12Then spake Jesus [Jesus therefore spoke] again unto them [see John 7:37 sqq.], saying, I am the light of the world: he that followeth me shall not walk in [the] darkness, but shall have the light of life. 13The Pharisees therefore said unto him, Thou bearest record [witness] of thyself; thy record [witness] is not true. 14Jesus answered and said unto them, Though I bear record [witness] of myself, yet [omit yet] my record [witness] is true: for I know whence I came, and whither I go: but ye cannot tell [know not] whence I come, and [or] whither I go. 15Ye judge after the flesh, I judge no man. 16And yet if I judge [But even if I myself judge], my 17judgment is true: for I am not alone, but I and the Father that sent me. It is also [Moreover, it is] written in your law, that the testimony of two men is true. 18I am one that bear [he who beareth] witness of myself; and the Father that sent me, beareth witness of me. Then said they [They said therefore] unto him. Where 19is thy Father? Jesus answered, Ye neither know [neither] me, nor my Father: if ye had known me, ye should have known [would know] my Father also. 20These words spake Jesus [he] in the treasury, as he taught [while teaching] in the temple: and no man [no one] laid hands on him, for his hour was [had] not yet come. 21Then said Jesus again [Again therefore he said] unto them, I go my way [I go away], and ye shall [will] seek me [in vain], and shall [will] die in your sins [sin]: 22whither I go, ye cannot come. Then [Therefore] said the Jews, Will he kill himself? because he saith, Whither I go, ye cannot come. 23And he said to them, Ye are from beneath; I am from above; ye are of this world; I am not of this world. 24I said therefore unto you, that ye shall [will] die in your sins: for if ye believe not 25that I am he, ye shall [will] die in your sins. Then [Therefore] said they unto him, Who art thou? And Jesus saith unto them, Even the same that I said unto you from the beginning [For the beginning; or, To begin with (I am) that which I even say to you]. 26I have many things to say, and to judge of you [before I fully express myself concerning myself]: but he that sent me, is true; and I speak to the 27world those things which I have heard of him [what I heard from him]. They 28understood not that he spake [spoke] to them of the Father. Then [Therefore] said Jesus unto them, When ye have lifted up the Son of man, then shall [will] ye know that I am he, and that I do nothing of myself, but as my Father hath taught me, I speak these things. 29And he that sent me is with me: the Father [he] hath not left me alone; for I do always those [the] things that please him. 30As he spake [spoke] these words, many believed on [in] him. TEXTUAL AND [The whole section concerning the adulteress, from John 7:53 to John 8:11, is omitted as spurious, or bracketted as doubtful by the critical editors of the Gr. Test. Hence I have italicized the E. V. to distinguish it from the undisputed text. (The same course should be pursued with Mark 16:9 ff.) Without anticipating the very full and judicious discussion of the genuineness by Dr. Lange in the Exeg. and Chit, below, I shall only state the chief authorities for both opinions, and the conclusion to which I have attained: 1. The section is defended as genuine by Augustine (who comments on it in Tract. xxxiii., and suggests, in another place, De conj. adult., II. 7, that it was thrown out of the text by enemies or weak believers from fear that it might encourage their wives to infidelity), Mill, Whitby, Fabricius, Lampe, Maldonatus, Corn. a Lapide, Bengel, Michaelis, Storr, Kuinoel, Hug (R. C.), Scholz, Klee, Maier (R. C.), Home, Owen, Webster and Wilkinson, Wieseler, Ebrard, Stier, Lange. 2. It is rejected as an interpolation (though not on that account as untrue) by Erasmus, Calvin (?), Beza, Grotius, Wetstein, Semler, Paulus, Knapp, Lόcke, Tholuck, Olshausen, Bleek, De Wette, Baur, Reuss, Luthardt, Meyer, Ewald, Hengstenberg (who regards it as an apocryphal fiction of some strongly anti-Jewish Christian of the second century), Godet, Wordsworth (?), Scrivener. So also Lachmann, Tischendorf, Tregelles, Alford, Wescott and Hort. The prevailing critical evidence, though mostly negative (especially from the Eastern Church), is against the passage, the moral evidence for it; in other words, it seems to be no original part of John’s written Gospel, but the record of an actual event, which probably happened about the time indicated by its position in the 8th chapter. The story could not have been invented, the less so as it runs contrary to the ascetic and legalistic tendency of the ancient church which could not appreciate it. It is eminently Christ-like and full of comfort to penitent outcasts. It breathes the Saviour’s spirit of holy mercy which condemns the sin and saves the sinner. It is a parallel to the parable of the prodigal, the story of Mary Magdalene and that of the Samaritan woman, and agrees with many express declarations of Christ that He came not to condemn, but to save the lost (John 3:17; John 12:47; Luke 9:56; Luke 19:10; comp. John 5:14; Luke 7:37 ff.). His refusal to act as judge in the case, has a parallel in a similar case related by Luke 12:13-15. The conduct of the Scribes and Pharisees in trying Jesus with ensnaring questions is characteristic and sustained by many examples of the synoptical Gospels. Calvin, who is disposed to reject it, admits that it “contains nothing contrary to the apostolic spirit.” Meyer (p. 321), while disowning its Johannean origin, says: “It entirely agrees with the tone of the Synoptical Gospels, and betrays not the least indication of a dogmatic or ecclesiastical reason which might account for its later invention.” It is moreover so manifestly original, and has so many positive witnesses in its favor, especially in the Western church, that it may be regarded as a genuine relic of the primitive evangelical tradition which was handed down in various recensions, but treated with great caution from fear of abuse in a licentious age, until in the second, certainly in the third, century it found its way into many copies of the Gospel of John. (Comp. Meyer.) Some older critics supposed that it is the same story as that which Papias (perhaps from the mouth of John) related of “a woman taken in many sins” (ἐπὶπολλαῖςἁμαρτίαις, not one ἁμαρτία, as in our case), and which was contained in “the Gospel of the Hebrews ”(Euseb. H. E., III. 39); but this Judaizing Gospel would hardly have given currency to a story so strongly anti-Jewish. Alford suggests that John himself may have, in this solitary case, incorporated a portion of the current oral tradition into his narrative; Wordsworth and others, that John delivered the story orally, and that another hand wrote it first on the margin from which it afterwards passed into the text. But these are mere conjectures. The number of readings is unusually large. There are two main recensions, that of the received text (from which the E. V. is made), that of Cod. D. (Cod. Bezζ) which is somewhat abridged; both are given with the lectiones variantes by Tischendorf, ed. VIII., I. pp. 830–836, and Tregelles, p. 417. To these may be added a third and more lengthy recension of other MSS. differing from those on which the received text is founded (see Griesbach and Wordsworth, p. 309). For the critical details, the reader is referred to Dr. Lange’s discussion below, Lόcke's Com., Vol. II, pp. 243–279; Meyer, pp. 320–323; Tregelles on the Text of the Gr. Test., pp. 236–243; Tischendorf (ed. VIII.), Bloomfield’s Recensio Synoptica, Alford (ed. VI), and Wordsworth.—P. S.] Footnotes: John 8:1.—[Δέ, unquestioned in the original, does not appear in the English Version.] John 8:2.—Codd. G. S. U., ὄχλος; not decisive against λαός. Ibid.—[Cod. D. omits the words of the text. rec. καὶκαθίσαςἐδίδασκεναὐτούς. Not decisive.] John 8:3.—Cod. D.: ἐπὶἁμαρτίᾳγυναῖκαείλ. [instead of ἐνμοιχεία]. Euphony. John 8:4.—[The insertion is from Cod. D.: λέγουσιναὐτῷἐκπειράζοντεςαὐτὸνοἱἱερεῖς, ἵναἔχωσινκατηγορείανὐτοῦ The text. rec. omits these words here, but has them in John 8:6. Cod. M. has them at the close of Joh 8:11.—P. S.] John 8:6.—[Different readings and spellings: κατειλήφθη (aor. I., with augmentum for κατελήφθη, as εἴληφα stands instead of the unusual λέληφα, see Winer, p. 69), κατελήφθη, κατείληπται, εἴληπται, κατειλημμένην, καταληφθεῖσαν.—P. S.] John 8:6.—[This clause must be omitted here, if it is inserted with Cod. D. in John 8:4.—P. S.] Ibid.—In e.g. K., μὴπροσποιούμενος is added. In others, καὶπροσπ. Both exegetical. John 8:8.—[The rec. omits here τῷδακτύλῳ, which Cod. U. supplies. Cod. D. and others have the strange addition: ἑυὸςἕκάστουαὐτῶνταςἁμαρτόας.—P. S.] John 8:9.—e.g. H., etc., omit ἕωςτῶνἐσχάτων; D. and others: ὥστεπάνταςἐξελθεῖν. [Alford in his version adopts the reading of Cod. D.: “But each of the Jews went out, beginning with the elders, so that all went out.”—P. S.] John 8:10.—Καὶγυναικός (and seeing none but the woman), is wanting in D. M. S. Ibid.—Ἡγυνή wanting in D. E. F., etc.John 8:10.—[Ποῦεἰσιν; So Cod. D., etc. The text. rec. inserts ἐκεῖνοιοἱκατήγοροίσου.—P. S.] John 8:11.—[The text. rec. reads καί, but Cod. D. ἀπὸτοῦνῦν which is more forcible.—P. S.] John 8:12.—Instead of περιπατήσει, Lachmann and Tischendorf, after Codd. B. C. K. T. have περιπατήσῃ. John 8:14.—Codd. D. K. T. and many others read ἤ. The καὶ probably comes from the preceding sentence, [Codd. Sin., καὶ.] John 8:16.—B. D. L., etc., ἀληθινή. So Lachmann, Tischendorf [Alford. Cod. Sin. supports here the text. rec., ἀληθής] John 8:20.—The ὁἸησοῦς interpolated after ἐλάλησεν. John 8:25.—[On this difficult passage and its many interpretations, see the Exeg. and Crit. Alford renders τὴνἀρχὴνὅτικαὶλαλῶὑμῖν. In very deed (or essentially), that which I also speak (discourse) unto you. Noyes: In the first place, I am just that which I speak to you. Am. B. U. (Conant): That which I also say to you from the beginning. Lauge: Fars. Erste das, was ich auch euch sage (sagen mag).—P. S.] John 8:26.—B. D. K., Lachmann, Tischendorf: λαλῶ, instead of λέγω. [Cod. Sin., λαλῶ.] John 8:28.—Μου, an interpolation, according to many authorities [Cod. Sin. among them]. John 8:29.—According to B. D. L., etc., ὁπατήρ should be dropped. [Cod. Sin. has it, but instead of μετ̓ἐμοῦἐστίνοὐκἀφῆκέμεμόνον, reads οὐκἀφῆκέμεμόνονμετ̓ἐμοῦἐστίν.] B. John 8:12-30[Christ, The Light Of The World.] AND Joh_8:12. Again therefore Jesus spoke to them [πάλινοὗναὐτοῖςἐλάλησενὁ̓Ιησοῦς].—The connection varies according as the section on the adulteress is regarded as in its true place or interpolated. On the supposition of its interpolation Meyer construes thus (and Lόcke): “After the Sanhedrin had failed in their attempt to get possession of Jesus, and had become divided among themselves, as is related in John 7:45-52, Jesus was able, in consequence of this miscarriage of the plan of His enemies (οὗν), to appear again and speak to the assembly in the temple.” The πάλιν is supposed to show that the time of the discourse is one of the days following the day of the feast. De Wette, on the contrary, supposes that John has not intended to preserve closely the thread of the history. Tholuck considers it impossible to decide whether the discourse was delivered on the last day of the feast or after it. He says: “If the pericope is genuine, this exclamation must have occurred some hours later.” Rather, a whole night and some hours later. If the section be genuine, the words following are connected with the affair of the adulteress (Cocceius, Bengel). We have given this connection the preference. In view of the remarks that the repeated πάλιν in John 8:12 and John 8:21 is quite unmeaning without this section, for Jesus has not been interrupted by the history John 7:45-52; only the evangelist has interrupted himself by communicating some things which preceded behind the scenes. But the official state of things after the production of the adulteress must have been essentially changed. The rulers who threatened to take Jesus, and occasioned His saying, I shall soon go away from you,—have given Him an involuntary token of acknowledgment before the people; now He has the field again for a time, and can speak once more. The transactions following took place, accordingly, after the scene just preceding, on the day after the last day of the feast. I am the light of the world.—Opinions as to the occasion of this figurative utterance: 1. Sunrise, or sunset. But the former was long past, and the latter had not yet come; and Jesus appears here not as antitype of the sun, as in John 9:5, but as the essential light, the light of the night. 2. The reading of the section Isaiah 42; since the “light of the Gentiles” (φῶςἐθνῶν) of John 8:6 is equivalent to the “light of the world” (φῶςτοῦκόσμου) of this place, and designates the Messiah. Jesus, accordingly, here addresses Himself to the hope of the light of Israel and the Gentiles (Luke 2:32; John 1:4; John 1:9). Against this it has been observed that the reading of Scripture lessons belonged to the synagogues, not to the temple; even the temple-synagogue, which Vitringa adduces, was not in the temple itself (Lόcke, p. 283). 3. The torch-feast, or the illumination at the feast of tabernacles. In the court of the women stood great golden candelabras, which were lit on the evening of the first day of the feast, and spread their light overall Jerusalem, while by the men a torch-light dance with music and singing was performed before these candelabras (see Winer, Laubhόttenfest. These lights are not to be confounded with the large golden lamps in the sanctuary). According to Maimonides this illumination took place also on the other evenings of the festival. Even apart from this, the exhausted lamps in the women’s court, or in the treasury-hall where Jesus according to John 8:20 was speaking, would on the day after the feast as distinctly suggest the symbolical transitory illumination of Jerusalem, as the eighth day of the feast would suggest the cessation of the symbolical streams of water; and this gave the Lord the same occasion for describing Himself as the true enlightener of the night, which the previous day had given for presenting Himself as the opener of the true fountain (Wetstein, Paulus, Olshausen; see Leben Jesu, II., p. 955). Opinions which lack a full appreciation of John’s symbolization, like Meyer’s, lose their weight by that very lack; though according to them we must take not the torch-light part of the feast, but, with Hug, the sight of the candelabras, as the occasion of our Lord’s expression. Of course the Messianic prophecies in Isaiah 42:6; Malachi 4:2; Luke 2, as well as the rabbinical figures (Lightfoot, p. 1041), assisted this application. But beyond doubt the illumination was specifically an emblem of the pillar fire which had accompanied Israel at the time of its pilgrimage in the wilderness and its dwelling in tabernacles; therefore also an emblem of the later manifestation of the δόξα of the Lord, the idea of the Shekinah (see Isaiah 4:5). To this was further added, as the immediate occasion, the fact that the adulterous woman had fallen into darkness, and that the tempters of Jesus had come and gone away in spiritual darkness. The light of the world. Κόσμος is here, as in John 17:11, and elsewhere, the world of humanity in its obscuration. The true light, which enlightens the human night, the antitype of the temple light and of all lamps and night lights, is the personal truth and purity, which enlightens and sanctifies, or delivers from walking in religious and moral darkness. The substance or New Testament fulfilment of the pillar of fire. Shall in no wise walk in the darkness [οὐμὴπεριπατατήσῃἐντῇσκοτίᾳ ?].—According to the reading περιπατήσῃ, this is assuring: He shall surely not walk. A stronger expression of the assurance which is implied in the light of Christ; not to be understood as a demand, for this is precluded by the words: He that followeth Me. Darkness; the sphere of error, of delusion, of blindness. A fundamental conception of John. Shall have the light of life.—Σκοτία, the fear of death, had literally brought the adulteress to the verge of bodily death itself. Hence the light of life is here not the life as light, but the light as life, as giving, securing, and sustaining the true life. He shall have it for a sure possession of his own, for the following of Christ by faith causes an enlightenment from Him which proves itself as a living light, the life turning into light, the light turning into life, a fountain of life; as the water which He gives becomes a fountain within. John 8:13. Thy Witness is not true.—The Pharisees who were present rejected the great utterance of Jesus respecting Himself, “but, prudently enough avoiding the matter of it, they dispute its formal validity.” Meyer. In reference to the matter of it they perhaps felt half bound by the preceding hypocritical act of homage on the part of their fellows. Jesus Himself also seemed to them to have formerly, chap, John 5:31, suggested to them this rule which they now stated. But (says Lόcke) the case is different. Matters of conscience, of the inmost sense of God and of divine things must be juged of otherwise than matters of outward experience. As God can only reveal and bear witness to Himself (ὁδὲθεὸςαὐτὸςἑαυτῷἁξιόπιστοςμάρτυς, says Chrysostom), so the divine life and light in the world are only their own evidence. “Lumen,” says Augustine, “et alia demonstrat et se ipsum. Testimonium sibi perhibet lux, aperit sanos oculos, et sibi ipsa testis est.” Yet the times differ. Christ must be first accredited and introduced by the Father on the testimony of Scripture and miracle; afterwards His own testimony of Himself is valid. The connection also in that place and in this is very different. There Christ professed Himself the awakener of the dead, and as such the Father had accredited Him by the miraculous raising of the sick. Here He presents Himself as the sure guide through the darkness of this world to the true life, and His credential in this character must be the certitude of His own conviction. The proof of the truth of this conviction lies in the fact that He is clear respecting the course of His own life, His origin and His goal, and this proof He soon states further on. [Comp. my note on John 5:31, p. 192.—P. S.] John 8:14. Though I bear witness of myself, etc.—Even when I am in this situation, as I am just now. He hereby intimates, that in other respects He quotes also another witness (the Father), as immediately afterwards in John 8:17. For I know whence I came.—The clear consciousness of His origin and appointment on the one hand, and of His destination on the other (His ἀρχή and His τέλος), gives Him also a clear knowledge of His path, clearness respecting His own way and His guidance of others. He comes from the Father and goes to the Father (John 16:28). Therefore He reveals the Father and is the way to the Father. Or He is in His essence pure person, He goes to the perfection of His personality, therefore He is in His holy personal conduct the quickener and restorer of erring souls to personal life. But ye know not [ὑμεῖςδέοὐκοἵδατε] whence I come, and whither I go.—In the former case the aorist (ἧλθον), now the present (ἕρχομαι, ὑπάγω). They could not know whence He had come, but they ought to have seen whence He still at present came, to wit, that He was sent by God. And from His appearance they might then have inferred His origin. No more did they know whence He was going, though they fully intended to put Him to death; that is, they did not know that by the sacrifice of His life in death He would rise to glory. The reading: or [ῆ instead of καί, and] whither I go, is improbable, because the knowledge of Christ’s end depends upon the knowledge of His spiritual origin. Grotius accounts for Christ’s testifying of Himself from His being sent of God: “Legationis injunctζ conscius est is, cui injuncta est, reliqui ab ipso hoc debent discere.” A true point, but not the whole thought. Cocceius observes that no other man knows whence He comes and whither He goes, and in this respect Christ stands above others, and may testify of Himself. Unquestionably His clear divine-human consciousness was the bright star of salvation in the night of the world. John 8:15. Ye judge according to the flesh [κατὰτὴνσάρκα].—Tholuck (after De Wette): “The loose and floating progression of ideas looks as if the ideas were inaccurately reproduced.” Hardly! The train of thought is similar to that at John 7:24; except that here the emphasis falls on the judging itself. Ye already judge persons and actions according to the flesh, according to their outward, finite appearance, and according to finite standards (κατ’ ὅψιν, John 7:24). He means, therefore, primarily, judging by a false outward standard, but, in connection with it, judging by a false inward estimate (so Chrysostom, De Wette: after a carnal, selfish manner). Ye judge (condemn) the internal character of the Son of Man from His humble form; I judge (condemn) no person. Meyer justly observes that the addition: according to the flesh, is not to be here supplied (as Augustine and others would have it; Lόcke: as ye do), but the κρίνειν is emphatic in the sense of κατακρίνειν. This is supported by the turn in John 8:16. The sentence, however, probably includes a reference to their theocratic judicial office, which in the affair of the adulteress had shown a thirst for reprobation, while His office consists not only in. not judging, but in delivering and saving. Hence modifications of the sentence: I judge no one. Now (νῦν, Augustine and others) is not untrue to the sense, but superfluous. So is the explanation: I have no pleasure in judging (De Wette). The maxim of Christ, however, is founded of course on the fact that He distinguishes between the original nature or essential constitution of persons and their caricature in sin (which Meyer disputes). It is just this which makes Him Redeemer. John 8:16. But even if I myself judge.—Meyer supposes that this also means condemn, and that the Lord would say that there are “exceptions to that maxim of not judging.” But the exceptions would destroy the positiveness of the previous sentence. He judgeth no man (unfavorably), but He does judge in general, and in the special sense judges in condemnation of sin in every man. Thus in His decision respecting the adulteress and her accusers He judged. Thus He judges or forms His estimate of them and of Himself. But all His judging is κρίσιςἀληθινή (see the critical notes), the real, essential estimation (of persons), discrimination (of sinner and sin), and separation (of believer and unbeliever). The ground of this judgment, of His being thus true, is that the Father by the actual course of things executes these same decisions, separations, and judgments, which the spirit of Christ passes. John 8:17. In your law.—From this turn it clearly appears that Christ was including judgment respecting Himself. After He has declared that His own testimony is alone sufficient for the declaration that He is the light of the world, He returns to the assurance that after all He is not limited to His own testimony, but has the Father also for a witness. In your law, i.e., in the law in which ye make your boast, and the very letter of which also binds you; not in the law which is nothing to Me (whether in the antinomian interpretation of Schweizer, or the doctrinal interpretation of De Wette). Comp. John 5:39; John 7:22; John 8:5; John 8:45-47; John 10:35.—Tholuck: In this way of speaking of the νόμος we must by no means fail to perceive a characteristic of John.—The testimony of two men is true. A free quotation from Deuteronomy 17:6. Two men is emphatic. John 8:18. I am he who beareth witness, etc.—He produces two significant witnesses: His own consciousness and the power of the Father working with Him. Paulus would take the ἐγώ to mean: I, as one who knows Himself; Olshausen: I, as Son of God. But it means also in particular: I, as the one sent by the Father. That which makes two witnesses valid in law, is the agreement of two consciences in a public declaration under oath. And if there may be two false witnesses it must be one of those abnormal, horrible exceptions for which human society cannot provide. But when the power of God in the miracles of Christ and His word in the Old Testament agree with the word of Jesus, it is a harmony of testimonies, in which the testimony of the Father Himself joined with the testimony of Him whom He has sent must be acknowledged. John 8:19. Where is thy Father?—An intentional misapprehension and malicious mockery. Therefore no doubt also a feint, as if they were inquiring after a human father of Jesus (Augustine, and others); the use of ποῦ instead of τίς is not against this. The Pharisees well knew that God is invisible; if their question had referred to God, it must have been: Where then does God, Thy Father, testify of Thee? They seem, in mockery, to look about for a human father of Jesus as His witness. This reference of the word to a human father does not necessarily involve, as Tholuck thinks, the calumnious intimation that He was a bastard (Cyril); for the thing in hand is not any exact information concerning His birth, but the presentation of His Father as a witness. Yet the irony might possibly have gone even to this wicked extent. If ye had known me, etc.—Because they did not and would not perceive the divine Spirit in the words and life of Jesus, they were blind to the Spirit of God in His miracles, as well as to the testimony of God concerning Him in the Scriptures; and this proved that they did not know God Himself any more than they knew Jesus. Comp. John 16:9. John 8:20. In the treasury.—Ἐντῷγαζοφυλακίῳ. We must in the first place distinguish between the treasury-hall, the γαζοφυλάκιον, which was in the court of the women (i.e., the court beyond which the women did not venture, but where the men also stopped or passed, see Mark 12:41), and the treasure-chambers of the temple, γαζοφυλάκια. Then we must again distinguish between the more special term γαζοφυλάκιον, applied to the thirteen chests, and the same term in its more general application to the whole hall of the chests, which was also called γαζοφυλάκιον, (see Tholuck, p. 241, where Meyer’s translation: at the money chests,—is also set aside). The evangelist names this locality, because it was the most public, here everybody deposited his temple gifts. The locality gives the bold words of Christ concerning Himself and concerning the Pharisees their full force; yet “no one laid hands on Him, for His hour had not yet come,” John 7:30. “The refrain of the history with an air of triumph.” Meyer. John 8:21. Again therefore he said to them, I go away, and ye will seek me, and will die in your sin [ἐντῇἁμαρτίᾳὑμῶνἁποθανεῖσθε].—As He had said before, John 7:33. Not a new discourse, placed by Ewald and Meyer, contrary to the usual view, on one of the subsequent days. It seems unnecessary to assume (with Tholuck) a special occasion for this discourse; for the occasion in the preceding mockery of the Pharisees stands out strongly enough (hence the οὗν). The mockery of unbelief stands entirely on a line with persecution; mockery therefore is here to the Lord a new signal of approaching death, as persecution was at John 7:34. But for this reason He here declares still more strongly than He did there, both His freedom in His death and their condemnation. In the former case: Ye will not find me; now: Ye will die in your sin. The seeking again denotes the seeking of the Messiah amidst the impending judgments; not a penitent seeking of the Redeemer, but a fanatical chiliastic seeking of a political deliverer. Hence without any finding of Christ. And the not finding is, positively, a dying in sin. Lόcke: The thing meant is natural dying in the state of sin, not a dying on account of sin or by reason of sin. But the former idea cannot here be kept apart from the latter. The sins are their sins as a whole, sealed by their unbelief and their murderous spirit towards the Messiah; the dying is dying in the whole sense of the word: perishing in woe, irremediable death, utter ruin in this world and in that which is to come; and lastly the persons meant are the people as a whole, deceivers and deceived. But as the ὑμεῖς does not mean every single Jew, so the sin of obduracy is not foretold of all, nor the prospect of death extended to hopeless damnation in every case. Only the sin and death of the nation as a body are without limit. The extension of the condemnation into the future world Jesus declares in the words: “Whither I go, ye cannot come.” As they now could not spiritually roach Him, so hereafter even as suppliants they could not reach Him on the throne of His glory nor beyond in His heaven. A distinct opposite of hell is not to be thought of (as Meyer holds); a place of punishment is no doubt at least implied. John 8:22. Will he kill himself?—Formerly He said: “Where I am;” now he says: “Whither I go.” Hence they now (the Jews in the Judaistic sense) give their mockery another and a more biting form. “The irony of Joh 7:35, rises to impudent sarcasm.” Tholuck. They assume that He spoke of His death; and as He called this a ὑπάγειν, they mock, because they have no conception of the element of voluntary departure in the violence of death: “Will He kill Himself?” They think He has set Himself far above them in saying that they could not reach Him; they revenge themselves by suggesting that He will sink far below them. An orthodox Jew, they would say, utterly abhors suicide. According to Josephus, De Bello Jud. III. 8, 5, the self-murderer goes to the σκοτιώτεροςᾅδης. Thus, according to the orthodox Jewish doctrine, to which the Pharisees bore allegiance, the suicide falls to the lowest hell of Hades, and is separated by a great gulf from Abraham’s bosom (Luke 16:26), into which they hoped to go. Concerning a peculiar interpretation of Origen, see Lόcke, p. John 207: [that Jesus would kill Himself, and so go to the place and punishment of suicides, to which the Jews could not go, because their sin did not subject them to it.—Tr.] John 8:23. Ye are from beneath; I am from above.—Jesus meets their mockery with a calm assertion which turns the point of it against themselves. For from beneath hardly means here merely from the earth (Meyer), as in John 3:31; but, as in John 8:44, it denotes the diabolical nature which they have shown, and by virtue of which they belong to that dark nether world. They therefore could go thither, where they are spiritually at home; He could not, since He is from above, from heaven (John 3:3). The antithesis in these words is that of hades and heaven, says Origen; in the moral sense, says Stier; on the contrary Tholuck, with Meyer, makes the antithesis heaven and earth. But the parallel κόσμοςοὗτος does not prove this; for that expression denotes not the visible world in itself, but the old bad nature of the world. The more obscure first sentence He explains by the second: Ye are of this world.—Κόσμοςοὗτος, also, according to the Jewish Christology, denoted pre-eminently the ancient heathen world, which was to come into condemnation. I am not of this world. Therefore in spirit and life belonging to the αἰὼνὁμέλλων, the new and higher world. The former antithesis denotes the principle of the life; the latter, the sphere of life corresponding. John 8:24. I said therefore unto you, that ye will die in your sins.—That is to say, the words: “ye will die in your sins,” and the words: “ye are of this world,” or “from beneath,” are equivalent. Their being from beneath as to the principle of their life is the reason why they will die in their sins (Crell. Other views of the connection see in Tholuck). Meyer: “Observe that in this repetition of the denunciation the emphasis, which in John 8:21 lay upon in your sins, falls upon will die, and thus the perdition itself comes into the foreground, which can be averted only by conversion to faith.” Yet they must not understand Him that they are in a fatalistic sense from beneath, or of this world, and therefore cannot but die in their sins. Hence He adds the condition: If ye believe not that I am He. There is, therefore, no lack of clearness in the connection (as Tholuck supposes). The expression: “that I am He,” is mysteriously delivered, without mention of the predicate. Meyer: “To wit, the Messiah, the self-evident predicate.” But the matter was not so simple; otherwise Christ would have previously named Himself the Messiah. And this He would not do, because their conception of the Messiah was distorted. They must, therefore, step by step perceive and believe that He is what He professed to be: the one sent of the Father, the Son of Man, the Quickener, the Light of the world; last: the one from above. They must believe in Him according to His words and His deeds; His higher existence, His real being, which stood before their eyes, and the real nature of which they criticised away, they must believe; not till then could they receive the word that He was the Messiah. The predicate is, therefore, the representation of Himself which Jesus gives in the context. According to Hofmann (Schriftbeweis, I. 62), an imitation of the Old Testament ΰֲ ?πִ ?ιδεּ ?ΰ. Undoubtedly correct in the view that both here and there the self-evidencing living presence of the divine person must be above all things acknowledged without prejudice. This mysterious import of the word is indicated also by the question of the Jews: “Who art thou?” (John 8:25). They wished to draw the last decisive word from Him. The answer of Jesus which follows speaks to the same point. Luther takes the σὺτίςεἰ as contemptuous; so does Meyer. But it is rather a sly question, to decoy or force Jesus to an avowal. Comp. John 10:24. If we compare the expression ὅτιἐγώεἰμι with that in John 7:39 : οὕπωγὰρἧνπνεῦμαἅγιον,—we might naturally translate: that I am here. That He is present as He is present in the fulness of His divine-human life,—this they must believe and apprehend before they will rightly apprehend Him as the Messiah. John 8:25. Even the same that I said unto you from the beginning. [So the E. V. renders τὴνἀρχὴνὅτικαὶλαλῶὐμῖν Comp. Text. Notes.—P. S.].—This passage has been a crux interpretum, because the progressive unfolding of the idea of the Messiah by Christ in His presentation of Himself has not been appreciated. The interpretation depends not merely on the sense of τὴνἀρχήν, but also on that of the expression ὅτικαὶλαλῶὑμῖν. [To state the points more fully, the interpretation depends: 1) On the construction of the whole sentence—whether it be interrogative, or exclamatory, or declarative; 2) on the sense of τὴνἀρχήν, whether it be taken substantively (principium, the beginning, the Logos), or adverbially (in the beginning, from the beginning, first of all, to start with, or omnino, generally); 3) on the ambiguity of ὅτι (conjunct.) and ὅ, τι (relative); 4) on the meaning of λαλῶ as distinct from λέγω; 5) on the proper force of καί. I remark in the premises that we must take τὴνἀρχήν adverbially, and write ὅ, τι, since ὅτι (quoniam, quia) gives no good sense.—P. S.] 1. Constructions which take the sentence as a question. (a) Cyril, Chrysostom, Matthζi, Lόcke (more or less equivalent): Why do I even speak to you at all? [Cur vero omnino vobiscum loquor? cur frustra vobiscum disputo?—P. S.] (Comp. John 10:25). This is grammatically possible, for τὴνἀρχήν can mean omnino (in certain circumstances), and ὅτι can mean why. But such a sentence would be contradicted by Christ’s going on to speak, and it would be too “empty” (Meyer). [With this agrees in sense Ewald’s explanation, with this difference that he takes the sentence as an indignant exclamation: That I should have to speak to you at all! (Dass ich auch όberhaupt zu euch rede!) But this leaves the position of τὴνἀρχήν before ὅτι (as Ewald writes instead of ὅ, τι) unexplained.—P. S.] (b) Meyer (and Hilgenfeld): What I originally (from the first) say to you, that do ye ask? or (Do you ask), what I have long been telling you? The objection to this is that Christ had from the first not presented Himself as Messiah. Besides, there is no: Do ye ask?—in the sentence. 2. Constructions which connect with this sentence the πολλὰἕχω following [John 8:26, and put only a comma, instead of a period, after λαλῶὑμῖν]. Some manuscripts, Bengel, Olshausen. Hofmann: “For the first, for the present, since He is engaged in speaking to them, He has many reproving and condemning things to say to them.” This would be an entire evasion of the question they had put.3. Constructions which take the sentence as a declaration. (a) Augustine (similarly Bede, Rupert, Lampe, Fritzche): Principium (the Logos, the Word) me credite, quia (ὅτι) et loquor vobis, i.e. quia humilis propter vos factus ad ista verba descendi. [Wordsworth: “I am what I am also declaring to you, the Beginning;” comp. Revelation 21:6, ἡἀρχὴκαὶτὸτέλος.—P. S.] Untenable both in point of grammar and of fact; τὴνἀρχήν is adverbial, and Jesus could not present Himself to these adversaries as the divine Logos. [A reference to the Logos would require λέγω instead of λαλῶ.—P. S.] (b) Calvin, Beza, Grotius, Baumgarten-Crusius, Tholuck: “I am what I told you in the beginning (and tell you until now).” But (1) He had not given them from the beginning a definite description of Himself; (2) τὴνἀρχήν ought not to stand first; not to say that we ought rather to have ἐλάλησα [instead of λαλῶ ?]. (c) Luthardt: “From the beginning I am, that [ὅτι] I may even speak to you.” Obscure, and in part incorrect; for Jesus did not exist merely to speak to the Jews (see Meyer). (d) Bretschneider: “At the outset I declared concerning Myself what I say also now.” But there is no λελάληκα. (e) De Wette: “First of all, or above all, I am what I even say to you”. Luther: “I am your preacher; if ye first believe this, ye will also know by experience who I am, and in no other way.” (Ammon: He is to be known, above all things, from His words). But, in the first place, τὴνἀρχήν must mean for the first thing, to begin with; and secondly, Christ says not that they must know Him from His words, but He refers to accounts which He actually gave of Himself. (f) Winer: “I am wholly such as I represent Myself in My words.” See the grammatical objection against wholly in Meyer. (g) “To begin with, for the first, I am that which I even say to you;” or, “First of all, I am the very thing I am declaring unto you.” Erasmus, Bucer, Grotius, et al., Leben Jesu, II., 963, Brόckner. For the first thing, they must receive with confidence His descriptions of Himself as the fountain of life, the light of the world, etc., which He openly and familiarly talks (λαλῶ) to them; then they will come to a full knowledge of His character; for all depends on their ceasing to determine His character by their crude notion of the Messiah, ceasing to require in Him such a Messiah as they have imagined, and beginning to determine their ideas of the Messiah from His revelation of Himself, and to correct and spiritualize them accordingly. When Tholuck objects that, upon this interpretation, Jesus would be drawing them first to a lower view of Himself, and afterwards to a higher, he is mistaken; for the issue here is between a designation of Himself by the New Testament thing that He is, and a designation of Himself by the theocratic name, which in its rabbinical form had to be regenerated by the New Testament spirit, and the course of thought is not from lower to higher, but from the more general to the more specific. John 8:26. I have many things to say and to judge of you.—Περὶὑμῶν is emphatic. Because He has so much to say and to judge of them, so much to clear up with them, He cannot go on to the final, decisive declaration concerning Himself. It must first be still more clearly brought out, what they are, and where they stand. Tholuck, therefore, groundlessly remarks, quoting an opinion of Maldonatus: “This expression also disturbs the clearness of the course of thought.” The opinion, of course, has in view also what follows. But he that sent me is true.—Ἀλλά is difficult. Meyer, with Apollinaris: πολλὰἕχωνλέγεινπερ̀ὑμῶν, σιγῶ. So Euthymius and others. Better Lόcke, Tholuck and others, after older expositors: However much I have to judge concerning you, My κρίσις is still ἀληθής. Yet this sentiment is to be modified. It grieves Him that He has so much to judge of them; yet it must be so; God, who hath sent Him, is true. God judges in act according to truth, and Christ, the interpreter of His essential words which He hears of Him through the facts and through the showing of the Spirit, must do the same in speech. The ἀλλά, therefore, forms an adversative (missed in this view by Meyer) to the πολλάἕχω. According to Chrysostom the apodosis would mean: But I limit Myself to speaking τὰπρὸςσωτηρίαν, οὐτὰπρὸςἕλεγχον. Meyer: He has things to say to the world, other than the worthlessness of His enemies. But in this view God would rather be referred to as gracious, than as true. And Christ would not appeal to His duty to speak what He hears (comp. John 5:30). John 8:27. They understood not.—Different conceptions: (1) Ὤτῆςἀγνοίας, Chrysostom. (2) Strange and improbable that they did not understand, De Wette. (3) The beginning of a new discourse with other hearers, Baumgarten-Crusius, Meyer. (4) A moral obtuseness, and refusal of acknowledgment, Lόcke. So Stier and Tholuck: hardness of heart.—The failure to understand was due, on the contrary, to their suspecting a secret behind the expression: He that sent Me, on account of their greedy chiliastic hope of a Messiah. For as Messiah in their sense Christ would have still been welcome to them. This introduces what follows. John 8:28. When ye have lifted up the Son of man.—It is now their turn to be tempted by Jesus, though in a holy mind. Jesus apparently yields to their vagueness of mind with a term of many meanings; hence the οὐν. The sense is: lifted up on the cross, as in John 3:14; but it carries also the thought that this shameful lifting up would be the means of His real exaltation (Calvin, et al.), which comes more strongly to light in John 12:32. Now His hearers understand it to mean: When ye have acknowledged the Son of Man as Messiah, and proclaimed Him in political form.—Then shall ye know-that I am he.—Some willingly, in the outpouring of the Holy Ghost; others against their will, in the destruction of Jerusalem, etc. (comp. John 6:62, a passage which is elucidated by this. On the different interpretations of the knowing, see Tholuck). They take it thus: Then shall ye perceive howl manifest and prove Myself the Messiah after your mind.—And that I do nothing of myself.—(Ἀπ’ ἐμαυτοῦ comes under ὅτι, and is not, as Lampe takes it, a new proposition). That is: That I do not of My own will and ambition usurp the honor and glory of Messiah. They understand it: That I, for secret reasons, do not come forward on my own responsibility, but abide the result.—But speak these things as the Father taught me.—His action is according to the instruction of the Father, primarily a testifying, speaking (therefore not a completing, according to Bengel and De Wette: λαλῶ completed by ποιῶ, ποιῶ by λαλῶ); and this very thing includes self-command in the matter of a decisive Messianic profession. Just this reserve leads Him into the difficult position, in which He seems to stand alone, and yet is not alone. He manifests Himself and conceals Himself as the Father instructs Him. See the history of the temptation. Now His hearers take it that the divine arrangement requires the Messiah to let the Messianic people take the initiative in His elevation. John 8:29. And he that sent me is with me.—The Messiah’s trust to the arrangement of the Father in the trying course assigned Him. But in the progress of their misapprehension they must take Him as expressing His confidence of happy success in His Messianic enterprise with the help of God.—He hath not left me alone.—Pointing to the help of God which He has hitherto received, and which is secured to Him by the co-working of the divine purpose throughout the government of the world with His work, as well as with His Spirit, and by the co-working of His dominion with the Father. But they probably think of the silent preparation of extraordinary succor. For I always do the things that are pleasing to him.—(Not: As appears from the fact that I do, etc., Maldonatus. The assistance of the Father is to be distinguished from the essential unity of the Father with the Son, and reciprocates the obedience of Jesus.) In His unconditional obedience He has the seal of His unconditional confidence. But they may imagine: He has already introduced and arranged everything according to the direction of God. John 8:30. As he spoke these words, many believed in him.—In the simplest historical sense: Became disciples, came forward as followers and confessors of Him. What kind of faith this was, the sequel must teach, and Jesus Himself took care that the faith which arose out of chiliastic misconstructions should soon be tested and set right. Tholuck: “Πιστεύειν is here used for a faith which arises certainly not from miracles, but from the word; by force of the imposing power of His testimony concerning Himself; a faith, however, which was but superficial, for it did not find in the words of Jesus ῥήματατῆςζωῆς. They stand upon the footing of the disciples mentioned in John 6:66; hence μένειν is required of them.” The main thing required is submission to the word of Christ, renunciation of their carnal expectations, and a clearing and spiritualizing of their faith. Failure to observe the misconstructions traced above has occasioned much confusion over the words of Jesus immediately following, and over the relapse of many or most of these disciples, which follows soon upon them. AND ETHICAL1. As Christ is the source of life under different aspects: source of satisfaction, source of healing, source of quickening and inspiration,—so He is the light also under different aspects: the star by night which prevents wandering in darkness, the sun by day which brings with it the works of the day and opens the eye to the day, John 9. Here He is the star or lamp of the night, the true pillar of fire, which is set to lighten from Mount Zion the holy city and the world. Suggested by the illumination at the feast of tabernacles. “Next to the water-drawing and libation, this illumination was the leading feature of the festivities. As the drawing and pouring of the water typified the fulness of salvation which abode in Jerusalem and flowed forth thence, so these lights typified the enlightening of the world from the mountain of the Lord, Micah 4:2; Isaiah 2:2; Isaiah 60:3; Isaiah 60:5; Isaiah 55:5; Zechariah 14:7; Zechariah 14:17. After the manner of His former interpretation of the water-drawing Jesus points here to that illumination. It was in Him that that prophetic festivity found its fulfilment: the light of the Gentiles, Isaiah 42:6; Isaiah 49:6; Isaiah 9:1-2. He who follows Him, follows no flitting, earthly glimmer, which first flashes up, and then leaves the darkness only the more dismal; His light is a light of life, a light which in itself is life.” Gerlach. 2. The consciousness of Christ is the star of night, the sun of day. He is sure of His origin (from the Father), of His destination (to the Father), and therefore of His way (with the Father), and can therefore offer Himself with absolute certitude and confidence as the guide of life to the people who are wandering in darkness. “Though I bear witness of Myself, yet My witness is true.” Consciousness attested by conscience is the basis of all certitude (Luther, Descartes, Kant, Schleiermacher). Christ’s divine self-consciousness is the starting-point of all divine certitude. Augustine: A light shows itself, as well as other things. You light a lamp, for example, to look for a garment, and the burning lamp helps you find it; but do you also light a lamp to look for a burning lamp? 3. The assault of the men of the letter on the testimony of Christ concerning Himself, a type of the battle between dead tradition and living faith. 4. The world’s way of judging, and Christ’s way: (1) The world judges of the nature of the person after the flesh (subjectively, with a carnal judgment, and objectively, from the mere appearance); Christ judges not the nature of the person, but his guilt. (2) The world forestalls the judgment of God, and, midway, condemns Christ to the cross; Christ pronounces the judgment of God, and the actual judgment He does not execute till the end of the world. 5. Christ’s appeal to the testimony of His Father, and the mockery of the Jews; the fact, and the mistaking and denial, of the original Life. “It is remarkable how, in the words: in your law (of which ye are so proud), Jesus takes issue with them, and indeed, as it were quits them.” Gerlach. “Had not God from eternity come out of a rigid, self-imprisoned unity, and revealed Himself as second person in the Son, etc., He had not been able to redeem the human race, nor even therefore, to reveal, demonstrate Himself to it in His full truth.” Ibid. [5 ½. The significant expression: “the Father is with Me,” is a counterpart of: “The Word was with God.” in John 1:1. From eternity the Son was with the Father; in time the Father is with the Son. This personal distinction of the Father and the Son from each other is the stronger rather than the weaker, for that other: “The Word was God,” which stands by its side, and which has a parallel here in John 8:19; “If ye had known Me, ye should have known My Father also.” It is impossible to do justice to its significance, without the doctrine of the essential, eternal trinity of the Godhead; and this doctrine may be said to be contained in this combination of mysterious words. Augustine, in the Catena: “Blush, thou Sabellian; our Lord doth not say, I am the Father, and I the self-same person am the Son; but I am not alone, because the Father is with Me.”—E. D. Y.] 6. The suicidal world suspects Christ and Christianity of a suicidal intent. Character of suicide on the part of the Lord. From beneath: the contrast of suicide, which is from beneath, and self-sacrifice, which is from above. [6 ½. Here the Lord says: “I am from above;” “ye neither know Me, nor My Father;” “ye cannot tell whence I come, and whither I go.” He had said before, John 7:28 : “Ye both know Me, and know whence I am.” This apparent contradiction only reflects in His free, spontaneous utterance the perfect harmony and unity of real deity and real humanity (against Docetism and Apollinarianism) in Him. And yet His having a really earthly, human origin, as well as a really divine, was not the same as being from beneath and of this world. This world “lieth in the wicked one.”—E. D. Y.] 7. Christ reveals Himself in the spirit by veiling Himself in the flesh. “The teaching of Christ is not something outside of Him or added to Him; He Himself is all teacher, all revelation; His doctrine is Himself.” Gerlach. [7 ½. “The Being who sent Jesus into the world, was in such close companionship with Him, that He shared with Him, so to speak, all the opprobrium and hostility with which His mission was met, and would be present to His aid in every danger.… It should ever be borne in mind that this obedience of the Son, although strictly predicable of Him only in His Messianic office, is to be regarded as proceeding from His essential unity with the Father; else, as Olshausen well remarks,…it would depend for its perpetuity upon the fidelity of the Son.…It is based upon those immutable relations of companionship springing from the essential unity of the Father and Son, and referred to so emphatically in the preceding words, is with me.” J. J. Owen.—E. D. Y.] 8. The chiliastic elements in the life of Jewish people: a. During the life of Jesus, in Galilee (John 6), in Judea (John 8); b. After the ascension of the Lord, (1) at the time of founding of the church, Acts 6:7; (2) before the death of James the Just. See his biography. 9. It is not right to presume that the rulers of the Jews would have absolutely closed themselves beforehand against the impression of the Messiahship of Jesus. On the contrary they were thoroughly disposed from the beginning, under certain conditions, to acknowledge Him as Messiah; viz., if He would meet their idea of Messiah (see Matthew , 4) This accounts for the alternate attractions and the repulsions, which John exhibits to us in the boldest contrast, John 3; chs. 8. and 10. Even in the revilings against Christ on the cross the craving for a chiliastic Messiah may be perceived (Matthew 27:42, see Leben Jesu, II. 3, p. 1562). This explains again the Lord’s reservation of His name of Messiah, which He positively refused to have publicly proclaimed by the people until the Palm-Sunday, and to which He Himself did not confess until the hour of His condemnation before the high council. 10. In the miraculous gliding of Christ out of the hands of His enemies, both here and often elsewhere, Luthardt rightly sees a presage of the resurrection of Christ, by which He perfectly transported Himself from the violence of His foes. AND See the Doctrinal and Ethical points.—Christ the true pillar of fire to His people: 1. He gives light upon the world of sin. 2. He gives light through the world of nature. 3. He gives light to His believing followers.—Christ the light of the world in His saving work for those who follow Him: 1. The Light of the world. 2. The followers of the light. 3. The saving effect: (a) They shall not walk in darkness, (b) They shall have the light of life.—The star of heaven in the night of earth.—The morning star, which guides out of the night of death into the day of life.—The light of life: 1. The light as life. The effect of the enlightening of the understanding is the quickening of the heart. 2. The life as light. Quickening is enlightenment.—The true light and the true life are one.—Redemption by the light of life from walking in the night.—Christ the light of the world: 1. In the sureness of His course. 2. In that which His work begins with: not judging, not destroying, but quickening. 3. In that which His work ends with: separating by the effects of light, judging according to the fact, separating dead and living. 4. In that which His work both begins and ends with: the revealing of the real God, of the Father in His working, His quickening, His judging. The Jews’ judging after the flesh, a judgment against themselves: 1. It is a judgment of the carnal mind, of passion, on the revelations of the Spirit. 2. It is a judgment according to outward appearance and pedigree on the wonders of the new life. 3. It is a carnal condemnation of the divine gentleness which could rescue from damnation.—Prejudice, a way to condemnation.—The Jewish students of God, in the treasury of God, unmasked as ignorant despisers of God.—The manifest Father of Christ, a hidden God to His adversaries.—How Christ can charge spiritual ignorance upon His adversaries at the height of their power (in the treasury). Men of the letter have the treasury of God, and not the knowledge of God. The fearful word of Christ concerning His departure: 1. The horrible misinterpretation of it. 2. Its true meaning.—Suicide elucidated by the conversation of Christ with the Jews.—Self-killing and self-sacrifice; or, the death from beneath, and the life from above.—To be from beneath, and to be from above.—How Christ would be known according to His own representation of Himself, and not according to the preconceived opinions of the world: 1. According to the Old Testament, not according to the Jewish schools. 2. According to the New Testament, not according to mediζval tradition. 3. According to His divine glory, not according to our human notion.—Legitimate steps in the revelation of Christ to us.—Before the world would come to a decision concerning Christ, it must have the judgment of Christ concerning Himself. John 8:26. The judgment of Christ concerning the world unavoidable: 1. As a testimony to the real government of God. 2. As a testimony to His true view of things.—The words of Christ concerning His elevation, as they are misinterpreted by the ear of the Jews.—The power of the Spirit in these words of the Lord: (a) His confidence that His elevation on the cross will be the lowest depth of His path to His heavenly exaltation. (b) The mercy with which He still gives His enemies the prospect of knowing their salvation by His death and resurrection, (c) The clear prediction of the effect of the preaching of the cross in the New Testament dispensation.—The twofold knowing that Jesus is the Lord, as produced by His twofold elevation (the knowing which believers have, and that which unbelievers have). The word of Christ: I am not (left) alone: 1. The sense of the expression: The Father is with Him through the whole course of His sufferings (Gethsemane). 2. The confidence of it: Notwithstanding He was soon to be forsaken by all the world and apparently by God Himself. 3. The foundation of the confidence: for I do always those things, etc.Those who believe from misunderstanding.—The form of enthusiastic belief, which can immediately turn into the bitterest unbelief.—Misunderstanding of the word of God: 1. Its forms. 2. Its causes. 3. Its marks. 4. Its solution. 5. Its consequences. Starke: Lange: The illumination of the understanding always inseparably connected with the sanctification of the will. On life depends light or use of eyes.—Teachers should always lead their hearers from the earthly to the spiritual.—Hedinger: He who follows Christ never misses the right way; always with will-o’-the-wisps! Isaiah 11:3-4.—God, who is (αὐτόπιστος) the truth itself, can testify of Himself, and all men, though they be but liars, must believe His testimony.—If the Father and the Son testify the very same thing, how strong, how invincible is the testimony!—Stiff-necked enemies of the truth deride what they do not and will not understand, and when they can go no further, they start something ridiculous.—(In the treasury.) God wonderfully protects faithful teachers and confessors of His word.—Quesnel: Jesus says nothing but what the Father bids Him say; therefore should His ministers also preach nothing but what they have learned of Him, Romans 15:18. John 8:28. Zeisius: The prophecies of God will never be more truly and fully understood than in their fulfilment.—O how many Christians do not know Christ before they have crucified Him with their sins! Braune: “Shall not walk in darkness,” in un-holiness, in sin. It is manifestly a fundamental truth that mind and will belong together; neither can be corrupted or improved without the other; and enlightenment and sanctification ever play into one another. At the same time, looking at the preceding occurrences, the Lord seems to intend to guard His dealing with the fallen woman against all abuses. He does not let sin prevail.—Does not the sun bear witness even to its own existence? Set it aside, if you can.—Jesus alone knew both whence He came and whither He went; His adversaries knew neither.—Contend not with blasphemers over God, but over noble life.—The cross is the knot in which humiliation and exaltation are entwined. In the cross the deepest humiliation ended; in the cross exaltation began. Heubner: Some light a man will always follow; the question is whether he will choose the right one. Criterion: The following of Jesus casts out all uncertain, restless groping.—There are only two ways: that of the darkness, and that of the light.—The test of true illumination is that it gives life.—Bearing witness to one’s self by no means absolutely inadmissible.—The believer also knows the source and the goal of his life.—How little would the hostile Jews have suspected that this Jesus, their antagonist, would soon be exalted at the right hand of God. So the children of the world suspect not the speedy glorification of the godly whom they despise. John 8:19; comp. v. 37. The knowing of the Father and the knowing of the Son are inseparable.—I go my way. Our enjoyment of the means of grace has its day.—Ye shall seek Me. The time is sure to come when the man shall know those through whom God would have saved him: children their father, etc.—Ye cannot come. Heaven inaccessible to the assaults of the wicked.—From beneath, etc. Between the worldly-minded and the heavenly-minded there is as great a distance (and an abyss) as between heaven and earth.—The enemies of the good cause must involuntarily promote it. Schleiermacher: Walking in the light, walking in the truth.—If our faith in the Lord rested on any human testimony, He could not be that on which we might build the full certainty of our salvation. We must cease to be of this world: then we can believe that He is that.—The Lord leaves not alone those who are joined with the Redeemer.—Besser: Zechariah 14:7 : “At evening time it shall be light.”—If Christ is the light of the world, the world without Him is darkness.—What a. cutting contradiction: The treasury of God surrounded by a God-forsaken people, whose offerings were as heartless as the coin clinking in the chest,—Hebrews 12:3.—Christ, and Christians with Him, go above, to heaven, because they are come down from above; but the servants of sin and of the devil go down, because they are from beneath. [Matt. Henry: John 8:12. He that followeth Me. It is not enough to look at this light, and to gaze upon it; but we must follow it, believe in it, walk in it,—for it is a light to our feet, not our eyes only. John 8:26 : I have many things to say, etc. 1. Whatever discoveries of sin are made to us, He that searcheth the heart hath still more to judge of us, 1 John 3:20. 2. How much soever God reckons with sinners in this world, there is still a farther reckoning yet behind, Deuteronomy 32:34. 3. Let us not be forward to say all we can say, even against the worst of men; we may have many things to say by way of censure, which yet it is better to leave unsaid, for what is it to us?—E. D. Y.] Footnotes: [The rec. reads περιπατήσει, with D. E. al., but περιπατήσῃ is supported by ΰ B. F. G., etc. Orig., and adopted by Lachmann, Tischendorf and Alford.—P. S.] [Baόmlein: “If we must take the question: Who art thou? as expressing contempt and wonder that Jesus should venture to say: Ye shall die in your sins,—the reply: τὴνἀρχὴν—Ὅτικαὶλαλῶὑμῖν–πολλὲἕχωπερὶὑμ. λαλ. κ. κρ. is perfectly suitable: Assuredly (from the first, in general) I have—what I am doing also now—many things to say,” etc.—E. D. Y.] [Ἐγώεἰμι is supplied from the preceding question of the Jews: σὺτίςεῖ ?̓ ?;—P. S.] [ Von vorne herein (vor allen Dingen) bin ich, was ich auch zu euch rede; i.e., I am in fact what I say; I must be known from My speeches. Alford professes to follow this interpretation of De Wette as expanded by Stier, hut translates somewhat differently: “Essentially, (τὴναρχήν, traced up to its principle, generally), that which I also discourse unto you; or, in very deed, that same which I speak unto you. he is the Logos—His discourses are the revelation of Himself…When Moses asked the name of God, I am that which I am, was the mysterious answer;…but when God manifest in the flesh is asked the same question, it is: I am that which I speak.’ ” Profound and true in itself; hut hardly an interpretation of the text in hand. The question, in all its circumstances and Its spirit, is not the same as that of Moses: and a hidden reference to Αόγος would produce λέγω rather than λαλῶ.—P. S.] [Grotius: Primum hoc sum quod et dico vobis (i.e., lux mundi)=πρῶτονμὲνὅ, τικαὶλέγωὑμῖν.—P. S.] [Brόckner, ed. 5th, does not materially differ from De Wette, except that he rejects his rendering of τὴνἀρχήν by above all things (vor allen Dingen), and translates: to begin with (von vorne herein).—Godet translates: (I am) Precisely what I tell you (no more or less).—P. S.] IV Christ The Liberator, As Son Of The House In Opposition To Servants; The One Sent From God, As Against The Agents Of The Devil; The Eternal And The Hope Of Abraham As Against The Bodily Seed Or Abraham. Or: The Liberator Of Israel, The Adversary Of Satan, The Hope Of Abraham. A Great Swinging From Faith To Unbelief. Attempted Stoning John 8:31-59(John 8:46-59, the Pericope for Judica Sunday.) 31Then said Jesus [Jesus therefore said] to those Jews which believed on him [who had believed him]. If ye continue in my word, then are ye [ye are] my disciples indeed; 32And ye shall [will] know the truth, and the truth shall [will] make you free. 33They answered him, We be [are] Abraham’s seed, and were never in bondage to any man: how sayest thou, Ye shall [will] be made free? 34Jesus answered them, Verily, verily, I say unto you, Whosoever committeth sin is the servant [a bondman, a slave] of sin. 35And the servant [the bondman] abideth not in the house for ever: but [omit but] the Son [son] abideth ever. 36If the Son therefore shall make you [If then the Son make you] free, ye shall [will] be free indeed. 37I know that ye are Abraham’s seed; but ye seek to kill me, because my word hath no place 38[maketh no progress] in you. I speak that which I have seen with my [the] Father: and ye [likewise] do that which ye have seen with your father. 39They answered and said unto him, Abraham is our father. Jesus saith unto them, If ye were [are] Abraham’s children, ye would do the works of Abraham. 40But now ye seek to kill me, a man that hath told you [spoken to you] the truth, which I have heard of [I heard from] God: this [the like of this] did not Abraham. 41Ye do the deeds [works] of your father. Then said they [They said] to him, We be [were] not born of fornication; we have one Father, even God. 42Jesus said unto them, If God were your Father, ye would love me: for I proceeded forth and came [am come] from God; [for] neither came I of myself, but he sent me. 43Why do ye not understand my speech? even because ye cannot hear my word. 44Ye are of your father [of the father who is] the devil, and the lusts of your father ye will [ye desire to] do: he was a murderer from the beginning, and abode not [doth not stand] in the truth, because there is no truth in him. When he speaketh a lie, he speaketh of his own [from his own nature]: for [because] he is a liar, and the father of 45it [thereof]. And [But] because I tell you [speak] the truth, ye believe me not. 46Which of you convinceth [convicteth] me of sin? And [omit And] if I say the truth, why do ye not believe me? 47He that is of God heareth God’s words: ye therefore hear them not [for this cause ye do not hear], because ye are not of God. 48Then answered the Jews [The Jews answered], and said unto him, Say we not well that thou art a Samaritan, and hast a devil [demon]? 49Jesus answered, I have 50not a devil [demon]; but I honour my Father, and ye do dishonour me. And 51[But] I seek not mine own glory: there is one that seeketh and judgeth. Verily, verily, I say unto you, If a man keep my saying [my word] he shall [will] never see death. 52Then said the Jews unto him, Now we know that thou hast a devil [demon]. Abraham is dead [died], and the prophets; and thou sayest, If a man keep my saying 53[my word], he shall [will] never taste of death. Art thou greater than our father Abraham, which is dead [who died]? and the prophets are dead [the prophets also 54died]: whom makest thou [dost thou make] thyself? Jesus answered; If I honour [glorify] myself my honour [glory] is nothing: it is my Father that honoureth 55[glorifieth] me; of whom ye say, that he is your [our] God: Yet ye have not known him; but I know him: and if I should say, I know him not, I shall [should] 56be a liar like unto you: but I know him, and keep his saying [word]. Your father Abraham rejoiced to see [that he should see, ἵναἴδῃ ?] my day: and he saw it, and was glad. 57Then said the Jews [The Jews therefore said] unto him, Thou art not yet fifty years old, and hast thou seen Abraham? 58Jesus said unto them, Verily, verily, I say unto you, Before Abraham was [was made, or, born, γενέσθαι] I am [εἰμί]. 59Then took they up [Therefore they took up] stones to cast at him: but Jesus hid himself, and went out of the temple, going through the midst of them, and so passed by [omit going—by]. AND [The last discourse had made an impression on many, and brought them to the door of a superficial discipleship (John 8:30), while yet their heart was full of prejudice. These half converts the Lord now addresses and warns them not to be satisfied with a passing excitement of feeling, but to become true and steady disciples. Then they would know the truth, and the truth would give them true freedom from the degrading bondage of sin and error. Knowledge appears here as the fruit of faith, and freedom as the fruit of knowledge. This earnest exhortation brings out the latent hatred of the Jews, whereupon the Lord, with fearful severity, exposes the diabolical nature of their opposition to Him, while He at the same time reveals His divine nature as the destroyer of death and the One who was before Abraham was born. This address, in the lively form of dialogue, unites the character of a testimony concerning Himself and a judgment of the Jews, and rises to the summit of moral force.—P. S.] John 8:31. If ye continue in my word.—That is, here, not merely: continue to believe, but believe according to the spirit of the word, and in obedience to the word, which He spoke. Working towards an exposure of their misapprehension of His words—Ye are my disciples indeed.—This, therefore, must first appear. [There is a latent antithesis between πεπιστευκότας and μαθηταί. It was one thing to believe in Jesus, quite another to be disciples, learners. Tue one could be a momentary impulse; the other required constant study and obedience?] True discipleship is the condition and guaranty of their knowing the truth; and then this knowledge carries the blessing, that the truth should make them free. Freedom is the very thing they were bent upon all along; but a political, theocratic freedom, as pictured by a chiliastic mind. Christ opens to them the prospect of a higher freedom which, if they should be true disciples, they would owe to the liberating effect of the truth, the living knowledge of God; He opens the prospect of freedom from sin. John 8:32. Ye shall know the truth more and more. [Hengstenberg: “A difference of degree of knowledge is put in the form of knowledge itself as opposed to ignorance, because in comparison with future attainments of knowledge in the path of fidelity, the present knowledge would be quite insignificant. The truth is not merely something thought; it has taken flesh and blood in Christ, who says, I am the truth. By a deeper and deeper knowing of Christ they would know also the truth, after which, as after freedom, every man who is not utterly lost has a deep constitutional longing, and this living truth would make them free from the bondage of sin and error; while the truth considered merely as a thought of the mind would be utterly powerless. The same liberating effect which is here ascribed to the truth, is in John 8:36 ascribed to Christ.”—E. D. Y.] [The truth will make you free, ἡἀλήθειαἐλευθερώσειὑμᾶς. Comp. John 8:36 : “If the Son make you free, ye will be free indeed,” ὄντωςἐλεύθεροι. Christ associates liberty always with the truth, which He is Himself, and presents the truth as the cause, and liberty as the effect. So also Paul speaks of liberty always in this positive, highest and noblest sense, liberty in Christ, the glorious liberty of the children of God, liberty from the bondage of sin and error, comp. Romans 8:21; 2 Corinthians 3:17; Galatians 2:4; Galatians 5:1; Galatians 5:13; James 1:25; 1 Peter 2:12. Man is truly free when he is released from abnormal foreign restraints and moves in harmony with the mind and will of God as his proper element. “Deo service vera libertas est.”—P. S.] John 8:33. They answered him, We are Abraham’s seed (or, offspring).—Here comes the turning-point. Christ has openly told them that He would redeem them spiritually from sin by the truth, and in this sense make them free; and now they see their misapprehension of His former words. But in bitter vexation they plunge into a new mistake, supposing that Christ had their political bondage in view, and would require them to console themselves under their political oppression with the enjoyment of spiritual truth. Hence, instead of explaining: Thou shouldst free us from the domination of the Romans, they explain with insulted pride, that they are already free; they have never been any man’s slaves. This answer contains (1) an unbelieving denial of their spiritual servitude; for they studiously avoid the spiritual meaning of the words of Jesus; (2) a revolutionary, chiliastic protest against the idea that they acknowledged the dominion of the Romans, or that they could, as the words of Jesus implied, console themselves under it with spiritual elevation. This breaks again the scarcely formed union with Christ. This sharp contrast in the same Jews between a great demonstration of submission to Jesus and a hostility ready to stone Him,—this reaction of sentiment, coming the moment they were undeceived concerning their chiliastic expectations, appears repeatedly in the Gospel of John in significant gradations. It has already come distinctly to view John 6:30 (comp. John 8:15); and in John 10:31 (comp. John 8:24) it is still more glaring than here. If these historical points are not duly considered, it must seem strange that the same Jews who had just believed in a mass, should so soon relapse into the bitterest unbelief. Hence many have supposed that here other Jews of the mass, quite distinct from those believing ones, now come forward and take up the conversation (Augustine, Calovius, etc., Lόcke et al.). Tholuck: “It is far more likely that the same adversaries who have hitherto been in view, the Ἰουδαῖοι, are the subject of ἀπεκρίθησαν. Before the believing hearers speak, some of the rulers interpose, to repel the supposed slander upon the whole people.” This would imply an inaccuracy of expression. On the contrary, according to the narrative of the evangelist, they are manifestly the same to whom Jesus had spoken, and ἀπεκρίθησεν cannot be translated: it was answered. Justly, therefore, Chrysostom, Maldonatus, Bengel, and others, have taken them to be the same. Chrysostom gave the sufficient interpretation: Κατέπεσενεὐθέωςαὐτῶνἡδιάνοιατοῦτοδὲγέγονενἀπὸτοῦπρὸςτὰκοσμικὰἐπτοῆσθαι . [“Their belief immediately gave way; and that because of their eagerness after worldly things.”] It seems transparent (1) that Jesus in His reply, John 8:34, to those who speak in John 8:33, simply pursues the discourse He had begun in John 8:31-32; and (2) that His suggestion of the need of being made free, John 8:32, was intended to test the sincerity, or provoke the latent insincerity, of the faith of the persons of Joh 8:30-31. Contrary to Dr. Tholuck’s remark above, the evangelist has here very accurately designated the interlocutors, John 8:31, as Jesus and those Jews who believed on Him. Meyer suggests that “the πολλοί, John 8:30, are many among the hearers in general; among these ‘many’ were some hierarchical Jews, and to these Jesus speaks in John 8:31.” There probably was this difference among the believing many; but it is hardly in John’s view here. Hengstenberg, who agrees on this point with Tholuck, thinks “John was quite too much intent upon reality than to ascribe faith to such murderous enemies of Christ as these, on the ground of a mere fleeting emotion.” But this very consideration might work the other way: the Evangelist would take even a transient and impure faith for what it is worth as faith for the time. This great relapse from a flash of faith into deepened darkness of unbelief may be just the “reality” on which John is intent. [Of recent expositors Olshausen, Meyer, Stier, Alford, Ellicott (“Life of Christ”), J. J. Owen, and others, take the same view with Dr. Lange.—E. D. Y.] Ibid. We are Abraham’s seed.—These words are put as the foundation of what follows: And were never in bondage (never yielded ourselves as bond-servants). Because they were Abraham’s seed (on the strength of many Old Testament passages like Genesis 22:17; Genesis 17:16), they claimed, according to Jewish theology, not only freedom, but even dominion over the nations. As πώποτε includes the whole past, these words can only mean: Often as we have been under oppression (under Egyptians, Babylonians, Syrians), we have never acknowledged any oppressor as master, but have always submitted only from necessity, reserving our right to freedom, and striving after it. This reservation carried the spirit and design of revolution, and afterwards, in the Jewish war, acted it out in the Zealots and Sicarii (Joseph. De bello Jud., VII. 8, 6). This extremely simple state of the case many interpreters have lost sight of, failing to distinguish between a bondage de facto and a bondage de jure; hence a list of mistaken explanations (specified by Tholuck, p. 250). Tholuck, referring to my Leben Jesu, II. 2, John 968: “They were as far from acknowledging subjection to Rome, as modern Rome is from acknowledging secular relations which contradict its hierarchical consciousness.” “Only as a domination de facto, and not de jure, does even Josephus represent to them the Roman domination, on the prudential principle of yielding to superior force (De bello Jud. V. 9, 3). And to this day it stands among the fifteen benedictions which should be said every morning: ‘Blessed art Thou, that Thou hast not made me a slave.’ Schόlchan Aruch. tr. Orach Chajim, fol. 10, John 3. The meanest laborer who is of the seed of Abraham, is like a king, says the Talmud.”John 8:34. Whosoever committeth sin [πᾶςὁποιῶντὴνἁμαρτίαν, living in the practice of sin], is a slave of sin.—A solemn declaration, enforced with: Verily, verily. In these words Jesus utterly expels the political question from His scope. He states first the principle, then the application. The committing of sin is to be taken with emphasis; He whose tendency and habit is to commit sin; which may be applied in a wide sense to every man born of the flesh (Romans 7:14), in the narrower sense to the evil propension of the earthly-minded (John 3:20; 1 John 3:8). He is the servant, the slave, of sin; fallen into the worst conceivable bondage, or rather the only real bondage; the man being even at heart a slave, whereas in other sorts of servitude the man may himself be free within, though in outward bonds. And the application was obvious. Jesus implied that they, not only for being born of the flesh, but for being carnally-minded and practically hostile to the truth, committed sin. The hint that they were therefore in the hardest slavery, and in the utmost need of liberation by the truth which they despised, the Lord in the sequel turns gradually into a decided opinion. Comp. Romans 6:17; Romans 7:14, if. “Analogous instances from the classics see in Wetstein; from Philo, in Lφsner, p. 149.” Meyer. [“The mere moral sentiment of which this is the moral expression, was common among the Greek and Roman philosophers.” Alford.—P. S.] John 8:35. And the bondman abideth not in the house for ever.—The thought takes its turn from the legal relations of civil life The bond-servant is not an organic member of the household, has no inheritance, and can be expelled or sold, Genesis 21:10; Galatians 4:30. According to the law of Moses the Hebrew servant must be set free in the seventh year, if he desire; but even if he wishes to remain servant of the house, he does not thereby become a member of the family, Exodus 21:1 ff. To this legal status of the servant, however, as not a permanent member of the household, Jesus gives an allegorical meaning. And in so doing He goes upon a presumption, where expositors readily incline to see a jump. He who is the servant of sin, is, under the dispensation of the law, an involuntary subject of the law; therefore a slave of the letter; and he who is such a slave of the letter, is a slave of sin. Paul also goes on this presumption in Galatians 3:10. The slave of the letter, therefore, being a slave of sin, abides not in the house of God, the theocracy. The application is obvious: In the kingdom of God there have been hitherto children and servants (Galatians 3:22; Galatians 4:1); the servants at this time are the unbelieving Jews; they are one day driven out (Matthew 8:12; Romans 9:31; Galatians 4:30). Not all Israel, but only the unbelieving portion; of these, who treat the law as a mere statute, a slavery to the letter, which corresponds with the bondage of sin, it is declared that they hold no relation of affinity and sonship to the master of the house. The reference of the servant to Moses, propounded by Chrysostom and Euthymius, belongs to a different train of thought and a different aspect of the servant, Hebrews 3:5. The house; typically denoting the royal family of the Lord, the household of God, Psalms 23:6; Psalms 27:4. The son abideth forever [viz., in the house.]—He is by blood one with the house and heir of the house. This point of law is also a similitude, expressing the perpetual dwelling and ruling of Christ in the kingdom of God. As the son is spoken of in the singular, the word cannot be taken to imply a class of men who are morally and religiously free. And in fact the children of the house themselves, under the Old Testament economy, not having attained their maturity, are put under the same law with the proper alien slaves.[The contrast is here between bondage to sin and a freedom to which even the children of the house of God could attain only in a new stage, a manhood, of spiritual life; and into this new stage of full-grown sonship they, and much more those who had let themselves down into servitude, could come only in Christ, the Son of God. There were no sons, whose position would afford, except prospectively, a general maxim of the kind here before us. Even the children differed not yet from servants, though they were not servants of sin. While, therefore, the word son not directly denoting Christ, but being used generically, might properly be printed both here and in the verse following without a capital, Dr. J. J. Owen’s remark upon it in this verse is unwarrantable, and in the next inconsistent: “The word son improperly commences with a capital in our common version, as though it referred to the Son of God. It stands here opposed to servant, and is generically put for all those born to a state of freedom, and consequently heirs to the paternal inheritance and privileges. In the next verse the word Son is properly capitalized.”—E. D. Y.]. John 8:36. If then the Son make yon free.—A new legal principle is here again presupposed by this expression. The son can give servants their freedom; and he can receive them to membership in the house, as adopted brothers, and to participation in his inheritance. The spiritual application which Jesus makes of this principle stops with the first point. The house of God has its son; and this son must make the servants in the house of God free, before any true freedom can be spoken of among you. Note, that He speaks primarily only of the son of the house, not of the Son of God, and that He does not designate Himself as the son (comp. John 5). But His meaning, that He is the son of the house, and as such the Son of God, the only one who is spiritually free and can give spiritual freedom, stands out clearly enough. The sentence is so framed, that it may be taken as containing at once the condition of the true freedom for Israel, a prophecy concerning the believing portion of Israel, and a warning and threatening for the unbelieving portion. Ye will be free indeed [ὅντωςἐλεύθεροι].—As opposed to their visionary, fanatical effort after external, political freedom in their spiritual bondage. Without the real freedom they could neither attain, nor maintain, nor enjoy the outward; while the inward freedom must ultimately bring about the outward. The fact that the son appears as the liberator, instead of the lord of the house himself, agrees with the figure; all depends in this case on what he is willing to do in regard to his hereditary right in the servants. Comp. John 10:26-27. John 8:37. I know that ye are Abraham’s seed; but ye seek to kill me.—The acknowledgment of their claim to natural descent from Abraham serves only to strengthen the reproof that follows. What a contrast: Abraham’s seed, murderers of Christ! Christ can charge them with seeking to kill Him: (1) because they are already turned into an apostasy from Him, which cannot stop short of deadly enmity; (2) because they are impelled by the chiliastic idea of Christ, which leads in the end to the crucifixion of Christ; (3) because they go back to the hierarchical opposition, which has already determined His death. Because my word maketh no progress in you.—Χωρεὶν: to make way, go through, encompass. Metaphorically: to come to something, to succeed, to make progress. The last meaning is the most probable here. These adversaries are the persons in view; hence ἐνὑμῖν cannot mean among you (does not take effect: Luther; has no success: Lόcke). In you: (a) Finds no room, gains no ground in you. Origen, Chrysostom, Beza, et al. Meyer says, it cannot mean this; Tholuck favors this meaning; and Origen and Chrysostom ought to have known the admissible use of the word. Yet this thought must then be reduced to: (b) Finds no entrance into you (Nonnus, Grotius, Luthardt, Tholuck). But then the accusative [or εἰςὑμᾶς] would be expected. Better, therefore, De Dieu and Meyer: It makes no progress in you. It does not thrive in you. This, in fact, Christ has just had experience of with them. They have first misunderstood His word, then loose hold of it again. This then turns into an opposition, which by the strength of its spirit and its reaction (“he that is not with Me,” &c.) must pass into deadly enmity. John 8:38. I speak what I have seen with the (my) Father.—The contrast between Him and them is threefold: 1. My Father, your father (though the verbal antithesis here is critically doubtful; see the Text. and Gram. Notes.) 2. He acts according to what He has clearly seen with His Father; they act according to what they have indistinctly heard from their father (and a further antithesis between the perfect ἑώρακα and the aorist ἠκούσατε.) Yet to limit ἐώρακα, with Meyer, to the pre-existent state of Christ, is partial. 3. His way towards them is to speak openly (λαλῶ) what He has known to be the will and decree of the Father; they, on the contrary, true to the manner of their father, even in moral concerns, go right on to malicious dealing. (“In οὖν there is a sad irony.”—Meyer.) It is the contrast, therefore, of a moral parentage, a moral instruction, a moral way, which in Christ issues in a purely spiritual witness-bearing, and one which in the Jews issues in a fanatical, murderous falling upon Christ. He speaks God’s judgment respecting them; they put Him on Satanic trial for death. The other result of Christ’s seeing: His doing what He sees His Father do, does not here come into view. His doing is all a doing good, and for this a susceptibility is prerequisite. But to His adversaries He says how it stands with them before the law and judgment of God. Who His Father is, and who is theirs, they must for the present forebode. Meyer: “He means, however, the devil, whose children in the ethical view they are, whereas He is in the metaphysical view and in reality the Son of God.” But the ethical view is also included. On the one hand, clear impression, free compliance, calm declaration; on the other, dark, sullen impulse, forced obedience, malignant practice. “Ποιεῖτε: constant conduct; including the seeking to kill, but not exclusively denoting that.” Meyer. John 8:39. Abraham is our father.—The distinction between true children of Abraham and spurious children who therefore, as to their moral nature, must have another father, Christ has introduced by the foregoing sentence. They suspect the stinging point of His distinction; hence their proud assertion, which calls forth the Lord’s denial: If ye were Abraham’s children. In the spiritual sense [children in moral character and habits, as distinct from seed or mere natural descent, John 8:37.—P. S.] Ye would do the works of Abraham, works of faith, above all the work of faith. [τέκνα and ἔργα are correlative.] Abraham had a longing for the coming of Christ, John 8:56. “Just as Paul does in Romans 9:8, Jesus here distinguishes the ethical posterity as τέκνα from the physical as σπέρμα.” Tholuck. [So also Meyer and Alford.—P. S.] Επέρμα, seed, is rather used to designate Abraham’s posterity as a unit, Galatians 3:16. John 8:40. But now ye seek to kill me.—The very opposite of Abraham’s spirit. The Lord does not yet characterize their murderous plot as a killing of the Christ; this alone condemns them, that they wished to kill in Him a man, and a man who had spoken to them the truth, who did nothing more but told the truth which He had heard from God, and therefore stood as a prophet. The counterpart is Abraham with his benevolent spirit in general, with his homage for Melohizedek, and with his sparing of Isaac when God interposed. [A man, ἄνθρωπον, with reference to παρὰτοῦθεοῦ. This self-designation of Christ as a man, a human being, implies all that is essential to our nature. It occurs nowhere else, but instead of it the frequent title the Son of Man, with the definite article, which at the same time elevates Him above the ordinary level of humanity, λελάληκα, the first person, according to Greek rule, see Buttmann, N. T. Gr. p. 241. This did not Abraham. Litotes, ἐποίησε, fecit (not fecisset), a statement of fact all the more stinging. A reference to Abraham’s treatment of the Angel of Jehovah, Genesis 18 (Lampe, Hengstenberg), is not clear.—P. S.] John 8:41. Ye do the works of your father.—Thus much is now perfectly manifest: They have, in respect to moral character, some other father than Abraham, who is exactly the opposite of them in spirit. The deeds of that father they do; that is, they do according to his deeds, and they do according to his bidding; they do his deeds in his service. We were not born of fornication.—They seem to suspect the spiritual intent of Christ’s words, yet they avoid it by at first standing upon the literal interpretation of them, that they may then immediately save themselves by a bold spring to the spiritual. In the first instance, therefore, they say: We are not bastards fathered upon Abraham, but genuine offspring of Abraham (bastards were excluded from the congregation, Deuteronomy 23:2). But they intend thereby at the same time to say; We are not idolaters (Grotius, Lampe, Lόcke); as is evident from their next words: We have one Father, God.—Their genuine descent from Abraham, is supposed to involve their having God for their Father, in the spiritual sense; and when they speak of Him as the one Father, the ἕνα is also emphatic. Accordingly they intend to say: We (ἡμεῖς, with proud emphasis) are not like the heathen, who are born of whoredom, in apostasy from God (Hosea 2:4; [Ezekiel 20:30; Isaiah 57:3]), and have many gods for their spiritual fathers (as they charged especially the Samaritans); bodily and spiritually we are free from the reproach of adulterous birth. Children of Abraham, children of God, Deuteronomy 32:6; Isaiah 63:16; Malachi 2:10; Romans 4:16; Galatians 4:23. The position: God is our father, is therefore in no opposition to the paternity of Abraham. The reference of Euthymius Zigabenus to the contrast of Isaac and Ishmael is unwarrantable. [For the Jews would not call Abraham’s connection with Hagar one of πορνεία, which implies several fathers, but one mother.] It is obvious that with their appeal to the fatherhood of God they wish to crowd Jesus from His position; whether they at the same time intended an allusion to the birth of Jesus (Wetstein and others) is doubtful. In their monotheistic pride they could boast of being the children of God, even while the accusations of the prophets, that Israel was of Gentile whoredom (Ezekiel 16:3; see Tholuck, p. 254), were in their mind; and we already know how little the Jewish fanaticism felt bound by the Scriptures. John 8:42. If God were your father, ye would love me.—Emphatic: Ye would have (long ago) learned to love Me; that is, being kindred in spirit and life. Luthardt: This would be the ethical test. From the fact, therefore, that they do not love Him [the Son of God, the Beloved of the Father], He can infer with certainty their ungodly mind and nature. Proof: For I (ἐγώ) proceeded forth and am come from God.—His consciousness is the clear mirror, the true standard. He is certain (1) that He proceeded forth in His essence and in His personality from God, ontologically and ethically; (2) that also, in His appearance and mission among them, in His coming like a prophet to them, He came from God. But again, He is certain of this because He came not of Himself, i. e. because He knew Himself to be pure from all egotistic motives (love of pleasure, love of honor, love of power; see the history of the temptation, Matthew 4); and because He was conscious of being sent by God, i.e. of being actuated by divine motives. Nothing but this alternative was conceivable: from Himself, or from God, (John 7:18; John 7:28); no third origin (Meyer) is supposable. John 8:43. Why do ye not understand my speech?—Λαλιά, in distinction from λογος; the personal language, the mode of speech, the familiar tone and sound of the words, in distinction from their meaning [John 12:48 : ὁλόγοςὅνἐλάλησα; comp. Philippians 1:14; Hebrews 13:7]. From its original idea of talk, babble, λαλιά here preserves the element of vividness, warmth, familiarity. It is the φωνή, the tone of spirituality and tone of love in the shepherd-voice of Christ. They are so far from recognizing this “loving tone,” that they are incapable of even listening to the substance of His words with a pure, undistracted, spiritual ear. Fanaticism is characterized by “false hearing and words;” primarily by false hearing. Our Lord means unprejudiced, kindly-disposed hearing and attention; something more therefore, even here, than the general power to understand, which is expressed by γινώσκετε, and, in the first instance, something less than the willing hearing which is the beginning of faith itself. To take λαλιά and λόγος as equivalent, and to lay stress on ἀκούειν, and make it the condition precedent to γινώσκειν (as Origen and others do), in the first place ignores the distinction of the two meanings of λέγειν and λαλεῖν, which distinctly runs through this Gospel, and in the second place it overlooks the language: οὐδύνασθεἀκούειν. The point here is an ability to hear the λόγος, to which the recognition of the λαλιά is the condition precedent. We therefore, with Calvin, take the ὅτι as inferential, equivalent to ὥστε, not with Luther as meaning for. Manifestly δύνασθε is to be understood ethically, not, with Hilgenfeld, in a Gnostic, fatalistic sense (see Tholuck). The lively emotion in the painful interrogatory utterance of these words introduced the solemn declaration following. John 8:44. Ye are of the father who is the devil.—[Of the (spiritual or moral) fatherhood or paternity of the devil, ἐκτοῦπατρὸςτοῦδιαβόλου. This is the most important doctrinal statement of Christ concerning the devil, teaching soberly and solemnly without figure of speech: (1) the objective personality of the devil; (2) his agency in the fall of the human race, and his connection with the whole history of sin as the father of murder and falsehood; (3) his own apostasy from a previous normal state in which he was created; (4) the connection of bad men with the devil.—ὑμεῖς with great emphasis, ye who boastfully claim to be lineal children of Abraham and spiritual children of God, are children of His great adversary, the devil. τοῦδιαβόλου is in apposition to πατρός.—P. S.] Not: Of the father of devils (plural τῶνδιαβόλων: Grotius); nor the Gnostic absurdity: “of the father of the devil” [the demiurge], that is the God of the Jews [Hilgenfeld, Volkmar]; also not: “of your father, the devil” (Lόcke, [De Wette, E. V., Alford, Wordsworth]); but: “of a father who is the devil” (Meyer). The idea is clearly confined to ethical fatherhood by the placing of father first; so that John could not have written simply ἐκτοῦδιαβόλου. And the lusts [τὰςἐπιθυμίαςτοῦπατρόςὑμῶνθέλετεποιεῖν]—Plural; primarily meaning not merely thirst for blood [but this is included]. According to Matthew 4, these are of three main classes [love of pleasure, love of honor, love of power.—P. S.]. These lusts of the devil are the main springs of the life of his like-minded children, who, with their captive propensity, desire (θέλετε) to do them.He was a murderer [lit. a manslayer] from the beginning [ἀνθρωποκτόνοςἀπ’ ἀρχῆς].—With special reference to their hatred of the Messiah issuing in blood-thirstiness and falsehood, hardened adherence to delusion and calumnious persecution of the truth and the evilness of it. The devil was a murderer of men from the very beginning (not of his existence, but) of human history (comp. Matthew 19:4, where ἁρχή likewise stands for the beginning of human history). How so? Different interpretations. (1) The devil is a murderer as the author of the fall of Adam, by which death came on man (Genesis 3; Romans 5:12). So Origen, Chrysostom, Augustine, and most in modern times. [Schleierm., Thol., Olsh., Luth., Meyer, Ewald, Hengstenb., Godet, Alford, Wordsworth.—P. S.] This interpretation is supported by the expression: “from the beginning;” and by Wis 2:24; Revelation 12:9; Revelation 20; comp. also Ev. Nicod.: where the devil is called ἡτοῦθανάτουἀρχή [and ἡρίζατῆςἁμαρτίας, the beginning of death, and the root of sin.—P. S.] (2) As the author of Cain’s murder of his brother. Cyril, Nitzsch, Lόcke, and others. [So also De Wette, Kling, Reuss, Bδumlein, Owen. The arguments for this interpretation are its appropriateness in view of the design of the literal murder of Christ entertained by the Jews, and especially the apparent parallel passage, 1 John 3:12 : “Cain was of the wicked one (i.e. a child of the devil, like other sinners, 1 John 3:8) and slew his brother,” comp. John 8:15 : “Whosoever hateth his brother is a murderer.” But neither here nor in Genesis 4 is the Satanic agency in the murder of Abel expressly mentioned, as it is in the history of temptation (Genesis 3), although it stands out prominently in the Bible as the first glaring consequence of the fall and as the type of bloodshed and violence that have since in unbroken succession desecrated the earth (comp. besides 1 John 3:12, also Matthew 23:35; Luke 11:51; Judges 11). Moreover, Cain’s deed itself presupposes the previous agency of the devil, when by the successful temptation of our first parents, he introduced first spiritual and then temporal murder and death into the world. The fall is the “beginning” of history, and of universal significance as the virtual fall of the whole race, and the fruitful source of sin in general and murder in particular. There the devil, in the shape of a serpent, proved himself both a murderer and a liar, as he is here described. To it therefore the passage must chiefly refer. 1 John 3:8 (ὁποιῶντὴνἁμαρτίανἐκτοῦδιαβόλουἐστιν, ὄτιἀπ̓ἀρχῆςὁδιάβολοςἁμαρτανει) which all commentators refer to the history of the fall, is the real parallel to our passage, and not 1 John 3:12.—P. S.] (3) He is quite generally described as a murderer, without any special reference. Baumgarten-Crusius, Brόckner. (4) Evidently the thing intended is the murderous work of Satan in all history, aiming to complete itself in the killing of Christ, but having signalized itself in the beginning in the temptation of man and the lie against God, which afterwards bore their full fruit in Cain’s murder of his brother (Theodoret, Heracleon, Euthymius). We therefore consider that there is properly no question here between Adam and Cain, 1 John 3:15-16. Yet the chief stress plainly lies on the temptation of Adam; for the devil, by his spiritual murder of man, brought man himself also to murder; and he is described pre-eminently as a liar. From that “beginning” he was a murderer of man from time to time. And doeth not stand [οὐχἕστηκεν] in the truth.—Interpretations: (1) He did not continue in the truth. Augustine (Vulg.: stetit), Luther, Martensen [Dogmatik, § 108], Delitzsch [Psychol. p. 62]. This makes the word refer to the fall of the devil according to 2 Peter 2:4; Jude John 8:6. Against this interpretation see Lόcke and Meyer. It would require the pluperfect εἱστήκει, stood. The perfect ἕστηκα means, I have placed myself, I stand [comp. John 1:26; John 3:29; Matthew 12:47; Matthew 20:6, etc.] (2) He does not stand in the truth. He has taken no stand and he holds no ground in it. In an emphatic sense he does not take a position; he has not honorably planted himself and valiantly stood. Euthymius: Οὐκἐμμένει, ἀναπαύετει; Lόcke: “He is perpetually in the act of apostasy from the truth,” De Wette, Meyer: “Falsehood is the sphere in which he stands; in it he is in his proper element, in it he has his station.” Correct, except that there can be no standing or fixedness, and no station in falsehood. Perpetual restlessness and going to and fro are his element, Job 2:2. Hence he is the spirit or devil of endless toil, and the number of his representative, as antichrist, Isaiah 666 (Revelation 13:18). Compare the description of Lokke, his deceptions and his flights, in the Scandinavian mythology. He denies his own existence, as he denies all truth and reality. But he is the perpetual rover, because he is the deceiver. [The passage then does not teach expressly the fall of the devil, but it presupposes it. ἔστηκεν has the force of the present and indicates the permanent character of the devil, but this status is the result of an act of a previous apostacy, as much as the sinful state of man is brought about by the fall of Adam. God made all things, without exception, through the Logos (John 1:3), and made the rational beings, both men and angels, pure and sinless, yet liable to temptation and fall. As to the time of the creation and fall of Satan and the bad angels, the Scriptures give us no light.—P. S.] Because there is no truth in him.—Because falsehood is in him as the maxim of his life, he is in falsehood; because he keeps no position with himself, he keeps no position in reality. As he deceives himself, so he deceives the world. For internal truth is the centre of gravity which causes a moral being in the sphere of truth to stand firm as a pillar in the world. [Mark the absence of the article before ἀλήθεια, subjective truth, truthfulness, while in the preceding clause ἀλήθεια has the article and means objective truth, the truth of God. Comp. De Wette and Meyer.—P. S.] When he speaketh [λαλῇ ?] a lie.—[τὸψεῦδου is generic, but the English language requires here the indefinite article, while it retains the definite article in the phrase “to speak the truth.” See Alford in loc.—P. S.] Through the devil falsehood comes to its manifestation, thorough his familiar way, his persuasion, his whispering, his insinuation (λαλεῖν). But then he always speaketh of his own [ἐκτῶνἰδίωνλαλεῖ, out of his own resources], from his own nature; himself revealing his own truthless and loveless mind (“The devil has a half-charred heart”); revealing himself to his own condemnation, Matthew 12:34 [ἐκτοῦπερισσεύματοςτῆςκαρδίαςτὸστόμαλαλεῖ. His ἴδια are to be taken ethically. Yet the description of a lie as that which is the devil’s own, includes the idea that it originates from his own will, and that, being only for his own sake, it remained a thing of his own, having no ground in the foundation of truth, in God. For he is a liar and the father thereof [ὃτιψεύστηςἐστινκαὶὁπατὴραὐτοῦ ?].—That which he says proceeds indeed from within himself, and what he is within himself as devil, in his ἴδιον of Satanic egoism, that he puts forth continually in his own work and in the work of his child as its father. Different interpretations of πατὴραὐτοῦ: (1) The father of the lie, τοῦψεύστους, Origen, Euthymius, et al., Lόcke. [With reference to the first lie recorded in history, by which the devil seduced Eve: “Ye shall not surely die,” Genesis 3:4.—P. S.] Observe, on the contrary, that Christ intends to speak here not merely of the author of the lie, but also concretely of the father of the liars, to whom he returns. Therefore, (2) Father of the liar [τοῦψεύστου = τῶνψεύστων. Consequently he is your father, and ye are his children, see beginning of the verse—ψεύστης being singular the pronoun αύτῶν is attracted into the singular αὐτοῦ.—P. S.] Bengel, Baumgarten-Crusius, Luthardt, Meyer [Tholuck, Stier, Alford, Hengstenberg]. Then we must of course take πσεύστης first as a general predicate of the wicked personality. The devil is a liar in himself, and is father of the liar in abominable self-propagation through the delusion of the children of wickedness (2 Thessalonians 2) The ancient Gnostic [and Manichean] interpretation, taking the demiurge as father of the devil, re-applied to the Gospel by Hilgenfeld [and Volkmar], is disposed of by Meyer [p. 359]. Meyer justly observes that in this passage the fall of the devil is presupposed; but it is by no means presupposed that the devil always was wicked (Hilgenfeld and others). It should be added that this description of the devil always suggests the causes of his fall: selfishness, falsehood, envy, hatred. The devil, the beginner of wickedness, 1 John 3:8; 1 John 3:12; the founder of wickedness, the spirit of the wicked. In the temptation of Adam (Wis 2:24; Hebrews 2:14; Revelation 12:9) as well as in Cain’s fratricide, that twofold nature of selfishness showed itself: hatred of truth and love of murder, which culminated in the crucifixion of Christ. There is, however, here no opposition of formal truth and formal falsehood, but the full extent of both ideas is kept in view (Luthardt, Tholuck); this is evident from the nature of the completed opposition itself, when speaking the truth turns life itself into truth, and in like manner lying makes life itself a lie. So the external murder of Abel which Satan effected through Cain is inconceivable without the spiritual murder performed in Adam, which became the cause of the literal murder. John 8:45. But I—because I speak the truth, ye believe me not.—The ἐγὼδέ is forcibly put first, not so much in opposition to the devil (Tholuck, Meyer), as in opposition to the Jews as the spiritual children of the devil. After telling them what they are, the last word of the explanation, what He is, hovers on His lips. Jesus characterizes His Ego to the extent of their present need: (1) He is the witness or the prophet of truth, in opposition to the arch-liar and his children; 2) The sinless one, in opposition to their lust of murder, intending to kill Him; 3) Coming from God, with the word of God, in opposition to their diabolic nature. This however is the great obstacle of His full self-revelation, or rather the Messianic designation of His full self-revelation, that in their hardened lying disposition they are opposed to His spirit of truth; that they do not believe Him for the very reason of His telling them the truth. [Alford: “This implies a charge of wilful striving against known and recognized truth.”] Euthymius [filling up the context]: εἰμὲνἔλεγονψεῦδος, ἐπιστεύσατέμοιἄν, ὡςτὸἴδιοντοῦπατρὸςὑμῶνλέγοντι [If I should speak a lie, you would believe Me as speaking what properly belongs to your father]. John 8:46. Which of you convicteth me of sin? [τίςἐξὑμῶνἐλέγχειμεπερὶἁμαρτίας.]—Different explanations of sin. 1) Because the truth in speaking is previously mentioned, ἁμαρτία must here mean error or intellectual defect. Origenes, Cyril, Erasmus and others. Against this speaks a) that ἁμαρτία in the New Testament throughout designates sin, and even with the classics it does not mean error, deceit, unless with a defining addition, e.g., τῆςγνώμης. [Comp. Meyer, p. 360 f.—P. S.] b) Jesus would in this case make the examination of truth an object of intellectual reflection, we might say, of theological disputation, while otherwise He represents it as a moral and religious process, c) The truth of His word is authenticated by the truthfulness and sinlessness of His life, see John 7:17-18. 2) Sin in speech, untruth, falsehood. Melancthon, Calvin [false doctrine], Hofmann [“Sόnde des Wortes”], Tholuck. Against this: Either this interpretation amounts to the same as the first, or it must include the idea of intentional delusion, of sinful and wicked speech, or all this together (“wicked delusion,” Fritzsche, Baumgarten-Crusius). But for this the expression is too general. 3) Sin, the moral offence. [This is the uniform usage of ἁμαρτία in the New Testament.—P. S.] Lόcke, Stier, Luthardt, etc. Jesus speaks from the fundamental conception that the intellectual life is inseparably connected with the ethical (Ullmann, Sinlessness of Jesus, p. 99). There is no reason in this explanation (with Tholuck) to miss a “connecting link,” or to assume a defect in the narrative. Meantime this declaration is also differently interpreted: a) The sinless one is the purest and safest organ of the perception and communication of truth (Lόcke), or the knowledge of the truth rests upon purity of the will (De Wette). b) Meyer against this: this would be discursive, or at least imply that Jesus acquired the knowledge of the truth in the discursive way, and only in His human state, while, according to John especially, He knew the truth by intuition and from His pre-existent state, and in His earthly state by virtue of His unbroken communion with God. His reasoning is: If I am without sin—and none of you can prove the contrary—I am also without error, consequently I say the truth, and ye, on your part have no reason to disbelieve Me. But Jesus could exhibit His morally pure self-consciousness only by His life. Hence c) the word is to be understood according to the historical connection of the reproach of theocratic sin, They tried to make Him a sinner in the sense of the Jewish regulation with regard to excommunication, but they do not venture to accuse Him publicly, still less can they convict Him. But this consciousness of His legal irreproachableness implies at the same time the consciousness of the moral infallibility of His life and the sinlessness of His character and being, as He on His part recognizes no merely legal righteousness. Our expression is therefore certainly a solemn declaration of the Lord in regard to His sinlessness, which indeed is indirectly implied also in other testimonies concerning Himself, as for instance in John 8:29. The circumstance, that the divine-human sinlessness of Christ had to develop and prove itself in a human way, affords no reason to call it (with Meyer) relative in opposition to the absolute sinlessness of God according to Hebrews 5:8. [This is a most important passage, teaching clearly the sinlessness, or (to use the positive term) the moral perfection, of Christ. He here presents Himself as the living impersonation of holiness and truth in inseparable union, in opposition to the devil as the author and instigator of sin and error. The sinlessness of Jesus is implied in His whole mission and character as the Saviour of sinners from sin and death; for the least transgression or moral defect would have annihilated His fitness to redeem and to judge. It is confirmed by the unanimous testimony of John the Baptist (Matthew 3:14; John 1:15; John 3:31), and the apostles (Acts 3:14; 1 Peter 1:19; 1 Peter 2:22; 1 Peter 3:18; 2 Corinthians 5:21; 1 John 2:29; 1 John 3:5; 1 John 3:7; Hebrews 4:15; Hebrews 7:26). Christ challenged His enemies to convict Him of sin, in the absolute certainty of freedom from sin. This agrees with His whole conduct, with the entire absence of everything like repentance or regret in His life. He never asked God forgiveness for any thought or word or deed of His; He stood far above the need of regeneration, conversion or reform. No other man could ask such a question as this without obvious hypocrisy or a degree of self-deception bordering on madness itself, while from the mouth of Jesus we hear it without surprise, as the unanswerable self-vindication of one who always speaks the truth, who is the Truth itself, and is beyond the reach of impeachment or suspicion. If Jesus had been a sinner, He must have been conscious of it like all other sinners, and could not have thus challenged His enemies, and conducted Himself throughout on the assumption of entire personal freedom from sin without a degree of hypocrisy which would be the greatest moral monstrosity ever conceived and absolutely irreconcilable with any principle of virtue. But if Christ was truly sinless, He forms an absolute exception to a universal rule and stands out the greatest moral miracle in midst of a fallen and ruined world, challenging our belief in all His astounding claims concerning His divine origin, character and mission.—The sinlessness of Jesus must not be confounded with the sinlessness of God: it is the sinlessness of the man Jesus, which implied, during His earthly life, peccability (the possibility of sinning, posse-peccare), temptability and actual temptation, while the sinlessness of God is an eternal attribute above the reach of conflict. If we view Christ merely in His human nature, we may say that His sinlessness was at first relative (impeccabilitas minor, posse non peccare) and, like Adam’s innocence in paradise, liable to fall (though such fall was made impossible by the indwelling divine Logos); nevertheless it was complete at every stage of His life in accordance with the character of each, i.e., He was sinless and perfect as. a child, perfect as a boy, perfect as a youth, and perfect as a man; there being different degrees of perfection. Sinless holiness grew with Him, and, by successfully overcoming temptation in all its forms, it became absolute impeccability or impossibility of sinning (impeccabilitas major, non posse peccare). Hence it is said that He learned obedience, Hebrews 5:8.—The historical fact of the sinlessness of Jesus overthrows the pantheistic notion of the necessity of sin for the moral development of man.—P. S.] John 8:46. I speak the truth, why do ye not believe me.—Luther co-ordinates this word with the former; Christ asking the reason why they did not believe in Him, since they could censure neither His life nor His doctrine. My life is pure, for none of you can convict Me of sin, My doctrine also, for I tell you nothing but the truth. But εἰδὲἀλήθειανλέγω cannot be [illigible words found] co-ordinate to the question. The connection is [illigible words found]rather this: Sinlessness is the truth of life; he who acts out the truth in a blameless life, must be admitted also to speak the truth and to be [illigible words found] worthy of faith. Purity of life guarantees purity [illigible words found] οf doctrine, as vice versa, James 3:2. John 8:47. He that is of God heareth God’s word.—A syllogism; but not with this conclusion: I now speak God’s words (De Wette), but: you are not of God. That Jesus speaks the word of God is pre-supposed in the foregoing. An attentive hearing and reception of the word of God is meant. This is conditioned by being from God, by moral relationship with God; for only kindred can know kindred. The being of God has above been more particularly characterized as a being drawn by God (John 4:44), being taught by Him (John 8:45), as showing itself by doing truth in God, John 3:21. Explanations of he that is of God (ὁὢνἐκτοῦθεοῦ): a) of divine essence and origin, in the dualistic, Manichean sense of two originally different classes of men (Hilgenfeld); b) elect, predestinated (Augustine, Piscator); c) born again (Lutheran and recent Reformed interpreters). In reference to the third interpretation it is to be assumed, that to be of God and to manifest it by hearing His word, is the beginning of the new birth; in reference to the second, that hereby true election comes to light, in reference to the first, that the antagonism between the children of God and the children of the devil is not metaphysical or ontological, but ethical, and is so defined in the New Testament, especially in John. On both sides self-determination is pre-supposed, but a direction and change of life is hereby expressed, which on the one side appears more and more as freedom and resemblance to God, on the other as demoniacal slavery (See John 8:24; John 8:34). John 8:48. Thou art a Samaritan, and hast a demon.—Malicious refusal of, and reply to, His reproach. A Samaritan is doubless the designation of a heretic; but also with the secondary meaning of a spurious origin (from a mongrel nation), and an adversary of orthodox Judaism. (Paulus). “Samaritan” is meant to be a retort to His reproach: “You are no spiritual children of Abraham.” But His reproach: “You are of the devil,” they answer with the insult: “Thou hast a demon,” here in the more definite sense of being possessed of a Satanic spirit. To His two ethical reproaches they oppose two insults, by which they expect triumphantly to silence Him. Hence the self-complacent expression: οὐκαλῶςλέγομενἡμεῖς; Are we not right? Did we not hit it? The form of the expression betrays, that they do not utter these words for the first time. Perhaps the reproach: “Thou art a Samaritan,” was hinted at already in John 8:19; at all events the other reproach: “Thou hast a demon,” in a milder form, was made by the people on a previous occasion (John 7:20); but here we must remember the fact, that the Pharisees had already formerly slanderously charged Him with casting out devils through Beelzebub, the prince of the devils (Matthew 9:34; comp. John 10:25; John 12:24). It is significant that in their view demoniacal possession and a voluntary demoniacal working are the same thing, or rather that they consider the former condition the higher degree of devilish life. John 8:49. I have not a demon.—Jesus, with, sublime self-control and calmness, ignores the first reproach (especially as He cannot recognize the designation of Samaritan either as a title of abuse or a verdict of rejection, “because He had already believers among the Samaritans, and He therefore did not hesitate in the parable of the good Samaritan to represent Himself under the symbol of a Samaritan.” Lampe). Yet He answers this reproach, while answering the second. He does this first with a simple refusal or protest, but then by the positive declaration: I honor my Father. This furnishes at the same time the counter-proof that He is no Samaritan and has no demon. No Samaritan: He proves it by word and life that God is His Father; not a demon: He proves it, that He is not possessed of a dark spirit, but full of the Spirit of the Father, and glorifying Him. This explains the character of their reproaches: they insult and blaspheme; they insult in Him the representative of God’s glory, therefore indirectly the glory of God itself. With this wickedness the matter cannot rest, because God reigns as the God of truth and righteousness. His τιμή obscured by their ἀτιμάζειν, must face them in higher brilliancy as δόξα. But it is not His business to aspire to this δόξα arbitrarily (John 5:41); He leaves this to the Father with the confidence: that as surely as He seeks the δόξα of His Father, so surely will the Father, by His guidance, seek His. He knows that this is even a constant direction of the divine guidance; God is in this respect ὁζητῶν, and brings the case to a decision as ὁκρίνων, in opposition to those who restrain the truth. John 8:51. If a man keep my saying, he will never see death.—The announcement of God’s judgment, includes the announcement of death. This announcement Jesus could not make unconditionally to a Jewish audience, for 1) there might be some among them and there were some who really kept His word; and 2) He could not yet withdraw from His adversaries the invitation to salvation; 3) the thought of the terrible judgment always awakened in Him an impulse of pity and mercy (comp. Matthew 23:27). It is therefore incorrect to assume (with Calvin, De Wette) that these words after a pause were addressed to believers only, or to connect them (with Lόcke) with John 8:31, instead of Joh 8:50. Meyer justly points out the antithesis to the reference to the judgment. His word will carry the believers safely through judgment and death, or rather beyond judgment and death, as the Christians afterwards really experienced at the destruction of Jerusalem. Generally the expression is equal to the similar one: to hear the word, to remain in the word; yet in this keeping the probation in trials and dangers of apostasy is especially emphasized in the κρίσις (Matthew 13:21; John 15:20; John 17:6). He will never see death (not: he will not die for ever); a promise, that his life shall pass entirely safe through the whole succession of judgments, and will not see death even in the final judgment. John 8:52. Now we know that thou hast a demon.—The answer of blind enmity to His enticing call of mercy. If they understand the word of Jesus of His natural death, it is probably an intentional misunderstanding in order to escape the force of His thoughts. They argue thus: He who promises to others bodily immortality, must Himself possess it in a still higher degree. But since Abraham and the Prophets died, it is a senseless and demoniacal self-exaltation if you claim for yourself freedom from death. It seems to be a characteristic part of their speech when they say: Now we know that Thou hast, etc, i.e., Now at last we know positively what we have before accused you of; and when they further change τόνἐμὸνλόγον (John 8:51) into τὸνλόγονμου (John 8:52), and the expression οὑμὴθεωρήσῃ into: οὐμὴγεύσηται, though the latter expression is also used by the Lord in a different connection, Matthew 16:28. The γεύεσθαι is a usual expression among the Rabbins (Schφttgen, Wetstein), probably not merely in general a picture of experience, but a figure of the drinking from the cup of death; in any case it denotes ironically the antithesis to every enjoyment of life. While the expression: not to see death, denotes the objective side of the believer’s experience, according to which death is changed into a metamorphosis of life, the phrase: not to taste death, means the subjective emancipation from the guilty sinner’s dread and horror of death. John 8:53. Whom dost thou make thyself?—With more than half-feigned shudder before the word of self-exaltation, which He is about to utter, they manifest at the same time a demoniacal curiosity to know the last word of His self-designation. Thus the form of the excited questions is explained by the mixture of their fanatical and chiliastic emotions. John 8:54. If I glorify myself, my glory is nothing.—At first a protest against the reproach of self-exaltation. He makes nothing of Himself from His own will, but suffers Himself to become everything through the guidance of God. He does not answer their question directly, because every word referring to the true greatness of His δόξα would only be to them unintelligible and cause error and offence. The full majesty of the divine-human Son of God must as a new fact be accompanied by the new idea, a new name, Philippians 2:9. The accomplishment of this fact, however, belongs to the government of the Father. Therefore He cannot arbitrarily anticipate His glorification, without contradicting His real δόξα, which is just a fruit of self-humiliation and perfect patience, Philippians 2:6. But for this very reason the Father is active as the one that glorifieth Him (ὁδοξάζωνμε), of whom they say that He is their God (ὅτιθεὸςἡμῶνἐστιν). To them it is the strongest reproach, that He is the same, whom they with spiritual pride point out as their God, and which is true in a historical, though not in a spiritual sense, to their own condemnation. The whole force of the contrast between their and His knowledge of God lies in this, that He can say: it is My Father, who glorifies Me, the same one whom you unjustly call your God, as you do not even know Him. That they do not know Him, they prove by their not recognizing His revelation in Christ, and their persecuting and insulting Him unto death. John 8:55. Ye know him not, but I know him.—Commentators are apt to ignore the contrast between the οὐκἐγνώκατεαὐτόν and the threefold οἶδααὐτόν [see, however, Meyer, footnote, p. 366]. In any case it means: you have not even indirectly made His acquaintance, but I have made His acquaintance directly; I. have looked at Him and know Him by intention. We choose from the different shades of the idea, the expression: I know Him.—I should be a liar like you. The child-like expression of the sublime self-consciousness of Christ. Were He to deny this unique and constant experience of God as His Father (Matthew 11:27), He would, if this were possible, through mistaken and cowardly modesty become a liar like them. This entry is longer than a Bible module can hold. The rest is at https://www.sermonindex.net/commentary/lange/ V Christ The Light Of The World Over Against The Blind. The Healing On The Sabbath Of The Man Who Was Born Blind, With The Symbolical Co-Operation Of The Temple-Spring Of Siloam. The Day Of Christ, And Christ The Light Of That Day. The Light Of The Blind A Judgment Of Blindness On Those Who Imagine They See. Symbolism Of Light, Of Day, Of Day‘S Works. (All Light Of The Sun Should Be Used, After The Example And Spirit Of Christ, To Produce Light; Hence Too All Efforts Of Culture A Symbolical Creation Of Light, Pointing To Him Who Creates Light In The Real Sense Of The Term.) The Excommunication, Of The Germinant SeparationJohn 91And as Jesus [he] passed [was passing] by, he saw a man which was [omit which was] blind from his birth. 2And his disciples asked him, saying, Master [Rabbi], who did sin [who sinned], this man, or his parents, that he was born [should be born] blind? 3Jesus answered, Neither hath this man sinned [Neither did this man sin] nor his 4parents: but that the works of God should be made manifest in him. I [We] must work the works of him that sent me, while it is day: the night cometh, when no man can work. 5As long as I am in the world, I am the light of the world. 6When he had thus spoken, he spat on the ground, and made clay of the spittle, and anointed the eyes of the blind man with the clay. 7And said unto him, Go, wash in the pool of Siloam, (which is by interpretation, Sent). He went his way 8[away], therefore, and washed, and came seeing. The neighbours, therefore, and they which before had seen him that he was blind [who had before observed him because he was a beggar] said, Is not this he that sat and begged [sitteth and beggeth]? 9Some said, This is he: others said, [said, Nay, but,] He is like him: but 10[omit but] he said, I am he. Therefore said they unto him, How were thine eyes opened? 11He answered and said [omit and said], A man that is called Jesus made clay, and anointed mine eyes, and said unto me, Go to the pool of [omit the pool of] Siloam, and wash: and I went and washed, and I received sight [I went therefore (οὖν) and washed and received sight]. 12Then said they [They said] unto him, 13Where is he [that man, ἐκεῖνος]? He said [saith, λέγει], I know not. They brought 14[bring] to the Pharisees him that aforetime [before, once] was blind. And it was the sabbath day [it was sabbath on the day] when Jesus made the clay, and opened 15his eyes. Then again [Again therefore] the Pharisees also asked him how he had received [he received] his sight. He said unto them, He put clay upon mine eyes, and I washed, and do see. 16Therefore said some of the Pharisees, This man is not of [from] God, because he keepeth not the sabbath day [omit day]. Others said, How can a man that is a sinner do such miracles [signs]? And there was a division 17among them. They say [therefore] unto the blind man again, What sayest thou of him, that [because, or, seeing that, or, for having opened] he hath opened thine eyes? He said, He is a prophet. 18But the Jews [The Jews therefore] did not believe concerning him, that he had been blind and received sight, until they called the parents of him that had received his sight. 19And they asked them, saying, Is this your son, who ye say was born blind? how then doth he now see? 20His parents answered them [omit them] and said, We know that this is our son, and that he was born blind: 21But by what means he now seeth, we know not; or who hath opened [who opened] his eyes, we know not: he is of age; ask him [ask him: he is of age]: he shall [will] speak 22for himself. These words spake his parents [These things his parents said] because they feared the Jews: for the Jews had agreed already that if any man did confess that he was Christ [should acknowledge him as Christ], he should be put out of the synagogue [excommunicated]. 23Therefore said his parents [For this reason his parents said], He is of age; ask him. 24Then again called they [So they called the second time] the man that was [had been] blind and said unto him, Give God the praise [Give glory to God]; we 25know that this man is a sinner. He [therefore] answered and said [omit and said], Whether he be a sinner or no [whether he is a sinner], I know not: one thing I 26know, that, whereas I was blind, now I see [that I, a blind man, now see]. Then said they to him again [They therefore said to him], What did he do to thee? how opened he thine eyes? 27He answered them, I have told you already, and ye did not hear: wherefore [why] would ye hear it again? will [would] ye also be 28[become] his disciples? Then [omit Then] they reviled him and said, Thou art his disciple; but we are Moses’ disciples. 29We know that God spake [hath spoken] unto Moses: as for this fellow [but as for this man], we know not from [omit from] whence he Isaiah 30 The man answered and said unto them, Why herein is a marvellous thing, that ye know not from [omit from] whence he is, and yet he hath opened [he 31opened] mine eyes. Now [omit Now] we know that God heareth not sinners; but if any man be a worshipper of God, and doeth [do] his will, him he heareth. 32Since the world began was it not heard [it was never heard] that any man opened the eyes of one that was born blind. 33If this man were not of [from] God he could do nothing. 34They answered and said unto him, Thou wast altogether [wholly, ὅλος] born in sins, and dost thou teach us? And they cast him out [not simply from the place where they were, but from the synagogue=excommunicated him]. 35Jesus heard that they had cast him out; and when he had [omit had] found him he said unto him, Dost thou believe on [in] the Son of God [the Son of Man]? 36He answered and said, Who [And who] is lie, Lord, that I might [may] believe on 37[in] him? And [omit And] Jesus said unto him, Thou hast both seen him, and it is he that talketh with thee. 38And he said, Lord, I believe [I believe, Lord]. And he worshipped him. 39And Jesus said, For judgment I am come [I came] into this world, that they which [who] see not might see; and that they which [who] see might be made [might become] blind. 40And some of the Pharisees which [who] were with him heard these words, and said unto him, Are we [also] blind also? 41Jesus said unto them, If ye were blind, ye should have no sin [ye should not have sin]; but now ye say, We see; [.] therefore [omit therefore] your sin remaineth. AND [The account of the blind man and the miracle wrought on him, with its consequences, is uncommonly life-like, full of circumstantiality and characteristic details which could not have been invented, and clearly show that the writer was an eye-witness of the scene. All attempts of modern skeptics to turn the miracle into a medical cure of inflammation of the eyes (Ammon), or to explain it from a misunderstanding of Joh 9:39 (Weisse), or from a mythical imitation of the healing of Naaman, 2 Kings 5:10 (Strauss), or from dogmatic design (Baur), are baseless and exploded conjectures. Comp. Meyer, p. 391, 5th ed.—P. S.] John 9:1. And in passing by (καὶπαράγων). This history is evidently connected [by καί] in respect to time and place with the preceding chapter [with ἐξῆλθενἐκτοῦἷεροῦ, John 8:59]. As regards time, it was the day after the close of the Feast of Tabernacles, and that a Sabbath. John 9:14. See Leviticus 23:39. As for the place, Jesus had just quitted the temple, and we are most probably to imagine the blind beggar as seated at the entrance to the temple (comp. Acts 3:2). De Wette cannot reconcile this peaceful occurrence with the scene of violence, John 8:59; John 16 but it is precisely in this secure deportment of Jesus, and in His halt after the moment of the most imminent peril of death, and while He was still in the vicinity of danger, that, we should recognize the Lord and Master. Hence we refer the παράγων (comp. Mark 2:14), not to the beggar, but to Jesus Himself. It is obviously the participle of the preceding, even though doubtful παρῆγενοὕτως. While lie is in the act of passing by the last frequenters of the temple, the blind beggar meets His eye at the door, and the fact of His pausing to look at Him is revealed by the question of His disciples. [A man blind from his birth, ἐκγενετῆς=ἐκκοιλίαςμητρός, Acts 3:2. Possibly the beggar himself proclaimed the fact of his native blindness as giving additional force to his appeal for alms. It makes the miracle all the greater, and places it beyond the reach of an extraordinary medical cure (Ammon and other rationalists), but does not warrant the extravagant notion of some fathers (Irenζus, Theodorus Mopsu., Nonnus) that Jesus created the eyes out of the πηλός, as God made the blind man out of clay. According to Luthardt, the blind man represents the “world,” to which Christ turned after being rejected by the Jews; but this does not follow from John 9:5, “lam the Light of the world,” for the emphasis lies on light, and the world embraces the whole of humanity, Jews and Gentiles—P. S.] John 9:2. Rabbi, who sinned? The motive for this question on the part of the disciples could, in their present situation, scarcely be dogmatical interest, being, its they were, just reunited to the Master after His escape from stoning. We suppose that they wish to induce the Lord to pass by the man as unworthy of His self-sacrificing interest, in order that He may hasten on; and that hence their question, uttered on the spur of the moment, derives a decided Pharisaical coloring from the popular notion. According to Euth. Zigabenus they suppose neither to be the case. Admitting this, the question itself would fall to the ground. The disciples take for granted that, this blindness was caused only by sin; the question is merely as to the dilemma: this man or his parents? The latter supposition was the proximate one, in accordance with the Pharisaical explication of Exo 20:5 (Lightfoot, p. 1048). Nevertheless, the disciples give the first place to the more remote question: whether this man himself sinned. Beza, Grotius and others have accounted for the expression by the belief in the transmigration of souls. This belief, however, could not have been, entertained by orthodox Jews, even though it may subsequently appear among the Cabalists (see Comm. on Matth., John 14:2, p. 272, Am. ed.). Cyril, De Wette and others mention, in explanation of the question, the belief in the pre-existence of souls (in accordance with Wisdom of Solomon John 8:20); but neither was this a national tenet of orthodox Jews, although it had forced an entrance from Platonism into Alexandrian Jewish theology. The view that most naturally suggests itself is, that the man may already have sinned in the womb, as an embryo, by evil affections. The distinction between nobler and baser vital motions in the embryonic state is also intimated by Scripture, Luke 1:41; Luke 1:44. Rabbinism has with reference to Genesis 25:22 [the struggle between Jacob and Esau in the mother’s womb] further matured this idea (Lightfoot, Sanhedrin, fol. 91, 2, etc.). An obscure idea of pre-existence may have occurred to the disciples, who were here fashioning a question from reminiscences, together with this notion of embryonic guilt. The conception of Lampe, Luthardt, etc.: has he sinned, or, as this is inconceivable, etc., is not in accordance with the text. Tholuck’s supposition after Camero: they thought that he might in anticipation have been branded as a sinner [for predestinated sin to be committed here-after], is certainly not altogether clear (Meyer), [and without analogy in the Scriptures]. Von Gerlach speaks doubtfully in this connection of a punishment that precedes sin; and just as one-sidedly of how the work of divine grace has swallowed up avenging justice; while according to Heubner it is simply a question of the recognition of the fact that there are also unmerited sufferings (i.e., of sinful men, who yet have not directly brought the suffering upon themselves). John 9:3. Neither did this man sin nor his parents. There is no question of their sinfulness in other respects, but Christ knows that no sin, either of this blind man or of his parents, was the cause of his being born blind.—But that (ἀλλ’ ἵνα); namely, to this end was he born blind [τυφλὸςἐγεννήθη]. The ultimate object of evil, as of things in general, is the glorification of God in the salvation of men; the glorification of God is however more definitely a glorification through the works of Christ, which are God’s own works. Here, too, God should be glorified in the salvation of the man who was born blind. It is incorrect to suppose that the question of the disciples first directed the attention of Jesus to the unfortunate man. This view is contradicted by the preceding εἷδεν. [Trench’s remarks on this verse [Miracles, p. 238 f.) are appropriate: “The Lord neither denies their [the parents’] sin, nor his: all that He does is to turn away His disciples from that most harmful practice of diving down with cruel surmises into the secrets of other men’s lives, and, like the friends of Job, guessing for them hidden sins in explanation of their unusual sufferings. This blindness, He would say, is the chastening of no particular sin on his own part, or on his parents’. Seek, therefore, neither here nor there the cause of his calamity; but see what nobler explanation the evil in the world, and this evil in particular, is capable of receiving. The purpose of the life-long blindness of this man is that the works of God should be made manifest in him, and that through it and its removal the grace and glory of God might be magnified. We must not, indeed, understand our Lord’s declaration as though this man was used merely as a means, visited with this blindness to the end that the power of God might be manifested to others in its removal. The manifestation of the works of God has here a wider reach, and embraces the lasting weal of the man himself … it includes their manifestation to him and in him” [as well as on him]. Comp. John 11:4; Rom. 5:30; Romans 9:17; Romans 11:25; Romans 11:32-33.—P. S.] “John 9:4. We [not I] must work. See the Textual Notes. According to Kuinoel, Jesus designed to meet the scruples entertained by the disciples as to the propriety of the healing on the Sabbath, which He was about to undertake. It is more probable that with this saying He encounters their urgent entreaties to hasten away from the dangerous position. Hence, with the “we,” He holds them fast also to the place where it is their duty to remain, and reveals to them that in the future they, as the prosecutors of His work, must stand firm in similar situations; with a view to which destiny they are now being exercised.—Who sent me. Not: Who sent us. The works of God are comprehended in His work, for which He alone is sent; in the carrying out of His work in individual works His disciples are to be participators with Him. As long as it is day; the night is coming. The antithesis of day and night is the antithesis of the time of His life and activity in opposition to the period of His passion and death; uttered in anticipation of His approaching death, yet in the assurance that at present no mortal peril threatens Him. Similarly the contrast of day and night is significant of the contrast of life and death in the classics, especially in Homer (see Meyer). In the Rabbins: “Pirke Aboth, II. 19; ‘R. Tarphon spake: The day is short; the work is great; the Master presseth.’ ” Tholuck. Hence the interpretation of Chrysostom and others with reference to the αἰὼνοὖτος and μέλλων is incorrect. Paulus quite tritely explains; Broad-daylight was requisite for cures effected upon the eyes! The day-time of the day’s work of Christ was at the same time a day-time of redemption, of visitation for Israel, which terminated with His night, viz: His death (see John 9:5). Only we must not convert this relative antithesis into an absolute one by the declaration: now is the time of grace, afterwards the time of darkness; thus Olshausen, after earlier exegetes (Grotius and others), too strongly defined the contrast. Luthardt: The presence of Christ in the world is the time of the event of redemption; His subsequent separation from the world the time solely of the appropriation of redemption; this interpretation comes nearer the mark, and yet Meyer, not without foundation, quotes against it John 16:7; John 16:15; John 16:26; John 14:26 and other passages, according to which the death of Jesus was the condition of greater enlightenment. The figure of the day’s work is here the decisive one. Every man has for his day’s work his one day by which he must profit; when his night comes he can work no more. So too must Christ perform His great, single, and yet universal, official historical day’s work, conditional upon His earthly pilgrimage. John 9:5. While I am in the world.—We suppose that Christ here compares Himself to the sun, the light of day, as chap. 8 to the pillar of fire, the light of the night. This assumption is founded on the preceding antithesis; day, night. Accordingly the ὅταν will mean quamdiu (Vulgate and many others), but not quandoquidem (Zwingle, Lampe, Lόcke), or: [quando] at the time when (Meyer). The sun, throughout the day, as long as it is in the world, is the light of the world. The sun, however, opens and enlightens only the eyes of the seeing; Christ, as the real Sun, opens and enlightens the eyes of the blind likewise. And along with this is expressed the fact that He is the Sun of the world in a spiritual sense. The ὅταν, however, in its figurative sense, denotes the antithesis between the personal presence of Christ in the world and His departure from the world, after which He does not indeed cease to be the light of the world (for the operations of the Paraclete are His), but He no longer works corporeo-spiritually as light, but spiritually, until at the last day the great solstice returns with the day of resurrection. The figure of the sun, which in its day illuminates everything, is the strong expression of His assurance that He will enlighten the eyes of the blind man. John 9:6. He spat.—The whole conduct of Jesus is manifestly expressive of strong intentionality, and this must first receive our consideration. As the pursuers are close behind Him, and the disciples in a state of anxious tension, it seems to Him that His primary concern must be to give proof of His tranquillity by calmly remaining on the ground. Moreover, as His adversaries accounted Him guilty of antagonism to the law of Jehovah in His previous healing on the Sabbath, chap. 5, they should now see that the God of their temple is His co-agent on the Sabbath, since the temple-waters of Siloam are brought into co-operation: a fundamental motive, this, which exegesis has omitted to notice (see Leben Jesu, III., p. 635). Furthermore, as the blind man does not yet know Him, and at first is en rapport with Him only through the tone of His voice, the life of faith must of course be developed within him by a gradual process, as in the case of the blind man at Bethsaida (Mark 8:23; comp. Mark 7:33). With reference to the use of external means, the three factors: the saliva, the clay, the spring of Siloam, and also the unity of the entire act must be distinguished. Respecting the employment of saliva comp. the analogous cases Mark 7 and chap. 8 (See Com. in loc.).On the sanativeness of clay in diseases of the eyes see Tholuck’s quotation from Serenus Samonicus:† “Si tumor insolitus typho se tollat inani, Turgentes oculos vili circumline c�no;” and Lightfoot. On the virtue of the waters of Siloam see above the Exegetical Notes on the pool of Bethesda (chap. 5) and Robinson II., p. 155. In discussing the destination of the elements here employed in Christ’s one act of healing, we have to distinguish the idea of their material or medicinal, their organic or instrumental, their ethical and their allegorical destination. That the external elements in their combination had, as ancient remedies, no medicinal power to give sight to the man who was born blind, is evident. But that they were the better fitted to be organical bearers of the miraculous power of Christ, i.e., conductors of it (Nonnus: πηλὸςφαεσφόρος; Olshausen and others), because they were moreover accounted medicinal, is all the more obvious since the question is here of the saliva of Christ and of a salve that He made with His own hand. But since the receptive faith in the miracle must correspond with the positive miraculous power, the alternative is misapprehended when Tholuck and Meyer will set aside the psychologico-ethical consideration (Chrysostom, Calvin and others) of the awakening of faith by the use of these in the case of the man who was born blind. In the instances given in the Old Testament also (2 Kings 4:41; John 5:12; Isaiah 38:21) the organic operation of the miracle-worker is to he grasped conjunctively with the awakening of the psychologico-ethical receptivity. The allegorical interpretation (Luthardt on the anointing with clay: he who will see must become blind; after some Church fathers) is the most remote; on the mythical interpretation of Strauss, Baur, etc., see Meyer [p. 378. John 9:7. Go, wash.—It is a question here whether the asyndeton would not be better composed of three members than of two. The latter (go, wash thyself into the pool) is of course explained by the custom of the language. Tholuck: νιψαιεἰς pregnant, either including the entering into the water or expressive only of the dipping into it. Winer, p. 369 [387].—In the pool of Siloam.—The spring, Isaiah 8:6; the pool, Nehemiah 3:15. Its situation see above, chap. 5 Meyer: “Re-discovered by Robinson (II., p. 142 ff. [Am. ed. of 1856, vol. I., pp. 338 ff.]), after Josephus, at the mouth of the Valley of Tyrop�um on the south-east side of Zion. See Tobler, The Fountain of Siloam and the Mount of Olives, 1852, p. 1 ff.; Rφdiger in Gesen. Thes. III. p. 1416; Ritter, Erdkunde, XVI. p. 446 ff. [Comp. my annotations with regard to the latest researches, on pp. 181 ff. Alford, at the close of his vol. on the Gospels, p. 923 f., gives a communication of a correspondent on the supposed identity of Siloam with the pool of Bethesda. Robinson has discovered, and Tobler and Warren have confirmed the connection of the intermittent Fountain of the Virgin (probably the pool of Bethesda) with the Fountain of Siloam, and both were probably connected with a fountain beneath the temple, which remains to be proven by further exploration.—P. S.]—The pool of Siloam.—The chief reference of this is not to the district of Siloam (as Tholuck has it, referring to Luke 13:4; Joseph. De bello Jud. II. 16, 2; VI. 7, 2); but it is especially the Siloah-pool of Siloah-spring which is again mentioned in the following. Tholuck’s explanation of the sending to this pool—for the purpose of purification—is too bald, as is also the design ascribed by Meyer: in order that the healing power of the clay ointment might have the necessary time for operation. Concerning the more direct purpose see the note to the preceding verse. As regards the sanative element of the water we can as little reject it (Meyer: the rabbinical traces of a healing power resident in the water point to the organs of digestion, see Schφttgen) as attach any particular credit to it; at all events it assisted in forming a foothold for the faith of the blind man.Which is, when translated, One Sent.—The designation ωִׁ ?ιμεֹ ?ηַ (Greek in the Sept. and in Josephus Σιλωάμ) signifies: the sending [missio sc. aquarum], probably with reference to the fact that the temple-mount sends forth its spring-water. The question is, how far this word may become synonymous with ωָׁ ?μεּ ?ηַ sent, [missus], or the sent. According to Hitzig the form is derived from ωָׁ ?μεּ ?ηַ as ιμּ ?εֹ ?γ from ιָ ?μεּ ?γ and John has correctly translated: ἀπεσταλμένος (Com. on Isaiah 8:6, p. 97. For particulars see Tholuck, p. 327). According to Bengel, Meyer and others the evangelist referred the name to the blind man who was sent to the spring. An unfounded typology, unsupported by the context. This fountain, in that it is called the Sent, is the type of Him who in John continually designates Himself as the real Sent One, the type of Christ (Theophylact, Erasmus, Calvin [Ebrard, Luthardt, Hengstenb., Brόckner, Godet, Trench, Alford, Wordsworth] and others). It is remarkable how this pregnant symbolism has perplexed the commentators. Wassenbergh and others are inclined to consider the parenthesis (after the Syrian and the Persian translation) a gloss; Lόcke also (p. 381) will not be “persuaded” that the parenthesis is Johannean; Meyer pleads in extenuation the “far more striking example” of a “typical etymologizing,” Galatians 4:25. He went away therefore.—As there is no mention of any leader it seems certainly to be indicated that a faint dawning of sight had already begun. Of course we are not to imagine that the anointing of the eyes glued them together; the release of the visive faculty may also have been preceded by a clairvoyant disposition. Compare the fine description of the restoration to sight of blind �dipus in Sophocles. But as this trait is at all events not brought forward, it cannot be insisted upon as a certainty (comp. Tholuck with reference to Neander: “although we may also think that there was a guide”).—And returned.—Not in particular to Jesus, but from the spring and to his family (John 9:8). John 9:8. The neighbors therefore.—Now follows an account of what further befell the blind man; so minute, distinct and true to life is this narration that we are at liberty to suppose the Evangelist had it from the very lips of him who was blind and healed (see Tholuck, Meyer). John 9:11. A man that is called Jesus.—He is therefore not acquainted with the Messianic character of Jesus; he, however, emphasizes the name of Jesus. He has immediately noticed the significant name, which was not the case with the impotent man of Bethesda (chap. 5). The form of his already budding faith in the prophetic dignity and divine mission of Jesus declares itself in John 9:17; John 9:33; he as yet does not know Him as the Messiah, John 9:35. I received sight.—Ἀναβλέπειν means to look up, to see again. Meyer maintains against Lόcke’s explanation: I looked up (Mark 16:4, etc.), the: I received sight again; for this there is no ground in John 9:15; John 9:18, although the explanation of Grotius: nec male recipere quis dicitur, quod communiter tributum humanζ naturζ ipsi abfuit, is ingenious. John 9:13. They bring to the Pharisees the whilom blind man.—Doubtless the Pharisees in a peculiar sense are meant; hence in their magisterial capacity and as enemies of Jesus; this is proved also by what follows. For to regard it as signifying the Pharisees in general “as a corporation” (Meyer) is historically inaccurate. Neither is there any ground for the assumption that they had led him before the Pharisees on account of the healing on the Sabbath, because they believed the transgression of the law should be reported. On the contrary, the clause: him that once was blind, indicates that they considered it their duty to bring the miracle to the cognizance of the theocratic court (see Tholuck). It is only after the introductory clause: it was the Sabbath, that the stumbling-block appears among the Pharisees. If these Pharisees did at all events form a judicial court (comp. the Pharisees John 7:47; John 11:46), since, as subsequently appears, they call a judicial inquiry and execute an act of excommunication, the question arises, whether it was the great Sanhedrin itself (Tholuck), or a minor Sanhedrin (Lόcke); of the latter there were two in Jerusalem; these small Sanhedrins, as synagogue-courts consisting of 23 assessors, settled minor lawsuits in the Jewish cities. The latter supposition is the more probable, in accordance with hierarchical discipline; yet doubtless the small Sanhedrins in Jerusalem were closely connected with the great Sanhedrin, especially in matters that concerned the Person of Jesus. Tholuck alleges in support of his position, that the great Sanhedrin alone wielded the power of excommunication from the congregation of Israel. But the grade of the ban incurred by the healed blind man is not mentioned, and in minor degrees the right of excommunicating was possessed by the small Sanhedrins as well. Lόcke assumes that the leading before the Pharisees took place after the Sabbath, as, according to the Talmud, on the Sabbath and on feast-days no causes were tried; Tholuck thinks it probable that sessions were held on the Sabbath also; he supposes only “that no writing was done.” At all events, such Sabbath sessions were extraordinary, and members of the Sanhedrin themselves took the initiative in them; therefore in this case we are safe in supposing that the presentation occurred after the Sabbath. John 9:14. And it was Sabbath on the day when Jesus.—“A rabbinical statute specially prohibits the spreading of saliva on the eyes on the Sabbath. Maimonides, Schabb. 21. If this ordinance was not yet extant or sanctioned, still the general law was in force which forbade all healing on the Sabbath except in cases where life was imperiled (Schφttgen and Wetstein ad Matthew 12:9).” Meyer. Hence stress is laid upon the fact that Jesus made clay on that day. John 9:15. Again therefore the Pharisees also asked him how he received his sight.—It is characteristic of them that they pass over the miracle itself, that he has received sight, and inquire at once as to the manner how, because the latter is the point to which the accusation of heresy against Jesus must attach itself. He put clay (a paste), etc.—Meyer justly draws attention to the circumstance that the man relates only what he has himself felt, and hence does not mention the saliva; so before John 9:11. John 9:16. This man is not from God because he keepeth not the Sabbath.—Characteristic hyperbaton, by which the name of God is brought forward first with hypocritical reverence, and then a contemptuous emphasis is laid upon: this man. Because he keepeth not the Sabbath, see note on John 9:14. Others said, How can a man that is a sinner do such signs? The disparaging inference was drawn only by a portion of the tribunal; by the majority, it is true. From the mention of a greater division in this forum it seems to result that it was an association other than the great Sanhedrin. Be it observed, that these more conscientious judges express themselves timidly through fear of the others, but yet go so far as to declare that the miracle performed by Jesus proves that He is not a sinner. John 9:17. What sayest thou [σύ is emphatic] of him, because, etc.—John introduces this statement with the characteristic οὖν again. It was to be expected that they would resort to artifices. For the evangelist is again speaking of the dominant party in this court. So explain Apollinaris and others: it is the hostile party which is here spoken of; Chrysostom on the contrary, erroneously: it is the friendly party; Meyer and others: all are included. It is patent, however, that the conduct of the suit is in the hands of the predominant hostile party. But of course the examination takes place in the name of the whole body. As regarded the fact itself, they had no further hold on the clear-headed and firm man. Hence they inquire what conclusion he has reached with respect to the miracle-worker,—what opinion he has formed of Him—in order from this dogmatical point to unsettle him and betray him into some other statement. From the question of faith they design to unsettle him in the question of fact, as the hierarchy once did with the Jansenists in France. He is a prophet.—The straight-forward, decided and intelligent character of the man appears still more distinctly here. May we call him “uncouth” also (Tholuck)? Instead of that he manifests good humor, acuteness and ready wit. [These attributes, especially a cheerful temper, I have frequently found in blind persons. Kindly nature often compensates for so great a calamity as the loss of an organ.—P. S.] John 9:18. The Jews therefore did not believe.—That the hostile party is here designated by the name of Jews, by no means proves that in this place it first re-appears in active operation (Meyer). It characterizes them, however, as Jews, or unbelievers, that they now, having heard the confession of the man, issuing from the fact, do not believe, i.e. will not believe the fact itself. This does not mean that they consider the whole account, for example, of the making of clay by the Lord, a lie; but they pretend that some fraud may exist. John again intimates by the expressive οὖν that their unbelief and mistrust originate in their fanaticism. In the first place, they evidently desired to reproach Jesus with a violation of the Sabbath. But in this they were thwarted by the great miracle which weighed heavily in the balance. Therefore they now hope to accuse Him of a spiritual deception and, at the same time, of violating the Sabbath.—Until they called the parents. Meyer explains; Then they believed. Tholuck on the contrary: This does not result from the ἕωςὅτου. Of course it follows only, that they must now let pass the judicially protested statement of the man, whether they believed it or not. John 9:19. Is this your son?—The one question progessively subdivides itself into three questions [put in strict legal formality: 1. Is this your ?Song of Solomon 2. Was he born blind? 3. How did he recover his sight?—P. S.]. They, however, hasten on to the third query, because in it is concentrated the weight of their fanatical passion, or because by intimidating the parents, they hope to be able to weaken the testimony of the son. John 9:21. But by what means he now seeth, we know not.—The first and second questions are successively answered by the parents simply in the affirmative. The third question they evade. Yet they hint that they have heard of One who has opened his eyes. On this point the son must speak for himself. The whole reply is characteristic of parents who are honest and sensible, but at the same time timidly and selfishly cautious. Something of their son’s intellectual humor is perceptible in their answer, which however especially testifies to their pride that their son has wit enough to give them correct information with regard to the last question. The thrice repeated αὐτός [αὐτοῦἡμεῖς—αὐτόν—αὐτός] is in the highest degree significant. On the one hand, it tells of their confidence in their son, but on the other hand also of their fear. That they thereby jeopardize him, or leave him in the lurch, is truly a selfish trait. They lack strength to prove their gratitude for the healing of their son by uniting their testimony to his, although they clearly indicate by the tartness and touchiness of their reply that they are thoroughly observant of the bad intentions of the inquisitors. John 9:22. For the Jews had already agreed, etc.—A public and formal decree or act (Tholuck) can not as yet be intended, else they must now have brought the cause of Jesus to an immediate termination; a mere agreement of private individuals (Meyer) would, however, be saying too little. Doubtless the subject in question is a regulation, made by the Jews in Jerusalem, concerning excommunication from the synagogue. Such a regulation directly became known to the people and served to intimidate the spirits of the undecided. The ἵνα gives the interest of excommunication as a motive for the regulation. This determination probably coincided with the resolution to have the Lord taken, chap. 7. He should be put out of the synagogue [be excommunicated.]—Tholuck: “The word άποσυνάγωγος has led to researches into the nature of the Jewish law; of these the latest (for example, Rόetschi in Herzog’s Encykl.) still refer to the old authorities, to Drusius, Lightfoot; the subject has been more thoroughly investigated in Gildemeister’s Blendwerk des Rationalismus, 1841.According to this the Mischna does not recognize several grades of excommunication; it knows of but one. the πִ ?γּ ?εּ ?ι, in pursuance of which the excommunicated person was not permitted to shave or wash or to enter other than an outer hall of the temple. The duration of this was dependent upon the contrition of the person. Excommunication was inflicted by the President of the great Sanhedrin. Opinions differ with regard to the biblical expression ἀποσυνάγωγος as to whether it means simply exclusion from divine worship in the synagogue of a single congregation (Vitringa, De Synagog. vet., p. 741; Witsius, Miscellanea, ii. p. 49), or exclusion from the ύύχָ ?δָ ?μύ the united congregation (Selden, De Synedr. i. 7). But the former appeared merely as a substitute, when the temple was no longer in existence. Moreover the recognition of Jesus as the Messiah was such an offence that nothing can be intended save exclusion from the great congregation.” The matter, however, is scarcely decided so simply. Evangelical history demonstrates that this man suffered a species of excommunication which did not prevent him from going about with impunity, while Jesus came under a ban with which a trial resulting in death was connected. The idea of the ἀνάθεμα (Romans 9:3) or ἀνάθεμα, μαρὰνἀθά (1 Corinthians 16:22) is manifestly derived from circumstances connected with the synagogue and denotes an excommunication symbolically expressive of reprobation, the Cherem of the Old Testament. On the other hand, we know that unclean persons and lepers (these from levitical reasons, as also from ethical reasons “publicans and sinners”) were excluded from the full right of communion in a way which could scarcely have amounted to Cherem. Thus from two to three degrees of excommunication are faintly traced in the Holy Scriptures themselves, and three grades of excommunication are certainly intimated by the words of Christ also: in danger of (the synagogue’s) judgment, in danger of the council (Sanhedrin), in danger of hell fire (Matthew 5:22). The first degree, as it appears in rabbinical tradition (Niddu), may be designated a congregational course of discipline. The second degree is ecclesiastical or rather theocratico-political (Cherem); the third hierarchico-criminal (Schamatha). The fact that the Mischna treats of excommunication in its more limited sense only, might be thus explained: the Jews had in its time lost all right of conducting religious criminal proceedings or executing the Cherem, whilst on the other hand, in the absence of a religious centre, the disciplinary congregational proceeding might coincide with the ecclesiastical in the limited sense of the latter term. The subsequent distinct, rabbinical development of several grades of excommunication (see Winer, s. v. Bann) must at all events be grounded on ancient tradition. In this connection be it observed that a purely disciplinary course of proceeding is no longer spoken of, while the Cherem in Elias Levita is in its turn intensified by the idea of Schamatha. Analogous to the latter is the solemn form of the great excommunication accompanied by curses in the Church of the middle ages.John 9:24. Then they called the second time the man, etc.—The rigor of the judicial procedure appears from the fact that they caused the man who had been healed to go away or step out during the examination of his parents. As they do not attain their purpose with them, they summon him again.—Give glory to God. As regards the expression, this is a solemn charge to tell the truth, which he might possibly have concealed hitherto (Joshua 7:19); as regards the intention, it is an insinuation that he should make a statement such as they desired; hence in reality it is blasphemous hypocrisy, meaning as much as this: give the hierarchy the glory, and lie or play the hypocrite. So they seek to influence his evidence by the previous statement of their opinion. John 9:25. Whether he is a sinner I know not. One thing I know.—The dogma of the hierarchical dignitaries he is content respectfully to leave undecided. But he will not be dissuaded from his actual experience. He knows full well too, what light his experience throws upon the dogma whereby they support their accusation of heresy. John 9:26. To him again: What did he to thee?—They at first endeavored to make the healed man the accuser of Jesus on the score of a violation of the Sabbath, then on the ground of spiritual deception. They now despair, in view of the firmness of the man, of making away with the miracle itself, that Jesus had wrought. They return therefore to the how, to the accusation of breaking the Sabbath, in order to make that a means of working upon the man. Their evidently malicious examination, however, fills the man with scorn, and he mingles irony with the expression of his displeasure. John 9:27. Are ye also desirous to become his disciples?—Chrysostom: He thus presents himself (with the καί) as the disciple of Jesus. But he utters the words principally with reference to all the disciples of Jesus, of whom he has heard. Plainly perceiving their intention to stamp him also as the disciple of Jesus if his testimony does not accord with their wishes, he makes use of the ironical and withal defensive expression not without a presentiment of his own destiny. John 9:28. They reviled him.—At first gravely, craftily, calmly, now passionately, meanly they press upon him. To call him the disciple of Jesus delights them as if it were some vile aspersion; and the accusation seems to them true, because he has allowed himself to be healed by Him on the Sabbath, bears witness to this fact and believes Him to be a prophet,—or, because he will not turn liar to please them. The antithesis: Jesus’ disciple, Moses’ disciples, relates here to the pretended violation of the Sabbath, in the guilt, of which he seems to have participated, and to their zeal for the sanctity of the Sabbath. Qualification of the antithesis by the antithesis: Moses, Jesus. Moses characterized as a prophet, Jesus as an antithesis to Moses, a suspected person, concerning whom they reserve their final opinion. Yet a sting lies in the expression: we know not whence. From some quarter He had extraordinary power; this his dealings with the blind man demonstrated; now if this power was not from above, the man on whom the cure had been performed would be distressed by the thought that he had been healed by demoniacal agency. John 9:30-31. With respect to him, this is marvellous, to wit, etc.—We do not translate ἐντούτῳ: in this matter, herein, but: in respect to this one, namely Jesus, previously the subject; and we render the γάρ not by: truly, but by: namely. They have ambiguously declared: we know not how it is with that fellow; he is a mystery to us. He rejoins ironically: certainly that is wonderful as far as He is concerned. And now comes the strange thing: they, fathers in Israel, know not whence He is, and yet He is a man of God and a prophet, who has opened his eyes. The expression doubtless boars the twofold signification that now his spiritual eyes are beginning to be opened. And he then appeals to their common creed: Now we know that God heareth not sinners, (John 9:31). Job 27:9; Job 35:13; Psalms 109:7; Proverbs 15:19. But a miracle is a hearing of prayer (John 11:41; Mark 7:34), consequently Jesus must be free from their reproach; He is of necessity no sinner, but in favor with God.—But if any be a God-fearing man, etc.—First, therefore, comes the testimony to the innocence and piety of Jesus, and then the enthusiastic testimony to His unique prophetic glory bursts forth. John 9:32-33. Since the world began it was never heard, etc.—Hereby, in accordance with his subjective sense of the greatness of the miracle experienced by himself, he not indistinctly elevates Jesus above all the prophets, and even above Abraham and Moses, whom they had exalted as judges over Him. Finally, reverting to what had gone before, he says appeasingly: If this man were not from God (as a prophet), he could do nothing.—He would likewise be unable to disquiet you. John 9:34. Thou wast born wholly in sins.—These Pharisees assume from the beginning that his being born blind is a punishment for sin; now however they cast upon him the additional reproach of being ὅλος (not simply ὅλως) born in sins,—intimating, namely, that as a heretic he was not only physically blind and maimed, but that his soul shared the defects of his body. With haughty emphasis: thou, born thus, thou wilt, teach us? Cast him out.—The external turning of the man out (of the hall of judgment) was doubtless here symbolical, a corroboration of the excommunication, the casting out πִ ?γַּ ?η ,πָ ?γָ ?η=ἐκβάλλεινἔξω, John 6:37; John 12:31, which preceded. The excommunication is indeed with malicious wit prefaced by the words: thou wast on every side born in sins (comp. also John 9:35), and is denied by Meyer without valid reason. John 9:35. Dost thou believe on the Son of God [Son of Man?—See Text. Notes.—P. S.] After Jesus has heard that by his steadfast testimony he has earned the disgrace of excommunication, He can reveal to him by His question the faith that he ignorantly possesses. According to Meyer, Jesus makes the assumption that he has confessed the Messiah before the tribunal; and Meyer also states that this conclusion is “virtually” correct. Jesus only assumes that the man has believingly recognized the living God in His miraculous deed, and has maintained this belief in temptation without being aware of what faith nominally comprehends. It is precisely the question of Jesus that gives him this fulfilment and sealing. Meyer asserts that not the metaphysical but solely the theocratical signification of the Son of God is to be understood in this place. The theocratical signification was, however, not exclusive; its background was formed by the “metaphysical” acceptation of the title. John 9:36. And who is it, Lord, that I may believe in him? etc., (ἵνα).—He is ready to take Jesus’ word for it. That is: he credits Jesus in an unlimited sense, and in this trust of his lies the presentiment that Jesus Himself is the Son of God;—the germ of his faith in Him. John 9:37. Thou hast both seen him, etc.—The animated question is followed by an animated answer from Jesus, hence beginning with καί (see John 14:22; Mark 10:26). Thou hast seen Him. Tholuck construes the word ὁρᾷν in a general sense, with reference to experience, namely, even to their first meeting; Meyer as having reference to the present seeing: thou hast a view of Him. But with this the rendering of the καί—καί as well—as also—does not correspond. The seeing really seems to contain also an allusion to his spiritual receiving of sight, (Lόcke). Indeed thou hast already seen Him, and—He it is that speaketh with thee. Manifestly, a turn is given to the expression. The true antithesis would be: thou hast perceived Him, and He hath given thee sight, or: thou hast seen Him and dost see Him now. John 9:38. I believe, Lord.—Lord in a loftier sense here than in John 9:36 (Bengel). The προσκυνεῖν denotes adoring worship. John 9:39. For judgment I came, etc.—The kneeling man has sealed his excommunication by his act of adoring homage and, knowing as yet little of fellow-disciples, finds himself in a unique and isolated position, confronting, with Jesus only, the mighty hierarchy. Jesus appreciates the state of the case. He reveals to him that he is entering into a congregation of the seeing, that the hierarchs who condemn him stand ever against him as blind men, and that He Himself, Jesus, is the destined cause of this separation. The oxymoron at the same time utters the decree that he has become possessed of spiritual sight, that he is illuminated inwardly as well as physically. The motive is the contrast between the Pharisees, learned in the Scriptures, hardening themselves in spiritual blindness in presence of His light, and the ignorant blind beggar who receives sight through His light; this contrast is presented in the light of divine appointment (see Matthew 11:25). The judgment is not a judgment of damnation (Euthym., Olshausen), for it refers also to the blind who obtain sight. It is the judgment of active sentencing and retributive separation between those who are in need of light and those who shun it; of course for the latter this severance is the beginning of the judgment of damnation, while to the former it is the commencement of bliss. The contrast between those that see not, who receive sight, and the converse, is ingeniously apprehended by Bucer and Neander in an intellectual and a physical sense, i.e., typically, not simply allegorically. The spiritually blind do not see well physically until with spiritual sight they receive also true bodily sight. Those possessed of spiritual sight, being primarily discerners of Old Testament truth, but who subsequently delude themselves in their self-conceit, become through their obduracy intellectually and physically blind in presence of the Messiah. Christ particularly addresses this saying to the blind man; but it is also loudly and solemnly uttered for the disciples and all that are about Him. John 9:40. Some of the Pharisees who were with him.—Faithless former disciples (Chrysostom), more favorably disposed ones (Calvin), spies from Jerusalem (Tholuck, Meyer). According to Matthew 12:30 and other passages, the εἶναιμετ’ αὐτοῦ seems to denote a relation of discipleship. Probably a remnant of pharisaically-minded followers is meant, who stand to Him in such wise as the people, Luke 18:9; comp. John 10:19-20. Judas, as the last Pharisee, did not desert Him until after this. Are we also blind?—They cannot mean this in the physical sense (as Chrysostom and others explain); neither can they understand it with reference to those who have become blind (Hunnius, Stier), but with reference to the intellectually blind who must receive sight. They deny, therefore, that they, as blind men, have received sight, or are yet to receive it, i.e., they assail the principle laid down by the Lord, and establish a third class consisting of men originally possessing sight and ever becoming more clear-sighted. This attack upon His antithesis calls forth the piercing words of Jesus. John 9:41. If ye were blind ye would not have sin.—It is questionable whether blindness is to be taken in the same sense here as John 9:38, οἱμὴβλέποντες i.e., whether it denotes those who need light. Or: if ye considered yourselves blind. Thus interpret with reference to the: ye say: we see, Augustine, Calvin, Meyer, Stier. Tholuck is undecided. Augustine: “Quia dicendo: ‘videmus,’ medicum non quζritis, in cecitate vestra remanetis.” On the other hand Chrysostom, Zwingli, etc., Lόcke, Neander [Alford] discover in the expression the recognition of a certain superiority. Tholuck: It cannot be denied that the position of the scribes towards the fountain of the saving knowledge of the Redeemer is regarded as an advantage (Luke 11:52; John 3:10); and thus Matthew 11:25 they are called συνετοί not merely inasmuch as they thus look upon themselves, but as men who really were so in comparison with the ὅχλοςἀγράμματος. So too in the practical field, where the δίκαιοι are confronted with the ἁμαρτωλοί the δίκαιοι are in very truth relatively righteous and the ἁμαρτωλοί gross sinners, publicans, Matthew , 9, comp. the elder brother, Luke 15; certainly, however, the former are also such as think themselves endowed with a sufficiency in possessing this δικαιοσύνη and σύνεσις. The recollection of this parallel has induced many commentators to see in the words εἶτυφλοὶἦτε the recognition of a certain pre-eminence. “If ye were indeed utterly incapable of perceiving what is divine,” or better: “if a certain insight into the truth of salvation were not granted you;” De Wette: “if ye were ignorant, erring,—with the accessory idea of susceptibility,—the imputation of sin would be on a smaller scale.”—We also assume that Christ here attributes to them a certain degree of sight. It is the gleam of a better, objective, Old Testament knowledge which they are consciously converting into a false, unbelieving knowledge, i.e. into the blindness of self-infatuation. Hence the advantage of Old Testament knowledge itself (as of legal righteousness itself) can not be meant. Certainly, however, self-conceit in the possession of this knowledge is meant; the vain-gloriousness that turns the Old Testament dawn into a dazzling brightness, legal righteousness into self-righteousness (=impenitence), and represses the consciousness within them that in the presence of the broad day they are still blind, i.e. in need of New Testament illumination. Between Chrysostom and Augustine there is then no real antithesis. If a man is to acknowledge himself to be blind (Augustine), there must needs be a relative gleam of light (Chrysostom); if he prematurely deem that he possesses sight, he abuses this very glimmering of light with evil consciousness, making himself then totally blind. But forasmuch as the emphasis lies upon this evil consciousness, both interpretations are onesided. If ye knew not that ye falsify yourselves, ye would through sincerity arrive at self-knowledge, and your sin (with the guilt the sin also) would be taken from you. But as, on the contrary, ye pretend against your better consciousness that ye see and that ye have always possessed sight, ye, with your need of light as with the light that has arisen upon you, fall into blindness and your sin remaineth (because the guilt remains). Thus in the saying, there is a dissembling, whereby they contradict their own deepest consciousness. Self-blinding results in self-hardening on the part of the intellect. Hence: if ye did not in reality know better how it is with you, etc.; but now ye haughtily dissemble, etc. This undoubtedly: your eyes are in some faint degree illuminated, but just sufficiently to render you entirely blind. AND ETHICAL1. “That of which Dr. Paulus regretted the absence in the tales of the miracles, a thorough investigation, is in this instance present in the form of a judicial examination on the part of the most embittered antagonists.” Tholuck. 2. The fact that in all cases evil is in a general sense connected with sin, had at an early period been individualized by natural Phariseeism; this is to be found among Gentiles as well as among Jews. Gentiles and Jews agreed in the disposition to see in the misfortune of an individual the punishment of his sin, in the wretch a man hateful to God (comp. Acts 28:4), or at least to regard his affliction as a curse entailed upon him by the sin of his parents. It is indeed in many instances impossible to mistake the immediate connection between sin and punishment in the life of an individual; neither can we shut our eyes to the fact that parents are frequently to blame for the misery of their offspring. That Jesus did not unconditionally reject this reference, the following passages demonstrate: Matthew 9:2; John 5:14; Luke 23:28. Nevertheless He does here reject the Pharisaical rule that in all cases extraordinary sufferings may be immediately traced to extraordinary sins,—a rule already contradicted by the book of Job. Luke 13:1, He likewise repudiates the judicial condemnation of afflicted sinners by sinners as yet unvisited by God, whether the guilt of the former be more or less apparent. The thing, however, most abhorrent to Him is the perverted view men take of misfortune and suffering in themselves, as though they were as bad as sin, nay, as if they were in the strictest sense of the word, evil itself, conducing to the perdition of souls, Matthew 5:10-11; Luke 15:16-17; Matthew 16:24; the present passage. Consistent Phariseeism saw in the lowliness of Jesus His unworthiness, in His defencelessness His guilt, and, after having crucified Him, in His cross His curse, whilst Jesus recognized therein His own glorification and the salvation of the world. 3. The declaration of Jesus: “Neither this man hath sinned, nor his parents,” opens to us a glimpse of the profoundest depths of life. There might still be a genealogical cause for the malady,—a cause, however, far remote and contained in the guilt of generations long since dead. But at the same time He teaches us to meditate upon the clear teleology, the removal of evil to the glory of God, rather than ponder over the particular causality of individual evil. 4. That the works of God might be made manifest in him (John 9:3). A clear and Christological teleology of evil, as also of the permission of sin. The old world of evil, debased by sin, is destined to be destroyed by the new wonder-world of Christ; similarly, the centre of evils, sin itself, is to be destroyed by the wonder of His life as the centre of His miracles. 5. The works of Christ the very works of God (John 9:4). 6. Christ’s day is the day of the world, from which proceeds all the day-light of the world until the last day (John 9:4-5). The day’s work of Christ is the day’s work of the world, the source of all New Testament days’ works until the last day. The night of His death-time is the termination of His work; it contains for unbelievers the principle and germ of the Last Judgment and the night of eternity. 7. The history of the man who was born blind is the portrait or type of the great and sudden conversion of an upright man; the portrait of a simple, wise, cheerful, vigorous and valiant manner of belief; the portrait of a leading from belief in the living God of miracles to the Personal Christ; the portrait of a Jewish inquisition, as of the impotence of hierarchic excommunication. 8. Christ is the real Sun-light of the world (John 9:5), as His work is the real day’s work in this Sun-light. Christ, in co-operation with the sacred temple-water of Siloam, appears as the real Shiloah and temple-fount itself. Christ has come into the intellectual world for judgment, to transform the seeing into blind men and to endow with sight those who are blind. The distinction in this fact between human guilt and divine dispensation in judgment is to be observed; similarly the distinction between the Christological purpose (the operation of Christ) and the final design (the glory of God). 9. The brook of Siloam was the true temple-spring at the foot of the temple-mount, outside of the sanctuary; hence at an early period it was a symbol of prophetic spiritual blessing, the fulfilment of which symbol has appeared in the Messiah, See Isaiah 8:6. 10. The discouraged disciples of Jesus, who had at this time in Jerusalem hoped for His glorification within the precincts of the temple—see John 8—and were now obliged to accompany Him in His flight from the temple to escape the stoning, stood in need of special encouragement. This was afforded them in the healing of the blind man, whose confession might even put them to shame. Here too we see how in every situation Jesus above all things restores to His dejected people first courage, confidence, and therewith presence of mind and true composure. 11. It is remarkable that the Pharisees do not directly prosecute Jesus Himself on account of this Sabbath-day healing. Probably because He called the temple-spring of Siloam into co-operation. AND The history of the man who was horn blind; 1. The miracle or the power of the love of Christ; 2. the trial or the power of upright simplicity and gratitude; 3. the issue or the victory of faith over the strongest temptation; 4. the profound interpretation and lofty signification of the event.—The question of the disciples, 1. with regard to its purport, 2. with regard to the motives which prompted it.—The answer of Jesus to the question of the disciples—in the most general sense all sufferings are to this end: God will glorify Himself in the sufferers.—The obscure causes of human sufferings often evade our glance, but the divine purpose is ever clear.—Above all things we should keep in sight the divine purpose and our duty in view of it.—Christ the real Light of the world: 1. hence a creative Light, not only luminous but illumining (the Light of the blind); 2. hence likewise the Day of the world, Light and Life; 3. hence, too, the Accomplisher of the great day’s work of the world.—The exhortations of God to the day’s work of Christ: 1. The day’s work (as type, archetype, copy); 2. the warnings (of day, of night).—Christ the Light of our day’s work.—The irrecoverable day of our life.—The Lord, the Giver of light and life when Himself in peril of death.—The beggars at the temple-gates (comp. Acts 3).—The night cometh, etc.—Christ, the Healer, in His employment of natural remedies: 1. He does not need them; 2. He uses them for the sake of the one who is to be healed; 8. This entry is longer than a Bible module can hold. The rest is at https://www.sermonindex.net/commentary/lange/ VI CHRIST THE OF ALL LIFE; THE TRUTH OF THE AND THE CHURCH. A) THE DOOR OF THE FOLD IN TO THE THIEVES; B) THE IN TO THE AND THE WOLF; C) THE CHIEF OF THE GREAT DOUBLE FLOCK. ( OF THE DOOR OF THE FOLD TO THE , John 9:35. OF FALSE , THIEVES AND . OF THE GOOD . CHRIST, , NOT ONLY THE HIGHER REALITY OF THE EARTHLY, BUT ALSO THE TRUTH AND OF THE OFFICE IN ISRAEL AND THE CHURCH, IN TO THE FEARFUL OF THE OFFICE.) THE AND THE REAL , OR AND REAL .—THE AND AMONG THE JEWS AT THEIR UTMOST HEIGHTJoh_10:1-21(John 10:1-11 pericope for Tuesday in Whitsun-week; John 10:12-16 pericope for Misericordias Domini.) 1Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that entereth not by [through] the door into the sheepfold, but climbeth up some other way, the same is a thief and a robber. 2But he that entereth in by [through] the door is the [omit the] shepherd of the sheep. 3To him the porter openeth; and the sheep hear [give heed to] his voice: and he calleth his own sheep by name, and leadeth them out. 4And when he putteth forth his own sheep [when he hath put forth all his own], he goeth before 5them, and the sheep follow him: for [because] they know his voice. And [But] a stranger will they [they will] not follow, but will flee from him; for [because] they know not the voice of strangers. 6This parable spake Jesus [Jesus spoke] unto them; but they understood not what things they were which he spake [spoke] unto them. 7Then said Jesus unto them again [Jesus therefore said], Verily, verily, I say unto you, I am the door of the sheep. 8All that ever [All those who] came before me [or, instead of me, ἦλoονπρὸἐμοῦ ?] are thieves and robbers: but the sheep did not hear them. 9I am the door; by [through] me if any man enter in, he shall 10[will] be saved, and shall [will] go in and out, and [will] find pasture. The thief cometh not, but for [omit for] to steal, and to kill, and to destroy: I am come [I came] that they might [may] have life, and that they might have it more abundantly [may have abundance]. 11I am the good shepherd: the good shepherd giveth [layeth down] his life for the sheep. 12But he that is an hireling, and not the [a] shepherd, whose own the sheep are not [nor the owner of the sheep], seeth the wolf coming, and leaveth the sheep, and fleeth; and the wolf catcheth [teareth] them, and scattereth the sheep. 13The hireling fleeth, because he is an hireling, and careth not for the sheep. 14I am the good shepherd, and know my sheep, and am known of mine [and they know 15me even as]. As [as] the Father knoweth me, even so know I [and I know, κὰγώ] the Father: and I lay down my life for the sheep. 16And other sheep I have, which are not of this fold: them also I must bring, and they shall [will] hear my voice; and there shall be [will become] one fold [flock, ποίμη, not αὐλή, Comp. John 10:16], and 17[omit and] one shepherd. Therefore [On this account, for this reason] doth my [the] Father love me, because I lay down my life, that I might [may] take it again. 18No man [No one] taketh it from me, but I lay it down of myself. I have power to lay it down, and I have power to take it again. This commandment have I received of my Father. 19There was a division therefore again among the Jews for these sayings. 20And many of them said, He hath a devil [demon], and is mad; why hear ye him? 21Others said, These are not the words of him [of one] that hath a devil [demon]. Can a devil [demon] open the eyes of the blind? AND [The parabolic discourse of John 10 is closely connected with the preceding miracle and suggested by the tyrannical and cruel conduct of the Pharisees—the blind guides and false shepherds—towards the blind man who had been restored to sight by Jesus—the Light of the world and the true Shepherd. It was no doubt spoken before the same audience, as may be inferred not only from the uninterrupted connection, but also from the express reference to the preceding miracle in John 10:21. We have here a divine pastoral taken from everyday life in Palestine and addressed mainly to ministers of the gospel. With the whole subject should be carefully compared the Old Testament descriptions of the false shepherds and the true Shepherd of Israel with prophetic reference to the Messiah, in Ezekiel 34.; Jeremiah 23:1-6; Zechariah 11:4-17. To these may be added, as a remoter parallel, the incomparable Psalms 23 which represents the Lord as the good Shepherd of the individual believer, who feeds and guides and protects him throughout life, and even through the dark valley of death.—John omits the parables which form such a prominent and characteristic part of Christ’s teaching in the Synoptists (comp. especially Matthew 13), but he gives two parabolic discourses or parabolic allegories, extended similes (called παροιμία, John 10:6), one on the Good shepherd (John 10), and on the True Vine (John 15), which are not found in the other Gospels. A parable (παραβολή, from παραβάλλω, a comparison, similitude), in the strict technical sense derived from the synoptical parables, is a poetic narrative taken from real life for the illustration of a higher truth relating to the kingdom of heaven, which is reflected in, and symbolized by, the world of nature. As a conscious fiction, the parable differs from the myth, and the legend, which are unconsciously produced and believed as an actual fact (as children invent stories without doubting the reality); as a truthful picture of real life for the illustration of spiritual truth, it differs from the fable, which rests on admitted impossibilities (as animals thinking, speaking and acting like rational men), and serves the purpose of inculcating the lower maxims of worldly wisdom and prudence. John’s parables are extended allegories rather than parables; they present no narrative or completed picture, but simply one figure, either a man (the shepherd in relation to his flock), or an object of nature (the vine in relation to its branches), as a symbolic illustration of the character and relation which Christ sustains to His true disciples. Christ stands out here expressly as the object and meaning of the parable. In the parable before us we must distinguish two acts: in the one Christ appears as the Door of access to the church and to God, John 10:1-10; in the other as the true Shepherd of the flock, John 10:11 to John 18:14 A similar blending of images we find in Hebrews 9, 10, where Christ is set forth both as the priest and the sacrifice, as the offerer and the offering (John 9:12; John 10:19). Bengel says: Christus est ostium et pastor et omnia.—P. S.] Our section closes the period of undecided fluctuations and fermentations in the nation. It is not merely a continuation of the word of the preceding chapter (as Meyer, Tholuck, Besser suppose); in that light is the fundamental idea, in this the shepherd is the leading thought. The conversion of the man who was born blind to Christ and his excommunication by the Pharisees (it appears from this chapter also, that they acted as an official forum) induce the Lord to exhibit in His own person the truth and fulfilment of the earthly as of the spiritual pastoral office, and in believers on Him the truth and fulfilment of the theocratic communion. Hence, this discourse ripens the disagreement among the people to a point necessarily resulting in separation. The scene is undoubtedly unchanged, the auditors are the same, but there is no reason why we should on this account, in pursuance of the example of Meyer [to which Alford assents], begin the chapter with John 9:35. Even John 10:40-41 belong to the close of the foregoing chapter. This figurative speech is in form a flowing parabolical discourse [παροιμία, together with παραβολή to be comprehended in the Hebrew ξָ ?ωָׁ ?μ; according to Quinctilian: fabella brevior, as the saying, John 15:1), and not a completed similitude (a parable). There is no foundation for the assumption of Strauss, that what was originally a parable was transposed by the hand of the evangelist into this more fluent form, especially as flowing parabolic discourses are to be found in the Synoptists also. Tholuck after Wilke (Rhetorik [p. 109],): “It has the character of an allegory, which exhibits a relation and is technically significant in all its features, not that of a parable, the scope of which is the application of the fundamental thought.” Allegories and parables form, however, no true antithesis. See Comm. on Matthew, chap. 13. John 10:1-9. First parabolic discourse.—Christ the Door of the fold for the true shepherds of the communion in antithesis to thieves and slaughterers. Introduced by the solemn formula, Verily, verily.—Certain knowledge of the true church-discipline in antithesis to that exercised by the hierarchy. John 10:1. He that entereth not through the door, etc.—A figure borrowed from oriental pastoral life. The sheep needing protection and guidance, but, at the same time, submissive and gentle, pressing closely to its fellows in such wise as to form a flock, knowing and following its leader, symbolizes the pious, believing soul; the flock is a symbol of the Church; the shepherd, entering by the door, symbolizes the ministry in the Church (Psalms 100:3; Psalms 95:7; Psalms 77:20); the fold βְּ ?γֵ ?ψָ ?δαὐλή aula), i.e., an uncovered space, surrounded by a low wall and affording protection to the flock at night—is a symbol of the fenced-in and inclosed theocracy (φραγμός, Matthew 21:33); the door itself, as the necessary entrance to the fold, is the symbol of Christ. For the further features consult the sequel. The Entering in [εἰσερχόμενος] is brought forward as the leading thought in antithesis to the climbing up [ἀναβαίνων]. By itself it denotes authorized entrance with right purposes. Each, however, is characterized by the addition: Through the door. There should be no doubt as to the meaning of this, after the explanation of Christ, John 10:7, in reference to the Pharisees who did not understand Him, John 10:6 : I am the door.The interpretation of the door as signifying the Holy Scriptures (Chrysostom, [Theophyl., Euth.-Zigab.] Ammon), is connected with the false discrimination of the parabolic discourses, in accordance with which the similitude changes as early as John 10:8 or 9; Tholuck approves of this discrimination. Patristic expositors since Augustine have therefore rightly comprehended the expression as having reference to the institution of the ministry by Christ; they were wrong only in limiting it to the historic Christ and the New Testament ministry. Luthardt wishes us to understand by the door, simply, the way ordained by God, without further definition, in contradiction to John 10:7. Tholuck, assenting to the opinion of Luthardt: the right, divinely ordained entrance, by which devoted love to the sheep is meant. De Wette: Only in His truth, in His way can one arrive at the condition of a true shepherd of the faithful. Approximately correct. But why is Christ spoken of in the Old Testament, and why is He in an especial manner the subject of this Gospel throughout? Christ is the principle of the Theocracy, the fundamental idea, fundamental impulse and goal of the Old Testament church of God, and hence the principle of every theocratico-official vocation from the beginning. Thus, He is the Door of the fold. He who enters not by Abrahamic faith in the promise, or through the spirit of revelation and in accordance with that, upon a theocratic office, has not entered into the fold through the door. Even Meyer says: Christ Himself is the door,—with the wonted, chiliastic reference, however, to the “future members of the Messianic Kingdom.”Climbeth up some other way [ἀναβαίνωνἀλλαχόθεν].—Climbeth over from some other side [than the one indicated by the door], in order to get in over the wall or over the hedge. The “Other whence [ἀλλαχόθεν, like the old classical ἄλλοθεν],” chiefly indicates the other place; it denotes likewise, however, the comer from some other direction, the stranger, who does not belong to the fold. Significant of the untheocratic mind, i.e., disbelief of the promise, and of untheocratic motives (according to Matthew 4 cupidity and sensuality, ambition, lust of power). The climbing over may denote a human, vain striving in scriptural learning, legalistic zeal, etc., in antithesis to the way of the Spirit. The same is a thief and a robber. The false way is in itself indicative of treacherous designs. The λῃστής, robber, is not simply a climactic augmentation (Meyer); neither is it a downright murderer. But the robber readily becomes a murderer if he meet with resistance, and the sheep-robber in the like case becomes a slaughterer (in this respect also the translation: Murderer is incorrect, since it is a question of sheep). In the explanation, John 10:10, the thief is the leading idea; it is divided, however, into the stealing thief and the rapacious slaughterer and destroyer. Thus, false officials become thieves to those souls that submit themselves to them and confide in them, and worriers of those that maintain their independent faith, as. chap. 9 of the blind man whom they excommunicated. The antithesis presented by these thieves and true shepherds is of course (after Tholuck) the antithesis of selfishness (Ezekiel 34:8) and love (Jeremiah 23:4). John 10:2. Is a shepherd of the sheep.—[ποιμήν without the article, in the generic sense, while in John 10:11-12; John 10:14 where it refers specifically to Christ, the article is used three times. The E. V. misses this difference by translating in all cases “the shepherd,” while Luther is equally inaccurate in using uniformly the indefinite article: “ein (guter) Hirte.” In tho first part of the parable, John 10:1-10, Christ appears as the Door; in the second as the Shepherd. He is indeed both, but the figures must not be mixed in the same picture.—P. S.] Only he who has become a shepherd through faith in the promise or through Christ, has a loving shepherd’s heart. The form of his entrance upon the office must have been pure, in accordance with his pure motive, and he will prove himself a shepherd. This True shepherd does but form a contrast to the robber; he is not yet, as the Good Shepherd, placed in antithesis to the hireling, or as the head Shepherd (John 10:16) to the under shepherds. John 10:3. To him the porter [ὁθυρωπός] openeth.—The porter watches in the night-time within the fold, and in the morning thrusts aside the bolt for the shepherd when he announces himself. Meyer (after Lόcke, De Wette and others): “Ὁθυρωρός is requisite to complete the picture of the lawful entering in, and is not designed for special exegesis; hence it is not taken into consideration again John 10:7. It is, therefore, not to be interpreted either as referring to God , or to the Holy Spirit, Acts 13:2 (Theodor., Heracl., Rupert, Aret., Cornel, a Lap. and several others), or to Christ (Cyrill, Augustine), or to Moses (Chrysost., Theod. Mopsuest. and several others).” Tholuck interprets it as signifying The Father, in accordance with John 6:44-45. But as the porter is within, in the fold, we must undoubtedly, with Stier, apprehend the Holy Spirit in this feature of the parable, although qualified as the Spirit of the church; this view is contested by Luthardt without sufficient grounds.And the sheep [τὰπρόβατα] give heed to his voice, and he calleth his own sheep [τὰἵδιαπρόβατα] by name.—The article τὰπρόβατα is to be observed. According to most expositors, these are all the sheep of the fold, and are identical with the ἴδιαπροβατα. [Bengel, Luthardt, Hengstenberg, etc.—P. S.] This view is impugned by the fact that nothing is said of the πρόβατα in general, but that they hear his voice; the ἴδια however, he calls by name. According to Bengel, these ἴδια are distinguished from the great mass of the sheep by their special need. Meyer considers it necessary to make use of the circumstance that one fold often afforded shelter at night to several flocks, whose shepherds, coming every morning, were known to all the sheep. On the other hand, the ἴδια are the sheep belonging to the particular flock of the shepherd in question. It is, however, an unfree dependence [of Meyer] upon an archζological note to pretend to discover in this passage a portrayal of the driving together of a plurality of flocks, when the figure has reference to the unitous Old Testament Theocracy. The second misapplication of an archζological comment, according to which it, was customary for the shepherds to give names to the sheep (Pricζus on our passage), consists in the idea that the shepherd must call out all the sheep of his flock by their names (indulge in a very minute roll-call). The statement that the sheep hear his voice forms part of the ideal background of the figure, for in the enclosure of the Old Testament Theocracy there are some that are not true sheep, and these do not give ear to the voice of the shepherd (comp. the Prophets and Galatians, chaps. 3 and 4). But from the real sheep, i.e., the susceptible in general, Christ further distinguishes the ί̓διαπρόβατα, that the shepherd calls by name; the favorite sheep, the elect in a stricter sense [Leben Jesu, II., p. 995); in the symbol of pastoral life the bell-wethers which precede the flock and are followed by it.Meyer controverts this view in the text and ratifies it in the note (against Luthardt) in these words [p. 395]: “Only the ἴδια does the shepherd call by name.” The idea of the figure is very clear: among the sheep there are some that are on terms of closest intimacy with the shepherd; these he calls by name, and because these follow him, he is followed by the whole flock. But to τὰπρόβατα, the others in the fold, do not here come under further consideration. John 10:4. And when he hath put forth [ἐκβάλῃ ?] all his own [τὰἲδιαπάντα, according to the true reading, instead of τὰἴδιαπρόβατα his own sheep.—P. S.] These come at his call. He Lays Hold Of Them and brings them out through the door. Comp. Acts 10. An intimation of the exode of the faithful from the old theocracy. He brings forth all the elect (see the reading πάντα), leaves not one behind. [Ἐκβάλλειν illustrates the energetic mode of ἐξαγαγεῖν, and is appropriate to the employment of a shepherd who “drives” and “turns out” the sheep to pasture. It implies that the sheep hesitate and linger behind, and must be almost forced out of the enclosure. Dr. Lange first discovered in this passage an allusion to the approaching violent secession of the Christian church from the Jewish theocracy, although Luther already intimated that Christian freedom from legal bondage and judgment was here hinted at. It is supported by the term ἐκβάλλειν, by the true reading, πάντα, but especially by the preceding historical situation, the excommunication of the blind man, John 9:34, the threatening decree of the excommunication of Jesus with all His disciples (John 9:22) and the deadly hostility of the Jewish leaders, which made an ultimate violent rupture inevitable. Meyer objects without reason, but Godet adopts and expands Lange’s view, although he connects it more with ἐξάγει (John 10:3) than ἐκβάλῃ (John 10:4). “Jesus, he says (II. 280), charactιrize par ces mots une situation historique determinιe. Le moment est venu pour lui d’emmener son propre troupeau hors de la thιocratic, dιvouιe ΰ la ruine,” etc.—P. S.] John 10:5. But a stranger.—The communion represented in John 10:4-5, is delineated in respect of its exclusive nature. By the stranger only the false prophets can here be understood, until the time of the pseudo-Messiahs.[They will not follow, but will flee from him. The future οὐμὴἀκολουθήσουσιν (the true reading instead of ἀκολουθήσωσιν), and φεύξονται is taken by Lampe as Prophetic, pointing to the cathedra Mosis plane deserenda, by Meyer simply as indicating the consequence.—This whole picture of Joh 10:4-5 is drawn from real life, and is to this day illustrated every day on the hills and plains of Palestine and Syria. Thomson, The Land and the Book, I. p. John 301: “I never ride over these hills, clothed with flocks, without meditating upon this delightful theme. Our Saviour says of the good shepherd, ‘When he putteth forth his own sheep, he goeth before them, and the sheep follow him.’…This is true to the letter. They are so tame and so trained that they follow their keeper with the utmost docility. He leads them forth from the fold, or from their houses in the villages, just where he pleases. Any one that wanders is sure to get into trouble. The shepherd calls sharply from time to time to remind them of his presence. They know his voice, and follow on; but, if a stranger call, they stop short, lift up their heads in alarm, and if it is repeated, they turn and flee, because they know not the voice of the stranger. This is not the fanciful costume of a parable; it is a simple fact.”—P. S.] John 10:6-7. This parable spoke Jesus unto them, etc.—Παροιμία [not=παραβολή], any discourse deviating from (παρά) the common way (οἶμος). See above [and Meyer and Alford in loc.]. What has been said is totally incomprehensible to the Pharisees, in consequence of the idea entertained by them of their office; hence follows the direct explanation of Christ, see above. Tholuck remarks: The not understanding is not to be taken in a merely literal sense, any more than John 8:27; it means rather a state of being sealed up against that truth, which would affirm that they are not the true leaders of the people. Nevertheless it is here a question of an inability to understand, resting upon that evil basis, not simply of the unwillingness to understand.—The door to the sheep, i.e., here, the door of the shepherds; not yet primarily that of the sheep (Chrysostom, Lampe). [John 10:7. I am the door of the sheep. An expansion of the parabolic allegory and the key to its understanding. Ἐγώ, emphatic. τῶνπροβάτων not to the sheep (Lange and Meyer who thinks that John 10:1 requires this interpretation), but for the sheep, i.e., the door through which both the sheep and the shepherds (spoken of Joh 10:1-5 in distinction from the one true arch-shepherd, mentioned afterwards, John 10:11) must pass into the fold of the church of God (Chrysostom, Lampe, Hengstenberg, Godet, Alford, etc.).—P. S.] John 10:8. All who came instead of me, ἧλθονπρὸἐμοῦ.—The expression is obscured by the failing to abide strictly by the figure, i.e., the door. In the first place, then, the meaning is: all who πρὸτῆςθύραςἧλθον. With the first idea of passing by-the door, this other is connected: the setting of themselves up for the door, i.e., all who came claiming rule over the conscience, as spiritual lords, instead of the Lord who is the Spirit. The time of their coming is undoubtedly indicated to be already past by the ἧλθον, not, however, by the πρό, forasmuch as the positive πρό does not coincide with the temporal one. Hence we must not only reject the interpretation of this passage as an antijudaistic utterance against Moses and the Prophets (Hilgenfeld), but also the temporal construction of Meyer: the hierarchic, especially the Pharisaic opposition preceded Him. John the Baptist also came before Him, as did all the Prophets. The explanations of Camerarius: prζter me (sine me, me neglecto), of Calov: before me (antequam mitterentur, instead of after me), of Tittmann, Schleussner: ὑπέρ, loco, in the place of, are correct; they are, however, imperfect and liable to misapprehension, since all the prophets came in a certain sense loco Christi. The instead of our text at once expresses the substitution of some one for Christ, the denial of Christ, the claim to absolute Messianic authority. And at the same time emphasis is given to the ἦλθον. They came as though the Messiah were come; there was no room left for Him (Jerome, Augustine, etc.). As a matter of course, they were false Messiahs, though without bearing that name. It is not necessary that we should confine our thought to those who were false Messiahs in the stricter sense of the term (Chrysostom, Grotius and many others), since the majority of these did not make their appearance until after Christ. Every hierarch prior to Christ was pseudo-Messianic in proportion as he was anti-christian, for pseudo-christianity involves anti-christianity, and the converse is also true. To covet rule over the conscience of men is pseudo-christian. Be it further observed that the thieves and robbers who climb over the wall, appear in this verse with the assumption of a higher power. They stand no longer in their naked selfishness; they lay claim to positive importance, and that not merely as shepherds, but as the Door itself. Thus, the hierarchs had just been attempting to exercise conscience-rule over the man who was born blind. But the sheep did not heed them. Only those who were like-minded with them became their followers. But the true sheep remained constant to the good Shepherd. John 10:9-10. I am the door; if any one enter in through me.—Conclusion of the antithesis.—Enter in through me, he will be saved; i.e., he shall find deliverance in the theocratic communion. The fence of the fold saves from destruction; so also does entrance into the true fastness of the church Through Christ.—He will go in, i.e., in the truth of the Old Testament he shall subordinate himself to the Law.—He will go out; i.e., he shall find in the fulfilment of the Old Testament, in Christ, the liberty of the New Testament faith.—And will find pasture. He who goes out through the door shall reach the true pasturage of faith, knowledge, peace. Already a new parabolical discourse announces itself: the true shepherd does indeed find the pasture for his sheep in the first place, but he also finds it for himself as a sheep (Augustine, Stier and others). Opposed to him stands the thief who arbitrarily makes a false door for himself, and finally himself counterfeits the door. He comes but, on the one hand, to steal, i.e., to rule over souls, and, on the other hand, to slay, i.e., to cast out spirits; in the one case, however, as in the other, to destroy. The following words: I came that they may have life, and that they may have abundance (περισσόν), constitute the transition to the next parable. Two considerations here claim our attention. First, they are for the first time to receive true life; secondly, together with true life they are to receive abundance of true food (green meadows, fresh water-springs). [Comp. John 1:1 : “Of His fulness have we all received grace for grace.” The English Version (with the Vulg., Chrysostom, Grotius, etc.), renders περισσόν “more abundantly,” but this would require περισσότερον.—P. S.] John 10:11. I am the good shepherd. Second parabolic discourse. Antithesis of the good Shepherd and the hireling, on the one hand; on the other hand, of the good Shepherd and the wolf, John 10:11-15. I, Ἐγώ, emphatically repeated. As The Shepherd (with the article), He is the true, real Shepherd, in antithesis to symbolical shepherds in the field and symbolical shepherds in the legal office (Hebrews 13:20 : όποιμὴνὁμέγας); as the Good Shepherd (ὁκαλός). He is the ideal of the shepherd (Psalms 23; Isaiah 40:11; Ezekiel 34:11) in antithesis to bad shepherds (Ezekiel 37; Zechariah 11; Jeremiah 23), who first appeared in the form of the thief, and now branch out into the figures of the Hireling and the wolf. That this is at the same time indicative of the promised Shepherd, Ezekiel 34:23; Ezekiel 37:24, results from the foregoing passages, especially the: “I came,” “they came in my position.” “Comp. Tr. Berachoth, fol. Leviticus 1 : Three things God Himself proclaims; famine,, plenty and a τּ ?ψπνθεα i.e., a good shepherd or head of the congregation; τγπρινθεαιν of Moses and David in Vitringa, Syn. Vet., p. 636. As the leading consideration in the idea of the shepherd, sacrificing love for his sheep is brought forward in Hebrews 13:20.” Tholuck. Layeth down his life for the sheep—Τιθέναιτὴνψυχήν, a Johannean expression (John 13:37; John 15:13; 1 John 3:16). If we keep the figure in mind, this is here expressive neither of the sacrificial death, nor of the payment of a ransom for the slave, but of the heroic risking of life in combat with the wolf. The ὑπέρ, then, is here synonymous with ἀντί. The shepherd dies that the flock may be saved. [Alford: “These words are here not so much a prophecy, as a declaration, implying, however, that which John 10:15 asserts explicitly.”—P. S.] John 10:12. But he that is an hireling [μισθωτός]. —He is characterized by two things: 1. he is not a real shepherd to the sheep, but a hired servant,—he has no affection for the sheep; 2. the sheep are not his own, are not united to him by appropriation and cannot confide in him. The inner vital bond is wanting on both sides. Characteristic of the Pharisaic leaders of the people. Whose own the sheep are not, does not denote the “owner,” but the own shepherd. In this very thing consisted the guilt of the hierarchical hirelings, that they constituted themselves “owners” of the flock. And in this very way also they became hirelings, i.e. under-shepherds, to whom the dishonestly increased wages were the principal thing, while they of course as hirelings had also the predicate of the official situation. [Christ sees here, prophetically, the long list of those selfish teachers who make merchandise of the ministry for filthy lucre and hate the cross, from the apostolic age (Galatians 6:12; Philippians 3:18) down to the present.—P. S.] He beholdeth the wolf coming.—That he perceives him while yet at a distance, is expressive of his fear, not of his watchfulness; this fear is manifested by his withdrawal at first to a place of security (ἀφίησιτὰπροβ.), and then by his downright flight (φεύγει). The wolf comes from without, from the wilderness; he is, however, connected with the hireling by the fact of his being an alien to the flock and by his treachery towards it. He has been interpreted as symbolizing the devil (Euthymius and others, Olshausen), heretics (Augustine and others), “every anti-theocratic power” (Lόcke); “every anti-Messianic power, whose ruling principle, however, as such, is contained in the devil” (Meyer). According to Matthew 7:15 and Acts 20:29, wolves may also make their appearance in an official or pseudo-prophetic form. In such case, however, according to the first passage, they have disguised themselves in sheep’s clothing. The declared wolf is the enemy of the flock, displaying his enmity openly and boldly, while the apostasy of the hireling is still cloaked in cowardly friendship; hence the wolf is the antichristian adversary of the Church, as heretic or persecutor,—in any case the instrument of Satan (comp. the Wolf in Northern Mythology). The wolf ravisheth them and scattereth.—Twofold pernicious effect. Individual sheep are ravished and torn to pieces, i.e. individual souls are destroyed, but the flock as a Whole, the Church, is confused and scattered. John 10:13. The hireling fleeth, because he is an hireling, etc.—No repetition, but the explanation of the flight. As a hireling, he is solely and selfishly interested in pasturing himself; he has not the welfare of the sheep at heart. It is questionable in what degree this figure is illustrated by the conduct of the Jewish shepherds of that time. They did not seem to be wanting in bravery; at first they acted like havening wolves towards Christ, the Good Shepherd, and in the Jewish war they conducted themselves in a similar manner towards the Romans. The point illustrated by the figure is this: The hireling vanishes at the appearance of danger. There are two classes of shepherds to be found when destruction overtakes a church; the one class is composed of cowards who are secretly faithless, the other of bold and open apostates. It is, however, the cowardice of the former that enables the boldness of the latter class to excite consternation in the church. Such hirelings composed a good part of the Sanhedrin, and were especially numerous among the Scribes in the time of Jesus (John 12:42); they possessed a consciousness of the truth of Christ but no heart for it, and they delivered up the Good Shepherd to the wolf. John 10:14. I am the good shepherd. I know my own, etc.—Explicit interpretation of the parabolic discourse just unfolded, as John 10:7. The proof of this character: I know them that are Mine, and the fact of the indissoluble connection with the flock, with true believers, whom the Father has given Him, here expressed by the relation of mutual acquaintance. True, this knowing does not mean loving; but it is still an emphatic expression by which a loving knowledge is implied. It is the expression of the personal, divine cognition of kindred personalities. The grace of Christ is such a cognition of His own on His part; faith, on the other hand, is a corresponding cognition of Christ on their part. John 10:15. Even as the Father knoweth me.—[Belongs to the preceding verse. The E. V. wrongly treats this as an independent sentence.—P. S.] In the personal, spiritual communion of the Father with Christ, and of Christ with the Father, the mutual relationship between Christ and the faithful is rooted. The “as” denotes the similarity of manner as also of kind, inasmuch as the life imparted by Christ to His people is a divine one. A chief motive for the comparison, however, is that the cognition on the part of Christ is the cause of His recognition by believers in return, as the cognition of the Father is the foundation for the corresponding cognition of Christ (comp. chap, John 14:20; John 15:10; John 17:8; John 17:21; 1 John 5:1; Matthew 25:40). Tholuck: “The γινώσκειντὰε̇μά corresponds with the καλεῖνκατ’ ὄνομα, the γινώσκομαι with the οἴδασιτὴνφωνὴναὐτοῦ.”—And I lay down my life.—Expression and measure of the strength of His love towards His people. But the salvation of the heathen also is to be effected by His death (see John 11:52; John 12:24; Ephesians 2:14; Hebrews 13:20). Thus this thought leads to the following. Τίθημι. “Near and certain future,” Meyer. John 10:16. And other sheep I have. [Other sheep, not another fold; for they are scattered throughout the world (John 11:52), while there is but one kingdom of Christ into which they will all ultimately be gathered, and to which they already belong in the counsel and love of God and His Son. Salvation comes from the Jews, but passes over to the Gentiles.—P. S.] Christ the chief Shepherd as Shepherd of the double flock of believers from the Jews and the Gentiles, John 10:16. The Jews resident out of Palestine (Paulus) are not meant, for they too belonged to the unitous Jewish fold; it is the heathen to whom Christ refers; they are not to be thought of as existing in a fold (De Wette), although subject to the guidance of God in another way (John 11:52; Acts 14:16). The heathen are His sheep in the manner stipulated, even as the Jews, i.e. those who hear His voice, who follow the drawing of the Father. Of these Christ says: I have them (ἔχω) with divine confidence. He must lead them (δεῖ); it is the decree of His Father’s love and of His own love. That He shall bring them into the fold of Israel (Tholuck), is not implied by the ἀγαγεῖν, which “means neither adducere, bring (Vulgate, Luther, Beza, Lutthardt [Hengstenb. Godet]), nor συναγαγεῖν (Euthymius, Casaubon and others), but to lead as a shepherd.” Meyer. Bengel: “Non opus est illis solum mutare.” Yet the form: ἀγαγεῖν certainly indicates that the imminent manifest leading of these sheep is a continuation of a secret leading, previously begun (gratia prζveniens). Christ saw the restriction of His ministry to Israel (Matthew 10:5) abolished with His death (Matthew 21:43; chap. 28) As the exalted Christ He was made manifest as the Shepherd of the nations. And they shall hear my voice.—Christ’s confidence in His mission to the Gentiles presupposes at the same time an assurance of their destination to salvation and of the divine guidance of grace exercised over them. They are already sheep, not merely proleptically speaking (Meyer), for the idea of the sheep which gives heed to the voice of the shepherd, and the idea of the regenerate child of God are not one and the same. The sheep is a symbol of the man who hears the voice of Christ; hence, he is shown to be a sheep by his calling, while regeneration occurs but in company with justification. One shepherd, one flock [μίαποίμνη, εἷςποιμήν].—The asyndeton betokens the closer connection of the two members. On an analogous utterance of Zeno in Plutarch (Alex., chap. vi.), see Tholuck. The two flocks become one flock by means of the one Shepherd, in Him; not by entrance into the αὐλή of the Jews. On the contrary, the subject recently under consideration has been the leading of the Jewish flock out of the αὐλή to pasturage. Tholuck: “Since the Old Testament and the New Testament kingdom of God is but One kingdom, the latter being merely an outgrowth of the former, the Gentiles’ reception into it is pictured as a leading unto Zion (Isaiah 2:3; Zechariah 14:17), by Paul as a grafting into the trunk of the good olive-tree and, similarly, in this passage as a reception into the αὐλή of Israel.” See, against this view, the note to John 10:16. In connection with the unity of the Old and the New Testament kingdom of God, we must, however, not overlook the antithesis between the typical Old Testament theocracy and the real New Testament kingdom of heaven. See Daniel 7:14. The latter does not issue from the former, but the former goes before the latter shadow-wise. Christ is the principle of the kingdom of heaven; He is, therefore, also the principle of the unity of the two flocks, Romans 11:25. Inner relation to Christ being the grand point here, this promise has been fulfilled from the beginning of Christianity (one church); but, hence, it must also receive at last its perfect fulfilment in appearance. [Christ is, as Bengel remarks on εἶζποιμήν always the one Shepherd by right, but He is to become so (γενήσεται) more and more in fact. So it may be said, the unity of Christ’s flock exists virtually from the beginning and need not be created, but must be progressively realized and manifested in the world. The unity of the church, like its catholicity and holiness, are in a steady process of growth towards perfection. “It has not yet appeared what we shall be.” The nearer Christians draw to Christ, the more they will be united to each other. It is a shallow exegesis to say that this word of Christ was completely fulfilled in the union of Jewish and Gentile believers in the apostolic church. It was indeed fulfilled then; comp. Ephesians 2:11-22, which is a good commentary on the passage; but it is also in ever-expanding fulfilment, and, like His sacerdotal prayer for the unity of all believers, it reaches as a precious promise far beyond the present to the gathering in of the fulness of the Gentiles and such a glorious unity and harmony of believers as the world has never seen yet. Meyer says correctly: “The fulfilment of the sentence began with the apostolic conversion of the Gentiles; but it progresses and will only be complete with Romans 11:25 f.”—P. S.] John 10:17. On this account doth the Father love me.—The freedom of Christ’s self-sacrifice, John 10:17-18. Various conceptions. 1. Διὰτοῦτο—ὅτι significatively refers to the following: “By this doth the love of my Father appear, that I lay down My life only to take it again” (Bucer, Stier). This view may seem to be upheld by the fact that the love of the Father precedes the work of redemption, and is manifest in the exaltation of Christ. But the love which from eternity has flowed from Father to Son, the love modified by their Trinitarian relation, does not exclude a love to the God-Man, called forth by His historic accomplishment of the work of redemption, and by His moral conduct on earth. Comp. John 8:29; Philippians 2:9. Hence 2. Meyer: Διὰτοῦτο—ὅτι is to be understood as in all passages in John (John 5:16; John 5:18; John 8:47; John 12:18; John 12:39; 1 John 3:1): on this account, because namely,—so that διὰτοῦτο refers to the words preceding, and ὄτι introduces an exposition of διὰτοῦτο. Consequently: “therefore, on account of this my pastoral relation of which I have been speaking (down to John 10:16), doth My Father love Me, because namely, I (εγώ with the emphasis of self-appointment, see John 10:18) lay down My life,” etc. Manifestly, the whole thought is contained in John 10:15-16 also, for the resurrection of Christ must of course precede the taking possession of the “other sheep” from the heathen-world. Even the conclusion, in order that I may take it again (ἵναπάλινλάβωαὐτήν), is variously understood. 1. It denotes the simple consequence of the sacrifice of Christ expressed in the preceding clause (Theod. of Mopsuest., and many others); 2. it indicates the condition (hac lege ut, Calvin, De Wette); 3. the subjective purpose of Christ: because thus only could be fulfilled the ultimate design of the pastoral office John 10:16 (Stier, Meyer); 4. the divine appointment of the aim; namely, in order to take it again, in accordance with the purpose of God, 1 Corinthians 1:14; 1 Corinthians 7:29; Romans 8:17. This taking again, also, is comprehended in the divine ἐντολὴτοῦπατρός, John 10:18. Tholuck. Since the obedience of Christ is here represented as the object of the love of God, ἵνα must undoubtedly be understood as referring to the purpose of Christ; this purpose, however, is not merely subjective, but corresponds with the ἐντολή of the Father, which again, is an ἐντολή of personal life; this has not without reason, been urged by Calvin and De Wette. The sense then is this: therefore doth My Father love Me, because I, dying, render a sacrificial obedience whose principle and motive is infinite trust in the resurrection of My personal life in the fellowship of His absolute personality; because I do not die despairingly, with the idea of annihilation, but in the assurance that I shall thus obtain the full revelation of life; or because I fall into the ground like a grain of wheat, in order to bear much fruit. In this victorious reliance on the new life in death contained in His sacrifice, Christ is the delight of the Father, as, in a similar spirit, the Christian is well-pleasing to God in Christ (see Isaiah 53:12; Luke 2:14; Matthew 3:17; John 17:5; John 12:28; John 17:1). “If the Father love the Son for this reason, this love contains also His love to the world, in the sense of Joh 3:16. Calvin: amorem unigenito debitum ad nos velut ad finalem causam refert.” Tholuck. John 10:18. No one taketh it from me.—As on many other occasions Christ has here, by the solemn asseveration of His voluntary self-sacrifice, precluded any misconstruction of His death, as if He had succumbed to the hostile power of the world involuntarily and contrary to His expectations.—I have power to lay it down, and I have power to take it again. Different interpretations of ἐξουσία. 1. Ancient dogmatical opinion: the power of the Son of God, the power of the divine nature to render the human nature quiescent in death, and to rouse it again. Tholuck: “Like John 14:13 a dictum probans for the non posse mori of the Redeemer (Quenstδdt, III. p. 420, also according to Beck, Christl. Lehrwissenschaft, 2. p. 513 and 517). But it is not the intrinsic, physical necessity of death that is denied, but the compulsive force of circumstances, as οὐδείς shows. Nothing is meant but what is contained in Matthew 26:53. Comp. John 14:30. Mortality, as also Luther rightly acknowledges, is to be imputed to Christ, inasmuch as He took upon Himself sin-infected [?] humanity; see my [Tholuck’s] Commentary on Romans 6:9.” 2. Meyer: “The authorization, in the first place of His self-sacrifice and secondly of His re-assumption of life, resting in the divine ἐντολή.” Probably a not altogether correct resumption of the views of Lόcke and De Wette. 3. Lόcke: “If the Father have given to the Son to have life in Himself (John 5:26), He has also given Him power to take it again. If that power be essentially a moral one, so too is this. But holy, moral power is at the same time always a power over nature. Forasmuch as Christ freely died as the Holy One, He likewise had power over death, but as a power in which the power of the Father is always present as absolute cause.”—There, however, the definite distinction: in Himself, John 5:26, is not adhered to. 4. Tholuck: “The human πνεῦμα of Christ did not die; His self-activity, gaining still greater freedom by His death, penetrates the bodily organ and admits it to the process of spiritualization; thus, according to John 5, Christ proceeds in the case of believers. Again, in John 2:19 it is the Son who effects His own resurrection.” 5. A separation of the divine and the human nature is unseasonable here. It was in His divine-human nature that Christ had life, as the principle of immortality and revivification, in Himself, i.e., in personal principial independence, though it was communicated by the Father. In this life-power, as the Man of spirit from heaven (1 Corinthians 15:45), He could pass immediately, by transformation, from the first earthly form of existence into the second heavenly one. But He also had power to let His pure and holy body assume the death-form of natural humanity (not by a quiescence of its immortality, but by suffering the natural conditions of death, by humbling Himself as a man even to die as men do). He might die, but He could not see corruption; for He had power to take His life again, i.e., to cause the transformatory energy reposing in His spirit, now modified into a resurrective energy, to operate within His organism from which life had been expelled. This entry is longer than a Bible module can hold. The rest is at https://www.sermonindex.net/commentary/lange/ FOURTH SECTION The separation between the friends and foes of Christ, the children of light and the children of darknesss John 10:22 to John 13:30I BETWEEN THE IN JUDEA, WHO WISH TO KILL THELORD, AND THE IN PEREA, AMONG WHOM HE FINDS REFUGE. THE FEAST OF OF THE TEMPLE. THE FINAL BETWEEN THE FALSE HOPE ANDTHE TRUE WORK; BY THE STONING. THE TRUE AND THE OF THE TEMPLE. CHRIST THE SON OF GOD. THE ACTUAL OF THE FORMS OF THE OLD John 10:22-4222 And it was at Jerusalem the feast of the dedication [Then the feast of the dedication 23occurred at Jerusalem], and [omit and] it [It] was winter [,]. And Jesus walked [was walking, περιεπάτει] in the temple in Solomon’s porch. 24Then came the Jews round about him, and said unto him, How long dost thou make us to doubt [agitate our souls, hold our minds in suspense]? If thou be [art] the Christ, tell us plainly [frankly]. 25Jesus answered them, I told you [spoke to you], and ye believed [believe] not: the works that I do in my Father’s name, they [these] bear 26witness of me. But [Nevertheless] ye believe not, because [for, γάρ] ye are not of my sheep, as I said unto you. 27My sheep hear [heed] my voice, and I know them, and they follow me: 28And I give unto them eternal life; and they shall never perish, neither shall any man [and no one shall] pluck [tear] them out of my hand. 29My Father, which gave them me [who hath given them to me], is greater [something greater, μεῖζον] than all, and no man [no one] is able to pluck [tear] them 30[anything (at all) ] out of my Father’s hand. I and my [the] Father are one [ἘγὼχαὶὁΠατὴρἕνἐσμεν]. 31Then the Jews [The Jews therefore] took up stones again to [in order to, ἵνα] stone him. 32Jesus answered them, Many good works have I shewed you from my [the] Father; for which of those [these] works do ye stone me ? 33The Jews answered him, saying, [omit saying]. For a good work we stone thee not; [,] but for blasphemy; and because that [omit that] thou, being a man, makest thyself God. 34Jesus answered them, Is it not written in your law,’ I said, Ye are gods?’ (Psalms 82:6). 35If he called them gods, unto whom the word of God came, and the Scripture cannot be broken [made void], 36Say ye of him, whom the Father hath [omit hath] sanctified, and sent into the world, ‘ Thou blasphemest;’ because I said, I am the 37Son of God? If I do not the works of my Father, believe me not. 38But if I do [them], though ye believe not me, believe the works; that ye may know, and believe [understand], that the Father is in me, and I in him [in the Father].39Therefore they sought again to take [seize] him; but [and] he escaped [passed out, went forth, ἐξῆλθεν] out of their hand, 40And went away again beyond [the] Jordan into [to] the place where John at first baptized [was baptizing]; and there he abode. 41And many resorted [came] unto him, and said, John did no miracle [John indeed wrought no sign]: but all things that John spake [said] of this man were true. 42And many believed on [in] him there. AND [Lόcke introduces this Discourse at the Feast of Dedication, John 10:22-42, with the remark: “The conflict thickens, the issue looms up with certainty, the great hour approaches swiftly.” The section is remarkable for one of the strongest assertions of Jesus concerning His dynamic and essential oneness with, and personal distinction from, God the Father, John 10:30.—P. S.] John 10:22. The feast of the dedication of the temple.—Christ, after His appearance at the Feast of Tabernacles, returned to Galilee (Leben Jesu, vol. II. p. 1004), in order to prepare the great body of His disciples for the last decisive journey to Jerusalem. The proof of this is given above. According to the testimony of the Synoptists, Jesus was followed at his final departure from Galilee by great multitudes that accompanied him through Perζa, whereas the greatest secrecy had been observed on the occasion of His journey to the Feast of Tabernacles. The charge of “harmonistic hypothesis,” made against this assumption, is utterly without weight; πάλιν, John 10:40, assuredly has reference to the presupposition that Jesus had before sojourned in Perζa. Tholuck alleges, in opposition to the view of Paulus, Ebrard, P. Lange and Neander, that the feast of the dedication of the temple might be celebrated out of Jerusalem; it, however, by no means follows that it must be celebrated out of that city. The evangelical history is made to exhibit a strange anomaly by the supposition that Jesus passed two entire months (between the Feast of Tabernacles and that of the Dedication of the Temple) in Jerusalem, without leaving any traces or reminiscences of His stay. This journey to the Feast of the Dedication may be regarded as an episode in the journey to the last Passover,—the latter journey being begun with full decision of purpose as openly and at as early a period as possible. The Feast of the Dedication of the Temple was by no means so insignificant; it must, from its nature, draw the Israelite, and hence the Lord individually to the temple, so long as He had not come to a positive rupture with the temple. It was the feast of renovation (ηֲ ?πֻ ?λָּ ?δ, ἐγκαίνια) instituted by Judas Maccabζus (1Ma 4:36; 2Ma 10:6; Joseph. Antiqu. X. 7, 6 [XII. 7, 7]) in commemoration of the purification and fresh dedication of the temple after its profanation by Antiochus Epiphanes; it was the type of the Christian festival of church dedication (which is also called ἐγκαίνια). The celebration lasted eight days, commencing with the 25th of the month Kislev (the middle of December); its jubilant pageantry resembled that of the Feast of Tabernacles; there was especially a general illumination of the city, and hence the feast was also called τὰψῶτα, while from its fundamental idea it derived the name of ἡμέραιἐγκαινιαμοῦτοῦθυσιαστηρίου. At Jerusalem.—Even if there was a general observance of the feast throughout the country, its centre was of course the temple.It was winter (-weather).—As this remark is designed as an explanation of what follows, it is not to be regarded (with Lόcke [Meyer, Alford]) as merely denoting the wintry season, in order thus to explain [to Greek readers] why Jesus walked in a porch of the temple, particularly as the temple was ordinarily the constant resort of Jesus when He was in Jerusalem. The raw wintry weather is at the same time indicated (Matthew 16:3, Clericus, Lampe), very probably in explanation of the circumstance that Jesus was, for the instant not encircled and protected by the customary throngs of faithful followers, when the Jews suddenly surrounded Him.John 10:23. In Solomon’s porch [arcade, colonnade].—The στοὰΣολομῶνος (Acts 3:11) was according to tradition incorporated into the new temple buildings as a venerable remnant of the temple of Solomon (Josephus Antiqu. XX. 9, 7). It was situated on the eastern side of the temple-porch (στοὰἀνατολική in Josephus). Exegetes direct attention to the trace of eye-witness-ship in this remark (comp. John 8:20).[In the same place the apostles afterwards wrought miracles and proclaimed the gospel of Christ, Acts 3:11; Acts 5:12. Large portions of massive masonry, evidently belonging to the early ages of the temple, are still found on the temple area. Dr. Robinson (Researches, Am. ed., 1856, vol. Ι. p. 289), after describing these ruins, says: “The former temple was destroyed by fire, which would not affect these foundations; nor is it probable that a feeble colony of returning exiles could have accomplished works like these. There seems, therefore, little room for hesitation in referring them back to the days of Solomon, or rather of his successors, who, according to Josephus, built up here immense walls, ‘immovable for all time’ (ἀκινήτουςτῷπαντὶξρόνῳ, Antiq. XV. 11, 3). Ages upon ages have since rolled away, yet these foundations still endure, and are immovable as at the beginning. Nor is there aught in the present physical condition of these remains, to prevent them from continuing so long as the world shall last. It was the temple of the living God; and, like the everlasting hills on which it stood, its foundations were laid for all time.”—P. S.] John 10:24. Then came the Jews around him [lit. gathered around him in a circle, ἐκύκλωσαναὐτόν].—It is manifest that Jesus is at this time destitute of adherents,—a situation of which the hostile Jews promptly take advantage. He finds Himself unawares encircled by them. He must, however, have had His reasons for permitting the arrival of this moment. Here again are things spoken, by which their most secret thoughts are laid bare and exposed to the illumination of the word of Christ. As a matter of course, these Jews are Pharisees; the position assumed by them and Jesus’ answer to them, John 10:26, prove that they are likewise members of the Sanhedrin. How long dost thou agitate our soul? [Ἕωςπότετὴνψυχὴνἡμῶναἴρεις;]—Not: how long dost Thou take possession of our hearts, but, how long dost Thou raise us up, excite us, how long dost Thou hold our souls in suspense? See the illustrations from the Classics and Josephus in Meyer. [In Josephus ψυχὴναἴρειν means to uplift the soul, to raise the courage (Antiq. III. 2, 3; III. 5, 1), but it has also the more general sense to excite the soul (= μετεωρίζειν), which in this case was done by Messianic expectations.—P. S.] If thou art the Christ.—The usual explanation, that they design from the first hypocritically to draw from Him some expression whereupon they may ground His condemnation, leaves unnoticed the ardent longing of the Jews for a temporal Messiah after their own heart,—a longing which occupies a conspicuous place in the gospel history. Hypocrisy certainly is at work, but only inasmuch as they have a presentiment that He will not answer their chiliastic cravings. There is then a visionary longing as well as a fanatical irony in their question (comp. chap. 8) The feast of the dedication was the festival of Judas Maccabζus who had driven the heathenish Syrians out of Jerusalem. On that day did the Jews wish more ardently than ever that a new Maccabee or Hammerer might arise and beat down the Romans.John 10:25. I have spoken to you.—The εἰπονὑμῖν must not be translated: I have told you so. For that would be an unmistakable affirmative, and would at once present to them the alternative either of paying Him homage as the Messiah, or of seizing and trying Him as a false prophet. The εἷπον might indeed be considered to have a positive reference to the foregoing εἰπὲἡμῖνπαῤῥησίᾳ: “I have (plainly) told you, but,” etc. Christ subsequently, however, Sets forth His desire to be first acknowledged by them in the works that He does in the Father’s name (not in the official Messianic name). Therefore we read: “I have spoken to you—and ye believe not—: the works,” etc.,—i.e. I have given you a token of what I am. This answer is not really evasive, for it is Christ’s will to be known as the Messiah by what He is to them, and not by their Messianic idea in what He is. According to Meyer Jesus had already told them many times that He was the Messiah, though not so directly as He had told the Samaritan woman. But the tragical part of this history and the proof of how far a would-be orthodox theology may depart from the living word of God, is contained in the very fact that it was necessary for Him to lock up His Messianic name from them in His own heart, until the moment (Matthew 26:64) when their fanatical Messianic conception condemns Him to the cross. John 10:26. For ye are not of my sheep.—A statement of the reason of their unbelief. Ye do not recognize Me in My word and work, and, not knowing Me, ye do not subordinate yourselves to Me and trust in My guidance; on the contrary, ye desire a Messiah, that he may be the subservient tool of your passions.—As I said unto you.—The omission (see the Text. Notes) was probably occasioned by the fact that no verbal declaration to this effect is to be found. Such a declaration is, however, conveyed in intention by the parables of the Good Shepherd, John 10. Hence we must not with Euthymius and others refer these words to the subsequent discourse of Jesus. And so much the less, since entirely new considerations are therein presented to us: 1. that the sheep follow the Shepherd, 2. that He gives His sheep eternal life, etc. Neither can any importance be attached to the doubts of Strauss and others concerning the probability of the assumption that Jesus is reminding His hearers of a parabolical discourse uttered by Him two months before; and Meyer justly observes that it was not characteristic of Jesus to repeat His more lengthy discourses. John 10:27-29. My sheep hoar my voice, etc.—Bengel: “Tria sententiarum paria, quorum singula et ovium fidem et pastoris bonitatem exprimunt per correlata.” But we apprehend the three correlative members somewhat differently, always placing the Shepherd before the sheep. In advance, however, comes the saying which embraces the whole: the sheep that are Mine, they hear My voice [τὰπρόβατατὰἐμὰτῆςφωνῆςγουἀκούουσιν]. The unfolding of this personal connection: a. I know them [κἀγὼγινώσκωαὐτά]: and they follow Me [καῖἀκολουθοῦσίνμοι]; b. I give unto them eternal life; and they shall never perish [κἀγὼδίδωμιαὐτοῖςζωὴναἰώνιον, καὶοὐμὴἀπόλωνταιεἰςτὸναἰῶνα]; c. none shall tear them out of My handοὐχἁρπάσειτιςαὐτὰἐκτῆςχειρόςμου]: the Father gave them to Me, and He is greater than all: none can tear them out of the Father’s hand.In this arrangement of the propositions, Christ is the Shepherd, the principle of the relationship; with His personal conduct the conduct and relationship of the flock correspond. The first proposition (a) declares the foundation and condition of salvation; the second proposition (b) declares the blessing, internally and externally considered: because Christ gives them eternal life, they shall never perish in the terrors of eternity, death and judgment. The third proposition (c) is descriptive of the absolute protection which they enjoy. It has reference to the former word concerning the wolf. Exegesis, however, should not overlook the fact that the Jews at that time beheld the wolf in the Roman power which threatened destruction to their nation. If, then, Jesus means to say that the spiritual safety of believers, as the Church of Christ, should be secured in His hand, so too He says that in the hand of the Father who is exalted above every power of this world, they should at the same time be preserved from destructive oppression on the part of the Roman temporal power. Therefore, what the Jews in carnal and fanatical excitement sought in vain in their Messiah, they should really and truly find in Christ. According to Augustine and Calvin, Christ’s words declare the doctrine of the grace of final perseverance; Tholuck agrees, but insists upon the condition which Augustinian and Calvinistic divines imply, that the marks of a true sheep must be discoverable in them that are kept, and that according to 1 John 2:19, the apostate is regarded as not really belonging to the Church, because of his failure to comply with the condition of walking in the light. Meyer, on the other hand, remarks in accordance with the Lutheran belief, that the possibility of falling away is not excluded by the words of Christ. What is excluded is, above all things, the confounding of different stages: he who is awakened may fall away as an awakened man; he who is sealed is sealed. A dispute upon this subject, without distinction of the different stages, is a battle of words.John 10:30. I and the Father are one.—This grand saying of Jesus serves primarily as a proof of the preceding statement; hence its primary signification is: land the Father are one in the work of salvation. The heart of the Shepherd corresponds with the nature of the sheep, which nature the Father created by His gratia prζveniens. The Shepherd’s call of grace corresponds with the divine vocation in them. His eternal life that He puts into their hearts, corresponds with the destiny prepared for them by God,—that they shall never perish. His spiritual preservation corresponds with the historical preservation ordained by God: the triumphant church of Christ, is the triumphant Kingdom of God. But this soteriological oneness of Father and Son in work and government is at the same time expressive of their ontological oneness in power and substance. This saying, therefore, has not a mere soteriological reference to the oneness of the hand or the oneness in power, as set forth in this syllogism: (a) No man can pluck them out of My Father’s hand; (b) I and My Father are one; (c) consequently no man can pluck them out of My hand. (Chrysostom, Calvin, and others, Lόcke). It is rather the unity of the whole parallel, “ the co-operation of Father and Son in the whole economy of salvation.” Tholuck after Tertullian and others; comp. 1 Corinthians 3:8. “In the Arian controversies Alexander, Athanasius and many others made use of this passage against the Arians as a dictum probans, declaring it to mean the unitas naturζ of the Logos and the Father, while the Arians on the other hand held that it signified the consensus voluntatis. The interpretation of the Socinians, who regarded it as signifying the unitas voluntatis et potestatis, was not indeed rejected by the representatives of the Church, but the latter considered the unitas naturζ to be implied by the unitas potentiζ. See Gerhard I. p. 252, Lyser and others. Even Calvin—although on this account accused by Hunnius of a scelus—brought forward this argument. The point treated of by this saying is, in fact, not the Trinitarian relationship, but the relation of the Incarnate One to the Father.” Tholuck. Meyer is also of this opinion. In upholding this view, however, they overlook these facts: 1. That the economical Trinity [of revelation] points back to the ontological Trinity [of essence]; 2. that the Jews apprehend this expression ontologically, and hence accuse Christ of blasphemy against God; 3. that Christ does not correct their ontologicai conception of His meaning, but favors it, and in conclusion, as they fully believe, confirms it, John 10:38. [The neuter ἕν denotes, according to the connection and for the purpose of the argument, unity of will and power, which rests on the unity of essence or nature; for power is one of the divine attributes which are not outside of the divine essence, but constitute it. Even if we confine ἕν to dynamic unity, we have hero one of the strongest arguments for the strict divinity of Christ. It is implied even more in ἐσμεν than in ἕν. No creature could possibly thus associate himself in one common plural with God Almighty without shocking blasphemy or downright madness. In this brief sentence we have, as Augustine and Bengel observe, a refutation both of Arianism and Sabellianism; ἕν refutes the former by asserting the dynamic (and, by implication, the essential) unity of the Father and the Son, Ἐγώκαὶὁπατήρ and ἐσμεν refute the latter by asserting the personal distinction. Sabellianism would require the masculine εἶς instead of the neuter, and this would be inconsistent with ἐσμεν and the self-conscious Ἐγώ.—P. S.] John 10:31. Took up stones again.—Again as John 8:59 and for a similar cause. The arrival of the decisive turning point in their wavering mood is again induced by Christ’s asseveration concerning His divine nature. They have no use for such a Messiah who contradicts their consciousness, that has become unitarian.—They have already caught up stones and raised them high in air (ἐβάστασαν); nevertheless the word of Jesus fetters their arm. It is the counteraction of the might of His Spirit; no doubt assisted, however, by the want of a literal formula, upon the strength of which they might securely bring Him to trial. His words are everywhere peculiar to Himself, the Man of the Spirit, and they are forever in doubt as to whether they have rightly understood Him. But the matter with which they think they can reproach Him, they subsequently declare. John 10:32. Many good works have I shewed you from my Father.—Jesus answers them; that is, He replies to their sign-language. He has thoroughly understood them in their malice, but designates them as incomprehensible, in accordance with their own consciences to which He appeals.Καλὰἔργα, 1. Works of love: Baumg.-Crusius; 2. prζclara opera, excellent works: Meyer; 3. irreproachable works: Luthardt. Special importance attaches to the ἔργον itself. The ἔργονἐκτοῦπατρός is a miracle. Similarly, the ἔδειξα without doubt contains the idea of sign-giving. Καλόν is indicative of moral beauty, beneficence.—For which of these works do ye stone me? The ironicalness of this expression is unmistakable and invites an elucidation of biblical irony in general (comp. 2 Corinthians 12:13. A principal passage is Psalms 2). At the foundation, however, of this ironical speech lies the deeper meaning that He, in all His words and works, is but the representative of the Father; so that their every assault upon Him is a declaration of war against God Himself. Furthermore these words seem to assume 1. that capital punishment should not be inflicted on account of a word; 2. that it should be inflicted on account of a work, only inasmuch as that work is proved to be deserving of death. Execution should be preceded by a regular trial. Above all things we should fix our eyes upon the sublime composure of Jesus as manifested by His ironical speech in this condition of affairs. John 10:33. For blasphemy, and because thou, being a man, makest thyself God.—It is questioned whether the following καὶὄτισύ, etc., is simply an explanation; according to Meyer: “For blasphemy and that because.” The καί would then be superfluous. They reproach Him with two things: first, that He places God on a par with Himself—and this they call blasphemy; secondly, that He makes Himself God—and in this they think they recognize the false prophet; although both ideas undoubtedly play into each other. John 10:34. Is it not written in your law, I said ye are gods?—In your law (see John 8:17), a reference to Psalms 82:6. According to Tholuck and Ewald the psalm does not refer to angels or foreign princes but to unjust theocratic judges. ΰֱ ?μηִֹ ?ιν, Exodus 21:6; Exodus 22:28 (comp. 2 Chronicles 19:5-7). “Moses uses it in a collective sense—Sept. to τὸκριτήριοντοῦθεοῦ; here in the Psalm it is a personal appellation of individuals; in parallel with θεοί is υἱοὶὑψίστου” Tholuck.—I said, εἶπα Ewald explains this: I thought ye were. Tholuck thinks it has reference to the institution of Moses; according to the subsequent explanation of the Lord, the expression refers to the fact that the λόγοςτοῦ came to them,—that they were called to their office by the word of God. Full of meaning, then, is the idea of Cyril who considers the passage as significant of the λόγοςἄσαρκος; and that of Theodor-Mopsuest. (and Olshausen) who take it to mean the word of God’s revelations to the judges. In opposition to this Tholuck remarks that revelations were attributed only to the. Law-giver as judge. This latter view is, however, contrary to the Old Testament: every judge in the time of the judges was called by a λόγοςθεοῦ, David and Solomon were so called and every royal or priestly Mashiach was assumed to have received such a call, inasmuch as he did at least receive it through the typical anointing. A principal consideration is this: the theocratical callings came by the Angel of the Lord, i.e., by Christ in the Old Testament, the λόγοςἄσαρκος, and hence those who were called received the name of Elohim. John 10:35. If he called them gods.—Conclusion: a minori ad majus. In what respect: 1. from those blameworthy judges and their lofty title—to Christ (Bengel, Lόcke); 2. from those who derived their dignity from the Mosaic institution, to Him whom God hath sanctified (Gerhard, Tholuck); 3. from those to whom the λόγοςτοῦθεοῦ did but come, to Him whom God sanctified and sent into the world, i.e., whom He has actually made His λόγος to the world; the Logos-nature of Christ is here implied though not expressed (Cyril, etc.). This last we hold to be the only correct conception, the only one satisfactory to the Old Testament Christology. [Alford: “The argument is a minori ad majus. If in any sense they could be called gods,—how I much more properly He, whom, etc. They were only officially so called, onlyλεγόμενοιθεοί—but He, the only One, sealed and hallowed by the Father, and sent into the world (the aorists refer to the time of the Incarnation), is essentially θεός, inasmuch as He is υἱὸςτοῦθεοῦ. The deeper aim of this argument is, to show them that the idea of man and God being one, was not alien from their Old Testament spirit, but set forth there in types and shadows of Him, the real God-Man.”—P. S.] And the Scripture cannot be broken; λυθῆναι, Matthew 5:19; John 5:18; John 7:23. Be made invalid, subverted. Meyer: “The auctoritas normativa et judicialis of the Scripture cannot be done away with. Note here the idea of the unity of the Scriptures.” This practical sense of the Scripture certainly prevails here, although it is founded upon the inspiration of the sacred writings. (Gaussen, Stier). Inspiration is undoubtedly modifiable, though not by the distinction of important and “unimportant” words. [Webster and Wilkinson: “This remark proves that the terms in which God made His revelation to man were regarded by our Lord as Divinely inspired; that the form as well as the substance of Scripture is given by inspiration of God, for His argument here is founded upon the mode of expression adopted by the sacred writers.” Godet: “ The expression shows the boundless confidence with which the Scripture word inspired Jesus.”—P. S.] John 10:35. Whom the Father hath sanctified, etc.—Interpretations: 1. Melanchthon and others: the unctio with divine gifts and attributes; 2. Tholuck: consecration to the Messianic office, one with the σφραγίζειν, John 6:27, etc. (?). The meaning, in accordance with the idea of sanctification, is as follows: He has taken Him out from the world in order to appropriate Him to the world; i.e., He has made Him the God-Man, the now Man, the wonder of the new life, and has also accredited Him to you by His sinlessness and miraculous works. This is spoken in antithesis to the typical sanctification, or consecration to office, enjoyed by the Old Testament judges or messiahs. They were consecrated by men, by means of outward anointing or calling; He is consecrated by the Father, by the anointing of the Spirit and the attestation of works. This circumstance, then, contains the strongest intimation that He is in truth the Messiah, and at the same time furnishes the most conclusive evidence that He is no typical Messiah, but the real Messiah.I am the Son of God.—Christ’s reasoning receives additional force from the antithesis between the real dignities and the titles. In respect of the dignities He proceeds a minori ad majus; in respect of the title a majors ad minus (gods, Son of God),—i.e., at least according to the literal expression as apprehended by them. This expression is also an explanation of the words: I and My Father are one. The conclusion, John 10:38, proves that the υἱὸς might, in accordance with rationalistic interpretation, be primarily understood as a mere official name. John 10:37. If I do not the works.—The works of Christ are the Father’s works as new works, creative works, such as He can do only in oneness with the Father, John 9:3.—Believe me not.—A conditional absolution from belief; at once real and ironical. John 10:38. And ye believe not me (might not—are not able to believe).—Distinction of a gradation in faith. They cannot, perchance, soar up to the direct view of His personality. This flight of faith is not allotted to every one. But they are able and are morally bound to set foot upon the first step of faith: to recognize the divinity of His mission by His works. Hence they will derive the knowledge that Christ stands in the closest communion with God, and thus a higher belief in His personality will be produced in them. There would hardly be an immediate knowledge on their part of His divine personality; and this also is unfavorable to the reading quoted above and recommended by Meyer [see Text. Notes]. That the Father is in me.—This is not the full import of that oneness with the Father, declared by Christ, John 10:30, but the living manifestation of it in His works; if they would not harden themselves, they would be in a condition believingly to take knowledge of that revelation, and their further progress in faith would be assured. In a sense, then, the περιχώρησις essentialis is but intimated here. Christ in His character as the Redeemer is in the Father by submersion, contemplation, by the seeing of His works; the Father is in Christ by revelation, appearance, co-operation in the works of Christ. John 10:39. Again to take him.—(See John 8:30; John 8:32). This denotes a milder ebullition of their rage in comparison with their previous attempt to stone Him. The apparently obscurer and more indefinite saying of Christ seemed to demand a preliminary trial. And he escaped out of their hands.—“Something in this of a miraculous nature (a rendering of Himself invisible), although assumed by many ancient exegetes and still by Baumg.-Crusius and Luthardt, is not intimated by John.” Meyer. But John has just shown that Christ was able so to impress His enemies as to render them powerless. John 10:40. Again beyond the Jordan.—Perζa. See Note on John 10:22. In thus doing He has not given up the people, but He withdraws into a region of greater susceptibility. He was still bound to the last trial, as to whether the dynamical power of His friends would overcome that of His enemies or succumb to it, when the whole nation should be assembled at the Paschal Feast. He remained in that place from the time of the feast of the dedication until His journey to Bethany. John 10:41. And many resorted unto him.—Bengel: Fructus posthumus officii Johannis. But we must not overlook the fact that Christ had before sojourned in Perζa and worked there.—John did no miracle.—Nevertheless he is attested by Christ. Himself in what he said of Him. And thus his testimony to Christ lives again and continues working to the furtherance of faith. Starke: The different dedications of the Jewish temple: 1. Under Solomon, 1 Kings 8:2; 1 Kings 2. under Hezekiah, 2 Chronicles 29:17; 2 Chronicles 29:19; 2 Chronicles 3. by Zerubbabel, Ezra 6:16; Ezra 4. by Judas Maccabζus, 1Ma 4:41; 2Ma 5:1; 2 Maccabees 5. in the time of Herod. Joseph. Antiqu. xv. AND ETHICAL1. See the Exeg. Notes John 10:24-30 and John 10:34. 2. The longing of the Jews for a Messiah in its relation to the temptation of Jesus in the wilderness, to John 6:15, and to similar moments in the evangelical history. 3. The temptation of Christ by the Jews, in connection with the temptation, John 8:1-11, and the temptation in the history of the Passion. 4. Christ here also evades their Messianic idea in order, on the other hand, to establish His own.—The life of Christ the ideal realization of Maccabζan heroism and of the new Dedication of the Temple.5. The sheep of Christ, or the germs of the New Testament biblical doctrine of election, predestination and vocation, Romans 8:29. 6. “I and the Father are one.” (John 10:30). The soteriological foreground, the ontological background of this word. The distinction of Person: We; the oneness of substance: One.[Comp. the Exeg. Notes.—Wordsworth in loc.: “We are one. Listen to both words ‘are’ and ‘one’. The word ‘ are’ delivers you from the heresy of Sabellius; the word ‘one’ (‘unum’) delivers you from that of Arius. (Aug.). Sail thou in the midst, between the Scylla of the one and the Charybdis of the other. Christians framed a new word, ‘Homoousion Patris (consubstantial with the Father), against the impiety of Arianism; but they did not coin a new thing by a new word. For the doctrine of the Homoousion is contained in our Lord’s own words,—‘I and My Father are one’—‘unum,’ one substance (Aug. Tract, xcvii. See also Aug. Serm. 139). And there were Christians in fact, before the name ‘Christians,’ was given to believers at Antioch. (Acts 11:26). The same remark applies to the words ‘Trinity,’ θεοτόκος, and some others; against which exceptions have been made by some in modern times. It has been objected by Socinians and others, that these words of Christ do not signify oneness of substance, because our Lord used a similar expression when speaking of His disciples, in His prayer,—ἵναπάντεςἔνὦσιν, καθὼςσὺ, πάτερ, ἐνἐμοὶ, κἀγὼἑνσοὶ, ἴνακαὶαὐτοὶἐνἡμῖνἕνὦσιν, John 17:21; comp. John 10:22-23. That language of Christ does indeed prove that the Father and the Son are not the same person; and so it is valid against the Sabellian heresy. But it does not show that they are not consubstantial. It is a comparison; and things compared are not identical. It contains a prayer, that all believers may be one in heart and will, as the Persons of the Trinity are; that by virtue of Christ’s Incarnation, by which He became Emmanuel,—God with us, God manifest in the flesh, or, as He there expresses it, ἐγὼἐναὐτοῖς (John 17:23; John 17:26)—they may be united in the One Godhead. Indeed that language proves the consubstantiality of the Three Persons. Men are not different natures from each other; they are all of one blood (Acts 17:26), of one substance,—being all from Adam and Eve. If the Son is inferior in nature to the Father, and different in substance from Him, the comparison could not have been made. The consubstantiality of all men, with a diversity of persons in each individual, and their union in God, is an apt illustration, as far as human things can be, of the true doctrine of the One Nature and Plurality of Persons in the Godhead.”—Owen: “Some refer this unity to one of purpose merely. But the context refers to power, as the attribute of the Father specially referred to. This shows that unity of power, rather than unity of purpose, is here predicated of the Father and Son. But a oneness of power—which with God is omnipotent power—involves the idea of a unity of being or essence, and shows that the Father and Son are essentially one. But even if a unity of will and purpose only is meant in the unity here spoken of, does not an absolute oneness in this respect presuppose essential unity? In either case, whether unity of power or purpose be intended, the passage teaches most clearly an essential unity of the Father and Son. The manifest design of the declaration is to prevent any misconception, which arises from the fact, that the sheep are spoken of as being in the hand of both the Father and the Son. The question might arise, how, at one and the same time, they could be in the hand of two distinct beings, each so powerful that none could pluck them from their hand. The answer, simple, concise, and unmistakable, is that these Persons are one and the same in essence; and that so united are they in their essential being, that whoever claims the protection and care of one, has an equal demand, upon that of the other. Hence there was nothing strange in the assertion, that the sheep were in His hand, and also in that of his Father. That this is the great argument of the passage, seems too plain to be for a moment questioned. To claim that a mere unity of will and purpose, aside from an essential unity of being, meets the requisitions of this declaration, when considered in relation to the context so clear and well defined, is as absurd as to say that two persons may have distinct and personal possession of a thing at one and the same time, merely because there exists between them a unity of will and purpose. That essential unity is here intended is clear, not only, as we have shown, from the scope of the passage, which requires something more than oneness of purpose, but also from the following context, and especially John 10:33, where the mutual indwelling of the Father and Son is expressly declared, in terms which admit of no other interpretation, than as referring to the mysterious and ineffable union taught so clearly in the passage before us. The numeral one is the Greek neuter, the idea of essence and not of personality being predominant. Had the masculine form been employed, it would have been I and My Father are one person, which would involve an untruth and an absurdity.”—P. S.] 7. The authority of Holy Scripture. Be it observed that Christ by His quotation also reminded the unjust judges who stood opposed to Him of the threat in the Psalm cited: ye shall die.8. Foretokens of the doctrine of the divinity of Christ in the Old Testament. Whom the Father hath sanctified, i.e., really consecrated by the anointing of the Spirit (after Psalms 2), in antithesis to the typical consecrations under the Old Covenant. 9. The majestic escapes and flights of Christ. AND The Jewish dedication of the temple: 1. In respect of its noble destination, 2. in respect of its degeneracy, 3. in respect of its terrible end in our text.—The degeneration of Christian church dedications. Its gradation: 1. The church is glorified more than Christ its Lord; 2. the festival is more a cause of rejoicing than the church; 3. attempts are finally made to cast out the Lord as the disturber of this joy.—Nevertheless, church dedication, as the birth-day feast of individual congregations of the Reformation, has the qualities of a delightful festival.—Christ suddenly surrounded by enemies in Solomon’s porch: provocative of a query as to the whereabouts of His friends.—Hindrances of Christians from the public assembling around the Lord, a measure of their fervor and faithfulness: 1. Wind and weather; 2. amusements; 3. contagious example.—Enemies around! The ever fresh experience of the always victorious Christ.—How long dost thou make us to doubt? or the wicked, temptations ambiguity of the Jews’ question: 1. The old and fading desire that He might become a Christ in their sense; 2. the ver new and over higher blazing enmity unto death.—Christ’s presence of mind at the moment when He sees Himself surrounded by enemies: 1. In His cautious and yet decided reply to their question, John 10:25-28; John 2. in the calm and triumphant answer and throat, John 10:31-32; John 3. in the profound and yet clear response to their charge of heresy, John 10:34-38; John 4. in the majestic answer in deed to their attempt, John 10:39-40.—The import of Christ’s answer, John 10:25 ff.: I am not a Christ in your sense, but the Christ in the name of the Father.—They do not know the Shepherd because they are not His sheep.—The word of Christ concerning His sheep a presentation of their cordial reciprocal conduct: 1. He is their Shepherd; they hear His voice; 2. He knows them; they follow Him; 3. He gives them eternal life; they do not” perish; 4. He keeps them securely in His hand; they rest safely through Him in the Father’s hand.—The great word of Christ: I and the Father are one—how it holds good: 1. Of His work of redemption in the life of His people and in the world; 2. of His redemptive impulse and His consciousness; 3. of His divine essence in the eternity of God.—” Ye are gods,” or the presages in the Old Testament of the doctrine of the divinity of Christ.—” The Scripture cannot be broken.” In particular not in its testimony to Christ. Christ sanctified by the Father; this, to a comprehender of the Old Testament, presented the following meaning: consecrated and anointed by the Holy Ghost as the real Messiah, in accordance with Psalms 2; Isaiah 61:1. The fearful contradictions in the conduct of fanatical passion: 1. First flattering, hypocritical questions, then murderous threats and assaults; 2. first the stoning, then the accusation; 3. first the charge of blasphemy, then the proposal of investigation (wished to take Him).—The charge of blasphemy brought against the Lord by the Jews, on account of the holy revelation of His divine consciousness of being one with the Father. The three great vouchers for the divinity of Christ: 1. The Scriptures; 2. His works; 3. the direct impression of His personality.—The separation between the friends and enemies of Christ. The retreat of Christ into Perζa a prelude to the flight of the Christians into Perζa before the destruction of Jerusalem.—Perζa, or the mountain sanctuaries of the Church of Christ (in the Piedmontese mountains, the mountains of Bohemia, the Cevennes, the Scottish hills, the mountains of Switzerland.—But principally in spiritual hill-countries, or in a popular life in which the heights of spirituality and the depths of simplicity and humility are united).—The believers of Perζa, or how John’s work revives, glorified, in the work of Christ.—The flights of Christ lay the foundation for the refuge of sinners. Starke: Nova. Bibl. Tub.: Church dedication an old but abused custom.—Zeisius: A Christian can, in pursuance of his Saviour’s example, with a good conscience observe those festivals which, though instituted by men, have a single aim to the glory of God and the edification of the Church.—Quesnel: The walks of our Saviour are not idle ones, etc.—The concourse of many men even to a holy place is not invariably an indication of zeal for learning.—As Christ proved by His work that He is the Messiah and Son of God, so shouldest thou prove by thy works that thou art a Christian and a child of God.—Zeisius: Believers may be entirely certain of the divine favor and of their salvation in this world and the next, Romans 8:31-39.—Cramer: Steadfastness in the faith does not rest in human strength, but we are by the grace of God preserved unto salvation.—The hand of the Father is God’s omnipotence.—Ibid.: The Father is one Person, the Son is another, and yet Father and Son are not divided but are one in substance. See the mystery of the Holy Trinity.—Holy Scripture is the sword wherewith we may strike our adversaries.—On John 10:35. Magistrates are indued by God Himself with a lofty title; hence they must not be despised, but honored.—Majus: Christ goes from one place to another with His Gospel.—Ibid.: Yet truth triumphs finally.—Zeisius: Godly meditation upon the strange and wonderful things that formerly came to pass in this or that place, may be a powerful incentive to repentance and faith. Gerlach: He and the Father are not εἶς, one Person, but ἕν, one divine Being.—Lisco: Since He (the Father) is greater, mightier than all, than all hostile powers, Christ’s friends are safe under the protection and guidance of the Almighty, nay, safe under the protection of both (Father and Son).—It is only malefactors that are usually persecuted; why then do ye persecute Me, who have conferred only benefits upon you?—Braune: He believes the works, who through them experiences suggestions and presentiments of the divine in Jesus; he believes Jesus, who knows that God is truly in Him.—Gossner: If Thou be Christ, tell us plainly.—Ye are not of My sheep: ye are in the Church, but not of the Church.—I know My sheep. The whole world may judge them as it will; He knows what to think of them.—My sheep follow Me. It is the magnet of love, that draws and drives, voluntarily on both sides.—Eternal Life.—Who can resist the hand of the Almighty or despoil it of anything? How sweetly and securely, then, may we repose in His hand!—The salvation of the chosen sheep of Christ stands firm, for 1. they belong to Christ, from whom no violence can ravish anything; 2. they are the gift of the Father, a gift of infinite love, presented by Him to His Song of Solomon 3. they are an irrevocable gift that can never be taken back; 4. they are the gift of a Father who is mightier and greater than all creatures.—To their stony reply He makes a right loving rejoinder.—As they caught up stones, He once more laid hold of their hearts.—Can it be wondered at, that the holiest truths we preach are railed at as errors and fanaticism, when Jesus Christ Himself was treated as a blasphemer because He spake the truth?—On John 10:37. A ghostly-man must be ghostly-minded, a Christian must have the mind of Christ, a child of God must be godly-minded; they must lead lives spiritual, Christian, and worthy of God, or make no professions so to live.—He escaped out of their hands, but they shall not escape Him.—He stays as long as He can,—until they begin stoning Him, until He finds everything walled up and petrified. Heubner: The Church is permitted [within proper limits] to institute festivals in commemoration of great benefits from the Lord (Festival of the Reformation; Days of Prayer and Humiliation, of Thanksgiving). John 10:23. He who here walked in a porch was more than all the Peripatetics and Stoics.—Jesus reveals Himself only to still and deep souls.—Many scoff at the figure: “Sheep, Flock of Jesus.” O were they but sensible of the warmth and tenderness of that love which chose the figure!—A believer must lose his faith in Jesus before he can be torn away from Him.—The enemy can disperse and scatter outward societies but not the confederation of hearts. John 10:33. They themselves were the blasphemers. John 10:41. John did no miracles. In this very thing Jesus was to have the preeminence over John. John 10:42. Thus John’s preaching is working even to this day. Schleiermacher: Art thou the Christ? No doubt they said as did others: Never man did such miracles before, etc.; but because they found in Him no food for their carnal natures, no encouragement for their lust of outward distinctions among men, their souls were kept in suspense: they wavered and fluctuated between faith and unbelief,—nothing firm took form in them. Hence they demanded only the letter and hoped for good from it. (All their fanatical claims, however, were attached to the letter; they held that if Jesus were the Messiah, He must be a Messiah in their sense of the term, opposed as that sense was to the divine Word).—But why did the Redeemer keep from them this trifling gift of the letter? In the first place, He would permit nothing to turn Him from the path on which He had once entered; secondly, the time was approaching when (at a formal trial) the Lord should hear this same question from those who, as the spiritual superiors of the people, deriving their superiority from the gradual conformation of time, had a right to demand of Him the decisive letter. So for that occasion He reserved it. Then that letter, being in the right place, also possessed the highest fulness of spirit and life. [Craven: From Chrysostom: John 10:30. I and My Father are one; this is added that we may not suppose that the Father protects while He is too weak to do so. John 10:34-35. Our Lord did not correct the Jews as if they misunderstood His speech, but confirmed and defended it in the very sense in which they had taken it. John 10:39-40. Christ after discoursing on some high truth commonly retired immediately, to give time to the fury of the people to abate.—From Augustine: John 10:27-29. Of these sheep, 1. the wolf robbeth none, 2. the thief taketh none, 3. the robber killeth none. John 10:30. We are one; what He is, that am I, in respect of essence, not of relation. John 10:34-35. If men by partaking of the word of God are made gods, much more is the Word, of which they partake, God.—From Theophylact: John 10:41. Our Lord often brings His people into solitary places, thus ridding them of the society of the unbelieving, for their furtherance in the faith.—Christ departs from Jerusalem, i.e., the Jewish people, and goes to a place where are springs of water, i.e., the Gentile church [?].—From Alcuin: They follow Me—1. here, by walking in gentleness and innocence, 2. hereafter, by entering into the joys of eternal life.—From Zeller: John 10:27. Hear My voice; one may hear the words of the Lord without submitting to His voice; the voice of the Lord is the spiritually quickening influence of His words upon the heart.—From Burkitt: John 10:24. The subtlety of Christ’s enemies, expressing earnest desire for information that they might entrap. John 10:25. The wisdom and caution of Jesus: He, 1. (refuses a direct answer, E. R. C.), 2. refers to His miracles. John 10:26. The true cause of infidelity, 1. not obscurity of doctrine, but 2. not having the properties of Christ’s sheep. John 10:27. All Christ’s sheep follow Him in His, 1. doctrine, 2. example. John 10:28. Eternal life Isaiah , 1. the portion of Christ’s sheep, 2. the gift of Christ, 3. now given to the sheep, in (1) purchase, (2) promise, (3) first fruits. John 10:32. Such was the perfect innocence of Christ that He dared appeal to the consciences of His most inveterate adversaries.—From Henry: If Wisdom’s sayings appear doubtful, the fault is not in the object, but in the eye. John 10:24-25. The Jews pretended that they only doubted, Christ declared that they did not believe; skepticism in religion is no better than infidelity. John 10:26. Ye are not of My sheep, i.e., ye are not 1. disposed to be My followers, 2. designed to be My followers. John 10:27-29. Jesus described concerning His sheep, their—1. gracious disposition, they (1) hear His voice, (2) follow Him; 2. happy state, He (1) takes cognizance of them, (2) has provided happiness for them (a) eternal life, (b) freely bestowed, (3) has undertaken for their security and preservation. John 10:37. Christ does not require a blind and implicit faith, nor an assent to His divine mission further than He gave proof of it. John 10:39. The flight of Jesus, 1. not an inglorious retreat, but 2. a glorious retirement. He escaped, 1. not because He was afraid to suffer, but 2. because His hour was not come, John 8:30. John 10:40. Though persecutors may drive Christ and His gospel out of their city, they cannot drive Him or it out of the world. John 10:41. The result of John’s ministry after his death; the success of the word preached not confined to the life of the preacher. John 10:42. Where the preaching of repentance has had success, there the preaching of gospel-grace is most likely to be prosperous.—From Barnes: John 10:29. It is implied that God will so control all other beings and things as that they shall be safe. John 10:28-29. We are taught concerning Christians that—1. they are given by the Father to Christ, 2. Christ gives to them eternal life, i.e., (1) procures by His death and intercession, and (2) imparts by His Spirit, that religion which results in eternal life, 3. both the Father and the Son are pledged to keep them, 4. there is no power in man or devil to defeat Christ’s purpose. John 10:39-42. The opposition of the wicked resulted in the increased success of the cause they persecuted.—From Ryle: John 10:26. “My sheep” indicates the close connection between Christ and believers; they are His, 1. by gift from the Father, 2. by purchase, 3. by choice and calling, 4. by their own consent.—Believers are called sheep, because they are, 1. helpless and dependent on their Shepherd, 2. harmless, 3. foolish and liable to go astray [?]. John 10:27. Christ knows His people with, 1. approbation, 2. interest, 3. affection. John 10:28. Christ, 1. often withholds worldly prosperity, 2. never fails to give eternal life, i.e., (1) grace, (2) peace, (3) glory. John 10:35. The high honor Christ puts on the Scriptures. John 10:37-38. The importance Christ attached to His miracles.] Footnotes: John 10:25.—[Tischend., Alf., etc., read οὐπιστεὐετε instead of οὐκἐπιστεύσατε.—P. S.] John 10:20.—Καθὼςεἶπονὑμῖν probably erroneously considered a superfluous addition, on which account it is wanting in Codd., B. K. L., etc. [It is wanting also in Cod. Sin., omitted by Tischend., bracketed by Alford.—P. S.] John 10:29.—[The received text reads: ὁπατήρμουὃςδέδεκέμοι, μείζωνἐστιν, the Father who hath given (them) to me is greater than all; but the best authorities omit μου, and read ὅ for ὅς, and μεῖζον for μείζων. Tert.: Pater quod mihi dedit, majus est omnibus. So Tischendorf: ὁπατὴρὁδεδωκένμοιπάντωνμεῖζόνἐστιν, that which the Father hath given me is greater than all. But this gives no good sense. The neuter μεῖζον was no doubt the original reading, but as transcribers did not understand it as belonging to πατήρ, they changed ὅς into the neuter. Restoring ὅς, we get the sense: “The Father (or, My Father, if we retain μου) who hath given (them) to me, is something greater (a greater power) than, all.” On the different readings see the apparatus in Tischend., ed. 8.—P. S.] John 10:33.—λέγοντες must be dropped in accordance with preponderant authorities. [λέγοντες is omitted in Sin., A. B. K. L., etc.; it occurs in D. e.g. H., etc.] John 10:38.—Meyer, in company with Lachmann and Tischendorf [Alford], prefers the reading: ἵναγνῶτεκαὶγινώσκητε [learn and know, or, know and understand], in accordance with B. L. X., supposing the γινώσκητε, on account of a failure to comprehend it, to have been changed into πιστεύστεύσητε [believe]. But manifestly the lect. recepta might at an earlier period have appeared strange to minds of the Alexandrian school. Yet its sense, notwithstanding the objections raised against it, is rich and pertinent. John 10:38.—Instead of ἐναὐτῷ, B. D. L. [Sin.], etc., most versions, etc., read ἐντῷπατρί. [The same view a new visit to Jerusalem to taken by Neander, Ebrard, Luthardt, Godet, Alford; while Meyer, Wieseler, Hengstenberg, Ewald and Owen assume that Jesus during the two months intervening between the feast of Tabernacles and that of the Dedication remained at or in the neighborhood of Jerusalem. The words ἐντοῖς̔Ιερουσ. favor Dr. Lange’s view and seem to indicate a previous absences from the city.—P. S.) [The temple was soon to be profaned again and to be destroyed by the Romans. But Christ raised His own body, and with it the indestructible temple of the true worship of God. Hooker and Wordsworth infer from the feasts of Dedication and of Purim the lawfulness of appointing religious festivals by human authority.—P. S.] [Wordsworth has a long note here on the supposed spiritual signification of this remark (χειμὼνἦν) and the inner sympathy between the world of nature and the world of grace. But it is imposition rather than exposition.—P. S.] [So Meyer: “The indication of this specific locality belongs to the traces of eye-witness-ship (Augenzeugenschaft), which impressed such events indelibly upon the memory of the author.” But he objects to the far-fetched view of Thiersch and Luthardt, that by walking in Solomon’s porch Christ intended symbolically to set forth the unity of the O. and N. covenant.—P. S.] [“How grateful,” says Bengel, “would their approach have been to the Saviour, had they approached in faith.”—P. S.] [So most commentators, referring to such passages as John 5:19; John 8:36; John 8:56; John 8:58; John 10:1, etc. Yet He did not expressly and directly reveal His Messiahship to the people, as He did to the Samaritan woman and to the blind man; the chief proof was His Messianic works, v. 36, and here.—P. S.] [John 10:27-29 characterize the true sheep of Christ with a glorious promise as to their future, and draw a clear line of demarcation between His true disciples and the unbelieving and persecuting Jews, as well as all that are merely nominal Christians. 1. Subjective marks: (a) “They hear My voice;” the receptive side, faith, (b) “They follow Me;” the active side, love, obedience. 2. Objective marks: (a) “I know them;” this knowledge implies recognition of the sheep by Christ and corresponds to their faith. (b) I give unto them eternal life (δίδωμι, even now in this world). This life is eternal both intensively and extensively, and implies (aa) “that they shall never perish;” lit. “they shall not at all,” in wise οὐμή, double negation) “perish for ever “(εἰςτὸναἰῶνα); (bb) that “no one” (no wolf, no robber, no hireling, no enemy) “can tear them out of the hand,” (i.e. the possession and protecting power of Christ; for to tear them out of His hand Would be to tear them out of the hand of His Father, who is greater (μεῖζον, neuter, something greater, a greater power) than all (πάντων) the enemies and opposing forces, singly or combined; since Christ and the Father are one in power because they are one in essence (John 10:30), Reduced to a syllogism the argument is this: No one can tear My sheep from, the hand of My Father, God Almighty; I and My Father are one; consequently no one can tear them out of My hand. This is the strongest possible assurance of the faithfulness of Christ to His chosen followers and a protection on His part that will prevail over all opposition, including the devil and his host. We have no right to weaken the language by arbitrary insertions and qualifications in the interest of a particular system of theology or sect. It will not do for instance to exempt sin from the opposing forces (πάντων), for, as Hengstenberg in loc. well remarks, this would deprive Christ’s promise of its chief weight and comfort, since we require first of all a guarantee against ourselves; sin being our greatest enemy.—There is therefore a kind of election which implies the grace of perseverance to the end and which can in no way be defeated. This is taught not only here, but also in John 4:14; John 6:37; John 6:39-40; John 6:44-45; John 17:2; John 17:9-10; 1 John 2:19; 1 John 3:9; 1 John 5:18; Romans 8:28-39; Ephesians 1:4 ff. Ephesians 1:13-14; 2 Timothy 2:13; 2 Timothy 2:19; 1 Corinthians 1:8-9, etc. On the other hand the Scriptures are full of exhortation and warning addressed to believers against the danger of unfaithfulness and apostasy (Hebrews 6:4 ff; Hebrews 10:35; Galatians 5:4, etc.), which are strengthened by not a few examples (Adam and Eve, David, Solomon, Peter, etc.) The apparent contradiction between these passages involves the great problem of the relation of God’s sovereignty to man’s freedom, which we are unable fully to solve theoretically in our present limited state of knowledge. Practically there is no serious difficulty among true Christians, who are all agreed that their ultimate salvation depends entirely on the power and grace of God, and implies faithful perseverance on their part. Looking to Christ, we are perfectly safe, looking to ourselves, we are surrounded by danger. Genuine faith and trust in God always implies distrust in ourselves, but controls and overrules it by constant prayer and watchfulness. Paul puts both together, Philippians 2:12-13 : “Work out your own salvation with fear and trembling; for it is God who worketh in you both to will and to work for His good pleasure.” Pious Lutherans and Methodists pray like Calvinists, as if all depended on God, and pious Calvinists work like Arminians, as if all depended on themselves. Theologically at war, they are devotionally agreed, and, forgetting the doctrinal antagonisms of their great hymnists in the days of their flesh, they unite all over the world in singing the hymns of Paul Gerhardt and Tersteegen, Toplady and Wesley, as if they had been of one creed. I discussed the question here involved more at length in my treatise on the Sin against the Holy Ghost (Halle, 1841) pp. 103–125. Alford and Wordsworth, perhaps from aversion to Calvinism, do not enter into an exegesis of this passage. Owen in loc. says: “The doctrine of the saints’ perseverance in holiness is here most expressly taught. If one of the elect should finally perish, it would not only falsify the declaration here made by Christ, but would be a violation of the compact between the Father and the Son (see John 6:37), and contrary to the expressly declared will of the Father (John 6:39-40). Yet this great truth, which so illustrates the sovereign mercy of God through Jesus Christ, and which is the only sure foundation upon which the believer rests his hope of eternal life, must not be abused to justify any laxity of effort on his part to make his calling and election sure, by a life of prayer and holy living, such as becometh the disciples of Christ.”—P. S.] [Meyer understands ἕνἐσμεν of the dynamic union, or union of power, and rejects both the Arian and Socinian interpretation of moral union, and the orthodox interpretation of essential union, but ho admits that, especially in the theological system of John, the essential union, the homoousia, though not required hero for the argument, is the presupposed basis of the dynamic union. See p. 409 f. (5th ed.)—P. S.] [The best commentators (with the exception of Calvin who understands the passage de consensu cum Patre), support the interpretation given in the text, as the following quotations from different ages and churches will show. Euthymius Zigabenus: ἕνκαταδύναμιν, ἤγουνταὐτοδύναμοι; εἰδὲέ̔νκατὰδύναμιν, ἕναρακαὶκατὰτὴνθεότητακαὶοὐσίανκαὶφύσιν. Bengel: “Unum sumus non solum voluntatis consensu, sad unitate potentiζ, adeoque naturζ. Nam omnipotentia est attributum naturale.” Godet (II. 307): “Ce pluriel ‘Nous Sommes,’ ne serait-il pas un blasphιme dans la bouche d ‘une crtature? Le minislre d’ ιtat qui se permit un jour de dire: Le roi et moi, nous … provoqua le rire de tout le Parlement; que mιriterait la crιature qui oserait dire: ‘Moi et Dieu nous.’…” Alford: “One in essence primarily, but therefore also one in working, and power and in will. This certainly is implied in the words, and so the Jews understood them, John 10:33.” Comp. also the long notes of Webster and Wilkinson, and Wordsworth in loc.—Two objections are raised against the orthodox interpretation: (1) The reply of Jesus, John 10:34-36; but this is evidently an argumentum a fortiori. This entry is longer than a Bible module can hold. The rest is at https://www.sermonindex.net/commentary/lange/ IV How Christ Putteth Thomas’ Unbelief To Shame, And Changeth The Doubting Disciple Into The Most Joyful Confessor John 10:24-29(John 20:24-31, is the pericope for St. Thomas’ Day). 24But Thomas, one of the twelve, called Didymus, was not with them when Jesus came. 25The other disciples therefore said unto him, We have seen the Lord. But he said unto them, Except I shall see [I see, ἴδω] in his hands the print of the nails, and put my finger into the print of the nails, and thrust [put] my hand into his side, I will not believe. 26And after eight days again his disciples were within, and Thomas with them: then came Jesus, [Jesus cometh, ἔρχεται], the doors being shut, and stood in the midst, and said, Peace be unto you. 27Then saith he to Thomas, Reach hither thy finger, and behold my hands; and reach hither thy hand, and thrust [put] it into 28 my side; and be [become, γίνου] not faithless, but believing. And Thomas an swered and said unto him, My Lord and my God [!] 29Jesus saith unto him, Thomas [omit Thomas] because thou hast seen me, thou hast believed: blessed are they that have not seen, and yet have believed. AND The second appearance of Christ, on the first Sunday after the resurrection-day, in the midst of the disciples, at Jerusalem, is entirely in accordance with the festival circumstances. The Easter-Sunday was the third day of the paschal celebration. The next Friday, therefore, was the eighth. The disciples were not permitted to set out on their homeward journey on the Sabbath. On Sunday they either would not, or could not, set out, because this had now become their feast-day, and Thomas was not yet pacified (Leben Jesu II., p. 1704). It was probably the evening before their departure for Galilee, whither, as the place where all His disciples should see Him again, Christ had at first ordered the apostles. See Comm. on Matthew, chap. 28. John 20:24. But Thomas, one of the twelve. [θωμᾶςδὲεἶςἐκτῶνδώδεκα, ὁλεγόμενοςΔίδυμος].—See John 11:16; John 14:5; Matt. chap. 10. His absence from the circle of disciples on the first Easter Sunday gives rise to the inference that he was wandering about, solitary and gloomy. John 20:25. But he said unto them, etc. [ὁδὲεἶπεναὐτοῖς. Ἐὰνμὴἴδωἐνταῖςχερσὶναὐτοῦτὸντύποντῶνἥλων, καὶβάλωτὸνδάκτυλόνμουεἰςτὸντύποντῶνἥλων, καὶβάλωμουτὴνχεῖραεἰςτὴνπλευρὰναὐτοῦ, οὐμὴπιστεύσω]. We must distinguish between the strong expression of Thomas, and his thought itself. The testimony of his fellow-disciples does not suffice for him; he must first see the Risen One with his own eyes, and by touch convince himself of His corporality, and of the identity of that corporeality with the Crucified One, before he can believe. On the fact that nothing, therefore, can be deduced from the expression of Thomas militating against the nailing down of the feet of the Crucified One, comp. Tholuck, p. 442. [Thomas has a place among the apostles, inferior indeed to John and Peter, yet an important one. He represents, within the Church, the principle: intellectus prζcedit fidem, which is not necessarily incompatible with the higher principle: fides prζcedit intellectum. He represents honest, earnest, inquiring, truth-loving skepticism, or that rationalism which anxiously craves tangible evidence, and embraces it with joy when presented. This is essentially distinct from the worldly, frivolous skepticism of indifference or hostility to truth, which ignores or opposes the truth in spite of evidence. The former wants knowledge in order to faith, the latter knowledge without or against faith. The inquiring spirit of Thomas, having a moral motive and a spiritual aim, is a wholesome, propelling principle in the Church, and indispensable in scientific theology; it dispels prejudice, ignorance and superstition, and promotes knowledge and intelligence. Yet, practically and spiritually, it is defective as compared with the childlike spirit of faith with which alone we can enter the kingdom of heaven, and hence it is gently rebuked by our Lord. For salvation we must go to Christ, not as reasoning logicians, or learned theologians, or pleading lawyers, or calculating merchants, but as the child goes to the mother’s bosom, as heart goes to heart, and love to love—with unbounded confidence and trust. Faith is the true mother of true knowledge in divine things, and even in philosophy, which starts in love of wisdom, and consequently implies its existence. It is only in a very qualified sense, in matters of historical inquiry and philosophic and scientific research, that doubt may be called the father of knowledge, according to the principle of Cartesius: De omnibus dubitandum est.—P. S.] John 20:26. And after eight days [μεθ̓ἡμέραςὀκτώ].—That the disciples already attribute a particular importance to Sunday, is evidenced by the numeric completeness of their assembly. [This is the beginning of the history of the Lord’s Day, which to this day has never suffered a single interruption in Christian lands, except for a brief period of madness in France during the reign of terror. Sunday is here pointed out by our Lord Himself and honored by His special presence as the day of religion, and public worship, and so it will remain to the end of time. God’s Word and God’s Day are inseparable companions, and the pillars of God’s Church.—P. S.] That Thomas is an unbeliever willing to believe, his presence at this time seems to prove. Manifestly, the same place is meant as that in which they were eight days before. They were within again, in the same house. “Olshausen erroneously makes Galilee the scene of the appearance” (Meyer). “To celebrate the Resurrection-day” (Luthardt). Meyer: "There is nothing to indicate this.” It seems at least to be indicated by the fact that they were still tarrying in Jerusalem on this day, and probably waiting for the Lord. John 20:27. Therefore saith He to Thomas [εἶταλέγειτῷθωμᾷ ?].—Immediately after the peace-greeting Christ turns to Thomas, for it is with him that He has now to do, since he, in his doubting spirit, is a hindrance to the whole Church. Christ’s acquaintance with Thomas state of mind and singular demand is not to be referred to a mediate knowledge on the part of Christ (through the disciples, Lόcke); it is the fruit of an immediate knowledge.—Reach hither thy finger, etc. [φέρετὸνδάκτυλόνσουὦδεκαὶἴδετὰςχεῖράςμου, καὶφέρετὴνχεῖράσουκαὶβάλεεἰςτὴνπλευράυμου].—A triumphant challenge which, with loving irony, accedes to his demand, in order to the infusing of a salutary shame into him who made it and who is now obliged to recognize the identity of personality by higher marks,—especially by the Lord’s knowledge of the deplorable state of his soul, and by His voice. Bengel: Si Pharisζus ita dixisset: “nisi videro,” etc., nil impetrasset; sed discipulo pridem probato nil non datur.[The Lord is silent about the print of the nails, which would have recalled the malice of His crurifiers, and points simply to the wounds as the abiding monument of His dying love to Thomas and to all. The words “Reach hither thy hand and put it into My side,” seem to imply that the wound in His side was as large as a man’s hand. Some infer also that His resurrection-body was bloodless. Wordsworth: “The wounds which Satan inflicted in malice and scorn on our Lord’s crucified Body, have been converted by His controlling power and wisdom into proofs of His Resurrection, and marks of His personal identity. They have become indelible evidences of His power, graven, as it were, with an iron pen on the Rock of Ages, to be read by the eyes of Angels and men for eternity; and they remain for ever, as glorious trophies of His victory over death and sin, and over Satan himself.”—P. S.] And become not faithless [καὶμὴγίνουἄπιστος, ἀλλὰπιστός],—γίνου not: be not faithless, Meyer. He had not been faithless hitherto, but he was in danger of becoming so. Tholuck: “Religious belief which demands the support of sensuous perception runs the risk of making an entire loss of faith.” Nevertheless, the sincere heart that needs and craves belief, receives even in the hour of temptation the right signs which transport it beyond the danger that threatens it. Such was the experience of Thomas. His faith was saved; the great sign of Christ’s appearance quickly made the sickly plant burst forth into fairest bloom. John 20:28. My Lord and my God! [ὁκύριόςμουκαὶὁθεόςμου! An address of Thomas to Christ (the nom. with the art. for the vocative, as often in the New Testament; compare Christ’s address to His Father, Mark 15:34 : ὁθεόςμου, ὁθεόςμου. The highest apostolic confession of faith in the Lordship and Divinity of Christ,—an echo of the beginning of this Gospel: “The Word was God,” John 1:1, and an anticipation of its close, John 20:30-31. Thomas, says Augustine, behold and touched Christ as Man, and confessed Him to be God, whom he did not see nor touch.—P. S.]—Weakening interpretation of Theodore of Mopsuestia: “Quasi pro miraculo factodeum, collaudat.” Alleging the expression to be addressed admiringly to God. Similarly the Socinians and Paulas [and Unitarians]. Against this view we cite 1. εἶπεναὐτῷ [to Jesus, not to God], 2. the reference of the words: ὁκύριόςμου to Christ. Erasmus: Agnovit Christus, utique repulsurus, si falso dictus fuisset Deus. The excitement of feeling in which Thomas utters the adoring word in glorification of Christ, does not lessen the definiteness of his acknowledgment of Christ’s divinity; it detracts merely from the definiteness of his dogmatical conception of it. Ver.29. Thou believest[“Οτιἑώρακάςμεπεπίστενκας]—According to Lachmann and Meyer, [Ewald], πεπίστευκας, should be read as a question. Lόcke objects against this view: It infuses into the words a tone of doubt as to the faith of Thomas. The doubt might indeed be expressive of this thought: Thinkest thou now that thou didst believe because thou hast seen Me outwardly? Seeing did but help thy faith to be born. However, Jesus designs not merely to recognize the faith of Thomas (as He did the faith of the disciples, John 16:31), but also to institute a contrast between the road travelled by his faith and the faith of others. Thou believest. The Perfect; properly, thou hast believed [πεπίστευκας], hast become believing—a believer.—Blessed are [μακάριοι]—properly they that saw not, and believed; [or, who never saw, and yet became believers, οἱμὴἰδόντες, καιπιστεύσαντες],—Meyer: The Aorists indicate, not habitude (Lόcke), but those who have believed [have become believers without first having viewed] from the time the μακαριότης is predicated of them. The saying is so constructed as 1.to intimate a peculiar praise of the other disciples who first believed, as well as to touch them, likewise, in its blame; 2. it, however, does not exclude Thomas (from this blessedness) inasmuch as he too commenced to believe before he had seen ; it establishes 3. a general rule destined for the beatification of the believing Church of a later period; at bottom, however, it Isaiah 4. generally declarative of the innermost essence of faith. Tholuck discovers a distinction of a degree of faith higher than that supported by sensuous perception: “That faith, namely, which, supported by the Word and the inner demonstrative power of the Word, believes, as St. Paul has it, παρ’ ἐλπίδαἐπ’ ἐλπίδι, Romans 4:18; comp. John 4:48.” There might be question of a higher way of faith; but the degree of faith attained by Thomas should certainly not be designated as a lower one. Baur seeks to contra-distinguish faith resting upon external events and that faith which is abstractly certain of what it holds; according to this view, Christ called blessed the quasi-faith of modern spiritualists, who claim that they are satisfied with mere abstract religious ideas and are able to do without those facts in which the ideas have been realized! Christianity, however, is the indissoluble synthesis of idea and fact, and an idea belief which pretends to discredit the belief in facts is a kind of platonizing mythologism, wherever it may start up with grand mien in these days. Meyer more correctly distinguishes belief in something which has occurred, with and without one’s own sensuous perception. Christ did not reject that belief which seeks and finds confirmation in the way of doubt and investigation; neither, therefore, did He reject the corresponding way of belief; He did, however, point out the danger of that way, in which it is possible for doubt to separate itself from a trust in spiritual experience, and, in consequence of the impulse alter sensuous experience, to turn into unbelief and apostasy. [Alford: “Wonderful indeed, and rich in blessing for us who have not seen Him, is this, the closing word of the Gospel. For these words cannot apply to the remaining Ten: they, like Thomas, had seen and believed.” Stier: “All the appearances of the forty days were mere preparations for the believing without seeing.” 1 Peter 1:8, “Whom having not seen, ye love; in whom, though now ye see Him not, yet believing, ye rejoice with joy unspeakable and full of glory: receiving the end of your faith, even the salvation of your souls.”—P. S.] AND ETHICAL1. The character of Thomas, and its import for the Church. See the citations of the Exeg. Note on John 20:24 [and my note on John 20:25.—P. S.] 2. The correct element in Thomas’ expectation: That the body of the Risen One would of necessity be indubitably recognizable by the stigmata of the Crucified One.3. The doubt of Thomas: (1) wherein allied to unbelief ; (2) wherein distinct from the same. Thomas comes into the congregation of the believing disciples. 4. The manifestation of Christ for Thomas. The confession of Thomas. The ascription of blessedness to those who see not and yet believe. See Exeg. Note to John 20:29. 5. On the eighth day, or the repeated sanction of Sunday.[6. Mary Magdalene and Thomas. Wordsworth :“From the two examples of Mary Magdalene and St. Thomas respectively, as described by St. John in this chapter, we learn two several duties to Christ, risen from the dead and ascended into heaven. The case of Mary Magdalene (John 5:17) was very different from that of St. Thomas. She acknowledged His bodily Resurrection, and clung with joy to His human Body risen from the grave, and was satisfied with His visible presence, and wished to retain that. She had yet to learn—and we by her—to see Him that is invisible; to touch Him by faith; to ascend to Him with heart and mind, and to cling to the hem of the garment of Him our great High Priest in heaven, and adore Him as God. Therefore our Lord said to her, ‘Touch me not, for I am not ascended; touch me by faith. That is the touch, which I require; that is the touch, by which I am to be held, and by which you may have My Presence with you.’ But St. Thomas would not believe that He was risen indeed; or, if risen, that He was risen in the same human body as that which he wore before, and at His crucifixion. This was, what he was to learn, and we by him, faith in our Lord’s Resurrection; faith in our own future Resurrection; faith in the identity of our own bodies to rise hereafter. Therefore Christ, who had said ‘Touch Me not’ to Mary, said ‘Touch Me’ to St. Thomas. Thus we are taught the true faith in His Divinity, Humanity and Personality, by His providential and gracious correction of the too material yearnings of a woman’s love, of the too spiritual doubts of an Apostle’s fears.”—P. S.] AND Thomas. His nature. His sin. His worth. His salvation. His Easter-festival. His confession. His example.—The Thomas-souls in the Church of disciples: 1. How they are a detention to the Church; 2. how they are worthy of its indulgence and clemency; 3. how they finally conduce to its confirmation in the faith.—The order of Christianity: 1 First believing without seeing; 2. then seeing in order to become perfect in believing.—Christ the Master, also Thomas’ Master.—Also the Master of Thomas-natures.—The certainty of Christ’s resurrection is mighty enough to shame every sincere doubter.—The difference betwixt solitude and solitude: 1. A solitude of Magdalene, who first saw the Lord (pure grief, constant seeking). 2. A solitude of Thomas who saw Him last (gloomy, repining and brooding).—Thomas’ doubt converted into a blessing to the faith of Christendom.—Thomas the character-portrait of honest doubters. 1. He holds fast the possibility of belief; 2. he put himself in the way of attaining belief. Starke: Zeisius: How perilous it is to forsake the assemblies of the saints! therefore doth the Apostle exhort: Let us not forsake, etc., Hebrews 10:25.—It is a blessed hour when, whilst men are fooling away the time with the world, Jesus doth please to come unto us, Matthew 25:10.—It is one of the duties of Christians gladly to guide others to Christ while themselves resorting to Him, 2 Corinthians 11:2.—Osiander: Those who are filled with spiritual joy, desire to make others sharers in the same, Philippians 2:18; Philippians 2:28.—Canstein: It is a transcendent grace of God, that He makes so much allowance for the manner of speech of the weak and tempted, Job 38:1 f.—Ibid: Mark, on Sunday Christ did several times appear unto the Apostles, on Sunday the disciples were assembled together; and so the first day in the week has been from that time consecrate, as the Lord’s Day, in memory of the resurrection of Christ and the ensuing outpouring of the Holy Ghost, Acts 20:7; 1 Corinthians 16:2; Revelation 1:10.—Jesus in the midst, all the disciples round about Him: one has as much part in Him as another, 1 Timothy 2:4.—Canstein: God exercises the most watchful care over the weak and tempted, and is most eager to help them, Luke 24:15. Gerlach: He who pinneth faith to bodily sight, to the earthly and visible, doth himself expose it to change, since all things visible are temporal, and only the invisible is eternal, 2 Corinthians 4:18.—And so every faith that still hath need of sight, that still hath need of sensuous helps and props, cometh short of being a saving faith. Braune: Thomas is just such a witness of the resurrection as we could desire.—Pope Leo the Great (440–401) was right in saying, with reference to the doubting of the disciples, and to that of Thomas in particular, that they doubted to the end that we might not need to doubt.—The disciples likewise believed not in the beginning; believed not on the strength of the tidings brought by the others; they believed not for joy. Thomas believed not—could not, would not, believe, for sorrow. Love for the Lord was the ground of that joy and of this sorrow,—not godless love of the world.—Thomas, doubtless, suffered many pangs in his faithless melancholy beside the comforted disciples—pangs inflicted upon him by his self-willed demand for proof. Doubts as to the legitimacy of his demand, as well as in regard to the statement of the disciples, augmented his grief.—Then entered Jesus with His familiar: Peace be with you! That is the salutation of the Risen One now and always. The greeting is for all, but for one, in particular: Jesus approaches Thomas, etc. Of so much importance does the Redeemer count the solitary individual who still believes not, though all the others are already believing.—Jesus does not censure inquiry, examination, investigation; He only reprehends the arbitrary and stubborn demand for proof, such as Thomas put forth.—He does not want credulity or thoughtless superstition, but neither does He like self-willed unbelief; He desires a faith that reposes upon the word of life and the idea of that truth which makes the spirit free.—Happy are all they in whose heart and life unbelief is but a passing shadow, driven away by the pursuing breath of the Spirit! Gossner: When these words were so positively heard: “No man can live that seeth God,” intercourse with God was very difficult. Enoch held close intercourse with God before the deluge, but forasmuch as he carried it to a greater extent than was possible for men, God took him, that he might come unto the true enjoyment of communion with Him. All this was different now,—all purely spiritual things became palpable in the forty days after Easter. Shadow gave place to substance. “Feel Me and see,” etc.—The doors are bolted unto the world when the Lord visiteth His people.—The Saviour will let none of His people be lost. He waits for the slow, who come eight days behindhand with their faith. Yet the reprimand that He administered to Thomas, shows that He does not approve of the weakness and hardness of belief which mingled in the demand of that disciple; and it is at the same time an intimation to the effect that his hardness of belief might easily have degenerated into perfect unbelief. Heubner: When a man is not found in the fellowship of the faithful, much good is speedily let slip. When a man mingles in the society of the wicked, much is speedily corrupted. Be not unbelieving, etc. This command manifestly presupposes that the exercise or non-exercise of faith is dependent upon a man’s will.—Faith built on seeing is little worth. For this reason, however, no demand is here made for blind faith. There is a difference between skepticism and the spirit of examination.—“From the beginning God hath instructed His people by faith, but we are continually deviating further and further from this way of faith; wise men labor with all their strength to the end that not faith but knowledge may have the mastery in the case of every truth contained in the Holy Scriptures.” (Bengel.) [Craven: From Augustine: John 20:27. He might, had He pleased, have wiped all spot and trace of wound from His glorified body; but He had reasons for retaining them. He showed them to Thomas, who would not believe except he saw and touched, and He will show them to His enemies, to convict them.——From Chrysostom: John 20:25. As to believe directly, and any how, is the mark of too easy a mind, so is too much inquiring of a gross one: and this is Thomas’ fault. John 20:27. Consider the mercy of the Lord, how for the sake of one soul, He exhibits His wounds. But he did not appear to him (Thomas) immediately, but waited till the eighth day, in order that the admonition being given in the presence of the disciples might kindle in him greater desire, and strengthen his faith for the future. John 20:27. Note how that before they receive the Holy Ghost faith wavers, but afterward is firm. John 20:29. If any one then says. Would that I had lived in those times, and seen Christ doing miracles! let him reflect, Blessed are they that, have not seen, and yet have believed.——From Gregory: John 20:24-25. It was not an accident that that particular disciple was not present. The Divine mercy ordained that a doubting disciple should, by feeling in his Master the wounds of the flesh, heal in us the wounds of unbelief. The unbelief of Thomas is more profitable to our faith than the belief of the other disciples ; the touch by which he is brought to believe, confirming our minds in belief beyond all question. [He causeth not only the wrath of enemies, but the weakness and errors of believers, to serve Him.—E. R. C]——From Theophylact: John 20:28. He who had been before unbelieving, after touching the body showed himself the best divine; for he asserted the twofold nature and one Person of Christ; by saying My Lord, the human nature; by saying, My God, the divine; and by joining them both, confessed that one and the same Person was Lord and God. [The skeptic convinced is often the firmest and most intelligent believer.—E. R. C] [From Burkitt: John 20:24. We know not what we lose, when we absent ourselves from the assembly of God’s people. Such views of a crucified, raised Jesus may be communicated to others, as would have confirmed our faith and established our joy, had we been present. John 20:25. How strangely rooted unbelief is in the hearts of holy men, insomuch that they desire the objects of faith should fall under the view of their senses. John 20:28. The convincing condescension of Christ turns unbelief into a rapture of holy admiration and humble adoration. John 20:29. By how much our faith stands in less need of the external evidence of sense, the stronger and the more acceptable it is, provided what we believe be revealed in the word of God. [From M. Henry: John 20:24. Absenters for a time must not be condemned as apostates forever; Thomas is not Judas. John 20:25. We have seen the Lord; The disciples of Christ should endeavor to build up one another in their most holy faith, both by repeating what they have heard, to those that were absent, that they may hear it at second hand; as also by communicating what they have experienced.John 20:26. A very melancholy week, we have reason to think, Thomas had of it, drooping, and in suspense, while the other disciples were full of joy; and it was owing to himself and his own folly: he that slips one tide, must stay a good while for another.—Thomas with them; When we have lost one opportunity, we should give the more earnest heed to lay hold on the next, that we may recover our losses. It is a good sign if such a loss whet our desires, and a bad sign if it cool them.—Observe, Christ did not appear to Thomas, for his satisfaction, till He found him in society with the rest of His disciples.—Peace be unto you; This was no vain repetition, but significant of the abundant and assured peace which Christ gives, and of the continuance of His blessings upon His people, for they fail not, but are new every morning, new every meeting. [The soul that hath heard its Saviour once speak Peace to it, craveth again and yet again, the comfortable word.—E. M.] John 20:27. There is not an unbelieving word in our tongues, no, nor thought in our minds, at any time, but it is known to the Lord Jesus, Psalms 78:21.—For the confirmation of our faith, He hath instituted an ordinance on purpose to keep His death in remembrance, and in that ordinance, wherein we show the Lord’s death, we are called, as it were, to put our finger into the print of the nails.John 20:28. In faith there must be the consent of the will to gospel-terms as well as the assent of the understanding to gospel-truths.—My; This is the vital act of faith, He is mine, Son 2:16. John 20:29. Christ owns Thomas as a believer. Sound and sincere believers, though they be slow and weak, shall be graciously accepted of the Lord Jesus.—“One proselyte is more acceptable to God than all the thousands of Israel that stood before Mt. Sinai; for they saw and received the law, but a proselyte sees not, and yet receives it.” (A Rabbi quoted by Lightfoot). From Scott: John 20:24-29. Unbelief is the source of almost all our sins and disquietudes. We all have too much copied the example of Thomas’ incredulity, by refusing to believe the word of God, and rely on His help, even when our experience of His care has been abundant; and we are often apt to demand such proof of His truths, and of His will, as we have no right to expect. [From A Plain Commentary (Oxford): John 20:25. It must have been a gaping and a ghastly wound,—that wound in our Saviour’s side,—that St. Thomas should have proposed to “thrust his hand” therein! John 20:26. But when He thus appeared for the second time, we may be well assured that He designed more than the removal of unbelief from the mind of a single disciple. He vouchsafed this appearance for the sake of confirming the faith of all the others,—and of ourselves. John 20:27. Having “convinced” the disciple, He proceeds to “rebuke” him,—which now He may do with good effect; whereas before, rebuke would have been fruitless. John 20:28. “Minds of every natural complexion are called to the exercise of Christian faith. The principle of faith,—the disposition to receive the word of God as such, to embrace and to walk by it,—is not indeed the gift of nature, but of grace; but its operation in each individual mind is modified by that mind’s peculiar cast or temperament; and to every class of mind there are sufficient motives presented for the willing and saved.” (Dr. W. H. Mill.) John 20:29. The blessedness of faith without the evidence of sense,—this it is of which our Lord here assures us; and of this, St. John (concerning whom it is expressly related that “he saw and believed”), St. Peter, St. Thomas and all the rest, were perforce destitute. “Blessed are they who have not seen, and yet have believed: who, against the things of sense, the temptations of the world and Satan, against the perplexities of the natural mind, the misgivings of a fearful, and the lacerations of a wounded, heart, have opposed a firm faith in facts remote in Time, but indelible and eternal in effect.” (Dr. W. H. Mill.) [From Barnes: John 20:25. Many are like Thomas. Many now are unwilling to believe because they do not see the Lord Jesus, and with just as little reason as Thomas had.——From Jacobus: John 20:24. Observe 1. How much is often lost by absence from a single social meeting; 2. This is often excused on the ground of divers hindrances, but is commonly traceable to the want of a lively piety; 3. Such absentees often miss the Saviour’s appearing, and His wonderful communications of the Holy Spirit.——From Owen: John 20:29. If any are disposed to regard it as an inferior privilege, to accept this truth (of the resurrection) through faith rather than sight, this great utterance of Jesus should fully correct such an erroneous view.] Footnotes: John 20:25 — Lachmann, in accordance with Cod. A., etc., Origen, Vulgate, reads here τόπον instead of τύπον. Meyer supposes the τύπον of the Recepta to be a mechanical repetition. But the reading τόπον can also have arisen from exegetical grounds. It weakens the solemnity of the expression. [Tischendorf, ed. 8, reads είςτὸντόποντῶνή́λων into the place of the nails,” but Alford, Westcott and Hon, like Lange, retain τύπον, print.—P. S.] John 20:27.—[Thomas was doubtful, hut not unbelieving; he was anxious and ready to believe, and only waiting for tangible evidence. See Exes.—P. S.] John 20:28 —The καί before ἀπεκρίθη, the ὁ before Θωμᾶς are not firmly established. John 20:29.—Θωμα, which the text. rec. inserts after ἑώρακάςμε, is omitted by A. B. C. D. X, Tischend., Alt, Westcott.—P. S.] [Tischendorf reads τόπον, place. Grotius says: τύπος, videtur τόπος impletur.—P. S.] [So also Wordsworth: “Remark γίνου: Do not become unbelieving. Thomas was doubtful, not unbelieving. Our Lord warns us, through him, that if we miss opportunities of having our scruples removed, if we close our eyes to the evidences lie gives us of truth, our doubts will be hardened into unbelief.”—P. S.] [So also Meyer, Alford, and the best exegetes generally. The Sociaian view is worse than absurd, it turns an. act of adoration into an irrelevant and profane exclamation unrebuked by the Lord! There is no instance of such profane use of the name of God in exclamations.—P. S.] [Alford: “The aorists, as often in such sentences (see Luke 1:45) indicate the present state of those spoken of, grounded in the past.”—P. S.] [And inasmuch as the other apostles also first saw before they believed. Bengel: “Non negatur beatitudo Thomζ, sed rara et lauta prζdicatur sors eorum, qui citra visum credunt, nam etiam cζteri apostoli, cum vidissent, demum credidere.”—P. S.] II BETWEEN THE AND THE JEWS OF JUDEA AND AT THE GRAVE OF LAZARUS. CHRIST, IN OF HIS RAISING OF LAZARUS FROM THE DEAD, HIMSELF DEVOTED TO DEATH. OF DAY’S WORK AND OF SLEEP. THE FROM THE DEAD. John 11:1-57A. Christ’s death-bringing journey to Bethany to raise His friend from the dead. Symbolism of day-life and night-life. Symbolism of sleep(John 11:1-16.)1Now [But] a certain man was sick, named Lazarus, of [from] Bethany, the town 2of Mary and her sister Martha. (It was that [the] Mary which [who afterwards] anointed the Lord with ointment, and wiped his feet with her hair, whose brother Lazarus was sick.) 3Therefore his sisters sent unto him, saying, Lord, behold he whom thou lovest is sick. 4When Jesus heard that, he said [And Jesus hearing it, said], This sickness is not unto death, but for the glory of God, that the Son of God might [may] be glorified thereby. 5Now Jesus loved Martha, and her sister, and Lazarus. 6When he had heard therefore [When therefore he heard] that he was sick, he abode two days still in the same place where he was [he then remained in the place where he was, two days]. 7Then after that saith he [Then after this he saith] to his [the] disciples, Let 8us go into Judea again. His [The] disciples say unto him, Master, the Jews of late sought [just now were seeking, νῦνἐζήτουν] to stone thee; and goest thou thither again? 9Jesus answered, Are there not twelve hours in the day? If any man 10walk in the day, he stumbleth not, because he seeth the light of this world. But if a man walk in the night, he stumbleth, because there is no light in him. 11These things said he: and after that [this] he saith unto them, our friend Lazarus sleepeth 12[hath fallen asleep]; but I go that I may awake him out of sleep. Then said his disciples [The disciples therefore said to him], Lord, if he sleep [hath fallen asleep] he shall do well [become whole, recover]. 13Howbeit Jesus spake [But Jesus had spoken] of his death: but they thought that he had spoken of taking of rest in sleep [he was speaking of the rest of sleep, περὶτῆςκοιμήσεωςτοῦὕπνου]. 14Then [Then therefore, τότεοὖν] said Jesus unto them plainly, Lazarus is dead. 15And I am glad for your sakes that I was not there, to the intent ye may believe; nevertheless let us go unto him. 16Then said Thomas, which [who] is called Didymus [i. e. twin child], unto his fellow-disciples, Let us also go, that we may die with him. AND In the raising of Lazarus from the dead, the most stupendous of the revivifying (quickening) miracles of Jesus, we see at once the ultimate occasion of His death, and the first foreshadowing of His resurrection. Bayle relates of Spinoza [the Jewish philosopher]: “On m’ a assurι qu ’il disait ΰ ses amis, que s’il eϋt pu se persuader la rιsurrection de Lazare, il aurait brisι en piιces tout son systθme et aurait embrassι sans rιpugnance la foi ordinaire des chrιtiens.” [Dict. art. Spinoza].The special plea of modern criticism against the reality of this miracle is the silence of the Synoptists. This fact may be explained: 1. By the character of the Gospels, each one of which being a particular view of the life of Jesus, uses only such historical matter as suits its total; 2. by historical circumstances which made it seem advisable to the Synoptists, who wrote earlier, to omit from their records the history of the family of Bethany, probably in order to avoid attracting to it the attention of Jewish fanatics in Jerusalem (see Leben Jesu, II. 2, p. 1132); 3. by the preponderance of Galilean tradition in the Synoptists, which may well be connected with the fact that a great portion of this tradition was derived from narratives of the life of Jesus addressed by the earlier disciples of Galilee to the later disciples at Jerusalem. We have proof in the writings of the Synoptists that they were well aware of the frequent sojourn of Jesus at Jerusalem; Matthew 23:37; Luke 10:38.[The narrative is divided into three parts: (1) The preparation, which is ruled by the idea of death, 1–16; (2) The raising of Lazarus, or the triumph of life over death, 17–44; (3) The effect, (a) the positive effect: confirmation of the faith of the disciples, 45; (b) the negative effect: exciting the opposition of the Sanhedrin to deadly hatred, 47–57.—The miracle carries its own evidence to every fair and unprejudiced mind. But as the performance of it was a moral test to the Jews, so is its narrative to the readers and critics: a savor of life and a source of comfort to believers, a stumbling-block to unbelievers. There are four false theories, opposed to the true one: 1. The rationalistic view of a raising from a trance, in spite of the ἤδηὄ ?̇ζει, John 11:39! (Paulus, Gabler, Ammon, Kern, Schweizer, modified by Gfrφrer and Weisse). 2. The mythical hypothesis of an unconscious poem of the primitive Christian fancy. (Strauss, in his large “Life of Jesus,” while in his new Leben Jesu, p. 476 ff., he represents the historic Lazarus of John as a free fiction of the fourth Evangelist based upon the parabolic Lazarus of Luke.) 3. The theory of a conscious symbolical or allegorical representation of the death-conquering glory of Christ and His disciples. (Baur, Weizsδcker). 4. The infamous hypothesis of a down-right imposture or pious fraud, an intrigue of the family of Bethany, to which Jesus lent Himself as an instrument with the view to make an impression upon the unbelieving Jews. (Renan, Vie de Jιsus, p. 359 f.). All these theories owe their origin to a disbelief in the supernatural. They neutralize each other and explain nothing at all. The only alternative is: historic truth, or dishonest fiction. The historic truth is abundantly attested by the simplicity, vivacity and circumstantiality of the narrative, the four days in the tomb (John 11:39), and the good sense and moral honesty—to say the very least—of Lazarus and his sisters, the Evangelist and Christ Himself.—P. S.] John 11:1. But there was a certain man sick.—The δέ indicates that Jesus’ stay in Perζa was terminated by the sickness and death of Lazarus. Lazarus, from Bethany.—The designation of Lazarus: from Bethany [άπό, like ἐκ, denotes descent, or, as here, residence], as also the designation of Bethany as the town of Mary and Martha her sister (comp. John 1:44), presupposes the acquaintance of the readers with the family of Bethany, and places Mary, as the most prominent personality of the group, in the foreground. After her, mention is made of Martha, as her sister; after both, Bethany is designated; after Bethany, Lazarus. Bethany on the Mount of Olives, distinct from the Bethany beyond Jordan, in the environs of which Jesus is now, probably, again abiding (see John 1:28), is distant three-quarters of an hour [about two miles] from Jerusalem, in a south-easterly direction, on the other [eastern] side of the Mount of Olives, over whose southern portion the road leads. From its situation on the declivity of the mountain, Simonis thus construes it: αֵּ ?ιϊςֲ ?πִ ?εָּ ?δ, locus depressionis, Low Borough, Valley Borough; with more probability, however, Lightfoot, Reland and others hold that it derives its name from its date-palms: αֵּ ?ιϊδִ ?ιπֵ ?ι, locus dactylorum, House of Dates, Date Borough (see the palm-entry, Matthew 21). In the history of the Passion, Bethany appears as a peaceful refuge for the Lord from hostile Jerusalem; Matthew 21:17; Matthew 26:6, etc.[Bethany is never mentioned in the Old Testament or the Apocrypha, and is known to us only from the New Testament, but possesses an unusual charm as the place where more than in any other Jesus loved to dwell and to enjoy domestic life. There was a house of peace with three children of peace, where the Prince of Peace went in and out as a friend. There He received the hospitable attentions of busy Martha, and commended the contemplative Mary (Luke 10:38 ff.); there He performed His greatest miracle on their brother Lazarus, and proved Himself to be the Resurrection and the Life; there Mary anointed Him against the day of His burial; from Bethany He commenced His triumphant entry into Jerusalem; to Bethany He resorted for the rest of the night during the few days before His crucifixion; and near this village He loved so well, He ascended to heaven. At present it is a poor, wretched mountain hamlet of some twenty families, and is called, from Lazarus, El-Azarξyeh (by Robinson) or El-Lazarieh (according to Lord Lindsay and Stanley); the traditional sites of the house and tomb of Lazarus are still shown. Stanley and Grove give a very unfavorable account; but Bonar and Lindsay describe the situation of Bethany, as viewed from a distance, as “remarkably beautiful,” “the perfection of retirement and repose,” “of seclusion and lovely peace.” It is no doubt with Bethany as with Jerusalem and Palestine generally: it is a mere shadow of the past, a scene of desolation and death; yet not without traces of former glory, and not without hope of a future resurrection.—P. S.] John 11:2. It was the Mary who (afterwards) anointed the Lord with ointment, etc.—John supposes the history of the anointing to be familiar through the evangelical tradition; and this trait shows the vividness and copiousness of that tradition and at the same time the historical character of this Gospel. In the next chapter he proceeds to relate the history of the anointing itself [as required by the course of his narrative]. The evangelist designs here to bring into view the friendly relation existing between Jesus and the brother and sisters of Bethany, in explanation of the following history. Comp. Com. on Matthew, chap. 26; Luke, chap. 10. Touching the vast difference between Mary of Bethany and the great sinner or Mary Magdalene, comp. the Art. Maria Magdalena in Herzog’s Real-Encyklopζdia [vol. ix. p. 102 ff.]. On the character of the two sisters comp. the Com. on Luke, chap. 10. Hengstenberg’s romance founded upon the story of the family of Bethany, is well known. [Hengstenberg devotes twenty-six pages of his Commentary on John (vol. ii. pp. 198–224) to prove that Lazarus of Bethany whom the Lord raised from the dead, is none other than the poor Lazarus of the parable, and that Mary of Bethany is the same with the unnamed sinner who washed the Saviour’s feet with her tears of repentance (Luke 7:36 ff.) and with Mary Magdalene (Luke 8:2). In the former he is original; in the latter he follows the tradition of the Latin church which identified the two or three Marys, down to recent times when it was rightly opposed by several Roman Catholic as well as Protestant divines. Out of the scattered hints of the Gospels Hengstenberg, with more ingenuity than sound judgment and good taste, weaves the following religious novel, which is worthy of a place in a Romish legendary. Mary, originally of Magdala, a village on the western coast of the lake of Galilee, near the city of Tiberias, led a disreputable life, but was converted to Christ, who expelled from her seven devils, i.e., her wild passions, and gave her rest and peace. She clung to Him with boundless devotion and followed Him on His journeys in Galilee (Luke 8:2) and to Judea. While the Lord labored in and around Jerusalem she resided at Bethany in the house or country-seat of her sister Martha, who had married a rich but low-minded Pharisee, Simon the Leper. Here she anointed the Lord and wiped His feet with the tears of repentance, six days before His passion (Luke 7, which is assumed to be the same with the scene described John 12.) Her brother Lazarus, after a similar life of dissipation and consequent poverty, resorted also to the protection of Martha and lived off the parsimonious charity of his brother-in-law. He is the beggar at the gate of “the rich man who was clothed in purple and fine linen and fared sumptuously every day” (Luke 16:19 ff.). He died, was buried, and carried to Abraham’s bosom, but was raised again by Christ, to which an allusion may be found in the parable (John 11:31, “though one rose from the dead”). Mary and Lazarus were so dearly loved by Him, not on account of their virtuous and lovely character, but as striking examples of the power of redeeming grace. They illustrate His saying that it is easier for publicans and sinners to enter the kingdom than for righteous Pharisees.—The grounds for this strange combination are the identity of names (Lazarus of the parable—the only name mentioned in any parable of the New Testament—and Lazarus of Bethany; Mary Magdalene and Mary of Bethany), and the similarity of the anointing scene related by Luke, John 7:36 ff., and the one described by John, John 12:3, as well as Matthew, Matthew 22:3 ff.; and Mark 14:3. But the differences of locality (Magdala and Bethany), of time (the beginning and the close of Christ’s ministry), and of circumstances, in the anointing scenes, are sufficient to neutralize the superficial appearance of identity. Besides, there are strong arguments against Hengstenberg’s hypothesis. 1. Luke’s Gospel which is constructed on the chronological order (Luke 1:3), can not be charged with such a glaring chronological mistake, as to place the anointing of Christ in Bethany in the first year of Christ’s ministry, when according to Matthew, Mark and John it occurred only six days before His passion and had special reference to His near burial. 2. Luke, in introducing Mary of Bethany in Luke 10:39, gives no intimation that she was the unnamed sinner of John 7 or the Mary Magdalene whom he had already honorably mentioned inLuke _8:2; nor does John give any hint of such identity when he introduces Mary Magdalene in Luke 19:25. To explain this fact, Hengstenberg (p. 208) resorts to the far-fetched conjecture of intentional concealment of the identity from family considerations and apprehensions of abuse. 3. If Lazarus lived in miserable dependence on a mean brother-in-law, it would have been cruel to call him back from Paradise. 4. There is an intrinsic improbability, as urged already by Origen and Chrysostom, that Jesus should have selected for His special friendship persons whoso former lives were stained by gross impurity.—The view of Hengstenberg has been generally rejected by German commentators, but Bishop Wordsworth (on Luke 11:1), without mentioning his name, seems to adopt it as far as the identity of the Lazarus of the parable and the Lazarus of the miracle is concerned. He finds in the parable a prophecy of the miracle, in the latter a fulfilment of the former. Godet (II. 320) aptly says of Hengstenberg’s dissertation that it only proves the facility with which a man of learning and acumen can prove any thing he wants to prove.—But while we must utterly reject the identification of the two Lazaruses, it is quite possible that the Lazarus of John 11 was either a son or a brother-in-law of Simon the Pharisee. An article in Smith’s Dict. (vol. II., p. 1614) identifies him with the young and rich ruler who came to Jesus and was loved by Him, Matthew 19; Mark 10; Luke 18:8, but this conjecture is without proof and contrary to the chronological order of events. The traditions concerning the later life of Lazarus and his labors in Marseilles, where he is said to have founded a church and suffered martyrdom, are worthless. The ecclesiastical applications of the name of Lazarus (Knights of St. Lazarus, lazaretto, lazar-house, lazzarone) are derived from the Lazarus of the parable and connected with the etymology (Lazarus=μֹ ?ΰςֵ ?ζֶ ?ψ, auxilio destitutus, no help, helpless, or better=μַ ?ςְ ?ζָ ?ψ, abridged from ΰֶ ?μְ ?ςָ ?ζָ ?ψ, Eliazar, Deus auxilium, the German Gotthilf). The Lazarists, a French Society of missionary priests, were named after Lazarus of Bethany (from the College of St. Lazarus in Paris which they acquired in 1632).—P. S.] John 11:3. Lord, behold, he whom Thou lovest is sick.—If we read in these words the indirect expression of a positive entreaty that Jesus would come, possibly we overlook the situation of the parties. It is as evident to the sisters in Bethany as to the disciples that imminent peril of death threatens the Lord in Jerusalem and its surrounding country. We are not warranted in assuming that they rated the sickness of their brother higher than the deadly peril impending over Jesus. In fact, in their very appreciation of His danger we read the explanation of their tender message in its delicate historicalness. They give emphasis to their communication thus: whom Thou lovest; it is the expression of an ardent, heart-felt desire wherewith they inform Him of what may happen. [ὅνφιλεῖς is more solicitous of help than the mere name, and yet more modest, than “who loves Thee,” or the designation of “friend,” as the Lord in His condescending love calls Lazarus, John 11:11.—P. S.] John 11:4. Jesus hearing it said [εἶπεν] This sickness, etc.—[Alford: “The only right understanding of this answer, and our Lord’s whole proceeding here is,—that He knew and foresaw all from the first,—as well the termination of Lazarus’s sickness and his being raised again, as the part which this miracle would bear in bringing about the close of His own ministry.”—P. S.] In the lack of ἀπεκρίνατο (replied) there is no warrant for the assumption that these words did not form part of a message sent to the sisters, although they were addressed to the disciples also. It was, in reality, His prophetic utterance concerning the entire sickness.—Is not unto death [πρὸςθάνατον].—The expression was an ambiguous one and involved a trial of faith for the sisters. They might thus understand it: The sickness will not result in death, will not be fatal; and to this interpretation the rest of the sentence might seem to point: for the glory of God, etc. From these words it was possible to draw the inference that Jesus would at all events preserve Lazarus from death; perhaps by an exercise of healing power from afar. But this was not His meaning. The certainty and the necessity of the death of Lazarus were manifest to Him from the beginning; He foreknew also that He should raise him from the dead. In this sense, therefore, we are to understand His words: The end and aim of this sickness is not death, but the glorification of God by a raising of the dead, which shall also glorify the Son of God. Therein lay a trial of faith for the sisters (Brenz, Neander). A human instrumentality in order to the divine awakening of the dead was also thus ordained. The sick man and his sisters waited hopefully for the Lord even until the coming of death; then, if they would not be perplexed by the promise of Jesus (see John 11:40), on which their hopes were based, they must take refuge in the mysterious expression: to the glory of God. Not only does the text afford no ground for the supposition that a second message concerning the further progress of the malady was sent to the Lord, informing Him of the incorrectness of His favorable opinion (Paulus, Neander), but such a supposition is directly contrary to the text (see John 11:14).—That the Son of God may be glorified thereby.—This was the purpose of God. Not that God should be glorified by the glorification of Christ (Meyer), but that the glorifying of God through the miracle wrought in His name should also glorify the Son of God,—and this in a striking manner, in the presence of a great multitude and in the vicinity of Jerusalem. They who accused Him of working miracles by the power of Satan, should be witnesses to this astounding miracle, performed by Him after a solemn invocation of that God, whom they called their God and as the blasphemer of whom they denounced Him. It is noteworthy that after this fact He is no more charged with having a demon and working miracles by the assistance of Beelzebub. Christ’s prayer to God at the grave of Lazarus was, however, introduced by the sending of the man who was born blind to the pool of Siloam, that being the property of the temple and of the God of the temple. John 11:5. Now Jesus loved Martha, and her sister, and Lazarus.—[and—and: happy family! Bengel.]—Reference of these words: 1. De Wette: Explanatory of Joh 11:3; John 2. Meyer: explanatory of the consoling assurance contained in John 11:4; John 3. Baumgarten-Crusius: preparatory to John 11:6. “Although He loved them all, He tarried.” Why is Martha here the prominent person and Mary simply designated as her sister? Martha stood in peculiar need of a still greater trial of faith, of purification from her petty cares; and in order to these results, death must be felt in all its terrors and deliverance in all its rapture. In this sense Jesus loved her. Thus the connection with John 11:6 might also be expressed by a “therefore,” etc. But since the evangelist has not specified this connection more positively, room is left for both conjectures (“although” and “therefore”). The expression ἠγάπα, not ἐφίλει (as John 11:3), may not have been chosen solely “on account of the therewith mentioned sisters” (Meyer), but also on account of the loftily severe conduct of the love of Christ. [ἀγαπᾶν may be used of divine love, but φιλεῖν expresses human love and the personal relation of friendship. The relation of Jesus to the female sex exhibits a tenderness truly human with a purity and dignity truly divine. Comp. the remarks on p. 167.—P. S.] John 11:6. When therefore he heard that he was sick, then (at that time), indeed, he remained two days.—Τότεμέν [tum quidem, omitted in the E. V.]. The μέν leads us to expect a δέ after ἔπειτα, which has, however, been omitted in order that the conclusion of the sentence might appear independently in all its significance. Explanation of the delay of Jesus: 1. In order to test the faith of the interested parties (Olshausen after the ancients). This motive cannot be rejected as “inhuman arbitrariness” (Meyer). It was undoubtedly influential, although not exclusively so. 2. Jesus was detained in Perζa by important business (Lόcke [Neander, Tholuck] and others.) Here, without doubt, we have the grand motive and the foundation of the previously mentioned one, for it would have been an utter impossibility for Jesus to remain two days away from Bethany in inactivity. Meyer objects to this explanation on the ground that nothing of the kind is stated in the text. But it is implied everywhere that Jesus was never inactive and that He had days’ works, times (καιροί) and hours, appointed Him by God. 3. Meyer [and Alford]: The motive is indicated John 11:4 : the glorification of God through the miracle. This was undoubtedly a final and supreme motive, one, however, that never stands alone; it is invariably associated with concrete, moral motives. Assuming this to be the sole motive, the delay of two days was totally unnecessary, since Lazarus had already been dead a long time. Bretschneider and his followers have based their arguments against the authenticity of the history itself upon this delay, which they did not comprehend. We must further beware of the false idea that Jesus first suffered Lazarus to die, and then went to raise him from the dead. As Lazarus had already lain in the grave four days, when Jesus arrived at Bethany, he would (assuming the distance to have been a day’s journey) have been two days in the grave, if Jesus had set out for Bethany immediately upon receiving the message. Hence He caused no fruitless waiting by the bedside of the sick man. The sisters had deferred sending the message to Jesus until Lazarus was at the point of death, because they knew the danger attending the return of the Saviour to Judea. So fine a historical trait cannot have been invented. Two days.—On the great activity of Jesus in Perζa see the Com. on Matthew. He was to depart from a province in which there were many that believed on Him. John 11:7. Let us go again into Judea (from Perζa), etc.—He does not say, to Bethany. To Judea, “to the land of unbelief and deadly enmity.” The πάλιν is doubtless indicative of the fact that Jesus had previously journeyed with the disciples from Perζa to Judea, to attend the feast of the consecration of the temple. John 11:8. But just now the Jews were seeking to stone Thee.—Dissuading, in view of the obvious peril of death. In this connection the form of the message sent by the sisters is to be explained. These words, as well as John 11:16, prove that the disciples were not apprehensive as to their own safety merely, but that the Lord was the principal subject of their anxiety. John 11:9. Are there not (fully) twelve hours, etc.?—“In Palestine, where the clays are of nearly equal duration, they are divided, the whole year through, into twelve hours.” Gerlach. Jesus probably uttered these words in the early morning, in view of the rising sun, just as the day was beginning; in like manner the words: I must work as long as it is day (John 9:4), were spoken in face of the setting sun. In the first place, this was not said to allay the apprehensions of the disciples on their own account (Chrysostom, Neander); it had reference to the life-journey of the Lord Himself: Christ employs, however, such general terms, that the words are applicable to the life-journey of the disciples also. Under the figure of the day, the idea of the life-day of the individual and of the day’s work appointed him is again presented, as in John 9:4 f. Here, however, the God-given, fully meted out day of life is the main point. If there the meaning be: I must work with speed, for My day draweth near its close—there is but little time remaining—the twelve hours will soon be over; so here the signification is: I can still work without peril of death,—I can still make the journey thither,—My twelve hours are not yet at an end. The determination of the day to twelve hours has led Grotius and others to this explanation: Are there not only twelve hours—contrary to the sense of the figure, which portions out the one day into twelve assured sections. Lyra and Luther have discerned in the twelve hours the image of the changing moods of men: “the hearts of the Jews are fickle.” This is at all events an import of minor weight and prominency. Entirely arbitrary and gratuitous is the interpretation of Augustine; according to him, the twelve hours are the twelve apostles, who must follow the Lord as the hours follow the sun. But now arises the question, whether, by the twelve hours, Jesus intended to express simply His present safety from mortal peril, or whether He would intimate at the same time that, in the future, death was inevitably prepared for Him; that a time of suffering and death was impending, when He must desist from active work. That we are to understand Him as having reference to both facts, the subsequent sentence proves: but if any man walk in the night, etc. The one consideration does not exclude the other; on the contrary they form together a higher unity. To walk and to work as long as the assured day of life lasts, but after that, to rest, and not by wilful working in the night of suffering and death, to plunge into danger and ruin,—such is the teaching of the outward life-regimen, prescribed to us in the distinction of day and night. But again, the expression, and particularly the “stumbling in the night” points to a still higher antithesis: as the day was made to symbolize the day of life, so the day of life becomes the symbol of duty and of heavenly light in divinely appointed duty; and the evening and night of life are an image of the darkness outside of duty. This was especially applicable to the disciples. Now, when the day of life was still assured to them, they would willingly have abstained from walking and working; but when the Saviour’s night of suffering arrived, then they desired to walk and to act. Judas walked, stumbled, and fell into bottomless perdition; Peter walked, and fell after the most perilous fashion. I walk in the day, and as long as the day lasts, in perfect security; take care that ye do not now desire prematurely to rest, and then, at an unseasonable time, when the night has come, to walk. Meyer admits only the former apprehension: “The working time appointed Me by God has not yet passed away; so long as this lasts, no man can prevail against Me; but when it has expired, I shall fall into the hands of My enemies, just as he who walks at night stumbles, because he is destitute of light” (and thus Apollinaris, Jansen [ Maldonatus, Corn. a Lapide ] and others). Tholuck apprehends in this the symbol of working as predominant over that of walking, with reference to the περιπατεῖν, which undoubtedly implies such an idea, because now the work of Jesus was a walking to Bethany; nevertheless, this is not the prevailing view; to warrant its adoption as such, another verb would be requisite. With the primary figure of the day of life, Lόcke, after Melanchthon, has rightly connected the figure of the day of duty. Luthardt: “He who moves within the bounds of duty, does not stumble, makes no false steps, for the light of the world, i.e. the will of God, enlightens him; but he who walks, i.e. is active, outside of the limits of his vocation, will err in what he does, since not the will of God, but his own pleasure is his guide.” And still further, beyond even this second figure, has the spiritual interpretation of this saying been carried out. Chrysostom and others: The walking by day is that blameless conduct wherein one has nought to fear; Erasmus and others: It is fellowship with Christ; De Wette: It is a pure, guiltless, clear course of action;—the twelve hours being the ways and means of activity, the night, deficiency in wisdom and integrity. All these considerations, however, are included in a just perception of the antithesis of day and night. The great law of physical life: the day-time for walking and working, the night-time for resting and sleeping, is a symbol of the law of moral life: during the whole day of life to fulfil with joyous and fearless activity the whole duty, and then, in the night of suffering and death, to submit calmly to God’s providence, and rest and cease from labor in Him. But this law of moral life is conditioned by that of religious life: to work in the day of the light of God and Christ; not in the night of self-will, whereby we should prepare for ourselves a fall into perdition. And thus this thought also is indicated: that a false prolongation of life by evasion of duty is the immediate preparation for a night, in which one must of necessity stumble and fall; while a resigned and passive demeanor in the divinely appointed night of death becomes a walking in a loftier sense, a going to the Father (Leben Jesu, ΙΙ. 2, p. 1118). Still this is but the result of the ethical idea, not the immediate sense of the figure itself.Twelve, brought forward with emphasis, signifying, objectively, life full-measured, rich, with its manifold appointments; subjectively, Christ’s joyful assurance of life. If any man walk.—The living man a walker and worker, a pilgrim and workman of God.—In the day.—The present day a symbol of the day of life, which, together with its day’s task, is appointed to man.—He stumbleth not.—As men run against objects at night. He does not stumble upon an occasion of his death.—For he seeth.—The light shines upon him so that he avoids the stumbling blocks that obstruct his road even in the day-time. Thus, in a moral sense, man sees in the light of his calling the dangers which he can and should avoid, without being obliged to abandon his vocation. But if any man walk in the night.—The exceptions to the law of physical life (nocturnal working and walking) do not here come under consideration. Such is the rule in the physical life:—a rule which obtains in a still greater degree in the moral life. A self-seeking excitement—tumultuous living—of life prepares for itself death in the twilight of suffering, and destruction in the night of death. As Jesus has no desire to walk=work in the night, this remark is intended especially for the disciples.—He stumbleth.—See the account of the disciples in the history of the Passion.—The light is not in him.—No day-light from heaven, no light in the eyes; this holds good both in a physical and in a symbolical sense. The weakening of the antithesis of day and night to tempus opportunum and inopportunum (Morus, Paulus, etc.) is not incorrect but altogether insufficient. John 11:11. And after this.—After the tranquilizing words a pause. Our friend Lazarus.—Thus Christ was acquainted with his sickness, with the hour of his death and the nature of it, by virtue of His divine-human consciousness. Our friend. An expression of hearty love and fellowship, in which they also do and should share. [Bengel notices the kind condescenion with which our Lord shares His friendship with the disciples. Only twice more does Christ call men by the endearing name of friends, viz., the apostles, John 15:14-15; Luke 12:4. Figuratively John the Baptist called himself a friend of Christ (John 3:29). Abraham is called a “friend of God” (James 2:23; comp. 2 Chronicles 20:7; Isaiah 41:8), but more in the passive sense: the favorite of God.—P. S.] Hath fallen asleep.—This expression is not selected simply in view of the approaching awakening. Comp. Matthew 9:24; 1 Thessalonians 4:13. It is the kinship of sleep and physical death, that Christ here proclaims. Sleep is the periodical death on earth; death is the final sleep for earth in the period of its present existence;—sleep is the concentration of outward life to the interior, in the nocturnal consciousness and vegetation of the body; death is the concentration and internalization of life in the transit of the soul to another state of existence.—But I go.—The confidence of the Lord in His mission. [Bengel: “Death, in the language of heaven, is the sleep of the pious, but the disciples did not here understand His language. The freedom of the divine language is incomparable; but men’s dullness often degrades Scripture to our sadder mode of speaking. Comp. Matthew 16:11.” The scriptural designation of death as a sleep from which the pious awakes in the glorious morning of eternity (Matthew 9:24; Matthew 27:52; Acts 7:59; Acts 13:36; 1 Corinthians 15:6; 1 Thessalonians 4:13; Revelation 14:13), furnishes no basis for the false doctrine of the sleep or unconscious condition of the soul from death till resurrection (psychopannychia), against which Calvin wrote his first theological treatise. The life union of the believer with Christ can not be suspended or lost in the darkness of unconsciousness; on the contrary, it passes through death to a higher degree of clearness and joy, being translated into the immediate presence of the Lord, although it does not attain to its perfect maturity till the time of the general resurrection, when the whole body of Christ, and consequently every member of it, will be fully grown.—P. S.] John 11:12. He shall be restored (be saved).—i.e. recover by means of sleep as a health-bringing crisis. Their misapprehension of the Lord’s words and their application of them to bodily sleep have a psychological connection with their repugnance to the journey to Bethany. According to Bengel and Luthardt, they thought that the sleep had been produced by the agency of Jesus while yet absent (to which the πορεύομαι is considered to refer); according to Ebrard, that a cure had already been effected by the same agency (after John 11:4). The text affords no ground for either assumption.—Of the rest of the sleep.—Of the rest of dream-life; i.e., of real sleep in antithesis to the sleep of death. John 11:14. Plainly: Lazarus is dead.—Παῥῥησίᾳ, here, without circumlocution, John 11:10; John 11:24. John 11:15. I am glad for your sakes.—He is glad that He was not there. This does not mean, glad that He was not there to see Lazarus die, because his death might have raised doubts in the minds of the disciples (Paulus; against this construction Bengel remarks, that none ever died in presence of the Prince of Life),—but glad because now the greater miracle of a raising of the dead should take the place of a healing of the sick. He rejoices—not at his death—but in anticipation of the sign from God.—That ye may believe.—[The subjective intent with regard to the disciples themselves; the objective intent being the glory of God, John 11:4.—P. S.] With reference to their still weak faith, and to the trials of faith which they are about to encounter. Meyer: “Every new step of faith is in measure a new believing.” Comp. John 2:11.—But let us depart.—The ἀλλά terminates the conversation in order to the departure, as John 14:31. John 11:16. Then said Thomas.—ϊְֹּ ?ΰν = ϊֹּ ?ΰξָ ?ΰ [Aramaic] corresponding to the Greek Δίδυμος [Didymus], twin. In the Gospels (Matthew 10:3; Mark 3:18; Luke 6:15) he is mentioned in connection with Matthew, in the Acts (1:13) with Philip. He was probably a Galilean, as he is mentioned John 21:2 together with the Galilean fisher-apostles. Tradition has made him a veritable twin and bestowed the name of Lysia on his sister. In yet another relation he was pronounced a twin. According to Eusebius, H. E. Ι. 13, 5, he was called Judas; he is also designated in the Acta Thomζ, and has doubtless in this way been confounded with Judas, “the brother of Jesus.” Tradition assigns Antioch as his birth-place, states that as an apostle he preached Christianity among the Parthians and that he was buried at Edessa. According to later authority (as early, however, as Gregory of Nazianzen) he made an apostolic journey to India and there, after the latest tradition, suffered martyrdom. Apocryphal literature has appended his name to an Evangelium Thomζ and the Acta Thomζ. His characteristics are vividly portrayed in the sayings preserved by St. John; thus here John 11:16; John 14:5; John 20:24 (21:2). In ecclesiastical tradition he is one-sidedly designated as skeptical, from his conduct in the moment of temptation. For various delineations of his character see the Art. Thomas in Winer. According to Winer, he had a bias towards the visible and comprehensible; he was, above all things, desirous of seeing clearly and was then rashly, even violently, decided. According to Tholuck, he united a mind inclining to doubt and despondency with intense acuteness of sensibility. From the passages cited it would appear that his doubting was the result of profound earnestness approaching to melancholy, and allied to a yearning after truth; hence, he became the critical spirit of the circle of apostles;—and hence, too, he displays the utmost decision in living in conformity to his convictions (see Leben Jesu, ΙΙ. 2, p. 697; Com. on Matthew, p. 183). John 11:16. Let us also depart that we may die with Him.—With reference to Jesus [Meyer, Alford], not to Lazarus (Ewald, following Grotius). Thomas foresees, as he believes, that Jesus is going to His death and is ready to die with Him. Weak faith, strong love; an unequal relationship which is thus explained: a vigorous germ of faith, reflected in his not yet purified and glorified love to Jesus; a weak, dull development of faith, held in check by the carefulness of his hitherto empirical view of the world. [It is the language of mingled melancholy, resignation and courage, controlled by love to Christ. It is in full accordance with the character of Thomas as it appears on other occasions, John 14:5; John 20:5 ff. He is ever inclined to take the dark view, but deeply attached to his Lord, and ready to die with and for Him. He represents the honest, earnest and noble skeptics, who do not hold fast to the Invisible as if they saw Him, who require tangible evidence before they believe, but who submit to the evidence when presented, and exclaim before the risen Saviour: My Lord and my God!—P. S.] AND ETHICAL1. The raising of Lazarus, the death of the Lord. Christ as dying for the resurrection of the world. 2. The three dead-awakenings of Christ in their gradation: The child on its death-bed,—the youth on his bier,—the man in his grave; the awakening in the hushed circle of friends,—in presence of a funeral procession of acquaintances,—in the midst of the Jews. 3. How the opinion of Jesus concerning the sickness of Lazarus applies in a broader sense to every sickness, considered with reference to its final aim, and so in a peculiar sense to the sickness of the believer. 4. The love of the Lord to His friends is holy, and therefore manifoldly and inscrutably deep and mysterious in its manifestation, like the providence of God itself. 5. The delay and haste of Jesus. 6. Symbolism of day-life and night-life. The duty of the day is the day of the duty. This is applicable to the day of life as well as to the individual day. 7. Symbolism of sleep. Christ has changed death into sleep; but as the death of His people is sleep, so is the spiritual sleep of unbelievers death. 8. The noble and therefore open doubt of Thomas in antithesis to the wicked, secret and reserved doubting of Judas. 9. The mysterious rapport of spirit and life between the praying Christ in Perζa and the praying household in Bethany. AND [Literature: On the raising of Lazarus see the numerous and valuable notes of Dr. Mallet on John, John 11, 12 in the “Bremer Post,” from the close of the year 1857 to the year 1859. Similarly John 11 Sermons on the eleventh chapter of St. John’s Gospel by Dr. Schroeder, Pastor at Elberfeld, 1853. As also the list of books in Heubner, p. 389. Historie von Lazaro, by Sutellius, Wittenberg, 1543; Joh. Arnd’s Lazarus redivivus, Jena 1620; Balthasar Muenter, Public Lectures on the discourses of Jesus, etc., ninth volume, 1793; Lilienthal, Predigten όber die Auferweckung des Lazarus, 1764; Ewald, Lazarus, Berlin 1790; Herder, Homilies, No. 19; Seiler, Pastoral-Theologie, ΙΙ. p. 93–101; Hanstein, Erinnerungen an Jesu, vierte Fortsetzung; Wichelhaus, Weg zur Ruhe; Bourdaloue, Sermon, etc.; Massillion, Fournier, Bethanien, Berlin, 1837; Theremin, Predigten, ΙΙΙ. no. 8; W. Huelsemann, die Geschichte der Auferweckung des Lazarus, Leipzig, 1835. [Gumlich, in the Studien und Kritiken, 1862, pp. 65 ff., 248 ff.; Trench, Notes on the Miracles, pp. 312 ff. Sea also a large list of English sermons, lectures and practical treatises on John 11 in Darling’s Cyclopζdia Bibliographica, vol. I., pp. 1115 ff.—P. S.] The three sections from John 11:1-57 together, as a homiletical trilogy: 1. The journey of Jesus to Bethany to the grave of His dead friend, or the journey into peril of death, in order to the raising of the dead; 2. the miracle at Bethany, or the raising of the dead in the face of mortal enemies; 3. the message from Bethany, or the death-fate impending over the Lord in consequence of the message of the Prince of Life.—”`Now there was one sick,” or how the distress of His people draws the Lord unto them: 1. down from heaven into human misery; 2. over the Jordan into peril of death; 3. forever back from the rest of heaven into the conflict of earth; 4. in the future, from the throne of glory to the judgment-seat. Our section, John 11:1-16. The pious household of the sick man.—The fellowship of a believing family: 1. a relationship of blood and spirit; 2. fellowship of suffering and triumph.—The imperishable glory and blessedness of the names of the just. How they shine eternally in the light of the love of Jesus.—“That the Son of God may be glorified thereby.” Or how Christ has always in the highest sense made a virtue of necessity: 1. Of oppression, deliverance; 2. of danger, a triumph; 3. of temptation, a victory; 4. of misery, redemption; 5. of death, a festival of resurrection.—Brothers and sisters after the flesh, as spiritually kindred in Scripture and history.—The message from Bethany: 1. How strong; 2. how tender.—Christ, the Master, over against His people; 1. They call and He tarries; 2. they dissuade and He goes.—Christ’s heavenly knowledge of the earthly circumstances of His people.—“Let us go again into Judea.” Or Christ returns in spite of His enemies.—The twelve hours of the day, or life-time and life’s duty in their indissoluble unity: 1. The certainty of life within the bounds of duty. The servant of God does not die until his work is performed. 2. The sacredness of duty within the bounds of life.—Day and night in relation to the life of duty; 1. Within, day; 2. without, night.—The order of the antithesis between day and night, an image of the antithesis between life-time and death. (Now—work, then—rest).—The inverters of this order, who pass their time in idleness now, shall then incur fearful pains.—Our friend Lazarus sleepeth. How this is applicable to every departed believer: our friend sleeps.—This also is true: the Awakener is already on the way.—The misunderstanding of the disciples.—“Let us go!” Or the same words in their two-fold meaning: 1. In the mouth of Christ; 2. in the mouth of Thomas.—The three expressions of doubt proceeding from Thomas and the victory of his faith. This entry is longer than a Bible module can hold. The rest is at https://www.sermonindex.net/commentary/lange/ B. The raising of Lazarus. The trial and victory of faith at the open grave. The heart of Jesus. The glory of the God of Israel and the glory of Jesus united in a glorious work, for a sign for the Jews from Jerusalem(John 11:17-44)17Then when Jesus came, he found that he had lain [been] in the grave four days already. 18Now Bethany was nigh unto [near] Jerusalem, about fifteen furlongs 19off: And [But] many of the Jews came [had come, ἐληλύθεισαν] to Martha and Mary, to comfort them concerning their brother [the brother, π. τοῦἀδελφοῦ ?]. 20Then Martha, as soon as she heard that Jesus was coming, went and met him [when she heard that Jesus was coming, went to meet him]: but Mary sat still 21[omit still] in the house. Then said Martha unto Jesus, Lord, if thou hadst been here, my brother had not died. 22But I know, that even now [And even now I know that] whatsoever thou wilt [mayest] ask of God, God will give it 23thee [will give to thee]. Jesus saith to her, Thy brother shall [will] rise again. 24Martha saith unto him, I know that he shall [will] rise again in the resurrection 25[of all] at the last day. Jesus said unto her, I am the resurrection, and the life: he that believeth in me, though he were dead [should die], yet shall he [he will] 26live: And whosoever [every one that] liveth and believeth in me shall never die 27[lit: will not die for ever, οὐμὴἀποθάνῃεἰςτὸναἰῶνα]. Believest thou this? She saith unto him, Yea, Lord: I believe [have believed, become a believer] that thou art the Christ, the Son of God, which should come [who cometh] into the world. 28And when she had so said [having said this] she went her way [away] and called Mary her sister secretly, saying, The Master is come [is here, πάρεστι], and calleth for (omit for] thee. 29As soon as she heard that [it], she arose quickly, and came unto him. 30Now Jesus was [had] not yet come into the town, but was [still] in that 31[the] place where Martha [had] met him. The Jews then [therefore] which [who] were with her in the house, and comforted [were comforting, παραμυθούμενοι] her, when they saw Mary, that she [saw that Mary] rose up hastily and went out, followed her, saying, She goeth unto the grave [thinking that she was going to the tomb] to weep there. 32Then when Mary was come where Jesus was, and saw him [Mary therefore, when she came … seeing him, or, as soon as she saw him], she fell down at his feet, saying unto him, Lord, if thou hadst been here, my brother had not died [comp. John 11:21-22]. 33When Jesus therefore saw her weeping, and the Jews also weeping which [who] came with her, he groaned [ἐνεβριμήσατο, was deeply and indignantly moved, stirred up] in the [his] spirit, and was troubled [troubled himself, ἐτάραξενἑαυτόν], 34And said, Where have ye laid him? They say unto him, Lord, come and see. 35Jesus wept. 36, 37Then said the Jews, Behold how he loved him! And [But] some of them said, Could not this man, which [he who] opened the eyes of the blind [man, τοῦτυφλοῦ, 38see chap. 9] have caused that even this man should not have died [die]? Jesus therefore again groaning in [deeply moved within] himself cometh to the grave 39[tomb]. It was a cave, and a stone lay upon it [against it]. Jesus. said [saith] Take ye [omit ye] away the stone. Martha, the sister of him that was dead, saith unto him, Lord, by this time he stinketh: for he hath been dead four days 40[he hath his four days]. Jesus saith unto her, Said I not [Did I not say] unto thee, that, if thou wouldest [omit wouldest] believe, thou shouldest [shall] see the glory of God? 41Then they took away the stone from the place where the dead was laid [omit from the place where the dead was laid]. And Jesus lifted up his [the] eyes [to heaven, 42or upward, ἄνω] and said, Father, I thank thee that thou hast heard me. And [Yet] I knew that thou hearest me always: but because of the people [for the sake of the multitude] which stand by [around] I said it, that they may [might] believe that thou hast sent [didst send] me. 43And when he thus had [had thus] spoken, he cried [out] with a loud voice, Lazarus, come forth. 44And he that was dead [the dead man] came forth, bound hand and foot with graveclothes; and his face was bound about with a napkin. Jesus saith unto them, Loose him, and let him go. AND Joh_11:17. Four days already.—Jesus comes into the vicinity of the place and learns that Lazarus has already been buried four days. The journey from Perζa to Bethany is estimated at ten hours,—a day’s. journey. One day, therefore, is consumed by His journey, two days by His stay in Perζa after the receipt of the message, and still another day by the journey of the messenger. Hence it results that Lazarus, who, in conformity to the Jewish custom, was buried on the day of his death, died shortly after the departure of the messenger, or while he was preparing to depart. The first and last days enter into the computation as parts of days. And so, when Lazarus died, his sisters must have known, with perfect certainty, that their messenger had not yet reached the Lord, or, at all events, that Jesus could not so soon be with them. They could not, therefore, with the feeling common to humanity, attribute the death of Lazarus to any delay on the part of Jesus; on the contrary, it is far more probable that they reproached themselves with delay in despatching the messenger. But this very trait, like their timid message, finds its explanation in the condition of affairs; they were well aware of the peril involved in His coming. Be it also observed that plain-spoken Martha says: “If Thou hadst been here, my brother had not died,”—and not: “if Thou hadst come sooner.” John 11:18. About fifteen furlongs (stadia) off [ὡςἀπὸσταδίωνδεκαπέντε].—A stadium (ατάδιος and in the classics also στάδιον) a distance of 125 paces. The fifteen stadia about three-quarters of an hour [about two miles]. Ancient construction (Tholuck): Trajection of the preposition ἀπό, which relates to Jerusalem. In opposition to this, Winer, [p. 518]: The ἀπό designates the locality beyond the fifteen stadia, and is to be considered as referring to the stadia. The latter construction seems far-fetched. The short distance is mentioned in order to account for the presence in Bethany of so many Jews from Jerusalem. The use of the preterite (Bethany was) is to be explained by its connection with the historical narrative. John 11:19. Many of the Jews,—i.e. not necessarily members of the Sanhedrin (John 11:46), but people of Pharisaic or Judaistic views. Possibly they wished to regain this family in the absence of Jesus, whose friendship for them may have been known. However, many of the kindred of the family may have been among these Jews and we have no grounds for representing all who came to condole with them as miserable comforters. To Martha and Mary. Πρὸςτὰςπερί M. κ. M. Properly, to the two sisters, with the persons about them. According to later Greek usage it might be indicative simply of the two sisters. “But the New Testament contains no instance of its use in this sense and there is here an especial decorum in the expression, since those who came to them were men. It reveals, moreover, an establishment of the better class.” (Meyer). But the more obvious and definite allusion is, probably, to the company of mourners and wailing women. To comfort them.—The conventional condolences and consolations lasted seven days, according to 1 Samuel 31:13; 1 Chronicles 10:12; Maimonides, De luctu, cap. xiii.; Lightfoot [pp. 107 sqq.], and others. John 11:20. Then Martha, when she heard, etc.—She appears as mistress of the house and receives the message. She goes without delay to meet the Lord and does not first communicate the sews to Mary; John 11:28 also leads us to suppose that such was the case (Meyer in opposition to Tholuck).—But Mary sat in the (interior of the) house; “because, according to Geier, De luctu Hebr. [pp. 210 sqq.] and others, it was the custom to be seated in receiving condolences,” or “sitting was a part of the mourning rite with the Greeks and Hebrews.” But certainly not for this reason alone. The different conduct of the two sisters in our Gospel is in perfect accordance with the characters in Luke 10:38-42. [This agreement between two Gospels so widely different is no small proof of the historical character of the two sisters. Both loved our Lord, but Martha was more active, practical, demonstrative; Mary contemplative, pensive and quiet, but moved in the deep. Martha as soon as she hears of the Lord’s approach, hastens to Him. Mary does the same afterwards (John 11:29), but speaks less and feels more. We have a precise analogy in the difference between Peter and John.—P. S.] John 11:21. Lord, if Thou hadst been here [εἰἦςὦδε, not the language of reproach, but of regret].—Meyer translates: If Thou wert here,—not abiding in distant Perζa. That would mean: if this were Thy constant place of abode. This would convey an excellent sense if Bethany had ever bean the permanent dwelling-place of Christ; this, however, was not the case.—My brother would not have died.—Strongly expressed: ἐτεθνήκει. [On the different readings see Text. Note 5.—P. S.] John 11:22. And even now [καὶνῦν without ἀλλά] I know that etc.—She still retains this assurance. She gives strong expression to her confidence: 1. Whatever Thou mayest ask God, 2. God will give it to Thee—in the original, the“give” [δώσεισοι] takes precedence of the rest—; 3. the name of God twice mentioned. Certainly an indirect expression of the boldest hope, to which she dares not verbally give utterance—a hope, namely, of the raising of the dead man. The sisters at Bethany were acquainted with the raising of the daughter of Jairus and of the youth at Nain. Martha also remembered the promise (John 11:4) contained in the message of Jesus (Tholuck, Meyer). Hence not simply: if Thou wilt implore consolation (Rosenmόller), or: that Lazarus may not be cast away (Euthymius), or only an assurance: nevertheless, I consider Thee a favorite of God (Paulus). We must not, however, convert this indefinite and sifting expression into a confident expectation of the raising of the dead man,—as results also from the words: whatever Thou mayest ask.[This is the only place where αἰτεῖσθαι is used of Jesus as praying to God, instead of ἐρωτᾶν, παρακαλεῖν, προσεύχεσθαι, δει̇σθαι, comp. Luke 22:32; John 14:16; John 16:26; John 17:9; John 17:15; John 17:20. Bengel calls αἰτεῖσθαι, verbum minus dignum; it is certainly more human and implies a state of dependence and need. It is, however, as Meyer remarks, in keeping with the deep excitement of Martha and her as yet imperfect knowledge of the superhuman relation of Christ to the Father.—P. S.] John 11:23. Thy brother will rise again.—A grand promise, though corresponding with the indefinite hope in being indefinitely worded; not: I will now raise him up. She might understand Him as referring to the general future resurrection. And besides, specific faith in the raising of the dead must issue from a general faith in their resurrection. It was an ambiguous expression, designed for the trial and development of her faith.John 11:24. I know that he will rise again, etc.—Her meaning is obvious: I acquiesce in that, but I hope for something more. Her words are expressive not merely of a sad resignation, but of an indirect query—she is feeling her way (De Wette). John 11:25-26. I am the resurrection.—[This is evidently the central idea of this chapter: Christ the Resurrection of the dead, and the Life of the living. The following miracle is the practical proof of what He is in His own person and a pledge of what He will do on the last day. To Himself (ἐγώ), therefore, He first directs the weak faith of Martha; from the future resurrection and the dead brother she was to look to the present (εἰμί), ever-living and life-giving Saviour. The general resurrection of the dead is only a manifestation of the moral power of the person that stood before her. What sublimity and what comfort in this testimony of Christ concerning Himself! Who can measure the effect which it produces from day to day in countless chambers of mourning and before open graves all over the Christian world!—Resurrection is put first, in opposition to the present power of death which is to be overcome; Resurrection is Life itself in conflict with, and victory over, death, it is the Death of death, the triumph over decay and dissolution swallowing up mortality in life. (Luther has forcibly described the marvellous duel between Life and Death on the cross, in an Easter hymn, where the passage occurs: “Wie ein Tod den andern frass; Ein Spott aus dem Tod ist worden.”) Life comprehends spiritual as well as physical life, life eternal of body and soul. Christ is the Victor of death and the grave, because He is the Prince of life in this absolute sense. In the words following the first clause is an explanation and application of the term Resurrection, the second of the term Life. I am the Resurrection: he that believeth in Me, though he have died, will live (will be raised up again). I am the Life: whoever liveth and believeth in Me will never die (will live forever in unbroken life-union with Me, the Prince of life).—P. S.] I [and no other], i.e., the future resurrection is not an impersonal fate that is to take place at some future time, but a personal effect proceeding from Me who am present with you. It is even now present and active in Me.—And the life.—Life in the absolute sense, in its power to awaken spirit and body. Hence, as well the principle of resurrection (Hunnius, Luthardt), as its essence and result (Meyer). As the vital principle of the resurrection, He exerts a purely quickening influence, which branches into two forms: a. He who believes on Him, if he have died [ἀποθάνῃ, past], shall live, shall continue to live, shall rise again; b. he who is still living, who through belief on Him becomes truly alive, shall never die, i.e. shall not become a prey to death and the sense of mortality. The life of Christ is the author of the resurrection in a two-fold sense; it is the root of the waking of the physically dead, because it is the power which effects the moral awakening,—the power which rouses into spiritual life. They that live in Him shall not die; and the dead are not dead, but live again. In both cases, undoubtedly, the saying has reference to the same believer; the two propositions do not resolve themselves, as ancient commentators declare, into the parallel: “for dead believers I am the resurrection, for living ones the remedium mortis.” It is true, however, that the two propositions indicate, after Euthymius and others, the two-fold point of view; whether one be already dead (Lazarus) or still living (Martha, Mary). In both cases, the spirituo-physical or whole life-agency of Christ is meant. The dead rise spiritually and corporeally to the new life of the resurrection. The living are not swallowed up in the death of the world either spiritually or bodily (inasmuch as they transport with them the germ or the concrete body of the resurrection). Therefore we are not to attach a merely spiritual meaning to the two propositions, just because Jesus is speaking of faith,—as, for instance: he that believeth on Me shall rise again spiritually, and he that hath received life shall retain it for ever; which would, implicite, involve the idea of the resurrection (Calvin). Neither is the first sentence to be referred to the resurrection of the body and the second to that of the spirit (Lampe, Olshausen, Stier). Comp. John 6:51; John 8:56.Believest thou this?—Christ had said: Every one that liveth and believeth, and had thus laid down a general rule. Now comes the application of it to her. If she believes this, she believes on Him. John 11:27. I have believed that Thou art the Christ, the Son of God.—It is apparent that Martha does not thoroughly comprehend the grand thoughts in the words of the Lord; she, however, takes for granted that He is designating Himself as the Raiser of believers from the dead, and perceives that this is involved in a belief on the Messiah. She therefore utters a joyful confession of her faith in Him,—Ἐγὼπεπίστευκα, with emphasis. She does not believe this now for the first time; she has already become a believer, being convinced a. that He is the Christ, b. as the Christ the Son of God; she believes in the full sense of the term, not simply in accordance with the theocratic idea of belief (Meyer), although she has not yet attained to a developed Johannean knowledge; c. that cometh [ὁἐρχόμενος] into the world (Present), that is: Who is even now continually engaged in the unfolding of His Messianic glory and work. Observe the truthfulness of Martha, which will not permit her to repeat Christ’s expressions word for word, but moulds her confession into conformity with the measure of her faith. And yet this is enough. Confessions differing in outward form or expression may agree internally and in substance. John 11:28. And when she had so said, she went away.—Martha knows enough for the moment. With womanly instinct (such as especially belongs to her practical nature) she does not enter upon a deeper investigation of the great thoughts of Jesus; sufficient for her is the practical thought, that He meets her boldest hopes with the assurance that the resurrection is not merely a distant resurrection-time, but rather a present resurrection power resident in His person. And called Mary, her sister, secretly.—On account of the Jews who were present. It appears that Mary was still sitting in the interior of the house, surrounded by the Jews. Therefore Martha called her secretly,—λαθρά, a word, no doubt, indicative of a whisper: therefore she simply said: the Master is here—which Mary well understood; and therefore: He calleth thee. She was to go out to Him. The prudence of Jesus, who remained standing outside, is met by the prudence of Martha; common fear, however, is not to be attributed to either. He must remove His disciples from the influence of the Jews; and they, by going out to Him, must make confession of their faith in Him. It was, moreover, the rule of the Lord to avoid making a parade of His miracles, though He did, on this occasion, finally welcome the eventual notice of the Jews. Remarkable consonance of human prudence and divine assurance. We must not suppose that Martha simply gathered the mandate: He calleth thee, from the expectations that Jesus excited in her own breast (Chrysostom, Tholuck [Brόckner, Stier]); she tells of a behest of Jesus (Lόcke, Meyer).John 11:29. As soon as she heard that.—Mary, as the more important personality, now steps into the fore-ground, although Martha, as we see from John 11:39, again makes one of the group. John 11:30. Now Jesus was not yet, etc.—See note to John 11:28. Jesus might have been assured from the circumstances of the case, that there were Jews in the house of mourning; it was needless for Martha to apprise Him (after Meyer) of the fact. John 11:31. The Jews… followed her, thinking that she was going to the tomb to weep there.—It was a custom much practised among the Jews and Greeks, to sit down and mourn by the graves of their dead (Wetstein, on this passage; Geier, De luctu Hebr.). They therefore went with her, doubtless regarding the scene of mourning which they expected to witness, as a ceremony that had to be performed in compliance with Oriental custom. Even in these points the false way of the ancient world, which gratified its feelings by a common lamentation over the dead, stands contrasted with the truth of life, which demands, solitude for its grief. Of course the too great isolation of mourners is to be guarded against as much as the other extreme. John 11:32. Mary… fell down at His feet.—The first stroke of character which distinguishes her from Martha. The second is, that she says nothing further than: Lord, if Thou hadst been here, my brother had not died. While Martha added to these words: and even now I know, etc. (John 11:22), Mary bursts into tears. Martha may at first strike us as the one who possesses the greater joy in believing, but Mary is the more human and warm in her feelings, and there is more of devotion in the expression of her faith. Her kneeling posture and her tears are more eloquent than the words of Martha. The saying that both utter, constitutes a precious trait from life. They made this remark to each other over and over again at the death -bed of Lazarus: if He were here, etc. Bengel: “Ex quo colligi potest, hunc earum fuisse sermonem ante fratris obitum: utinam adesset Dominus Jesus!” John 11:33. He was vehemently (indignantly, angrily) affected (stirred up) in (his) spirit and troubled himself [ἐνεβριμήσατοτῷπνεύματικαὶἐτάραξενἐαυτόν.—Comp. John 11:38 ἐμβριμώμενοςἐνἑαυτῷ, but also the weeping between, ἐδάκρυσεν, John 11:35. Note first of all the perfect participation of the Lord in our natural feelings and His sympathy with our sorrows (Hebrews 2:17; Hebrews 4:15), in opposition to the stoic apathy, yet at the same time His perfect control over passion and grief and its violent outbreak.—P. S.]—He was deeply perturbed inspirit. The ἐνεβριμήσατοτῷπνεύματι (see Matthew 9:30; Mark 1:43; Mark 14:5) makes the passage one of exceeding difficulty. The affection here depicted is explained in three ways: 1. as anger, 2. as grief, 3. as a general affection of the mind, in which there is a combination of different emotions.1. Of anger. “βριμάομαι with all its compounds has in the classics as well as in the fathers of the Church (and the Byzantines) the signification: to snort (of horses), to mutter (of Hecate), to express anger, to threaten angrily.” But again, anger is variously understood: a. He was angry, in respect of His divine nature, with His human spirit (πνεῦμα) in its passionate emotion (πάθος). So Origen, Chrysostom [Cyril, Theophylact, Euthymius Zigab.], recently Merz [Alford]. This conception is doubly untenable: in the first place, it condemns the human sentiment of grief; and secondly, it creates a conflict in the consciousness of the Lord. [It is also inconsistent with the act of weeping, which follows, John 11:35, and with the parallel expression ἐνἑαυτῷ ?—in Himself, John 11:38, which proves that τῷπνεύματι cannot be the object, but must be the sphere of the emotion=in His spirit.—P. S.] Hilgenfeld and others fall upon the same interpretation, with a different conception of it, in imputing a gnostic Christology to this Gospel. b. He was angry at the power of sin and death (Augustine, Erasmus and others, Luthardt). Not to be excluded, but too abstract by itself. c. At the unbelief of the Jews [Erasmus, Scholten, Wordsworth], and also the sisters (Theodor of Mopsueste, Lampe [Kuinoel],Wichelhaus]). But the sisters were not unbelieving. d. That He was unable to avert the death of Lazarus (De Wette). This would be impious and is contrary to the connection. e. At the misconception of His enemies and the want of comprehension displayed by His friends (Brόckner). There was, at the moment, no special occasion for such a feeling. f. At the mingling of the hypocritical tears [crocodile tears] of the Jews with the true tears of Mary (Meyer). Against this, comp. John 11:45 [“Many of the Jews… believed in Him”].g. This description of anger has, in the interest of negative criticism, been caricatured by Strauss and others. 2. Of grief. In the passages, Matthew 9:30; Mark 1:43, anger is out of the question. Tholuck: “This verb is equally comprehensive with the corresponding German ‘grimmen,’ i.e. originally, an inward convulsive emotion of anger, grief, etc. Hence Luther renders: Er ergrimmete, which he himself explains by σπλαγχνίζεται.” Yet Tholuck observes that the signification of grief is not supported by usage, but only by analogy. In favor of this view are—Nonnus, Buzer, Grotius and others, Lόcke. Tholuck, in the early editions of his Commentary, and Ewald: an emotion of great strength, analogous to the στενάζειντῷπνεύματι of Jesus, Mark 7:34 (comp. Mark 8:12).3. A general affection of the spirit, in which different sentiments combine and alternate. This construction is supported: (1) by the choice of the expression, since the Evangelists are familiar with other terms for the definite emotion either of anger or of grief; (2) by the addition: τῷπνεύματι. The nature of the spirit renders it impossible for any single psychical emotion to rule within it, the spirit is the all-embracing unity of the many-parted life of the soul. (3) By the psychological experience, that when the soul is in a state of intense excitement, it is seized at once by the most diverse emotions (see the quotation from Gφthe’s Iphigenie: “Es wδlzet sich ein Rad von Freud’ und Schmerz durch meine Seele”—“A wheel of joy and grief revolveth through my soul.”—Leben Jesu, p. 1125). (4) By the situation. The weeping of Mary could excite nought but the most heart-felt sympathy. But the tears of the better sort among the Jews were mingled with the tears of the unbelieving. A scene of human lamentation over death presented itself—sympathy in view of the power of death was aroused. Jesus had not to bar out this sympathy; still it was necessary that He should stand on His guard against it—and rouse Himself in indignation against it. Thus His emotion was converted into an ecstatic anticipation of victory. I had at first chosen the expression: Er schόtterte sich—He convulsed—agitated Himself. It is significant of violent agitation. But the one upon which I finally settled seems preferable: Er regte sich tief auf, He stirred Himself up from the deep. He moved Himself in the spirit to such a degree that the disciples perceived His agitation in His bodily appearance,—hence: He convulsed Himself; He billowed up,—He surged up. A divine storm of the spirit [ein Gottesge witter des Geistes] passed through His breast, under which His human nature quaked. The fremere invariably arises out of the depths. [It is not inconsistent with this interpretation of Dr. Lange, if we emphasize sin and death as the chief object of Christ’s mingled emotion and commotion. In this heart-rending scene of mourning: the grave of the departed friend, the broken hearts of the beloved sisters, and the tears of their sympathizers, Jesus saw a miniature photograph of the world of human suffering caused by the terrible curse of sin; all the graves and all the mourners passed in endless procession before His vision; He felt the combined misery and woe of the human family (“der Menschheit ganzer Jammer fasste Ihn an”); He was moved at once with holy indignation at sin which caused all this dreadful desolation, and with tender sympathy for the sufferers, which latter feeling found vent in tears.—And troubled (shook) himself, ἐτάραξενἑαυτόν. This is not quite the same with the passive form ἐταράχθητῷπνεύματι, which is used on a similar occasion, John 13:21, but it expresses the external manifestation of the inward commotion by a voluntary act. Hengstenberg (II. 261): “Jesus excites Himself for the energetic conflict with Death, the evil enemy of mankind.” Comp. Meyer, Luthardt, Godet, in loc. Augustine, Bengel and Wordsworth derive from the expression the inference that Christ’s affections were not passions, but voluntary emotions (voluntariζ commotiones), which He had entirely in His power, and that the emotion here spoken of was therefore orderly, rational, full of dignity and directed to proper ends.—P. S.] John 11:34. Where have ye laid him?—Manifestly, the impulse to work the miracle is completed by what has been going on in His inner life.—Come and see.—The answerers—Martha and Mary. John 11:35. Jesus wept [ἘδάκρυσενὁἸησ.].—Two little words: a whole verse, of infinite value. Significant and pertinent verse-division. On the way to the grave, Jesus weeps. After He has troubled Himself in spirit and has made good His stand against all sympathy with Jewish lamentations for the dead, He is at liberty to give Himself up to His fellow-feeling with the sisters; the tear follows His passion, as a summer rain succeeds the thunder-storm. The objection, that Jesus could not weep if He had a real presentiment of the miracle that He was about to perform, carries with it a doubt as to the compatibility of the divine and the human nature; it is also contradicted by human experience itself. Not only the succession of feelings, but likewise the truth and disinterestedness of feeling, are explained by a fact, in accordance with which the deepest grief may invade the mind when it is occupied with the anticipation of joy, and vice versβ; nay, more;—these opposite emotions may even succeed each other with the rapidity of lightning, like a “wheel of fire” in swift revolution. “Chrysologus supposed that Jesus wept for joy; Isodorus Pelus., because the raising of Lazarus would summon him from repose back to the unrest of life (this was the decision even of the Concilium Toletanum) etc. All these explanations of the fathers of the Church are utterly unnatural.” Heubner.[This sentence is the shortest, and yet one of the most significant verses in the Bible. It stands by itself unconnected by any particle with what precedes or what follows. It describes what was seen, and intimates what was felt. Jesus knew that He would shortly raise Lazarus, but in true sympathy He opened His heart to the present grief which opened to Him a picture of the universal desolations of the king of terrors; and with a sympathizing heart, not with a heart of stone, He raised the friend to life again. He felt and acted like a man before He gave a proof of His divine power; so He slept just before He stilled the storm (Matthew 8:24). But His grief was moderate. Δακρύειν signifies a gentle weeping, the expression of a calm and tender grief; it differs from κλαίειν, the crying and wailing of the sisters and their friends, John 11:33, which implies “not only the shedding of tears, but also every external expression of grief” (Robinson, sub. κλαίω). It is remarkable that the very Gospel which most clearly reveals the divinity of Christ, notices this truly human trait of His character. As far as we are informed, Jesus wept or shed tears on three occasions: tears of tender friendship and silent grief at the grave of Lazarus (ἐδάκρυσεν); tears of bitter sorrow and loud lamentation over unbelieving Jerusalem in view of the approaching judgment, Luke 19:41 (ἔκλαυσεν); and bloody tears of agony and sacerdotal intercession in Gethsemane when He bore the burden of the sins of all mankind and wrestled with the powers of darkness, Luke 22:44 (comp. Hebrews 5:7, μετὰκραυγῆςἰσχυρᾶςκαὶδακρύων). The eternal Son of God in tears! What a sublime contrast; what a proof of His true humanity, condescending love and tender sympathy. How near He is brought in His tears to every mourner. How far more natural, lovely and attractive is a weeping Saviour than a cold, heartless, unfeeling stoic! By His conduct at the grave He has sanctified tears of sympathy, provided only we sorrow not immoderately as those who have no hope (1 Thessalonians 4:13). His tears over Jerusalem and in Gethsemane should call forth our tears of repentance and gratitude.—P. S.] John 11:36-37. Behold how he loved him.—This even the Jews could see, without comprehending the full significance of His tears. It is certainly the intention of the evangelist to distinguish these kindly disposed Jews from the others who thus express themselves: Could not he who opened the eyes of the blind man, etc. (John 11:37). According to Chrysostom and most of the ancients, as also Luthardt and Meyer, this speech has something of malice in it; according to Lόcke, Tholuck and others, it is well meant. The idea of malice is supported by 1. the manifest intention to spread abroad an accusation against Jesus, to the effect that He was either unable (want of power) or unwilling (want of love) to avert this death; 2. the circumstance that their words occasion again the convulsive self-agitation of the Lord, and, so to speak, constrain Him to brace Himself anew in the spirit. 3. Here, as in John 11:46, John distinguishes the malicious Jews from those of the better sort by τινὲςδέ. [“John seldom uses δέ as a mere copula, but generally as but, see John 11:46; John 11:49; John 11:51.” Alford]. Hence arises the conjecture that they, starting from the assumption of the powerlessness of Jesus in this case, are desirous to cast a shadow of doubt even upon the healing of the blind man (Meyer). Still less is it to be expected that these citizens of Jerusalem should cite the previous raisings of the dead in Galilee (Strauss) rather than the healing of the blind man, which last was an event of recent occurrence in Jerusalem, still fresh in the memory of all,—an occasion of admiration to some, and to others of Pharisaical offence. Their words are the cause of fresh agitation on the part of the Lord, now, however, He is stirred not only in spirit but in Himself, i.e. the emotion is felt in the soul-life also. John 11:38. To the tomb. It was a cave.—[An indication of the comparative Wealth of Lazarus and his sisters that they had a family vault, such as is here implied. The poor were buried in common places. The large concourse of mourners from Jerusalem, and the very costly ointment with which Mary anointed the feet of our Lord (12:3), lead to the same conclusion.—P. S.] On the Israelitish graves see Com. on Matt. chap. 27. On the grave of Lazarus, which is said still to exist, see the books of travel (Robinson, II. p. 310).—And a stone lay upon [or against] it.—Ἐπέκειτο may mean: upon or before, according as the grave is to be conceived of as a perpendicular vault (such were entered by means of steps), or as a horizontal one. That the tradition makes it a perpendicular sepulchre is not conclusive proof that it was so; yet the expression ἄρατετὸνλίθον, seems also to testify in favor of a perpendicular grave. In Matthew 28:2 the term is ἀπεκύλιτε.John 11:39. Lord, by this time he stinketh [ἤδηὄζει].—The fearful reality of the grave, in which her brother has lain four days, disturbs the practical woman and shakes her faith. She thinks a scandal may result from the bursting forth of the odor of corruption,—especially in the presence of so many people from Jerusalem. For it follows from the reason she assigns for her remark, that she does not already perceive this odor: for he hath been dead four days. [Lit. he is now the fourth day (viz. as a dead man), τεταρταῖος quatriduanus, an adjective marking Succession of days, but used only proverbially, like δευτεραῖος, τριταῖος. δωδεκαταῖος.—P. S.] “It is a proverb in the Talmud and the Targum, that corruption sets in the third day after death” (Tholuck after Wetstein). As “the sister of the dead man” [ἡἀδελφὴτοῦτετελευκότος] she shudders at the thought of seeing her brother in a putrefying state, of witnessing the exposure of that countenance upon which corruption had already set its seal. We cannot, from the words of Martha, draw the inference that a previous embalming of the body by wrapping spices about it, had not taken place; the customary anointing might, however, have been deferred by the sisters, because, almost unconsciously to themselves, a spark of hope was smouldering within them, as they anxiously expected the coming of Jesus. Hence, likewise, Mary had saved the precious ointment of spikenard. There is no more foundation for the statement that at this particular moment Martha, influenced by the utterances of Jesus, John 11:23-26, had merged her hope of a special raising of Lazarus in a higher stretch of faith (Meyer), than there is ground for questioning the momentary tottering of her hope (Tholuck). This only can be said: she is so agitated by the fear lest her brother appear as a putrefying corpse, that she is unmindful for the instant of the duty of submission to the word of Christ, and delays the execution of His command. John 11:40. Did I not tell thee?—Not only the words, John 11:25, but the whole of His sayings from John 11:4.—The glory of God appears at such time as He reveals Himself in His wonderworking might. Manifestly, therefore, they had faith in the words of Jesus as they took the stone away (41). John 11:41. Jesus lifted up His eyes to heaven.—We have already adverted to the grand aim of this form of the miraculous healing of Jesus. The Jews in Jerusalem are to see in a great sign, not only the miraculous power of Jesus but also His connection with their God in the working of this miracle. Hence the unreserved outpouring of the prayer. But the prayer is a thanksgiving: I thank thee. He is confident of being heard, and this presupposes earlier prayers. So that when He says: I knew that thou hearest me always, an intimation is given us of an uninterrupted life of prayer, a continual union, in prayer, of the will of Jesus with the will of the Father—a union resulting in the continual working with Him of God’s omnipotence. Thus Christ accomplishes His miracles as the God-Man; not in pure divinity, or as a super-human God, without the Father (see John 5:19; John 5:26; John 6:6), nor in simple humanity amidst sporadic entreaties.At the same time this saying introduces the following utterance: but because of the multitude standing around, etc.—Those who, like Baur, have inferred from these words that the prayer of Jesus is debased to a mock-prayer have failed to comprehend the grand idea of it. In presence of the Jews of Jerusalem, Jesus calls upon their God as His Father, and is heard. Thus Moses, in pursuance of God’s instructions, produces his credentials as the ambassador of the God of Israel, before his nation and before Pharaoh (Exodus 4:3 ff; John 7:9); and thus Elijah on Mount Carmel, before the priests of Baal and the backsliding people, petitions the God of Israel for the decisive sign from heaven which shall corroborate the truth of the Israelitish faith, 1 Kings 18:36 ff. For this cause, the design of this prayer is so distinctly emphasized: that they might believe that Thou didst send Me.—That prayer may not have a reflexive reference to the hearers of it, is a tenet which finds prayer only in pantheistic moods; it would, if consistently acted upon, abolish the idea of motherly, ecclesiastical, judicial prayer (the oath), of prayer offered in performing miracles and of prayer generally. John 11:43. Lazarus, come forth!—Properly: Lazarus, hither! forth! [δεῦροἔξω, without a verb, huc foras! Ici, dehors! The simple grandeur, brevity and force of this resurrection call corresponds with the mighty effect, and may be compared to the sublime passage in Genesis: Let there be light! And there was light. Cyril calls it θεοπρεπὲςκαὶβασιλικὸνκέλευσμα.—P. S.] According to Origen [and Chrysostom] the moment of awakening preceded the thanksgiving of Jesus and the call merely occasioned the forthcoming of the recipient of new life. But, manifestly, the loud call with a powerful voice and majestic utterance should itself be recognized as the moment of awakening.John 11:44. Bound hand and foot with grave-clothes.—Since the dead man was so wrapped up, even his face being covered, there happened, according to Basilius (θαύμαζεθαῦμαἐνθαύματι), Chrysostom and many others, Lampe, Stier, a miracle within a miracle,—namely, that Lazarus was able to go forth in spite of his wrappings. Others, again, have assumed that he was wrapped about after the fashion of the Egyptians, his hands and feet being bandaged separately (Olshausen, De Wette). Lόcke supposes him to have been wrapped from head to foot so closely that his freedom of motion was not impeded. From our passage the windings certainly seem to have been partial; whether they were applied in the Egyptian style or not. Such might also have been the idea of the sisters, particularly as the ceremonies of anointing and interment had not yet been completed. But it is obvious that the miracle of new life might be carried out in a miraculous walking, similar to somnambulism. And indeed it was necessary that the forthcomer should be disencumbered of his wrappings, in order that he might move with perfect freedom,—in accordance with the words of Jesus: Loose him and let him go.—i.e. go home independent of aid. We cannot adopt the inference of Grotius; he holds that Christ did not accompany him: ne quasi in triumphum ducere videretur.[The terms ἄφετεὑπάγειν, as Godet observes, have a triumphant tone, like the order to the cripple: “Take up thy bed and walk” (John 5:8). Trench: “St. John here breaks off the narrative of the miracle itself, leaving us to imagine their joy, who thus beyond all expectation received back their dead from the grave; a joy, which was well nigh theirs alone, among all the mourners of all times, ‘Who to the verge have followed those they love And on the insuperable threshold stand, With cherished names its speechless calm reprove, And stretch in the abyss their ungrasped hand.’ He leaves this, and passes on to show us the historic significance of this miracle in the development of the Lord’s earthly history, the permitted link which it formed in the chain of those events, which were to end, according to the determinate decree and counsel of God, in the atoning death of the Son of God upon the cross.”—P. S.] AND ETHICAL1. Christ the Resurrection and the Life, the principle of the future resurrection: a. The foretokens of the principle: the miracles of transformation and the histories of raisings from the dead in the Old Testament, and the raisings of the dead effected by Jesus. b. The appearance of the principle in the revivifying life and spiritual resurrection of Christ. c. The operations of the principle until the first resurrection and until the general resurrection. 2. Faith in Christ, the Son of God, embraces the resurrection. 3. The mysterious, holy affections in the life of the Lord. The sensational life in the spirit or the innermost and highest emotion, within which all feelings revolve;—supreme compassion for the misery of men, supreme indignation at the unbelief of the world. The Lord’s bracing of Himself against all sympathy with ungodly sorrow, while at the same time fully sympathizing with the godly sorrow of men. 4. The raising of Lazarus. Different interpretations: (1) Lazarus was apparently dead (Paulus, Ammon, Schweizer and others); (2) the account a myth (Strauss); either a misunderstanding of a conversation concerning the resurrection, held with the two women of Bethany on the occasion of the death of Lazarus (Weisse); or a remodelling of the story of the raising of the young man at Nain (Gfrφrer); or a dogmatico-allegorical representation of the δόξα of Christ (Baur).—At the grave of Lazarus modern skeptical criticism manifestly celebrates its own dissolution—every man tells a different story. Omission of the history in the Synoptists: (1) The synoptists were not acquainted with it (Lόcke and others). (2) It lay beyond the circle of their statements (Meyer). (3) It was omitted out of consideration for the family of Bethany (Herder, Schulthess, Olshausen, Lange, Leben Jesu, II. 2, p. 1133). Meyer assures us that this last explanation runs counter to the mind and spirit of that first age of Christianity (he should say rather: to the spiritual bravado of the Montanists and Circumcellians). Comp. John 12:10. Instrumentalities of the miracle. a. The general one: Christ the resurrection and the life, the principle of raisings, quickenings, of the dead. b. The special one: Christ, now entertaining a presentiment of His own death and resurrection. It was necessary that Jerusalem and the Supreme Council should behold a sign of His glory beaming very near to them; this robbed them of all excuse c. The most special one: The faith of the sisters and of Lazarus, and the expectation of all,—especially of the dying man,—that Jesus would come and manifest His power and willingness to help; an expectation which Lazarus preserved in death, as Jesus Himself carried down to death His confidence in His own resurrection (see my Leben Jesu, II. 2, p. 327 and 1127 ff.). The form of the miracle: A prayer for the hearing of the God of Israel, as a testimony to the Lord in the face of Jerusalem. Its import: The crown of His raisings from the dead, the presage of His resurrection, the first flashing of His δόξα from the Mount of Olives over Jerusalem. 5. “As regards the moral application, there is no need for allegorical interpretation such as is found in Jerome, Augustine, Bourdaloue, H. Martin, etc. This allegorical interpretation is obviously without historical foundation; it is unnatural,—and to make Lazarus, the friend of Jesus, the type of a sinner utterly dead and even stinking,—is also unseemly.” Heubner. AND The raising of Lazarus as the most glorious of the revivifying miracles of Jesus: 1. In respect of the peculiar circumstances attending it in comparison with the previous raisings of the dead; 2. in respect of its intrinsic significance, as demonstrating that Christ is the Resurrection and the Life, or as a demonstration of His glory; 3. in respect of its decisive effects.—Or: the raising of Lazarus in respect of its essential features: 1. The introductory conversation; 2. the walk to the grave; 3. the prayer of thanksgiving; 4. the awakening call; 5. the appearance of the dead man; 6. the effect of his resurrection.—The arrival of Jesus on the fourth day after the burial of Lazarus. Or: Jesus, coming as a Saviour, never comes too late.—How the banished and fugitive Jesus from Perζa and those haughty scorners of Him, the Jews from Jerusalem, meet again at the grave of Lazarus.—The different kinds of condolence on the death of a member of a family: 1. The condolence of the world in general; 2. the ceremonious condolence of Pharisees; 3. the hearty condolence of relatives and friends; 4. the heavenly condolence of Christ.—Christ waiting before the village, or the divine power of Christ in His human weakness,—the type of the Christian life.—The greatest precaution combined with the most joyful anticipation of victory.—Martha and Mary at the grave of Lazarus. Comparison of the two, 1. At their first meeting with Jesus (Luke 10:38), 2. at the second here, 3. at the third in the history of the anointing.—The saying of both: Lord, if Thou hadst been here, etc.—The if of mourners in view of the dead. If this and that had happened: 1. In what degree sinful? As an expression of grief that will not be reconciled to the dispensation of God. 2. In what degree warranted? As an expression of pain investigating the causes of the suffering. 3. In what degree salutary? As an expression of humiliation before God on account of actual neglect.—The trial of faith imposed upon Martha.—The deliverance of Martha from petty household cares by means of the deep distress and mighty aid.—Christ the Resurrection and the Life: 1. What this means: a. the Life unto resurrection; b. the Resurrection unto life: 2. What this signifies to believers: a. to the dead; b. to the living.—Believest thou this?—The confession of Martha in reply to the question of Christ touching her faith.—How Martha here already subordinates herself to Mary, whom she before desired to tutor (she takes a still more subordinate position in the history of the anointing,—serving silently).—“The Master is here:” 1. The Master is here 2. and calleth thee.—The presageful visit to the grave, prelusive to the most presageful visit to the grave of Jesus.—The weeping of Mary and the weeping of the Jews: 1. In itself; the external similarity, the internal diversity; 2. in its signification: thus voices mingle in the songs of the sanctuary, tears in our houses, different spirits in the company of Jesus.—The twice-repeated convulsion of Jesus inspirit: 1. The occasion, 2. the mood, 3. the fruit.—The sensational life of Jesus.—The heart of Jesus in its full revelation: 1. In the full revelation of its love, 2. of its holiness, 3. of its divine power.—How the Lord Himself must guard His temper before His great work.—The moving and yet so salutary sight of the grave.—Our graves.—In their relation to the grave of Christ.—The temptation of Martha.—The prayer of thanksgiving and its signification: 1. In relation to the Lord: reliance on God; 2. with reference to the Jews: a miracle in fellowship with their God, as a testimony against them and to them; 3. in relation to the mourners: the divine consecration of their human joy.—The call of Christ three ghostly words, instinct with vital power: 1. The name, 2. to Christ, 3. forth.—The voice of Christ.—The infinitely significative and comprehensive nature of the human voice.—The unique heaven-tone (the peal of love and lightning-flash of life) in the voice of Christ.—The decidedness of Christ in all His vital traits,—even in His voice.—The appearance of the living man in the garments of the grave, a type of the new life of the Christian in the old vestments of death.—What is expressed by the words: “Loose him and let him go”: 1. How the adoring amazement of the chronicler is lost in silence; 2. how Christ gives Lazarus credit for full vital strength; 3. how He diverts attention from Himself to him who has been raised up.—The three evangelical stories of Bethany. Starke: Canstein: Jesus comes soon enough because He always brings salvation with Him, though to us He often seems to come too late.—Hedinger: Everything is possible to the power of God: it quickens physically and spiritually those who have lain in the grave for an hour or for a thousand years,—who have sinned for a long or for a short time.—To comfort the mourning is a part of godliness.—Quesnel: We comfort one who has lost his brother by death, and have little or no compassion for him who has lost his God.—Osiander: See how faith wrestles and battles with unbelief!—God is rich above all who call on Him and can do infinitely more than we ask.—Bibl. Wirt.: The greatest consolation of Christians in all kinds of misery and so in peril of death, is the resurrection of the dead, 1 Corinthians 15:54; Hebrews 2:14.—He who believes not on Christ is dead ere he dies. John 11:28. Ah, how fitting it is for one friend to call the other to Christ!—It is often better to preach Christ in secret than to proclaim Him publicly. John 11:29. Hedinger: Love tarrieth not. John 11:31. Zeisius: Those whose hearts are very heavy—and particularly those that are sorely tempted—should not be left alone. John 11:32. Canstein: A believing knowledge of Jesus worketh holy reverence toward Him and deep humility.—The misery of men moves Jesus’ pity. We too, after His example, should pity the wretched.—Zeisius: We may weep and lament for them that are asleep in Jesus,—but with moderation; and we may comfort ourselves, on the other hand, with the future, joyful resurrection, 1 Thessalonians 4:13; 1 Thessalonians 4:18. John 11:35. Thus He wept over Jerusalem (Luke 19:41) and in the garden of Gethsemane, Hebrews 5:7. He first gives a sign of His true humanity and then of His divinity. John 11:41. Ibid.: Learn here from Jesus, when thou art about anything of importance, not to enter upon it without prayer. John 11:43. Osiander: A testimony to the divine majesty of Christ. John 11:45. Quesnel: It is good for us to visit pious people; sometimes our salvation depends thereon.—Gerlach: Jesus begins here, as He often does, with words purposely mysterious and sifting; they sound like a general consolation uttered in view of the future resurrection.—It was the grand aim of Jesus in many of His discourses to exhibit the unity of the spiritual and bodily resurrection; He therefore raised up the bodies of the dead.—The resurrection of the wicked is not a true resurrection, but the second death.—He calls the dead as He would a living man, as God calls that which is not as though it were, Romans 4:17. Lisco, John 11:33 : The affections of believers have not the mastery over them; they are not passions.—Braune: Mourning has a good name in the Old Testament; Abraham, Isaac and Jacob mourned. And Paul writes (Romans 12:15): “Rejoice with them that do rejoice, and weep with them that weep.” Comp. Philippians 2:27.—From the God of all comfort cometh the gift of consolation. John 11:27. In this belief is contained her all. Lest her defective conception should deprive her of the enjoyment of salvation.—Mary, John 11:32. Not another word,—only tears; they speak louder.—He was convulsed, etc. What a glorious glimpse of the great heart of Jesus John gives us here!—Scripture mentions eight persons who were raised from the dead: the son of the widow of Sarepta, by means of Elijah (1 Kings 17:22), the son of the Shunamitess by Elisha (2 Kings 4:35), a dead man who was cast into the grave of Elisha (2 Kings 13:21), the young man of Nain (Luke 7:15), the daughter of Jairus (Matthew 9:25), Lazarus, Tabitha by Peter (Acts 9:40), Eutychus by Paul (Acts 20:9).—Gossner, John 11:17. Yet He never fails to come.—No Christian dies.—It is true a child of God may outwardly suffer all manner of things,—but that is to be sick; that is not death.—Mary. She arose, not to go to the dead, but to Him who was her life.—Mary spoke in the same tone that her sister used. For it is customary for one thing to infect another. One man may discourage and dishearten another.—Another time He said on a similar occasion: Weep not! Namely, for the consolation of the widow of Nain. But here He weeps Himself. By His tears 1. This entry is longer than a Bible module can hold. The rest is at https://www.sermonindex.net/commentary/lange/ C. Two-fold result of the raising of Lazarus. The believing Jews. The obdurate ones as betrayers. The high-priestly prophecy, or the extinction of the ancient Urim and Thummim. Demoniacal policy and Divine counsel. Jesus now in the wilderness of Ephraim, as He was in the wilderness at the beginning of His ministry(John 11:45-57.)45Then many [Many therefore] of the Jews which came [who had come] to Mary, and had seen the things which Jesus [what he] did, believed on [in] him. 46But some of them went their ways [went away] to the Pharisees, and told them what things [omit things] Jesus had done. 47Then [Therefore] gathered the chief priests and the Pharisees a council [the Council, or, the Sanhedrin] and said, What do we [shall we do, or, are we to do]? for this man doeth [worketh] many miracles [signs]. 48If we let him thus alone [thus go on], all men [omit men] will believe on [in] him; and the Romans shall [will] 49come and take away both our place and nation. And [a certain] one of them, named [omit named] Caiaphas, being the [omit the] high priest that same [omit 50same] year, said unto them, Ye know nothing at all, Nor [do ye] consider that it is expedient for us [for you], that one man should die for the people, and that the whole nation perish not [and not the whole nation perish]. 51And this spake he [he spoke] not of [from] himself: but being high priest that year, he prophesied [gave the high-priestly prophetic decision] that Jesus should [was about to] die for that [the] nation; 52And not for that [the] nation only, but that also he should [that he might also] gather together in [into] one [body, or, people] the children of God that were [are] scattered abroad. 53Then [Therefore] from that day forth they took counsel together for [omit for] to put him to death. 54Jesus therefore walked no more [longer] openly [freely] among the Jews; but went [departed] thence unto a [into the] country near to [omit to] the wilderness, unto a city called Ephraim, and there continued [so-journed, 55abode] with his [the] disciples. And [Now] the Jews’ passover [the passover of the Jews] was nigh at hand [omit nigh, or, at hand]: and many went out of the country up to Jerusalem before the passover, to purify themselves. 56Then sought they [They sought therefore] for Jesus, and spake [said] among themselves, as they stood in the temple, What think ye, that he will not come to the feast? 57Now both [omit both] the chief priests and the Pharisees had given a commandment [issued commandments or, ordered], that, if any man [any one] knew where he were [was], he should shew it [give information, or, make it known], that they might take [seize] him. AND Joh_11:45. Many of the Jews therefore. A new split in the Pharisaical party in Jerusalem itself. The important effect of the raising of Lazarus is observable in the fact that many of these Jews became believers. Some, however, of those who witnessed the miracle at Bethany, separate from the believing portion and confirm themselves in their obduracy, giving notice of the event to the Pharisees, i.e., here, the hostile members of the Sanhedrin. Origen held these individuals to be friends of Jesus, whose intentions in giving the information were good. On the other hand the view of Euthymius who regarded them as malevolents, is the one generally entertained. According to Euthymius, they denounced Him as a sorcerer (γοέτης); according to Theophylact, as a sacrilegious person, who had disinterred a corpse. These hypotheses overlook the possibility that the hardened denunciators held the same opinion to which Caiaphas gives utterance John 11:50, and considered Jesus to be merely a dangerous man. And thus their notification is apprehended by the generality of people. Meyer impugns the assumption of hostile intention on the part of these men; it is οἱἐλθόντες [who had come], says he,—not τῶνἐλθόντων [the reading of D. and text rec.—P. S.] But in this construction the evangelist would say, that the—Jews who came to Bethany constituted a plurality of the whole body of Jews. The better plan would be, perhaps, to distinguish among the spectators friends of Mary, sharers of her sentiments; these had come to Mary and were θεασάμενοι. The Jews were well aware of the deadly enmity of the Pharisees towards Jesus; if these informants had been friends, they must have witnessed for Jesus with heroic martyr-courage, and they would have secured a firm and conspicuous station in the evangelical history. John 11:47. The high priests and the Pharisees therefore assembled the Sanhedrin.—See Comm. on Matthew, chap. 5 p. 113, Am. Ed.; Winer, Art. Synedrium. 1. The Name: συνέδριον, talmudic: ρַ ?πְ ?δֵ ?γְ ?ψִ ?ικ, Sanhedrin.2. Signification: the supreme, theocratico-hierarchical Court of the Jews, resident at Jerusalem. 3. Composition and organization. It consisted of seventy-one members forming three classes (chief priests, elders, scribes). At that time it was composed of Pharisaic and Sadducean elements (Caiaphas, the high-priest, belonged to the Sadducean party). The Sanhedrin had a president (δַ ?πָּ ?ωִׂ ?ιΰ), ordinarily the high-priest, who was assisted by a vice-president (ΰַ ?ααֵּ ?ιϊγִּ ?ιο). There is not sufficient proof that a third functionary, styled ηָ ?λָ ?ν, stood at the left of the high-priest (Vitringa). 4. Sessions. Extraordinary: in urgent cases at the house of the high-priest. Ordinary: held daily (with the exception of the Sabbath and feast days), of old in a session room adjoining the temple, called Gazith, but in later times (from a period of forty years before the destruction of the temple) in places near the temple-mount. 5. Matters coming under the cognizance of this court as a forum: Matters concerning a whole tribe, a false prophet, the high-priest, or an arbitrary war, or blasphemy. 6. Punitory power. Formerly: Infliction of capital punishment (stoning, burning, beheading, hanging); later: excommunication and recommendation for capital punishment. 7. Administration. Connection with the minor courts; highest court of appeal from these; intercourse with them through surrogates and apparitors. 8. Extent of authority: Legislation, administration, justice. 9. History. According to the Talmudists this court originated in the institution of Moses, Numbers 11:24. That, probably, was but prelusive. So, too, the Supreme court of Jehoshaphat, 2 Chronicles 19:8. Increased importance of this institution after the exile. The γερουσία in the time of the Seleucidζ (2Ma 1:10); the first decided mention at the time of Antipater and Herod (Joseph. Antiqu., XIV. 9, 4). A session of the Sanhedrin is called. What shall we do [or, What are we to do, ποιοῦμεμν]?—The indicative, i.e., something must be done.—For this man.—Implacable hatred. They no longer protest against the many signs of Jesus; but nevertheless they contemptuously say: this man. Doubtless the expression—many miracles, is also intended to obliterate the simple recognition of the grand raising of the dead. At the same time an expression of fear that He would perform yet other miracles. John 11:48. If we let Him thus alone.—The policy of fear and anti-christianity. It is a wicked and empty fear that all will believe on Him; a wicked and empty fear that thence troubles will arise that will cause the Romans to invade the country; a wicked and empty fear that they will then make an end of the Jewish commonwealth. There is, moreover, in each one of these considerations a co-operative element of falsehood; hence it is likewise a trebly hypocritical fear And a fear, in sooth, which thinks itself justified by its motives, in carrying on hostile proceedings against a prophet of God, a doer of many miracles. In fine, a fear that occasions the very mischief it considers itself bound mischievously to avert. Weisse and Strauss have regarded this hierarchical portrait as an improbable one. Analogies at once suggest themselves; for instance, Ultramontanism confounds the Reformation with Anabaptism, Socialism, Communism, Antichristianity,—and is itself the parent of those very things which it seeks to foist upon the other. They will take away both our place and nation [καὶτὸντόπονκαὶτὸἔθνος]. Αροῦσιν according to Euthymius and many others, ἀπολέσουσιν, according to Nonnus and others: they will wrest from us; this certainly is more in accordance with their egotistical sentiment which considers everything lost when the hierarchical rule is gone. Tholuck is in favor of: annihilate,—because Judea was already a Roman province. But the hierarchy still exercised rule. Our, ἡμῶν. Meyer: placed first, with the emphasis of egotism. Τὸντόπον variously construed: 1. As the temple, as the central sanctuary (Origen, Lόcke [De Wette, Hengstenberg] and others, after Acts 6:13; 2Ma 5:19); 2. as the country, “Land und Leute” [Luther] country and people—(Bengel, Luthardt, and others); 3. as the holy city [the seat of the Sanhedrin and the whole hierarchy], in favor of which, 2Ma 3:18; 2Ma 3:30. Chrysostom, Meyer. Be it observed that the temple with the holy mountain and the holy city form a concrete unit, as the residence of the theocratical hierarchy. However, the expression is also an unconscious prophecy, like the subsequent remark of Caiaphas. John 11:49. And a certain one of them, Caiaphas. Καϊάφας. See Comm. on Matt. Matthew 26:3. Also Luke 3:2. It must be observed that the Sadducees, to whom Caiaphas belonged, have already begun to take part in the hostility against Jesus; having probably long despised Him, their active enmity is doubtless excited by the raising of Lazarus. They now, in the person of Caiaphas, take the foremost rank in the persecution; subsequently we see them for a time take the lead even of the Pharisees in hostility towards the Christian Church (Acts 4:1-2). Being high-priest that year [τοῦἐνιαυτοῦἐκείνου]. Different interpretations: 1. Bretschneider, Strauss [Schenkel, Scholten]: It is the erroneous idea that the high-priestly office changed hands from year to year. [But whoever was the writer of this Gospel, he shows sufficient familiarity with Jewish customs and localities throughout, to manifest that he was incapable of making such a mistake.—P. S.] 2. Baur: The Pseudo-John supposed Caiaphas and Hannas to have discharged the office alternately [very arbitrary]. 3. Tholuck: “The repetition of τ. ἐνιαυτοῦἐκ. John 11:49; John 11:51; John 18:13 cannot be understood otherwise than thus: namely, that the high-priest who once in the year offered the joint sacrifice for the people (Hebrews 9:7), must himself declare that in that year a greater and more universal joint sacrifice should be offered.” Yet John himself refers the saying not to the high priestly, but to the prophetic position of the high-priest. 4. Lόcke: In that memorable year, the deathyear of the Redeemer, Caiaphas was at the head of affairs (and the Evangelist deemed it superfluous to add to the mention of this fact a reference to the duration of the office). This suffices; yet the expression undoubtedly contains also an intimation to the effect, that the high-priestly-office was debased at that time by the frequent alternations it sustained. See Leben Jesu.Ye know nothing at all. Οὐκοὐδέν. As he is aware that he is giving utterance to the inmost wishes of the greater part of them, he can, with an appearance of righteous indignation, revile them, without apprehending the taking of much offence. John 11:50. Nor consider that it is expedient [συμφέρέι] for us—us of the Sanhedrin—that one man should die for the people [ἵνα—according to divine purpose—εἶςἄνθρωποςἀποθάνῃὑπὲρτοῦλαοῦ, and not the whole nation perish, καὶμὴὃλοντὸἔθνοςἀπόληται. Thus the Jewish priesthood expired with an unconscious and unwilling prophecy of Christ’s atoning death, which it typically foreshadowed. Stier and Luthardt see in this a sublime irony of a most special Providence in the very centre of the world’s history.—P. S.] The ὑπέρ, in commodum, for the benefit, becomes also an ἀντί, instead of, in consequence of the concluding clause: “and that not the whole nation (λαός, the whole mass of the people) perish. “Analogous sentences are collected by Schφttgen and Wetstein.” The devilishness of this pseudo-political maxim as conceived by Caiaphas, is contained in the idea that Jesus shall be a guiltless and involuntary sacrifice to secure the good of the nation. This diabolical notion causes the proposition to assume, in this sense, an ultra-heathenish, superstitious and lying aspect. It is the completed idea of the most revolting heathen Moloch-sacrifices, into which Israel lapses when at the very acme of its legalistic zeal for putatively pure Judaism. See Leben Jesu, II., p. 1138. John 11:51. But being high-priest that year, he prophesied—i.e., unconsciously to himself, the wicked decree, as he apprehended it, had the significancy of an official prediction, and, as such, a higher sense. Various interpretations: 1. In the sense of αַּ ?ϊַ ?Ξχεֹ ?μ (De Wette). There is undoubtedly something of a kindred nature in the Bath Kol; yet that is here insufficient, and it belongs to another sphere. See Herzog’s Real-Encyklopζdie [I. 719].2. An involuntary prophecy, like that of old, contained in the involuntary blessing of Balaam (Lόcke, Tholuck). The cases are certainly allied; they differ, however, in that in the ease of Balaam, a distinction must be made between his common consciousness and his inspired mood (wherefore his words of blessing are not susceptible of a double interpretation, as is his character), while in Caiaphas we have to distinguish between his consciousness and the unconscious expression, mirroring a higher truth, and hence bearing a double meaning. 3. A sentence in accordance with the appointment of the high-priest, to prophesy by the Urim and Thummim, i.e., to utter the decision assignable to divine causality. Leben Jesu 2, 2, p. 1137. [So also Alford. This view is confirmed by the repetition of the phrase ἀρχιερεὺςὤντοῦἐν. ἐκ. But this reference to the Urim and Thummim does not exclude the second view.—P. S.] “The high-priest,” says Meyer, “was considered in ancient Israelitish times as the bearer of the divine oracle, the organ of divine revelation (Ewald, Antiquities, p. 385 sq.), which he obtained by examination of the Urim and Thummim (Exodus 28:30; Leviticus 27:21). It is true that this examination was discontinued in later times (Joseph. Ant. III., 8, 9)—the high-priestly office being in all things shorn of its glory; yet even in the prophetic age there still existed a belief in the prophethood of the high-priest (Hosea 3:4); we find also in Josephus Antiq. VI., 6, 3, the ancient high-priesthood represented as the bearer of the oracle,” etc., [p. 444 f., 5th ed.] The high-priest was not the organ of divine revelation, but of divine decision; for the people whose king was God, must be able in all cases to have the mandate of its King. Now the decision was, if auspicious (as Philo, idealizing the priest, represents him as a prophet), a prophecy of blessing; but if the high-priest was an unenlightened man, his oracle became the utterance of a curse. The decision might also, in itself, be the fountain sometimes of fortune, sometimes of misfortune. But even in the latter case there was attached to it the blessing of a divine judgment, that brought deliverance to the pious (rabbinical passages of unconscious predictions in Schφttgen). That Jesus was about to die [ἥμελλενἀποθνήσκειν]. Ὅτι. The subsequent observation is not merely a pious reflection of John, as Lόcke represents it; it is declaratory of the decisive providence of God, which caused the wicked decree to be so worded that it must express at the same time, unconsciously to the speaker, a divine sense, containing the real doctrine of salvation,—the doctrine of the redemption of man by the death of Jesus. To die for the nation.—The ὑπὲρτοῦλαοῦ (John 11:50), with its hierarchico-national sound, is here changed, in accordance with the last words of Caiaphas, into ὑπὲρτοῦἔθνους. John 11:52. And not for the nation only, but that he might also gather together into one [people] the children of God that are scattered abroad.—Christian universalism, conditional, however, upon divine ordinance, as defined in the Bible, and upon human faith.—[John 11:52 is an addition of the Evangelist to the unconscious prophecy of Caiaphas to prevent a limitation of the benefits of Christ’s death; comp. 1 John 2:2 : “He is the propitiation for our sins; not for ours only, but also for the sins of the whole world.”] The children of God. Interpretations: 1. The future children of God. [Among the heathen. Prophetic and proleptic, like 10:16]. (Euthymius [ὡςμέλλονταγενέσθαι], Meyer [Alford, Trench: Those who should hereafter become His children. So also Calvin, in a predestinarian sense (to which Meyer assents): Filios ergo Dei, etiam antequam vocentur, ab electione ζstimat.—P. S.] 2. Children of God, who are longing for Christ (Messner [Tholuck, Luthardt, Godet]). 3. Children of God by nature, who are such without first becoming so through Christ (Hilgenfeld [contrary to 1:12; 3:3, 6, etc.]) 4. The children of God generally, among the Jews,—they being in reality scattered by the hierarchy, jealous for the λαός,—as among the heathen, whose religious men have been scattered abroad since the building of the tower of Babel. The antithesis is: dying for the nation as a unit; dying in order to the gathering of the people of God from all places whither they have been scattered. The fundamental idea is the bringing together (this expression does not refer to place) of all the children of God into one, i.e., into one nation, in antithesis to the λαός of Caiaphas. Comp. Ephesians 2:14. In that passage the fundamental idea is the union of believing Jews and Gentiles, as John 10:16; here the fundamental thought is the union of the scattered sheep. Caiaphas said: the nation is perishing—therefore He must die; John says: He, doubtless, has by His death created the true, real λαός. Christ is the union of this people. John 11:53. From that day forth they held assemblies of their council, having in view His death: meetings for the murder of Christ. Before this time inferior courts, as well as the Sanhedrin itself, have occasionally sought to bring about His death (chh. 5 and 8); before now, individual Pharisees have sought to thrust Him aside by means of their standing tribunal of zealotism (chh. 9 and 10); before this, too, His adherents have been threatened with excommunication,—have been actually excommunicated (John 9) Now the question how He shall be put to death, becomes a settled and ever recurring subject of debate in the Sanhedrin. It is clear that Jesus has long been considered by them as under the ban; apparently, fear of the people has deterred them from inflicting public and formal excommunication upon Him, although this is involved in the mandate issued subsequently to this session. John 11:54. To a city called Ephraim.—Jesus can no longer appear openly among the people without exposing Himself to the danger of being seized and prematurely sacrificed. It only remains to Him to reflect upon the true way of sacrifice. For this purpose He retires to the city of Ephraim, a small place, whence He can easily withdraw into the wilderness for security and contemplation.—Into the country.—The country in antithesis to Jerusalem.—Into a region near the wilderness.—Ἔρημος generally denotes the wilderness of Judea. In reality, however, it is a uniform desert tract between Jerusalem or the hill-country of Judea and the valley of the Jordan; its centre is formed by the wilderness of Judea between Jerusalem and the Dead Sea, to the right of the brook of Kidron; this wilderness is continued southwards in the deserts of Engeddi, Siph and Maon, and northwards in those of Tekoa, Jericho (with Mt. Quarantania) and Ephraim, which last appears as the northern extension of the whole desert region of Judea. Thus it was, in effect, one wilderness in which Christ dwelt at the beginning and the close of the years of His ministry. Ephraim was probably situated not far from Bethel, since it is several times associated with Bethel in historical events and records. With regard to the site of Bethel, it is Robinson’s belief that he recognized it in the ruins of Beitξn (Biblical Researches, II., p. 127 [Am. ed., vol. I., p. 449]). “Bethel,” he remarks, “was a border city between Benjamin and Ephraim; at first assigned to Benjamin, but conquered and afterwards retained by Ephraim. According to Eusebius and Jerome, it lay twelve Roman miles from Jerusalem, on the right or east of the road leading to Sichem or Neapolis (Nβbulus). From Beitξn to el-Bξreh we found the distance to be forty-five minutes, and from Bξreh to Jerusalem three hours, with horses.” In an easterly direction, not far from Bethel, Robinson passed the night at the village of Taiyibeh. “Here the proximity of the wilderness was plainly discernible.” In particular, there is here a rocky valley, “overgrown with furzy plants and sage, interspersed with the fragrant Zaeter.” For a description of the desert itself see Robinson. The village of Taiyibeh is considered by some to be identical with the ancient Ephraim [the same with Ophrah (Joshua 18:23; 1 Samuel 13:17) and Ephron (2 Chronicles 13:17) of the Old Testament. So besides Robinson, Van de Velde and Stanley. The latter says (Sinai and Palestine, p. 210): ‘Further still, the dark conical hill of Taiyibeh, with its village perched aloft, like those of the Apennines, the probable representative of Ophrah of Benjamin, in later times ‘the city called Ephraim,’ to which our Lord retired, ‘near to the wilderness,’ after the raising of Lazarus.”—P. S.] Since Jesus was now resolved to repair to Jerusalem with the next Galilean and Perζan paschal caravan, i.e. since but one step remained for Him to surrender Himself publicly to the Messianic hope entertained by the pious among the people and now purified by Him,—possessing a distinct foresight, however, of the death resulting upon this step, accompanied by the succumbing of the party of believers to the hierarchical party—(see Leben Jesu II., p. 1140)—Ephraim was the place exactly fitted for a temporary sojourn. Hence He could at need withdraw into the desert; here He could collect His disciples and prepare them for the last journey (see Comm, on Matthew, p. 360, Am. Ed.); here He could join either the caravan coming across Samaria to Bethel or the one passing through Jericho on its way from Perζa (see Tholuck, p. 316). Comp. Joshua 15:61; Joshua 16:1; Joshua 18:22; 2 Kings 2. It was in the vicinity of Jericho, according to the Synoptists, that Jesus attached Himself to the festive train from Perζa, having, it is probable, previously received His friends from the Galilean company that passed through Samaria. John 11:55. And the passover of the Jews was at hand. The nearness of this feast occasioned many to go out of the Jewish country (χώρα not simply that region, as Bengel supposes, but the country in contrast to Jerusalem) beforehand up to Jerusalem, because they had to purify themselves (Lightfoot) before the feast, by means of the prescribed sacrifices and ablutions (Numbers 9:6; 2 Chronicles 30:17 ff.). John 11:56. They sought therefore for Jesus. We gather from this, in the first place, how eagerly all the people were expecting the appearance of Jesus at the feast. They had hoped to find Him already in Jerusalem. Hence, then, it likewise follows that no special reference is had to people from the country about Ephraim. We therefore translate the ὅτιοὐμὴἔλθῃ: that He will not come (with Meyer), but not: that He has not come (Vulgate and others). Some appear to take it for granted from the condition of things that He will not come, while others question this decision. Manifestly, it is like a sort of betting whether He will come or not. The occasion of this conduct was the mandate of the high-priest, which had been spread abroad throughout the land by means of special orders of the Sanhedrin (see the Textual note) and in accordance with which every one who knew of the abode of Jesus, was bound to give information of it. This mandate—a kind of interdict—of course presupposes excommunication. There seems to have been at that time not a single traitor among the peasants and dwellers in the deserts of Ephraim. Subsequently, however, this decree formed a point for Judas to fasten on. He probably silenced his conscience at first with the cry, that he must be an “obedient son” of the hierarchical Church, or a “loyal subject” of the spiritual authorities. The decree may be regarded as the result of the session John 11:47 (comp. John 11:53, Meyer). The anteposition of δεδώκεισαν, with reference to the decree, is emphatic. We must observe that this edict was at all events designed as an interdict,—a fact of special importance to the friends of Jesus; no one should receive Him into his house without giving information of Him, i.e. without hostility to Him. In all probability the command was issued with a particular view to the family of Lazarus. See John 12:10. AND ETHICAL1. It has been early demonstrated by John in the history of Nicodemus, that a sincere lawzealot, Jew and Pharisee may believe and be saved. Here he gives prominence to the fact that many Jews believed after witnessing the raising of Lazarus. And this was the second great spiritual miracle connected with the external mighty miracle of the raising of Lazarus: with one impulse many Jews believed on Him. Some, indeed, of those who at first were overpowered by the grand fact, may probably have apostatized. At all events, there was a remnant of unbelievers. To these the savor of life unto life did here become literally a savor of death unto death. 2. The Jews who go from Bethany, from the grave of Lazarus, to the Pharisees, to show them what Jesus has done, are thus become precursors of Judas; in a general sense, types of apostates. They all come—from Bethany; they all go—to the Pharisees; they all, with hostile intent, report what Jesus has done. 3. The council of blood. The policy of fear. It occasions what it means to avert. The policy of timidity became a policy of intimidation, terrorism. Probably the rough words of Caiaphas to his colleagues were further serviceable in terroristically beating down any attempt on the part of the friends of Jesus, Nicodemus and Joseph of Arimathea, to dwell upon His many miracles (comp. Gerlach on this passage). It is not likely that these men had any share in the subsequent determined deliberations of the Council of Blood. Once they expressed their positive disapprobation (see Luke 23:51), probably on this very occasion. To this the minute account of this session is no doubt attributable. 4. On the road of ultra-Judaism the Jews have relapsed into the worst heathenism. Pursuant to the counsel of Caiaphas, they relapsed, as regards their intentions into the Moloch-sacrifice. After the destruction of Jerusalem, at the conquest of Massada, into the suicidal despair of the Hindus (Josephus, De bello jud., VII. chh. VIII. IX.); with their Talmud into a mythology which, in comparison with that of Greece and Home, is utterly odious. Thus, too, Christian Judaism [Romanism] usually relapses into the most abominable heathenism. 5. Even Caiaphas, then, has with tolerable plainness set forth the maxim: the end justifies the means. 6. The extinction of the Old Testament office of high-priestly prophecy in the sentence of Caiaphas. Caiaphas must unconsciously sketch the principal features of Christian dogmatics and soteriology. The fearful double meaning of his speech with regard to his intention and the meaning of the Spirit. What it proves: 1. Proverbs 16:1 : Man is master of his intention; that is his own; not so, however, the full import of his words. In the domain of speech the cooperating and counteracting rule of divine providence begins. 2. The symbolical ministry becomes, even in its ungodly tendency, an unconscious prophecy of the real ministry of the Spirit; the false, official high-priest a prophet of the true High Priest and His sacrifice. In what relation do these types stand to the former typism? They are types moulded by the irony of divine dispensation from the elements of human perversity. The school of truth is perfected in the mouth of these wicked priests, while the school of falsehood is perfected in their heart. Hence they are able to blaspheme with words of prayer, to prophesy with words of demoniacal policy. Caiaphas prophesied. “Roman Catholics apply this to popes; popes, though wicked, might still be the organs of truth, as Stolberg remarks in his History of the Religion of Jesus. Our church teaches only—that the Word of God and the Sacraments retain their own virtue even when administered by unregenerate preachers.” Heubner. But here also a relative soundness of the Church as a body must be assumable. 7. The Urim and Thummim are likewise expressive of the truth that decision and resolution are needful in all cases, while, on the other hand, endless vacillation is the greatest evil. Therefore God hardens Pharaoh’s heart with the view of expediting matters, and Judas also receives the command, “What thou doest, do quickly.” The temporal hardening of the people of Israel, however, was designed to prevent their eternal obduracy, Romans 9-11. 8. The work of Christ, regarded by His enemies as a scattering and destroying of the ancient people of God, resulted in the creation of a new and real people of God, gathered from abroad. 9. Christ in the wilderness at the beginning and the end of His career. In the beginning He resolved not to appear publicly under the title of the Messiah, to avoid the Messianic conception of His nation. Now the time had come for Him to issue from the desert for the purpose of surrendering Himself to the Messianic faith of His people, in the state of purification to which He had brought it. 10. Christ the subject of interest and conversation with all the people, while they are occupied with services of ordinances and legal works of purification. How is this? An ultra-montane mind cannot rid itself of the thought of the Evangelical Confession; moreover, the friends of Jesus are present in the camp of legality. 11. The mandate of the Supreme Council: the interdict. Men should show where Christ was. Soon He showed Himself and afterwards all Christian church-steeples pointed upwards to Him. And thus Luther is no longer hidden in the Wartburg, but is everywhere proclaiming himself to the hierarchy. AND The decisive effect of the raising of Lazarus.—Bethany and its quiet family the starting point of the decision: 1. The starting point of the positive separation between the friends and the enemies of Jesus; 2. of the palm-entry; 3. of Judas, as 4. of the faithful anointing of the dying Christ.—Sincere consciences are liberated from dead ordinances by facts of life.—The “some” also believed that Jesus had raised Lazarus; they believed it and trembled with fear and rage. Comp. James 2:19.—Even the new life of Lazarus to some a savor of death unto death.—And thus every important awakening is a soul-danger (of offence) for those whose attitude towards the truth is a false one.—Treachery a main-spring of unbelief.—The conference of the Supreme Council about the raising of Lazarus: 1. The wicked lack of counsel of some; 2. the hellish counsel of the high-priest; 3. the silenced voice of the pious counselors (Nicodemus, Joseph of Arimathea); 4. the heavenly counsel of divine Providence.—How selfish fear ever brings on by its superstitious proceedings the very trouble it would avert by arbitrary acts (the parents of (�dipus).—He who thinks to escape some fate by wicked ways of his own choosing, incurs the doom he flees.—The Supreme Council also prophesied in its own fashion,—like the high-priest; the former conversely, Caiaphas unconsciously.—The recognition of the works of Christ uttered by the Supreme Council: He doeth many signs.—The saying of Caiaphas in its twofold sense.—The irony of divine Providence as exercised over human perversity, Psalms 2:4.—The ministry of the letter a type of the ministry of the spirit; thus, too, unconsciously, official—things and words are manifoldly typical.—Christ, by His death, the Rescuer of the ancient people, the Creator of a new people.—They would kill Him because He made alive.—This the main reproach that the slaying ordinance has to make against vitalizing faith.—How the Supreme Council has become a standing court of inquisition against Christ.—Jesus, outlawed and banished, in the wilderness.—The Jews who have repaired to Jerusalem, do not converse about their Jewish rites and ceremonies, but about Christ.—The conjectures (bets), as to whether He will dare come or not.—The champion of God; and Israel with Philistinish thoughts concerning Him.—The Jewish edict and interdict, John 11:57.—How all the world fulfils this commandment: 1. How enemies show where Christ Isaiah 2. friends.—How Christ gives information concerning Himself. See Matthew 26:64.—How far the edict was ineffectual or rather accomplished the reverse of its design. Starke, Hedinger: How wise worldly-minded people and knavish men think themselves, when they imagine that they are able to quench the word and kingdom of Christ by their false, famous strokes of state!—Cramer: It is possible even for councils and assemblies of the learned to err.—It is never well to make church matters affairs of state.—Zeisius: The Jews thought that if they did but put Christ out of the way, their repose and prosperity would be lastingly secured, and it was thus that they lost both their temporal and spiritual good things.—Bibl. Wirt.: God often punishes the wicked with calamities which they thought they had averted.—Canstein: It is almost a daily occurrence for men to plunge into disaster while essaying to ward off some imaginary evil.—Ibid.: It is the way of worldly-minded politicians to measure all things by the standard of profit and gain, not by that of truth, righteousness and justice; and this, while in most cases the prosperity of the country is declared to be the grand reason for such a course, though in reality they are actuated by nothing but selfishness.—Osiander: The false church is cruel and blood-thirsty.—O happy country, that receives the Son of God in His persecution! Gerlach: “That He should die instead of the whole nation, a cleanse-offering, as it were, to avert the ruin that else would threaten the entire nation.—It seems that superstition was mingled with the unbelief of the Sadducee, or that he feigned it while in company with the Pharisees. (Not the Sadducees, however, but the Essenes, were at variance with the old system of sacrifices).—Not merely for the Jews whom Caiaphas meant, but also that He should gather God’s elect into His flock from among the heathen, whilst this wicked high-priest believed that the dispersion of His followers would be the natural accompaniment of His death. (Quite right. This, however, is the first antithesis present to the mind of the evangelist: In the sense of Caiaphas the meaning is: if Christ die, the Jewish nation lives, in the ordinary sense,—while the higher sense of the ambiguous expression was; if Christ die, the nation lives as a redeemed people, and thus a great nation is formed from the scattered children of God).—Lisco: The decision of Caiaphas, that the end justifies the means, that necessity is here an excuse for injustice.—They feel that one must fall: the kingdom of purity and truth, or the kingdom of falsehood and hypocrisy; and this last, in their avaricious lust of dominion, they desire to save. Gossner: They are forced to say it themselves: this man doeth many miracles. This is true, to be sure,—but—of what consequence is a single man? (thinks Caiaphas) it is the many, to whom regard is due. The world cares nothing for the small ones of the earth; it thinks: what if they be unjustly dealt with, so long as the others are satisfied? John 11:55. To His last hour He was a faithful church-goer and observer of religion. If He for once missed a feast-day, the people immediately inquired: where is He? John 11:57. They wished to prepare themselves a festive joy, and to do God a service by slaying His Son at the Passover.—He should show it. An obedient son of the devil was Judas, who conscientiously obeyed this command of hell and delivered Jesus into their hands. “The church hath commanded it.” Thus Judas might (fain would) think. Heubner: The assembly should have met for the recognition of Jesus. It was the duty of the Supreme Council to be the first to accept Jesus and to call upon the nation to accept Him. But from this very college proceeded the rejection of Jesus. The power of self-interest, and avarice, make men blind to the strongest proofs of divine power,—deaf to the voice of God. John 11:49-50. How are the weal of the masses and the right of the individual to be united? Impure state-craft never discovers the right means for accomplishing such a result.—The same words have an entirely different sense in the mouth of the wicked and the meaning of the Holy Ghost. John 11:54. This concealment of Jesus also belonged to His state of humiliation. The Light that lightened all men must withdraw itself.—Often it was a hidden country, valley, that received Christ’s faithful ones until the wrath of the enemy was overpast. Schleiermacher: Evil should be overcome only by good. But to do evil that good may come is the grossest perversity and the worst depravity into which man can fall.—Involuntarily he prophesied, and in uttering the counsel of human depravity, he declared at the same time the counsel of eternal wisdom and love,—the counsel of Him who gave His Son for us while we were yet sinners. Besser, John 11:43 : They went their way to the Pharisees who were a net spread, Hosea 5:1.—Once, on the threshold of the Promised land, Israel was blessed through the prediction of a prophet who would fain have cursed; him the strength of the Lord overpowered, putting words into his mouth which confirmed the promise made to the Patriarchs and renewed through Moses, Numbers 23:24. Thus Caiaphas, willing to curse, must now, a second Balaam, on the threshold of the New Covenant, pronounce a blessing upon the true Israel, confirming the prediction of the law and the prophets concerning the expiatory death of the Lamb (see, however, the note to John 11:51).—“Caiaphas and Pilate condemned Jesus, but both must testify of Him in words exceeding the sense which they consciously attached to them; here Caiaphas witnesses to the high-priestly death of Christ,—there Pilate testifies to His kingdom, in the superscription of the cross” (Bengel).—John reads the names of many scattered ones already written in God’s heart as children; he gazes with opened eyes into the holy mission movement of the whole reconciled world, which movement shall not end until all that the Father hath given the Son are brought together. [Craven: From Origen: John 11:47. This speech an evidence of their audacity and blindness. John 11:51. Not every one who prophesies is a prophet, as not every one who does a just action is just. John 11:54. Jesus therefore walked no more openly among the Jews: It is praiseworthy when struggles are at hand (pressed upon us) not to avoid confession or refuse to suffer; and it is no less praiseworthy to avoid giving occasion for such trial. If we do not avoid our persecutor, when we have the opportunity (without sin), we make ourselves responsible for his offence.——From Gregory: John 11:50-53. That which human cruelty executed against Him, He turned to the purposes of His mercy.——From Augustine: John 11:47-48. They were afraid of losing temporal things and thought not of eternal life, and thus they lost both. John 11:54. He would show by example that believers do not sin by retiring from the sight of persecutors.——From Chrysostom: John 11:51. The power of the Holy Ghost in drawing forth a prophecy from a wicked man.—The virtue of a (divinely appointed) office. John 11:56. His enemies made the feast time, the time of His death.——From Alcuin: John 11:56. Men may seek Jesus with bad intent.—From Theophylact: John 11:55-57. While engaged in purifications they were plotting our Lord’s death.—From Burkitt: John 11:45-46. The different effects produced by this miracle. John 11:48. Opposers of Christ color their enmity with specious pretences. John 11:50. A most wicked speech: as a judge he regarded not what was lawful but as a politician consented to what was (apparently) expedient.—It is unlawful to (strive to) promote the greatest national good by unlawful means. John 11:51. It is consistent with the holiness of God to make use of the worst of men in declaring his will. John 11:53. The baneful effects of evil counsel, especially from leading men.——From M. Henry: John 11:47. The witness of the Sanhedrin for Christ. John 11:48. The success of the gospel the dread of its adversaries. When men lose piety they lose courage. Pretended fears are often the color of malicious designs. John 11:49-50. Carnal policy commonly sets up reasons of state in opposition to rules of justice.—That calamity which we seek to escape by sin, we take the most effectual course to bring upon us.—That the welfare of communities is to be preferred before that of individuals, is a true or false maxim as it may be employed; it is expedient and honorable for an individual to hazard his life for his country, but it is devilish for rulers to put an innocent man to death under color of consulting the public safety. John 11:51. Caiaphas prophesied—1. God often employs wicked men as His instruments; 2. prophecy in the mouth is no infallible evidence of grace in the heart. John 11:51-52. The enlargement of the Evangelist on the prophecy, teaching—1. for whom Christ died, (1) the Jews, (2) the children of God scattered abroad, (a) then living, (b) throughout all time; 2. the purpose of His death concerning these, to gather them together in one.—Christ’s dying is—1. the great attractive of our hearts; 2. the great centre of our unity, (1) by the merit of His death recommending all in one to the favor of God, (2) by the motive of His death drawing each to the love of every other. John 11:53. Evil men confirm themselves and one another in ill practices by conference. John 11:57. It is an aggravation of the sins of rulers when they make their subjects the instruments of their unrighteousness.—From Scott: John 11:47-57. No devices of man can derange the purposes of God; whilst hypocrites and worldlings pursue their own projects, Christ still communes with His disciples (John 11:54) and orders all things for His own glory and their salvation.—From Barnes: John 11:50-51. God may—1. fulfill the words of the wicked in a way they do not intend; 2. make their wicked plots the means of accomplishing His purposes.—From A Plain Commentary (Oxford): John 11:51. The unworthiness of the individual does not affect the sanctity of his office.—From Ryle: John 11:46. Seeing miracles will not necessarily convert souls, Luke 16:31. John 11:47-57. The power of unbelief; ecclesiastical rulers are often the foremost enemies of the gospel. John 11:50. What is morally wrong can never be politically right. John 11:53. The conclusions of great ecclesiastical councils are sometimes wicked. John 11:54. Christ retires Himself for a season before His last great work; it is well to get alone and be still, before we undertake any great work for God. John 11:55. What importance bad men sometimes attach to outward ceremonial. The religion which expends itself in zeal for outward formalities is worthless.——From Owen: John 11:52. Gathered in one, i.e., into one spiritual nation or people. [John 11:47-50. The blinding power of hate. John 11:54. Christ never acted recklessly nor in bravado, nor in the spirit of one seeking martyrdom; He did Himself from danger when duty did not require exposure.] Footnotes: John 11:45.—[Οἱἐλθόντες is the true reading, supported by Origen, and adopted by Alford, Tischendorf, etc., instead of τῶνἐλθόντων of Cod. D.—P. S.] John 11:47.—[συνέδριον means the Sanhedrin, the great council of the Jews. See Exeg.—P. S.] John 11:50.—[Tischendorf (ed. 1869), Alford, Westcott and Hort read ὑμῖν in accordance with B. D. L., etc., instead of ἡμῖν. Lange follows here the text. rec.—P. S.] John 11:53.—[Tischendorf supplies συνεβουλέυσαντο by ἐβουλέυσαντο in accordance with Sin. B. D.—P. S.] John 11:57.—καὶ is omitted by Lachmann and Tischendorf in accordance with many Codd. Yet it is recommended by Cod. D. and others, and was perhaps omitted because men failed to recognize the great intensification of the persecution of Jesus expressed in this mandate. Since the decree in question must be disseminated throughout the land, we also consider the reading ἐντολάς, in accordance with B. M., etc., to be correct. [The first καί after δεδώκεισαν, which in the E. V. is rendered both, must be rejected on the authority of ΰ. A. B. K. L. M. U. X., Alford, Tischendorf, Westcott and Hort.—P. S.] John 11:57.—[The singular ἐντολήν of the text. rec. as a correction (because but one is mentioned) must be set aside for the plural ἐντολάς, orders, on the authority of Cod. Sin. and B., etc.—P. S.] [Sanhedrin is more accurate than Sanhedrim, though this is more frequently used (even by Alford). The rabbinical attempts to trace it to a Hebrew root are futile (see Buxtorf, sub verb.); it is formed from the Greek συνέδριον (σύνεδρος, ἕδρα), a sitting together, an assembly, a council. Winer’s article is more scholarly than the article Sanhedrim in Smith’s Dictionary of the Bible. Lange has conveniently brought together all the necessary information on the subject.—P. S.] [Alford: Our local habitation and national existence.—P. S.] [So also Grotius, Ewald, Bδumlein, Godet.—P. S.] [So also Meyer and Alford. Comp. 18:13, where the expression is repeated.—P. S.] [Lange follows Lachmann in reading ἡμῖν. But the true reading is ὑμῖν, for you, see Text. Notes.—P. S.] [There is here a slight mistake, as will he seen by referring to the Greek text. Caiaphas uses λαός in the first, and ἔθνος in the last clause. Meyer distinguishes between ἔθνος, the people as a nation, and λαός, the people as a political or theocratic society. Or, to speak more accurately, λαός usually signifies the chosen people (Matthew 1:21; Matthew 2:4; Matthew 2:6, etc.), ἔθνος, a nation among the nations (comp. below John 11:52 οὐχὑπὲρτοὐἔθνουςμόνον); Matthew 24:7, “nation against nation;” 25:32, “all nations,” etc.). Yet λαός is also used for a great crowd or multitude, like ὅχλος, John 8:2; Luke 23:27, “a great company of people,” etc.—P. S.] [The Talmudic term, Bath Kol, lit., “the daughter of the voice,” means the echo of a heavenly voice of revelation, or a divine oracle which the Rabbins imagined to receive, or which they were accustomed to derive from accidental circumstances and lots. It arose after the extinction of the prophecy and is a bastard substitute for it. John would not use of this the verb ἐπροφήτευσεν.—P. S.] [So also Trench and Wordsworth. Similar instances of involuntary prophets or witnesses to the truth we have in Pharaoh, Saul, Nebuchadnezzar, Pilate.god uses bad men as well as good ones for His own ends; He can speak wisdom even through the mouth of an ass, and confound the philosophers. Trench says: “There is no difficulty in such unconscious prophecies as this evidently is. How many prophecies of the like kind,—most of them, it is true, rather in act than in word, meet us in the whole history of the crucifixion! What was the title over our blessed Lord, ‘Jesus of Nazareth, the King of the Jews,’ but another such scornful and contemptuous, yet most veritable prophecy? Or what again the robe and the homage, the sceptre and the crown? And in the typical rehearsals of the great and final catastrophe in the drama of God’s providence, how many Nimrods and Pharaohs, antichrists that do not quite come to the birth, have prophetic parts allotted to them, which they play out, unknowing what they do; for such is the divine irony; so, in a very deep sense of the words, ‘Ludit in humanis divina potentia rebus,’ ”—P. S.] [De creat. princ. II., p. 367. [Luther’s translation reads differently from our English version, viz: “Man indeed proposeth in his heart, but from the Lord cometh what the tongue shall speak.”] III Antithesis Between Faithfulness And Apostasy In The Circle Of Disciples Itself. The Life Feast Over Lazarus An Anticipatory Celebration Of The Death Of Jesus. The Anointing (Of The Messiah, At The Beginning Of The Six Days’ Work Of His Passion, The New Six Days’ Work For The Redemption And Glorification Of The World) John 12:1-8(Matthew 26:6-16; Mark 14:3-11; Luke 22:3-6.) 1Then Jesus [therefore], six days before the passover, came to Bethany, where Lazarus was which [who] had been dead, whom he [Jesus] raised from the dead. 2There they made him a supper [dinner]; and Martha served: but Lazarus was one of them that sat [reclined] at the table with him. 3Then took Mary a pound of ointment of [pure] spikenard, very costly, and anointed the feet of Jesus, and wiped [dried] his feet with her hair; and the house was filled with the odour of 4the ointment. Then saith [Judas Iscariot] one of his disciples, Judas Iscariot, Simon’s son [omit Simon’s son], which should betray him [who was about to betray him], 5Why was not this ointment sold for three hundred pence [denβries], 6and given to the poor? This [however] he said, not that [because] he cared for the poor; but because he was a thief, and had the bag [kept the purse], and bare 7[laid hold of, took away] what was put therein. Then said Jesus, Let her alone; against the day of my burying hath she kept this [Suffer her that she may keep this for (or, until) the day of my burial]. 8For the poor always ye have [ye have always] with you; but me ye have not always. AND Joh_12:1. Jesus therefore came.—The οὖν is certainly not designed merely to resume the story of Jesus (Meyer); neither does it declare simply that Jesus went consciously and freely to meet death (Luthardt). It is preparatory to the fact that Jesus Himself showed Himself to the Sanhedrists in the most public manner. The edict commanding that information should be given of the hidden Jesus, was answered by Him with the palm-entry. (Starke, from harmonistic interest, supposes two anointings in Bethany, one at the house of Simon, two days before the Passover, the other at the house of Lazarus, six days before the Passover.) Six days before the Passover.—See Comm. on Matt., John 26 [Am., ed, p. 454 ff., and Robinson’s Harmony, pp. 207 and 212 ff.—P. S.] The 15th of Nisan was the dying day of Jesus, a Friday; six days before, therefore, was the Sabbath (the 9th of Nisan). We learn here that a day intervened between the departure of Jesus from Ephraim (and Jericho) and the palm-entry on Sunday; this day is passed over by the Synoptists, who place the palm-entry in immediate connection with the departure from Jericho. In accordance with the more exact statement of John, we must suppose that Jesus left Jericho on Friday, in company with the festive caravan, and arrived in the neighborhood of the Mount of Olives. Here they rested during the Sabbath. On the evening of that day, after the legal Sabbath time, the meal was prepared for Him at which the anointing occurred.Upon the difference which Meyer and others pretend to discover between John and the Synoptists see the Comm. on Matthew; see the same on the motives which induced the Synoptists to transpose chronologically the story of the anointing, and make it introductory to the history of the Passion. Meyer reckons with Ewald from the 14th back to the 8th of Nisan; he also asserts, however, that it was a Sabbath, in accordance with the false assumption that Jesus died on the 14th of Nisan, and yet on a Friday. Grotius, Tholuck, Wieseler and others fix upon Friday, because the law regulating a Sabbath day’s journey forbids the arrival in Bethany on the Sabbath. Hence, according to Tholuck, the feast was on Friday evening. But certainly the caravan of pilgrims to the feast might be encamped on the Sabbath around the Mount of Olives, and thus extend itself into the vicinity of Bethany. Theophylact and Lόcke are in favor of the 9th Nisan. Others reckon it to have been Sunday (De Wette) others Monday (Baur). The matter is confused by prejudice respecting the difference between John and the Synoptists, and by the different ways of reckoning,—from the 14th or 15th Nisan. (Upon the calculation of this date see Jacobi, Stud. u. Kritik. 1838, No. 4; Wieseler, Chronol., p. 377; Wichelhaus, Leidensgeschichte, p. 147.) The trajectio verborum πρὸἓξἡμερῶν instead of ἓξἡμέραιςπρό seems to have been made for the sake of emphasis: perchance, before the great six days’ work or Hexaλmeron of this passover. Where Lazarus was.—Made prominent as a continual living sign of the glory of Jesus; also in particular as a motive for the anointing of Mary, for the palm-entry, and for the hatred of the Sanhedrin. John 12:2. There they made Him a dinner (feast).—See the parallel passages in Matthew and Mark. The Jews were fond of giving entertainments at the close of the Sabbath. The following points in John’s statement are characteristic: 1. The representation of the feast as a festive celebration of the raising of Lazarus in the circle of the brother and sisters of Bethany. 2. The distinct delineation of the three,—Lazarus sits with the guests; he is therefore perfectly well; Martha serves at table, in accordance with her way, and as hostess; Mary glorifies the feast by the extraordinary anointing. 3. The manner of the anointing. “A vase of precious ointment,” says Matthew; “of pure, precious nard,” says Mark; “a pound of ointment of pure precious nard,” says John (comp. the precise mention of the one hundred pounds of spices, John 19:39, and other precise accounts; for instance, John 21:11). According to Matthew, she anoints the head of Jesus; likewise according to Mark,—breaking the flask, however; according to Matthew, she pours it on his head,—so, too, according to Mark; John gives prominence to the fact that she anointed the feet of Jesus and dried them with her hair. Manifestly this latter item does not exclude the former ones; to John, however, this strong expression of adoration and devotion is the main point. The trait reported by John reminds us of the anointing of the feet of Jesus by the great sinner; from this similarity, as well as from the name of Simon in Luke, some have taken occasion, utterly without ground, to identify this history with that related by Luke John 7:37 ff. Furthermore John mentions that the house was filled with the odor of the ointment. 4. John, who gives the most explicit account of the act of Mary, pursues the same course with regard to the censure encountered by that act. According to Matthew, the disciples were angry,—according to Mark, some had indignation,—according to John, one of the disciples, Judas, Simon’s son, the Iscariot, lifted up his voice. It is John alone, too, who distinctly characterizes Judas as a thief. We arrive at the conclusion that the murmuring originated with Judas, that it infected some of the disciples; but that the disciples generally were, by their silence, more or less concerned in this sin. John seems best to have understood Mary who, in her feeling, was in advance of the entire circle of disciples. On the other hand, John omits the promise for Mary, that her deed should be proclaimed in all the world; he mentions, however, the exceedingly significant saying: she hath kept the ointment for this day. John 12:3. A pound.—According to Olshausen, this unwonted measure of ointment employed by her was an expression of love; Meyer corrects him: she did not anoint with the pound, but from it. But John writes,—she took the pound and the house was filled with the odor; Mark writes that she broke the vase. Had not the anointing in its heroic measure given rise to the appearance of prodigality, Judas would hardly have ventured to speak, and would have still less met with assent among the disciples. “Who knows whether it was a Roman or a Greek pound? And the ancient Greek pound was but half as large as the Roman pound, while that, again, does not equal our pound.” Braune. Comp. Comm. on Matthew. p. 463, Am. Ed. Anointed the feet.—“The anointing of the head at feasts was a customary thing, and might have been passed over by the Evangelist in order to mention the unusual demonstration of love for which the remainder of the ointment might be employed. To wash the feet with tepid water, and then to anoint them with costly oil, is mentioned in the Talmud tr. Menachoth as a duty of maid-servants.” Tholuck. Braune gives prominence to the fact, that the anointing of the feet was also particularly noticeable to John, since he reclined by the side of Jesus and the anointing of the feet took place close behind him John 12:5. For three hundred denβries [i.e., between forty-five and fifty dollars gold. See Text. Note 6.—P. S.]. See Comm. on Matthew. The precise estimation is characteristic. Indicative of the wealth of the family. [Utterly inconsistent with Hengstenberg’s hypothesis of the identity of the historic Lazarus with the poor Lazarus of the parable.—P. S.] John 12:6. He kept the purse, γλωσσόκομον, cash repository. Luther, significantly and expressively: the purse (Beutel). The common cash-box, made up by male and female disciples (Luke 8:3), to supply the common wants. Alms for the poor likewise (John 13:29) were of course taken from this coffer. This keeping of the cash must have been connected with a corresponding talent possessed by Judas; that talent, however, was, in its turn, connected with the temptation that made him a thief; and thus a connection exists between his chiliastic views of the kingdom of Christ and the despondency which led him to turn traitor (see Comm. on Matthew, John 10). He proved himself a thief by his management of the coffer. He laid hold of what was put therein. He put aside for himself a portion of what others offered. Βαστάζειν may mean: he bore, kept (portabat) what was donated (Vulgate, Luther, Lόcke, etc., Luthardt), [De Wette, Alford, Ebrard, Hengstenberg, Ewald, Godet], and he bore away, stole (aufcrebat), he abstracted the deposits (Origen, Nonnus and others, Meyer). Stress has been laid upon the article, as opposed to the latter view. It is inconceivable that Judas should have purloined everything. Be it observed that βαστάζειν also means to lay hold of, to touch, to handle. We adopt this intermediate signification: he laid violent hands on the money and especially on the alms. His lusting after the three hundred denβries renders him not simply heartless towards Mary’s beautiful act, but it also makes him a hypocrite. With reference to the apparent singularity of his being intrusted by Jesus with the purse, the following considerations are to be pondered: 1. The common purse itself, doubtless, did not acquire considerable importance before the final departure from Galilee; 2. the appointment of the cashier was probably a general determination of the disciples rather than a matter with which Christ particularly concerned Himself. Compare the institution of deacons, Acts 6:3. 3. The disciples must learn by experience that their reliance upon the brilliant talent of Judas—in accordance with this trust, doubtless, he was introduced by their intercession into the circle of the apostles (see Comm. on Matthew)—was even in this point premature. 4. Jesus committed the bag to him, not indeed to deprive him of all excuse for his treason (Chrysostom and others), but He committed it to him having respect to his destiny, and because such a character might better be cured by confidence than by mistrust. 5. We are guilty of a wondrous over-estimation of the cashiership in relation to the apostolic dignity, if we think that a man intrusted with the former is beset with greater difficulties than one upon whom the latter is conferred. The Lord in a measure intrusted Judas with Himself and His life; it was a small thing for Him to commit the money-bag to his keeping. So the grand question would again be: wherefore He called him (hereupon comp. Leben Jesu, II. p. 693 and 700). Since Jesus could venture to have Judas for His apostle, He might well risk having him for His cashier. 6. The history, it is probable, was also intended to be expressive of the standard by which the purse was here estimated in relation to higher good things, and it should be a significant warning to the Church not to reckon upon the security of an accumulation of external church-property. John 12:7. That she may keep this [τηρήση, spoken proleptically, and therefore, like all similar expressions of our Lord, somewhat enigmatically] for the day of my burial.—See the Textual Notes. We do not understand the reading of Lachmann as Meyer does: Let her alone that she may (not give this oil, a portion of which she has just used to anoint My feet, to the poor, but) keep it for the day of My embalming. Meyer means, namely, on the actual day of burial. In this we can detect nought of the “odor of the ointment.” The sense is: Permit her to keep the ointment (which she might already have used at the burial of Lazarus and which would not keep well in thy bag) for the day of My burial (which is now ideally present with the outbreak of thy malignity). In this we, at the same time, read the declaration that she, though without being clearly conscious of His approaching death, did entertain a foreboding presentiment of it and offered this great sacrifice of love as her farewell to Him. Baumgarten-Crusius: Suffer her, that she may have kept; Luthardt: that she has reserved. These explanations too are grammatically proper in the sense: leave her this, do not grudge her this,—that she has kept it and is even now saving it from your bag for the anointing of My body unto death. We are of opinion that the τηρεῖν also contains an allusion to the infidelity of Judas; a reference which, as well as the numerous authorities, recommends this reading; and we deny the need for the explanation that the reading originated in the necessity for meeting the objection urging the later occurrence of the embalming (Lόcke.) John 12:8. For the poor, etc. See Com. on Matthew on the same passage. AND ETHICAL1. See the Comm. on Matthew and Mark. The anointing of the Messiah, the Anointed One, previous to His public procession as the Messiah and entry into Jerusalem: (1) By whom anointed? The Christ by a grateful, presageful Christian woman. (2) Wherewith anointed? With flowing ointment, with precious balm, the offering of devoted love. (3) How anointed? On the head and feet. The hair which adorned the head of His disciple, appropriated to His service. (4) Whereunto anointed? To His high-priestly sacrificial death as the completion of His life-work (to the six days’ work of His Passion, as the preliminary condition of His Sabbath). With a foreboding presentiment, half consciously, half unconsciously, well known to the Spirit of God. 2. The six days before the Passover (until the death of Jesus) the six days of Christ’s great toil and labor. Comp. Isaiah 63:1 ff. and the symbolism of the number six in John 2:6. 3. The post-celebration of the raising of Lazarus at the same time the pre-celebration of the death of Jesus. This connection makes the death of Jesus appear in a peculiar sense a sacrifice for His friends and His friend in Bethany. 4. The festive celebration of the Bethanian family in honor of the Lord a symbol of the feasts of the living communion in the Church, and of the heavenly feast. 5. The involuntary similarity in the anointing of the great disciple and that of the great sinner [Luke 7:36.—P. S.] The contrast and its equalization. The disciple as a sinner,—the sinner as a disciple,—at the feet of Jesus.—If the washing of a pilgrim’s feet denoted the termination of the little journey of a day, so the anointing of the feet of Jesus with oil might be indicative of the end of His glorious life-pilgrimage. Thus too did the great sinner anoint the feet of Jesus, wetting them with her tears—those feet which had drawn near to rescue her. But in our anointing there is a predominant reference forwards, to the death of Jesus, in accordance with His explanation. 6. The contrast between the heavenly offering and life-portrait of Mary and the hellish malice and death-portrait of Judas. Faith’s half-conscious presentiment of the death of Jesus and of its import, within the breast of Mary. The already half-conscious thought of the betrayal to death in the soul of Judas. The evangelic hearty acquiescence of Mary in the Passion of Christ. The anti-christian self-will of Judas in his obduracy. The deed of the innermost heart and the words of the outermost hypocrisy. Over against the first ripe Christian woman stands the first ripe anti-christ. Heaven and hell in their manifestations drawn up in close opposition. 7. The silence of Mary, the speech of Jesus. 8. Christ suffers no sort of hypocrisy to obtain dominion in His Church; neither hypocrisy of prayer nor of fasting, nor humanistic eleemosynary hypocrisy. 9. The doctrine of Judas is at bottom self-destroying. If every one should sell the precious ointment, in order to give it to the poor, it would be rendered worthless. Judas must therefore assume: the ointment is too good for Christ; it is for people of higher rank, or the moment is not one of sufficient importance. Pauperism. 10. Antithesis between the fixed affairs and exercises in the kingdom of God and the unique, irrecoverable moments; and the subordination of the former to the latter. 11. An evangelic flash of light, illuminating the subject of church-property, the temptations of administration and the dangers of an increase of property in the common treasury (see Acts 5:1). 12. The gradual hardening of Judas at the two feasts of the glory and grace of Christ. Great operations of grace are succeeded in false minds by a great reaction of wickedness. AND In what way Jesus, upon the edict of the Sanhedrin commanding that information should be given against Him, Himself appears by making the palm-entry into Jerusalem.—The six workdays or Passion-days of Christ until Easter.—The feast at Bethany or the trio (Lazarus and his sisters) in three different meetings with the Lord: 1. The visit of Jesus: Lazarus probably at his business, Martha serving, Mary learning at Jesus’ feet [Luke 10]. 2. The return of Jesus: Lazarus in the grave, Martha busy about the grave of Lazarus, Mary with her tears at the feet of Jesus [John 11]. 3. The departure of Jesus: Lazarus at the table, participating in the feast, Martha the festive hostess, Mary with the costly ointment at Jesus’ feet [John 12]. Or: 1. The school of the word; 2. the battle-ground of distress; 3. the feast of salvation.—The festival in Bethany compared with the festival of the Lord’s Supper. Agreement, difference.—The house was filled with the odor of the ointment.—The anointing in its signification: 1. The expression of the most heartfelt gratitude, 2. of the most solemn veneration and homage, 3. of the deepest humility, 4. of the most devoted love, 5. of the holiest sorrow, 6. of the boldest confidence.—How Mary by her spirit of sacrifice manifests her budding courage in the face of the cross and death.—The discipless, a ripe Christian heart, uncomprehended even in the circle of the disciples, and in advance of most of the disciples.—Mary and Judas.—The two in their participation in the death of Jesus.—Self-denial, in its heavenly brilliance, over against selfishness, in hellish darkness.—The connection of fanaticism and avarice in the soul of Judas (after the prelude of Balaam).—How the secrets of hell come to light face to face with the secrets of heaven.—The Lord’s defence of Mary in its eternal signification: 1. A defence of a festive spirit in opposition to hypocritical sadness, 2. of great love-offerings in opposition to a hypocritical reckoning, 3. of holy spending (prodigality) in opposition to a hypocritical pauperism.—The perception of the unique moments of life.—The censure of Judas, merely as a rude disturbance of the feast, immoral and reprehensible; on the other hand, the reproof of Christ gentle, mild, in accordance with the festive spirit and intelligible in its hidden sharpness to the disturber of the peace alone.—The separation between Christ and the poor made by Judas, was opposed to the spirit of Christ (see Matthew 25:35). For: 1. In the true veneration of Christ consists the most effectual caring for the poor; 2. true care for the poor ministers to Christ in the poor.—While, therefore, Christ accedes to the separation of Judas, He at the same time pronounces His judgment upon the false, externalized care of the poor. (Externalized poverty itself is forever at your heels; it is inexterminable; but Christ, meanwhile, is vanishing from you).—The contradiction in the censure of Judas. If Christ should not be anointed with the precious ointment, who then should? People of rank? Manifestly, the Lord has grown small and poor in his sight, and the polite world rich and great.—The offence of Judas: 1. The fair, festive joy augments his gloom, 2. the celebration of the honor of Jesus his envy, 3. the princely munificence his avarice, 4. the mild reproof his exasperation against Him, 5. the heavenly calmness with which Jesus saw through him the dark self-confusion in which he surrendered himself to the influences of Satan.—The false antithesis which Judas makes between Christ and the poor: 1. It asperses the Lord; 2. it asperses poverty.—A prelude to pauperism.—The judgment upon this pauperism: 1. It loses the Christ; 2. it retains the poor.—How the spirit of Christ is victorious over the disturbances of the feast. Starke: Zeisius: Though Christ gave place for a time to the rage of His enemies, He, nevertheless, returns in accordance with His divine vocation; duty, therefore, must not be abandoned by a teacher or by any Christian on account of danger.—Hedinger: Love spares no expense.—Canstein: All Christ’s friends, when they have been awakened by Him, sup with Him in the kingdom of grace (Revelation 3:20), and when He shall have aroused them from bodily death at the last day, they shall sit with Him at His table in the kingdom of glory, Luke 16:22; Luke 22:30.—That which is spent on Christ is not wasted but well employed.—Cramer: Even in extreme persecution God does not leave His own without comfort and refreshment.—A friend of Christ gladly lays out all that he has, even to the very choicest of his possessions, in testimony of his love to his Saviour.—Nothing more shameful than ingratitude.—Zeisius: Hypocrites always find something to censure in the works and conduct of honest Christians.—Ibid.: Judas is a true type of wicked church-patrons, directors, managers of ecclesiastical estates, who, under cover of all sorts of specious reasons, secure to themselves the funds, benefices and revenues and do not restore them).—Christ espouses the cause of His people and defends them faithfully.—Piscator: Men, impelled by the Holy Ghost, frequently perform an important action without comprehending its significance. Braune: What a feast was that where the noble Simon, gratefully rejoicing in his health, was host; Lazarus, the visible trophy of life’s triumph over death; friend Martha, personating business-like alacrity, is the waitress; but where Mary, as thoughtful love, brings precious oil, and Jesus, the Son of God, going to a death upon the cross, appears as guest, to refresh Himself on the way! Here is a table prepared for Him in the presence of His enemies, and His head is anointed with oil, Psalms 23:5.—To John, Bethany is as one house, and families friendly to Jesus (the house of Simon the leper, the house of Lazarus and his sisters) are as one family.—1 Timothy 6:10.—Like Mary, prevent death, that death may not prevent thee and cut off thine opportunity.—Gossner: Mary. With her what was outward proceeded from within, as it always should be.—The odor of her ointment, etc. How the glorious odor of the gospel fills all Christendom, and particularly the house of a heart that receives it.—Judas betrayed that he would rather have money in his purse than his Saviour in his heart.—Yes, to such lengths do abuses go that the thief, avarice, covetousness, the devil, steals into the apostolic college.—Ointments were preserved among the household treasures until burial.—It is true that we have Jesus always with us in the poor, but His presence with us is not always to be felt. Therefore when He discloses Himself so perceptibly, as if we saw Him, as if He were corporeally and visibly present, we must profit by this occasion and not forsake Him for the sake of outside works that can be performed at another time. Schleiermacher: The human kindliness and pleasantness of the Redeemer.—As Christians, who have become what they are by the death of the Lord, death itself must remain a something continually present to us all. But gladsomeness of heart is just what turns even the continual thought of death into something that does not annoy us in the cheerful moments of social life.—Mallet: The odor of the ointment. Thus the house had suddenly become the very opposite of the grave (there a savor of mould,—here a savor of life).—The days of glory and the cross in Jerusalem stand in the closest connection with the occurrences in Bethany. [Craven: From Augustine: John 12:6. Judas was already a thief, and followed our Lord in body, not in heart: wherein we are taught the duty of tolerating wicked men in the Church (for a season.—E. R. C.)—It is not surprising that Judas who was accustomed to steal money from the bag, should betray our Lord for money.—In the person of Judas are represented the wicked in the Church.—From Alcuin: John 12:1. As the time approached in which our Lord had resolved to suffer, He approached the place He had chosen for the scene of His suffering. John 12:2. The Lord’s Supper is the faith of the Church working by love.—Martha serveth, whenever a believing soul devotes itself to the worship of the Lord.—Lazarus is one of them that sit at table when those who have been raised from the death of sin, rejoice together with the righteous, in the presence of truth, and are fed with the gifts of heavenly grace.——From Burkitt: John 12:1. Our Lord’s example teaches us that although we are bound by all lawful means to preserve ourselves from the violence of persecutors, yet when God’s time for our suffering is come we ought to set our faces cheerfully toward it. John 12:3. When strong love prevails in the heart nothing is adjudged too dear for Christ. John 12:4-6. How does a covetous heart think every thing too good for Christ. John 12:5-7. Men may, through ignorance or prejudice, censure those actions which God commends.——From M. Henry: John 12:1. As there is a time when we are allowed to shift for our own preservation, so there is a time when we are called to jeopard our lives for God. John 12:2. Martha served: Our Lord had formerly reproved her for being troubled with much serving, she did not therefore leave off all serving as some who being reproved for one extreme run into another.—Better a waiter at Christ’s table than a guest at the table of a prince.—Lazarus—sat at the table with Him: Those whom Christ has raised up to a spiritual life, are made to sit together with Him, Ephesians 2:6 John 12:3. The act of Mary manifested a love—1. generous, 2. condescending (self-humbling), 3. believing.—God’s Anointed (Messiah) should be our Anointed—with the ointment of our best affections (and service). Honors done to Christ are to God and men an offering of a sweet smelling savor. John 12:4. It is possible for the worst of men to lurk under the disguise of the best profession. John 12:4-5. Coldness of love to Christ in professors of religion is a sad presage of final apostasy. John 12:5. Here is—1. a foul iniquity gilded over with a specious pretence; 2. worldly wisdom passing censure on pious zeal; 3. charity to the poor made a color for opposing an act of piety to Christ.—Many excuse themselves for laying out in charity, under pretence of laying up for charity.—Proud men think all ill advised who do not advise with them. John 12:6. Judas the purse-bearer: Strong inclinations to sin within, are often furnished with strong temptations to sin without.—He was a thief: The reigning love of money is heart-theft, as much as anger and revenge are heart-murder.—Judas who betrayed his trust, soon after betrayed his Master. John 12:7. Against the day of My burying hath she kept this: Providence often so affords opportunity to Christians that the expressions of their pious zeal prove to be more seasonable and beautiful than any foresight of their own could make them. John 12:8. The good which may be done at any time, ought to give way to that which cannot be done but just now.——From Stier: John 12:4-5. The censure of Judas echoed by the other Apostles (see Matthew 26:8-9; Mark 14:4; also the ye of Joh 12:8): 1. “Censure infects like a plague;” 2. Could we but know the wicked origin of many of the judgments which we thoughtlessly echo, the Judas-heart from which springs many of the current criticisms of books and things (and men)—how should we recoil from them!—An example of those views and judgments which have their foundation in the principle of utilitarianism falsely applied—1. to the wounding of pious hearts; 2. to the damage of that justifiable cultus which, (1) aims worthily to express the sentiments of reverence and love, (2) is in itself productive of highest blessing.—An example of—1. the “cold judgments passed upon the virtuous emotions of warm hearts;” 2. the more or less conscious or unconscious censures of the artless outgoings of honest feelings; 3. the narrow-minded criticism of others according to our own mind and temper; 4. that slavish spirit which metes out all good works by rigid rule. John 12:7-8 (see also Matthew 26:10-13; Mark 14:6-9). Christ’s affectionate and sympathetic justification of the wounded Mary;—1. He surpasses the blame of the disciples by His own instant praise and consolation; 2. Behold the moral ζsthetics in the estimation of human acts which He teaches and requires—He commends the deed as deriving its value from the state of the soul thereby expressed; 3. He corrects the errors of human judgment as to what is great and noble in human works—the greatness of the result gives them not their value, but the intention; 4. Observe the deepest ground of His verdict—she hath done it unto Me (Matt. and Mark)—love for Him (for God) the first, and most essential regulating measure of all good and lovely works.—Be confident, misunderstood soul—He knows thee and thy purpose; even if His disciples blame, He will justify thee both now and hereafter. John 12:7. The beautiful work (καλὸνἔργον) of love elevated, interpreted and glorified into a prophetic act; Jesus establishes from its providential significance its moral propriety. (?) John 12:8. No agragrian law can abolish the poverty which is ever being reproduced; we must, indeed, give with the wisdom of charity, but without hoping that giving will make poverty cease.—From Barnes: John 12:6. He was a thief and had the bag: Every man is tried according to his native propensity—the object of trial is to bring out a man’s native character. John 12:4-6. Learn that—1. it is no new thing for members of the Church to be covetous; 2. such members will be those who complain of the great waste in spreading the gospel; 3. this passion will work all evil in a Church (even the betrayal of our Lord, John 12:4).—From Williams: John 12:3-5. Observe the nature of the action selected by our Lord as the one above all others that should receive an earthly memorial (Matthew 26:13); it was—1. wrought in a private room; 2. an expression of loving, reverential thanksgiving; 3. not to please men, but for the simple purpose of doing honor to Jesus. John 12:5. But for the reproof of Judas the costliness of Mary’s offering had not been known and honored—the evil eye (and tongue) of the wicked serves to do honor to God’s servants.—From A Plain Commentary (Oxford): John 12:3. Can we wonder at the love of Mary? Lazarus was at the table! John 12:2-3. Christ at the table with the Leper who was cleansed (Matthew 26:6) and with the dead man whom He had raised to life—a figure of His Church when he who is cleansed and he who is raised from the death of sin, sit with Christ, and eat and drink in His kingdom which is filled with the odor of His Death.—(Altered from Williams). John 12:5-7. The offering of Mary the most expensive she could procure: Our Lord’s commendation is—1. the abiding warrant for munificence on every similar occasion; 2. the perpetual rebuke of those who think that anything is good enough for the House of God, while they deny themselves in no luxury at home. John 12:6. Christ suffered Judas to remain amongst the Apostles—teaching us not to look for a Church (or a ministry) where all shall be saints. John 12:8. The poor always with the Church, in order that His people may always show them kindness for His sake.—From Ryle: John 12:2. The supper a type of the marriage supper of the Lamb. John 12:5. A specimen of the way in which wicked men often try to depreciate a good action, by suggesting that something better might have been done. John 12:6. Multitudes, like Judas, excuse themselves from one class of duties by pretended zeal for others—they compensate neglecting Christ’s cause by affecting concern for the poor.—It is the successors of Mary and not of Judas who really care for the poor.—He was a thief, and yet an Apostle—privileges alone convert nobody.—A man may go far in Christian profession without inward grace. John 12:7. Christians do not always know the full meaning of what they do—God uses them as His instruments. John 12:8. The existence of pauperism is no proof that States are ill governed or that Churches are not doing their duty.—Relieving the poor is not so important a work as doing honor to Christ. (During His absence from us is He not honored by our ministering to the poor (Matthew 25:40; Matthew 25:45)?—E. R. C.) John 12:8. Me ye have not always: These words overthrow the Romish doctrine of transubstantiation.—From Owen: John 12:4-5 (in connection with Matthew 26:8; Mark 14:4). How pernicious, even upon good men, may be the example and influence of one, who with apparently charitable motive decries the benevolence that would surrender all for Christ.—The Evangelist does not seek to cover up the disgrace brought upon the family of Christ by having cherished so long in its number this bad man: it is thus (by their honesty) that the sacred writers manifest the truthfulness of their statements. John 12:8. The inference is clear that it is a Christian duty to relieve the wants of the poor.] Footnotes: John 12:1.—[In Cod. Sin. B. L. X. ὁτεθνηκὠς is wanting, on which account Lachmann and Alford have bracketed the words, and Tischendorf, Westcott and Hort have omitted them. Probably this purposely significant term was employed as expressive of the fact that a man who had lately been dead did, by means of the miracle of Christ, appear as one of the guests at the feast. It is, however, superfluous, the fact being sufficiently indicated without it.—P. S.] John 12:1.—[Tischendorf, Alford, etc., read Ἰησοῦς in accordance with Sin. A. B. D. e.g., etc. The text. rec. omits it.—P. S.] John 12:2.—[δεῖπνον should perhaps be better translated dinner or feast, than supper, for it was the chief meal of the Jews, as also of the Greeks and Romans, taken after the work and heat of the day early in the evening and often prolonged into the night. ἄριστον is breakfast, lunch.—P. S.] John 12:3.—[ἐκμάσσω or ἐκμάττω, to wipe off, to wipe dry, in poets and later prose writers, for the Attic ἀπομόργνυμι and ἐξομόργνυμι.—P. S.] John 12:4.—Instead of ἸούδαςΣίμωνος̓Ισκαριώτης in accordance with Codd. A. Q. and the Recepta, Tischendorf simply reads Ἰσκαρ. in accordance with Cod. B. and several minuscules. Σίμωνος appears doubtful, being now become superfluous. Omitted also from the Sin. [Tischendorf, ed. 8, Alford, Westcott and Hort read ΙοῦδαςὁἸσκαριώτης, without Σίμωνος.—P. S.] John 12:6.—[A δηνάριον (Lat. denarius=10 asses), a Roman coin, is equal to the Attic drachma, about 15 or 17 cents of our money. Three hundred denarii therefore are about £9 16s. sterling, or from 45 to 50 Am. dollars. The E. V. gives a very false idea of the value of this ointment. Dimes or shillings (in the New York sense) would come nearer.—P. S.] John 12:7.—Instead of εἰςτὴνἡμέραντοῦἐνταφιασμοῦτετήρηκεν [hath kept] αὐτό (comp. Mark 14:8), Lachmann and Tischendorf [Alford, Westcott and Hort] read in accordance with ΰ. B. D. K. L. and others, Vulgate and other translations and Fathers: ἵναεἰςτὴνἡμέραντοῦἐνταφιασμοῦτηρήσῃ [may keep]. The Sin. likewise. John 12:8.—The eighth verse is wanting in Cod. D. “and might be suspected of having been introduced from Matthew 26:11; Mark 14:7, if it came before ἄφες, and the characteristic order of the words were the same as in the Synoptists (πάντοτε first).” Meyer. Here, however, the complete preponderance of Codd. is alone decisive in favor of the verse. [Tischendorf, ed. 8, Alford and Westcott and Hort retain it.—P. S.] [πρὸἓξἡμερῶντοῦπάσχα, instead of ἓξἡμέραιςπρὸτοῦπάσχα, is no Latinism (ante six dies, instead of six dies ante pascha), but very frequent in later Greek writers (Philo, Josephus, Plutarch, Appian, etc.), see Winer, p. 518 f., 7th ed. The same combination is formed with μετά, and in local specifications, comp. John 11:18, ὡςἀπὸσταδίωνδεκαπέντε. Greswell (as quoted by Alford) defines the expression to be exclusive of the period named as the limit ad quem or a quo (according as πρό or μετά may be used), but inclusive of the day or month or year of the occurrence specified.—P. S.] [Wordsworth: “This Supper at Bethany was probably on the Sabbath before-is death. It was on a Sabbath—the Sabbath before that great Sabbath, on which Christ rested in the grave and fulfilled the Sabbath, and prepared the grave as a place of rest for all who pass from this life in His faith and fear.” He also allegorizes on the meaning of Bethany, a house of passage, as prefiguring the passage to the spiritual banquet in Paradise.—P. S.] [The Greek λίτρα, the Latin libra, a pound, was adopted into the Aramaic, and is found in the Rabbinical writings as equivalent to a mina (see Friedlieb, Archδol. der Leidensgesch., p. 33, quoted by Alford). The Roman libra was divided into 12 ounces, and was equivalent to nearly 12 ounces avoirdupois—P. S.] [Lit., a tongue-box (from γλώσσα and κομἑω) or reed-case for keeping the tongues or mouth-pieces of pipes and flutes; then any kind of chest, or box, or pouch, or purse for money. Found only in late writers. Mark the striking contrast between the money-box of Judas and the alabaster box of Mary, his thirty pieces of silver and her three hundred denβries, his love of money and her liberality, his hypocritical profession of concern for the poor and her noble deed for the Lord, his wretched end and her blessed memory throughout the Christian world to the end of time.—P. S.] [Meyer, while substantially agreeing with Lange, objects that βαστάζειν means to seize only in the literal sense of ψηλαφᾶν (Suidas).—P. S.] IV Antithesis Between The Homage Of Pious Jews And Festal Pilgrims, And The High-Priests With Their Adherents, Who Desire To Destroy The Lord’s Friends As Well As Himself. The Prince Of Peace And The Palm-Branches (John 12:9-19.)(Matthew 21:1-11; Mark 11:1-10; Luke 19:29-44.) 9Much people of the Jews therefore knew [learned] that he was there: and they came [thither] not for Jesus’ sake [on account of Jesus] only, but that they might see Lazarus also, whom he had raised from the dead; 10But the chief priests consulted that they might put Lazarus also to death. 11Because that by reason of him [For on his account] many of the Jews went away, and believed on [were going away and believing in] Jesus. 12On the next day much people that were [had] come to the feast, when they heard 13[hearing] that Jesus was coming to Jerusalem, Took [the] branches of [the] palm trees, and went forth to meet him, and cried, Hosanna: Blessed is the King of Israel that cometh in the name of the Lord [Blessed is he that cometh in the name 14of the Lord, even (χαί) the king of Israel]. And [But] Jesus, when he had found 15[having found] a young ass, sat [set himself] thereon; as it is written, Fear not, daughter of Zion: behold, thy King cometh, sitting on an ass’s colt. [Zechariah 9:9. 16These things understood not his disciples [his disciples did not understand] at the first: but when Jesus was glorified, then [they] remembered they that these 17things were written of him, and that they had done these things unto him. The people [multitude] therefore that was with him when he called Lazarus out of his 18[the] grave [tomb], and raised him from the dead, bare record [bore witness]. For this cause [On this account] the people [multitude] also met him, for that [because] they heard that he had done this miracle [wrought this sign]. 19The Pharisees therefore said among themselves, Perceive ye how ye prevail nothing? [Ye see that ye accomplish, or, effect nothing:] behold, the world is gone [has run away] after him. AND See the Commentary on Matthew, John 21; on Mark 10; on Luke 19. It has been shown there that there are no actual differences (the existence of which is claimed by Meyer and others) between the narrative of John and the accounts of the Synoptists, irrespective of the fact that the latter have in effect blended the two halves of the journey, from Jericho to Bethany, and from Bethany to Jerusalem, into one journey, without mentioning the intervening rest. Consequently a double entry (Paulus, Schleiermacher) is still less conceivable: on these points comp. the construction of the facts in Matthew [p. 368, 371]. John 12:9. A great multitude of the Jews.—The Jews in the national sense (especially the inhabitants of Jerusalem, as the word is generally understood) were, at the same time, most of them Jews in the Pharisaic sense, and here also John understands the expression in this latter sense, not, however, necessarily of “the Jewish opposition” (Meyer [and Alford]). The raising of Lazarus had created a great sensation among these Jews in Jerusalem; it had inclined many of them to believe, so that the whole party of the Pharisees seemed about to go over to Christ, John 12:19. They came thither.—All the people streamed forth to Bethany. Some already believed, and wished above all things to see Jesus again; others were desirous of seeing Lazarus, i.e., they were on the high road to faith. This pilgrimaging began as early as Saturday evening, see John 12:12. John 12:10. But the high-priests took counsel.—The state of matters seemed so desperate to the high-priests (Caiaphas, Hannas and the innermost circle of chief-priestly intimates in the Sanhedrin) that they consulted together as to how they might make away with Lazarus also, the living memorial of the miraculous power of Jesus. The consequence of the counsel of blood: ‘It is expedient that one man should die,’ thus begins to make itself manifest. It ever demands more blood, as is proved by the history of the hierarchy. Upon similar, secret murderous plots see Acts 23:12; Acts 25:3. Of course, as Lampe remarks, the Sadducean party, of which Caiaphas was a member, were specially interested in putting Lazarus aside, he being a living witness to the truth of the resurrection. Comp. Acts 4:1-2. John 12:11. Many of the Jews were going away; ὐπῆγον.—Lampe and others: They apostatized. Meyer combats this interpretation. The apostasy is indeed merely a consequence of their going away to Bethany; nevertheless it is intimated. John 12:12. On the nest day.—On Sunday morning. See Comm. on Matthew. Here, too, the diversity between John and the Synoptists continues; John mentions that part of the palm-procession which issues from Jerusalem, while the Synoptists give prominence to the portion accompanying Jesus, i.e., the Galilean. Since the same story is here told us by the Synoptists and by John, it becomes very evident that it was John’s intention to supplement their accounts. However, the Synoptists themselves distinguish between a part of the procession that preceded Jesus, and a part that followed Him. By the former attendants these seem to be meant who set out from Jerusalem intending to bring Jesus into the city. John, on the other hand, likewise discriminates between two divisions (John 12:17-18),—citizens of Jerusalem and festal pilgrims who are already in Jerusalem. A great multitude that had come to the feast, hearing, etc.—Believing pilgrims to the feast, already present in Jerusalem. Be it observed that, according to John, the Hosanna movement, the solemn proclamation of Jesus as the Messiah, originates with these festal pilgrims. Jerusalem herself seems to receive the Lord as her King. According to Tholuck, these were Galilean pilgrims; this is contradicted by the fact that the Galilean festive train is just approaching from Perζa; but a considerable portion of the Galilean pilgrims may have already entered Jerusalem or its environs, and may thus turn back to join in escorting Jesus. The acclamation, according to Psalms 118:25-26, “where the Messiah is greeted as coming ἐνὀνόματικυρίου A reception such as is allotted to kings and conquerors, 1Ma 13:51; 2Ma 10:7.” Tholuck. John 12:13. They took the branches of the palm-trees [τὰβαΐατῶνφοινίκων].—A lively view of the well-known palm-trees, which then, as the reporter vividly reminds us, stood on the road leading from the city to Bethany. This notice is wanting in Luke; Matthew mentions only branches of the trees; Mark speaks of things strewed in the way; we are indebted to John alone for the precise information; and therewith for the terms: Palm-Sunday, Palm-entry, and the symbolism of the palm-branch. “As the pomegranate tree is the symbol of the secretly flowing fulness of blessing, so, on the other hand, the palm-tree represents the overflowing horn of plenty and is the symbol of all fulness of strength and outward prosperity: thy stature is like to the palm-tree, thy breast like clusters of dates, Sol. Son 7:7. Hence Tamar a favorite name for women, Genesis 38:6; 2 Samuel 13:1; 2 Samuel 14:27. Hence the palm has from ancient times been regarded as the escutcheon and sign of Israel, Coins of the times of the Maccabees have on one side the palm, and on the other a vine branch as tokens of the land. Also on the medals of the Emperor Titus, struck at his command in countless numbers from the spoil of Jerusalem and distributed among the Roman army, the ‘Captive Judah’ is portrayed as a woman sitting under a palm-tree.” (Bibl. Naturgesch., publ. at Calw. p. 343.) By the biblical palm we are generally to understand the date palm. Elim, the camp of the seventy palm-trees, Exodus 15:27; Numbers 23:9; the palm-branches at the feast of tabernacles, Leviticus 23:40; Jericho, the city of palms, Deuteronomy 34:3; Judges 1:16; the righteous a flourishing palm-tree, Psalms 92:13; Sulamith, Sol. Son 7:8. According to these stages of the symbol it is expressive of refreshment, blessing, festival, new life or victory; 1Ma 13:51 a sign of victory. Hosanna. Matthew: “Hosanna to the Son of David! Blessed is he that cometh in the name of the Lord; Hosanna in the highest!” Mark: “Hosanna! Blessed is He that cometh in the name of the Lord: Blessed be the kingdom of our father David, that cometh in the name of the Lord! Hosanna in the highest!” Luke: “Blessed be the king that cometh in the name of the Lord! Peace in heaven and glory in the highest!” Here (as in the account of the resurrection) the variations more decidedly attest the reality of this scene of intense excitement than would a uniform account. It is the liturgy of ecstatic life. Some cry thus, others thus; each evangelist reports in accordance with his own hearing or that of witnesses. Be it observed that in John the Hosanna precedes the mention of the ass’s colt, while in the Synoptists it is subsequent to that. Naturally, because the Hosanna with which, as with the watch-word of the day, the festal pilgrims from Jerusalem approach, is not communicated until later to the festal train from Galilee and Perζa. In this the new disciples are in advance of the old ones; hence too more rapturous. John 12:14-16. And Jesus having found a young ass, etc. See Comm. on Matthew: the quotation Zechariah 9:9. Freely cited. That upon which alone the evangelist lays stress, is the contrast between the devout homage paid to Jesus, and His humble equipment, mounted upon a young ass (ὀνάριον),—found, as it were, by accident,—together with the prediction concerning this fact in the prophet. Hence he also gives prominence to the circumstance that the disciples did not then understand this fulfilment of prophecy. Hence the highly emphatic, thrice repeated ταῦτα, “these things,” John 12:16. That the fulfilment of the prophecy was directed by God and not by men, is expressed by the first and the third ταῦτα. Exactly so men did unto Him, and even the disciples did not so much as understand it. Even if Jesus was conscious of the fulfilment of that prophecy, the unsuspicious co-operation of men proves it to have been the dispensation of God. At a later stage of enlightenment the import of this moment was revealed to the disciples also. And here it cannot be merely the fulfilment of a type which is spoken of. It is the fulfilment of a prediction concerning the Messiah; in a typico-symbolical form, doubtless, i.e., the prophet has predicted the entrance of the Messiah in insignificant equipment; but to him the ride upon the ass’s colt was typically the symbol of the gentle and humble accoutrement of the Prince of Peace,—i.e., the investment of his prediction. John 12:17. The multitude therefore … bore witness.—An antiphony is formed between the eye-witnesses of the raising of Lazarus (inhabitants of Jerusalem, of Bethany, and others) and the people who have come, as believers, from Jerusalem to meet Him. This antiphony is likewise indicated in Mark (where in our translation we read: and they that went before and they that followed). Luke, too, has indicated that the disciples who formed the escort of Jesus praised Him on account of His wondrous deeds. Here John supplements; he informs us that the raising of Lazarus was the leading motive for the ascriptions of praise to Jesus in the Palm-procession. This motive was passed over by the Synoptists for the same reason which induced them to pass over the raising of Lazarus itself. John 12:19. The Pharisees therefore said.—According to Chrysostom, thus spoke the secret friends among the Pharisees. But it is manifestly the language of despairing rage. Comp. the similar expression of displeasure on the part of John’s disciples, John 3:26. They reproach each other for not having taken more energetic measures. In the great movement they, as they hyperbolically express themselves in their excitement and fear, believe they already see the apostasy of the whole nation from the hierarchical party. This moment of despair on the part of the Pharisees is the corresponding contrast to the triumphal procession of Christ. But that Christ better understood the import of this procession is proved not only by His weeping in the midst of the triumphal entry, according to Luke, but also in the subsequent portrayal of the mood of Jesus by John himself. AND ETHICAL1. See Comm. on Matthew, Mark, Luke, on the Palm-entry. 2. As Jesus, at the beginning of His ministry, issued from the wilderness resolved to avoid, during His official pilgrimage, the unpurified Messianic name among His people,—connected, as it was, with all false Messianic hopes,—in order, by His actual self-revelation in prophetic anonymousness, to purify the Messianic hope of His nation, and the Messianic conception,—so now He has come forth from the wilderness with the determination of surrendering Himself to the purified Messianic faith of His disciples in the nation, i.e., to the nation itself, in respect of its present festive enthusiasm. In both cases He acts, according to the command (ἐντολή) of the Father, in perfect obedience; according to the principle of truth, as personal Wisdom, in perfect freedom. But He foreknows the event; He knows that in the fluctuations of dynamical moods in His nation the curse shall at first outweigh the blessing, or the demoniacal spirit that came to Him as a tempter in the wilderness, according to Matthew , 4, shall circumvent and overpower the heavenly enthusiasm with which He has inspired His people; that He consequently shall be betrayed, that He goes to meet His sacrificial death, but that then, when the propitiatory effect of His death has been manifested in His resurrection, the blessing shall preponderate over the curse, for His people as well as for the whole world. And thus the Palm-procession has a twofold import. In reference to the Lord, it is the free surrender to His people, in His real Messianic dignity, unto death, and, therewith, the free surrender to the disposition of the law itself—a veiled type of His sacrificial procession to Golgotha; hence, also, the symbolical pre-celebration of His Easter passage, in the resurrection, back to the Mount of Olives, and up to the Throne of glory, of His triumphant entry into the world and His kingly appearing to judgment. But in reference to the world itself, it is the surrender to a legal enthusiasm of His people, which cannot protect Him from death, but changes to treachery, and His surrender to the people of true believers, with which surrender His real glorification in the world begins. In the former relation we have to distinguish the extolled Christ who became the Crucified One, and the crucified Christ who became the Risen One; in the latter relation the symbolic Hosanna of those who were under the temporary influence of a spirit of enthusiasm, and the real Hosanna of the children of the Spirit. 3. In the celebration of the raising of Lazarus by the Palm-entry is concentrated the celebration of the whole official pilgrimage of Christ, particularly in His thaumaturgic activity. See Luke 19:37. 4. To the symbolism of sacred springs and mountains is annexed the symbolism of trees which are especially hallowed. The fig-tree, under which Nathanael sat, the symbol of peace, of calm life and of quiet contemplativeness (John 1:48), is here joined by the palm-tree, the symbol of blessing and victory, of peace, of kingly state and royal grandeur and glory; subsequently, however, John 15:1 ff., the symbol of the vine is set forth in detail: see Friedreich, Symbolik und Mythologie der Natur, Wόrzburg, 1859, p. John 332: the Palm-tree. 5. “Thus Zechariah, in one of his visions (John 9:9), describes the Messiah, in wretchedness and lowliness approaching His people. That this—and not the bringing of peace—is the meaning of this symbol—has been convincingly shown by Hengstenberg (Christologie des A. T. on the passage, iii. 1. Second edition). Christ designs by facts to recall this prophecy; the young ass’s colt in the prophet forms a climax to ὄνος (Ewald, Hengstenberg), and as this (ὄνος) presents to our view what is already contained in ςָ ?πִ ?ι, not gentleness, but lowliness, so the colt is expressive of the same in a higher degree. Seeing that John omits not only the significative predicates πεֹ ?ωָׁ ?ς ,φַ ?γִּ ?ιχ, but also the πραΰς of the Septuagint and of Matthew, the simple riding upon this colt must have been significant enough,—namely, as a symbol of lowliness,—for great men and kings ride only upon horses.” Tholuck. To this we have to remark: (1) the idea of lowliness as condescension is not necessarily connected with wretchedness; (2) in Zechariah the symbol of humility is evidently a symbol, at the same time, of gentleness and peace, John 12:9-10. (3) If John, therefore, pretended to see in His mounting of this animal merely a sign of lowliness, then would Matthew’s interpretation of the prophet be more correct than his. (4) But this is the more out of the question since, according to John, the people that wish to glorify the Lord, put Him upon the young ass. In accordance with the she-ass of Balaam, we should see in the ass a symbol of the presageful in the irrational creation. In Friedreich’s Symbolik und Mythologie der Natur are various interpretations without result. Here we have to do with the ass merely as the beast of peace. 6. John too intimates, with εὑρών, that the choice of the ass’ colt proceeded from Jesus. But he lays special stress on the fact that the people, not thinking of that prophecy, did thus with Him; thus he emphasizes the providential direction of the event, which took care that the prophecy should be fulfilled, consciously to the Lord, but unconsciously to the disciples and the people. 7. The great contrast. The victorious kingdom of Christ seemed to have arisen, the whole nation was apparently going over to Him with Hosannas; the hostile party was in despair. Then the treachery of Judas brought the fearful turning. But what explanation is to be found for the treachery of Judas in the present posture of affairs? Judas saw that Jesus did not utilize the triumphal entry for the founding of a worldly kingdom, and he now gave up His cause for lost. Exactly the opposite to this contrast is formed by the triumph of enemies after the crucifixion of Christ. Hell is jubilant, Christ dies, His disciples fear. And now Nicodemus and Joseph desert the Sanhedrin and go over to Christ, as Judas, after the Palm-entry, forsook the company of the disciples and went over to the enemy. Appearances, therefore, are not decisive in the situations of the kingdom of God. Exalted moments of triumph are admonitory to extreme prudence; on the other hand, the greatest calamities are accompanied by the announcement of an approaching wondrous festival in honor of the victory of divine help and wisdom. AND See Comm, on Matthew, Mark, Luke.—The great movement and meeting between Bethany and Jerusalem, or the Communion of the Gospel and the Communion of the Law: 1. Jerusalem comes to Bethany; 2. Bethany comes to Jerusalem.—Christ’s great victory over the Jews a sign of eternal promise.—To kill Lazarus also, or the consequence of violence in the domain of the spirit and faith.—The Palm-entry according to John 1. Its cause (John 12:9-11); 2. its form (John 12:12-18); 3. its effect, John 12:19.—Antithesis of life and death in the story of Lazarus: 1. In contemplating the life-miracle of the Prince of Life susceptible hearts become alive; alive to such a degree that all Israel seems to quicken; 2. the mortal hatred of dead Pharisee hearts towards Christ seeks to kill Lazarus also, and with the breath of death breathes upon the people (even upon the flock of disciples, especially Judas).—The scattering of palm-branches, or triumphal homage to the Victor: 1. As Victor and King in the kingdom of the Spirit, in the believing heart, the believing people, the whole world receptive of salvation; 2. as Victor over, and Destroyer of, the kingdom of darkness in the heart, in the church, in the world (here and hereafter); 3. as Victor and Conqueror with the spoils of Victory (His are souls entirely; His the people of the peoples—their marrow).—The world in its destiny as the new heaven and the new earth.—As Sunday precedes the week-day, so the Palm-entry precedes the last great work of Christ: 1. As a refreshment for the work; 2. as the survey of the work; 3. as the warranty for the success of the work.—The Hosanna of the people of Jerusalem: 1. In the old time (Psalms 118:26); 2. on Palm Sunday; 3. at Pentecost; 4. in the time of the Reformation.—The riding-beast of Balaam and the riding-beast of Christ, a sign: 1. How dumb nature, (a)loudly contradicts all false prophets, and (b) is wiser than they. 2. How it is (a) serviceable to the King of truth, and (b) is rendered worthy and consecrate by Him.—The important, minute fulfilments of ancient prophecies in the life of the Lord.—The Spirit of Christ in the Old Testament specially glorified by the prophecy under our consideration: 1. The prophet knew in spirit the wonderful humility and meekness of Christ; 2. he saw in spirit a people, spiritual enough not to be offended in a Prince of Peace on the ass’s colt.—The grand antiphony on the Mount of Olives, or the greetings and counter-greetings in the kingdom of faith: 1. From heart to heart; 2. from congregation to congregation; 3. from church to church; 4. from world to world (from star to star, or between, heaven and earth).—The Pharisees’ hour of despair: 1. Why they despair (on account of the triumphs of Christ); 2. how they despair (they lose head after having lost heart, and dispute among themselves); 3. who comes to their aid in their despair (Satan and treacherous disciples); 4. whereunto that helps them (into ever deeper despair).—The kingdom of darkness, the shadowy foil of the kingdom of light.—Ye see that ye prevail nothing, etc., or how the hierarchy prophesies concerning its own downfall; 1. In vain all our plots; 2. all the world sides with Him.—Behold, thy King cometh unto thee.—He cometh; 1. He cometh; 2. He cometh. Starke, Quesnel:—Only Satan’s spirit, yea, Satanic envy, would fain destroy the works of the Spirit of God.—Miracles arouse human hearts, but they do not convert; that belongs to the word of the Lord, Luke 16:29.—Ibid.: Jesus leaves to the kings of earth their magnificence which they need as a cloak for their weakness. Humility and lowliness are the best adornments of a King who is fighting only against pride, and who wills to triumph over sin and death.—Cramer: In the school of Christianity there is much to be learned and remembered, even though it be not yet understood; for we do not believe because we understand, but that we may finally understand.—Zeisius: Believers increase in the knowledge of Christ and in understanding of the Holy Scriptures.—Canstein: As a general thing, the fulfilment of prophecies first exhibits their true meaning.—Hedinger: We should praise God’s work and the grace of Him who hath called us to His wonderful light.—Zeisius: Christ, His honor and doctrine, must be boldly confessed, even though His enemies be like to “burst” with envy and malice.—Honor to whom honor is due.—Cramer: Envy does not injure Christ, but His enemies themselves.—The whole world runneth after Christ, is still the language of the wicked; O that it might soon come to pass in the greatest fulness! Lisco: The manner of His entry showed Him to be not an earthly prince, but a King of Peace. John 12:16. Braune: Thus what seemed lost for the present has become a blessing for the future.—Palm branches are true peace branches. The palm is verily the noblest tree; it is ever reaching upwards, without lavishing its strength in side-branches, and it proves itself of the utmost utility in leaf, fruit and wood.—Yet there was a little band of believers hidden in unbelieving Jerusalem; some of the seven thousand of God, whom Elijah saw not, came forth.—Gossner: Wished to kill Lazarus. This is the religion of Caiaphas and Herod. It spares nothing. Everything that is feared must be thrust out of the way.—Instead of reporting Him to the magistrates, as they were commanded to do, John 11:57, they bring Him as their King.—Jesus always finds more faith and love among the people than among those who hold themselves above the people.—The state of our King consists in simplicity and lowliness. He comes with such condescension that even the meanest need not fear but may gather confidence.—All wrath is put away; He is all meekness and goodness.—Behold, the whole world, etc. O that this would come to pass today! Truly, it is written, Genesis 49:10. Heubner:—Those that were healed or raised by Jesus were standing witnesses to His glory.—Jesus accepted applause; He knew it to be the road to shame. And He then endured shame as having the prospect of eternal glory.—Schenkel: How Christ as a King is continually coming to His people: 1. What Christ as the coming King brings us; 2. what we as His people should bring Him—Besser: Ye see that ye prevail nothing; behold, the world runneth alter Him. Even in this angry speech somewhat of a prophecy lies hidden, and that which we are about to read is a prelude to the fulfilment of this prophecy. [Craven: From Augustine: John 12:9. Curiosity brought them, not love. John 12:10. O blind rage! as if the Lord could raise the dead, and not raise the slain. John 12:12-13. See how great was the fruit of His preaching, and how large a flock of the lost sheep of the house of Israel heard the voice of their Shepherd. John 12:13-15. Christ was not the king of Israel, to exact tribute and command armies, but to direct souls and bring them to the kingdom of Heaven.—For Christ to be king of Israel was a condescension, not an elevation—a sign of His pity, not an increase of His power.—From Chrysostom: John 12:13. This is what more than any thing made men believe in Christ, viz., the assurance, that He was not opposed to God, that He came from the Father.—From Bede: John 12:13-15. Christ does not lose His divinity when He teaches us (by example) humility.—From Burkitt: John 12:9. It was the sin of many that they flocked after Christ rather out of curiosity than conscience. John 12:10-11. Such as have received special favor from Christ must expect to be made the butt of malicious enemies.—Nothing so enrages the enemies of Christ as the enlargement of His kingdom. John 12:14-15. That it might appear that Christ’s kingdom was not of this world He abandons all outward magnificence. John 12:19. In the day of Christ’s greatest solemnity there will be some who will neither rejoice themselves nor endure that others should.—From M. Henry: John 12:9. Much people came not for Jesus sake only: yet they came to see Jesus—there are some in whose affections Christ will have an interest in spite of all the attempts of His enemies to misrepresent Him. John 12:10. The consultation of the Chief-priests a sign that they neither feared God nor regarded man. John 12:12-13. Those who have a true veneration for Christ will neither be ashamed nor afraid to own Him before men.—Those that met Him were they that were come to the feast; the more regard men have to God and religion in general, the better disposed they will be to entertain Christ.—Tidings of the approach of Christ and His kingdom should awaken us to consider the work of the day, that it may be done in the day.—The palm-branch was—1. a symbol of triumph; 2. carried as a part of the ceremonial of the feast of Tabernacles—its use on this occasion intimates that all the feasts, especially that of Tabernacles, pointed to Christ’s gospel. (It may have been so in the purpose of God. E. R. C.) John 12:13. language employed was that of Psa 118:25-26; high thoughts of Christ are best expressed in Scripture words.—Thus must every one bid Christ welcome into his heart—we must praise Him, and be well pleased in Him. John 12:14.—This was—1. More of state than He used to take—showing that, though His followers should be willing to take up with mean things, yet it is allowed them to use the inferior creatures; 2. Less of state than the great ones of earth usually affect—manifesting that His kingdom was not of this world. John 12:16. See—1. the imperfection of the disciples in their infant state; 2. their improvement in their adult state.—The Scripture is often fulfilled by the agency of those who have no thought of Scripture in what they do.—There are many excellent things both in the Word and Providence of God which disciples do not at first understand.—It becomes Christians when they are grown to maturity in knowledge frequently to reflect upon the weakness of their beginning.—Such an admirable harmony there is between the Word and works of God that the remembrance of what is written will enable us to understand what is done, and the observation of what is done will help us to understand what is written. John 12:17. They who wish well to Christ’s kingdom should proclaim what they know. John 12:17-19. This miracle reserved for one of the last that it might confirm those that went before, just before His sufferings; Christ’s works were not only well done, but well limed. John 12:19. They who oppose Christ will be made to see that they prevail nothing.—From Scott: John 12:10. There is nothing so wicked and infatuated that men who have engaged in persecution, will not attempt to escape defeat.—From Barnes: John 12:10. When men are determined not to believe the gospel, there is no end to the crimes to which they are driven.—From A Plain Commentary (Oxford): John 12:10. Notice the rapid growth of sin. John 12:12-15. Royal even in its lowliness is the mysterious pageant!—From Ryle: John 12:9-11. People will think for themselves when God’s truth comes into a land. John 12:13. From “Hosanna” to “Crucify Him,” there was an interval of only a few days! Nothing so soon caught up as a popular applause. John 12:16. Men may be true Christians and yet very ignorant on some points.—In estimating others we must make great allowance for early training and association.] Footnotes: John 12:9.—[Noyes translates ὄχλοςπολύς, the great multitude, Conant: a great multitude. Alford retains the A. V.] John 12:13.—Lachmann in accordance with D. K. X., Origen, etc.: ὁβασ. Since even B. L., etc., read: καὶὁβασ., the omission of the article seems unfounded. [The reading καὶὁ before βασιλεὺς is adopted by Tischendorf in ed. 8, Alf., Westc. and II. and supported by ΰ *etcd B. L. Q., etc.—P. S.] John 12:16.—[Lachmann in accordance with A. D., etc., inserts δέ; Tischendorf, Alf., W. and H. omit it by authority of ΰ. B. L. Q., etc.—P. S.] John 12:17.—For ὃτι B. [?] D. E.* K. L., Lachmann, Tischendorf [formerly]; for ὃτε A. E.** G. M., and many others. Since ἐμαρτύρει receives additional weight, the eye-witnesship greater emphasis by ὃτε, and the preponderance of Codd. is in favor of it, this reading seems preferable. [Tischendorf, ed. 8, for contextual reasons, prefers ὃτι; although he affirms that not only ΰ. A. E.2 G. H. M. Q., etc., but also B., give ὃτε, which is adopted by Alford, Westcott and Hort. If we read ὃτι, the translation would be: The multitude that was with him bore witness that he called Lazarus out of the tomb, and raised him from the dead.—P. S.] John 12:19.—[Viz., with our cautious, undecided, hesitating policy. Bengel: Approbant Caiphζ consilium (John 11:50). The sentence is generally taken as an interrogation (also by Lange and Alford); but it seems to be more forcible as a direct assertion.—P. S.] John 12:19.—[Or, the whole world. In D. L. Q. X., ὃλος is inserted; Tisch. omits it, in accordance with ΰ. A. B. Γ. Δ. Λ. 2, etc.—P. S.] [The article τῶν (not τά), which is omitted in the E. V., indicates, as Lange and Meyer explain, that the palm-trees were on the road, or perhaps that the custom was usual at such festivities (Alford).—P. S.] [δָּ ?ξָ ?ψ the palm-tree.—P. S.] [Ὡσαννά, from the Hebrew, means σῶσονδήsave now, and is originally a formula of supplication, hut conventionally one of triumphant acclamation, and joyful greeting to a deliverer.—P. S.] V aA BETWEEN THE GENTILE GREEKS FROM ABROAD WHO DO HOMAGE TO CHRIST, AND THE OF THE JEWISH PEOPLE THAT FALL AWAY FROM CHRIST IN AND HIS RETURN INTO . OF THE JEWISH PASCHAL-FEAST, OF , OF THE GRAIN OF WHEAT. THE BY AND DEATH, OR THE SELF- OF CHRIST IN THE TEMPLE John 12:20-36(John 12:24-26. Laurentius-Pericope; John 12:31-36. Elevation of the Cross.) 20And [But] there were certain Greeks [Ἕλληνες, Gentile Greeks, not Ἑλληνισταί, Greek Jews] among them that [those who] came up [made pilgrimage up to Jerusalem] to21worship at the feast. The same [These] came therefore to Philip, which [who] was of [from] Bethsaida of Galilee, and desired [asked] him, saying, Sir, we would see22[wish, or, desire to see] Jesus. Philip cometh and telleth Andrew: and again [omit23and again] Andrew [cometh] and Philip [, and they] tell Jesus. And [But] Jesus answered them, saying, The hour is [hath] come, that the Son of man should be glori-fied. 24Verily, verily, I say unto you, Except a corn [the grain] of wheat fall into the ground and die, it abideth alone [isolated, by itself alone]: but if it die, it bringethforth much fruit. 25He that loveth his life [his own soul, τὴνφυχὴναὑτοῦ ?] shall lose it; and he that hateth his life [his own soul] in this world shall [will] keep it unto life26[ζωήν] eternal. If any man [any one would] serve me, let him follow me; and where I am, there shall [will] also my servant be: if [ἐάν without χαί] any man [any oneshall] serve me, him will my [the] Father honour. 27Now is my soul troubled; and what shall I say? Father, save me from this hour: [!] but [But] for this cause camel unto [I came to] this hour. 28Father, glorify thy name. [!] Then came there a voice from heaven, saying [omit saying], I have both glorified it, and will glorify it again. 29The people [multitude] therefore that stood by, and heard it, said that it thundered: others said, An angel spake [hath spoken, λελάληχεν] to him. 30Jesus answered and said, This voice came not because of me [for my sake, δἰνἐμέ], but for your sakes [δἰὑμᾶς]. 31Now is the judgment of this world: now shall [will] the prince of this world be cast out. 32And I, if I [shall] be lifted up from the33earth, will [shall] draw all men unto me [myself, πρὸςἐμαυτόν]. This he said, signifying what death he should die [by what manner of death he was about to die, 34or, what kind of death he was to die]. The people [multitude, therefore, οῦ ?̓ν] answered him, We have heard out of the law that [the] Christ abideth for ever: and how sayest thou [how then dost thou say], The Son of man must be lifted up? who35is this Son of man? Then Jesus [Jesus therefore] said unto them, Yet a little while is the light with you [within you]. Walk while [as] ye have the light, lest darkness come upon you [that darkness may not overtake you, ἵναμὴσχοτίαὑμᾶςχαταλάβῃ ?]: for [and] he that walketh in [the] darkness knoweth not whither hegoeth. 36While ye have [the] light, believe in the light, that ye may be the children of light [become sons of light, ἵναυἱοὶφωτὸςγένησθε]. These things spake [spoke] Jesus, and departed, and did hide [and, having departed, he hid, or, withdrew] himself from them. AND Joh_12:20. Certain Greeks [Ἕλληνες].—By these we are 1. not to understand (after Semler and Baumgarten-Crusius [Calvin, Ewald],) Jews who spoke Greek [Hellenists]; this view is contradicted by the name, comp. John 7:35, the whole scene and the deduction of Christ, John 12:23; John 12:32,—the reference to the universal extension of His ministry. 2. Not perfect or pure heathen (after Chrysostom, Euthymius, Schweizer), against which interpretation ἀναβαίνοντες militates,—but, as this very word proves, 3. proselytes of the gate [half Jews, or Judaizing pagans], like the treasurer, Acts 8:27. See Comm. on Acts [p. 155, Am. ed.]. “If they were from Galilee, which was partly inhabited by Gentiles, we might imagine them to have been previously acquainted with Philip; yet (Grecianized) Syrians inhabited the country from Lebanon to Lake Tiberias (Josephus, De bello Jud., III. 4, 5); Perζa had Greek cities (Joseph. Antiq., XVI. 11, 4), etc. Philip’s consultation with Andrew must be attributed to the unusualness of seeing the Master hold intercourse with Gentiles (Matthew 10:5)—for the uncircumcised proselytes of the gate were still so considered—(Acts 10).” Tholuck. On this we remark that it is not altogether probable that these Gentiles were from Galilee, or from any part of Canaan, because in that case they might easily have had an earlier opportunity of seeing Jesus. Furthermore, Jesus had already had dealings with the Gentile captain at Capernaum, and the Canaanitish woman; the disciples, however, might for reasons of policy, hesitate for a while before bringing the Lord, after He had just been proclaimed King of Israel, into contact with Gentiles, in the sight of all the Jews. For, doubtless, the scene occurred within the area of the temple, i.e., the porch. Perhaps Jesus was, by the mediation of His disciples, to be called back into the court of the Gentiles. This locality is supported by 1. the testimony of the Synoptists, that in the days subsequent to the Palm-entry Jesus abode continually in the temple; 2. the character of these Gentile visitors to the temple; 3. the concourse of people, John 12:29. (Contrary to all indications Michaelis and others have shifted the scene to Bethany; Baur places it “in the idea of the author!”) As to the day, the thirty-sixth verse seems to indicate that it was the last of the three days of Jesus’ stay in the temple, i.e., Tuesday (see Doctrinal and Ethical Notes, No. 1). [These God-fearing Greeks, who (in their groping after “the unknown God,” embraced the monotheism and the Messianic hopes of the Jews, without being circumcised) belonged to the church invisible, to the children of God scattered among the heathen, John 10:16; John 11:52, and were the forerunners of the Gentile converts. Stier: “These men from the West at the end of the life of Jesus, set forth the same as the Magi from the East at its beginning; but they come to the cross of the King, as those to His cradle.” We find such chosen outsiders under the Old Testament, as Melchisedek, Jethro, Job, Ruth, king Hiram, the queen of Sheba, Naaman the Syrian. Augustine, exclusive as was his system, yet adduces the case of Job as an example of genuine piety outside of the visible theocracy, and infers from it that among other nations also there were persons “qui secundum Deum vixerunt eique placuerunt, per-tinentes ad spiritualem, Jerusalem” (De civit. Dei xviii. 47).—P. S.] John 12:21. These therefore came to Philip.—Philip might be accidentally in the court of the Gentiles, and hence, as the first of the disciples who was forthcoming, be charged with the communication of their request to the Lord. It is still remarkable, however, that both Philip and Andrew had Greek names and, according to tradition, their labors were likewise in part among the Greeks. Sir, we wish to see Jesus.—[Κύριε, not in the higher sense, yet with reverence]. The expression of their desire is threefold: 1. The solicitation; 2. the respectful manner of addressing even the disciple of the celebrated Master; 3. the strong and yet modest expression of the wish. To see can here mean nothing less than: to speak with. (Goldhorn: They wished to propose to Him that He should go to the Hellenists. A misapprehension of the proselytes and also of the situation. Brόckner: They wished merely to see Him. Too literal). As proselytes of the gate they shared Israel’s hope and the enthusiastic feelings of the people. John 12:22. Philip cometh and telleth Andrew.—Meyer: Philip was of a deliberate disposition. The other characteristics of Philip are in no wise indicative of a deliberate man. The case was of sufficient importance, as an official question, for two disciples, and Mark 3:18 we find these two in close contact; John 6:7-8, however, they even act in concert, as in this place, and in measure, likewise, in “foreign affairs.”—Andrew cometh and, etc.—Andrew seems to take the lead. John 12:23. And Jesus answered them.—The following discourse is framed so decidedly for the Greeks that we cannot assume their request to have been denied by Jesus (Ewald [Hengstenberg, Godet]),—such a proceeding would, moreover, be unprecedented; neither can we hold that the admission of the Gentiles had been resolved upon, but that the voice from heaven changed the scene (Meyer). De Wette thought the answer unsuitable. Tholuck, in accordance with the usual conception, supposes the meeting between Jesus and the Greeks to have preceded this discourse; Luthardt: the disciples had given Jesus occasion to speak in presence of the Greeks. The scene certainly seems to have changed; either the Greeks must have immediately followed the two disciples to Jesus, or else Jesus directly accompanied the disciples to the Greeks. He seems to have intentionally avoided addressing Himself particularly to the Greeks, preferring to discourse in their presence to the circle of disciples, with special reference to them and their desire. For at this moment and in this place it was of the utmost importance that He should withhold from His enemies every pretext for reproach. John 12:23. The hour is come.—From the visit of the Gentiles Jesus deduces the preparation of His mission for the Gentiles, i.e., His resurrection. From the nearness of the period when the bounds which have encompassed Him shall be removed, and His ministry be rendered a universal one, He infers His imminent, death. Universalness and resurrection are for Him reciprocal ideas; universalness and preceding death are for Him inseparably connected, John 10:15-16; John 17. And so this saying also again recalls the barrier which hinders Him from surrendering Himself to full communion with the Greeks. But the decisive hour which is to conduct Him across this barrier is at hand; it announces itself in this petition. The hour, however, is not His hour of death by itself, but that together with the hour of His departure out of this world. The two are comprehended in one, as in the idea of exaltation, John 12:32; John 12:34, and John 3:14. Thus Christ saw in the Samaritans (John 4) and in the Gentile centurion (Matthew 8:11) a distant indication of the future approach of the believing Gentiles; here the future of the believing Gentile world, the future of its access to Him, is before Him in its nearest representatives as an incipient present (comp. John 13:31). Be it observed that, here it is the glorification of the Son of Man that is spoken of, not simply that of the Son of God, as John 11:4. The glorification of the Son of Man is the exaltation of Christ in His human nature above death (a transit from the first stage of human life to the second), above the limits of the servant to the boundless liberty of the lord; above a qualified working by individual words and signs to unqualified activity through the Spirit. It is a development of His inner wealth, according to John 12:24; a personal lifting up, according to John 12:32; a local, but at the same time a universal one, according to John 12:33. For the Greeks, whom we conceive to have been true Hellenes, a peculiar significance attached to the announcement that Christ as the Son of Man should be manifested in His glory. This glorification presupposes a suffering of death, in accordance with a law of nature (John 12:24) and in accordance with an ethical law obtaining in this world, John 12:25. John 12:24. Except the grain of wheat fall into the ground and die, etc. [ἐὰνμὴὁκόκκοςτοῦσίτουπεσὼνεὶςτὴνγὴνἀποθάνῃ, αὐτὸςμόνοςμένει].—First oxymoron. A fundamental truth is again announced with verily, verily. We assume the subsequent words to have been intended to correct the Greek view of the world, just as those contained in John 18:36 are applicable to the ideas entertained by the Romans. Human nature does not attain in this world a true and essentially beautiful appearance by the aid of poetry and art; but it arrives at the true and the beautiful by passing through death into a new life (see 1 John 3:2). The grain of wheat here symbolizes the new life which must proceed from death in order to appear in its richness, its fruit. Hence the thought is no mere elucidation of the preceding sentence. It advances from the idea of the personal glory of Christ in the new life (the glorification of His human nature) to the idea of His glorification in the universal Church. Thus even nature protests against the Hellenic fear of death, against the Hellenic isolation of the personality in the outward individuality. In the way of death, not only does the single grain of wheat develop into many, but these many, as fruit for nourishment and new seed, appear as an infinite power, a universal life. It is evident that this symbolism of the grain of wheat is indirectly illustrative of simple death in the physical nature itself. This death, however, is in particular a symbolism of the ethical, sacrificial death. [Alford: “The symbolism here lies at the root of that in John 6, where Christ is the Bread of life.”] John 12:25. He that loveth his own life [Lange translates: Eigenleben; better: his own soul, ὁφιλῶντὴνψυχὴναὑτοῦ ?], etc.—Comp. Matthew 10:39; Matthew 16:25; Luke 9:24; Luke 17:33. This is the watch-word of Christ, and it should be that of His people also, Matthew 10:38, 1 John 2:6. The egoism that clings to the outward life of appearance, and lives for that, loses its true life which is conditional on surrender to God; the spirit of sacrifice which does not cleave to its life of self, nay, which hates it in its old form in this old world, i.e., joyfully sacrifices it, the sooner the better, and even hates it, if it be about to become a hindrance—regains it unto a higher, eternal life. That ψυχή must here mean soul in our conception of the word, does not result (as Meyer maintains) from the distinction made between ψυχή and ζωή (αἰώνιος); for the latter is expressive not simply of an endless duration of natural life, but of divine life. The declaration Matthew 16:25 [“for whosoever will save his life, τὴνψυχὴναὑτοῦ, shall lose it,” etc.] is undoubtedly intended as the rationale of the foregoing ἀπαρνησάσθωἑαυτόν and hence it is proved that ψυχή means “self” as well as “life” (Tholuck). But the reason of this is that the false love of life is one with, and has its root in, false self-love. With the life of self the selfishness of the soul, the false self, must be sacrificed; thus with the life in God, in the true self, new life also is gained. But the point in question is the sacrifice of life, since the opposite is death. On the μισεῖν comp. Luke 14:26. Augustine; “Magna et mira sententia, quemadmodum sit hominis in animam suam amor ut pereat, odium ne pereat; si male amaveris, tunc odisti, si bene oderis, tunc amasti.”—Unto life eternal.—First promise. John 12:26. Follow me.—Indicative of the way of suffering and death, so readily forgotten by the disciples, as they witness the fresh homage rendered him by the Greeks; a way which Hellenic worldly-mindedness in particular must henceforth tread. And where I am, there, etc.—Not simply on the same road (Luthardt); that is expressed in the preceding sentence; nor only in the Parousia (Meyer), but first in the state of humiliation, of death, then in the state and land of δόξα, beyond death,—the idea of the raising of the servant being thus involved (see John 6:39; John 6:44; John 6:54; John 17:24; 2 Timothy 2:11-12). Second promise. Him will the Father honour [τιμήσει].—Third promise. The Father Himself will esteem him as a personality connected with Himself and exalted above death. John 12:27. Now is my soul troubled [Νῦνἡψυχήμουτετάρακται].—The agitation of soul experienced by Jesus has been already introduced by the whole train of thought from John 12:24. Primarily, indeed, Jesus fixed His eye upon the great goal of the death-road; now the road itself engages His attention. Another thing the Greeks must learn by His example, viz., neither to be fanatically enthusiastic about the conditions of death, nor to turn away their eyes from them in cowardly dread. He therefore gives free utterance to His emotion. This change of mood is, however, not unlooked for in the life of the Lord. In the perfect life of the spirit the most blissful moods pass, in the sublimest transition of feeling, into the saddest. Thus in the Palm-entry (Luke 19:41), thus here, thus after the high-priestly prayer, thus at the Supper, John 13:31. On the other hand, the saddest moods likewise pass into the most blissful. Thus at the departure from Galilee (Matthew 11:25), thus at the Supper (John 13:31), thus in Gethsemane (John 18:15 ff.), thus en the Cross (see Comm, on Matthew, John 11:25; comp. Luke 12:49-50). The difference between the ἡψυχήμουτετάρακται and the ἐτάραξενἐαυτόν, John 11:33, does not lie in the antithesis of πνεῦμα and ψυχή (as Olshausen affirms; since the latter passage does not treat of a ταράσσεσθαιτῷπνεύματι), but in the fact that there the psychico-corporeal agitation is an effect of His indignation in spirit, an act of His spirit (Origen: τὸπάθοςῆ ?̓νἐρχόμενοντῇἐπικρατείᾳτοῦπνεύματος), while here it is an affection of suffering inflicted upon Him by the objective situation. It is the horror of death which the contemplation of death brings upon the inward life of feeling. The soul may and must be thus troubled,—prepared, as it were, for its death; but not so the καρδία (John 14:1; John 14:27). So then, the subject under consideration is neither the trichotomy nor the dichotomy, body and soul (Tholuck), but the antithesis of passive and actual consciousness, or of the life of feeling and the will. The thought of death moves Him as the law of His death, as of the death of all His followers who must be baptized with His baptism into His death. And doubtless this, rightly understood, is a feeling of divine wrath, not as confronting Jesus within His conscience, but as perceived by Jesus in the law of death governing sinful humanity, to which law He has submitted Himself. A “momentary abhorrence of the pains of death, induced by human weakness” (Meyer), must be out of the question, inasmuch as abhorrence involves an active inclination of the will. We might with equal truth talk of an innocent abhorrence of suffering or the cross. (Beza, Calov, Calvin: Mortem, quam subibat, horroris plenam esse oportuit, quia satisfactione pro nobis perfungi non poterat, quin horribile dei judicium sensu suo apprehenderet.) Schleiermacher gives special prominence to the thought, that to Jesus the coming of the Hellenes was attended with the full presentiment of the fact that His people would reject Him, and that the salvation of the Gentiles was conditional upon the great judgment on the Jews. That was the great tragic grief of Paul also (Romans 9; comp. 2 Corinthians 12:7). We have seen how, also in Gethsemane, Christ’s sufferings were especially grievous to him as a being betrayed and delivered up (see Comm. on Matthew, John 20:17; Note 3). And what shall I say? etc.—[On the punctuation compare the Textual Note.—P. S.]. It is difficult to suppose with Euthymius [ἀποροώμενοςἀπὸτῆςἀγωνίας] and others (Lόcke, Meyer, etc., even Calvin [Alford]), that Jesus is uncertain what to pray for; that in this uncertainty He at first prays: Father, save me from this hour; but then, in the subsequent words, retracts “this momentary wish of a human abhorrence of death.” In opposition to this view: 1. the assumption of such an uncertainty on the part of Jesus is not justified by Romans 8:26; Romans 2. the presentation of such a retracted wish would be explained neither by the words, Hebrews 5:7, nor by the prayer in Gethsemane; 3. the idea of a self-correction is inappropriately applied to Jesus. We prefer, therefore, the interrogative explanation with most Greek exegetes and Erasmus (Lampe, Tholuck [Ewald, Godet], etc.), the interrogative interpretation of πάτερ, etc. After Jesus has revealed His quaking heart to His auditors He can also show them how He works off the affection, that they in like situations may behave similarly. They too should accord to grief its sacred right. We cannot discover that such a reflection is incongruous with this mood replete with emotion, as Meyer maintains. Comp. John 11:42. They may thus see that He stands at the junction of two ways. What shall I say? He asks them. Hence the subsequent words are part of the question. Would you advise Me to give utterance to My feeling in these words: Father, save Me? etc. From this hour.—Meyer: “The hour of suffering is made present to His mind as if He had actually entered into it.” But He has indeed actually entered it, for here as little as in Gethsemane is He speaking of the hour of external death in itself alone (comp. Comm. on Matthew). It is the convulsion itself in its deathlike might. In Gethsemane, when He was similarly and yet more powerfully affected, He could conceal Himself in some measure from His most intimate friends; it humiliates Him to be obliged to stand here before representatives of the Gentile world who are to greet in Him the King of Glory, in this sad figure. [?] But He is directly able to reconcile Himself to this juncture, and with the question there begins already His elevation above the nameless grief which has come upon Him from the historical world. But for this cause I came into this hour.—[But: Christ controls and corrects the natural shrinking of His true humanity from the horrors of death by the consideration that He came to this world for the very purpose of enduring death for the redemption of the world. To do full justice to the deep commotion of our Lord on this occasion and in Gethsemane of which this was a foretaste, we must keep in view the vicarious nature of His passion by which He bore the sins of the whole world.—P. S.] For this cause [ διὰτοῦτο], not that by My mortal sufferings Thy name may be glorified (Lόcke, Meyer), but in order to be thus troubled, and in order to appear before you in this commotion. He knows: 1. that grief itself has its holy aim, and 2. that the humiliation in His grief, like every one of His humiliations (see the Baptism, the conflict in Gethsemane), is connected with a glorification, to the glorification of the Father. And because in His grief He has just sacrificed Himself to the Father, He can now pray as follows.John 12:28. Father, glorify Thy name [δόξασόνσουτὸὅνομα].—The σου emphatically comes first, yet not in antithesis to an “egotistical “reference of the preceding prayer [Meyer]. It expresses the idea: it is Thy cause and for Thine honor that there should be a compensation for this humiliation also. Whereby is the Father to glorify His name: 1. Greek exegetes [and Alford]: by His death (Comp. chap, John 21:18); 2. Bengel: quovis impendio mei; 3. Tholuck: by the bearing of fruit, John 12:34; John 15:8. The most obvious explanation is: by the issue of this mood itself. By this the name of the Father, i.e., the one God of revelation, must be glorified in presence of the Greeks in particular. And this purpose was served by the heavenly voice, in and for itself, irrespective of its purport; a form of revelation exactly suited to the exigencies of the Gentile disciples. Then came there a voice from heaven.—The evangelist, in writing οῦ ?̓ν here, expresses the assurance of his faith. The answer to Christ’s prayer could not fail. We must first distinguish the voice itself from its purport, because the voice, in the abstract, was a glorification at once of the Father and the Son. interpretations of this wonder: 1. “Since Spencer many (Paulus, Kuinoel, Lόcke, etc.) have apprehended this heavenly voice to be the Jewish Bath-Kol (αַּ ?ϊχεֹ ?μ daughter of a voice), and this has been regarded as a voice issuing from a peal of thunder—according to modern rationalistic interpretation (as in his time Maimonides) the subjective interpretation of a peal of thunder on the part of Jesus and His disciples.” Tholuck. However “the Bath-Kol itself cannot be traced to a peal of thunder, and how much less the voice mentioned here, where the narrator expressly excluded the idea of thunder” (the same). Still it is remarkable that by the Bath-Kol a derivative voice is to be understood, one developed from another, the echo of a voice, a voice in the second power, i.e., the transformation of an apparently fortuitous sound into a spirit-voice by the interpretation of the Spirit conformably to the situation (comp. Tholuck on this passage; Lόbkert Stud. u. Krit, 1835, III. Herzog’s Real-Encyklopζdie: Bath-Kol). 2. A voice actually issuing from heaven, considered by John as an objective occurrence. a. Acoustic. The voice sounds directly over Christ’s head; hence those who stand at some distance from Him perceive only a heavenly talking, those still further removed, but a sound as of thunder (ancient commentators). But in the case of purely objective sounds as loud as thunder, even those at a distance must have understood the words as well. Untenable, likewise, is the interpretation which affirms that the σαρκικοί soon forgot the more exact impression of what they had heard (Chrysostom). b. Resembling thunder, so that the precise words sounding through these tones were unperceived by the insusceptible (Meyer). There is a lack of clearness in this reasoning in the case of a purely objective voice, for in such case perception would depend upon the acuteness of the hearing, not upon the degrees of spiritual susceptibility. c. Of an angelic nature, mediated by angelic ministry (Hofmann). Apart from the arbitrary interpretation of an intensified doctrine of angels, this would afford not the slightest explanation of the voice. d. A spirituo-corporeal [a spiritual and celestial, yet audible] voice, which was understood more or less according to the corresponding frame of mind (Tholuck; my Leben Jesu, II. p. 1207).Manifestly, the voice now heard by Jesus is entirely analogous to the voice at His baptism (see Comm, on Matthew, the baptism of Jesus, and at His transfiguration (see Comm. on Matthew, the Transfiguration). Its distinguishing point is the circumstance of its sounding here openly above the temple, in the hearing of all the people and of the Greek proselytes, and the trait of its striking even the insusceptible with the force of a sound like thunder, ringing upon the ears of the more susceptible with a beauty of tone which they can liken only to angelic voices, while Jesus, and with Him doubtless the most intimate of His disciples, perceive the perfectly distinct expression of the words which even contain an antithesis. Just this latter trait of a twofold gradation converts the event into a revelation concerning the nature of celestial voices. In the voice heard by Samuel, and not by Eli (see the note in Tholuck, p. 333), the subjective, ecstatic condition of the voice was clearly conspicuous, as in the case of the two angels seen by Mary Magdalene, and not by the disciples, this contrast became apparent in reference to miraculous visions. In the history of Paul there is a proportional, simple gradation between Paul himself, who sees the Christ within the shining light and hears the word of His voice, and the attendants who perceive only the brilliant light and the sound (see Apostol. Zeitalter, II. p. 115). But here a twofold gradation appears: the hearing of Christ and His intimate friends, the hearing of the people, the hearing of others. The ecstatic conditions of such a hearing are clearly manifest, Acts 9:7; comp. Acts 22:9. The condition upon which an apprehension of the voice by those not standing in the centre of revelation (as here Christ; Acts 9, Paul) depends, is spiritual connection, fellowship of feeling,—sympathy; this results especially from the rapport between Christ and the Baptist at the baptism in Jordan. But the objectivity of the voice which proceeds from the living God is proved by sensuous evidence which it creates and procures. Tholuck: “Voices from heaven, as in this place, are found also, Daniel 4:31; 1 Kings 19:11-12; Matthew 3:17; Matthew 17:5; Acts 9:7; Acts 10:13; Revelation 1:10; Revelation 4:5, where we read of φωναί together with βρονταί;—on this Zόllich: articulate sounds contrasted with the inarticulate thunderings.” Purport of the voice: I have glorified it, and will glorify it again [Καὶἐδόξασακαὶπάλινδοξάσω. Πάλιν is no mere repetition, but an intensification of the glorification]. Meyer makes the first sentence of the voice refer to the works of Jesus hitherto, the second to the impending glorification through death to δόξα. Taking into consideration the antithesis, chap. 10, and the existing state of matters, we assume that the consummated glorification of the name of God refers to His revelation in Israel, closing of course in the labors of Christ, and the new glorification of His name to the impending revelation of God in the Gentile world, this of course being conditioned by the death and resurrection of Jesus. John 12:29. The multitude therefore, etc. Perception of the voice. 1. The comprehension of it was probably not confined to Jesus, but was shared by His disciples, or by some chosen ones among them. 2. For the surrounding people the voice had a tone like thunder. Is this expressive simply of the third degree of susceptibility? Perchance it contains also an intimation of the judgment impending over the people of Israel. 3. To this hearing the hearing of others seems to form an antithesis. Those hear a voice of thunder; they, on the other hand, angelic speech. Is it not possible that by these others the Greek proselytes are meant? Such a thing is not positively expressed. Be it observed, however, that it is these very men whom Jesus seems to answer in the subsequent speech. At all events, their attitude towards the people is that of a more susceptible minority. John 12:30. This voice came not [was not audibly uttered] for my sake, but for yours.—The disciples were really no longer in need of this attestation of Jesus. Neither was it needed by that portion of the people that believed on Him on account of the raising of Lazarus. From the words immediately following it seems to be spoken with special reference to the Greeks. Hence He continues: John 12:31. Now is the judgment of this world, etc.—The Jewish world is assuredly included; the words, however, relate pre-eminently to the heathen world. Therefore Satan is spoken of as the prince of this world who is now being cast out. The words are explanatory of the heavenly voice: I will glorify it again. Judgment was also now proclaimed to the world. It proclaimed itself with His woful feeling of death; it was put in execution by His death, made manifest by His resurrection, published and appropriated to the world by His Holy Spirit (John 16:11). The judgment upon the world should, however, be the world’s salvation; a judgment in which it was judged but as an ungodly world, its prince (2 Corinthians 4:4; Ephesians 2:2; John 6:12) being cast out of it and Christ in his stead assuming the sovereignty over it. In the rabbins, Satan, as regent of the heathen world, bears the name; Prince of the world (according to Lightfoot, Schφttgen and Eisenmenger. Delitzsch, Bibl. Psychologie, p. 44). The expulsion from heaven (Luke 10:18) is not again meant here. Satan had penetrated into the Paradise of the first man when he tempted the first of the human race; when he tempted Christ in the wilderness he had ventured into heaven itself (the heaven of spiritual life) as a tempter. With the victory of Christ over Satan in the wilderness, the latter fell from heaven like lightning; and upon this transaction rested the victories of Jesus’ disciples over demons in Israel (see Leben Jesu, II. 3, p. 1070; III. p. 428). Now Satan is likewise cast out of the world, the κόσμοςοῦ ?̓τος i.e., the old pre-Messianic and non-Messianic world—with special reference to the Gentile world whose highest cosmical formation is the very Hellenism that is confronting Him. Satan’s empire over the world is shattered with the death and resurrection of Jesus. He is indeed still tarrying and working over the earth (Ephesians 2:2); here he retains his “Εξω, the air and wind regions of the human world as far as it is not yet spiritual, whence he reacts upon the church of Christ. Subsequently he is cast upon the earth (Revelation 12:9), i.e., he possesses himself of traditional, ancient ordinances, now deadened—lifeless. But in time to come he is also cast out of the earth into the bottomless pit, Revelation 20. Thus this saying opens up a perspective of the final judgment, whilst Hilgenfeld has pretended to discover in it a negation of the last judgment (together with other favorite gnostic ideas). John 12:32. And I, if I shall be lifted up [κἀγὼἐὰνὑψωθῶἐκτῆςγῆς]. See chap John 3:14; John 8:28. As in those passages both events are understood by the lifting up; the lifting up upon the cross and the lifting up upon the heavenly throne; in this place, pre-eminently the latter. This double meaning of the word (Erasmus, Tholuck, etc.), is disallowed here by Meyer; he particularly denies that there is any reference to the crucifixion (the Fathers, most of the ancients, Kling, Frommann), maintaining that the ἐκτῆςγῆς conflicts with such an interpretation, though indeed it is that of John himself. However, the crucifixion itself in its inward essence was an exaltation of Christ above the earth. With the dethroning of Satan, the dark usurper in the world, the enthroning of Jesus corresponds; hence: “And I.” With the breaking of the Satanic principle and the power of the spirits of darkness by the expiatory and redemptive death of Christ, the full power of the Christian spirit releases itself; then comes the Holy Ghost, John 7:39; John 14:26 ff. Will draw all men unto Myself [πάνταςἑλκύσωπρὸςἐμαυτόν].—All is referred: 1. by Chrysostom, Cyril, Calvin, Lampe, to the antithesis of Jews and Gentiles, after John 10:16; John 2. by Lutheran theologians to all who hear the preaching of the Gospel and do not resist the drawing of Christ; 3. by individual Reformed theologians to the elect; 4. Meyer: without restriction. We suppose it to be indicative of the totality of the nations in antithesis to the firstlings of the Greeks who have here inquired after Him; similarly: I will draw them forms a contrast to the announcement sent by these individuals. It is the attraction of the cross,—its medium the preaching of the crucified One,—made effectual by His Spirit, which draws the nations to baptism and death with Him, and to new life. But the ἑλκύειν of the Son does not here assume the place of the ἐλκύειν on the part of the Father, John 6:44 (Tholuck); for the drawing of the Son is the gratia convertens in vocation which joins the drawing of the Father in the gratia prζveniens or fore-ordination. All must experience the powerful drawing of calling grace; yet it is a drawing without moral compulsion because it is a drawing of free love calling unto freedom. The emphasis contained in πρὸςἐμαυτόν (comp. John 14:3) signifies of course: to Myself. They will not stay with Philip or Andrew, or require the mediation of a Jewish or priestly church.John 12:33. Signifying what kind of death he was to die [ποίῳθάνατῳἤμελλενἀποθνήσκειν].—Not simply a Johannean interpretation (Meyer) or a mere hint perchance (Tholuck). For the death of the cross was not only objectively the condition of the lifting up of Christ; it is also subjectively the strongest and the single decisive attraction to the exalted Christ (ποῖοςθάνατοσς !). John 12:34. That the Christ abideth forever [ὁ Xριστὸςμένειεἰςαἰῶνα].—A people is spoken of that recognizes the Christ in Jesus. They have heard out of the law [ἐκτοῦνόμου], i.e., by the reading, as well as by the explanation of the Holy Scriptures generally, that the Messiah should abide forever. This conception was occasioned in them by passages such as Psalms 110:4; Isaiah 9:7, and the like. According to Meyer also Daniel 7:13. But with this last passage in their minds, Christ’s being lifted up from the earth could not have appeared strange to them, for there the Son of Man is brought to the Ancient of Days before whom His kingdom is given to Him. Neither was that passage popularly supposed to refer to the Messiah. According to Meyer it was likewise from the Danielic passage that they took the expression: the Son of Man, and put it into His mouth; such an explanation of their use of the term is entirely unnecessary since Jesus has just entitled Himself the Son of Man (see John 12:23)—(although even Tholuck can remark, in opposition to Luthardt, that this reference to Christ’s words is too remote). Neither is it alone the distinction of the earthly and the spiritual Messianic hope which here comes under consideration, even though an elucidation is found in the fact that Jonathan translates the ΰֲ ?αִ ?ιΞςֵ ?γ, Isaiah 9:6, precisely as the people express themselves: “He that abideth forever, the Messiah;” the Septuagint, however, has it: πατὴρτοῦμέλλοντοςαἰῶνος.” Tholuck. But the people, as also the disciples, lack as yet all discrimination between the first and the second coming of Christ. They imagine that if the Messiah had but come (with the breaking forth of the “Messianic travail-pangs,” perchance) the Kingdom of Glory would at once be ushered in with His residence at Jerusalem. At this they first stumbled,—that their Christ should be removed again from the earth, like Enoch and Elijah. But manifestly at this also, that He has again exchanged the name of Messiah for the designation of the Son of Man. And hence they ask: who is this Son of Man? Meyer considers their meaning to be: Who is this anti-Scriptural Son of Man who is not to abide in accordance with Daniel, but is to be lifted up from the earth? Thus too Tholuck. But in that case they would not ask: who is this Son of Man? but, how does that agree with the Son of Man? The first offence, namely at His being lifted up, concerns the spiritual and heavenly side of the Messianic picture set up by Christ; the second concerns that universality in the idea of the Son of Man, which they doubtless feel. The Greeks, evidently, have again excited their Jewish jealousy, manifested on a former occasion, John 7:35. Especially prominent in the response of the people is this practical trait; their carnal Messianic hope prevents them from having the slightest suspicion of what is impending over the Messiah, and hence also over them in their relation to Him during the next days. To this the answer of Christ has reference. John 12:35. Yet a little while is the light among you.—[τὸφῶς refers to Christ Himself; see John 1:4-5; John 1:7-8; John 7:33; John 8:12; John 9:4-5.—P. S.] Jesus does not enter upon a theological disquisition with the view of convincing them of their error in stumbling at His sayings, because the reason of their stumbling lies in their want of obedience to His word, in their lack of true surrender to the light. In the path of this surrender they should be freed from stumbling. Thus He practically lays hold of them in the centre, the conscience. They have not the slightest suspicion or presentiment of what awaits Him and them. Therefore: Walk as ye have the light (ὡς stronger than ε͂ως), in accordance with the fact that the light is about being taken from you, unless, by submissive faith, ye appropriate it permanently to yourselves as inward light. That darkness may not overtake you, [ἴναμὴσκοτίαὑμᾶςκαταλάβῃ ?].—Namely unprepared, and so to your destruction. The great night of temptation came upon them on the day of crucifixion, and to those who confronted it unsuspiciously, with their outward Messianic hope, it likewise became an inward night of apostasy and ruin. He that walketh in the darkness.—He that acts then, walks then (comp. John 11:10). This περιπατεῖν is expressive of the fault by which outward darkness is converted into inward obscurity.—Knoweth not whither he goeth.—The figure drawn from outside life is strikingly demonstrative of the fate of the Jews. They knew not whither they went—into perdition, into dispersion to the ends of the world, into the curse of judgment until the end of time. Antithesis to Christ’s going to the sure goal of glory. John 12:36. Believe in the light that, etc.—Faith here especially conditional upon obedience. The stumbling of these believers on the Messiah proved that they had not yet true faith in the sense of submissive obedience. The walk should be in conformance to the light, i.e., with trust in the light.—That ye may become [not be] sons of light [ἵναυἱοὶφωτὸςγένησθε. It is by believing in the light that men become sons of light]. Then should the inward light of illumination conduct them safely through the outer darkness, Luke 16:8. It is most fitting that these should be the last words of Christ to the believing portion of the people. Nothing but trust in that light which had risen upon them in Him, could lead them safely through the fearful night of trial. And He departed and hid Himself from them [καὶἀπελθὼνἐκρύβηἀπʼ ? αὐτῶν].—This moment coincides, as regards the main point, with the departure from the temple described by the Synoptists (see Comm. on Matthew, p. 415, Am. Ed.) Meyer [and Alford]: “Probably to Bethany [Luke 21:37], in order to spend the last days of His life, before the coming of His hour, in the circle of the disciples.” These last days of His life amounted at the utmost to two. On Tuesday evening Christ left the temple; on Thursday, towards evening, He returned to Jerusalem to celebrate the Passover. AND ETHICAL1. John’s description of the close of the public ministry of Christ forms a most important supplement to the description of the same given by the Synoptists, Matthew 23:39; Mark 13:1; Luke 21:38. They depict pre-eminently the departure of Jesus from the hostile portion of the people (with the exception of Luke, whose account in this respect is less definite), while John delineates His departure from the more friendly portion. But if we regard the Palm-entry as the introduction to this history, then John has supplemented an account not only of the immediate occasion of the Palm-procession, but also of the grand acme of it,—the coming of the Greeks and the glorification of Jesus by the voice from heaven within the precincts of the temple itself. In accordance with this presentation of the subject, we should conjecture that the introduction of the Greeks took place on the great, festive Monday when Christ displayed His glory in the temple undisturbed (see Leben Jesu, III. 1, p. 1200). It were possible so to incorporate these words (descriptive of His stay in the temple) with the Johannean account, that we should find in the ἀπελθών John 12:36 an intimation of the farewell discourse of Jesus, Matthew 23 together with the preceding great contests on the Tuesday. But since the denunciatory discourse, at all events, which Matthew records as pronounced against the Pharisees by Jesus, was followed by His still longer stay in the temple over against the treasury, according to Mark and Luke,—since Matthew is induced by the order of affairs to alter the historical sequence, not so, however, John,—since, furthermore, the definite announcement, in the temple, of His speedy death, nay, the very presentiment of death which has already entered His soul, seem to presuppose His final, open rupture with the Hierarchs on the great day of contest, Tuesday,—we now assume this conference of Jesus with the Hellenes, the glorification consequent upon it, and His charge to the people, to be significant of the last grand sunbeam which His presence shed on Mount Zion; the very reference to the remnant of day-light still illumining the nation is apparently indicative of the decline of this, the last day of His public ministry. These proselytes of the gate remind one involuntarily of the tradition (protested against indeed) that Luke was one of the seventy disciples. Comp. Luke 24:13 ff. 2. The last facts recorded by John do not present the motive for Christ’s departure from the people and the temple as distinctly as do those related by the Synoptists; nevertheless, the cause is intimated by the final question of the people that recognize Him as the Messiah. They have not the faintest foreboding of the state of matters, and even their lofty enthusiasm of the day of Palms begins to be obscured again by Judaistic expectations. This exhibition of the mind of the multitude seems to the evangelist sufficiently expressive; but he too subjoins his explanation in his epilogue on the public ministry of Jesus and the motive for His retirement. 3. Remarkable is the glorious, threefold climax with which, according to John, the public ministry of Jesus closes: 1. The anointing of Jesus in Bethany before His official Messianic entry into Jerusalem; 2. the Palm-entry itself, originating particularly with festal pilgrims going forth to Bethany out of Jerusalem; contrasted with this, the despair of the Supreme Council; 3. the announcement of the Greeks, and the glorification of Jesus through the voice from heaven, upon Mount Zion itself, in the hearing of the whole nation,—together with the proclamation from His own mouth of His redemptive death, His glorification for all nations, and the universal Gospel. 4. Christ’s last words of farewell to the people on the temple-mount a gentle warning, according to John, and yet also an earnest explanation of Jewish stumblings. Therefore did Jesus return no answer to these stumblings themselves. Obedience from the heart unto truth alone can free from the prejudices of tradition. 5. At the moment of the consummated apostasy of the sacerdotal party from the Christ on Zion, the first Gentiles most significantly made their public appearance as His disciples. The hypothesis of Sepp assuming them to have been a deputation sent to Jesus by king Abgarus of Edessa, after the well-known account of apocryphal sound in Eusebius, cannot avail to enrich this event. 6. The Hellenes. A literal fulfilment of the predictions of the prophets, especially of Isaiah 2; also a fulfilment of the type contained in the history of the wise men from the East. A foretoken of the ensuing conversion of the proselytes of the gate, then of the Gentile world itself. 7. The pure historical truth, the clear picture of the situation in the intercession of the disciples Philip and Andrew. 8. The Hour. To the Lord the presentiment of His death is connected with the presentiment of His glorification. Be it observed that John regards even the humiliation of Jesus unto death as a particular form of Christ’s exaltation, and that not simply in the ironical sense of the being lifted up upon the cross. It is the perfect exaltation of Jesus in His love, to the perfect glorification of the grace of God. 9. Stier very ingeniously remarks: “For this He now appeals—not to the testimony of the prophets, but to a secretly prophetic mystery of nature (as a proof also that His discourse is aimed at the Greeks as well as the Jews) which yet on the instant shines transfigured in His mouth.” Symbolism of the grain of wheat. See Note on John 12:24. The word concerning the grain of wheat has a threefold reference: (1) It declares a universal law of life: a death-like metamorphosis, as a condition whereon depends the renewal of life, is a type of the fundamental law in the kingdom of God, which law provides that we by a priestly surrender of our own wills to the will of God do obtain new kingly life in God. (2) The law of life of sinful humanity; in God’s kingdom of this earth real death is a condition of the transition from the old life to the new; a symbol of the propitiatory sacrificial death of Christ for the reconciliation and glorification of the world; likewise of the death of thank-offering in which believers die with Christ in order to walk with Him in new life. (3) In the most special sense, the law of life of the regeneration of Hellenism, whose peculiar essence consists in a fleeing from death and the cross in the embellishment of the present life (Leben Jesu, II. p. 1203; III. p. 665). The Greek’s aim is levelled at beauty of appearance. Even these Greeks, religious though they be, betray themselves with the expression: “We wish to see Jesus.” Essentially eternal youth, beauty and glory in the new world are attained by the Christian only through death. Hence the butterfly alone does not suffice for a symbol of immortality; the symbol of the grain of wheat must be added to it. The butterfly symbolizes the capacity of man for a paradisaical, death-like metamorphosis which yet is not dead and is merely a symbol of an individual renewal; the grain of wheat symbolizes the renewal of life through death,—and that a renewal which is at once its infinite enrichment and extension, and its glorification in spirit. Jesus did not indeed see corruption, but He drew very near to it; and thus it is, at bottom, with the grain of wheat; it passes through the semblance of corruption, but, in respect of its innermost kernel, its life leaps out from corruption into the metamorphosis of the butterfly, just, as on the other hand, the butterfly must strip itself of a corruptible something—the dead pupa. Christ has glorified both forms of transit from the old to the new life. Moreover all the chief moments in the life of Christ are prefigured in the history of the grain of wheat: Christmas, Good Friday, Easter, Ascension, Whitsuntide. 10. The two oxymora, John 12:24-25; the three promises, John 12:24-26. See the Exegetical and Critical Notes.11. John 12:27. The first presentiment of the death of Jesus in the temple a fulfilment of the foretoken of His baptism, the announcement of His baptism of suffering (Luke 12:50); again, a foretoken of the mortal conflict of His soul in Gethsemane, the sure prophecy of His death; crowned, therefore, as a great moment in the pathway of His humiliations, with a glorification,—like the baptism, like the announcement of His sufferings (Matthew 16:21 by the transfiguration John 17:1), like His conflict in Gethsemane, like His death. We have too mean an idea of the emotional life of Jesus if we refer these moods to a fear of death. See Exegetical and Critical Notes on John 12:23 and the conclusion of that on the first clause of Joh 12:27. The present moment denotes nothing less than the mental self-sacrifice of Jesus in the temple. 12. The voice within the precincts of the temple. See Exegetical and Critical Notes.13. John 12:31. The different stages in the subjection of Satan, the prince of this world. See exegetical and critical notes. The death of Jesus a judgment, glorified by the Spirit. See John 16:1. The foundation and beginning of the separation between Satan and the world; 2. the foundation and beginning of the separation between believers and unbelievers; 3. the foundation and beginning of the union of all the godly. “The anabaptists cited this verse (31) among others as a proof that the powers that be are not of divine ordinance. See the refutation in Gerhard, Loci theol. 13, p. 260.” Heubner.14. John 12:35. Who is this Son of Man? It was as little their desire to find the doctrine of the Son of Man in their Christology, as to discover in it the doctrine of the Son of God. They would have no true Son of Man, no Redeemer revealing divinity in the perfection of manhood and humanity, no suffering Messiah; they wanted an orientally superhuman and godlike Son of David, displaying the perfect and exact medium of a divinity broken through humanity, of a humanity broken through divinity;—the ideal of all benumbed orthodoxistic systems, a rigid, everlasting -symbol of the God-Man, which should be the central point of the rigid symbolism of the kingdom of God, beyond which symbolism they desired never to pass. (See Leben Jesu, III. p. 608.) 15. John 12:35-36. The gentle and impressive farewell words of Jesus to the believing portion of the people in the evening of His public ministry. But once more should He re-appear as a prisoner among the people; like a setting sun, to shed upon them for the last time the radiance of His life. (Ibid. p. 668.) AND See the Doctrinal Notes.—The Greek proselytes, or Judaism a leading of the Gentiles to Christianity: 1. In the historical sense; 2. in the spiritual sense.—The advance of the Gentiles at the recession of the Jews in the history of the kingdom of God: 1. Historical; 2. typical.—The last discourse of Jesus in the temple for the benefit of the Greeks, compared with the last discourse of Jesus in the temple for the benefit of the Jews (according to Matthew).—The two signs in the meeting of Jesus with the Greeks within the temple limits: 1. The sign seen by Jesus in the appearance of the Greeks: a sign of decision, a sign of death, a sign of life. And that in accordance with the Old Testament and the law of the spirit. 2. The sign given by the Father to the people about Jesus.—How the Lord was troubled also by grief at the impending rejection of His nation when He saw the coming of the Gentiles (see the conclusion of the note on the first clause of Joh 12:27).—The humiliation and glorification of Jesus in the temple an image—a reflection—of His whole life (especially of the baptism, the transfiguration, His soul-passion in Gethsemane, His death).—The great change in the great emotional life of the Lord: 1. How often it appears (see note on first clause of Joh 12:27); 2. what it denotes: the strength, extent, earnestness, buoyancy and holiness of His spirit.—Even the humiliation of Christ already an exaltation of Him, or the beginning of the full revelation of the glory of His inner life: 1. In His obedience; 2. in His confidence; 3. in His love.—Made specially prominent by John as a precursory exaltation.—The anticipatory solemnization of the Christian sacrificial feast upon the eve of the Jewish one.—Christ and the Greeks (Christianity and Hellenism): 1. The application of the Greeks: a. Courteous form (through Philip and Andrew); b. purport: we would see Jesus. 2. The word concerning the grain of wheat. Concerning the life of this world; concerning the following of Christ.—Messianic traits in our history: 1. The teaching Christ (John 12:24-26); 2. the high-priestly Christ (John 12:27-28, first half); 3. the royal Christ (John 12:28-32); 4. the wholly undivided Christ (John 12:33-36).—The saying concerning the grain of wheat and the succeeding sayings: 1. A sermon on salvation, as a word concerning Christ; 2. a sermon on repentance, as a word for us; 8. a sermon of consolation, as a word concerning suffering and dying Christians.—The Christian life in three decisive traits: 1. In the three truths concerning the grain of wheat, life, service; 2. in the three demands of Christ; 3. in the three promises.—The soul-passion of Jesus in the temple a foretoken of His soul-passion in Gethsemane.—The self-sacrifice of Christ in the temple: 1. Its occasion: the announcement of the Gentiles; 2. its form: assumption of the feeling of death; by anticipation, therefore, of death itself; 3. its result: the voice, the future of Christ.—The three voices from heaven in attestation of the Lord: 1. By Jordan; 2. on the Mount of Transfiguration; 3. in the temple.—The prospect of death and of glory as one undivided prospect with Jesus. The import of this to the Christian.—The two stumbling-blocks to the believing Jews in the word and life of the Lord: 1. His removal to heaven unto divine glory; 2. His humanity and devotion to mankind.—The farewell words of Jesus to the better portion of the Jews like the solemn, tender, parting gleam of the sinking sun. Starke: It was not without the special providence of God that so great a multitude of strangers from the Gentiles were at Jerusalem in those days;—to the end, namely, that in this way the truth of the revealed glory of Christ might, through approved witnesses, not from the Jews alone, but also from the Gentiles, be published and corroborated throughout the world.—Lampe: This desire (of the Greeks) typified the fulfilment of the prophecies in which it was predicted that the nations should cleave unto Him (Christ), Genesis 49:10; Haggai 2:7-8.—O shame, that heathen who have not God’s word, outstrip Christians in inquiring after Christ, though these latter call themselves after His name!—(Philip and Andrew.) Preachers must agree in this, the leading of souls to Christ. John 12:24. Zeisius: Christ’s death is the world’s life.—Hedinger: He who would live in Christ must first die unto flesh and sin. John 12:25. Ibid.: Much lost to gain a thousand-fold more.—Zeisius: How many servants Christ hath and yet so few true and constant followers! John 12:27. Soul, if thou be not cheerful and joyous, but, on the contrary, sad and dejected, look upon thy Saviour,—He in His infirmities was as thou art; courage! as He conquered, thou too shalt conquer in Him.—Ibid.: No better remedy for all suffering, nay, for death itself, than fervent prayer after the example of Christ.—Osiander: Even the cross and tribulation add fresh glory to the name of God; therefore we also should take such upon us with thorough willingness. John 12:29. Lampe: O how diverse are the hearers of the Gospel! John 12:30. (The voice of God.) Canstein: We must take for granted that we too are concerned in everything that it says. John 12:31. Hebrews 2:14. John 12:32. Cramer: Christ is the true magnet that draweth us after itself. John 12:35. Hedinger: To-day, to-day is certain,—to-morrow is uncertain.—Zeisius: The greater the light was, the thicker the darkness of wrath fallen upon the despisers of grace.—Am I too a child of light?—Gerlach: Jesus warns His disciples likewise not to surrender themselves now to earthly hopes of a carnal glory; He indeed is going to His glorification, but the way lies through death and resurrection.—The goal of suffering and death,—that of Christ and hence His people’s also,—is glorification.—My soul is troubled. To the end that He may the more decisively counteract the carnal hopes of His disciples, He openly announces the state of His feelings.—The voice. As, at the conclusion of the Old Covenant, Moses spake and God answered him aloud (Exodus 19:19), so the New Covenant is here solemnly concluded before all the people, the Son offering Himself to the Father and the Father accepting His sacrifice.—The prince of this world. It stands to reason that this is no denial of the devil’s power to tempt the people of Christ after His exaltation; as little do the words of Jesus: “It is finished,” declare that there are no more battles to be fought by Christ and His Church. But the power of the prince of this world has now become impotency in respect to the faithful; individual Christians, as well as the Church of the Lord as a body, are now in faith on Christ sure of their ultimate victory.—He had striven to subdue the carnal transport of joy by the mention of His mortal sufferings (John 12:24), and seeks with equal earnestness to show that His death itself, His deepest humiliation, would constitute the strongest centre of attraction for the hearts of men. Hence in this instance the double meaning attaching to the term “lifted up” is expressive of the following facts: His deepest humiliation should be His very exaltation,—the most horrid shame His highest honor; and so afterwards in the incidents attendant upon His death everything significantly came to pass after this fashion (purple, crown, John 19:2; kingly title, John 19:19-22), which very circumstances are mentioned by John with peculiar emphasis.—Lisco: Fruits of the death of Jesus.—The true and only way to serve Christ is to follow Him.—To the impenitent the Gospel is thunder; to him who thirsts for salvation it is an angel; to him on whom salvation has been bestowed, it is Jesus Himself and His heavenly Father.—By means of the Redeemer’s passion and death, judgment is passed upon the world. Braune: This scene constitutes most truly the close of Christ’s public ministry. Gentiles approach Jesus, divining that they behold in Him the Light of the Gentiles, whilst His nation rejects Him; here a divine voice attests Him in Jerusalem at the close of His ministry, as by Jordan at its beginning; and before the conflict, He is stirred with a sense of victory.—He speaks here, as at the commencement of the high-priestly prayer, John 17:1.—It abideth alone. It doth not increase; no slender verdant stalk, no rich car is given it, wherewith to rejoice in the brightness of the sun, and to make glad the eyes of the world.—Seed-time and harvest, suffering and glory are mated for Himself and His people.—The glimpse of the rich harvest ensuing from the seed of His death, draws His soul into that conflict, whose first traces are perceptible in His lamentation, Luke 12:50, and whose culmination is reached in Gethsemane. The Baptist cried. “Behold the Lamb of God!” This title was given to Christ, not simply under the cross, but from the beginning; and thus, side by side with the assurance of victory, the anguish of conflict threaded His life. Divine life did not stifle or abolish human feeling; and this must needs struggle against the sufferings which were pressing upon Him,—against death. (? But doubtless the struggle consisted 1. in His working off His emotion, and in His submission, 2. in His resurrection.) Jesus was the original man, not an unnatural man; not dis-humanized, but the ideal of pure human nature. His grief was the misery of all who despised Him, etc.—Follow Him. He requires the act of obedience.—Father, glorify, etc. That was a sublime moment on earth, in perfect unison with that heaven, whence a voice resounded.—Are there not, then, organs of perception for the higher regimen of the world? Ephesians 5:8.——Gossner: Thus He gives death an entirely different form. It is, namely, nothing but a passage; the goal is glorification.—And where i am. Where Christ stayeth, there do we stay also.—Thus it is betwixt the Saviour and the soul. This entry is longer than a Bible module can hold. The rest is at https://www.sermonindex.net/commentary/lange/ V bA BETWEEN SELF- ISRAEL AND THE WORLD, THAT BOTH STANDS IN NEED OF AND IS READY TO RECEIVE IT,—OR THE OF CHRIST AND THE ’S REVIEW OF HIS LABORS (John 12:37-50.)37But though he had done so many miracles [had wrought so many, or, so great signs] before them, yet they believed not on [in] him: 38That the saying of Esaias [Isaiah] the prophet might be fulfilled, which he spake, ‘Lord, who hath believed our report? and to whom hath the arm of the Lord been revealed’ [Isaiah 53:1]? 39Therefore [On this account, or, For this cause] they could not believe, because that 40[omit that] Esaias [Isaiah] said again, ‘He hath blinded their eyes, and hardened their heart; that they should not see with their eyes, nor [and] understand with their heart, and be converted [turn themselves], and I should heal them.’ 41These things said Esaias [Isaiah], when [because] he saw his glory, and spake [he spoke]of him. 42Nevertheless among the chief rulers also [Yet even of the rulers] many believed on [in] him; but because of the Pharisees they did not confess him 43[omit him], lest they should be put out of the synagogue [excommunicated]. For they loved the praise [glory] of men more than [rather than at all] the praise [glory] of God. 44[But] Jesus cried [aloud] and said, He that believeth on [in] me, believeth not on [in] me, but on [in] him that sent me. 45And he that seeth [beholdeth] me seeth 46[beholdeth] him that sent me. I am come a [omit a, ins. as] light into the world, that whosoever [every one that] believeth on [in] me should not abide in [remain in the] darkness. 47And if any man hear my words, and believe [keep them] not I judge him not: for I came not to judge the world, but to save the world. 48He that rejecteth me, and receiveth not my words, hath one that judgeth him [his judge (with him)]: the word that I have spoken, the same shall [will] judge him 49in the last day. For [Because] I have not spoken of [from] myself; but the Father which [who] sent me, he gave me a [omit a] commandment, what I should say, and what I should speak. 50And I know that his commandment is life everlasting: whatsoever I speak therefore, even as the Father said [hath said unto me, εἴρηχένμοι], so I speak. AND The entire section is an epilogue of the Evangelist on the public ministry of Jesus and its result in the Israelitish nation; a result already announced by the lamentation, John 1:11. Even the concluding words from John 12:44 are to be regarded throughout as an epilogue (according to Coccejus and many others, Lόcke, Tholuck, Olshausen, Meyer). We reject therefore as unfounded 1. the supposition of Chrysostom and all the ancients (among the moderns Kling), that Jesus once more addressed the people publicly in these words; 2. the modification of this hypothesis in Lampe and Bengel, who affirm that on His departure from the temple, in the very act of withdrawal from the Jews, He shouted out these words to them from afar; 3. the conjecture of Besser and Luthardt, who hold that He uttered these remarks respecting the Jews in the presence of the disciples; 4. finally, the fancy of De Wette, who supposes these reminiscences to have grown under the hand of the Evangelist into a regular discourse—one, however, not delivered by Jesus. The main support of assumptions of this kind has been found in the ἔκραξεκαὶεἴπεν, John 12:44. But the first word is employed by John in (tho sense of loud, public declarations (John 1:15; John 7:28; John 7:37), and docs not necessarily signify a shout from a distance, or a final, vehement outcry. And as for the aorists, it is not necessary to regard them, with Tholuck, as resumptive Pluperfects. On the contrary, the whole is a resume en gros of the life of Jesus, in which summary the account of the unbelief and obduracy of the great, mass of the Jewish people and its rulers is contrasted with the account of Christ’s holy testimony to Himself. John 12:37. But though He had done such, etc.—Τοσαῦτα Lόcke, De Wette: So great; Meyer, Tholuck: so many, so too the E. V. Its proper signification is: such signs as these He did; hence the nature of the signs itself determines whether so great or so many should be understood. The passages John 6:9; John 14:9; John 21:11 certainly seem, as Meyer remarks, to be in favor of the interpretation: so many; yet the generalness of the term is doubtless indicative of quality as well. Yet they did not believe in Him.—In disobedience to the purpose of God in the signs, and to the divine attestation of Jesus. John 12:38.—That the word [ὁλόγος] of Isaiah, etc.—“It is in the very presence of unbelief and of hinderances cast in the way of the kingdom of God that both Jesus and the apostles most frequently appeal to the word of prophecy. For prophecy exhibits the divine ὡρισμένον (comp. Luke 22:22 with Matthew 26:24), while it demonstrates the fast that oven these seeming contradictions in history must be co-included in the divine counsel, John 13:9; John 17:2.” Tholuck. The passage is Isaiah 53:1 according to the Septuagint. According to Meyer, Jesus is introduced in this passage as addressing God, κύριε. According to Luthardt, it is a lament of the Evangelist and of those like-minded with him, and ἀκοή means the message that we actually receive from Jesus. If, however, we adhere to the context, it is the lament of the prophet, in his own name and that of his colleagues, over his time. But the emphasis is upon the words: that it might be fulfilled.—Herewith, undoubtedly, the lament of the prophet becomes indirectly, and as a type, the lament of Christ (comp. Psalms 22:1). The prophets might lament over two things: 1. That men did not believingly receive their ἀκοή (the message heard by them—the prophets—or the message which penetrated the ears of the hearers); and 2. that men did not suffer their prophetic wonders whereby they made plain the arm of the Lord, i.e, interpreted the great deeds of God, to be the means of revealing to them these deeds in their significance. All this unbelief which opposed itself to them as an incipient hardening, is now fulfilled in the perfect obduracy manifested by the Jews towards Jesus: towards His preaching and His revelation of the arm of the Lord in His miracles (by the arm of the Lord, Augustine and others incorrectly apprehend Christ Himself); hence the lament of the prophets is also fulfilled in the words of Jesus and His people. The saying is most significantly chosen from the beginning of the prophecy about the suffering Messiah, Isaiah 53. The hardening began to be accomplished in the face of the sufferings of the prophets; its fulfilment is completed in the crucifixion of Christ on the part of the Jews and in the rejection of the Crucified and Risen One. John 12:39. On this account they could not believe, because Isaiah said again.—According to Meyer διὰτοῦτο—ὄτι, therefore, on this account, has reference to what has gone before, i.e. the saying of Joh 12:38 contains the ground for the saying John 12:40. On the other hand, according to Theophylact and many others, also Tholuck and Luthardt, διὰτοῦτο is preparative;—it announces the cause, i.e. the inability to believe of Joh 12:39 explains why they did not believe according to John 12:38. This interpretation seems to be supported by the sequence of the dicta; first Isaiah 53:1, then Isaiah 6:10, and Tholuck remarks: “After the fact of their unbelief is declared, the reason of it is assigned in the fate of hardening decreed them by God.” But their divinely decreed destiny, as a judicial infliction, presupposes their guilt in voluntarily choosing unbelief, as it is also remarked by Tholuck: “The fact that the guilt of the parties involved is not excluded in such an actus judicialis Dei in the Scriptural sense, is most plainly set forth by the history of Pharaoh, in which it is said in six places: he hardened himself, and in six others: God hardened him.” Moreover it is not necessary to regard Isaiah 53 as the thought-sequence of Isaiah 6; with regard to facts the train of ideas may be inverted, and thus it is doubtless here. Fast upon the ουκἐπίστευσαν follows the οὐκἠδύναντοπιστεύειν as a judgment. Undoubtedly, therefore, διὰτοῦτο is to be explained in accordance with Meyer. As in the prophet the preaching of the prophet was the object by means of which the judgment of hardening should be brought upon Israel, so in the evangelical history it was the manifestation of Jesus by word and deed. That which might and should have been a savor of life to the Jews, became a savor of death to them; and herein was accomplished their judgment of hardening. As the most speaking type of this judgment the passage Isaiah 6:9-10 is repeatedly cited: Matthew 13:14; Acts 28:26; Romans 11:8 (comp. Luke 2:34). The quotation from Isaiah 6:9-10 varies from the letter of the original text, but in a way that is agreeable to its sense. There the prophet is commissioned to occasion obduracy by his preaching; here it is said, by way of historical report: He hath hardened them. I.e. the secondary or instrumental cause mentioned by Isaiah is omitted by the Evangelist, because in the latter, Christ, in accordance with John 12:41, is at once the secondary cause and the author of this hardness. According to Isaiah, God is the author or efficient cause, in His revealed form, His δόξα; according to John, Christ is the author, in His divine glory, as the Christ of the Old Testament. Hence there is no foundation in the text for the assertion of Meyer (and Tholuck) that not Christ, but God, is to be understood as the subject; the interpretation of Morus and others who consider the nation itself as the subject, likewise does violence to the text. According to Meyer, on the other hand, Christ is, in the sense of the Evangelist, the speaker in Isaiah, God the hardener, while ἰάσοηαι has reference to Christ. The assumption that the hardener cannot also be the healer, is a groundless one. According to Tholuck ἰάσομαι should also be referred to God, having, as a negligence in expression, remained in the first person; Grotius and others, and Luthardt are correct in considering the whole as referring to Christ. The “negligence” is, however, conscious breviloquence; to be supplemented is: and as it is further written, That I should heal them. This turn, however, has its foundation in the fact that the negation of καὶἰάσομαι, etc. is not to lapse into the historical past like the items of the hardening, and that there is present to the mind of the Evangelist a distinction between Christ as the retributive God of revelation and the historical Saviour. John 12:41. These things said Isaiah because [ὄτι] he saw his glory.—Meyer: “According to Isaiah 6:1, it was indeed the glory of God that was seen by the prophet (God sitting upon His throne, attended by seraphim, etc.); in accordance with the idea of the Logos, however, the theophanies are appearances of the Logos.” Rather, the Logos who is about becoming incarnate, is Himself one with the δόξα of the Father, although this again in the abstract is distinguished from the δόξα of Christ (comp. Hebrews 1:3); and hence too the δόξα of God is one with the Angel of the Presence (see Luke 2:9), although Christ again has also His divine-human δόξα. His essential estate is the μορφήθεοῦ. The seeing of Christ on the part of the prophet was not cognitive (Origen), but visionary (Tholuck). Vatablus and others have, in opposition to the context, referred αὐτοῦ to God.—And he (not dependent upon ὄτι, the prophet) spoke of Him. [Alford: “Αὐτοῦ of Christ. The Evangelist is giving his judgment,—having had his understanding opened (Luke 24:45) to understand the Scriptures,—that the passage in Isaiah is spoken of Christ. And indeed, strictly considered, the glory which Isaiah saw could only be that of the Son, who is the ἀπαύγασματῆςδόξης of the Father, whom no eye hath seen.”—Wordsworth: “The Evangelist here says that Esaias (Isaiah 6:1-9) saw the glory of the Son. St. Paul says (Acts 28:25) that he heard the words of the Holy Spirit. There is one glory, therefore, of the Holy Trinity: and the glory of the Father is the glory of the Son, and is the glory of the Holy Ghost. (Theoph.) The glory of the Ever-blessed Trinity appeared to Isaiah, when he heard the Angelic Holy, Holy, Holy (Isaiah 6:3); and the glory of the Trinity is here called the glory of Christ, because Christ is God. (Cyril).—There is a remarkable resemblance to this passage in the Book of Revelation (Revelation 4:8-11), compared with Revelation 5:12-14, where the glory ascribed to the Holy Trinity, and the worship paid to the Holy Trinity, is ascribed and paid to Christ; and is therefore a clear evidence of His Divinity.”—P. S.] John 12:42. Yet even of the rulers many believed in him.—The Evangelist limits and explains the preceding sentence. In relating that many even of the rulers (Sanhedrists) believed on Christ, he cannot mean such people as Nicodemus and Joseph of Arimathea (Meyer). We must appreciate the fact that John distinguishes between the wider sense of the word “believe” (John 8:30) and its more limited sense (John 7:5; John 20:27). Manifestly, it is belief in the wider sense of the term, inward historical recognition (“almost faith”), that is here meant. The Evangelist then proceeds to explain how it happened that the great commotion and awakening in the nation did not ripen into a great conversion. But because of the Pharisees they did not confess (it or him), etc.—The counteraction of Pharisaism in its broadest sense is meant. They did not confess, did not come forward with the confession of their belief, for fear of excommunication. But excommunication seemed so frightful to them because they loved honor among men better than any (ἤπερ emphatically) honor with God. This means in the first place objectively the honor which men bestow by their recognition, in contrast to the honor given by God. This signification is, however, not exclusive of the subjective sense in which we interpret that honor of men to be of a human kind, but the honor of God of a divine sort, 2Ma 14:42; Romans 3:23. John 12:44. But Jesus cried aloud and said.—A perfect antithesis to the honor-seeking partyism of the Jews, which was the cause of their unbelief, is now presented to us by the Evangelist in Jesus’ testimony to Himself, as the expression of His mental disposition or mind. In the first place, the setting forth of the person of Christ was free from ambition; it was a setting forth of the glory of God. He sought singly and alone the glory of God. Belief in Him should be a belief in the living God to the same extent as if it were no belief in Christ, i.e. as if belief in His human, individual appearance were fully merged in the divine glory of revelation of which He was the Mediator. And thus, also, in correspondence with the above, His appearance should be to those who saw Him the image of the appearance of the Father who sent Him. So, moreover, the sending of Him was free from selfish aims; being designed purely for the salvation of those to whom He was sent. Being, as Light that came into the world, in principle purely a shining of God, so He was, in respect of His aim, absolutely the deliverance of believers from darkness, John 12:46. Further, therefore, the operation of Christ was likewise purely and exclusively of a redeeming species without admixture of a condemning agency. This shining unto salvation and deliverance from darkness is in so great and exclusive a degree the aim of His mission that He is able to say: He that shall have heard My word and not have kept it (which will be proved at the Day of Judgment) shall not be judged by Me. I.e. He came solely and alone (in His one appearance as the Saviour of the world) to save. But the word of God which the unbeliever has not kept, but which holds him fast in the evil consciousness of his unbelief; the consciousness within him of the divine mission that he has slighted—that shall judge him at the last day (the ἐσχάτηἡμέρα, comp. John 6:39-40). And this is then, finally, purely and absolutely a judgment of God, devoid of any humanly turbid, individual admixture, because He has not spoken of Himself, but entirely in accordance with the ἐντολή of God by which He was conducted;—and that, as it regards the purport (the εἰπεῖν) of what He said, as well as the form, the human treatment and argument (the λαλεῖν). The ἔντολή, however, is not simply the commission laid upon Him at His sending; it is God’s law for Him—a law continually in operation, fitting itself to each moment; it is the voice of God within Him (“an individual court of appeal”). But as this life-law of the speech of Christ is principally a commandment of God, so it is, in regard to its end and aim, eternal life; i.e. it contains, imparts, is productive of, eternal life; it develops into eternal life in the obedience of faith. And Christ, being fully conscious that He stands, with every word, between the God who has commissioned Him and the eternal life of the soul, says nothing in false selfism, but gives utterance to all things as the Father has told them to Him. i.e. even in expression, His word is thoroughly in accordance with God. So Christ could testify of His works that they were pure from all self-seeking and selfism, as though He vanished out of each one; disappearing first as a principle, in presence of the causal all-agency of the personal God, and then theologically before the aim of bringing salvation to souls as the perfect Mediator. This is one side of the divine-human revelation—and this, as a clear mirror, is contrasted by John with the sombre picture of that ambitious, selfish, utterly falsified party righteousness which rejected the Lord. In contemplating this we may not overlook the other side, namely, that this pure revelation of God was accomplished by the very perfection and perfect distinctness of the human individuality of Christ. AND ETHICAL1. The pause between the end of the prophetic and the beginning of the high-priestly ministry of Christ, is marked by the Evangelist with an epilogue, which excites the certain expectation that the close of the second half of the Gospel will also be furnished with its epilogue, as a conclusion to the entire Gospel and also as a companion piece to the prologue (see the Introduction and chap 21) 2. Had Jesus been simply a Prophet, His work would have been accomplished with the announcement of judgment made by Him within the temple after the rulers of the people had tempted Him and hardened themselves against Him within that building (see Comm. on Matt. p. 418, etc. Am. Ed.). But the bond of fellowship with His nation, the bond of high-priestly compassion, now drew Him forth again from His concealment to the hour of the Paschal sacrifice. 3. The grief of the disciple that Israel hardened himself in face of the full and perfect unfolding of the life of the prophetic Christ, John 12:37. 4. The pacification of the Evangelist in submissive contemplation of God’s word and providence, John 12:38-41. Analogous is the lament of the Prophet and his pacification in which the Evangelist merges himself. 5. The lament of the Prophet (Isaiah 53) abstractly considered. The unbelief of the Jews in the time of Isaiah impenitently opposed itself to the preaching of the prophets as well as to the arm of the Lord,—His wonders and signs of judgment. Hence the prophet saw in the sufferings of the prophethood the type of the suffering servant of God, the Messiah. And hence the greatest of the Evangelists, in passing to the sufferings of Christ, reverts to that lament of the greatest of the prophets. He knows that lamentation to have had its perfect fulfilment in the face of the sufferings of Christ and in those sufferings. Isaiah, in prophetic spirit, saw the beginnings of unbelief of the Messianic promise, the beginnings of impenitence and obduracy, the beginnings of the suffering prophethood and of judgment accelerated by the preaching,—and depicted the future in advance; John witnessed the fulfilment of all this in the life of Jesus. 6. Unbelief, as an unwillingness to believe, was punished even in Isaiah’s time with the inability to believe, the judgment of obduracy. It is the solicitous operation of the word of God which, with a holy and even healing purpose, drives the beginnings of judgment towards their completion. The Evangelist, like the Prophet, becomes tranquillized in adoring this judgment. 7. The Evangelist, with equal meaning, explains the unbelief of the Jews, which brought about the sufferings of Christ, by the introduction to Isaiah 53, and the judgment of impenitence upon the Jews by the vision Isaiah 6. Consequent upon the judgment of impenitence was the destruction of the city, the climax of which was reached by the burning of the temple; Isaiah himself had seen the temple totter at the revelation of the glory of Christ, the house being filled with smoke at the appearance of the seraphim. Hence these are doubtless symbolical angels of fiery judgment, as, in like manner, the cherubim are symbolical angels of divine providence under its historical veil, in great storms especially; an explanation certainly more obvious than the usual interpretation of ωׇׂ ?ψׇ ?σ. 8. Christ, in the Old Testament, the manifestation of the δόξα of God, as also the Angel of the Presence (see Notes on John 1:14). 9. But the Evangelist is also necessitated to assign the human, ethical reason for that divine judgment in the unbelief of his nation. He therefore repeatedly gives prominence to the inclination to believe, found not only in the greater part of the people but also in many of its rulers. It is a fact of the highest significance that fear of the Pharisees, of the enmity of the Pharisaic party against Christ, was the ruin of everything and prepared for the nation its tragic fate. It is a statement of startling gravity that all the causes of the general apostasy were concentrated in the one sin of fear; and that the different phases of fear: the fear of man, the fear of spectres, the fear of shame and suffering, were concentrated in the one form: the fear of Pharisaic excommunication. Such fearful ruin can the dominion of a Pharisaic terrorism effect. This has been again demonstrated by the history of the Reformation. And the true courage of belief and conviction is as holy and replete with blessing as that fear, in spite of all its pretended holiness, is fatal and damnable. The emotion of fear was, however, grounded on the impulse of ambition, slavish devotion to the honor of Jewish patriotism, irreproachable orthodoxy, Pharisaic righteousness. Yet the ultimate reason of this wordly ambition in hypocritico-spiritual apparel, was the lack of a knowledge and sense of honor with God, the lack of true, inward spiritual life and of a prayerful spirit,—spiritual lethargy, spiritual death under the mask of the most fiery life. 10. In contrast to the gloomy picture of fatal and damnable ambition presented by Pharisaic Judaism, which denied the honor of God in Christ and finally blasphemed it and covered it with shame on the cross, appears the bright image of the mind and self-presentation of Christ. He sought nothing for Himself, with human selfism and selfishness, but made His life a pure sacrifice for the glory of God and the salvation of the world. So it is with His personality: it is the pure ideality of His essence as the manifestation of God, John 12:44. Thus with the sending of Him: it is the pure ideality of His appearance: the glorification of the manifestation of God, John 12:45. With His aim: it is the pure ideality of the transfiguration of the substantial world, of the enlightenment of the darkened world of sin, John 12:46. With His operation: it is the pure ideality of redemption, John 12:47. With the judicial operation of His word: it is the pure ideality of His coming to judgment, John 12:48. So it is with the motive, the aim and even the expression of His word, i. e. the pure ideality of His obedience, life and conduct even to the expression of His word itself, John 12:49-50. 11. We may sum up this rιsumι of the self-presentation of Jesus in these words: Jesus was the pure, perfect, divine-human hypostasis; transparent as crystal in respect of the motive of His life, the manifestation of the Father, hence pure devotion, in His love, to that portion of the world that will receive salvation,—the pure outpouring of eternal life. He was, however, just this complete personality because His presentation by the Father was equally distinct with His own presentation of the Father; i.e. He was the complete divine-human individuality, the complete character. And He gave proof of His perfect personality as well as of His perfect individuality because He, in perfect subjectivity, continually transformed the general ἐντολή into the momentary ἐντολή of His consciousness, or kept the will of God in unison with His own will. (Comp. Leben Jesu, II. p. 1292.) Η AND The Evangelist’s retrospect of the public ministry of Christ and its apparently frustrated result.—This retrospect in the light of prophecy.—Yet they believed not. The yet of unbelievers and the yet of believers, Psalms 73:1 : 1. An antithesis in which the reality of human freedom is expressed; 2. the glory of divine judgment and divine grace; 3. decision for eternity; 4. a contrast, as betwixt heaven and hell.—The shocking obduracy of the Jewish nation in view of Christ’s full, divine revelation of life.—How unbelief is changed from guilt to judgment: 1. Unwillingness to believe, as a crime demanding judgment; 2. inability to believe, as the judgment upon the crime.—The fault contained in the unbelief of the Jews a warning to all times.—The form of their fault: 1. Fear the cause of their unbelief; a. as a fear of excommunication; b. of excommunication by the Pharisees. 2. Ambition the foundation of their fear a morbid delight in the fame of piety, righteousness, orthodoxy, etc. 3. The want of knowledge, of spiritual life and of a sense of God’s honor the foundation of their morbid ambition.—The frightful effects of a Pharisaic ordinance of excommunication 1. As displayed in our history; 2. in the history of the middle ages; 3. as resulting from the very nature of such an ordinance.—The curse of the fear of man, especially in matters of faith.—The ultimate and deepest cause of all evil the want of a sense of God’s glory, Romans 1:21.—Unholy party spirit in its fatal effects: 1. Characteristics of such party spirit: mutual belying, deception, exciting, fettering. 2. The fatal effects; a. fear; b. denial; c. universal ruin.—The rarity and gloriousness of true frankness in the service of truth.—Christ the Glory of God in the Old Testament.—That the Jews despised the glory which God gives, was manifest in that they despised Christ, who, in His righteousness, revealed the glory of God.—Jesus cried aloud. The solemn protestation of Jesus against the charge of having arrogated to Himself a peculiar glory as a false prophet.—The gloriously effulgent picture of the life of Jesus, who rejoiced in sacrifice, contrasted with the selfishness of His contemporaries: 1. They sought their own profit, honor, life, etc.; He lived but for the cause of God. 2. They, therefore, were slavishly dependent one upon another; He stood free in God. 3. They, under the mask of zeal for the glory of God, sought to mar and obliterate the radiant image of His glory; Christ glorified the honor of God and His mercy to His enemies by His perfect joyfulness in meeting shame.—Christ the pure manifestation of God: 1. In His essence; 2. in His aim; 3. in His work; 4. in His word.—Christ the pure manifestation of God in the clear distinctness of His personal nature.—What distinguishes Christ’s testimony to Himself from all self-praise: 1. His remounting unreservedly to the source of His life, the Father; 2. His single aiming at His life’s goal, the salvation of the world.—How the unbeliever is unable to rid himself of the despised word of salvation, bearing it with him, as an inward judgment, to the Last Day, which day shall convert it into an outward judgment also.—The Last Day a revelation of inward judgment.—Christ’s clear law of life an admonition to us to make our darkened life-law clear.—Christ’s law of life as the law of His freedom.—The Evangelist’s retrospect of the prophetic work of Christ a proof that His high-priestly and kingly work was yet to follow.—The deep grief and the sublime pacification of Prophet and Apostle (Isaiah, John) in regarding the unbelief of their times. Starke, Canstein: What happens, happens not because it has been foretold, but it was foretold because God foresaw that it would happen.—The truth of righteous and divine obduration. John 12:42. Hedinger: Blessed is the man to whom the world, with all her rags of honor, is crucified, and who holds her to be worth no more than a thief on the gallows, Galatians 4:16.—Cramer: True, unfeigned belief must always be in harmony with a man’s confession.—Quesnel: Stand we in whatsoever circumstances or situation we may, we are on no account to attach ourselves to them; we must place our dependence on nothing that men can deprive us of, if we desire to obtain and keep that which God alone can give.—Canstein: Christ always appeals to the Father when defending Himself against His enemies. So may faithful servants of the word, finding themselves in contempt and adversity, trust in the ministry which they have received from God. John 12:46. The sun is a fair light; Christ, the Sun of Righteousness, many thousand times fairer. John 12:47. A loyal servant of the Word is sent only to bring salvation. John 12:48. Quesnel: It is never permitted to the servants of Christ to avenge themselves on the despisers of their preaching; it is God’s word; at the right time He will judge such conduct. Gerlach: The guilt of the Jews assumed such magnitude in that they were not only inwardly estranged from Jesus and His revelation, but also, when, by the most glorious miracles, Jesus supported that highest proof (see chap John 7:17), they yet turned away from Him.—The discourse from John 12:44 is not a single one; in order to show the inexcusableness of Jewish unbelief John subjoins a summary of the Lord’s discourses; many reminiscences of former speeches. With John 12:44 comp. John 7:16; John 5:19; John 8:42.—With John 12:44 John 8:19; John 14:10; chap. 1.—With John 12:46 John 1:5; John 8:12; John 12:35.—With John 12:47-48 John 3:17; John 5:45, etc.—With John 12:49 John 8:28; John 8:38.—With John 12:50 John 6:39-40; John 10:11.—His revelation was nothing but light, life and love. Braune: Elisha did twelve miracles, Elijah fewer still, and if we reckon up all the miracles of the prophets we find that seventy-four were performed by them; those of Moses are estimated at seventy-six. But although John chronicles but seven, he remarks, John 21:25, that the world would not contain the books that would have to be written if all the deeds of Jesus should be detailed. (Interesting from a theological point of view; homiletically a quantitative numeration of all the miracles would be unadvisable. As to the Number Seven of John the case is of course quite different). And yet the believed not on Him. Awful yet!—In sins of conscience the beginning is to fear and flee.—Without confession, faith soon wanes and its light threatens to become extinct. Gossner: We fear the excommunication of men, but not the excommunication of God, of Christ.—This fear of an unrighteous excommunication may plunge us into eternal perdition, into the denial excommunication of God.—It is possible for a soul to be saved without external communion with the Church, without sacraments administered by priests, if it be unrighteously shut out from them.—Let us therefore fear nothing but excommunication from Christ in our hearts, nothing but separation from the love of Christ.—Faith is the name of the way that leads from darkness into light. John 12:48. The hearing of God’s word is never without result; a man cannot remain neutral with regard to it; it is either, or—friend or foe—grace or judgment. John 12:50. He preaches with exceeding joyfulness who speaks nothing from himself; when it is His (God’s) word and not the preacher’s babble or work of art. Heubner: The secret, inward conviction of the divine mission of Jesus makes him so much the more culpable who is ashamed of acknowledging such a conviction.—The confession of the gospel, the confession of Jesus, is of particular worth in times when it involves shame.—How many dangers and hinderances to free confession there are in high positions! The fear of men, and ambition are the mightiest impediments to outspoken belief.—Pharisees. Entire parties may exert an influence in the repression and hinderance of the gospel.—To reject Jesus is to reject God.—His judging at some future day shall not be partial, as on account of personal injuries inflicted by unbelievers. The unbeliever will be condemned by his own conscience. Unbelief bears its judge within itself.—Christ left no particle of His duty undone. So it was no fault of His if men would not believe. Schleiermacher: There is but one honor—and that is the honor which is in God’s sight; there is but one fear which does not debase men—and that is the fear that says: How should I do this great wickedness and sin against God? But we do commit sin against God and His Spirit, if we seal up within our hearts what we in their inmost depths account as truth, and put a bar to its outgoing and further operation. For as common property and possession the Lord has endowed us with all spiritual gifts.—Some are of opinion that it was the general design of the Lord to turn aside the belief of mankind in great measure from His own person and direct it towards Him who sent Him; others think: All the faith that He demands must be directed to Him and His person alone. Let us avoid the one and the other extreme, whilst we combine the two, for such was the Redeemer’s intention.—In view of His Passion and Death saith the Redeemer: I know that His commandment is life everlasting. Besser: Perhaps the expression that so frequently and emphatically recurs in the discourses of the Lord, to the effect, namely, that God had sent Him, should also serve to designate Him as the Angel (Ambassador) of the Lord in the Scriptures of the Old Testament.—Stier: John knows no other true and full belief than that which makes confession. [Craven: From Augustine: John 12:38. It is evident that the arm of the Lord is the Son of God Himself. John 12:37-38. God predicted the unbelief of the Jews but did not cause it; He does not compel men to sin because He knows they will sin. John 12:39-40. If any ask why they could not, I answer, Because they would not—it is the fault of the human will that they could not. They well deserved this—God hardens and blinds a man by forsaking and not supporting him. John 12:42-43. As their faith grew, their love of human praise grew still more, and outstripped it. John 12:44-45. He signifies that He is more than He appears to be.—We believe an Apostle, but we do not believe in an Apostle. John 12:46. He saith to His disciples, Ye are the light of the world, but He does not say, Ye are come a light into the world that whosoever believeth in you, etc.; All saints are lights but they are so by faith [reflection] because they are enlightened by Him. John 12:47. I judge Him not, i.e. not now; now is the time of mercy, afterward will be the time of judgment. John 12:49. He Himself is the Word which the Father speaketh.—From Chrysostom: John 12:37-38. The prophets had predicted this very unbelief, and He came [amongst other intents] that it might be made manifest.—That is expressive not of the cause but of the event; they did not disbelieve because Isaiah said they would, Esaias said they would because they would. John 12:39. Could not, a common form of speech among ourselves; we say, I cannot love such a man, meaning only a vehement will. John 12:39-40. He does not leave us except we wish Him; we begin to forsake first.—As it is not the fault of the sun that it hurts weak eyes, so neither is God to blame for punishing those who do not attend to His words. John 12:43. The praise [glory] of God is publicly to confess Christ; the praise [glory] of men is to glory in earthly things. John 12:47. I am not the cause of his judgment, but he is himself by despising My words. John 12:48. That this (John 12:46-47) might not serve to encourage sloth, He warns of a terrible judgment about to come.——From Litany of the Church of England: John 12:37-40. “From all hardness of heart, and contempt of Thy Word and commandment, good Lord, deliver us.” [From Burkitt: John 12:38-41. The reference is to Isaiah 6:3; whence a clear argument for Christ’s divinity may be drawn. John 12:37. Let not the ministers of Christ be discouraged at their want of success, when they consider the small success of our Lord’s own ministry. John 12:38. Isaiah’s complaint of the small success of his preaching, a prophecy of the like success that Christ and His ministers should have under the gospel.—The gospel in all ages has met with more that rejected it than have savingly entertained it. John 12:38; John 12:40. When men close their eyes wilfully, it is just with God to close their eyes judicially.—The infidelity of a people is to be resolved into the perverseness of their own wills, and not to any judicial blindness wrought by God upon them antecedent to their own sin.—God’s act of hardening was consequential upon their sinning. John 12:42. Even in times and places where infidelity most prevails, the ministry of the word shall not be altogether without fruit.—Fear of men has kept many from believing on Christ, and more from confessing Him. John 12:43. They valued applause from men, more than God’s approving them; no greater snare to draw persons from duty than an inordinate love of their own reputation.—How often is the applause of men preferred before the commendation of God. John 12:45. We do not see Christ aright unless we see Him to be truly God.—The Father is not to be seen but in the Son. John 12:46. The dreadful judgment denounced by Christ against all unbelievers John 12:46-47. Learn—1. Christ and His doctrine inseparable; 2. rejecters of Christ and His doctrine shall not escape the judgment of Christ at the last day; 3. were there no other witness against rejecters, the word preached would be sufficient.—The word preached is now the rule of living, hereafter it shall be the rule of judging. [From M. Henry: John 12:37-41. The honor done to our Lord by the Old Testament prophets.—Two things said concerning untractable Israel —1. they did not believe; 2. they could not believe.—They could not believe because—1. they would not, a moral impotency like that of one accustomed to do evil, Jeremiah 13:23; Jeremiah 2. God had blinded their eyes, God is not the author of sin and yet, (1) a righteous hand of God sometimes to be acknowledged in the blindness of those who persist in sin as punishment for preceding resistance, (2) judicial blindness is threatened against those who wilfully persist in wickedness. John 12:42-43. Many professed more kindness for Christ than they had, these had more than they were willing to profess.—A struggle between their convictions and corruptions.—There are more good people than we think there are—some are better than they seem.—The power of the world in smothering convictions.—Observe concerning these believers—1. wherein they failed—in not confessing Christ; 2. what they feared—disgrace and damage; 3. the ground of their fear—they loved the praise of men more than the praise of God.—Love of the praise of men—1. as a by-end in that which is good, will make a man a hypocrite where religion is in fashion; 2. as a principle in that which is evil, will make one an apostate where religion is in disgrace. John 12:44. Jesus cried [aloud] and said: this intimates His boldness and earnestness in speaking. John 12:44-46. The privileges and dignities of those that believe, they are brought into—1. an honorable acquaintance with God; 2. a comfortable enjoyment of themselves. John 12:47-48. The peril of those that believe not; observe—1. who they are whose unbelief is here condemned—those who hear and believe not; 2. the constructive malignity of their unbelief—a rejection of Christ; 3. the forbearance of Jesus toward them; 4. their certain judgment at the great day. John 12:49-50. The authority of Christ—1. His commission from the Father; 2. the design of that commission—life everlasting; 3. His own observance of the instructions thereof.—Our Lord learned obedience Himself before He taught it to us.—Those who disobey Christ despise everlasting life. [From Doddridge: John 12:42-43. Strange infatuation! that the human mind should be capable of believing that there is a God, and yet of preferring the creature before Him.—From Scott: John 12:42-43. That will not be accounted true faith which does not overcome [worldly] ambition, and induce its possessors to confess Christ before His enemies.—Chief Rulers are especially in danger of prevaricating.—From A. ClarkeJoh_12:42-43. Many persons are liberal in their condemnation of the Jews who are probably committing the same sort of transgression under circumstances which heighten their iniquity.—It is possible for a man to credit the four Evangelists [the entire Bible] and yet live and die an infidel so far as his own salvation is concerned. [From Stier: John 12:39-40. The predicted judicial hardening [of the Jews] in the fulfilment of which, unbelief itself becomes only a new sign [to us] in proof.—The guilt of unbelief rested solely with Israel John 12:37-43. Of the unbelieving there are, according to St. John, two classes—1. the unsusceptible and hardened; 2. those who confess not in spite of their [imperfect] belief—He knows no other genuine, and perfect faith than that which confesses. John 12:50. The commission is, in its ground and aim, according to its design and indwelling power, life everlasting for all who believe. [From A Plain Commentary (Oxford): John 12:46. It is evidently implied that He found all the world in darkness.—From Barnes: John 12:37. The Jews did not believe as a nation. John 12:42-43. True faith is active—it overcomes the fear of man, it prompts to self-denying duties. John 12:48. Hath one that judgeth him: He will carry his own condemnation with him, his own conscience will condemn him.—Learn that—1. a guilty conscience needs no accuser; 2. the words of Christ will be remembered by the rejecter; 3. this [rejection] will be the source of his condemnation; 4. the conscience of the sinner will concur with the sentence of Christ in the great day; 5. the word that Christ has spoken will be that by which the sinner will be judged in the last day. John 12:50. His commandment is life everlasting, i.e. the cause or source of everlasting life.—The [one] reason of the earnestness and fidelity of Jesus—He saw that eternal life depended on faithful preaching.—Every minister should have a deep and abiding conviction that He delivers a message connected with the eternal welfare of his hearers; under the influence of this belief he should preach fearlessly.—The close of the public ministry of Christ; such a close as all His ministers should desire to make. [From Ryle: John 12:37. Where there is the greatest quantity of the form of religion, there is often the greatest proportion of formality and unbelief. John 12:38. It is a singular fact that the very chapter which the Jews have been most unwilling to believe should begin with the question—Who hath believed our report?—If the Jews had not been unbelieving, the Scriptures would have been untrue.—“Darkness does not blind men so much as light, unless God renews the mind by His Spirit.” [Rollock.]—Remark how seeing, understanding, being converted, and being healed, are linked together. John 12:42. Many of the Chief Rulers believed: their faith was only of the head and not of the heart—they were cowards. John 12:43. The same miserable motive is still ruining myriads of souls.—“They were not willing to part with their great places in the magistracy.” [Poole.] John 12:48. There will be a resurrection of all faithful servants at the last day. [From Owen: John 12:40. He hath blinded—hardened; this He did mediately or by the instrumentality of the truth; the indirect agency of truth when resisted to render the soul insensible to divine love is equally certain and dreadful in its results as though the effect were produced by a direct agency upon the heart. John 12:50. His commandment contains in itself the germ and principle of eternal life, and when received into the soul results in everlasting salvation. [From Whedon: John 12:40. Although God was the unwilling cause of their blindness, it was their wicked will that gave to the cause its effect.—Their perverse will transformed His mercy into judgment; his means of softening into results of hardening—thus does the same sun that melts the wax harden the clay. John 12:42. A type fulfilled in nearly every age of advancement and beneficent resolution. John 12:50. God’s divine, authoritative word implanted within our soul is eternal life in its very element and essence.] Footnotes: John 12:37.—[Tοσαῦτα may be understood of magnitude: so great, such (comp. Matthew 8:10, Luke 7:9; Revelation 18:17; Galatians 3:1), or of multitude: so many (Matthew 15:33; John 6:9; John 14:9; John 11:11). Lόcke and De Wette decide for the former, Meyer and Alford for the latter. Lange translates such.—P. S.] John 12:40.—[Tischendorf gives ἐπώρωσεν, instead of the πεπώρωκεν of Lach., in accordance with A. B* K. L. X., etc., and also ΰ.II., as amended from ἐπηρώτησεν]. John 12:40.—[Tischenderf and Alford give στραφῶσιν in accordance with ΰ. B. D.; the text. rec. reads ἐριστοραφῶσι according to A. D. 2 E. F., etc.] John 12:40.—The Future ἰάσομαι is to be preferred to the Subjunctive ἰάσωμαι, in accordance with the decided preponderance of authorities, Lachmann, Tischendorf. ΰ. A. B. D., etc.] John 12:41.—Ὅτι [because] is to he adopted in the place of ὅτε [when, text roc, E. V.] in accordance with [ΰ. A. B. L., etc., Lachmann, Tischenderf [Alford, Westcott and Hort]. John 12:41.—[See Exegetical Notes]. John 12:43.—[See Exegetical Notes]. John 12:47.—Καὶμὴφυλάξῃ instead of καὶμὴπιστεύσῃ, in accordance with Codd. [ΰ.] A. B. K. [L.M.], etc., Lachmann Tischendorf [Alford, Westcott and Hort], Jesus goes away after uttering this saying. [ΰ. T. Δ. Δ. and Verss. give ἓως, in this verse; in John 12:36, ΰ. B. D. L. give ςω.—P.S.] VI THE RETURN OF JESUS FROM , IN LOVE TO HIS OWN. THE IN THE CIRCLE OF ITSELF. THE AND OF THE . THE AND OF JUDAS. THE FOOT-WASHING OF CHRIST A OF , AS OF . AND OF IN THE CHURCH. THE OF THE FROM THE OF JESUS John 13:1-30(Comp. Matthew 26:17-35; Mark 14:12-31; Luke 22:7-38; John 13:1-15 Pericope for Maundy-Thursday) 1Now [but] before the feast of the passover, when Jesus knew [Jesus knowing] that his hour was come [coming] that he should depart out of this world unto the Father, having loved his own which were (who remained behind) in the world, he 2[omit he] loved them unto the end. And supper being ended [the meal being about to begin, or, having begun] the devil having now [already, ἤδη] put into the heart of Judas Iscariot, Simon’s son, to betray him [put into the heart, i.e., suggested 3that Judas Iscariot, the son of Simon, should betray him]; Jesus [He] knowing that the Father had given [him, αὐτῷ ?] all things into his hands, and that he was come [came forth, ἐξῆλθεν] from God, and went [was going, ὑπάγει] to God; 4He riseth from supper [the meal], and laid [layeth] aside his garments [the outer 5or, upper garment]; and took a towel and girded himself. After that [thereupon or, then] he poureth water into a [the] basin, and [and he] began to wash the disciples’ feet, and to wipe them with the towel wherewith he was girded. 6Then cometh he [so he cometh] to Simon Peter: [,] and Peter [he] saith unto him, Lord, dost thou wash my feet? 7Jesus answered and said unto him, What I do thou knowest not now; but thou shalt know [wilt learn, understand] hereafter. 8Peter saith unto him, Thou shalt never [Never shalt thou] wash my feet. Jesus answered him, if I wash thee not, thou hast no part with [in] me. 9Simon Peter saith unto him, Lord, not my feet only, but also my [the] hands, and my [the] head. 10Jesus saith to him, He that is washed [hath been bathed] needeth not save to wash his [the] feet [needeth not to wash himself (save his feet)], but is clean every whit [wholly, entirely clean]: and ye are clean, but not all. 11For he knew who should [was about to] betray him; therefore [for this reason] said he, Ye are not all clean. 12So after he had washed their feet, and had taken his garments [upper garment] and was set [had sat] down again, he said unto them, Know[Un derstand] ye what I have done to you? 13Ye call me Master [the Teacher] and 14[the] Lord: and ye say well; for so I am. If I then, your [the] Lord and Master [the Teacher], have washed your feet; ye also ought to wash one another’s feet. 15For I have given you an example, that ye [also] should do as I have done to you. 16Verily, verily, I say unto you, The [A] servant is not greater than his lord; neither he that is sent [nor one sent] greater than he that sent [the one sending] him. 17If ye know these things, happy [blessed] are ye if ye do them [the same]. 18I speak not of you all: I know whom I have chosen [I chose]: but (thus it is) that the Scripture may be fulfilled, “He that eateth bread with me hath lifted up 19his heel against me.” (Psalms 41:9). Now [From henceforth] I tell you before it come [hath come to pass], that, when it is [hath] come to pass, ye may believe that I am he. [He, the Messiah indicated in Psalms 41:9]. 20Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that receiveth whomsoever I send receiveth me; and [but] he that receiveth me receiveth him that sent me. 21When Jesus had thus said, he [Having said this, Jesus] was troubled in spirit, and testified, and said, Verily, verily, I say unto you, that one of you shall [will 22betray me. Then [omit then] the disciples looked one on another [at one another] 23doubting [being uncertain (ὰπορoύηενοι)] of whom he spake. Now there was leaning [reclining at the table] on [in] Jesus’ bosom one of his disciples, whom Jesus loved. 24Simon Peter therefore beckoned [beckoneth, maketh a sign, νεύει] to him, that he should ask who it should be of whom he spake [and saith to him, say, who 25is it of whom he speaketh]? He then [But he] lying [leaning back (thus), ὰναπεσὼν (οὕτως) ] on Jesus’ breast saith unto him, Lord, who is it? Jesus [therefore] answered, He it is to whom I shall give a sop, when I have dipped it [for whom I shall dip the sop (morsel) and give it to him]. And when he had dipped the sop he gave it [Having therefore dipped the sop, he taketh and giveth it] to Judas Iscariot, the son of Simon [to Judas, the son of Simon Iscariot]. 27And after the sop Satan entered into him. Then [Therefore] said Jesus unto him, That [What] thou doest, do quickly. 28Now [But] no man [no one of those reclining] at the table knew [understood] for what intent he spake [said] this unto him. 29For some of them thought, because Judas had the bag [kept the purse] that Jesus had [omit had] said unto him, Buy those things that we have need of against [Buy what we need for] the feast; or, 30that he should give something to the poor. He then, having received the sop, went immediately out; and [but] it was night. AND [Here begins the third main part of the gospel of John setting forth the glorification of Christ as the suffering High Priest and the victorious King. It is subdivided into three sections. The first treats of His private glorification in the midst of His disciples; the foot-washing, the parting discourses and the sacerdotal prayer, chs. 13–17; the second His public glorification in His passion and death, chs. 18 and 19; the third His full glorification in His resurrection and reappearance among His disciples as the pledge of His abiding presence to the end of time, chs. 20 and 21. With John 13 we approach the Holy of holies in the earthly life of our Lord. Having completed His prophetic office and public ministry, He spent the evening before His crucifixion in the quiet circle of His disciples and friends, and poured out before them His heart, in full view of the sacrifice on the cross by which He was shortly to show in fact His boundless love to them and to the whole world. Such an evening occurred but once in the world’s history: the fullness of eternity itself was condensed into a few fleeting moments. The farewell words of our Lord, chs. John 13:31 to John 17:26, stand alone even in the Book of books. The nearest approach to them we may find in the parting song and blessing of Moses (Deuteronomy 32, 33), and the farewell address of Paul to the elders of Ephesus (Acts 20:17 ff.). A more remote parallel is the prophetic picture in the second part of Isaiah, the prince and evangelist among the prophets, especially John 53, where the Messiah is represented as a man of sorrows who bore our griefs and carried our sorrows, who was wounded for our transgressions and bruised for our iniquities. The last words of our Lord to His own combine the deepest emotion with serene repose; they are solemn, weighty and affecting beyond description; they seem to sound directly from heaven, and they lift the reader high above time and space. We have here more than words, we have things, verities, acts of infinite love going out from God and going into the hearts of men. The main idea is: I in the Father, the Father in Me; I in the believers, the believers in Me, sharing My glory; or, as Bengel puts it: I came from My Father in heaven, I fulfilled His will on earth, I now return to My Father. (“Veni a Patre, fui in mundo, vado ad Patrem”). No disciple was so well qualified to apprehend, preserve and record these farewell words, as the bosom friend of Jesus who, during their delivery, reclined on His breast and heard the beatings of His heart. He omits an account of the institution of the Lord’s Supper, as being already sufficiently known from the other Gospels, but these discourses, as also those in chs. 4 and 6, are full of the ideas of vital union with Christ and the communion of saints, which the sacrament symbolizes. In the same way John omits the form of baptism, but unfolds the underlying idea of regeneration, (John 3). Comp on these wonderful chapters the introductory remarks off Dr. Lange below on John 13:31 and John 17:16—P. S.] On the hypotheses of modern criticism (Bretschneider, Strauss, Baur, etc.), concerning the history of the foot-washing, see Meyer [p. 492]. On the relation of the Johannean account of the farewell-repast of Jesus to that found in the Synoptists, comp. Comm. on Matthew, chap. 26. [Am. ed. p. 454 ff., where the English literature on this difficult question of chronology with many additional remarks is supplied.—P. S.]. After that general examination it will here suffice for us to render prominent once more the agreement between John and the Synoptists in those particular passages in which it is disputed. Thus here John 13:1-4; John 13:27; John 18:28; John 19:31. Bynδus, Wichelhaus (History of the Passion) and Rφpe (1856) hold that the repast of the foot-washing was not identical with the feast of the Passover. This view, is, indeed, not tenable in its separation of the two repasts;—there is, however, some truth in it, inasmuch as two divisions in the Last Supper are to be definitely distinguished, of which divisions the Synoptists portray preλminently the second, i.e. the institution of the Lord’s Supper, while John brings into relief the first section, i.e. the Jewish paschal feast,—that which has been transformed into the typical Christian love-feasts. That the Christian Agape, in its distinction from the Lord’s Supper and yet in conjunction with the same, was already existent at the time when John wrote his Gospel, is evident from 1 Corinthians 11:17 ff., etc.; Jude John 13:12; 2 Peter 2:13; probably also, from Acts 2:42; Acts 2:46; Acts 6:2. That, moreover, the Agape preceded the celebration of the Supper in the Apostolic Church, is evidenced by 1 Corinthians 11:20-21 and by the fact that down to Augustine’s time the African Church retained the custom of holding a common feast in the Church on Maundy Thursday, previous to the reception of the Lord’s Supper; this was the case long after the ordinary Agapes had been separated from the Lord’s Supper. (There was doubtless, however, a more decided separation of the Love Feast and the Communion in the Western than in the Eastern Church). Now if in John’s time the Agape already existed in the stead of the Paschal feast, we can readily comprehend that the term ἀγαπᾷν,—an expression which of itself signifies: to testify love,—might have a double meaning in the mouth of John, and thus imply: He showed them His love by the Agape. The mysterious expression of the Evangelist seems to contain still more of design when we consider that τὸτέλος was likewise indicative of the religious ceremony, the celebration of initiation. The scarce translatable word: unto the end, unto the decision He loved them (or: His love to them brought on His end together with its [His love’s] completion; or, as Zinzendorf has it: He loved Himself to death, brought on death by loving), contains for Christian Greek readers the assonance of the thought: He gave them the Agape in anticipation of the Christian festival of initiation, of Christian initiation into the fellowship of His death by the Lord’s Supper. Since Christ desired to dovelop the Passover into the New Testament form of the Supper, it was quite significant that He so ordered the feast that the Passover itself took place before the beginning of the 15th Nisan and only the Supper fell into the full feast. Therefore He came early with the disciples to Jerusalem and commenced the celebration before the turning-point of the two days, i.e. Before six o’clock on the evening of the 14th Nisan; so early was it that the conclusion of the Paschal feast or original Agape was reached before six o’clock, or, at all events, just about that hour. This simple supposition removes all difficulties, especially when it is observed that in those days the accuracy of our measurement of time had no existence. John 13:1. But before the feast of the passover, etc. [ΙΙρὸδὲτῆςἑορτῆςτοῦπάσχα, εἰδὼςὁἸησοῦςὕτιη̇ ?͂λθεναὐτοῦἡὥραἵναμεταβῇἐκτοῦκόσμουτούτουπρὸςτὸνπατέρα, ἀγαπήσαςτοὺςἰδίουςτοὺςἐντῷκόσμῳ, εἰςτέλοςἠγάπησεναὐτούς.] Different constructions: 1. The first sentence continues to the close John 13:5 [or rather John 13:4—P. S.] and the apodosis begins with the words John 13:4 : “He rose from supper” (Griesbach, Matthδi [Bleek, Ebrard, Westcott and Hort] and others). If we make it the evening before the festal eve, or the evening of the 13th Nisan and allow of no pause, the history is continued uninterruptedly through the night until the end of chap. 17, and the crucifixion follows the next day, on the 14th, still before the feast. This assumption is contradicted by a. the exceedingly difficult construction (comp. John 6:22); b. the different sense of εἰδώς, John 13:1; John 13:3; the distinction is entirely blotted out if we consider the second εἰδώς a repetition of the first, and the words: εἰςτέλος, etc. a parenthesis. (Bleek: Before the feast, when Jesus knew that His hour was come to depart out of this world unto the Father, having loved His own who were in the world—He did love them unto the end—, when a repast was spread, etc.). The Evangelist had in view a twofold great antithesis redounding to the glorification of the Lord. The first (John 13:1) glorifies especially His love, whereby in the love-feast itself He revealed His love to the disciples unto the consummation; the second (John 13:2-4) especially glorifies His humility, in which He washed the disciples’ feet, although He knew, of Himself, that the Father was already tendering omnipotence to Him and that the Satanic betrayer was amongst the disciples. These two specifically different considerations cannot be mingled without obliterating the sense of the entire passage c. The formal ending of the sentence John 13:1 is equally clear. 2. The first sentence comes to a conclusion with the first verse (Vulgate, Luther, Lόcke, Lachmann, etc. [Ewald, Hengstenberg, Godet]). Still there are various conceptions: a. Kling, Luthardt and others connect πρὸτῆςἑορτῆς, etc. with εἰδώς; when Jesus knew before the feast of the passover. But this would render the designation of the time unmeaning. b. Application of the πρὸτν͂ς, etc. to ἀγαπήσας (Wieseler, Tholuck) in this sense: having even before the feast, in His consciousness of His approaching departure (John 12:23), loved His own, He loved them more than ever at the end. In connection with this, Tholuck observes, that it is impossible to interpret ἠγάπησεναὐτούς with Lόcke: He gave them a proof of His love, and he maintains that it indicates merely a loving frame of mind. But certainly it may mean a loving mood manifesting itself by a sign. And this admitted, the loving mood relapses into the proof of love. c. Application of πρὸτῆς to (the entire history. Meyer thinks that if it had been the eve of the feast (the evening of the 14th Nisan) John must have written: τῇπρώτῃτῶνἀζύμων. The chronological turning-point seems to be obscured in this place by the fear of “Harmonistics.” Τῇπρώτῃτῶνἀζύμων and πρὸτῆςἑοπτῆς are the self-same thing. We make πρὸτῆς, etc. relate to the mysterious and significant εἰςτέλοςἠγάπησεναὐτούς. But before the feast He came forward again (contrast to what has gone before). Then He carried His love to the τέλος. The completed expression of His love brought along with it the completion of His life. In particular, namely, He manifested at the love-feast the humility of His love. Jesus, knowing [εἰδὼςὁἸησ.].—The δέ [after πρό at the beginning of the verse] is of great moment here, serving also as an elucidation. Jesus had withdrawn Himself. But before the beginning of the feast He was again drawn forth by the consciousness that His hour was come, and by His love to His own, and now He loved them so that the end, or the crisis, was the result. The love-feast brought the crisis. And so, even though the primary reference of the words of the first verse is to the disciples, they also relate to the great mass of His own in the world. He came back and carried out His work of love to the end. He loved Himself to His end, to death, for the paschal feast brought on the decision of the betrayer and hence His death. ἸΙγάπησεν, therefore, has reference undoubtedly to the whole love-feast, and the like is true of πρὸτῆςἑορτῆς. Before the paschal evening had fully begun, Judas went out into the night; with his departure τὸτέλος was decided; Jesus’ act of love had induced the decision. But the more definite date was the leaving of Bethany for Jerusalem: that was the expression of His love by which the end was occasioned. The reference of the words ἀγαπήσαςτοὺςἰδίους to the foregoing: to depart unto the Father, after He had loved (Meyer), is void of meaning; but the interpretation: “He rendered them the last testimony of His love,” likewise withholds from εἰςτέλος its rights. John 13:2. And when the meal bad begun, or, supper being served [καὶδείπνουγινομένου].—The introduction of δεῖπνον without an article is explained by the fact that John has already indicated the nature of the δεῖπνον by the ἠγάπησεν in the first verse. “It seems unfavorable to the idea that it was the paschal meal (Wichelhaus), but as ἀπὸδεἰπνου, ἐπὶδεῖπνονἰένου mean: after the repast, to go to table, so δείπνουγινομένου does not mean: when a meal took place, but it signifies when the meal took place or was about to take place, to wit, the repast of this day, and that was the festive meal.” Tholuck. Should we even read γενομένου (see the Textual Notes), it would not mean: after the repast was over (Luther, Hofmann [E. V.]), but after it had already begun. According to Meyer and many others this meal was not the supper; John, they say, assumes that to be already known to his readers (it having been celebrated on the same evening). Hence, according to Meyer the paschal meal is omitted. According to Baur it is omitted because the author of the Gospel chap. 6. connected it with the second paschal feast of Jesus; according to Strauss the Evangelist knew nothing of the Supper. [According to Schenkel John intended to guard against ascribing a magical effect to the Lord’s Supper, and to prevent sacramental controversies. But this could have been done more effectually by plain instruction.—P. S.] The meal having begun, or, being served.—That is, they had already reclined, John 13:4; John 13:12. [Not being ended, as in the E. V. See Textual Notes.—P. S.] The devil having already put it into the heart of Judas [τοὺδιαβόλουῆδηβεβληκότοςεἰςτὴνκαρδὶαν]—The explanation of Meyer, when the devil had already made his plot [had put it into hisheart], is untenable (see Textual Notes). Strange indeed it would be if the heart of the devil were the subject of this announcement, independently of the fact that after all there would be little sense in the statement: the devil had resolved within himself, etc. As if such a thing were dependent on the resolve of the devil. The condition of affairs is this: the devil had sown the thought, the ἐπιθυηία, of betrayal in Judas’ heart; the wicked counsel becomes a firm decree only in John 13:27. It is true that, according to Matthew, Judas had previously been to the high-priests and negotiated with them; this fact, however, does not preclude subsequent waverings and conflicts on the part of the unhappy man. Now while the first antithesis was general in its character and referred to the whole love-feast, this second antithesis is special and has reference to the humility of the love of Jesus which found expression in the washing of the disciples’ feet. Yet the words: the devil having, etc., are to be primarily referred as a supplement to the foregoing, in this sense: the brooding treason in the breast of Judas did not hinder the Lord from causing the repast to commence. Perhaps, however, it is likewise intended that the words should mark out Judas as the chief author of the dispute which arose among the disciples on this occasion as to their respective ranks,—a dispute chronicled by Luke. No doubt the unwillingness of each one of the disciples to take upon himself the office of the foot-washing was one of the modes in which their contentious spirit manifested itself (Luke 22:24; Luke 22:27; ancient exegetes; Leben Jesu, ii. p. 1314). Euthymius Zigabenus sees in the mention of Judas a trait illustrative of the long-suffering of Jesus; the truth of this view Meyer groundlessly denies. John 13:3. Jesus, knowing.—Albeit He had the presentiment of His glory; namely 1. the presentiment of His elevation to divine power; 2. of His perfected mission resting upon His descent from the Father; 3. of His imminent elevation to the throne of glory. John 13:4. He riseth from supper.—The contrast of His service with the presentiment of His lofty dignity. He rises to perform the foot-washing. Since this was ordinarily done by slaves previous to the commencement of the meal, in the absence of a slave the duty naturally devolved upon the humblest of the circle. In this assumption lay the fuse that kindled the disciples’ last strife for preλminence. At all events the dispute recounted by Luke appears to have been in part the occasion of the foot-washing. According to Strauss, De Wette; Meyer and others this is not the place for that dispute. It was, however, natural for it to break out more than once, and we should be attributing too great a piece of inaccuracy to Luke, were we to imagine that his placing of it in the history of the Supper was altogether erroneous. According to Meyer and Tholuck no such cause was requisite to induce Jesus to wash the disciples’ feet; they maintain that the act was a purely symbolical one. But this is in opposition to the realism of the life of Jesus and commingles the Old and New Testaments. Symbolism set forth in ceremonies is of the Old Testament. Wichelhaus discovers in the foot-washing an indication that the entertainment was no paschal feast, since, if it had been, the host must have assumed the duty. As contradictory to this view we cannot, with Tholuck, cite Luke 7:44, affirming that the washing of the feet was not always practiced. The omission of it there is reprehended. Manifestly, the very absence of the host proves that it was the time of the celebration of the Passover. On the evening of the 13th Nisan the host might have charged himself with the foot-washing; on the evening of the 14th Nisan he was obliged to eat in company with his family-circle as the father of the house and was thus prevented from performing the rite in question. For he did not sup with the circle of disciples; here the position of father of the family belonged to Jesus. Layeth aside His outer garment [τὰιμάτια. Bengel: eas vestes, quζ lotionem impedirent.—P. S.]—The prompt and joyous alacrity of the Lord is picturesquely delineated by the rapid succession of the several sentences in designation of the several acts. The fact of His girding Himself contrasts with the expectation that others should have done it for Him. John 13:5. Into the wash-basin [τὸννιπτῆρα].—Into the one appointed which stood there. [Grotius: Nihil ministerii omitlit.] From this trait as well as from the expression: He girded Himself, we perceive that the foot-washing was anticipated and had been left undone in default of a servant, or a disciple willing to discharge the office. And He began [καὶἤρξατο].—It undoubtedly seems to follow from the relation of Joh 13:5 to John 13:6, that He had already washed the feet of other disciples when He came to Peter (Meyer), because the whole proceeding is already described John 13:5. But He seems too to have come soon to Peter, since the latter interrupted His work as He was beginning. It would also be contrary to the inversion of orders of rank in the foot-washing if Jesus had begun with a disciple who was in a certain respect the first. Augustine and many Catholic exegetes make Peter the first; Chrysostom and others, on the contrary, conceive Judas to have been the first. John 13:6. Dost thou wash my feet?—According to Tholuck (with reference to Chrysost.), this is a refusal from reverence, only after the reproof of Jesus becoming a refusal from self-will. Yet the unmistakable reverence is lacking in a true sense of the extraordinariness and spiritual significance of the action,—is lacking in full submission; thus a germ of self-will lent its influence even here. At all events Peter applied to the action of Jesus the same rule of outward rank, which effectually hindered the introduction into his own mind of the idea that he should wash the feet of his fellow-disciples. John 13:7. Thou knowest not now, but thou wilt know hereafter [σν̀οὐκοἱδαςἄρτι, γνώσῃδὲμετὰταῦτα].—The antithesis of σύ is sternly met by the antithesis of ἐγώ and σύ. According to Chrysostom and others, also Tholuck [Hengstenberg, Ewald], μετὰταῦτα is indicative of subsequent enlightenment [after the day of Pentecost]; according to Luthardt it means: in eternity; according to De Wette and Meyer, the explanation John 13:12 ff. That explanation is doubtless intended in the first instance, not, however, to the exclusion of a progressive experience or knowledge in Christian illumination. Calvin: Quavis scientia doctior hζc ignorantiζ species (est), cum Domino concedimus, ut supra nos sapiat.John 13:8. Peter saith unto Him, Never shalt Thou wash my feet [οὐμὴ ?…εἰςτὸναἰῶνα].—Again the self-will of the apostle develops into open contradiction and disobedience,—as on the occasion when Jesus announced that He was about to tread the path of suffering, Matthew 16:22. The connection between the two passages is discoverable, on the one hand, in the great attachment and reverence which Peter entertained for the Lord; but, on the other hand, also, in his cleaving to the external glory and sovereignty of Christ and in coveting a share thereof for himself. Christ now began practically with His self-humiliation to turn Peter’s moral view of the world upside down; Peter, meanwhile, instead of divining the blessing of the cross enfolded in this act, struggled with anxious forebodings against its pricks. Christ’s washing of the disciples’ feet was an affair utterly repugnant to his soul. Never; properly—to eternity, into the ζon; εἰςτὸναἰῶνα. If I wash thee not.—In this case too Jesus must give utterance to a threat, as in Matthew 16:23, before Peter’s strong self-will is brought into subjection. This strong self-will is indicated in the further history of Peter and likewise by the words of Jesus John 21:18. Hence the saying of Jesus was true, primarily, in the literal sense; not, indeed, in the sense ascribed to it by Peter, viz., If I do not corporeally cleanse thy feet,—but: if thou accept not my service of love in this washing of thy feet. Peter, had he persistently refused, would have put an end to the relationship between disciple and Master. The entire relationship was made dependent on this single point. No fortuitous thought was thereby involved, but a symbolic-typical act. Insomuch as this is true, Peter’s resistance was, in the first place, a negation of the act of religion symbolized by Christ; in the second place, a refusal to have his life purified by the Lord; a fatal protestation,—this latter—against that spiritual foot-washing, for example, which was apportioned him chap. 21. and without which he could have had no part in Christ; his resistance was, finally, a revolt against that ordinance obtaining in the kingdom,—the law of ministering love and humility in the Church of Christ;—a revolt which would in no wise have fitted him for his place as the first pioneer of that kingdom. Thou hast no part with Me [οὐκἔχειςμέροςμετʼ ? ἐμοῦ ?]—Matthew 24:51, etc. (ΰֶ ?ϊηֵ ?μֶ ?χּ ςִ ?ν ,ηֵ ?μֶ ?χ) i.e. in the same kingdom and the same glory of the kingdom, they being founded on loving and serving. According to Maldonatus and others, the menace contains a renouncement of personal friendship; according to Grotius an announcement of the loss of eternal life; according to Bengel, Luthardt and others it signifies: no part in my cleansing. The latter explanation is, however, not demanded, as Tholuck thinks it is, by the ethical and symbolical sense of the washing (in so far as this sense is presupposed, which is certainly to be assumed). The outward washing is accompanied by that which is inward, i.e. moral purification; from this, however, the future blessing must be distinguished. Baptism is attended by the renunciation of sin, but the blessing of it is communion with Christ and Christians in this present world; the Lord’s Supper is attended by the sealing of reconciliation and the communication of the new life of Christ: but its future blessing is communion with Christ and with Christians in the resurrection. The view represented by Bengel, Luthardt and Tholuck might be designated as one-sided or ultra-Reformed. John 13:9. But also my hands and my head.—An utterance prompted by the agitation and entire subjection of the disciple. Not for all the world would he lose the fellowship of Jesus. He would be washed by Him as a child; he offers to Him all the uncovered portions of his body: his hands, his feet, his head. A trace of dictatorialness is, however, still visible in this act of submission; a fact connected with his apprehension of the action of Christ; he still regards it in too great measure as an outward or legal thing and does not yet fully perceive the simple, Spiritual symbolicalness which appertains to it when viewed in accordance with the idea of Christ. Hence a third reprimand is necessary, albeit one of dispassionate mildness. John 13:10. He that hath bathed, needeth not to wash himself.—Not a shade of doubt (as, for instance, by Tholuck) should be cast on the fact that Jesus primarily proclaims a law of the Jewish ordinances relative to purification (Michaelis, etc.). But this ordinance consisted not in the custom of bathing before each meal (Wetstein), and then again washing the feet, defiled by the going forth to the meal, or washing the feet again separately on account of their pollution by the bath-water itself (Beza). Rather, the bathing is indicative of the greater and rarer purification,—the foot-washing of the minor and daily one, such as was requisite each time that the traveller paused for rest or refreshment. Provided, therefore, that a man had seasonably bathed himself in conformity to the ordinance, he needed, on such an occasion as the present one, nought save to wash his feet. Jesus, then, declares in the first place, on Peter’s demanding a bath for his whole body, that he must content himself with the washing of his feet, in accordance with the law which regulated this custom. But at the same time He pronounces the spiritual law of life in conformity to which He would wash the feet of His people spiritually and symbolically. Ye are bathed in the spiritual sense and thus clean in general (although not all of you); hence ye need, in this sense, but the washing of your feet. What is the meaning of this? A distinction must here be made between the signification of the saying as a rule of Christian ethics, and as the rule of an ecclesiastical ordinance. Relative to the former. Origen: they were clean in general through baptism; it was obligatory merely that the inferior parts, the affections, should be purified. Theod., Herak.: Clean by means of the doctrine; their feet must be consecrated to the apostleship. Chrysost.: Clean through the word (John 15:8); the washing of their feet signified that they had still to learn humility. The latter interpretation is doubtless the true one. As disciples, they had received, in the fellowship and the Word of Christ, the principle of their general purification or regeneration; but they must, by the shaming example of their Lord and Master, be cleansed from ambition and other sins which had clung to their feet, their endeavorings, in their pilgrimage as disciples. The maxim generalized reads thus for Christians; Justification must be followed by sanctification or daily repentance (evangelical theologians). Connected with this is the symbolical interpretation with reference to the ecclesiastical ordinance in Cyprian, Aug. and others: “They were clean through baptism, and had need but of the Sacramentum p�nitentiζ.” Only not in a legal sense. The manner in which Christ made the love-feast with the foot-washing a purificative preparation for the Supper, is a vivid type for the evangelical, ecclesiastical ordinance, in accordance with which a purificative, disciplinary preparation or confession precedes the celebration of the Lord’s Supper. It is not altogether clear how Tholuck, after De Wette, Lόcke (so too Meyer) can protest against the universal, symbolical significance, originally intended, of Christ’s words; for together with the primary signification of the act for the disciples, its second universal, Christian, moral signification is established; and the latter contains likewise the ecclesiastical ordinance in embryo. Be it observed, furthermore, that the declaration relative to the needs of the disciples must by no means be confounded with the enforcement of the example of Jesus upon the disciples (John 13:14-15), although the second consideration corresponds with the first. And ye are clean.—Application of His words to the disciples.—But not all.—A hint at the traitor. Since he does not stand in the communion of Jesus and His word, or, figuratively speaking, is not bathed, the foot-washing is vain in his case. “Such further comments on our passage as impute to it a polemical tendency against Peter, in spite of Joh 1:42; John 6:68, etc. (Strauss, Schwegler, Baur, Hilgenf.), and even credit Peter with the demand for an Ebionite lavation of the whole body (Hilgenf.), are pure fabrications.” Meyer. John 13:12. Know ye what I have done to you.—Namely, the meaning and significance of it. Herewith begins the introduction to the explanation. John 13:13. The Teacher and the Lord [ὁδιδάσκαλοςκαὶὁκύριος]—ξַ ?ψ and ψַ ?αִּ ?ι were likewise the titles given by the Rabbins’ scholars to their masters (Lightfoot and others). With the relation of the Master, who was also the Lord (in a theoretico-practical school), corresponded the relation of the disciples, who were also servants. John 13:14. If I then, etc.—If your Lord has performed for you this service of a slave, ye must do likewise to one another. One another. Much more should ye, in conformity to your natural coφrdination, discharge for one another this lowly office of self-denying love. But since the disciples were to be under a life-long obligation to self-abasement in humble love, this act of Christ must also suggest to their minds the spiritual fact of His having ever thus served them in a spiritual sense. The sign of His self-humiliation hitherto in slavery to legal ordinances should thus be to them a presage of His impending self-humiliation unto the death of the slave. And so neither had the Lord in mind the outward copying of His action, but rather the spiritual imitation of it. This imitation in the service of love and humility is to consist, however, specifically in a mutual foot-washing, i.e., in efforts for the purification and emancipation of our brother from the sin that cleaves to him. If we would show our brother the right way and lead him in it as we should, we must do it in the spirit of humility, of subordination in self-denying love; thus done, it is an act of the greatest self-denial. Reprehension or reproof administered from the high horse or throne is no foot-washing. Hence it is remarkable that the literal foot-washing gradually gained ground as a ceremony in the church at a time when the spiritual foot-washing receded more and more before hierarchical pride, lust of power and austerity (See the Article Fusswaschung, by H. Merz in Herzog’s Real-Encyklopδdie, with reference to Bingham, IV. 394). It follows from Augustine’s Epistol., 118 ad Januarium, that it was in use during his time, though without definite appointment of the day. Bernard of Clairvaux desired to convert the customary Catholic ceremony into a sacrament; without success. Catholic argumentation for the tradition of this rite does not sufficiently discriminate between the ancient custom of hospitality (1 Timothy 5:10), which of course extends forward into Christian times, and the rise of the Catholic ceremony. On Maundy-Thursday Catholic monarchs and the pope symbolically practise it upon twelve poor old men. Upon this Bengel sarcastically comments thus: “Magis admirandus foret pontifex, Unius regis, quam duodecim pauperum pedes, seria humilitate, lavans.” Luther counsels the substitution of a bath for the poor men when they really stand in need of one. Yet we cannot avoid recalling the beautiful saying of Claudius touching ceremonies that have become void: “they are little flags, floating above the surface of the waters and showing where a richly freighted ship hath sunk.” In the communion of the Moravians the governors of the choir decide as to the practice. The sacramental character of the foot-washing has found an advocate in Fr. Bφhmer [Stud. u. Kritiken, fourth number, 1850). Tholuck.The frequent recurrence of evangelical theologians to this view overlooks these facts: 1. That the Lord desired a reciprocal foot-washing of all the faithful, not a one-sided one of inferiors by superiors. 2. That He elevated His foot-washing into a unique symbol, expressly substituting for His people the ethical explanation and application. 3. That the foot-washing as a sacrament would be a sacrament devoid of any definite word of promise; a circumstance which would, of course, alter the whole idea of a sacrament. 4. That the ecclesiastical consideration of the moral exaction of the Lord is fulfilled in the evangelical preparation or confession. 5. That the foot-washing as a sacrament would constitute a pendant to the Lord’s Supper, as the sacrament of sanctification, equally marring with the Catholic confession or absolution in its relation to the Lord’s Supper. Irrespective of the fact that the outward foot-washing is too climatic in its nature and too closely connected with the difference between sandals and shoes, to be adapted for a universal rite. In many places it is more necessary to shoe the feet; in the Polar regions to warm them. The commandment of the Lord; ye shall wash each other’s feet, is indicative of the duty of humbly and lovingly helping our neighbor in his daily repentance; with equal distinctness does the necessity for washing the feet set forth the necessity for accepting the assistance of others in our daily repentance. “Humbly to labor for the purification of others” (Meyer, Luthardt). John 13:15. For I have given you an example.—Now an example is intended not to be outwardly counterfeited, but to prompt to ethical imitation. John 13:16. A servant is not greater, etc.—Comp. John 15:20; Matthew 10:24; Luke 6:40. With a “verily, verily” the humility and self-denial of ministering love here enforces the axiom according to which the servant should look upon himself as being at least as lowly as his master. Well did the Lord foresee the great temptations and errors connected with clerical self-upliftment in His church. See Matthew 20:25; Matthew 24:49. John 13:17. Blessed are ye if ye do them.—“In conclusion yet another reference to the great gulf that is wont to lie between insight and practice with regard to this very commandment.” Tholuck. As with regard to all commandments; here, however, it is particularly damnable. This is a saying spoken by the Lord as if in anticipation of the ceremony of foot-washing. For the ceremony is at all events an expression of intelligence. Suggestive of the “servus servorum.” The non-performance of knowledge, then, is in like manner followed by unblessedness. A knowing without doing, i.e., without moral realization in spirit and life, is creative of a shadowy doing in abortive ceremony; in many respects the ceremony may be regarded as the visible type of knowledge that falls short of performance. John 13:18. Not of you all.—A second stronger allusion to Judas. See John 13:10. Tholuck: “According to general interpretation, John 13:18 is connected with John 13:17 : a fulfilment of this ministering love is not to be expected from you all. Since this thought, however, does not fit into the connection of the subsequent remarks, we must assume that reference is had to John 13:10,—a looseness which fails to appear surprising in the Johannean style.” Yet even here John is sufficiently precise. Meyer, after ancient exegetes (Augustine: est inter vos, qui non erit beatus, neque faciet ea), more pertinently refers John 13:18 to the beatitude, John 13:17. The two verses are even implicative of a sharp antithesis: there is one who, instead of washing the feet of his fellow-disciples, ventures to trample his Master under foot. The contrast to faithful, humble, ministering love towards fellow-disciples is found in false, haughty, seditious treason to the Lord and Master. I know whom I chose.—This sentence—ἐγὼοῖ ?̓δαοὕς [Tischend., Alf.: τίνας] ἐξελεξάμην—is differently explained: 1. The emphasis is upon ἐκλέγεσθαι. Election ad salutem is meant, either in accordance with the Calvinistic doctrine of decree, or with reference to foreknowledge, agreeably to the teaching of the Lutheran communion. “Non omnes ad apostolatum electi ad beatitudinem electi sunt” (Gerhard). Tholuck gives a slightly different explanation: “I know whom I have really chosen; thus in 1 John 2:19 the signification is: ‘those who have fallen away from us were—not really of us.” Yet another interpretation has been attached to this: I know whom I have chosen, i.e. of My own accord, not at the instigation and intercession of the circle of disciples. But there is no second ἐγώ to support this. The passage John 6:70 is, however, contradictory of the method of explanation noted above. In this place, as in the former passage, a distinction must be made between the eternal election of God and the historical election of Christ. That Christ acknowledges having in the historical sense chosen Judas, is proved by the following: “he that eateth My bread.” Hence 2. Οἰ ?̈δα must be emphasized. I know them; I fathom them all and discriminate between them; thus I know even the wretch. The same idea is presented as in John 6:70; it is but developed. But then, according to Meyer, the idea proceeds thus: ἀλλ̓ ? with the supplement of ἐξελέξαμεναὐτούς, etc.: but I have made the selection in the service of that divine destiny conformably to which the Scripture had to be fulfilled. An exceedingly hazardous and fatalistic supplement. Meyer here also fails to discriminate between the moment of the calling of Judas and that moment of his germinant apostasy, John 6:70. [Οὐκἐγὼὑμᾶςτοὺςδώδεκαἐξελεξάμην; καὶἐξὑμῶνεἱςδιάβολόςἐστιν]. But—that the Scripture may be fulfilled.—This but contrasts the allusion to the apostasy of Judas, prophesied by the Scripture, with the painful fact that Christ sees through His chosen ones and perceives a traitor among them. It is the ever-recurring antithesis of the human, moral grief of Jesus over unbelief, apostasy, and His religious elevation and pacification in view of that divine providence which directs all things; a mode of pacification in which He has been followed by the apostles and by all Christians of all ages (see John 12:38). Hence the connection of ἀλλ’ with τρώγων (whereby ἵναἡγρ. would be resolved into a parenthetic proposition, Semler, Kuinoel) is contrary to analogy (comp. John 19:28; John 19:36). To be supplied is “this happened” (see 1 Corinthians 2:9).The Scripture: Psalms 41:9. A free citation [differing from the Hebrew and the Sept.] without any material alteration of the sense. The expression: My bread is changed into: bread with me. It was not Christ’s intention to represent Himself as the bread-provider of Judas in a literal sense; David, to whom the description is more applicable than to Jeremiah (Hitzig), might with truth thus speak of his betrayer. But in a higher sense Judas did indeed eat His bread, subsisting, as he did, upon the blessing of His society. But what Jesus desires to throw into relief is the contrast between the malicious plot of the traitor and the unbounded confidence that prevailed in his familiar association with Judas at the table. This prophecy manifestly belongs to the spiritual types [and was fulfilled in an analogous experience of a higher order]; even that experience of shameful treason allotted to David, the typical Mashiah, must finally, in accordance with divine judgment, be fulfilled in that highest imaginable treason of Judas to the real Messiah. The choice of the passage was likewise suggested by the meal.—He hath (already) lifted up his heel against me.—The figure represents a fellow who, having turned his back, makes off with a sudden act of cunning and brutal malice; it cannot be expressive of the throwing of the foot under in wrestling [πτερνίζειν]. We need not enlarge upon the truth that the prophecy of the Scripture is in this instance as little proclamatory of a fatalistic destiny as in similar cases, since the prophecy should be regarded as the ideal consequence of the facts, although it does historically precede them. John 13:19. From henceforth I tell you [ἀπ’ ἄρτι, now, from, this time], etc.—He intimates that He will tell them repeatedly, and gives His reason for so doing.—That I am he [ὅτιἐγώεἰμι] has here more of explicitness than chap John 8:24, to which Tholuck refers. The very Person is meant to whom that passage in the Psalms typically points. When the treachery of Judas stalked forth in all its horridness, the disciples (whose faith might have been shaken by the success of that treachery, Meyer) stood in special need of comfort; this was afforded them when they contemplated the fulfilled word and sentence of God.John 13:20. He that receiveth whomsoever, etc.—Comp. Matthew 10:40. The original fitness of the saying in this place is confirmed by the preceding verily, verily (notwithstanding that Kuinoel and Lόcke consider the words as a gloss derived from Matthew, and that Lampe [Hengstenberg] and others annex them to John 13:16). The connection is resident in the fact that Jesus intends to contrast the future glory of His faithful ones with the picture of the miserable traitor, for the consolation and comfort of those (Melanchthon and others), and for a mirror to the traitor; in connection with the antithesis between those whom He has historically chosen and those, from among these historically chosen ones, whom He will send in the might of the Spirit (between disciples and apostles). They shall be endued with such dignity, they shall communicate such blessing, as though He came Himself; nay, as though, mediately through Him, God Himself came. This dignity is still more powerfully represented in its spiritual exaltedness by being portrayed in the light of the receivers of apostles, i.e. of the faithful. By means of them Christ shall appear, God shall be made manifest, throughout the world. And thus the contrast between treason and apostolic worth is also expressed (Hilgenfeld, see Acts 2:17-18). According to Calvin Christ means to say: the wickedness of some few who are guilty of unworthy conduct in the apostolic office does not impair the dignity of that office—a conclusion which results but indirectly from this passage and which is but conditionally correct; according to Zwingle, He designs to dissuade the others from imitating the apostasy of Judas;—but of their eventual fidelity He was assured (see John 13:10). [Alford: The saying sets forth the dignity of that office from which Judas was about to fall; and the consideration of this dignity, as contrasted with the sad announcement just to be made, leads on to the ἐταράχθητῷπν. of the next verse. Meyer connects John 13:20 with ἴναπιστεύσητε, John 13:19, i.e. to confirm you in this faith, I say to you, etc.—P. S.] John 13:21. One of you will betray me.—On the relation of John to the Synoptists comp. Comm. on Matthew [p. 469 Am. Ed.]; Tholuck, p. 347. In the 21st verse we find the first intimation of the Lord’s Supper, together with the beginning of the history relative to the disclosure of the betrayer. Comp. Matthew 26:21. That the conflict here undergone by Jesus [ἐταράχθητῷπνεύματι, comp. John 11:33; John 12:27] extended far deeper than that recorded John 11:33, and that it was not merely “physical compassion,” results from the fact that He is here represented not as being stirred up in spirit so that He troubles Himself outwardly, but as being troubled in the spirit itself. The inmost life of His human spirit was invaded by horror at the unprecedented fact of His approaching and imminent betrayal; the sight of the crafty one and of his connection with the circle of disciples, most of whom were without suspicion of his guilt and had trusted implicitly to his fidelity, tempted Him to despise the whole race of mankind and tended to produce in Him an exasperation of spirit which He must summon all His energies to resist. His victory was comprised in the open proclamation, characterized by John both as a testimony and a declaration [ἐμαρτύρησενκαὶεἰ ?̈πεν]: One of you will betray Me. Strong emphasis is placed, in the first instance, upon the “one of you.” The Lord must bring into view the entire accompliceship of the disciples simultaneously with the immeasurable iniquity of the disciple. Such is His object; the saying may not be regarded as barely expressive of “His grief-stirred soul.” The horror of spirit from which Christ here frees Himself can not be lightly compared with an emotion of grief having its seat in the soul. John 13:22. Then the disciples looked one on another, etc.—See the Synoptists: they were troubled. They inquire of each other and of the Lord, saying: surely it is not I? John 13:23. On Jesus’ bosom [ἐντῷκόλπῳτοῦἸησοῦ ?].—Κόλπος, the bellying of the garment over the girdle [Luke 6:38; Pliny, Ep. iv. 22], the bosom, the lap; ethically defined, the breast. They reclined [on divans or couches] in a half sitting posture, facing the low table, the left elbow resting upon the pillow, the feet outward [behind], and the right hand free. So that the person who sat to the right of another seemed to lean upon his breast. (Hardly, however, in accordance with Lightfoot [p. 1095 s. v.] and others, did “the back of his head come into contact with His breast,” because in that case the other would have been unable to reach the table with his right hand). The purposed omission of the name proves this person spoken of to have been John; comp. John 19:26; John 20:2; John 21:7; John 21:20. The traditional name of John: ὁἐπιστήθιος. See the Introduction.—Whom Jesus loved. In a special sense; hence designative of friendship. Here for the first time do we meet with this [“nameless and yet so expressive”] self-designation, induced by “the hallowed moment, never to be forgotten by him.” [Words of Meyer in loc. Bengel: “’Optabilius est amari ab Jesu, quam nomine proprio celebrari. Est tamen hoc loco notatio ipsius nominis proprii (uti Luc. ii. 11; Apoc. i. 1).” Besides Bengel, Hengstenberg also and Godet discover in the designation ὅνἠγάπαὁἸησοῦς a periphrase of the name of John=“Jehovah is merciful,” Gotthold. Godet adds (II. 446) that for this reason Jesus gave to John no new name, as He did to Peter, being content to sanction the significant name which involved as it were a prophecy of his relation to Jesus. Meyer objects on the ground that Ἰησοῦς is used, not κύριος. But see John 12:41.—P. S.] John 13:24. Simon Peter, therefore, beckoneth to this man.—They were, then, not sitting by each other. The reading: “and saith unto Him: Say, who is it of whom He spedketh? (see the Textual Notes) is to be preferred; insomuch the more since it is more vividly characteristic of Peter. Peter, with his usual impetuosity, presupposes that John already knows. And, without doubt, John had a distinct presentiment of the facts of the case, without, however, allowing himself prematurely to declare his suspicion. See John 6:70. The whole disturbance among the disciples is indicative of an anxious whispering, murmuring, or speaking in an under tone. In this and similar traits, Baur and others pretended to discover an indication of the intention of giving Peter an inferior position in comparison with John; whereupon, see Meyer [p. 493, foot-note]. It is the perverted fancy of a humanly cunning, egotistical pragmatism that seeks to foist the like base motives of its own invention upon every passage of the Holy Scriptures. John 13:25. Leaning back on the bosom of Jesus.—Illustrative. Indicative of a low and familiar questioning. [John, who was before reclining on the bosom (ἐντῷκόλπῳ, John 13:23) of Jesus, now moved his head more closely to His breast (ἐπὶτὸστῆθος) and whispered the question into His ear; ἐπιπεσών, having fallen upon, thrown himself upon, is better supported than ἀναπεσών (although ἀναπίπτω is the usual verb for reclining at table, see notes in Tischend. ed. 8th), and indicates a lively movement corresponding to the excited state of feeling.—P. S.]. John 13:26. He it is to whom I shall give the sop.—i.e. whose turn it is that I should give him the morsel. In the first place, we must remove the prejudice denying that the paschal meal is here spoken of; such, for instance, is Meyer’s view. Then the question arises as to what moment of the paschal meal is intended. As regards the order of the Passover (see Comm. on Matthew, p. 469, etc.), it is a question whether we are to understand by the morsel [τὸψωμίον] presented, a morsel of the bitter herbs which were partaken of after the first cup, or the morsel of blessed bread distributed by the householder subsequently to the second cup. According to Tholuck, a sop of the bitter herbs wrapped together might also be called ψωμίον. Contradictory to this, however, is the fact that the herbs were not handed round, but that several dipped in the dish at the same time. On account of this latter circumstance Tholuck opines that the ὁἐμβάψας in Matthew, spoken with reference to Judas, cannot be conceived to apply to anything but the herbs. But doubtless a weightier meaning attaches to the trait that Judas dipped his hand also into the dish. According to Matthew, Jesus says: he that dippeth his hand with Me in the dish; similarly Mark; according to Luke, to whom we owe the greatest number of psychological traits, He even exclaims: But lo! the hand of My betrayer is with Me on the table. Hence we persist in regarding this trait—viz., that Judas thrust his hand into the dish simultaneously with the Lord—as an arbitrary movement of his hand in violation of the rite, by which movement his evil conscience betrayed itself (see Comm. on Mark, p. 140, Am. Ed.) Hence, too, the token in the Synoptists coincides perfectly with the token in John. It was the presentation of the morsel of bread subsequently to the second cup. Three things are now conceivable: First supposition. That Judas received the consecrated bread and, shortly after, the consecrated cup likewise. This, however, is flatly contradicted by the account of John. After the sop Satan entered into him and he went out into the night. It is simply inconceivable that the presentation of the cup took place prior to this movement of Judas; irrespective of the consideration that John would have mentioned such au item. This statement is not invalidated by the different sequence which Luke, in conformity to his view of the facts, observes, if we only rightly understand the construction of Luke. It is doubtless to be apprehended thus. He designs, in the first place, Luke 22:15-20, to set before us a picture of the sacred transaction, inclusive of the celebration of the Passover as well as the Lord’s Supper. Then he reverts to the Lord’s dealings with individual disciples oh this occasion (John 13:21-38)—and, again, not chronologically, for he first disposes of the betrayer, then recounts the contention of the disciples relative to their respective ranks and, finally, relates the warning of Simon. The story proceeds in its order from the worst disciple to the one of most repute, him who after his conversion is to strengthen his brethren. The account of Matthew and Mark makes the institution of the Lord’s Supper succeed the putting aside of the traitor. Second supposition. Judas did not receive the cup, but he did receive the consecrated bread. It is true that Luke is not here to be taken into consideration in respect of chronology; but John speaks of a sop dispensed by Christ. However, not only are Matthew and Mark against the view how under examination,—albeit simply by giving the precedence to the positive unmasking of the traitor,—but also John, inasmuch as it is not until after the purification of the circle of disciples by the withdrawal of Judas, that he pictures the Lord as yielding Himself up, in entire trustfulness, to communion with the disciples. Third supposition. Judas did not participate at all in the Lord’s Supper. In favor of this: a. the destination of the love-feast, to purify the circle of disciples; b. the great contrast made by John between the celebration prior to the departure of Judas and after it; c. the account of Matthew and Mark. But hence it will result that, after the distribution of the paschal loaf, when Jesus handed Judas the bread with the words: this is the bread of affliction, etc., and after which Judas withdrew, Jesus paused in order then to begin the distribution of the bread for His Supper. It would even be conceivable that Judas was the first and last who received the morsel of the paschal loaf as such: the bread of affliction. Give the sop when I have dipped it.—According to Meyer, this act was merely a sign for John, whose query was prompted not by curiosity but by affection. Taking this view of the matter, the act would certainly be a somewhat surprising one,—and thanks for an elucidation of the moment are due to the harmony of the Evangelists. Judas, in imitation of the other disciples, asked, at about this time: is it I? and Jesus answered him: thou sayest it. We are doubtless to conceive of the words: he it is, as spoken in a tone sufficiently loud for Judas to hear them;—the betrayer must have sat near Christ since his hand reached the dish. Then, upon his shameless question, followed the direct announcement of Jesus. (On Strauss’ preference of Luke, and Weisse’s of Mark, see Meyer [p. 494]. Weisse psychologically maltreats the entire narrative of John as a fiction growing out of Joh 13:18). John 13:27. And after the sop.—That is, after the reception of the same, he took his resolve,—made up his mind—τότε. [Then, at that moment; marking with graphic power and pathos the horrible moment of Satan’s entering into the heart of the traitor and taking full possession of him. When Satan entered into Judas, εἰσῆλθεν, Judas went out, ἐξῆλθεν, from the company of Christ into the darkness of crime and despair.—P. S.] John specifies three periods in the development of the iniquity of Judas; these may be severally designated as the period of the treacherous bent or disposition of mind (John 6:70); as the period of the thought of betrayal (John 13:2; comp. John 12:1, etc.); and as the period of the resolve of betrayal (in this place). He now resigned his will entirely to the will of Satan, becoming the devil’s slavish tool. Meyer disputes the interpretation of Theodore of Mopsueste who holds that the consummate hardening of Judas is meant [τὴνκύρωσιντῶνκαταθυμίωντῷδιαβόλῳλογισμῶν]. But what other designation could the ethical side of the present transaction possibly receive? The only thing is, that the expression is not sufficiently strong for the historical import of the moment; in respect of that, he became the complete tool of the enemy of Christ in the midst of a posture of affairs the like of which was never seen again. The confounding of the condition of Judas with the state of actual demoniacs (Meyer) must, however, not be ascribed to John. Neither should too great stress be laid upon the distinction of Bengel: post offulam, non cum offula; as if the matter of the greatest importance were to guard against the imputation of a magical effect to the sop. In this connection Tholuck remarks that he far rather became an organ of Satan “in consequence of perceiving that he was known and therewith (with the bestowal of the sop) branded.” Notwithstanding all this, his hardening did accompany his reception of Christ’s last token of love; it was of course no magical result, but an ethical one. Thus unworthy communicants eat and drink judgment—condemnation—to themselves, and perfect hardening can, as a general thing, take place only in connection with the full operation of the gospel. The unmasking of the traitor was so gentle, so gradual as to allow time enough for repentance; the branding was accomplished by Judas himself, when he arose after the sop and went out. Even at the words: What thou wilt do, do quickly, most of the disciples were ignorant as to how matters stood with him. What thou doest (wouldest do, art about to do), do quickly [ὁποιεῖς, ποίησοντάχιον, lit., more quickly, right soon].—́Ποιεῖς, art on the point of doing. See John 13:6. The comparative [τάχιον] is not only augmentative in reference to the time, but also mitigative in reference to the command. Thou art already doing it, without any word of Mine; and so be quick about it, and not so lurkingly slow. In point of fact this saying is declaratory of the true expression for the divine judgment of obduracy, in the whole world and to all time. The command in all these judgments is never: do quickly what thou art not yet intending to do, but invariably: what thou wilt do, what thou hast already begun to do, do more speedily. This entry is longer than a Bible module can hold. The rest is at https://www.sermonindex.net/commentary/lange/ FIFTH SECTION The Lord in the circle of His friends, the children of light; how He discloses and communicates to them the riches of His inner life, thereby consecrating them as bearers and ministers of His own life, with a view to the enlightenment and transfiguration of the world, and the union of the present and the hereafter.—Disclosure of Heaven (and explanations relative to the Heavenly life) John 13:31—John 17:26synoptical viewThe farewell discourses of Jesus, as recorded by John, contain the most mysterious and most holy of all the sayings through which He manifested Himself to His own. They form the spiritual ante-celebration of His own glorification and that of His people in the new celestial life opened up by His death and resurrection. Distinction must be made between historical periods and those embracing different divisions of the subject matter; there exists, however, an exact correspondence in the march of the two. The total is the walk to the Mount of Olives and the revelation of heaven or the new heavenly home, high above the old Sheol of the dead. First Period. From the end of the paschal meal, or the departure of Judas, to the end of the Supper. Starting-point of the meditation: the Supper; how it reveals the gulf that intervenes between the heavenly home that Christ discloses and whither He is going; but also transfigures the same, supplying Christ’s presence to the disciples, who sojourn on this earthly shore, until the time when they shall be ripe for heaven until the time when they shall be ripe for heaven and at liberty to follow the Lord as martyrs (John 13:36). Martyrdom the fairest, ripest fruit of the Lord’s Supper. Therefore: the task and goal of personal life in that Kingdom of glory, to found which Christ leaves this world, John 13:31-38. Second Period. From the close of the Supper to the departure for the Mount of Olives. On stepping forth beneath the starry sky. Starting-point of the meditation: the going forth into the dark world, and the contemplation of the nocturnal heavens. Revelation of the heavens situate beyond the gulf. Exposition of heaven, or the Father’s House, as the goal of Christ and His people. 1. Christ as the Way to the goal; in the truth and life of His personal essence standing surety for the goal, in spite of the contradiction of out-ward agencies which reveal an apparently aim-less and pathless vista of misery and death (Thomas). 2.Christ as the Goal of the way, or the spiritual and heavenly theophany, in antithesis to the sensual and earthly theophany; or as the personal Christ, through whom the personal Father manifests Himself, and who, through the Holy Ghost, founds the fellowship of personal, heavenly life (John 13:20; Philip). 3. Christ, on His return, at once the Goal and the Way. How, in the communion of His people, He establishes the hidden heaven upon earth, as the Kingdom of the Spirit and of Love in antithesis to the ungodliness of the world (Judas Lebbζus). 4. The departure for the Passion as a departure for heaven, or the parting salutation as a pledge of greeting at a speedily ensuing meeting. The one warranty for the heaven beyond this world—which warranty is given us through the heavenly Christ present in the world—branches out into various manifestations: (1) Of the heavenly Christ; (2) of the heavenly Father; (3) of the heavenly Spirit or other Paraclete; (4) of the heavenly and personal life and operation of Christians. First promise of the Holy Ghost as the Spirit of Christ and the Church generally, John 13:16. Second promise of the Holy Ghost as the Spirit of evangelic knowledge and of enlightenment, John 13:26. Chap. 14. Third Period. The walk from the city to the brook Kedron. Vineyards and nocturnal garden-fires on either side (see below). Starting-point of the meditation: the sight of the vineyards, of the cleansed vines and the burning branches. Glorification of this earthly shore; or the heavenly life upon earth, in the history of the Kingdom of Love or the Vine of God; in the judgment executed upon dead branches, and in the fruit bearing—love’s blessing—of living ones. 1. Divine establishment and cultivation of the heavenly Vine upon earth, or the establishment of the heavenly Kingdom of Love—a kingdom rich in joy. The fiery judgment upon dead branches; the purification of living ones; or the destiny of the Vine (John 15:1-8). 2. The fruit-bearing of disciples in their life of lave (John 13:9-17). 3. Verification of love in opposition to the hatred of the world, or the defensive conduct of the disciples of Jesus (John 13:18 to John 16:6). 4. Consummation of love in the fellowship of the Holy Ghost who convinces and conquers the world by the judgment of the Spirit, or the offensive conduct of disciples, John 16:7-11. Revelation of the future, together with the development of Christianity, John 13:12-15. Third promise of the Holy Ghost as the Spirit of martyr-faithfulness, John 15:26. Fourth promise of the Holy Ghost as the Spirit of victorious might that overcometh the world, John 16:8-11. Fifth promise of the Holy Ghost as the Spirit of apostolic development and apocalyptic revelation of the future, John 16:12-15. Fourth Period. Towards the end of the way. Conclusion of communications, and promise of future disclosures through the Holy Ghost. Starting-point of the meditation: The approach to the goal. Transfiguration of the union betwixt this world and the world beyond, in the new, heavenly life. 1. Promise of the revelation of the new and second heavenly life in the resurrection of Christ, John 13:16-22. 2. Promise of a new meeting, when He of the further shore shall hold intercourse with them who are still remaining on this side of the gulf, John 13:23-24. 3. Promise of life in the Spirit, John 13:25-27. 4. The flash of light from the Spirit, apportioned to the disciples even now in surveying the life of Jesus, John 13:28-31. 5. Christ’s consciousness of victory, His assurance of new life, as a legacy of consolation for His people, John 13:32-33. John 16:12-33. Fifth Period. Before the crossing of the brook Kedron, the black brook in the gloomy vale. Period of final decision.Development of Christ’s consciousness of victory in His high-priestly prayer for the transfiguration of the personal Kingdom of Love, or House of the Father, in this world and the next, through the sanctification or sacrifice of Christ, the redemption of mankind: 1. For the glorification of the Son, John 13:1-8; 2. For the glorification of His people, John 13:9-19; 3. For the glorification of all future believers until the disappearance of the world before the glory of the Son and of His heaven, John 13:20-24; 4. The perfect glorification of the Father, in conformity to His righteousness; the foundation of said glorification having already been laid by the Son, John 13:25-26. Or, the prayer for the perfection of the Kingdom of Love unto the absolute Epiphany, Revelation 21.; Titus 2:13; 1 John 2:28; 1 John 3:2. Chap. 17. Synopsis. First Period: Antithesis between heaven and earth; Second Period: Heaven and its vouchers on earth; Third Period: Establishment and development of heaven on earth; Fourth Period: Internal union of heaven and earth; Fifth Period: The perfect appearing. On the farewell discourses of Jesus see Luther’s Sermons of the year 1538, vol. 8. [ed. Walch]. Matthesius: Luther said this was the best book he had written. G. Lehr: De sublimitate sermonum Jesu Christi, John 13-16, Gφttingen, 1774. Stark: Paraphr. et Comment, in Ev. John 13-17, Jena, 1814. An extensive catalogue of separate treatises see in Lilienthal’s Bibl. Archivar, p. 321; Danz, Universalwφrterbuch der theolog. Literatur, p. 466, etc. On the sacerdotal prayer see below chap. 17. [Comp. also our introductory remarks on John 13:1, p. 405.—P. S.] I Strong Antithesis Between This Present World And The World Beyond; Also The Link Between Them Formed By The New Institution Of Christ (The Lord’s Supper, As The Commandment Of Brotherly Love). Grave Magnitude Of This Antithesis, Expressed In The Announcement Of Peter’s Denial. The Glorification Of Christ; And The New Covenant. The New Commandment As The Transfiguration Of The Law And Likewise Of The Antithesis Between Christ’s Visible Existence In The World Beyond And The Sojoun Of His People In Ihis Present World. John 13:31-38(Matthew 26:26-35; Mark 14:22-31; Luke 22:31-38.) 31Therefore, when he [Judas] was [had] gone out, Jesus said, Now is the Son of man glorified, and God is glorified in him. 32If God be [is] glorified in him, God shall [will] also glorify him in himself, and shall [will] 33straightway [immediately] glorify him. Little children [τεχνία], yet a little while [only a little while longer] I am with you. Ye shall [will] seek me; and [,] as I 34 said unto the Jews, Whither I go, ye cannot come; so now I say to you. A new commandment I give unto you, That [in order that, ἵνα] ye love one another; 35[even] as I have loved you, [in order] that ye also love one another. By this shall [will] all men know [perceive] that ye are my [ἐμοί disciples, if ye have love one to another. 36Simon Peter said [saith, λέγει] unto him, Lord, whither goest thou? Jesus answered him [omit him], Whither I go, thou canst not follow me now; but thou 37shalt [wilt] follow me afterwards. Peter said [saith] unto him, Lord, why cannot 38I follow thee now? I will lay down my life for thy sake [for thee]. Jesus answered [answereth] him, Wilt thou lay down thy life for my sake [for me]? Verily, verily, I say unto thee, The cock shall not crow [will not have crowed], till [before] thou hast denied me thrice. AND Joh_13:31. Now when he had gone out.—Chrysostom and others connect this sentence with the foregoing: “but it was night when he went out.” Not only the οῦ ?̓ν, but also the emphatic pause introduced by the word νύξ, and the strong contrast between the preceding and the ensuing Sect, are declarative against this view. Now is the Son of Man glorified [ἐδοξάσθη].—This is not merely a proleptical announcement on the part of Jesus of approaching triumph [Meyer, Alford, etc.]. It is the celebration of an actual triumph. In spirit He has already vanquished the kingdom of darkness. His victory succeeded to His perturbation of spirit at the sight of Judas, and was gained on this wise: By the operation of His Spirit in perfect consistency with His truth, love and patience as opposed to the utmost falseness, embitterment and irritation, He, as the Christ, sundered Antichrist from the communion of the faithful through the mere exercise of His personal might. The victory gained by Him in spirit over Judas, is a victory over Satan himself and over those worldly temptations whose nature partakes of the spirit of Iscariot (see Leben Jesu, II., p. 1327; iii., p. 675). This victory lays the foundation for the victory in His psychical life (Gethsemane) and for that in His physical life (Golgotha): in view of this fact He is already glorified in principle. John 13:32. If God is glorified in Him.—Antithesis to the Son of Man. It was while conserving to the uttermost His purely human nature that He, as the Son of Man, overcame Judas; but, as this Son of Man, He was also the instrument of God, John 5:19; 2 Corinthians 5:19. It is effectual to the glory of God Himself that evil,—the whole kingdom of Antichrist—is, in respect of its principle, overcome in so purely human a manner now, and that it shall henceforth be thus overcome throughout the world. God will also glorify Him in Himself.—As God is glorified in the heart of Christ and in His victorious conduct, being therein set forth as the omnipotence of the Spirit, He shall also glorify Christ in Himself; i.e., He shall glorify the almighty spiritual power of the Son in His (the Father’s) divine providence, in His peculiar domain, the sphere, the revelation of the Father—and that especially in that world and from that world whither Christ is now returning. Ἐνἑαυτῷ has been interpreted by Chrysostom and Ammon as equivalent to διά. Such an interpretation does away with the antithesis. In like manner the antithesis is weakened by the explanation of Cocceius: Since God was glorified, the Son also was glorified. Augustine and many others interpret the passage as referring to the exaltation: “ita scilicet, ut natura humana, quζ a verbo ζterno suscepta est, etiam immortali ζternitate donetur.” Tholuck refers to Philippians 2:9 : “The exaltation of the Son, which, in accordance with the representation of Paul, is the ηισθός for His humiliation.” Meyer: By the return to the fellowship of God, out of which He went forth. From this point of view ἐνἑαυτῷ needs defining. The existence of Christ was an existence in God, not alone from the time of His ascension, but from the moment of His death, inasmuch as He was removed from this present world. For this world His personal life was now hidden in God’s providence, but His personal essence issued forth again, clear and distinct, from the providence of God, simultaneously with the resurrection and the sending of the Spirit; an essence now glorified in divine spiritual might, and destined to be ever more and more glorified until His appearing. See Colossians 3:3. Hence the expression: in Him, has been in course of fulfilment ever since the death of Christ. And shall immediately.—The second καί introduces the modifying word, εὐθύς, from which it follows that the glorification of Christ in God shall take place immediately. John 13:33. Little children, but yet a little while (a little longer).—After the stern dismissal of the traitor He is at liberty to unbosom Himself to the disciples and to reveal to them the love and grief that stir His heart at parting from them. Here for the first time we find the tender “little children,” τεκνία. With them too, however, He has to deal earnestly (see Comm. on Luke). He designs teaching them not to set their hearts upon following Him to death now. [Alford: “τεκνία—here only used by Christ (comp., however, παιδία, John 21:5)—affectingly expresses not only His brotherly, but fatherly love (Isaiah 9:6) for His own, and at the same time their immature and weak state, now about to be left without Him.” The same term of endearment, τεκνία, little children, dear children, is used once by Paul, Galatians 4:19, and seven times by John, the disciple of love, in his Epistle. According to Jerome the last exhortation of the aged John to his congregation in Ephesus was simply this: “Little children, love one another,” because this comprehended the whole of practical Christianity.—P. S.] Ye cannot come.—As I said unto the Jews, John 7:34; John 8:21; John 8:24. He now says the same thing to them; although in another sense [and without the threatening addition: “and ye will not find Me, and ye will die in your sins.” The ζητεῖν of the unbelieving Jews is the vain looking for a deliverer after rejecting the true Messiah, the ζητεῖν of the disciples. is the seeking of faith and love.—P. S.]. What He says to them now [ἂρτι, emphatically put last, as John 13:7; John 13:37; John 16:12.—P. S.] is binding only for the present. For the present they cannot follow Him to heaven. From the two propositions: ye will miss Me, and: ye cannot follow Me now, the following results.John 13:34. A new commandment I give unto you [ἐντολὴνκαινὴνδίδωηιὑμῖν].—Manifestly, the new commandment is to supply His [visible] presence to them for a time, until they come to Him again. Different interpretations, premising, in every ease, that the corollary: ἵναἀγαπᾶτεἀλλήλους, etc., contains the substance of the new commandment. The consideration that the commandment of neighborly love is not a new but an old one, (Leviticus 19:18; Matthew 5:43 ff; Matthew 19:19; Matthew 22:39), has led some to ascribe an intensive sense to the adjective new, and others to take it in an altered sense. 1. The intensive sense [new in degree.] (a.) One is not to love his neighbor simply as himself [ὠςἑαυτόν], but more than himself [υπὲρἑαυτόν] (Cyril, Theod. Mopsueste [Theophyl., Euthym. Zigab.; among modern commentators, especially Knapp, Scripta var. arg., p. 369 sqq.] etc.). Without regard to other objections to the view, the idea of it is not clear. [Christ, Matthew 22:39-40, and Paul, Romans 13:9, adopt the Old Testament commandment, “Love thy neighbor as thyself,” without addition, as the second great commandment which is like unto the first, “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God,” etc. The ὡςἑαυτόν is the highest measure of love and does not exclude, but includes the self-denial even to the sacrifice of life for our neighbor. Finally καθώς does not indicate the degree, but the kind of love.—P. S.]. (b.) One should love his neighbor as Christ has loved His people. The following ἠγάπησα is modificative of καινή (Chrysostom, Tholuck). Against this view it has been objected (by De Wette) that the modifying clause does not apply to what precedes, but to that which follows it. A main consideration against the view just set forth is that it represents the most involved commandment as being given, without any instructions as to the manner of its fulfilment. (c.) It is the new commandment of Christian brotherly love as distinguished from a general love to our neighbor. Grotius, Kφlbing, Stud. u. Krit., 1845; and similarly Luthardt, [Ebrard, Brόckner, Bδumlein, Hengstenberg, Godet]. Meyer: “The novelty lies in the impulsive power of love; the love of Christ, as experienced by us, should be this impellent. Thus the commandment, old in itself, is endowed with new explicitness, viz., the love ἐν Xριστῷ.” Here the fact is overlooked, that a commandment with which we are experimentally conversant and which is instinct with motive power, is no longer a mere commandment, but an inwardly impellent principle. Therefore, (d.) The principle of the new life brought by Christ (De Wette). Meyer: That, indeed, is the new ἐντολή, but it is not so stated here. In that respect, then, Meyer’s own interpretation would be refuted. (e.) The removal of the bounds which, in the Old Testament, inclosed neighborly love within national limits (Kφstlin, Hilgenfeld). This has already been done, Matthew 5:44, inasmuch as Christ there finds in the Old Testament commandment itself the germ of His commandment of neighborly love, in antithesis to the ordinance of the scribes. 2. Altered sense: (a.) Prζceptum illustre (Hackspan, [Hammond], Wolf). (b.) Mandatum ultimum (Heumann). (c.) The most recent (Nonnus; ὁπλοτέρην). (d.) One always new (Olshausen: never growing old, ever fresh [=ἀεὶκαινή]. (e.) A renewed one (Irenζus, Jansen) [Calvin, Maldonatus, Schφttgen]. (f.) A renewing [regenerating] one (Augustine), [Wordsworth]. (g.) An unexpected one (Semler: unexpected after the strife touching rank, Luke 22:24 ff.). (h.) The καινότης of this commandment consists in its simplicity and unicity (?) Alford. Similarly Owen: “a love unique, simple, self-renewing and ever fresh.” The same applies to the old commandment.—P. S.] 3. We adhere to the view which we have previously set forth, viz., that the ἐντολὴκαινή, is indicative of the institution of the Lord’s Supper (Leben Jesu, ii., p. 1330; III.,681); and Meyer’s wondering note of exclamation we accept as a sign of affirmation. That Christ did not intend His precepts to be taken in the sense of outward laws, is a fact which the whole of the New Testament warrants us in assuming. But He did found institutions for His Church: the Lord’s Supper, Baptism, the ministry, etc., all centering in the Lord’s Supper. Of that Christ says: τὸαἴμάμουτῆςκαινῆςδιαθήκς (Matthew 26:28; Mark 14:24), or, also, ἡκαινὴδιαθήκη (Luke 22:20). If διαθήκη and ἐντολή be thoroughly kindred ideas, the former is converted into the latter by the words: “Do this in remembrance of Me;” “Ye shall show forth,” etc.; if there be but one new διαθήκη, but one new ἐντολή, the one necessarily coincides with the other. Moreover, it is just in this place that we should expect John to mention the Lord’s Supper. Tholuck: “The institution of the Lord’s Supper, omitted by John—on account of its being sufficiently well known by tradition—would here (John 13:34) find the place best befitting it. That Supper is not only a memorial feast of the Departing One (1 Corinthians 11:25), but a feast of union with His disciples in love until He comes, Revelation 3:20; 1 Corinthians 11:26. In like manner it is a feast wherein His cherished ones are mutually united, 1 Corinthians 10:17.”—Attention should likewise be directed to the ἠγάπησα; on which word Meyer: “For Jesus perceives Himself to be at the end of His work of loving self-surrender.” This was undoubtedly the case at the institution of the Lord’s Supper, and it can be explained only by a reference to that institution. In order that [ἵνα] ye may love one another, etc.—Agreeably to the foregoing explanation, these words do not constitute the substance of the new commandment, but the ethical purpose of it. The Lord’s Supper is to be the channel for the conveyance of light, impulse and strength for such a brotherly love. Two-fold construction: 1. The sentence: καθὼςἠγάπησα, etc., is a parallel sentence to the preceding one (Beza, De Wette and others). Καθὼς, etc., is emphatically put first: “As I have loved you—that ye so love one another.” Meyer remarks with reason: This does not correspond with the simple Johannean style. 2. The sentence: καθὼςἠψάπησα, etc., is the apodosis to the preceding clause, and contains that which shall ensure compliance with the admonition: ye shall love one another. Meyer: “In order that ye may love one another, in accordance with My having loved you, in order that ye, on your part, might love one another.” This would make the last clause either tautological or oblique. The love of Jesus would be modified solely in accordance with its purpose of exciting love, and it would be accordingly required that the disciples’ love should exhibit a similar mode. We come back to No. 1, with a different apprehension of it, however: The new institution is founded in order that the disciples may love one another; [its foundation being] in conformity to the fact that Christ has loved His people in order that they may love one another. That is: The Lord’s Supper is the sacrament by whichthe καθὼς of His sacrificial death is brought home to the minds of His people; the ethical fruit that would spring from that death itself, viz., a company of believers living in the fellowship of brotherly love—shall now be realized by the Supper as the lively representation of His sacrificial death, and the substitute for His presence. John 13:35. By this will all know (perceive).—Mutual brotherly love the distinctive mark of Christians, 1 John 3:10; Neander’s Denkwόrdigkeiten, I. p. 97; G. Arnold, Abbildung der ersten Christen, Vol. III. Tholuck: “The heathen were wont to exclaim with astonishment: ‘Behold how these Christians love one another, and how they are ready to die for one another.’ One Minucius Felix, the heathen, says of the Christians: ‘They love each other before knowing each other;’ and Lucian (in Peregrinus) sneeringly remarks: ‘Their law-giver has persuaded them that they are all brethren.’ ” John 13:36. Lord, whither goest thou?—Peter finds a thorn in the saying of Jesus (John 13:33), of whose prick he cannot yet rid himself. Jesus, therefore, meets the true idea of his question with the answer: Thither thou canst not follow Me now. He thus makes an application of the general sentence (John 13:33) to him; comforting him, however, with the obscure intimation of his martyrdom, as He pacified the sons of Zebedee, Matthew 20:23 (comp. John 21:18). By δύνασαι Tholuck apprehends simply the subjective impossibility in Peter, whereas, on the other hand, he conceives δύνασθε to be declarative of an objective impossibility. In both cases, however, an objective and a subjective import correspond. The disciples were no more ordained to pass through death immediately with Christ than they were ripe for such a journey. [The words ἀκολουθήσεις (μοι is doubtful, see Textual Notes) ὕστερον, are probably an allusion to the crucifixion of Peter, comp. John 21:18-19.—P. S.]John 13:37. Why can I not follow thee now? I will lay down my life for thee.—It is clear to him that the going is to be through death. But not only does he undertake to die after the example of the Master; he even protests that he will lay down his life for Him.John 13:38. Jesus answers in view of these facts and puts Peter to the blush. He uses the asseveration: Verily, verily. Lay down thy life for Me! Thou wilt not so much as confess Me. On the contrary, thou wilt deny Me. And that three times. And this will come to pass directly, before the cock hath crowed, before the ensuing morning. Peter again stood in need of strong and emphatic words. As regards the time of this conversation with Peter, Luke’s account agrees with that of our Evangelist, while it supplies additional items (Luke 22:31-34). Matthew and Mark are induced to record the conversation after the departure of Jesus from the place where He celebrated the Passover to the Mount of Olives, by their desire to superordinate the more general declaration made by Jesus to all His disciples, to the effect that they should all be offended that night because of Him. This declaration might also very readily occasion Peter once more to avouch his faithful devotion. AND ETHICAL1. The exultant breathing again of Jesus after the departure of Judas: (a) A presage of the reviving and shining of the Church at the Last Day, Matthew 13:43; Luke 21:28; (b) a sign expressive of the great victory of His Spirit in the spiritual combat with treason in the circle of disciples,—with Judas as the representative of Satan; (c) a symbolical sign for His Church, teaching her how she shall conquer the anti-Christian Adversary and finally expel him by a dynamical censure; all this she shall do (after the example of the Son of Man) in simple humanity, a state which God, in the person of His Son, has hallowed, and with whose conditions Ha has complied. Similarly, an intimation that we should solemnly rejoice at the open desertion of false brethren and members rather than be vexed at the same. 2. The contrast of the pure Son of Man, the representative of God’s honor, and the false friend who, from an historical point of view, became the tool of a Hierarchy possessing hearts hardened against Christ, or, regarded from an ethical stand-point, delivered himself up to be the tool of Satan. 3. Glorification is the revelation of internal spiritual power in the untrammeled appearance and activity of its life;—hence, appearance in conformity to the idea,—the real and perfect beauty, a representation of spiritual sovereignty in the unobstructed glory of life. The Father glorified through Christ. The highest victory of love over hate, of faithfulness over falseness, of humility over pride, of a repose of soul over excitement and self-perturbation, of brightness over demoniacal gloom, is the highest verification of the glory of the personal Son of Man, the central Hypostasis Himself, and, at the same time, the perfect glorification of the personal God, the Father, who has given such power to His Son and, through Him, to His children. The glorifying of the Son of Man in God. In and from the other world God glorifies Christ’s personality as the absolutely dynamical principle which retains its grasp of itself even in death, which breaks through all the bonds of death, soars above the highest heavens, comprehends in its personality the depths of the Spirit and pours them out over all flesh; in order to draw all mankind up into the Kingdom of personal life and love and, in and along with mankind, to glorify the world into the Father’s House. 4. The tender saying of Christ at His departure, Little children, etc., echoing in the words of His disciple; 1 John 2:1; John 3:18. The chasm betwixt this world and the world to come disclosed, and closed, or glorified, by the Lord’s Supper. 5. Christ no new Law-giver, because He has comprehended all of His commandments: (a) In the institution of love which is His sacrament accompanied by His word, or (b) in the gift of His Spirit; two principal phases of the same blessing. 6. If the Lord’s Supper be intended to supply to us the presence of Christ, because He works and manifests Himself dynamically through it, how can the self-same thing be declared of the Comforter, John 14:16? For the reason that the office of the Comforter bears altogether upon the heritage left by Christ to His people, the institutions established by Him in word and sacrament; and only in the fellowship of the Holy Ghost has the proclamation of the death of Christ by word and sacrament its full truth. 7. The unsuspicious self-confidence of Peter a great warning to the Church and a foretoken of her history. 8. How Christ, by the celebration of the Love-feast and the Supper, has prepared His disciples for the new and great revelation of the heavenly Paradise, of heaven, and of the living connection between heaven and earth which He is to establish by means of them. 9. The divine assurance of Christ in view of the treason of Judas and the denial of Peter, an assurance of the absolute victory of Divine Providence over all the contradictions of evil; of the triumph of truth and righteousness over wickedness; of the triumph of love and grace over needy sinners. AND Christ’s triumphant joy consequent upon the departure of the traitor.—The Lord’s subsequent aloneness with His disciples a type of the purified, heavenly Church: 1. in respect of the cordial intimacy; 2. the high festivity; 3. the rich revelation of love and life; 4. the glorious disclosures; 5. the presageful glimpse of eternity—in this communion.—What the Lord discourses of with His disciples after Judas has gone out: 1. Not another word does He say of Judas himself, let alone a harsh one; 2. but He talks of God’s triumphant over-ruling of his dark deeds.—Now is the Son of Man glorified. A blissful sense of victory is felt in the disburdened breast, after the weightiest of oppressions and the hottest of conflicts (John 13:21).—Judas goeth out to betray His Master, and Christ trembleth not—except for joy.—He looketh not upon that which is being done by men who have conspired together against Him, but upon what God doeth.—And therein also should the evangelical Church recognize and follow His example.—The mutual glorification of the Father and the Son. See John 17:1. How the Son of Man has glorified His God as the Friend of man in holy humanity. 2. How God glorifies the Son of Man as the Son of God in holy and divine sovereignty.—Dear little children. The sensations of the Lord in anticipation of His departure: 1. of grief; 2. of bliss; 3. of apprehension; 4. of good confidence.—Or: The horror and joy of Christ at the departure of Judas, in comparison with the mild grief with which He now departs from the disciples.—The intimation of Christ relative to His entrance into heaven: 1. He is now going thither; 2. the Jews, as Jews, can never come thither; 3. the disciples cannot now come thither.—A decided indication of our need to ripen for heaven by a Christian life.—Christ’s bequest to His people upon His departure, or the new commandment.—The Holy Supper the new life-law of Christ’s Church.—The Supper of the Church her fundamental law: 1. the sum of her institutions (Word, Baptism, Discipline, etc.); 2. the sum of her teaching; 3. the sum of her moral admonitions.—Love, the mark of Christians.—The interruption of Christ’s leave-taking with His disciples by the overweening protestations of Peter: 1. Once more a self-willed contradicting of Jesus’ words, and that after the foot-washing and the Supper; 2. the utterance of a stout vow of fidelity, a vow which the Lord foresaw would turn to denial.—Comparison of Judas and Peter at this moment: 1. Similar features: The former, out in the night, prostitutes himself to the enemy in determined apostasy; the latter, within the circle of disciples, lays claim to a fidelity for which he has not the strength. 2. The difference: In that case embitterment, in this love to the Lord; Yonder the utmost falseness, here sincerity and open outspokenness.—There is always a capability of redemption in the sincere man.—The sad certitude of Jesus touching the imminent denial of Peter, set in the calm assurance of the certain victory of grace. Starke, John 13:31 : A wise teacher giveth not that which is holy unto the dogs, nor casteth the pearls of the divine word before swine, Matthew 7:6; 2 Timothy 2:15.—Canstein: All the sufferings of true Christians end in their glorification; nay, they are themselves a glory to them.—Zeisius: In all tribulations the best course to be pursued is to fix the eye of faith immovably upon the promised, future glory.—Even in the midst of suffering, as in the deepest humiliation and in death itself, the most admirable beams of glory shine forth.—Zeisius: Christ’s glory is our glory also, for to this end (also) was He glorified, that He might bring us to everlasting radiance and glory.—A blissful death is the way to the eternal glory of God’s children in heaven. John 13:34 :—Hedinger: Try thyself. Much love, much Christianity.—1 Peter 1:22.—Zeisius: As the brethren of a fleshly order have their particular insignia, so love is the badge of spiritual brethren, or faithful Christians. He who has not this, has forfeited his order. John 13:36.—Quesnel: God has His hours. What we cannot do at one time, He causes us to perform at another.John 13:37.—Hedinger: Even in good hearts there is sometimes more presumption than strength, Philippians 2:13;—Christ must die for Peter before Peter can die for Christ.—Beware, therefore, of relying upon thyself. Everything must come of Christ’s Spirit and death. John 13:38. We should not reject or disown our brethren on account of their many infirmities, but bear with them, in the confident hope of their renewal and purification, 1 Corinthians 10:12.—God sometimes lets His saints stumble and fall, so that the ruin latent in them may become right patent to them. Heubner: Now. With the treason of Judas, Jesus looked upon His death as determined (the proximate sense of the “now,” however, is, that His victory was already decided), as good as accomplished and, by consequence, His glorification was the same. John 13:32. A man is deserving of glory in proportion to what he himself has done and sacrificed for the glory of God.—He who makes that glory his first aim, may confidently hope that God will glorify him. How were the apostles glorified! John 13:36. An assurance that an honest man grows in strength for duty, in the strength of spiritual life. Gossner: On John 13:30. The devil is a stormy master; he demands to be served with speed, and he leaves a man no time to bethink himself. Away with thee quickly! Be off! he cries. John 13:33. The way I go is as yet too rough for you (and the goal is still too high for you).—Throughout the world Christians should be known by love. Each reverences that grace in another, which the other honors in him.—On John 13:37. Human nature is so arrogant. It thinks itself able to outrun grace, until, having started in the race and stumbling, as in Peter’s case, pride dies at last.——Gerlach: By the word glorify we are to understand the revelation of the divine power and glory. The divine glory is God’s manifest, almighty, holy love.—This one another (John 13:34) deserves our special consideration.—In these last parting discourses Jesus is no longer speaking of the world, (? See John 16:8, etc.), but of His people only; therefore not of the love that sacrifices itself for another without meeting with any return from that other; but of the love existing in the mutual relationship of true disciples. It is the duty of these to strive for a unity like that of the Father and Son (John 17:21), and to manifest this unity before the world, that the world may know that Jesus was sent from God. This brotherly love is, in its nature, one and the same with a universal love; it differs, however, in expression. John 13:36. In this annexed allusion to the future martyr’s death which Peter should suffer, there is contained a word of comfort that afterwards had the power to raise him up, when bitter grief at his deep fall brought him nigh unto despair. Comp. Luke 22:32.——Lisco:I will lay down my life. Thus he spoke with a lively consciousness of his sincere love and hearty attachment to Jesus; but, blinded with regard to his weakness, he gave himself credit for more moral strength and firmness of faith than he possessed.——Braune, John 13:31. An exultant cry of victory in the night in which He was betrayed.—God is glorified in Christ through suffering and death, and Christ is glorified in God through the (resurrection,) ascension into heaven and the exaltation to the right hand of the majesty of the Father.—Little children, 1 Peter 1:23.—And as I said unto the Jews. But with what a difference here. Here the sharp words are wanting, that were aimed at the Jews; but the perverse rejoinders are missing likewise (John 7:34; John 8:21).—A Christian destitute of this brotherly love, is like sounding brass or a tinkling cymbal.—Peter proves that a man is always better than his bad, but worse than his good, moods. Richter: John 13:37. That Peter did not, in the exercise of faith and obedience, keep silence, was the inward beginning of his fall. Stier: John 13:34. If the καινὴδιαθήκη, spoken of in the institution of the Lord’s Supper, have reference to Exodus 24:8, comp. Jeremiah 31:31, then doubtless the ἐντολὴκαινή stands in closest connection with the διαθήκη. For the making of laws is the necessary accompaniment to a covenant.—As I have loved you. In Christ, a man, like us, the first perfect fulfilment of the law now stands before us as a living decalogue; but when faith petitions, strength to love in like manner issues forth from His perfectness and flows into us, Ephesians 5:1-2.—It has been falsely said Peter’s denial was thrice predicted; here, in accordance with Luke, in accordance with Matthew and Mark. Truer and more significant would be the statement that Peter thrice protested against such a catastrophe.—Nitzsch: It results of itself that those who love one another, are but practising and preparing themselves to extend their love outside of their own circle into the whole world. [Craven: From Origen: John 13:31-32. It is the glory of the Man which is here meant; Christ at His death glorified God, making peace by the blood of His cross—thus the Son of Man was glorified, and God glorified in Him.—The word glory is here used in a different sense from that which some pagans attach to it, who defined glory to be the collected praises of many; the mind when it ascends above material things and spiritually sees God, is deified, and of this spiritual glory the visible glory on the face of Moses is a figure.—The whole of the Father’s glory shines upon the Son; of this glory He hath made all who know Him partakers. John 13:33. Little children He says, for their souls were yet in infancy. John 13:33. To seek Jesus, is to seek the Word, wisdom, righteousness, truth, all which is Christ.—As if He said, I say it to you but with the addition of now (John 13:36); the Jews would never be able to follow Him, but the disciples were unable only for a little while.——From Augustine: John 13:31. The unclean went out, the clean remained with the cleanser; thus will it be when the tares are separated from the wheat. John 13:34. He teaches them how to fit themselves to follow Him. John 13:36. He checks the forwardness of Peter but does not destroy his hope; nay, He confirms it.—Be not lifted up with presumption, thou canst not now; be not cast down with despair, thou shalt follow me, afterwards.John 13:37. Peter knew his great desire, his strength he knew not.——From Chrysostom: John 13:34. As I have loved you; My love has not been the payment of something owing to you, but had its beginning on My side. John 13:38. Thou (Peter) shalt know by experience that thy love is nothing, unless thou be enabled from above.——From Bede: John 13:36-38. Should any one fall, let the example of Peter save him from despair. [From Burkitt: John 13:33. Little children; intimating the tender affection He bears His disciples.—Whither I go ye cannot come; till our work be done, whither Christ is gone we cannot come. John 13:34. A new commandment because, urged from a new motive, and enforced by a new example.John 13:35. Christ will have His disciples known by their profound affection to each other.—One of the best evidences we can have of our vital relation to Christ, is a hearty love toward fellow. Christians. John 13:36. Though disciples shall certainly follow their Lord, they must patiently wait His time and finish His work. John 13:37-38. The holiest of men knows not his own strength till temptation brings him to the trial.—None are so near falling as those who are most confident of their own standing.——From M. Henry: From John 13:31, to the end of chap. 14. Christ’s table-talk with His disciples; teaching us to make conversation at table serviceable to religion. John 13:31. Christ did not begin this discourse till Judas had gone out; the presence of wicked people often a hindrance to good discourse. John 13:31-32. Christ gives three comforting assurances concerning His sufferings—1. That He should be glorified in them, by (1) obtaining a glorious victory over Satan, (2) working out a glorious deliverance for His people, (3) giving a glorious example of self-denial and patience; 2. That God the Father should be glorified in them—those sufferings were, (1) the satisfaction of the Father’s justice, (2) the manifestation of the Father’s holiness and mercy; 3. That He Himself should be greatly glorified after them, in consideration of the glorification of the Father by them (John 13:32).—In the exaltation of Christ there was a regard had to His (self) humiliation, and a reward given for it; those who mind the business of glorifying God shall have the happiness of being glorified with Him.John 13:33. The words little children do not declare so much their weakness, as His tenderness and compassion.—The declaration Whither I go ye cannot come suggests—1. high thoughts of Him, 2. low thoughts of themselves.—They could not follow Him to His cross, for they had not (then) courage; they could not follow Him to His crown, for they had not a sufficiency of their own, nor was their work yet finished.John 13:34-35. He urges the great duty of mutual love by three arguments—1. The command of their Master; 2. The example of their Saviour; 3. The reputation of their profession.—Brotherly love is the badge of Christ’s disciples, by this—1. He knows them, 2. others (the world) know them.—The true honor of Christ’s disciples to excel in brotherly love. John 13:36. Peter’s curiosity and the check given to it.—Believers must not expect to be glorified as soon as they are effectually called—there is a wilderness between the Red Sea and Canaan. John 13:37-38. Peter’s (self-) confidence and the check given to that.—Peter was inconsiderate but not insincere; we are apt to think we can do anything, but without Christ we can do nothing.—It is good for us to shame ourselves out of our presumptuous confidence; shall a bruised reed set up for a pillar, or a sickly child undertake to be a champion?—Christ not only foresaw that Judas would betray Him, but that Peter would deny Him; He knows not only the wickedness of sinners, but the weakness of Saints.—The most secure are commonly the least safe.——From Scott: John 13:34. Alas! the commandment to love one another as Christ has loved us is still new and strange to most professed Christians.——From A. Clark: John 13:31. Now it fully appears (is about to appear) that I am the Person appointed to redeem a lost world by My blood. John 13:34. Christ more than fulfilled the Mosaic precept; He not only loved His neighbor asHimself, but He loved him more than Himself—His commandment was strictly knew.John 13:36; John 13:38. We should will, and then look to God for power to execute.——From Stier: John 13:31. A cry of exultation in the night in which He was betrayed.—The first glorification is the beginning and ground of that which follows as its consummation.—In His humiliation He is exalted, in this darkness of shame does His glory beam forth, from Golgotha go forth those attracting energies which are to wrest from Satan the world of mankind.—The glorification of God in the suffering and dying Son of man embraces—1. when we look into it, the self-offering of God in the person of this Son of man as a great and solitary fact; 2. when we look back, the shining forth of God in human nature generally, as the longed for goal of all aspiration and effort; 3. when we look forward, the representation and offering of God to humanity as the object of faith and love.—The purest honor of God shines forth in the deepest dishonor of this Son of Man.—All is human and all is Divine; the Ecce Homo is changed to the eye of faith into—Behold thy God!John 13:32. The Lord speaks of a twofold glorification—1. He is made perfect through suffering; 2. the glorification of the Son of Man in God. John 13:34. A new commandment—1. in the simplicity and plainness of the expression; 2. in the perfection of the new, now first existing, type; 3. in the power of fulfilment which flows from this life-giving type; 4. and consequently, in the abiding, living newness of this commandment. John 13:37. Peter (a little child, John 13:33) would be a man before the time!——From A Plain Commentary (Oxford); John 13:34. The commandment called new because destined to become the gnat law of the new creation.—From Barnes: John 13:34-35. This commandment to be a badge of discipleship; it was called new because—1. it had never before been made that by which any class of men, had been distinguished; 2. of the extent to which it was to be carried.——From Owen: John 13:35. As a historical fact there has been no feature of Christianity exemplified in the life of believers, so potent in overcoming opposition as their mutual love.——From Whedon: John 13:36-38. Enough there was of a downfall to neutralize the pride of Peter, but his subsequent recovery evinced the earnestness of his profession.] Footnotes: John 13:31.—[Tischendorf, Alf. and W. &H. give ὅτεοῦ ?̓ν, in accordance with ΰ. B. C. D. L. X.; οῦ ?̓ν is omitted in A. E. H. K., etc., and those ed. who wrongly join ὅτεἐξῆλθεν to John 13:30.—P. S.] John 13:32.—The words εἰὁθεὸςἐδοξάσθηἐναὐτῷ are wanting in [ΰ. * B. C. D., etc. Probably the repetition was regarded as superfluous. [They occur in ΰ.c A. C.2 T. Δ., etc., they are retained by Tischend., omitted by Westc. and H., bracketed by Alf. The omission may have been occasioned by the similar endings of this and preceding clauses.—P. S.] John 13:36.—[Tischendorf, Alford, Westcott and Hort omit αὐτῷ (text. rec.), in accordance with B. C.* L.; it occurs, however, in ΰ. A. C.3 D., etc.—P. S.] John 13:36.—The μοι is wanting in [ΰ.] B. C. * L. X., Vulgate, etc. [It occurs in A. C.3 D., etc., text. rec., but is omitted by Tischend., Alf., Westc. and Hort.—P.S.] John 13:38.—[Instead of ἀπεκρίθη the best authorities read ἀποκρίνεται, in accordance with ΰ. B. C. L. X., etc.—P. S.] John 13:38.—Φωνήσῃ, against Φωνήσει, has very strong authority. [It is so given ΰ. A. B. G., etc. and in the best crit. ed.—P. S.] John 13:38.—The reading ἀρνήσῃ decidedly preponderant over against the (synoptic) composite [ἀπαρνήσῃ ?]. A milder term. [The former occurs in B. D. L. X.; the latter in ΰ. A. C. T. Δ., etc.—P. S.] [Similarly Stier and Alford connect John 13:33-34 : Ye will be left on earth, when I go to heaven; hut, unlike the Jews, ye will seek Me and find Me in the way of love to Me and to one another, forming a united body, the church, in which all will recognize My presence among you as My disciples.—P. S.] [So also Wordsworth who, however, combines with this interpretation that of Augustine (renewing), see below, 2 f. Similarly Webster and Wilkinson: “This love was to resemble His love to them in manner and degree (καθώς, κ. τ. λ.), and therefore must be grounded on their spiritual relationship to each other in Him.”—V. S.] [In his fifth edition, Meyer has no “wondering note of exclamation,” but objects to Dr. Lange’s reference of ἐςτολή to the institution of the Lord’s Supper, that it is not indicated in the connection, and is contrary to the parallel passage, 1 John 2:8. But it should be remembered that these words were spoken at the very time when the Lord’s Supper in connection with the Agape was instituted and commanded to be observed to the second advent as a perpetual commemoration of Christ’s dying love. Neander, Ammon and Ebrard put the institution after John 13:32; Tholuck at John 13:34. Lange makes the ἐντολὴκαινή itself the καινὴδιαθήκη, the love-feast of which Christ says: “Do this in remembrance of Me.” This view is certainly ingenious and plausible, and allows ἵνα its full force.—P.S.] [From a well-known passage in Tertullian’s Apologeticus, c. 39. He adds: “Yea, verily this must strike them (the heathen); for they hate each other, and are rather ready to kill one another. And even that we call each other brethren, seems to them suspicions for no other reason than that among them all expressions of kindred are only feigned. We are even your brethren in virtue of the common nature, which is the mother of us all; though ye, as evil brethren, deny your human nature. But how much more justly are those called and considered brethren, who acknowledge the one God as their Father; who have received the one Spirit of holiness; who have awaked from the same darkness of uncertainty to the light of the same truth?” Comp. my Church History, Vol. I., p. 336 ff., N. Y. ed.—P. S.] [The question of Peter κύριε, ποῦὑπάγεις; Domine, quo vadis? has furnished the name to a church outside the city of Rome, on the spot where, according to the legend, Peter having from love of life escaped from prison, was confronted by the appearance of Christ, and asked Him: “Lord, whither goest Thou?” The Lord replied: “I go to Rome, to be crucified again,” whereupon the disciple returned to his prison and cheerfully suffered martyrdom on the cross. Si non e vero, e ben trocato.—P. S.] [Augustine: Peter imagined that he could precede his guide. Presumptuous supposition! It was necessary that Christ should first lay down His life for the salvation of Peter, before Peter could be able to lay down his life for the gospel of Christ. But when Christ had died for Peter and redeemed turn by His own blood, and had risen from the dead, then Peter was able to follow Christ, even to the cross,—P. S.] II HEAVEN (THE HOME) THROWN OPEN AND BY THE OF THE CHRIST IN THIS PRESENT WORLD. OF THE WORLD BEYOND, UPON HIS GOING AWAY AND HIS UNION WITH THE IN THE SPIRIT. THE STARRY HEAVENS. CHRIST THE WAY TO THE FATHER’S HOUSE. (THE OF THE FATHER (AND OF HEAVEN) IN THE VISIBLE WORLD. THE OF THE SPIRIT AS THE TO THE FATHER’S HOUSE, OR AS THE AND OF THE HOME. THOMAS, PHILIP, JUDAS LEBBΖUS, OR: 1. THE CHRIST, AS OPPOSED TO THE OF THINGS, AND TO DOUBT; 2. THE OF GOD, IN TO A VISIBLE AND TO ; 3. THE CHURCH OF THE LORD IN TO THE WORLD AND TO WORLDLY IDEALS) John 14:1-31(John 14:1-14, Gospel for St. Philip and St. James’ Day; John 14:23-31 for Whit-Sunday.) 1Let not your heart be troubled: ye [omit ye] believe in God, believe also in me 2[Have faith in God, and have faith in me]. In my Father’s house are many mansions: if it were not so, I would have told you. [For, ὅτι] I go to prepare a place for you. [Lange: If it were not so, would I then have said to you, I go to prepare 3a place for you?] And if [Lange: Even though] I go and prepare a place for you, I will [omit will] come [ἔρχομαι] again, and [will] receive [παραλήμψομαι] you unto myself; that where I am, there [omit there] ye may be also. 4And whither I go ye know, and the way ye know [And ye know the way whither I go, χαὶὅπουἐγὼὑπάγωοἵδατετὴνὁδόν].5Thomas saith unto him, Lord, we know not whither thou goest; and how Song of Solomon 6[should] we know the way? Jesus saith unto him, I am the way, [and] the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by [through] me. 7If ye had known me, ye should [would] have known my Father also: and from henceforth ye know him, and have seen him. 8Philip saith unto him, Lord, shew us the Father [visibly], and it sufficeth us [we shall be satisfied] 9Jesus saith unto him, Have I been so long time with you, and yet hast thou not known me [dost thou not know me], Philip? he that hath seen me hath seen the Father; and how sayest thou then [omit then], Shew us the Father? 10Believest thou not that I am in the Father, and the Father [is] in me? the words that I speak unto you I speak not of myself: but the Father that dwelleth in me, he doeth the works [the Father, abiding in me, doeth his works]. 11Believe me that I am in the Father, and the Father in me: or else [but if not] believe me for the very works’ sake. 12Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that believeth on me, the works that I do shall he do also; and [even] greater works [omit works] than these shall he do; because [for] I go unto my [the] Father. 13And whatsoever ye shall ask in my name, that will I do, that the Father may be glorified in the Son. 14If ye shall ask anything in my name, I will do it. 15, If ye love me, keep my commandments. 16And I will [shall] pray the Father, and he shall [will] give you another Comforter [Paraclete], that he may abide 17[be] with you for ever; Even [omit Even] the Spirit of truth; whom the world cannot receive, because [for] it seeth [beholdeth] him not, neither knoweth him: but ye know him; for [because] he dwelleth [abideth] with you, and shall be 18[will be] in you. I will [shall] not leave you comfortless [orphans]: I will 19[shall] come to you. Yet a little while, and the world seeth [beholdeth] me no more; but ye see [behold] me: because [for] I live, [and] ye shall live also.—20At that day ye shall [will] know that I am in my Father, and ye in me, and I in you. 21He that hath [possesseth] my commandments, and keepeth them, he it is that loveth me; and [but] he that loveth me shall [will] be loved of my Father, and I will [shall] love him, and will [shall] manifest myself to him. 22Judas saith unto him, not Iscariot, Lord, how is it that thou wilt manifest thyself unto us, and not unto the world? 23Jesus answered and said unto him, If a man [any one] love me, he will keep my words [word]: and my Father will love him, and we will [shall] come unto him, and make our abode with him. 24He that loveth me not keepeth not my sayings [words]: and the word which ye hear is not mine, but the Father’s which [who] sent me. 25These things have I spoken unto you, being yet present [while yet abiding, or, tarrying] with you. 26But the Comforter, which is [But the Paraclete, even] the Holy Ghost, whom the [my] Father will send in my name, he shall [will] teach you all things, and bring all things to your remembrance, whatsoever [which] I have said unto you. 27Peace I leave with you, my peace I give unto you: not as the world giveth, give I unto you. Let not your heart be troubled, neither let it be afraid. 28Ye have heard how [that] I said unto you, I go away, and come again [omit again] unto you. If ye loved me, ye would rejoice [ye would have rejoiced, ἐχάρητε] because [that] I said [omit I said], I go unto the Father: for my [the] Father is greater than I. 29And now I have told you before it come to pass, that, when it is come to pass, ye might [may] believe. 30Hereafter I will [shall] not talk much [add more] with you; for the prince of this [the] world cometh, and hath nothing in me [and of me there belongeth to him nothing at all]. 31But that the world may know that I love the Father; and as the Father gave me commandment [commanded me], even so [thus] I do. Arise, let us go hence. AND [These discourses were spoken after the Lord’s Supper, which took place, according to Lange and Tholuck, at John 13:34. A pause intervened between the close of the last and the beginning of this chapter. When Peter was “humbled and silent” (Lόcke), and the other disciples sadly moved by what they had just heard of the treason of Judas, the denial of Peter and the departure of their beloved Lord and Master, He addressed to them these opening words of cheer which, coming from His lips with all the thrilling solemnities of the night preceding the crucifixion, have an immeasurable power of comfort and consolation in seasons of deepest distress and on the very borders of despair. The parting discourses have already been characterized at the beginning of John 13 and on John 13:31; but the beautiful remarks of Olshausen may here be added: “We come, finally,” he says, “to that portion of the evangelical history, which we may with propriety call its Holy of Holies. Our Evangelist, like a consecrated priest, alone opens to us the view into this sanctuary. This is composed of the last moments spent by the Lord in the midst of His disciples before His passion, when words full of heavenly thought flowed from His sacred lips. All that His heart which glowed with love had yet to say to His friends, was compressed into this short season. At first the interview with the disciples took the form of conversation; sitting at table they talked together familiarly. But when (John 14:31) the repast was finished, the language of Christ assumed a loftier strain; the disciples assembled around their Master, listened to the words of life and seldom spoke a word (only John 16:17; John 16:29). At length in the Redeemer’s sublime intercessory prayer, His full soul was poured forth in express petitions to His heavenly Father on behalf of those who were his own. Meanwhile, His discourse retained the form of free communication, in which no marks of designed arrangement are to be discovered, as would be the case with a formal oration.—It is a peculiarity of these last chapters, that they treat almost exclusively of the most profound relations—as that of the Son to the Father, and of both to the Spirit, that of the Christ to the Church, of the Church to the world, and so forth. Moreover, a considerable portion of these sublime communications surpassed the point of view to which the disciples had at that time attained; hence the Redeemer frequently repeats the same sentiments in order to impress them more deeply upon their minds, and, on account of what they still did not understand, He points them to the Holy Spirit, who would remind them of all His sayings, and lead them into the whole truth (John 14:26).”—P. S.] John 14:1. Let not your heart be troubled [affrighted, μὴταρασσέσθωὑμῶνἡκαρδία].—The spirit, the soul, may be troubled (see chap.John 11:33; John 13:21); not so the heart, as the organ and symbol of trust. This encouragement has reference not simply to what He has told them about the approaching denial of Him (Chrysost., etc.), but, in the first place, to the announcement of His departure and to the decree uttered by Him (De Wette and others), to the effect that they could not follow Him. Taking this decree in its concrete sense, however, there comes into consideration as well the saying concerning the denial of Peter,—a saying which revealed a perspective full of danger to all the disciples. The prospect of the denial of faith’s goal in the high and invisible world which lay beyond them, was a prospect calculated to startle them, even when apprehended in the most general sense. Trust in God, and (then) ye (will) trust in me [or rather: Have faith in God, and have faith in Me, πιστεύε̅ε (Imperative) εἰςτὸνθεὸν, καὶεἰςἐμὲπιστεύετε (Imperative). See the Textual Notes.—P. S.]—Πιστεύειν does not here mean belief in the general sense of that term (in which sense they had belief), but in its special sense—trust: trust directed to God, and trust directed to Christ. Hence we translate: trust in; namely, in God who is on high; in Me when I ascend on high. This sets aside: 1. The interpretation: ‘ye believe in God, believe also in Me.’ With the first verb in the Indicative, the second in the Imperative (Vulg., Erasm. and others [E. V.]). 2. ‘If ye believe in God (as if it were εἰπιστ.), ye believe also in Me’ (Luther). With the verb each time in the Indicative. 3. According to Cyril, Lόcke, De Wette and others [Meyer, Alford, Godet], both expressions are in the Imperative: ‘Rely on God and rely also on Me.’ We do not think, however, that Christ can thus make two separate trusts. We might, perhaps, more reasonably expect: ‘Rely on Me; in so doing ye rely also on God,’—in analogy with the saying John 14:6. But here Christ’s ascension to heaven must be presupposed, as resulting from the fact that the Father in heaven is the goal towards whom that ascension tends. Therefore: Trust in God; in so doing ye do also trust in Me (εἰς, expressive of the direction of this trust to heaven and to the One who is about ascending into heaven). Tholuok: “Even Erasmus observes that John 14:1 may be apprehended in four ways, according as πιστεύετε is assumed to be both times in the Indicative, the sense of an hypothesis being attached to the word at its first occurrence (Aug., Luth.), or taking the latter as Indicative and as a consequence of the former (Grot., Olsh. and others), or the former as Indicative and the second as Imperative (Vulg.), or, after the example of most of the church fathers, both as in the Imperative.” For the reasons cited above, we agree with Grotius in holding the first πιστεύετε to be in the Imperative mood,—attaching to it the sense of trust, however—and the second to be consecutive to the first. [I prefer to read πιστεύετε both times imperatively, as in John 14:11, because this agrees best with the preceding imperative, μὴταρασσέθω, and with the fresh, direct, hortatory character of the address. The other interpretations introduce a reflective tone. Our Lord exhorts and encourages the disciples to dismiss all trouble from their hearts and to exercise full trust and confidence (πιστεύετ.e, emphatically first and last) in God, who has in reserve for them many mansions in heaven, and consequently also to trust in Christ, who is one with the Father and is going to prepare a place for them; faith in God and faith in Christ are inseparable (hence εἰςἐμέ is placed before the second πιστεύετε), and the glorification of the Son is a glorification of the Father in the Son; comp. John 13:31-32, with which this passage is closely connected. In claiming the same trust and reliance on Himself as on the Father, Christ makes Himself equal with God, as in John 5:17; John 5:23. Hence there is here no addition of faith in Christ to faith in God (as Olshausen objects), nor a transfer of our trust from its proper object to another, but simply the concentration of our trust in the unseen God—who out of Christ is a mere abstraction—upon the incarnate Son, in whom this trust becomes real and effective.—P. S.] John 14:2. In my Father’s house [ἐντῇοἰκίᾳτοῦπατρόςμουμοναὶπολλαίεἰσιν. Mark the simple, childlike, cheering character of this address to dear children (τεκνία, John 13:33): the touching ideas of Father, house, home, peaceful and durable rest, room enough for all in heaven.—P. S.] The house of the Father is the real temple of God, as opposed to the typical temple or house of the Father (John 2:16), which they are now cast out of, having taken their leave of it as Jews. According to Meyer [p. 505], this house is “not heaven in general, but the particular dwelling-place of the divine δόξα in heaven, the place of His glorious throne (Psalms 2:4; Psalms 33:13 ff.; Isaiah 63:15, etc.), considered as the heavenly sanctuary (Isaiah 57:15), according to the analogy of the temple at Jerusalem as the οῖ ?̓κοςτοῦπατρός on earth (John 2:16).” But not in vain is it written: Our Father in the heavens (Matthew 6:9); Christ came down from heaven (John 3:13); ascended into heaven (Acts 1:11); is set on the throne of the Majesty in the heavens (Hebrews 8:1); the inheritance of Christians is reserved for them in the heavens (1 Peter 1:4). Therefore even if the throne of God be denominated the central point in the heavens or the highest point above the heavens, still the heavens themselves are not excluded from being His house, for there is a distinction between the seat or throne in a house and the house itself; and this irrespective of the fact that heaven is also simply called His throne, Isaiah 66:1. We assume, moreover, that we are not required to make a spiritualistic separation between God’s heaven and the starry universe, and that the aspect of the starry heavens is a figure to us of the heavenly mansions, even though it be true that all stars are not to be regarded as heavenly places. (See my book: The Land of Glory. Kurtz, Bible and Astronomy; also my Leben Jesu, II. p. 1349.) And so it is most probable that Jesus spoke these words to the disciples as they were leaving the Passover room, pointing, as He uttered them, up to the starry sky. [According to John 14:31, they seem to have been still in the room, but see Lange’s notes on the passage.—P. S.] Henceforth they, like Him, were strangers on earth, having no abiding place: at this moment He disclosed heaven to their view and gave them a promise of the many dwelling-places in the Father’s house. Hence the significant choice of the expression: μοναί, a place of rest, a lodging. [The term μοναί, which in the N. T. occurs only here and John 14:23, is derived from μένω, to abide, and hence implies the idea of abode, rest, stability, home (comp. μένουσανπόλιν, Hebrews 13:14; the σκηναὶαἰώνιοι, Luke 16:9, and the οἰκοδομὴνἐκθεοῦ, the οἰκίαἀχειροποίητοςἀιώνιοςέντοῖςοὐρανοῖς, 2 Corinthians 5:1). The E. V. mansion, from mansio, manere, μένειν (introduced by Tyndale), here and in old English means dwelling-house, not, as in modern usage, manor-house, palace. Christ probably alludes to the temple, His Father’s house on earth (John 2:16; Revelation 3:12; comp. Luke 2:49) with its numerous chambers (1 Kings 6:5-6; 1 Kings 6:10), perhaps also to the vast oriental palaces with apartments for all the princes and courtiers. Heaven is not only a state, which commences already here on earth with the presence of Christ in the soul and the possession of everlasting life by faith in Him, but also a place, from which Christ descended and to which He ascended, and where He, with the Father and the Spirit, dwells among saints and angels, patriarchs and prophets (Luke 13:28), in the fulness of His majesty and glory. Philosophy and astronomy are unable to define the locality of this spiritual heaven, it is a matter of pure faith, yet most real, even more so than this changing earth; for earth is but the footstool of God and derives its value from the life and light of the supernatural world above, around and within us. The Jewish Rabbis distinguished two heavens (comp. Deuteronomy 10:14, the “heaven and the heaven of heavens”), or seven heavens (severally called velum, expansum, nubes, habitaculum, habitatio, sedes fixa, araboth; see Wetstein on 2 Corinthians 12:2). St. Paul speaks of the third heaven (2 Corinthians 12:2), which by some commentators is placed beyond the atmospheric and the starry heavens; but heaven may be much nearer than is generally supposed. According to the Apocalypse, the many heavenly mansions here spoken of are after all not the final but the intermediate resting-places of the saints till the general resurrection when the heavenly Jerusalem will descend upon the new, glorified earth, and God will dwell with His people for ever, Revelation 21:1 ff.; 2 Peter 3:13. Then heaven and earth will be one; earth being changed to heaven and heaven to earth, “one kingdom, joy and union without end.”—P. S.] Many mansions. Tholuck: “In the multiplicity of the μοναί the fathers discovered a diversity of grades; thus Clemens Alex., etc., also Stier, Lange, etc. The context, however, does not indicate any difference of degrees, but simply the multiplicity of the dwellings.” But if this multiplicity were merely quantitative and not qualitative as well, the expression: there is room enough, would suffice. Of course the words convey this meaning too, in accordance with Luther’s saying: “If the devil with his tyrants hunt you out of the world, ye shall still have room enough.” [Wordsworth agrees with Lange as to different degrees of felicity in the same blessed eternity. But Meyer, Godet and Alford confine πολλαί to the number: mansions enough for each and all, ἰκαναὶδέξασθαικαὶὑμᾶς (Euthym. Zig.) The idea of degrees of dignity and blessedness in heaven corresponding to the degrees of perfection, though perhaps not implied in the word many here, is certainly scriptural, comp. 1 Corinthians 15:41, and has always been admitted in the Church. No envy or jealousy will arise from disparity of glory, for, as Augustine says, the unity of love will reign in all.—P. S.]If it were not so, would I have told you: I go to prepare a place for you? [This is Lange’s construction, which differs from the English V. Comp. Textual Notes and see below.—P. S.] Various constructions: 1. The fathers, Erasm., Luther and others [Maldonatus, Bengel, Ebrard], Hofmann: “If it were not so, I would say to you: I go to prepare a place for you.” [These interpreters refer εῖ ?̓πονἂνὑμῖν to the following ὅτιπορεύομαι. Lange does the same, but makes the sentence a question.—P. S.] Meyer thinks that John 14:3 is decisive against this supposition; according to that verse Jesus actually goes and prepares a place. But it would not be the only passage in which John presents a relative antithesis in the form of an absolute one. (See John 1:11-12.) A more powerful consideration against the view is, that the work of Christ joins on to the work of the Father, re-organizing the creation but not extending it (Leben Jesu, II. p. 1350). 2. Laurent. Valla, Beza, Calvin, Lόcke, Tholuck and many others have placed a period after εὶπονἂνὑμῖν. “If it were not so, I would have told you.” The expression of Christ’s veracity might recommend this reading, if the idea of the heavenly dwellings had been already diffused among the disciples. But this was not the case: hitherto they had had but the idea of Sheol, with its two grand divisions: Paradise and the place of punishment [Gehenna]. Hence it would have been superfluous for Christ to deny the truth of an idea which as yet they had not entertained. 3. We, therefore, adopt the interrogative apprehension of the words: “would I then, etc.?” (Mosheim, Ernesti, Beck); yet not in the sense of the Present: would I tell you? against which Meyer cites the aorist εῖ ?̓πον, but: would I have told you? (Ewald). He has really told them this, though not literally, any more than He said to the Jews—John 10:14—: Ye are not My sheep (comp. John 14:26); for instance John 8:22; comp. John 13:33; John 10:4; John 10:11; John 14:28-29; John 12:26. So, then, He has told them before this, that He is going to another world where He has destined abiding-places for them near Himself. It is His intention now to develop this germ of revelation in the most glorious disclosures concerning heaven. The μονή is there already; by Christ, and above all by His making Himself the centre of it, it shall be converted into a fitting τόπος for them and all believers. For ἑτοιμάσαιτόπον does not mean: to create the place as a place, but: to arrange it as a habitable place. [Comp. 2 Peter 1:11 : “An entrance shall be richly ministered unto you into the eternal kingdom of our Lord;” 2 Corinthians 5:1, “a building from God, a dwelling not made with hands, eternal in the heavens.” Alford quotes here from the Te Deum: “When Thou hadst overcome the sharpness of death, Thou didst open the Kingdom of Heaven to all believers.” Christ prepared a heavenly home for His disciples by His atoning death, resurrection and ascension; but considering that the heavenly mansions are merely intermistic abodes, the term may perhaps also refer to the building up of the heavenly Jerusalem, which is ultimately to descend upon the new earth. On πορεν́ομαι Augustine and Wordsworth remark: “Christ sets out on a journey, to prepare a place for us. Let Him depart; let Him ascend, and not be visible to the bodily eye; let Him be hidden from it, that thus He may be seen by the eye of faith; and being so seen, may be desired; and being desired, may be possessed for ever; the desire of our love is the preparation of our house in heaven.”—P. S.] John 14:3. And though I go.—Here stress is laid upon the going away. To prepare for them the place in the inheritance of glory, He must, indeed, first leave them. But the going away is to be counterbalanced by His coming again to take them to Himself. [Meyer: καὶἐάν, not κ. ὅταν. Jesus does not intend to indicate the time of His return, but the consequence of His departure. The πορεύεσθαι k. ἑτοιμάσαι are the antecedent facts which, once accomplished, result in the πάλινʼ ? ἐρχομαι. The nearness or distance of this return is left undecided by ἐάν.—P. S.] I come again [πάλινἔρχομαι].—Three different interpretations: 1. As referring to the παρουσία, of Christ on the last day (Origen, Calvin, Lampe, Meyer, Hofmann [also Luthardt, Brόckner, Ewald]). On which Meyer: It is the idea of the imminent Parousia, an idea appearing also in John, though with less prominence. [Meyer refers to John 5:28 ff; John 21:22; 1 John 2:28.—P. S.] This view is contradicted (a) by the erroneousness of the supposition that the disciples (or Christ Himself) conceived of the Parousia as so imminent, in a chronological sense. (b) By the fact that in the true Parousia there is to take place, not a re-union between Christ and His people in heaven (where Christ is), but a re-union on earth (where the Church is; see Rev. chap. 14 and 20); while here the disclosures made concern the heaven beyond this life, not the earth with its future destiny of glorification, (c) By the circumstance that the Present ἔρχομαι denotes a right speedy return of Christ, thus being adapted to console these disciples at their separation from Christ and in the sufferings inflicted upon them through persecution. 2. Christ’s coming again to His people, through His Spirit, and their reception into the full and holy spiritual fellowship of the glorified Christ, in accordance with John 14:18 (Lόcke, Neander [Godet], etc.). But that this spiritual re-union is not the precise thing intended by the passage, though con-supposed or pre-supposed, results from the fact that Christ is here speaking of coming to fetch them to a goal whose locality is determined. 3. The words are indicative of a coming of Jesus for the purpose of receiving the disciples into heaven by means of a blissful death (Grotius, Knapp, Baumg.-Crusius, Nitzsch [Reuss, Tholuck, Hengstenberg] and others). Against this view Meyer remarks: “It is in opposition to these words (comp. John 14:21-22) and to the manner in which other portions of the New Testament speak of the coming of Christ; death truly transports the apostles and martyrs to Christ (2 Corinthians 5:8; Philippians 1:23; Acts 7:59), but nowhere is it said of Christ that He comes and takes them to Himself. Except in the Paraclete of whom John treats, Christ comes only in His glory at the Parousia.” Against this we would remind our readers that the parable of Lazarus mentions a calling for and carrying away of pious souls (Luke 16:22). There, indeed, the coming of angels is still the temporary substitute for Christ’s coming Himself. But when dying Stephen prays: “Lord Jesus, receive my spirit” (Acts 7:58), he takes it for granted that the Lord is coming to meet his parting spirit; for this cause he saw Jesus beforehand, already standing, i.e. having arisen from His throne, on the point of receiving or fetching him (Acts 7:55). Further, unless we are willing to affirm that the saying of Christ, John 21:22, has not been fulfilled, there is no way in which we can understand it except as referring to His coming to John in death, to take him away with Him. Dying believers also (not “Apostles and Martyrs” only) are in Jesus’ hand (John 10:28). But, without doubt, this coming of Jesus to believers in death is connected with His spiritual and yet personal coming to them in life, in Word and Sacrament, and in the Holy Ghost (John 17:23; Revelation 1:8; John 3:20) and, similarly, it points to the last coming of Christ (Stier, and my Leben Jesu, ΙΙ. p. 1351). Tholuck: “It only remains to explain ἐρχομαι agreeably to Biblical usage, according to which the word to come, to visit, τχγ, is employed to express every revelation of the Lord, every manifestation of His power, whether for good or evil, comp. John 14:18; John 14:23; John 14:30; Matthew 10:23; Matthew 26:64, and in Revelation whose whole theme is the ἔρχεσθαι of the Lord.” [Alford in loc., with Stier and Lange, takes a comprehensive ‘perspective’ view of the coming again of our Lord from the resurrection of Christ to the final judgment. “This ἔρχομαι is begun (John 14:18) in His resurrection—carried on (John 14:23) in the spiritual life (John 16:22 ff.), the making them ready for the place prepared;—further advanced when each by death is fetched away to be with Him (Philippians 1:23); fully completed at His coming in glory, when they shall for ever be with Him (1 Thessalonians 4:17) in the perfected resurrection state.”—P. S.] John 14:4. And whither I go.—See the Text. note. According to the Recepta Christ says to them: “Ye know the goal whither I go, and so ye also know the way.” This reading seems to be confirmed by John 14:5, since Thomas too distinguishes between the goal and the way. But the connection rests upon the contrast of Christ’s spiritual view to the sensual view which Thomas takes of the matter. Christ means to say: because ye know the way to the place to which I am going, ye also know the goal. Thomas, on the other hand, says: because we know not the goal, neither do we know the way. For here the subject of discourse is not simply the Father’s house, or the Father generally, as the goal of Christ (John 14:2, to which Tholuck refers), but that place in the hereafter, the place of Christ’s glory. The way should be their guide to an inference concerning the goal. Interpretation of the way: 1. The Passion and death of Christ (Luther, Grotius and others, Luthardt. Tholuck “the way of denial,” John 13:36; John 12:24; John 12:26). 2. Christ Himself, in accordance with John 14:6 (De Wette, Meyer). Christ most undoubtedly; Christ, however, in His motion; consequently the view presented in No. 1 is equally to be held here, in accordance with John 14:3 (Tittmann, Knapp). The expression is not anacoluthical; it is a specimen of breviloquence. And whither I (ἐγώ, emphatic) go, thither ye know the way. Christ is the living way for Himself and His people to δόξα with the Father. John 14:5. Thomas saith unto Him: Lord, we know not.—This was perfectly correct, supposing the goal to be inwardly and outwardly determined. Here the way or direction is known only by the goal. Grotius: Quodsi ignoretur, quζ sit meta, non potest via sub ratione viζ concipi. But this reflection is an accessory consideration merely; the main point is the oppressive sense of obscurity, of uncertainty with regard to the goal—uncertainty arising from their imperfect apprehension of their Lord and Master. John 14:6. Jesus saith unto him: I am the way.—The answer of Jesus is not intended to divert the over-forward curiosity of Thomas, as Calvin supposes. (“In re magis necessaria insistit.”) Thomas has declared that he does not know the way to that goal of Christ, because he is ignorant of the goal itself. Jesus answers, very pertinently: I am the way; only for Him the way means something different from the idea which it conveys to the mind of Thomas. The contrast is, however, not that which exists between an exterior way and a spiritual one; it is a contrast between a local, dead, external way and a dynamical, living way, with which latter, incontrovertibly, the attribute of spirituality is bound up. Since the way is the main idea, it follows: 1. that the words: the truth and the life [καὶἡἀλήθειακαὶἡζωή], are explicative (the truth as well as the life), primarily of this way, i.e. for this reason: because He is absolutely truth and life; 2. that, on the other hand, the words: No one cometh unto the Father but by Me, are an applicative circumscription. The significative summing up of Augustine: vera via vitζ [the true way of life], is inadmissible, for it fuses into one the three definitions. Neither may they be apprehended as three co-ordinate definitions as (1) in respect of time; Luther: the beginning, the middle and the end on the ladder to heaven; (2) in respect of effects, Grotius: exemplum, doctor, dator vitζζternζ. On the contrary, the way is the whole idea, metaphorically presented (De Wette, my Leben Jesu, p. 1353, Tholuck). We must further guard against conceiving of the way as the bare, objective means of salvation (Meyer, Tholuck); it is the objective and effectual means of coming to δόξα with the Father through salvation (redemption and glorification comprehended together in the predominant idea of glorification). But He is the way in an absolute sense because, in His own coming from the Father and going to the Father, He is absolute motion (the pioneer) and in His going first and bringing to the Father, He is the absolute motor. (A warranted double reference in Augustine, Lampe and others, misconstrued by Tholuck as an irrelevancy; Hebrews 9:12.) But now, to enter into particulars, Christ is the truth of this way, the clear manifestation of it, because He is, in general, the truth or manifestation of God; and He is the life of this way, the animating motive power by which we come to the Father, because He is, in general, life. This life is, indeed, ζωὴαἰώνιος; it is, however, in part conceived of more generally, in part differently applied. The difficult conception of life presents for observation these items: the powers of development, appearance and action. If we turn truth into the metaphorical expression: light, then light and life appear side by side as exponents of the way,—that being identical with love, and, similarly, our transport past hate and its exponents, darkness and death. No man cometh unto the Father.—“ ‘And so, when a man is saved, the Lord Christ must have a hand in the work,’ says Luther, rightly citing these words against Zwingli, who makes a Theseus, a Socrates, to be saved even without Christ.” Thus Tholuck; inexactly, however; proof should have been adduced that Zwingli expressly taught the possibility of being saved in the other world without Christ, and that Luther, on the other hand, advanced the doctrine of salvation in the other world through Christ. De Wette observes: “the exclusive principle, to the effect, namely, that no man cometh unto the Father but by Christ, is mitigated in reference to those who are ignorant of Him as the historical Messiah, by the fact that He is also the eternal, ideal Logos.” More definitely stated: that He is also the eternal Christ and High-priest. (See 1 Peter 3:19; 1 Peter 4:6.) John 14:7. If ye had known Me.—In accordance with the antithesis: known the Father, the emphasis falls thus: known Me, not upon ἐγνώκ. It is not His intention utterly to deny their knowledge of His personality; what grieves Him, is that they have as yet not recognized in Him the absolute way to the absolute goal, i.e. the living, heavenly image of the heavenly Father,—an image coming from heaven and going to heaven. In a knowledge of the eternal, divine-human personality of Christ they would also have obtained a view of the personal Father and His love-kingdom in heaven—a kingdom elevated above all transitory things.—And from henceforth.—The sharp contrast: ye have not known the Father, and from henceforth ye know Him, is somewhat striking; hence it has been the subject of various interpretations: 1. The terminus a quo is imminent in the future; it is the time of the communication of the Spirit (Chrysost., Lόcke and others; the explanation of Kuinoel and others, who apprehend the verbs as though they were in the Future tense, is but another phase of the above). 2. The statement is hypothetical: from henceforth, I hope (De Wette). 3. The from henceforth is indicative of the beginning of appropriation, comp. John 15:3 (Tholuck). 4. From henceforth, “after My having told you, John 14:6, what I am” (Meyer).—The from henceforth denotes that method just now to be disclosed by Him, and which He desired sharply to define, by which they were to arrive at a knowledge of the Father and the Father’s House—the method of faith, namely. Doubtless, however, the ἄρτι at the same time embraces the confirmation of this method by the whole grand period of Christ’s death and resurrection, whereby, according to Romans 1:4, He was demonstrated to be the Son of God and thus at once made the Surety and the Heir of the Father in heaven. The καί is expressive of both contrast and connection.—Ye have seen Him.—Said of the intuitive glance of faith. John 14:8. Philip saith unto Him: Lord, show us, etc.—As the seeming contradictions of reality darken the glimpse which Thomas’ faith might have of things spiritual, so Philip, in like manner, looks for the confirmation of faith by sight; comp. John 1:46; John 6:5. According to De Wette, Tholuck, Meyer: he demands that Jesus effect a theophany, in accordance with Malachi 3:1; as Exodus 33:18. The main point is this: accepting Christ’s words: ye have seen Him, in their literal sense, he requires that Jesus should occasion an appearing of the Father outside of Christ; a sign in the heaven, perhaps, rather than a theophany. Luther: “he flutters up into the clouds.” He declares his faith by assuming Jesus to be capable of producing such a vision; his failing to perceive the manifestation of the Father in Christ, however, proves that faith to be but small.—And it sufficeth us.—I. e. in accordance with the context: it suffices to render us certain of the goal above us or beyond us, and to make us journey towards it with a brave heart; or, to cause us to abandon the expectations we have hitherto entertained and to embrace the new hope. John 14:9. And thou hast not known Me.—For so long time I have appeared among you and hast thou not known the nature of My appearing? Not alone from the “words and works,” but from the whole personality of Christ he should have recognized His heavenly origin, which did, indeed, display itself in word and work. John 14:10. I am in the Father, and the Father in Me.—See John 10:38. There the order is inverted, and with reason. The Father is in Christ in virtue of His Father-revelation in the works of Christ. Christ is in the Father in virtue of His Son-revelation in His words. The Jews were to ascend from a belief in His works and mission to a belief in His words and individual personality. But the disciples began with a belief in His word and they have not to ascend to a belief in His works, but to advance to a discrimination between the manifestation of the Father in Him through His works and His being in the Father with His word. Though Christ even speaks His word according to the Father’s commission (John 12:50), there is still this distinction: that the words are His most individual, personal life-revelation, while in the works the most special concurrence of the Father’s government is, consciously to Christ, manifested in the creation and the human world. We may not wipe out this contrast with De Wette: “The words that I speak to you, I speak not of Myself, and the works that I do, I do not of Myself, but the Father who is in Me teacheth Me the words and doeth the works.” Neither does there occur a climactic progression (as Theoph. and Lόcke pretend): not only are the words God’s words, but the works also are God’s works. As little are the works here intended as a proof that Christ does not speak the words of Himself (Grot., Fritzsche, Meyer). Least of all are the works to be apprehended as effects of the word as “the office of teaching” (Aug., Nφsselt); nor are we to assume with Tholuck the existence of an “incongruence of contrasts peculiar to the Johannean style.” Even the words Christ speaks not of Himself; as the Son He utters them from the depths of the Father; as it respects them, however, the initiative lies within Himself, while for the works the initiative is in the Father who permanently dwells in Him (μένων). Words and works are the property of both Father and Son; the words, however, are preλminently and primarily the Son’s, the works preλminently and primarily the Father’s. John 14:11. Believe me for the very works’ sake [διὰτὰἔργααὐτὰπιστεύετέμοι].—Jesus here turns to the disciples as a body. For as Thomas’ doubt was, more or less, the doubt of all, so the like was the case with the scruple of Philip. The explanation of the verse results from the foregoing. As disciples of Jesus, they ought first to believe that He was in the Father and then to know that the Father was in Him. If ye are not able to do this,—it is His intention to say to them in a few sharp words,—why then go to work the other way: begin with the works (in the way pointed out to the Jews, John 10:38) and, through a belief in the divinity of My works, arrive at a belief in the divinity of My person. John 14:12. Verily, verily, I say unto you, he that believeth in me, the works that I do he shall do also, etc.—Now follows, undoubtedly, a new series of consolations. Not only shall they be united to Him, but also He to them (Tholuck). The further progress of the discourse, however, must correspond with the principal thought, according to which His earthly appearance shall cease to veil from them the heavenly house of the Father. The disclosure of which we speak, consists in the revelation of that personal, heavenly life which issues from His person as its centre. Verily, verily, therefore it is written, he that believeth on Me, i.e. on the divine personality of Christ Himself, the works that I do, shall he do also, and greater works than these. I. e.: Through this faith there shall be developed in that man likewise such a mighty, personal spirit-life that works shall be the necessary outflowings of the life-spring of personality, which, originating in Christ, wells up within his breast;. the heavenly state shall be unfolded to him on earth and become his surety for the heavenly home, which last should be regarded as the perfect revelation and realization of the personal kingdom of love founded by Christ in this world.—He that believeth on Me.—Not simply applicable “to the disciples of Jesus” in the strictest sense (Meyer). Still the “believeth on Me,” is emphatic. Bengel: qui Christo de se loquenti credit, i.e. he that believes on Himself, His personality (see John 14:11).—The works that I do he shall also do himself.—Expressive of the essential relationship or homogeneousness existing between the works of believers and the works of Christ; of the eternal progress of Christ’s wonder-works through the world by means of Christianity. And (even) greater than these shall he do [καιμείζονατούτωνποιήσει].—The καί is climactic: And even. Tholuck: “Ancient writers believe this greaterness [μειζονότης] of the ἔργα to consist: 1. In their numerical superiority; 2. in their local extension beyond Judea; 3. in the more striking signs, such as the healing by the shadow of Peter, Acts 5 (Theod., Herakl.). Origen: In the victories which believers obtain, through faith, over the world, the flesh and the devil. Augustine: In the results of the preached word in the heathen world. John 4:38 He had, with prophetic glance, declared that others would reap what He had sowed; John 15:26-27, and, indirectly, John 8:28; John 12:32 are likewise indicative of the greater efficacy of the Messiah through the medium of the apostolic testimony.” Be it observed in this connection that even here, John 14:14, it is Christ that will do these greater works; the disciples, through their prayers in His name, in fellowship with Him, are to be but the instruments through which He acts, John 15:16; John 16:28; comp. Acts 3:6; Acts 16:18. Luther: “For He took but a little corner for Himself, to preach and to work miracles in, and but a little time; whereas the apostles and their followers have spread themselves through the whole world.” Manifestly, Christ has in view the greatness of the development of His wondrous works throughout the Christian ages until the glorification of the world. [Alford: “This word μείζονατούτων is not to be evaded (so as to=πλείονα, Lampe), but taken in its full strict sense. And the key to its meaning will be found John 1:51; John 5:20. The works which Jesus did, His Apostles also did,—scil., raising the dead, etc.;—greater works than those they did,—not in degree, but in kind: spiritual works, under the dispensation of the Spirit, which had not yet come in. But they did them, not as separate from Him: but in Him, and by Him; and so (John 5:21) He is said so to do them. The work which He did by Peter’s sermon, Acts 2, was one of these μείζονατούτων,—the first-fruits of the unspeakable gift. This union of them with and in Him is expressed here by τὰἔργαἃἐγὼποιῶ, κἀκεῖνοςποιήσει.” “He has sown, we reap; and the harvest is greater than the seed-time.” Stier. Godet (ii. 472) refers the μείζονα to the communication of spiritual life which is superior to the healing of the body. “Le terme plus grand ne dιsigne pas des miracles plus prodigieux, mais des miracles d’une nature plus excellente.”—P. S.] For I am going to the Father, and whatever ye shall ask, etc. [ὄτιἐγὼπρὸςτὸνπατέρα (μου) πορεύομαι, καὶὅ, τιἄναἰτήσητε].—Rationale of the preceding and, in the abstract, astonishing clause. Various interpretations: 1. The πορεύομαι forms the foundation for the idea that they are to do the miracles in His stead, because of His retirement from the scene (Chrysostom, Theophylact and many others [A. V.]); 2. because He goes to the Father, i.e. to glory with the Father and will thence work in them in His might (Luther, Baumg.-Crusius, Luthardt and others). In the first case a period follows πορεύομαι; in the second a comma. 3. The two considerations are not to be sundered. His going to the Father (ἐγώ is emphasized), as well as His being with the Father, is the reason for their doing greater miracles (Grotius, Lόcke and others). When this view of the matter is taken, πορεύομαι is connected with the following sentence by a colon (Knapp, Griesbach, Lachmann, Tischendorf). Both items are more directly emphasized in John 16:7, in accordance with which our passage is to be explained. John 14:13. Shall ask in My name.—Exposition of the import of His going to the Father, in reference to their destiny to work miracles. Invocation of God in the name of Jesus, in order to any τὶ in the way of works of redemption or glorification; that is, in order to the working of miracles. Their power of prayer is to have no other limit than His name. A name is objectively the revelation of any subject,—subjectively, experience of it; the signature of its consciousness stamped upon the consciousness of others. The name of the heavenward ascending Jesus is the Elijah-mantle left by Him to His people on the earth: the sign of the living revelation and knowledge of His essence, in which His essence, fully concentrated, works. His name, viewed by faith, is the continual working of His essence, or, rather, of His personality: the element of His personal self-revelation in the experience of His people; hence a. His word or cognizance, b. His Spirit or mind, c. His works, His institutions and instigations, d. His aim. In a word: the communion of His Spirit. There are various interpretations which form different parts of the one just given: I. Bearing upon the principle. Chrysostom: Amidst the invocation of the name of Christ (formal); Augustine; In the name of Him who is called Salvator (non contra salutem nostram); 2. Bearing upon the medium. Melanchthon: Me agnito; Luther: With faith in Me; Calov: Per meritum meum. 3. Bearing upon the end. Erasmus: In gloriam Christi. Or upon the furtherance of the end; De Wette: In accordance with My mind, and in My cause. If we desire to sum up all in one, No. 2, setting forth the medium, seems best fitted for our purpose: in faith, knowing and confessing Christ; hence, briefly, ἐνχριστῷ, ἐνκυρίῳ (Lόcke), only with a more objective and teleological modification. Manifestly, the prevailing thought is the end purposed; hence the predominance of the idea: as ambassadors of Christ, the Son of God, by virtue of His δόξα. See John 15:16; John 16:23. Tholuck: “When even finite good things are prayed for in accordance with the mind of Christ, they are desired only as means to the final end, Matthew 6:33. As, however, this may be attained by other means, the cardo desiderii is fulfilled even when specific requests are denied” (Augustine). Nevertheless, the ideal side of prayer, its perfect, prophetic nature, is here assumed, and, such being the case, the ὃ, τι is fulfilled in the τοῦτο. That will I do [τοῦτοποιήσω].—Stress falls upon τοῦτο; the ἐγώ, expressed in conjunction with πορεύομαι, is absent here. He will do precisely that for which they pray, and in such a manner, besides, that their doing in the matter shall be vindicated,—their believing, individual personality. That the Father may be glorified.—The end is the δόξα; modified, the δόξα of the Father; still more explicitly defined, the δόξα of the Father in the Son. Hence results, also, the modification of prayer in the name of Jesus as prayer in the δόξα of the name of the Son of God, in the name of the glorified Christ. John 14:14. If ye shall ask anything [τι] in My name, I will do it [ἐγώ—emphatic—ποιήσω]. John 14:14 appears, at first sight, to be a recapitulative repetition of the foregoing (Euthymius); Bengel, however, very justly gives prominence to the ἐγώ. Here the definite ὃ, τι , or the thing (this simply τι) is no longer emphasized; but stress is laid upon the asking in the name of Jesus,—the mind, the communion of spirit with Him, and, to correspond with this, upon His doing, as His doing. According to the preceding verse, He does it upon the request of the disciples; here He does it through their request, Himself, again. At the same time John 14:14 forms an introduction to John 14:15-16. See John 16:23. In the latter passage the doing is ascribed to the Father. But the Father operates through the Son. Here we see the instrumentality, there the final causality. John 14:15. If ye love me, keep my commandments [ἐὰνἀγαπᾶτέμε, τὰςἐντολὰδτὰςἐμὰςτηρήσατε].—Jesus proceeds to explain more fully how the disciples are to attain to the doing of the greater works in His name. The first condition is, however, an assumption as well; to the effect, namely, that they love Him. Thence it will follow that they will keep His commandments, embraced, as these are, in the one commandment of fellowship. If they thus stand in the fellowship of prayer (see Acts 2:1, ὁμοθυμαδὸνἐπὶτὸαὐτό), the Holy Ghost shall, at Christ’s intercession, be given them. Tholuck: “With John, love is no mere blissfulness of feeling; it is oneness of will with the beloved, John 14:21; John 15:14; 1 John 3:18. It is love which makes men susceptible of the communication of the Paraclete; the κόσμος cannot receive Him.” A loving contemplation of Christ’s personality is the bond of fellowship of disciples,—that which makes them a collective personality—and in this fellowship they may become the organ of the personal manifestation of the Holy Ghost. John 14:16. And I will entreat the Father [καὶἐγωἐρωτήσωτὸνπατέρα].—Christ here makes choice of the term ἐρωτᾶν, not αἰτεῖν, as before, in reference to the disciples. Expressive of a more intimate, free and homogeneous relation. In John 16:26, on the contrary, He says: οὐλέγω, ὄτιἐρωτήσω. Tholuck, setting aside Calov’s explanation: non solus, sed vobiscum rogabo, remarks: “He is there speaking of the time when they, in possession of the Spirit whose mediation is here promised, shall be able themselves to pray acceptably in that Spirit.” And he shall give you another representative, or, helper [καὶἄλλονπαρά-κλητονδώσειὑμῖν].—Here the great promise of the παράκλητος, to speak more accurately, the ἄλλοςπαράκλητος, makes its appearance; the promise of the Holy Ghost, spoken of under this name by John only, John 14:26; John 15:26; John 16:7. The word itself is never met with in the New Testament except in the writings of John, yet the designation: ἄλλοςπαράκλητος, announces that it may be applied to Christ also. [The designation of the Holy Ghost, as another Paraclete, who would supply Christ’s own place in His absence, implies that the Lord Himself is the first Paraclete; and this is confirmed by 1 John 2:1, where “Jesus Christ the righteous ”is called παράκλητοςπρὸςτὸνπατέρα. This allusion is lost to the readers of our English version. I quote here beforehand the excellent interpretation of Calvin in loc.: “The name Paraclete is here applied to Christ as well as to the Spirit, and properly: for it is the common office of each to console and encourage us and to preserve us by their defence. Christ was their patron as long as He lived in the world; He then committed them to the guidance and protection of the Spirit. If any one asks whether we are not to-day under the guardianship of Christ, the answer is easy: Christ is a perpetual Guardian, but not visibly. As long as He walked on earth, He appeared openly as their Guardian (patronus); now He preserves us by His Spirit. He calls the Spirit another (sc. paracletum) in view of the distinction which we observe in the blessings proceeding from each. It was the appropriate work of Christ, by expiating the sins of the world to appease the anger of God, to redeem men from death, to obtain righteousness and life. It is the office of the Spirit, to make us partakers of Christ Himself, as well as of all His blessings.” The designation Paraclete, advocate (as already Irenζus, Adv. hζr. III. 17, and also Grotius observed), implies an antithesis to the accuser, the κατήγοροςτῶνἀδελφῶν, as the Spirit of evil is called, Revelation 12:10. Comp. on this whole passage the excellent remarks of the late Archdeacon Hare on The Mission of the Comforter (a series of Sermons on John 16:7-11, preached before the University of Cambridge, 1840, with long notes which are by far the most important part of the book), 2d ed. 1850, Boston reprint 1854, pp. 348 ff.—P. S.] 1. As to the Philological meaning, Meyer says: “The παράκλητος is, according to classical. Greek usage, one who is summoned to help; in particular, an advocate (advocatus), one who manages another’s cause, or an intercessor. With this the talmudic τְּ ?ψַ ?χְ ?μִ ?ιθ agrees. See Buxtorf, Lexicon. Talm., p. 1843, and in general Wetstein on our passage and Dόsterdieck on 1 John 2:1.” [It should be added, however, that in our passage, as also in Philo De opific. mundi, p. 4, and in the Ep. of the church of Vienne, c. 5, ap. Euseb. v. 2 (both quoted by Knapp and Meyer, p. 515), παράκλητος must not be taken in the narrow sense of a legal advocate or pleader (for which the Greeks generally use the terms σύνσδκος and συνήγορος), but in the more general sense of counsellor, helper, patron. On the philological meaning Knapp has a valuable dissertation De Spiritu S. et Christo paracletis, in his Scripta varii arg. I. pp. 115 sqq. He shows that the Greek παράκλητος and the Latin advocatus, answer more nearly to our general term counsel whose office is to advise, direct and support rather than to plead. It is the work of the Holy Spirit, not only to plead for the disciples, but also to plead in them, to direct them in all their ways, to give them mouth and wisdom, to fulfil the part of a higher conscience, to sustain, comfort and cheer them in all their trials and to lead them to heaven. Hence the English word Advocate, which relates more exclusively to the pleading of a cause, is no full equivalent to παράκλητος, and does not cover the whole extent of the office of the Spirit. The idea of Comforter must be added to it. A Comforter is a spiritual Helper. Unfortunately we have no single word coλxtensive in signification. See below sub. 2.—P. S.] II. Interpretations: 1. Conformably to the idea of the advocatus in its wider sense: assistant, helper, etc., Tertullian, Augustine, Calvin, Lampe, most of the moderns. [I add under this head the names of Melancthon, Beza, Grotius, Wetstein, Bengel, Knapp, Lόcke, Tholuck, De Wette (Beistand), Hengstenberg (Fόrsprecher), Godet (dιfenseur), Hammond, Pierson, Webster and Wilkinson.—P. S.] 2. Comforter, consolator [in accordance with the Hellenistic use of παρακαλεῖν and παράκλησις], Origen, Chrysostom, Theophylact [Cyril, Euthymius Zigab.], Jerome [Erasmus], Luther [Maldonatus, Jansen] and others [A. E. V.]. Against this Meyer says (according to the note in Lόcke, p. 608): “It rests upon an unphilological confusion of the word with παρακλήτωρ (Sept., Job 16:2) in Aquila and Theodotus.” Nevertheless, we may safely give he Greek exegetes, who are by preference on this side, credit for having said something philologically justifiable. That, however, in point of fact, the word 1 John 2:1 cannot mean comforter, but only mediator, representative, helper, and that here also there is no immediate question of comforting, is manifest. [The term Comforter, as used in this and the 16th ch. of John by our E. V., in harmony with the Hellenistic use of παρακαλεῖν and παράκλησις, with all the Greek commentators and Luther (Trφster), carries with it so many sacred associations and expresses such an important part of the office of the Holy Spirit (comp. the παράκλησιςτοῦἀγίουπνεύματος, Acts 9:31), that it seems almost sacrilege to exchange it for another; and hence Archdeacon Hare and Dean Alford, while admitting that Advocate (in the wider sense above explained) is the strict etymological meaning of παράκλητος, which satisfies 1 John 2:1, yet retain the E. V. and combine the idea of help and strength with that of consolation in the term. Olshausen does the same among German commentators. We should remember that the English word Comforter originally means not only Consoler, as now, but primarily also Strengthener and Supporter, agreeably to its derivation from the Latin confortari, to strengthen, which, though scarcely found in classical Latin, is common in the Vulgate, and was frequently used in its Latin sense by Wiclif, e.g. Luke 22:43; Acts 9:19; 1 Corinthians 16:13; Philippians 4:13. In this sense it falls in with the connection and object of our Lord, which was, not merely to comfort the disciples for the loss of His visible presence, but mainly to strengthen their hearts. Dr. Lange, as will be seen below, likewise takes a broader but somewhat different view and combines in παράκλητος the idea of Helper (Beistand) with that of Mediator (Vermittler), and hence translates it Representative (Vertreter).—P. S.] 3. Teacher, Theod. of Mopsueste [Ernesti, Opusc. p. 215], Hofmann (Schriflbeweis, II. 2, p. 17), Luthardt [also Campbell who inappropriately translates Monitor.—P. S.]. This view has less to support it than either of the others. In reference to No. 1, explanations are again divided: a. Ancient exegetes explain advocatus as equivalent to causζ patronus, orator, against which view Lόcke observes: “this would suit 1 John 2:1, but not the passages of the Gospel.” b. It was Knapp who, supported by the usage of the term, in pure Greek writers as well as in Jewish ones availing themselves of the language, also in the writings of the Rabbins who have adopted the Greek word (τְ ?ψַ ?χְ ?μִ ?ιθ), etc., demonstrated that the word originally possessed the general signification of a helper [Beistand]. “The office of helper as performed by the Holy Ghost consists of directing and leading to the truth, testifying and reminding, teaching and glorifying.” Against this view, it must be observed: (a) Christ arrives at the idea of the ἄλλοςπαράκλ. through the promise: “What ye shall ask in My name, I will do.” He will mediate with God for His accomplishment of their work. Thus He is the Mediator, 1 John 2:1. (b) The ἄλλοςπαράκλ. is described as “the Spirit of truth; ”as such He is the Mediator through whose instrumentality believers are made one with the Father in Christ; He transports them into Christ, thus making them certain and glad of the operations of God. Without doubt, then, He is a helper, but it is because He is a mediator (see Romans 8:26-27); i.e. since He conducts their cause before God, He conducts it before the world; (not vice versβ). III. Dogmatical question. Tholuck: “The representative of the departing One is called, in these discourses, παράκλ. (rather ἄλλοςπαράκλ)., again, πνεῦματῆςἀληθείας here and in John 15:26; John 16:13,—not immediately ὄτιἀξιόπιστοςἔσται (Chrysostom), but on account of His being the Mediator of the theocratic and practical truth which, according to John 14:9, is Christ Himself; again, according to John 14:26, He is called πνεῦμαἄγιον and, according to an expression peculiar to Luke, δύναμιςτοῦὑψίστου, Luke 24:49; Luke 1:35; Acts 1:8. He is called ἄλλος, for it is not Christ according to His historical appearing. Yet again it is also Christ Himself John 14:18; that which, according to John 16:25; John 17:26 (γνωρίσω), is declared to them by Christ, is, according to John 16:14, to be declared to them by the Spirit, for He shall take of His (Christ’s). These declarations lead us to the belief that, in John, by this πνεῦμα we must understand Christ, glorified into a spirit. The view setting forth this πνεῦμα as a ‘self, distinct from Christ’ has lately been revived by Olshausen, Meyer, Schmid, Theologie des Neuen Testaments, I. p. 108; Brόckner, p. 230; Hofmann, I. p. 165. No arguments but those of Quenstδdt have been brought forward in favor of it.” It is strange that Tholuck will admit neither the expression ἄλλοςπαράκλ., nor the μεθ’ ὑμῶν, nor the masculine ἐκεῖνος, nor the διδάξει, λαλήσει, etc., as a proof that the Spirit is designated as another self, although he fully grants the hypostatizing of the Holy Ghost in the dogmatical conception of the Divinity. But if in this point dogmatics are to find their support in Paul, not in John, the latter is thrust into a false position, unsustained by the fact that he has given the deepest conception of the doctrinal system of the New Testament. That Christ alternately speaks of the coming of the Holy Spirit and of His own return, does not justify the expression by which the πνεῦμα is in this instance declared to be “Christ glorified into a spirit;” it is an expression inadmissible in any case,—Christ being, indeed, glorified in the Spirit and through the Spirit, but not into a spirit. We might almost as well say that the Father is, according to John 14:9, glorified into Christ. We have seen that the two expressions; I in the Father, the Father in Me (John 10:38; John 14:10), do not mean the same thing. The former is indicative of the personality of Christ, the other of the personality of the Father as manifested in Christ. Precisely in the same way do the expressions: ye in Me, and I in you, John 14:20, differ. By the translation of Christ’s personality into the disciples, they are translated into Him as personalities; but that whereby they, being translated into Christ, are made one personality with Christ, is that very ἄλλος and ἐκεῖνος, the personality of the Holy Ghost. For the Holy Ghost Himself shall not only be in them, but also with them, John 14:17. Inasmuch as He is in them, Christ Himself is with them; inasmuch as He is with them, He is the ἄλλοςπαράκλ. and Christ is in them. That is, the fellowship rests, in individuals, upon the manifestation of the glorified Christ; individuals rest, as Christ’s fellowship, upon the revelation of the Holy Ghost. This entry is longer than a Bible module can hold. The rest is at https://www.sermonindex.net/commentary/lange/ III OF THIS PRESENT WORLD. BROUGHT ABOUT BY MEANS OF , BY THE OF THE IN THE LOVE OF CHRIST, AND BY THEIR UPON THE WORLD, IN ORDER TO WHICH HE WILL SEND THEM HIS SPIRIT. AMID THE BURNING -FIRES IN THE VALLEY OF KIDRON. CHRIST THE VINE. OF THE NOBLE PLANT, AND OF . OF AND JOY. THE HOLY OF THE OF GOD. OF THEIR LIFE IN FACE OF THE HATRED OF THE WORLD. THE HOLY SPIRIT‘S VICTORY IN THEM OVER THE WORLD. OF THROUGH THE HOLY SPIRIT John 15:1–John 16:15(Pericope for Exaudi Sunday John 15:26–John 16:4; John 16:5-15 Pericope for Cantate Sunday) 1. The love of Jesus as the source of love to Him (John 15:1-10) 1I am the true vine, and my Father is the husbandman. 2Every branch in me that beareth not fruit he taketh away [αἴρει, cutteth off]: and every branch that beareth fruit, he purgeth [χαθαιρει, cutteth partially, pruneth, cleanseth] it, that it may bring forth [bear] more fruit. 3Now ye are clean through [Ye are clean already because of, by reason of] the word which I have spoken unto you. 4Abide in me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, except it abide in the vine; no more [so neither] can ye, except ye abide in me. 5I am the vine, ye are the branches. He that abideth in me, and I in him, the same bringeth forth 6[beareth] much fruit; for without [apart from] me ye can do nothing. If a man [any one] abide not in me, he is cast forth as a [the] branch, and is withered; and men [they] gather them, and cast them into the fire, and they are burned [they burn (quickly and readily). 7If ye abide in me, and my words abide in you, ye shall [may] ask what [whatsoever] ye will, and it shall [will] be done unto you. 8Herein [Therein] is my Father glorified, that ye bear much fruit; so shall ye be [and ye will become (thus for the first time truly)] my disciples. 9As the Father hath loved me, so [thus also] have I loved you: continue [abide] ye in my love. 10If ye keep my commandments, ye shall [will] abide in my love; even as I have kept my Father’s commandments, and abide in his love. 2. Joy (John 15:11-17) 11These things have I spoken unto you, that my joy might remain [may be] in you, and that your joy might be full [may be made full, filled up]. 12This is my commandment, That ye love one another, as I have [omit have] loved you. 13Greater love hath no man [no one] than this, that a man [he] lay down his life for his 14,15 friends. Ye are my friends, if ye do whatsoever [what] I command you. Henceforth I call you not [No longer do I call you] servants; for the servant knoweth not what his lord doeth: but I have called you friends; for all things that I have heard of [which I heard from] my Father I have [omit have] made known unto you. 16Ye have not chosen me, but I have chosen you [Ye did not choose me, but I chose you], and ordained [appointed] you, that ye should [may] go and bring forth [bear] fruit, and that your fruit should [may] remain; [in order] that whatsoever ye shall ask of the Father in my name, he may give it you. 17These things I command you, [in order] that ye [may] love one another. 3. Steadfastness in view of the hatred of the world (John 15:18-25) 18If the world hate you, ye [omit ye] know that it [hath] hated me before it hated 19[omit it hated] you. If ye were of the world, the world would love his [its] own [in you]; but because ye are not of the world, but I have chosen you out of the world, therefore the world hateth you. 20Remember the word that I said unto you, The servant is not greater than his lord. If they have [omit have] persecuted me, they will also persecute you; if they have kept my saying [if they kept my word] they will keep yours also. 21But all these things will they do unto you for my name’s sake, because they know not him that sent me. 22If I had not come and spoken unto them, they had not had sin [would have no sin]; but now they have no cloak [pretext, excuse] for their sin. 23He that hateth me hateth my Father also. 24If I had not done among them the works which none [no] other man did, they had not had [they would have no] sin: but now have they [they have] 25both seen and hated both me and my Father. But this cometh to pass, that [But in order that] the word might [may] be fulfilled that is written in their law, They hated me without a cause (Psalms 35:19; Psalms 69:4). 4. Promise of the Holy Ghost as the strength of martyrdom (John 15:26 to John 16:6) 26But when the Comforter. [Paraclete] is come, whom I will [shall] send unto you from the Father, even [omit even] the Spirit of truth, which [who] proceedeth from the Father, he shall testify [will bear witness, μαρτυρήσει] of me: 27And ye also shall bear witness [But ye also bear witness, or, are witnesses, χαὶύμεῖςδὲμαρτυρεῖτε] John 16:1 because [for] ye have been [are] with me from the beginning. These things have I spoken unto you, that ye should [may] not be offended [fall 2through offence]. They shall [will] put you out of the synagogues [excommunicate you]: yea the time [hour] cometh, that whosoever [when every man that] killeth you will think that he doeth God service [a sacrificial service, or, that he is offering service to God]. 3And these things will they do unto you [omit unto you], because they have not known the Father, nor me [they neither know the Father nor me]. 4But these things have I told you [But I have spoken these things unto you], that when the time shall come [when the (their) hour cometh], ye may remember that I told you of them [ye may remember them as I told you, or, ye may remember that I myself told you of them]. And these things I said not unto you [I told you not] at the beginning, because I was with you. 5But now I go my way [ὑπάγω, see John 15:7] to him that sent me; and none of you asketh me, Whither goest thou? 6But [Yet] because I have said these things unto you, sorrow hath filled your heart. 5. The Holy Ghost as the strength of the victory over the world (John 15:7-11) 7Nevertheless [But] I tell you the truth; It is expedient for you that I go away [depart, ἀπέλθω]; for if I go not away [do not depart], the Comforter [the Paraclete] will not come unto you; but if I depart [go, shall have gone, πορευθῶ ?], I will send him unto you. 8And when he is come, he will reprove the world of sin, and of righteousness, and of judgment [he will convince and convict the world, or, bring conviction to the world concerning, or, in regard to sin, and to righteousness, and to judgment, ἐλέγξειτὸνκόσμονπερὶἁμαρτίαςκαὶπερὶδικαιοσύνηςκαὶπερὶκρίσεως]. 9Of [In regard to] sin (that it is rooted and essentially consists in the fact), because 10[that] they believe not on me; Of [In regard to] righteousness (that it becomes manifest in the fact), because [that] I (glorified) go to my [the] Father, and ye see 11me no more (whereby grace and judgment are indicated); Of [In regard to] judgment, because [that] the prince of this world is [hath been] judged (in the work of redemption). 6. Promise of the Holy Ghost as the Spirit of the glorification of Christ, and the revelation of the future (John 15:12-15.) 12, 13I have yet many things to say unto you, but ye cannot bear them now. How beit [But] when he, the Spirit of truth is come, he will guide you into all truth [all the truth, or, the whole truth, εἰςτὴνἀλήθειανπᾶσαν]: for he shall [will] not speak of [from] himself; but whatsoever he shall hear [he heareth], that shall he speak [he will speak about]: and he will shew you [tell you, proclaim to you] things to 14come. He shall [will] glorify me: for he shall receive of mine [he will take of what is mine, ἐκτοῦἐμοῦλήμψεται], and shall shew [will tell, proclaim] it unto you. 15All things that the Father hath are mine: therefore said I [for this cause I said], that he shall take of mine [he taketh of what is mine, ἐκτοῦἐμοῦλαμβἀνει], and shall shew [will tell, proclaim] it unto you. AND [The parabolic discourse or allegory of the Vine and the Branches is the second of the two παροιμίαι recorded in the Gospel of John; the other being the parable of the Good Shepherd, John 10. See the remarks p. 317 f. It illustrates, under the figure of the noblest of fruit-bearing plants, the precious truth of the organic life-union of Christ with believers: He is the only source of their spiritual life and fruitfulness; they live in Him and of Him; and apart from Him they must inevitably wither and die, like the branches cut off from the parent stem, although they may retain for a little while a deceitful greenness and appearance of life. The same truth is set forth by Paul under the similitude of the head and the members, Ephesians 5:30; Colossians 1:23; Colossians 2:19; Romans 12:5; 1 Corinthians 10:17; 1 Corinthians 12:20; 1 Corinthians 12:27. In Archbishop Trench’s Studies on the Gospels, pp. 273–286, there is a suggestive exegetical essay on John 15:1-6.—P. S.] John 15:1. I am the true vine, etc. [Ἐγώεἰμιἡἄμπελοςἡἀληθινή, καὶὁπατήρμουὁγεωργόςἐστι].—The new meditation takes for granted a preceding pause; the figure chosen by the Lord presupposes a particular inducement to its selection. Various conjectures as to the inducement: 1. It was presented by the golden vine on the door of the temple (Josephus Ant. XV. 11, 3; De bello Jud. V. 5, 4), viewed during a stay in the temple (Jerome, Rosenmόller), or seen from a distance in the moonlight (Lampe). [This golden vine was one of the chief ornaments of Herod’s temple and no doubt a symbol of the theocracy which is called ‘a noble vine’ (Jeremiah 2:21; comp. Isaiah 5:1 ff.; Ezekiel 19:10 ff.; Psalms 80:8-19); yet Christ would scarcely set Himself over against a dead image of man’s workmanship.—P. S.] 2. The sight of the wine-cup at the Lord’s supper (see Matthew 26:28; Grotius, Nφsselt, Meyer). [Ewald, Trench. The Communion wine, the γέννηματοῦἀμπέλου (Matthew 26:28), which He had declared to be the symbol of His blood shed for the remission of sins, presented undoubtedly the nearest motive for this discourse on the closest union between Christ and His people, which is embodied in the sacrament of union with Christ and His people. Yet this does not exclude an external occasion such as is suggested by Lange, sub 6.—P. S.] 3. A vine which, from the house, had shot its tendrils into the guest-chamber (Knapp, Tholuck). 4. The view of vineyards reposing outside in the full moon (Storr). 5. Only the mental recollection of the Old Testament figure (Isaiah 5:1; Jeremiah 2:21; Ezekiel 15:2; Ezekiel 19:10; Psalms 80:8; Lόcke, Baumg. -Crusius. [Alford who, however, combines with this the second conjecture] considered as relating to Christ and the disciples who were about Him (Hofmann). 6. The walk down to Kedron through the vineyards (Lampe, Lange) [in his Leben Jesu, followed by Godet (II. 406), who supposes that Christ, seeing a vine with branches, stopped on the way, gathered His disciples around Him and spoke this parable.—P. S.] We, however, in upholding this latter view, proceed from the supposition that there were burning along the sides of the valley of Kedron nocturnal vineyard-fires,—for the burning of the cut-off branches is a principal point of consideration. It was 1. the time of year for the vineyard-fires, 2. for the cleansing of the vine, 3. for the burning of the offal from the Paschal lamb; this last was strictly commanded (Exodus 12:10; Numbers 9:12) and might easily have been performed in connection with the duties appertaining to vine-dressing (see Leben Jesu II. 3, p. 1425). The Easter-fires which the Gallic and British Churches caused to be kindled in the night following Maundy-Thursday, point to the celebration of the Lord’s Supper as obtaining in Asia Minor and, through this, back to the Jewish Paschal-fires. Jesus’ discourse concerning the vine is neither an allegory nor a parable, but a parabolic discourse, and that a symbolical one (see chap. 10). The essential Vine, not the “real.” [Comp. on ἀληθινός the first Textual Note.—P. S.] That which the earthly vine is figuratively as a symbol, that which the people of Israel was as a type (Psalms 80:8; Jer. ii. 21), Christ is in radical essentiality; He is the trunk-root and stem of the kingdom of love, of its invigorating and inspiriting fruit and effect: festive joy doth the vine represent in an earthly figure, more a child of the heavenly sun than of earthly soil. [The comparison with the O. T. theocracy (defended also by Ebrard and Hengstenberg who find in ἀληθινή an antithesis to the unfruitful vine of the Jewish theocracy) is not so natural here, since Christ represents Himself, and not His Church, as the true Vine, i.e. the reality of the idea which is figuratively represented in the natural vine.—P.S.] Ye the branches [ὑμεῖςτὰκλήματα, John 15:5.—P. S.] 1. Christ the principle of discipleship, bearing and quickening all through His Spirit; 2. they an organic whole with Him, through the communion of His Spirit. The husbandman. [γεωργοίς, the owner of the vineyard as well as the laborer, is a more dignified term than ἀμπελουργός, i.e. the vine dresser or actual cultivator of the vine. King Uzziah is called γεωργοίς, 2 Chronicles 26:10, and the leaders of the Jewish theocracy γεωργοί, Matthew 21:31-41. Trench: “Not that the γεωργοίς need be assumed to ‘purge’ or prune only by the hand of others. The labor of the vineyard is exactly of that lighter kind, in which the proprietor might be well pleased himself to take a share.” Wordsworth: “He tills our hearts with the ploughshare of His word, and scatters the seeds of His precepts there, and sends us the dew and rain of the Spirit, that He may reap the fruits of holiness.”—P. S.] God’s rule over the world Isaiah 1. a personal government; 2. a teleological government: establishment, culture, perfection of the kingdom of love; 3. a government exercised upon Christ as the centre of the world and upon His disciples as His organs; a strict and wise government corresponding with the noble nature of the Vine; a government realizing the destiny of the Vine, partly through a cutting off of the useless, partly through a pruning of the serviceable, branches (judgments and purifyings). [Arians used this passage, as implying that the Son was a creature and entirely subordinated to the Father. But Christ calls Himself the true Vine, not in His eternal divine nature, but in His historical mediatorial character and work. Augustine: Quamvis autem Christus vitis non esset, nisi homo esset, tamen istam gratiam palmitibus non prζberet, nisi etiam Deus esset.—P. S.] John 15:2. Every branch in me that beareth not fruit, he taketh away [ΙΙᾶνκλῆμαἐνἐμοὶμὴφέρονκαρπόν, αἳρειαὐτσ́ ?].—In Me; namely in organic intimacy, ἐνἐμοί. Antithesis of the non-fruit-bearing and fruit-bearing branches. The circumstance that the fruit-bearing branches are not placed in the fore-ground, is indicative of the occasion which suggested the figure: the view of the vineyard-fires. The ground of unfruitfulness is declared in the following, John 15:4. The natural degeneracy of the proud shoots (Luther) which are not governed by the noble impulse of the vine, but are common, useless wood, is made a figure of the moral misconduct of such of Christ’s members as stand in the external connection of discipleship, without, however, remaining internally connected with Him. [The fruits of the Spirit are enumerated Galatians 5:22.—P. S.] Every (branch) that beareth fruit, he pruneth (cleanseth) it [καθαίρειαὐτό].—Seeming to attack their lives also with the knife, as is indicated by the similarity of sound: αἴρει, καθαίρει. The purgings here mentioned are to be referred to the providences of the Father. Chrysostom calls them πειρασμοί; Augustine: castigationes dei (“sunt emendatoriζ, non interfectoriζ”). [Bengel: afflictiointerna et externa; Trench and others refer the purging to the whole process of sanctification which includes temptations and afflictions.—P. S.] The purging itself is not, indeed, accomplished without the co-operation of the internal judgment of the Spirit (Galatians 2:19); here, however, Christ has in view those divine judgments, such as overtook the disciples in the Passion-night.—That it may bear more fruit [ἳνακαρπο͂νπλείοναφέρῃ ?].—The relation between Christ and His disciples is here indicated in such general terms as to render it impossible for the branches to denote only the Apostles, or the fruits official fruits merely. The general fruits of spiritual fellowship with Christ, particularly as fruits of love, constitute the meaning. Such fruits were, doubtless, to make their first appearance as results of the ministry of the Apostles, there being, indeed no true official fruits independent of the fruits of their labors. John 15:3. Ye are clean already [Ἤδηὑμεῖςκαθαροίἐστε, clean by virtue of your connection with the root and stem, and yet in need of being cleansed as branches, John 15:2 (καθαίρει); mundi atque mundandi…quis enim in hac vita sic mundus, ut non sit magis magisque mundandus? (Augustine). Clean objectively, as being justified in Christ, in need of cleansing subjectively, as to sanctifieation.—P. S.]—See John 13:10. It is a question whether the idea presented is that of men already purified in antithesis to those whose purification is yet future (Meyer), or that of an internal principial purification, which they already possess, in antithesis to the external purification which they still lack and must now receive (Leben Jesu, Tholuck). We regard the latter antithesis as the one intended and agreeing with the context.—The noble vine-branch is clean in respect of its inward vitality, but, nevertheless, it must be purged from wild outgrowths, shoots and appendicles. The purifying word of Jesus that made the disciples clean from within (see John 6:57), must be supplemented from without by the Father’s school of suffering; the latter, however, was not to give them the principle of purity, but to strengthen it and free it from the danger of degeneration. In this school of suffering their purification must be rendered complete through their abiding in Him. [By reason of the word which I have spoken to you, διὰτὸνλόγον—διὰ indicates the ground or reason, as John 6:57. The living word of Christ received by faith into the heart and dwelling there (comp. John 15:7, τᾶῥήματάμουἐνὑμῖνμείνοντα) is the principle of regeneration and purification (John 17:17; James 1:18; 1 Peter 1:23; Ephesians 5:26). It is not said by reason of baptism; the apostles were not baptized (except with the preparatory baptism of John), and regeneration is possible still without water baptism, which receives its force and efficacy only from the word and power of the Spirit present with it and working through it. Augustine who otherwise, as most of the fathers, has an exaggerated view of the efficacy and necessity of water baptism, remarks: “Why did Ho not say: ‘Ye are clean by baptism?’ Because it is the word which cleanses in the water. Take away the word, and what is the water? Add the word to the element, and it becomes a sacrament. Whence is this power of the water that it touches the body and the heart is cleansed? Whence, but because the word operates not merely in being spoken, but in being believed.”—P. S.] John 15:4. Abide in Me and I in you [Μείνατεἐνἐμοί, κἀγὼἐνὑμῖν].—Not “on Me” (Meyer) but “in Me,” i e. in the true internal vital connection of spiritual communion with Christ. The abiding in Him is the condition whereon depends His ability to abide in them. The interpretation: “Take heed that I may abide in you” (Grotius), likewise converts the promise into a condition, and that the one already declared: “Abide in Me.” [Meyer supplies to κἀγὼε̇νὑμῖν, with Lange, μενῶ, I shall abide; but Bengel, Godet, Trench supply, with Grotius, μείνω, I abide. Bengel: Facite ut maneatis in me, et ut ego maneam in vobis. Trench: “Take heed that ye abide in Me, and that I abide in you.” This is supported by John 15:7 (μείνῃ), but it is grammatically less natural than the usual interpretation, which makes the second clause a promise.—P. S.] As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself [καθὼςτὸκλῆμαοὐδύναταικαρπὸνφέρεινἀφ’ ἑαυτοῦ ?].—The thing treated of here is, manifestly, the abiding of the branch as a noble branch in the vine, not merely as a shoot on the vine. This is the condition of fruit-bearing. The same law applies to the disciples: so neither can ye [οὔτωςοὐδὲὑμεῖς, ἐὰνμὴἐνἐμοὶμένητε].—It is no question here of the natural inability of the old man (Augustine), but of the simple organic dependence of the believer on Christ; though with this dependence, the effect of such inability, or the constant danger of turning into a proud shoot again, is taken for granted also. The sort of synergism expressed under the supposition of abiding in Christ is explained by the figure itself; nothing without Him, everything in connection with Him. This is fulfilled, in the case of the branch, in organic vitality; in the case of the disciples, in free personality. John 15:5. I am the Vine, ye are the branches [Ἐγώεἰμιἡἄμπελοςτὰκλήματα].—The positive antithesis to the negative declaration John 15:4. At the same time, however, an emphasizing of the organic contrast: I the Vine=principle; ye the branches=organs entirely conditional upon the Vine and dependent upon it.—And I in him, abide, namely.—For apart from Me.—Without fellowship with Me [χωρὶςἐμοῦ = χωρισθέντεςἀπ’ ἐμοῦ, separate from Me, which is more than without Me.—P. S.]—Ye can do nothing [οὐδύνασθεποιεῖνοὐδέν].—Properly, ye cannot be productive and creative as vine-branches. Hence, Christ is speaking of specifically Christian labors and achievements. Christian vital activity is entirely dependent upon vital communion with Christ. Even such noble things as precede conversion are, so far as they are noble, done in the truth of the Logos (Olshausen); but it is only through communion with the Christ of history that a man attains to the performance of Christian acts, new works, deeds of faith, God-like deeds,—or, in fine, that a man brings forth fruit. Luther: “He doth not here speak of a natural or worldly life and conduct, but of fruits of the Gospel.” [The passage plainly asserts the total spiritual inability and unfruitfulness of man without vital connection with Christ, and so far is a strong proof-text for Augustinian and against Pelagian views. Augustine says that Christ spoke thus “ut respondent futuro Pelagio.” Calvin: “Non tantum co-operantis suζ gratiζ auxilium hic commendat, sed nos penitus privat omni virtute nisi quam suppeditat ipse nobis.” Yet the passage has frequently been applied without proper discrimination. Christ speaks here not of natural morality and civil righteousness, which has nothing to do with man’s salvation, but of spiritual righteousness and fruits of the gospel; nor does He speak of unconverted men, but of Christians who even after their conversion are in constant need of His grace for the performance of any Christian work. Christ is the beginning, middle and end of spiritual life; we can do nothing without Him, but much, yea, every thing with Him. Trench says: “It is a poor and inadequate interpretation of the words ‘Without Me’ to make them to mean, ‘Ye can do nothing until ye are in Me and have My grace.’ It is rather, ‘After ye are in Me, ye can even then accomplish nothing except ye draw life and strength from Me. . . . From first to last it is I that must work in and through you.’ We have a warning here to the regenerate man that he never seek to do aught of himself; not a declaration that the unregenerate is unable to do aught.”—P. S.] John 15:6. If any one abide not in Me [ἐὰνμήτιςμένῃἐνἐμοί].—Properly, shall not have abode.—He is cast forth [ἐβλήθηἔξωὡςτὸκλῆμακαὶἐξαράνθη, καὶσυνάγουσιναὐτὰκαὶεἰςτὸπῦρβάλλουσιν, καὶκαίεται].—I.e. already cast forth (or cast out, ἔξω, viz. from the vineyard, i.e. the true Church), like the branch [τὸκλη̇μα, sc. τὸἄχρηστον (Euthym.), the useless branch.—P. S.] The article, as well as what follows, very distinctly intimates that Jesus and His disciples are viewing the burning up of withered branches. He is cast forth and is withered, and is now, in company with other similar branches, gathered for the fire. Interpretations of the Aorists [ἐβλήθη and έξαράνθη]: 1. As is the custom (Grotius); 2. They have a Future signification (Kuinoel, Baumg.-Crusius); 3. They are expressive of what is immediately to happen: very soon, etc. (Beza, Lόcke, etc.);4. The events described are things past as viewed in presence of the Last Day. The fire, therefore, meaning the fire of the final judgment (Meyer).But we should not permit our interpretation to be biased by this allusion tο the last fiery judgment, since fiery judgments manifold in their nature precede that final one, and every trial is directly converted into a fiery judgment to him who has not stood the test, Malachi 3:3; Matthew 3:12. Therefore the Aorists are indicative of time past, because the things which they denote are viewed from the stand-point of judgments already present in time. When we see branches gathered together and blazing up, we know that these were withered because they were cut off, and they were cut off because they had not abode in the vine. Jesus is induced to select this tense: 1. by the sight of the burning branches; 2. by proximate reference to Judas who but now is being gathered up together with the withered branches of the Sanhedrin. Hence the fire is, primarily, only a prelude to the fire of Gehenna, though, at the same time, it points towards it; and the gatherers are all divinely ordained instruments of judgment, and not merely the angels at the end of the world, Matthew 13:41 (Matthew 24:31; Rev. 19:24); see Psalms 104:4. Similarly Tholuck in reference to Hebrews 6:8. And they burn [καὶκαίεται, sc. τὰκλήματα].—Emphatic. Like dry brush they flame up quickly and are speedily consumed. Indicative of the conspicuous, rapid and shocking ruin of apostates, or, in general, of dead members of Christ. [They burn, is more graphic and terrible than the E. V., they are burned; comp. the Pass. part. καιόμενος, burning, flaming, and Ezekiel 15:5, where it is said of the wood of the vine-tree: ‘Lo, to the fire it hath been given for fuel, Its two ends have the fire eaten, And its midst has been scorched!’ Bengel: “Magna vi positum eximia cum majestate.” Trench: “All which is here expressed or implied, of ‘the fire’ (Matthew 3:10), ‘the flame’ (Luke 16:24), ‘the flaming fire’ (2 Thessalonians 1:8), ‘the furnace of fire’ (Matthew 13:42; Matthew 13:50), ‘the gehenna of fire’ (Matthew 5:22; Mark 9:43), ‘the lake of fire’ (Revelation 20:15; Revelation 21:8), ‘the everlasting fire’ (Matthew 25:41; Judges 7), with all the secrets of anguish which words like these, if there be any truth in words, must involve, demands rather to be trembled at than needs to be expounded.”—P. S.] John 15:7. If ye abide in Me, etc. [Ἐὰνμείνητεἐνἐμοὶκαὶτὰῥήματάμουἐνὑμῖνμείνη, ὅἐὰνθέλητεαἰτήσασθε (imperative, which some MSS. have changed into the future tense καὶγενήσεταιὑμῖν]. The shocking judgment of the withered branches inspires them with the ardent wish that they may be preserved from a like catastrophe. The Lord’s answer anticipates the expression of this wish. Ye shall not only be preserved, but the most glorious gain shall accrue to you; but ye must pray aright. Βut in order to pray aright, ye must retain my words within you,—and for this end, again, ye must steadfastly continue in the true fellowship of love with Me, 1 John 5:14.—What ye will (ὅἐὰνθέλητε, emphatically put first).—I.e. not in the sense of arbitrary choice, but in the way of love and of Christ’s word [or “in the way of God’s will and as tending to πολὺνκαρπὸνφέρειν” (Alford) ]. In this direction (in His name) no request which they may venture, can be too bold. How far did their deliverance and exaltation by means of the night of the Passion exceed all that they could ask or understand! [They who abide in Christ, can only pray in conformity or at least in entire submission to His will, and for things which tend to His glory and the salvation of souls. Such prayers must be heard, as to their true spiritual intent, although very often they are heard at a time and in a manner which differs widely from our short-sighted vision. God sometimes hears the substance of our prayers best by denying their form. On prayer in Christ’s name, see notes on John 14:13 f.—P. S.] John 15:8. Therein is My Father glorified [Ἐντούτῳἐδοξάσθηὁπατήρμου).—We agree with Meyer in considering ἐντούτῳ as relating not to the ἴνα following it (Lόcke), but to the verse preceding it: “by this granting of prayer, conceded to the fulfilling of the condition,—the μένεινἐνἐμοί.” The first object to be accomplished by the granting of the disciples’ prayers is the glorification of the Father, in pursuance of the glorification of the Son,—the latter being accomplished subsequently to the effusion of the Holy Ghost upon the disciples. This, the Father’s glorification, should, however, react upon the disciples, causing them to bear much fruit and to become, more thoroughly than ever, the disciples of Jesus. The bearing of much fruit was not to be the means of their entering into new discipleship with Him; the two things were to appear simultaneously.—So shall ye grow up to be true disciples to Me.—[καὶγενήσεσθε (Codd. Sin. and A., text. rec., Tischend. 8, Mey., etc.), or γένησθε (B. D., etc., Lachm., Treg., Alf., Westcott and Hort) ἐμοὶμαθηταί.—P. S.]. It is most fitting to interpret γενήσεσθε as a consecutive promise, not as a further demand; hence it is independent of ἴνα. [This is preferable. Τεςήσεσθε expresses the results of πολύνκαρπὸν (φέρειν) with the additional idea of a gradual process of growth. Discipleship of Christ is the beginning and the end, or, as Bengel has it, the foundation and top (fundamentum et fastigium), of Christianity. Μαθηταί here is, of course, pregnant, such as are worthy of Me and worthy of the name of Christians which means followers or imitators of Christ.—P. S.] John 15:9. As My Father hath loved Me. [Kαθὼςἠγάπησένμεὁπατήρ, κἀγὼυμᾶςἡγάπησα].—The apodosis commences, not at μείνατε (Grotius) but at κἀτώ, as is demonstrated by the distinction John 15:10. Aside from this fact, the construction of Grotius would certainly afford a good sense. According as My Father hath loved Me, i.e. in accordance with the mystery of the Trinity,—and as I have loved you, i.e. in accordance with the mystery of redemption. Continue in My love [μείνατεἐντῇἀγάπῃτῇἐμῆ ?]. Thus the whole weight would rest in the modification of the continuing. The continuing, however, has already been the subject of discourse; this continuing in Christ is modified here as a continuing in His love. It is a question whether the Aorists are employed because Jesus is standing upon the boundary of His life and looking back (Meyer), or whether the meaning of the expression is not: recognized in love, conceived a love for, as, similarly, the term πεπἰστευκα means: I have become a believer. We take the latter for granted; in this view of the case, the Aorists mark the love of God and Jesus as an accomplished fact, not simply from the boundary of Jesus’ life, but from the whole future of the disciples. In the glorification of Jesus they should contemplate the fact of the Father’s love to the Son; also, however, the measure of the Son’s love to them—a love which was analogously to glorify them. They must continue, must take root in the contemplation of this love; their regeneration, their fruits, their discipleship, shall all spring from their thus abiding (i.e. it shall be the source of their justification). The ἀγάπηἡἐμή not love to Jesus (Grotius and others), though grammatically the expression might have this signification, but the love of Jesus to them, as is proved by the foregoing (John 15:11 ἡχαρὰἡἐμή). Love to Jesus is here, as throughout the section, expressed by the continuing in Him. John 15:10. If ye keep My commandments.—The commandments of Jesus are, in this place as elsewhere, the provisions that He has made for the spiritual regulation of men’s lives: precepts, promises, instructions, consolations and warnings in a mass. The warmth and sincerity of vital communion is conditioned by fidelity in “will-oneness” (Tholuck). But, again, the singleness of our view of the life of Christ is conditioned by our faithful perception of His word in detail. True unity is conditioned by the plenitude of manifoldness, true synthesis by analysis, fidelity in great things by fidelity in small things.—Even as I have kept My Father’s commandments.—The obedience of Jesus even to the death upon the cross; the conservation of the love the Father bore His human form and conduct. John 15:11. These things have I spoken unto you.—Now follows the section bearing upon the joy that the new life in brotherly love and friendship with Jesus brings. The discourse upon the love of Christ was to be the means of developing joy within them. Thus it is written of the fruit of the Spirit, Galatians 5:22 : love, joy.—That My joy might be in you [ἵναἡχαρὰἡἐμὴἐνὑμῖνᾖ . Observe the collocation of ἡἐμή and ἐνὑμῖν].—Interpretations: 1. My joy in you [mea de vobis lζtitia] (χαίρεινἐν; Augustine, Lampe: the joy inspired by His viewing their life as pictured in predestination,—which joy was always perfect). That I may rejoice in you,—that ye may be a cause and subject for my joy (Luthardt). 2. Your joy over Me [gaudium vestrum de me] (Euth. Zigab., Grotius, Piscator; over Christ’s merit). 3. That the joyfulness occasioned by Me may be in you (Calvin, De Wette). 4. The joy experienced by Christ Himself, the joy of His own Spirit (Cyril, Lόcke, Meyer [Alford]). Doubtless this is the meaning of the passage. The holy joyfulness of Christ, the untrammeled, glad upsoaring of His soul in the midst of all His tribulations shall, through the Spirit, by means of the communication and awakening of love, devolve upon the disciples themselves (see 1 John 3:21; 1 John 4:17; Gosp. John 16:22; Philippians 2:17; Philippians 4:4 and many passages in the epistles of St. Paul). It is impossible to maintain the distinction of a joy that Christ tastes in Himself (Chrysostom, Bengel), and of one which He occasions (Calvin, Hofmann, Tholuck); for Christ communicates to, and occasions in, His people precisely that which He possesses in Himself. That, moreover, Christ’s joy itself was first made humanly complete in His exaltation and communication of salvation to the world, is certainly a fact to be insisted upon, in accordance with Chrysostom and Bengel, although they specialize individual considerations too much. From the following it also results that Christ’s joy in the redeemed is likewise particularly treated of. “And good pleasure in men.”—In you, i.e. as a new and resident vital principle. They have not this perfect joyfulness yet; it must come to them from Christ; and for this reason also the reading ῇ is better than [μέινη.—And your joy may be made perfect [καὶἡχαρὰὑμῶνπληρωθῇ ?].—Man’s natural impulse to joy has, even in the disciples, already developed into the beginnings of a sacred joy; these beginnings are, however, as yet imperfect; through Christ’s joy, their joy shall be made complete [“uplifted and ennobled even to fulness—to the extreme of their capability and satisfaction” (Alford)]. And, again, the joy shall be theirs, existing under a peculiar phase in each one. For the dominion of Christ’s personality in the hearts of His people does not destroy, but quicken, develop and glorify their own personality, 1 John 1:4; 2 John 1:12. John 15:12. This is My commandment, That ye love one another.—Christ does not here pass to another exhortation (Tholuck, Meyer); He does but declare the vital law whose aim is the perfection of their joy. It must be grounded on His love, developed in mutual brotherly love. As the 14th chapter is an exposition of the words John 13:33 : “whither I go, ye cannot come,”—i.e. an exposition of the heaven beyond this present world, so here the exposition of the saying John 13:34 appears as the full explanation of the heaven upon earth treated of in John 15 : that earthly heaven, with its heavenly joy, is to be revealed in mutual brotherly love. This ἐντολή is the sum of the ἐντολαί John 15:10; comp. Romans 13:8.—As I have loved you.—Ι. e. first qualitatively: as personalities destined for salvation they must love one another sub specie, ζterni; for only such loving constitutes true love; thus doing, however, they will always be quantitatively approaching the true sacrificial joyfulness of His love. John 15:13. Greater love hath no man than this, etc. [Μείζοναταύτηςἀγάπηνοὐδεὶςἔχ̇ει, ἵνατιςτὴνψυχὴναὐτοῦθῇὑπὲρτῶνφίλωναυ̇τοῦ ?],—Difficulty is here occasioned by the ἵνα, and the different construction of this leads to a different interpretation of the verse. The ordinary explanation considers it an exposition of ταύτης. This makes the whole verse a generalized description of the love of Christ. “A greater love than I bear to you hath no man, namely, that he layeth down his life for his friends.” Meyer, on the other hand, maintains that ἵνα is expressive of purpose even in this place; he interprets thus: Greater love than My love to you. hath no man: the divine purpose (ἴνα) which My love is destined to accomplish, is, that a man shall surrender his life for his friends. Opposed to this view is, however, the grammatical objection that ἴνα would then in reality be the beginning of a new sentence; another objection is the logical one that the love of Christ would then be cited merely as an example. Moreover, in the subsequent verse the Lord calls the disciples His friends, after having given utterance to the idea of a man’s dying for his friends. Hence we must doubtless assume, with De Wette, that ἀγάπη, in conjunction with its meaning of love, contains the idea of an impulse of the will, a law; and in like manner we must accept the supposition of Lόcke, that the case of a sacrificing of life is put to express the ideal of love. The proper meaning of the saying is this: greater love hath no man than that which goes to the point of causing him to lay down his life for his friends. It is a picture of the love of Christ—generalized, however, because this love, after the pattern of Christ, should be to His people a law of their lives, and because foretokens of this love may make their appearance in the realm of the noble, even amongst the unchristianized of mankind. Yet another interpretation were this: a love, great like this, hath no man beside,—in order that One there might be to give proof of such by laying down His life, etc. The dearth of love in all others renders the great love-sacrifice of the One necessary. Still, it is the intention of Christ to represent His self-sacrificing love as a pattern for the disciples, and therefore the usual interpretation seems advisable. The passage Romans 5:6 is apparently acquainted with a still higher degree of love. But dying for men who have been sinners and enemies is a dying for men who shall be friends; Christ dies for sinners who are to be friends; or, again, He dies in a special sense for sinners who have already become friends, in a general sense for friends who are still sinners. Be it observed, moreover, that He is not delineating His death under its unique form of an expiatory death, but under its representative form as a death of self-sacrificing friendly love. John 15:14. Ye are My friends [ὐμεῖςφίλοιμουἐστέ, ἐὰνποιῆτεἅἐγὼἐντέλλομαιὑμῖν],—Christ, with these words, applies the general proposition of the preceding verse to His relation to the disciples. I look upon you as friends for whom I die; but ye too must prove yourselves My friends by doing after My commandment, i.e. loving one another according to the degree set forth by My sacrificial love, in so far as that is designed as a pattern for you. And hence the idea of φίλοι is not merely that of “passive recipients of love”—and indeed the word must always, from the nature of the case, mean something more than that. John 15:15. Now no more—servants.—Neither did He officially call them servants before, but they were such in accordance with the conception of Rabbinical discipleship, and but a short time previous to this He had expressly brought out this characteristic of their relation. This is now at an end; but their emancipation and conversion into freedmen does not estrange them from Him; on the contrary, it elevates them into the category of friends. As, however, the idea of disciple is connected with that of servant, so the condition of friends is implicative of that of apostles. What Christ understands by the term friends, He explains by the antithesis of servants. A distinction must undoubtedly be made between the stricter and the broader sense of friend as well as of servant. Friends though they were before (Luke 12:4; John 11:11), from this time forth they become such in a higher sense; and though now ceasing to be His servants in a legal sense, yet, in the sense of free obedience, they do now become servants of His more truly than ever (John 15:20; Acts 4:29; Romans 1:1, etc.); just as the Son of God was, as such, also the Servant of God κατ’ ἐξοχγ́ν. In what respect, then, do they cease to be His servants in the former sense? The servant knoweth not what his lord doeth; but I have called you friends, etc.—The servant executes the individual orders of his master but is not privy to the whole idea which informs his government; moreover he executes the individual order simply as under authority, without being in full unison with it, because it is not instilled into him as an idea and a motive,—and in respect of this fact, it is his master that does such and such things through him; still less does he understand what his master does personally, or through the medium of other servants. He, with his unfree individual performances, does not understand the free doings of his lord, Romans 7:15. The friend, on the other hand, is the confidant of the thought of his friend and exerts himself in harmony with him. And so the exaltation of the disciples from Christ’s service to friendship is accomplished by His confiding to them the fundamental idea of His life, His sacrificial death of love in accordance with the loving counsel of God; it was by this confidence that He sought to arouse them to a loving activity that should rejoice in sacrifice. They are initiated into His foundation of the personal kingdom of love and consecrated to assist in the extension of the same.—And in this respect He has made known to them all (πάντα) that He has heard from the Father,—not extensively (see John 16:12), but intensively; in the Father’s counsel of love all lies enfolded. Lόcke makes this distinction: All that I have heard that was meant to be communicated to you; Meyer distinguishes the will of salvation and the further instructions connected with it. The distinction between a principle and its development is also intimated, Ephesians 1:17 ff. Be it observed that also in Luke 12:4 as well as in John 11:11, the name of friend is placed in connection with joyfulness in death. Friendship with Christ is co-partnery in His loving, self-sacrificing dying-courage in the strength of the thought of self-sacrificing love. John 15:16. Ye did not choose Me, etc.[Οὐχὑμεῖςμεἐξελέξασθε, ἀλλ’ ἐγὼἐξελεξάμηνὑμᾶς, κ. τ. λ. “A wholesome memento after the lofty things He had just said about their mutual indwelling, and the unreservedness of the friendship they had been admitted to” (David Brown).—P. S.]—Though sharers with Him in the perfect vital fellowship of joy, though placed on an equal footing with Him as friends, their relation is still not one of caprice and individual extravagance. For the principle of their friendship is not resident in them, but in His love. He has chosen them to be His friends,—not out of an abstract liking for their individuality, but in the light of the moral destiny of their personality. The election of Christ is not identical with the election to the kingdom on the part of God, in the Pauline sense (Augustine and others), though, in respect to these faithful disciples, the former election is pre-suppositive of the latter; the choosing spoken of by Christ is the election to the apostolic office (see John 6:70; John 13:18); in a more general sense it is here expressive of Christ’s election of any and all of His disciples to render friendly service to Him as co-workers in His kingdom of love (Euth. Zig., Luthardt). And appointed you.—This ἔθηκαὑμᾶς presents with greater distinctness the idea of the apostolic calling. The election to friendship is, viewed from the stand-point of their moral destiny, a now still more settled calling or ordination to apostolic labors (τιθέναι, 1 Corinthians 12:28; 1 Timothy 1:12, etc.) Hence not: I have planted you (Chrysostom and others); this interpretation does not correspond with the preceding figure of the branches and still less does it harmonize with the following ἴναὑπάγητε. To suit this interpretation of ἔθηκα, the latter words were constrained to mean the reaching forth of plants (Chrysostom and others). They are expressive of the forth-going of the disciples by virtue of their mission as apostles (Meyer, Tholuck); at the same time, however, they imply a personal laboring, carried on in independent life (Luther, Lόcke, etc.)—Meyer, without grounds, denies that this is the case. The repetition of ὑμᾶς countenances the view we have just set forth. Hence it results, however, that an oxymoron is contained in the antithesis ἔθηκαὑμᾶς, ἴναὑμεῖςὑπάγητε. I have set you right firmly in your place, in order that ye might sally forth right independently and travel far and wide, knowing no bounds. In the farewell discourses the item of the ordination, like a series of similar Preterites, is expressive of the imminent sending of the Comforter as a fact already determined; and thus we may regard the whole matter of the farewell discourses as a, pre-celebration of the Pentecostal festival. And that your fruit may remain.—Their institution into the fellowship of His love should result in their going forth under the impulse of love; this going forth should be followed by their bringing forth fruit, their work and ministry of love. This fruit, again, in its virtue of keeping and being propagated everlastingly, should be demonstrated to be a foundation imperishable, established by love. Undoubtedly the fruit is to remain unto eternal life (John 4:36; Tholuck, Meyer); but here the proximate idea is the remaining of the apostolic fruit in the world and in face of the world,—as results from the following. That whatsoever ye shall ask of the Father [ἴναὄτιἄναἰτήσητετὸνπατέραἐντῷὀνόματίμου, δῷὑμῖν].—The Lord having previously made the bearing of fruit in work dependent upon prayer (John 15:7-8), Lόcke, Tholuck, Meyer, infer that the second ἵνα is here not co-ordinate with the first, but subordinate to it, whilst Chrysostom and others deem that the hearing of prayer is here declared to be the fruit of faithful activity. It is, however, possible that a good reason exists for the change in the succession of these two considerations. As prayer must precede work, so work, again, must become the basis of a more extended, bolder asking. This is what Christ has in view, He being upon the point of setting His disciples, with their work of love and fellowship of love, in array against the entire hatred of the whole world. John 15:17. That ye may love one another [ἴναἀγαπᾶτεἀλλήλους].—With these words the Lord sums up the fundamental thought presented John 15:11-17 in one concluding utterance. Everything that He has told them of His perfect joy, His friendship, His election and their calling, is intended to become to them a vital law of mutual love. Brotherly love, concord, unity—are to form the close-banded fellowship of the disciples of Jesus, in which fellowship they may confront the hatred of the world and vanquish it. John 15:18. If the world hate you [Εἰὁκόσμοςὑμᾶςμισεῖ.]—Saying concerning the hatred of the world and their defensive attitude towards it, reaching from John 15:18-27, in its more extended bearing, to John 16:6.—Know that it hath hated Me before you [γινώσκετε—imperative, not indicative—ὄτιἐμὲπρῶτονὐμῶνμεμίσηκεν].—Me as the first, in advance of you. Before (above) you all. Together with its reference to time, the expression is indicative of causality and comparison: Me first, Me most; Me as the predecessor for whose sake it hateth you. Tholuck: “The superlative comprehends the comparative” (see John 13:16; Matthew 10:24; 1 Peter 2:21; 1 Peter 4:12; 1 John 3:13-14). John 15:19. If ye were of the world [Εἰἐκτοῦκόσμουῆ ?̓τε].—“The five times repeated κόσμος is solemn” (Meyer). It is at the same time a strong emphasizing of the idea. Mankind is a world in its sympathy in sin, in the ungodly tendency in which individuals, as personalities, are dissolved. As a world, they hate believers; their individual antipathy to Christianity results from that sympathy with ungodliness wherein they stand. John 15:20. The servant is not greater, etc.—John 13:16; comp. Matthew 10:24. If they persecuted Me.—The hypothetical el is εἰ ?exceedingly apodictical here. It expresses in a concrete manner the certainty of the fact that they, as disciples of Christ, must experience the same treatment at the hands of the world which Christ has met with. They must, therefore, be able to see by Christ what fate is awaiting them, since the life of Christ is the same in Christ and in them, and since the world, for its part, continues the same, as world. The first “if,” then, reveals to them the positive prospect of persecution; the second tells them how scant a hope they need entertain of a contrary course of proceeding. It is inadmissible to apprehend τηρεῖν, as do Bengel and others, in the sense of: to lurk for. That, on the other hand, it contains an element of irony (Grotius), is not inconsistent with the gravity of the discourse; and neither is it inconsistent with the strength of the negation, that the second clause leaves them a ray of hope in regard to some with whom they may have to do (Olshausen, Baumg.-Crusius), since the subject here is not the world, but individual men. John 15:21. But all these things will they do unto you, etc.—The reference is to the first clause, that prophetic of persecution. Consolatory explanation of persecution: Worldly men persecute the disciples for Christ’s name’s sake, just as they persecute Christ because they have turned away from God who sent Him. Hence it follows that the persecuted have their Christ and God Himself on their side (see John 8:19; John 16:3). The name of Christ, in accordance with the full extent of its meaning, is the confession of the disciples. Now this name is odious to the children of the world for the reason that the originator of it, the Father, is unknown to them. The first clause is declarative of the world’s guilt, the second of at least so much palliation of its guilt as to leave hope for its conversion; yet but in part. John 15:22. If I had not come and spoken unto them, they would have no sin [comparatively]. [Εἰμὴῆ ?̓λθονκαὶἐλάλησααὐτοῖς, ἀμαρτίανοὐκεἴχοσαν (Alexandrian form for εἶχον)].—This is expressive of the depth of His origin, the glory of His being, the holiness of His mission.—And spoken to them (ἐλάλησα). This is expressive of the perfect familiarity, clearness, fulness, warmth and condescension appertaining to the revelation He has made of Himself and of God. They would not have sin. i.e. in respect to this sin, they would be relatively sinless, guiltless. Unbelief, “the new and deeper fall,” John 3:16. Meyer seeks in vain to put a distinction between unbelief (Bengel and others) and hatred of the name of Jesus. No pretext or excuse [νῦνδὲπρόφασινοὐκἔχουσινπερὶτῆςἁμαρτίαςαὐτῶν].—I.e. every attempt at an apology comes to nought. It melts away in face of the revelations of judgment. Had Jesus not come, or not yet come, they would still be under the πάρεσις (Romans 3:25) of the olden time; now their sin has become guilt, has become a new παράβασις. The objection to this view, urged by De Wette: As a matter of course they would not have fallen into this sin without the coming of Christ, overlooks the indicated graduation of sin; in changing the hatred of Christ into a hatred of the divine cause, he mistakes the spirit of this Gospel in particular,—John’s special characteristic being the merging of things in persons. As little is Tholuck (with Meyer) in the right in contesting that this new guilt is not the sin of unbelief in specie (in opposition to Augustine: hoc est peccatum quo tenentur cuncta peccata, quod unusquisque, si non habet, dimittuntur ei peccata; similarly Zwingli, Luther, Stier, Luthardt). The citations John 8:21; John 8:34; John 9:41 also speak of sins of self-blinding, which are identical with unbelief.—But now they have no pretext.—It can not be inferred from this that the heathen, to whom Christ has not yet spoken, are guiltless; such a supposition is the less tenable from the fact that the crucifixion perpetrated upon Christ by the Jews must be regarded as an act of the whole world. What does result from the passage is, not that they incur a lesser (damnation) punishment (Augustine), but that decision in regard to them is still reserved until the time of their own decision. If damnation be made dependent upon the antithesis to a revelatio universalis, facta ab initio mundi (Cyril, Melanchthon), the natural inference must be that that revelatio might have been sufficient even for salvation. John 15:23. He that hateth Me, hateth My Father also.—In the face of Christ, want of knowledge of the unknown God who sent Him (John 15:21) develops into hatred of the Father whom they do know. The unbelieving Jew, like the unbelieving Gentile, turns in hostility against the idea of the living, personal God of revelation,—and that in the face of Christ’s works, though they be referred in a special manner to the Father. John 15:24. Not done among them the works.—Climactic gradation of the guilt of unbelievers in accordance with the distinction of degrees of faith: John 5:36; John 10:37; John 14:11. John 15:25. The word that is written.—The frequently recurring exaltation of Christ’s spirit to a state of calm acquiescence in the providence of God (particularly that exercised over the Messiah), as portrayed centuries before in Holy Writ. The word is found Psalms 35:19; Psalms 69:4; in neither case as a verbal prophecy, but as a mental type. They have cast (ηִ ?πָּ ?ν) their hatred upon Me without a reason, without a cause. I.e. not ironically: they faithfully follow what is in their law (De Wette), but: as a judgment upon them, there must be a fulfilment of what is written in their Law,—i.e. in their Holy Scriptures which they read with blinded eyes,—concerning their hatred of Messianic piety. The broader sense of νόμος is the one intended, as John 10:34. Αὐτῶν as John 8:17; John 10:34; it upbraids them with the fact that the same Scripture wherein they do continually read, as in their own, has sketched their portraits with so sure a touch (see John 5:45; 2 Corinthians 3:13). John 15:26. But when the Paraclete is come, etc. [Ὅταν (δὲ) ἔλθῃὁπαράκλητος].—Promise of the Holy Ghost as the strength of their martyrdom in the world, John 15:26 to John 16:6 :—If left to their own resources, they would succumb to the hatred of the world and be overcome of evil; but the Holy Ghost shall victoriously meet this hatred and, unmoved, bear testimony to Christ. Repeated promise of the Holy Ghost. John 14:16 ff. He is first promised as the Spirit of faith and of the living knowledge of Christ. (See John 15:26). Here He is promised as the Spirit of steadfast testimony for Christ. John 16:7 as the Spirit of the world-overcoming strength of the gospel. John 16:13 as the Spirit of Christ’s glorification and of the future until the consummation. It is declared in the promise that the Son asks the Father, and the Father sends the Spirit; whilst here the Son sends [ὅνἐγὼπέμψω] the Spirit who proceedeth from the Father [ὁπαρὰτοῦπατρὸςἐκπορεύεται]. For it is only through the intercession of the Son that they receive the Spirit as the Spirit of prayer, and they then know that not only the Father sends the Spirit, but the Son sends Him too. Moreover, the glorification of Christ in the knowledge of believers is pre-eminently a work of the Father; the maintenance of the witness of Christ in the world is a work that He, the faithful Witness (Revelation 3:14), continues through the Holy Ghost. Upon the disagreement of the Greek and Latin Churches in respect to the procession of the Spirit, comp. the history of doctrinal theology and the notes upon John 14:16. To the Father, doubtless, belongs the honor of being the first ἀρχή from which the Son Himself proceeds; but since the Holy Ghost is at the same time the Spirit of the Son, unto whom (the Son) it is also given to have life in Himself, the διὰτοῦυἱοῦ (ἐκτοῦπατρός) of the Greek theology is not sufficient. As it regards the ἐκπορεύεται, most of the Lutheran [and Greek] exegetes (also Lόcke, Olshausen) understand it as having a theological reference to the trinitarian relations of the Spirit; Beza, Cocceius, Lampe, etc., apprehend it soteriologically as identical with the being sent. But if we decline to assume the existence of any tautology in our passage, the soteriological πέμπεσθαι may be referred to its theological basis, the proceeding from the Father; though the proceeding from the Father is also practically designed as an intimation of the Holy Ghost’s invincible power of truth and witness. Hence emphatically ἐκεῖνος [as opposed to the world, which hates Christ. Observe also the masculine, though τὸπνεῦμα …ὅ is neuter. An additional indication of the personality of the Holy Ghost, as distinct from a mere power or influence. His testimony is personal, and distinguished from the personal testimony of the disciples, ὑμεῖςδὲμαρτυρεῖτε.—P. S.] Will bear witness of Me [μαρτυρήσειπερὶἐμοῦ ?].—“Of My person, My work,” [Meyer]; according to the context, however, more particularly of Him as the Vine, of the personal life of love, and of His love. [This is one of the principal proof-texts for the doctrine of the Holy Trinity. Both the essential identity and the personal distinction of the Father (παρὰτοῦπατρός), of the Son (ἐγὼπέμψω—περὶεμοῦ), and of the Holy Spirit (ἔλθῃο̇παράκλητος … ἐκπορεύεται … ἐκεῖνοςμαρτυρήσει) are very clearly stated, especially when compared with John 14:16; John 14:18; John 14:26; John 16:7; John 16:13; John 20:22. Our passage is also the locus classicus for the technical word “procession” of the Holy Ghost. The noun ἐκπόρευσις, processio, nowhere occurs in the New Testament, and belongs to the ecclesiastical language, but it is legitimately formed from the verb ἐκπορεύομαι, which is here (and here alone) used of the Holy Ghost and denotes the characteristic individuality (ἰδιότης, proprietas, character hypostaticus) of the person (not the essence, which is the same in all Persons) of the Holy Spirit, as Sonship or eternal Generation γεννησία, γέυνησις, generatio, filiatio) is the propriety of the Son, unbegotten Paternity (paternitas, ἀγεννησία) the propriety of the Father. The Nicene orthodoxy refers the procession of the Spirit to the eternal, metaphysical procession from the Father. Christ speaks here no doubt mainly of the Trinity of revelation and of the historic mission of the Holy Ghost in the Christian Church and in believers (comp. John 20:22; Romans 8:9; 1 Corinthians 2:10-11; 2 Corinthians 3:17, etc.). Yet it is significant that while He speaks of His sending of the Spirit in the future tense (πέμψω), He speaks of the procession of the Spirit from the Father in the present (ἐκπορεύεται), as if He intended to intimate a permanent relation of the Spirit to the Father. The effusion of the Holy Spirit on the day of Pentecost is the historic manifestation of His eternal procession from the Father, and bears a similar relation to the latter as the incarnation of Christ does to the eternal generation. At all events we have a right to deduce the �conomical Trinity from the ontological or immanent Trinity; the former is the revelation of the latter; for God manifests Himself as He is (or, as Godet, II. 514, well expresses it: “Les faits de la rιvιlation reposent sur les relations trinitaires. Ils en sont comme les reflets.”). Comp. This entry is longer than a Bible module can hold. The rest is at https://www.sermonindex.net/commentary/lange/ See John 15:1 ff for the passage quote with footnotes. John 16:1-15 John 16:1. These things have I spoken unto you.—Ταῦτα: Another recapitulation, this time of the contents of Joh 16:18-25, in order to the introduction of a new idea; like John 15:17; John 15:11.—That ye may not be offended [ἴναμὴσκανδαλισθῆτε], i.e. that ye may not be disconcerted by coming in contact with the sufferings attendant upon the world’s persecution, and be made to fall from the faith, but may, rather, steadfastly approve yourselves martyrs. See Matthew 5:29; Matthew 13:21; Matthew 18:7. Christ is discoursing of the danger of becoming offended in the future; His glance pierces beyond the offence that they shall take at Him in the impending night; He reverts to it, however, John 16:32. John 16:2. They will put you out of the synagogues [or they will excommunicate you, ἀποσυναγώγουςποιήσουσιὑμᾶς]—He now reveals to them, by fundamental traits, the operations of the world’s hatred, announced to them by Him. First comes excommunication. See John 9:22 [and John 12:42]. Jewish persecutions are meant; as a type, however, of the whole mass of declarations of excommunication and outlawry to be levelled against His followers. Yea, and an hour cometh [ἀλλ’ ἔρχεταιὥρα].—In the form of an antithesis, ἀλλά [at, yea and] gives exceeding prominence to the following climax to the persecutions. [It introduces the contrast of a much more grievous, even bloody persecution; comp. 2 Corinthians 1:9; 2 Corinthians 7:11; Philippians 3:8.—P. S.]. Lόcke: They were also to experience the bloody fanaticism of the world at the hands of Jews and Gentiles. He Himself fell a sacrifice to the same, as, did later, Stephen, Acts 6:8, etc.; 2 Corinthians 1:9; 1 Corinthians 4:13.—That every one.—ἴνα lays stress upon the destiny of that hour. [Or, as Meyer expresses it, “that which shall happen in the ὤρα, is regarded as the object of its coming; comp. John 12:23.”—P. S.].—Will think that he doeth God sacrificial service [ἴναπᾶςὁἀποκτείναςὑμᾶςδόξῃλατρείανπροσφέρειντῷθεῷ ?].—Serve God by offering unto Him a sacrifice.—λατρεία in the sense of worship, service rendered to the Deity [comp. Romans 12:1; Hebrews 9:1; Hebrews 9:6, etc.]. The performance of the curse-sacrifice, Cherem, as the last and highest form of excommunication, was looked upon as a religious act. That the idea of a Cherem is present in this place is proved by the expression προσφέρειν, a term which Lόcke seems not precisely to understand, whilst Meyer observes: “This axiom of Jewish fanaticism is well known: “omnis effundens sanguinem improborum ζqualis est illi, qui sacrificium facit. Bammidbar Rabba, f. 329.” Comp. Matthew 10. Τῷθεῷ “is primarily expressive of Jewish fanaticism: Gentile fanaticism, however, was substantially the same.” Lόcke. The Gentile world also was acquainted with the curse-offering and performed it in manifold ways. See 1 Corinthians 4:12. John 16:3. And these things will they do unto you.—This verse contains 1. consolation for the disciples in regard to their persecutions—conveyed in the intimation that these persecutions will not arise on account of anything in the disciples themselves; this involves the presupposition of their normal behaviour. 2. The thought is suggested that the persecutors will overweeningly imagine themselves to be raised above the disciples on the platform of intelligent judges and defenders of the truth, whilst in reality they are grovelling in the most lamentable darkness. John 16:4. But I have spoken these things unto you.—According to Lόcke, ἀλλά is an explanation: notwithstanding that nothing else can be expected, I have, etc. But it has just been necessary for Him to inform them that these very things must be expected. Meyer interprets the ἀλλά as a breaking off. But enough: these things (thus much) have I told you beforehand, etc. [So also Alford]. A later recollection of the prophetic fore-announcements shall serve to strengthen faith,—faith in the trustworthiness of the Lord as well as in the divinely normal course of things, see John 13:19. Hence correctly Tholuck (after Cyril, Gerhard): But, so little is it My intention to affright you with these things, that I have told you of them only in order that, etc.I told you not from the beginning.—In what respect do the words: Because I was with you, serve as an elucidation? 1. So that I could comfort you (Aug., Lόcke). Against this view it may be said: they were then not in need of comfort. 2. The hatred of the world touched Me alone (Chrysostom, Luth., Meyer, etc.). 3. Because ye were then too weak to bear such sayings (Erasmus, Calvin). 4. Because He now promises them the help of the Spirit, He can also tell them of suffering (Bengel, Tholuck). The meaning may be simply this: because I thus had it in My power to tell you at any time and had neither inclination nor need to tell you something painful and oppressive too soon; now, however, for the reason assigned, I am obliged to tell you, in order that ye may not be astonished at experiencing sufferings, of whose coming I have forewarned you. Further motives, as, for instance, forbearance towards their hitherto gradual development, etc., are not excluded by the above. But according to the Synoptists, Christ foretold such sufferings to the disciples at a much earlier time (Matthew 5:10 ff; Matthew 10:16 ff; Matthew 24:9). Deliverances upon this diversity: 1. Here φοβερώτεραέκείνων are announced (Euthymius, Chrysostom). 2. Christ before spoke minus aperte (Grotius, Bengel). 3. Now He proclaims the cause of the world’s hatred (Lampe). 4. As a farewell-word the revelation was a new one (Luthardt). [So also Alford: in reference to His immediate departure.—P. S.] 5. Earlier intimations of a more general and less definite character are reported by the Synoptists in agreement with later and more definite ones (Meyer). 6. Those earlier predictions probably belong to the time when Jesus delivered His last discourses (Beza, Maldonatus). 7. The expression here recorded by John can hardly be justified (De Wette). 8. Tholuck: Those utterances were of an isolated cast; Christ has here more expressly declared the principial position of the disciples. This view must be illustrated more in detail: (1) in the Sermon on the Mount, Matthew 5:10, the prediction is couched in such general terms that the disciples might apprehend it as referring to a participation in transient “throes of the Messiah,” soon to be succeeded by the appearance of the kingdom of God. (2) In the Apostolic Instructions, Matthew 10, the momentary predictions are, in accordance with the ideal order of things, amplified through later additions. Even to the adoption of the eschatological items. (3) The eschatological sayings, Matthew 24, were uttered but a day or two previously; hence they coincide ideally with our date. John 16:5. But now I go [ὑπάγω] to Him that sent Me.—The motive for His present full enlightenment of them with regard to their future, in order that, together with what is sad, He may tell them the most gladdening things.—And none of you asketh Me—This seems to be at variance with John 13:36; John 14:5. The sense, however, is as follows: ye give yourselves up to the sad thought that I go away and make no inquiries as to the glad thought: whither, namely, to the Father. Calvin: “Audito meo discessu expavescitis, neque enim reputatis, quo discedam, vel in quem finem.” They cling to the ruins of their old expectations with regard to the Messiah’s kingdom and are afraid to venture a leap into the new views of life, however urgently the solemn mood of the Lord presses them thereto. John 16:6. Sorrow hath filled your heart.—Sorrow and only sorrow. John 16:6 is explanatory of the mild reproach John 16:5,—none asketh Me: whither? They do the opposite; they linger at the fact of His departure and its immediate and sad results, as revealed to them by Him; they stay at the ὑπάγω, not at the πρὸςτὸνπέμψαντα. The course of ideas, therefore, is perfectly clear; De Wette and Lόcke are under some misapprehension when they fain would improve it by reading John 16:6 before καὶοὐδείς. Even the construction of Olshausen seems to be superfluous; he introduces a period and pause after πέμψ. με and makes John 16:6 follow as a question. John 16:7-11. The Holy Ghost as the strength of their victory over the world. [This whole passage (7–12), relating to the mission of the Holy Ghost, is unmeaning and incomprehensible to the carnal mind, but unspeakably precious and comforting to the spiritual; it touches on the deepest questions of doctrine, and on the practical discipline of our hearts and lives. With a few great strokes, as Olshausen remarks, Christ depicts all and every part of the ministry of the Holy Ghost in the world, His operation on individuals as well as the mass, on believers and unbelievers alike. Comp. here the remarks on pp. 440 f., and the Critical Notes to the five Sermons of Julius Charles Hare (late Archdeacon of Lewis and Rector of Hertsmonceux) on John 16:7-11, entitled: The Mission of the Comforter (2d ed., republ. Boston, 1854). These notes betray a rare familiarity with patristic and German exegesis, and contain by far the ablest and fullest exposition of our passage in the English language; yet they are wholly unknown to continental commentators and are ignored even by Wordsworth.—P. S.] John 16:7. But I tell you the truth, etc.—Prominence given to the cheering results of His departure, as also to that departure itself. [But, ἀλλά, notwithstanding, nevertheless, refers to the λύπη in John 16:6.—P. S.]. I tell you; ἐγώ [I myself, in opposition to υμεῖς, the sorrowing disciples (5, 6), and in the consciousness of personal ability to remove their sorrow by sending the Comforter.—P. S.].—It is expedient for you that I [for My part] should go away [συμφέρειὑμινἴνα (expressing the divine necessity and intention), ἐγὼἀπέλθω (depart from this world, leave you).—P. S.] “Ἵνα marks the fact of His going away, considered with regard to the purposes destined to be accomplished by it. [With this passage should be compared John 7:39 and the notes pp. 258 f. The sending of the Spirit to men as the Spirit of redemption and adoption, presupposes the offering of the atoning sacrifice, the glorification of Christ’s humanity and His elevation to His mediatorial throne. Συμφέρειὑμῖν, it is profitable, expedient for you (comp. 2 Corinthians 8:18; 1 Corinthians 6:12), indicates that the post-pentecostal dispensation of the Spirit who makes us partakers of the whole fulness of Christ and His completed redemption, is higher and more blessed than the dispensation of the Son in the state of His humiliation, as this was higher than the dispensation of the Father before Christ’s advent. Christ’s departure, in itself considered, without the consequent sending of the Paraclete mentioned in the last clause of this verse, would be the greatest calamity that could have befallen the disciples. For there never was any communion upon earth that could at all be compared in blessedness with their daily intercourse with their Lord and Master, who was dearer to them than life itself. But they lived then more in sight than in faith, and depended too much on His visible presence and His human form, like children upon the presence of their parents. They had to lose Christ as a mere man in order to find Him again as God exalted on His heavenly throne, from which He might send them His Spirit as it never had been sent before, establish His kingdom and convert through them the whole world. The book of Acts proves what they gained in independence and self-government, in strength and endurance of faith by the withdrawal of Christ’s visible presence. Archdeacon Hare (Note C., p. 234) ingeniously turns this passage against the Church of Rome, which has indeed preserved the true confession of Christ against all Christological heresies, but has been unable to recognize how it was expedient for Christ to go away. “She has never been content, unless she could get something present, a vicar, images, outward works, actual sacrifices, with priests to offer them up, real flesh and real blood. She chose rather to defy the evidence of the senses, than not to have an object of sense.” She has, as Augustine (Serm. 270, quoted by Hare, p. 232) says of Peter, “loved the Lord Jesus Christ as a man loves man, as the carnal loves the carnal, not as the spiritual loves true Majesty.”—P. S.] For if I go not away, etc. [ἐὰνγὰρ (ἐγὼ) μὴἀπέλθω (depart, leave you), ὁπαράκλητοςοὐκἐλεύσεταιπρὸςὑμᾶς, ἐὰνδὲπορευθῶ (go to My Father), πέμψωαὐτὸνπρὸςὑμᾶς].—Explanation see in Doctr. and Ethical No. 15. Augustine: “Si alimenta, quibus vos alui, non subtraxero, solidum cibum non esurietis.” The expression here becomes sublime; it is indued with ghostly severity and heroic boldness. John 16:8. And when He is come, etc. [καὶἐλθὼνἐκεῖνος].—Solemn and triumphant exaltation of spirit, and proclamation. The witness of the Spirit, announced John 15:26, is now, in accordance with its subject-matter, power and effect, declared to be a threefold victory over the world. Mention is not made of the disciples for the simple reason that, as bearers of the Spirit, they seem to vanish, utterly from sight in His glory. [Godet, ΙΙ. John 519: “Voici la description de la victoire morale que, par l’organe des disciples, le Saint Esprit remportera sur le monde. Le discours de saint Pierre ΰ la Pentecτte et ses effets sont le meilleur commentaire de cette promesse.”—P. S.] He will convict the world ἐλέγξειτὸνκόσμονπερὶἁμαρτίας, κ.τ.λ.].—By His testimony. The ἐλέγχειν of the Holy Ghost is variously construed: 1. In the sense of a judgment. Chrysostom: They shall not do such things unreproved; on the contrary, sentence shall be passed upon them; similarly Theophylact [Erasmus, Wetzel] and others. De Wette: “The idea of judgment is conclusive.” A one-sided and abstract upholding of the punitory consideration; in opposition also to the idea of conviction, which in the forum itself is distinct from the passing of sentence, as is the latter, again, from the infliction of punishment. The κρίσις here spoken of is the judgment upon the devil. [The patristic interpretation to reprove, strafen, conveys a very inadequate description of the work of the Spirit, and gives no clear sense when applied to righteousness and judgment.—P. S.] 2. A convicting, a bringing to a consciousness of the truth, in such wise that decision must ensue, resulting either in faith or in impenitence (Calvin, Lampe, Bengel, Lόcke, etc). Exposition No. 1 must not be confounded with the doctrine of the Holy Ghost’s disciplinary office (Tholuck), in accordance with which Luther’s translation: strafen, discipline, reprove, likewise conveys an excellent meaning. The operation of the Holy Ghost is never external but always internal; His testification addresses itself to the human consciousness,—never to the intellectual consciousness alone, but invariably to the moral consciousness as well, the conscience. And inasmuch as this is true, the world, in being convicted, is always reproved as well, through the judgment of the Spirit. Now the power of Christ’s saying is involved in the idea that the Holy Ghost, as the Paraclete of the persecuted Apostles, turns the tables upon their adversaries,—reverently be it said; He prosecutes the persecuting world, brings it to judgment, and, in its totality as world, as sinner, convicts it. Thus, with checkless superiority, He executes an ideal judgment upon the whole world. The conversion of the world, or its confirmation in impenitence, is a result resting not solely in the impressions of the Holy Ghost, but in the diverse reactions of men, some turning to belief, others hardening themselves in unbelief. Under this all-powerful ἕλεγχος, however, the world, as an ungodly world, advances towards its dissolution; after the accomplishment of the ἔλεγχος it no longer exists. (See John 17:23; 1 John 2:17). The meaning, therefore, is as follows: He shall reprovingly convince—convict—the world in His judgment, and, by convicting it, occasion its disintegration into the two portions of the saved and the judged, neither of which is any longer a world. (See John 3:20; John 8:46; 1 Corinthians 14:24). The conviction of the world ensues in three acts. Be it observed that the point of view taken by Christ in describing the following events, is that of the consummation of the things predicted; hence He employs the Present tense. On the three themes see Tholuck, p. 384. [Ἐλέγχειν in Homer and earlier Greek authors means chiefly to rebuke, to reprove, to reproach; so also in Luke 3:19; 1 Timothy 5:20; Titus 1:13; Revelation 3:19. But in the phraseology of the courts of justice and of the schools the verb expresses demonstration, conviction and refutation of an opponent by fair and conclusive arguments. “In ἐλέγχειν,” says Lόcke, “is always implied the refutation, the overcoming of an error, wrong,—by the truth and the right.” So the word is used Matthew 18:15; Titus 1:9; James 2:9 (ἐλεγχόμενοιὑπὸτοῦνόμουὡςπαραβάται); John 8:9 (ὑπὸτῆςσυνειδήσεωςἐλεγχόμενοι, being convicted by their conscience); John 8:46 (τίςἐξὑμῶνἐλέγχειμεπερὶἁμαρτίας, which of you, convicteth Me of sin?). The last passage comes nearest to our own. The ἔλεγξις here meant is a conviction (Ueberfόhrung), by which the sinner is proved to be such and becomes conscious of his sin and guilt, is “pricked to the heart” and “smitten in conscience” (comp. Acts 2:37), and brought to a crisis that he will either sincerely repent and be converted (1 Corinthians 14:24), or harden his heart and bring upon him condemnation (Acts 24:25; Romans 11:7 ff.). The divine intention of this convicting agency is the salvation of the sinner; for the Holy Spirit, like Christ Himself, was sent not to condemn the world, but to save it (comp. John 3:17). This view of ἐλέγχειν is substantially held by Calvin and Beza, who translate it convincere, Lampe, Bengel (arguet), Lόcke, Olshausen, Tholuck, Stier, Meyer, Hare (l. c. p. 355 ff.), Alford, Wordsworth, Barnes (“convince men that they are sinners and cause them to feel this”), Godet (convaincre de tort ou d’erreur, ici ΰ la foi de l’un et de l’autre).—The world, ὁκόσμος, is the object of the Spirit’s convicting agency and must not be confined to the Jews or to the heathen or to the ungodly, but be extended to all men (comp. John 3:16; John 12:31) who come under the influence of the Spirit and the preaching of the gospel. Calvin: “The term world comprehends those who were to be truly converted to Christ, as well as hypocrites and reprobates. For the Spirit reproves men through the preaching of the gospel in two ways. Some are seriously impressed, so that they willingly humble themselves, willingly subscribe to the sentence by which they are condemned. Others, although they are convicted and cannot escape from the position of a criminal, yet do not heartily yield, nor submit themselves to the authority and dictation of the Holy Spirit; nay, rather being constrained they inwardly fret, and in their perplexity cease not to cherish obstinacy of mind.” Calvin aptly quotes, in illustration, 1 Corinthians 14:24-25 : “If all prophesy, and there come in an unbeliever or an ignorant man, he is convinced (ἐλέγχεται) by all, he is judged by all; and thus are the secrets of his heart made manifest; and so, falling down on his face, he will worship God and declare that God is truly in you.” Godet: “Si le monde est l’objet de la rιprιhension du Saint-Espirit c’est donc encore dans un but de salut.”—The threefold objects of the conviction are sin, which belongs to men, righteousness, which belongs to Christ, judgment, which is executed on Satan by the overthrow of his kingdom and the establishment of Christ’s kingdom. He who is convicted of sin, passes over either to the righteousness of Christ, or to the judgment of Satan (see Bengel). The triple ὅτι defines the substance and ground of the triple ἔλεγχος, and is=εἰςἐκεῖνοὅτι, in that, inasmuch as (comp. John 2:18; John 9:17; John 11:51). The omission of the article before the three nouns gives them the widest sense. The natural man has some slight perception of sin, righteousness, and judgment, as is evident from the writings of the heathen and infidels, and the penal codes of all nations; but it is only the Spirit of God who, appealing to the inner law of our conscience, and unfolding the higher law of God, especially the atoning sacrifice and divine-human fullness of Christ, leads us to a living, practical knowledge and personal conviction of these three facts, and traces them to their fountain-head and culminating point—sin to unbelief, righteousness to Christ, and judgment to Satan. Moreover, the natural man, with all his knowledge of sin, cannot get rid of its power. The great aim of the Spirit is to deliver man from his sin and from the judgment to come, and to make him partaker of the righteousness of Christ. The actual proof of this threefold work of the Spirit is found in the Acts of the Apostles, who were His organs, and is daily repeated in the history of the Church throughout the world; for the Spirit’s convictive work goes on in unbroken succession wherever the gospel is preached, producing everywhere the same effects unto condemnation and salvation, and will go on to the end of time, as long as there is a world to be converted. There is, however, another work of the Spirit, which is not touched upon here, the work of the sanctification of those who have come out of the κόσμος. Our Lord speaks here of the great help of His disciples in their warfare with the world and in laying the foundations of Christianity. Within the Church the blessed gifts and graces of the Spirit, love, joy, peace, gentleness, goodness, etc. (Galatians 5:22-23; 1 Corinthians 12-14; Romans 12), will necessarily manifest themselves.—As to the interpretation of this profound and comprehensive passage there is a substantial agreement among orthodox commentators, yet with characteristic differences of theological schools and creeds. See the details below.—P. S.] John 16:9. With respect to sin [περῖ ?—concerning, on the subject of, in respect to—ἁμαρτίας].—Act the first.—That they believe not on Me.—ὅτιon explicative: inasmuch as. Interpretations: 1. He will discover to them the sin they commit in not believing on Me (Euthymius Zigab., Lόcke;—“He will convince them that their unbelief is sin, is wrong,” Meyer). But to the truth of this interpretation it were requisite that unbelief should be the object—not sin. And, moreover, the thought would not be a particularly comprehensive one. But above all, the view is subverted by the circumstance that the three terms: sin, righteousness, judgment, are mentioned with perfect universality, and unconditionally, in accordance with the universal operation of the Spirit. Therefore, 2. The passage has reference to sin simply, which, as the Holy Ghost shall convince the world, consists in, is rooted in, in its different phases comprehended in, and, finally, made manifest in, their not believing on Me (Apollinar., Calvin [qualis in se sit hominum natura], De Wette [also Wetzel and Godet]. Only De Wette’s construction of the case is obscure; he opines that the Saviour’s words have reference solely to the unbelief of the impenitent as contrasted with believers, according to John 3:36. That unbelief is not prior, but subsequent, to the act of ἔλεγξις. It is sin too, beyond a doubt; sin, however, of a particular kind, since it is unpardonable. Believers themselves do not attain unto faith without, through the medium of the conviction of the Spirit, perceiving the identity of their sin with the unbelief hitherto cherished by them. The rejection of Christ is the central appearance of all the sins of all the world; light is thrown thereupon by the spiritual manifestation of Christ’s divine exaltedness above all the world. The old world makes a distinction between sin and unbelief, and even ventures to consider the latter a very meritorious thing; on that point, the views of the world shall be subverted by the Holy Ghost. [Bengel: “Infidelitas est confluens peccatorum omnium et omnibus pejor.” Alford: “This unbelief is not a mere want of historical faith,—but unbelief in its very root,—the want of a personal and living recognition of Jesus as the Lord (1 Corinthians 12:3) which, wherever the Spirit has opened His commission by the planting of the visible church, is the condemning sin of the world.” On this point Luther, in his usual forcible and graphic style, makes some remarks which show how much deeper he penetrated into the marrow of the Scriptures on the doctrines of sin and grace and the depths of faith and unbelief than the fathers, not excluding even Chrysostom and Augustine. “The unbelief spoken of in the text,” says Luther, “is not merely that which is planted by Adam in man’s nature, but plainly this, that men believe not in Christ, that is, when the gospel of Christ is preached, in order that we may confess our sins, and through Christ seek and obtain grace. For when Christ came, the sin of Adam and of the whole human race, namely, their previous unbelief and disobedience, was taken away before God by Christ’s sufferings and death; and He built a new heaven of grace and forgiveness; so that the sin, which we have inherited from Adam, shall no longer keep us under God’s wrath and condemnation, if we believe in this Saviour. And henceforward he who is condemned must not complain of Adam and of his inborn sin: for this Seed of the woman, promised by God to bruise the head of the serpent, is now come, and has atoned for this sin, and taken away condemnation. But he must cry out against himself, for not having accepted or believed in this Christ, the devil’s head-bruiser and sin-strangler. Thus every man’s danger rests with himself; and it is his own fault if he is condemned; not because he is a sinner through the sin of Adam, and deserving of condemnation by reason of his former unbelief; but because he will not accept this Saviour Christ, who takes away our sin and condemnation. True it is indeed, that Adam has condemned us all, inasmuch as he brought us along with him into sin and under the power of the devil. But now that Christ, the second Adam, is come, born without sin, and has taken away sin, it cannot longer condemn me if I believe in Him; but I shall be delivered from it through Him and be saved. If, on the other hand, I do not believe, the same sin and condemnation must continue; because He who is to deliver me from it, is not taken hold of: nay, it will be a doubly great and heavy sin and condemnation, that I will not believe in this dear Saviour, by whom I might be helped, nor accept His redemption. Thus all our salvation and condemnation depend now upon this, whether we believe in Christ or no. A judgment has at length gone forth which closes heaven against all such as have not, and will not receive, this faith in Christ. For this unbelief retains all sin, so that it cannot obtain forgiveness, even as faith removes all sin. And hence without this faith everything is and continues sinful and condemnable, even in the best life and the best works which a man can perform; which although in themselves they are praiseworthy and commended by God, yet are corrupted by unbelief, so that on account thereof they cannot please God; even as in faith all the works and life of a Christian are pleasing to God. In fine, without Christ everything is condemned and lost; in Christ everything is good and blessed; so that even sin, which continues in our flesh and blood, being inherited from Adam, can no longer hurt or condemn us.”—I add Olshausen’s explanation, which well agrees with the foregoing extract: “In the first place the Spirit makes sin manifest, not however in its outward character,—in this respect the Law awakens the knowledge of sin (Romans 3:20),—but in its inward deep root. Now this is nothing else than unbelief, which we may call the mother of all sinful actions: but unbelief itself is, in its most glaring form, unbelief in the Incarnate Christ. The inability of recognizing this purest manifestation of the Divinity implies utter blindness.” Stier and Hare may also be profitably consulted on this passage.—P. S.] John 16:10. With respect to righteousness [περὶδικαιοσύνης].—Act the second. Here, again, righteousness simply is manifested. Christ’s exaltation to the throne of glory is the central appearance of God’s righteousness; we say, of God’s righteousness in Christ, God’s righteousness in His providence, God’s righteousness in believers, in the conscience of unbelievers even,—an appearance illuminated by the spiritual manifestation of Christ’s world-reconciling and glorifying operations. Meyer thinks that “things of entirely diverse natures are mingled together” in these words (Leben Jesu, II. 1385). So Paul might seem to him to mingle things of different natures, Romans 3:26, but the δικαιοσύνηθεοῦ is but one. 1. By Chrysostom, Beza, etc., Lόcke, Meyer, the passage is construed to mean the righteousness of Christ (“guiltlessness,” which is too weak a term in this connection); comp. 1 Timothy 3:16. This view, Tholuck thinks, is untenable in the absence of a μου in connection with δικαιοσύνη; in addition to this objection, we would state that “the going to the Father” and “the seeing Christ no more,” must receive their share of consideration. 2. By Cyril, Augustine, Calvin, Luther, Gerlach, Stier, it is interpreted as significant of the righteousness that comes of faith, in the Pauline sense. Controverted by Tholuck on the ground that in the writings of Paul δικαιοσύνη is the central idea, but in those of John that position is occupied by ζωή. Hence he thinks to interpret the word in accordance with the Johannean usage exemplified elsewhere (1 John 2:29; 1 John 3:7; 1 John 3:10), as indicative of moral purity or “Rechtbeschaffenheit” (righteous nature, to use the abortive term that has sprung up of late). But if we consider that the moral purity of Christ is infinitely positive, that it is the moral purity not of a child, but of the Lord of glory, we find that this exposition coincides with No. 1; irrespective of the fact that the lack of μου might with equal justice be complained of here.—Besides, the word is introduced entirely without limitation. The old world pronounced the Lord a sinner (John 9:24); in His crucifixion it set Him forth as sin itself, as the enemy of man κατ’ ἐξοχήν, and treated Him as such;—the Holy Ghost will subvert the world’s old views in reference to Christ and, together with these, its views of the righteousness of God and the human life itself. The expression, and ye see Me no more [καὶοὐκέτιθεωρεῖτέμε], is interpreted by Meyer as an affectionate participation in the disciples’ grief at their parting—an idea utterly incongruous with the context. It is likewise in accordance with righteousness that Christ, in His exaltation, is removed from the sinful world until His appearance in judgment; hence His kingdom this side of eternity must be a kingdom of the cross, and the world can reach Him only through faith. The full glory of righteousness is still in the hereafter with Christ, and not until the Last Day shall it appear. [The explanation of δικαιοσύνη has caused more difficulty than that of ἁμαρτία. Commentators are divided, as has already been stated, on the question whether δικαιοσύνη here means the personal and inherent righteousness of Christ (as maintained by the ancient Greek and the majority of modern exegetes), or the communicated, justifying righteousness apprehended by faith (as vigorously advocated by the reformers and recently by Stier). Dr. Lange rightly sides with the former view, but gives it, in his own original way, the most comprehensive meaning, in accordance with his exposition of the δικαιοσύνηθεοῦ in Romans 1:17; Romans 3:26. (Comp. my annotations in the Comm. on Rom., pp. 74 f., 134 ff). To me it is very clear that the personal righteousness or absolute sinless perfection of Christ is meant, and not justification by faith (although this, of course, rests on the former), for the following reasons: 1. δικαιοσύνη is plainly the opposite to ἁμαρτία, and Christ is the subject of “righteousness,” as the world is the subject of “sin.” (Stier and Alford, who take δικ. in the sense of justification of the sinner, consistently make κόσμος the subject not only of ἁμαρτίας but also of δικαιοσύνης and κρίσεως, which is unnatural). The absolute holiness of Christ is the only full and proper antithesis to the sin of the world, which centres in unbelief, as the mother of sins from Adam’s disobedience down to the rejection of Christ in our day. 2. The explanatory ὅτιπρὸςτὸνπατέρα, etc., refers to Christ, not to us, and gives the proof of His righteousness, not ours. It was by the triumphant exaltation of Christ to the right hand of the Father and His invisible reign, that He, who had been sent to death as a “sinner,” yea as a blasphemer and impostor (John 18:30; John 9:24), was vindicated by God Himself and demonstrated by the testimony of the Paraclete, through the apostles, as the δίκαιος, the pure and holy one (comp. Acts 2:33 ff; Acts 3:14; Acts 7:52; Romans 1:4; 1 Peter 3:18; 1 John 2:1; 1 John 2:29; 1 John 3:7). The other interpretation would require the mention of Christ’s expiatory death (comp. John 6:51; John 17:19), as the explanatory ground of justification, rather than His exaltation to glory. 3. John uses δικαιοσύνη always in its proper sense of righteousness (1 John 2:29; 1 John 3:7; 1 John 3:10; Revelation 19:11), not of justification, which corresponds to the Greek δικαίωσις—a term unknown to John’s vocabulary. 4. He expresses the Pauline idea of justification in opposition to condemnation not so much in its legal as in its moral aspects and in connection with its effects upon the soul by the familiar phrase: “He that believeth on Christ, hath eternal life” (John 3:16; John 4:14; John 5:24; John 6:27; John 6:40; John 6:47; John 12:50; 1 John 2:25; 1 John 5:11; 1 John 5:13).—It is perfectly true, however, that according to John as well as Paul, Christ’s righteousness becomes our righteousness by faith. Christ is the Lord our Righteousness. He did not come down to lead a holy life for Himself, for He was holy from eternity, but for our benefit, that we may become partakers of His righteousness, and so also sharers of His exaltation to the Father in glory. It is in this way that Archdeacon Hare, Dean Alford, and Bishop Words-worth endeavor to combine the two interpretations. “If the conviction of righteousness,” says Hare (p. 135 f.), “which the Spirit works in us, were merely the conviction of God’s righteousness, or of Christ’s, we could only fall to the ground with awestruck, palsied hearts: we could no more venture to look upon Christ, than the naked eye can look upon the sun. But when we are thoroughly convinced that Christ’s righteousness is our righteousness, the righteousness which He purposes to bestow upon mankind,—that He came to fulfil all righteousness, not for His own sake but for ours, in order that He might give us all that we lack out of His exceeding abundance,—then indeed a bright ray of joy and comfort darts through the heart, startling the frost-bound waters out of their yearlong sleep. Then the soul, which before was a wilderness and a solitary place, solitary, because God was far from it,—yea, the barren desert of the heart rejoices and blossoms like the rose. All its hidden powers, all its suppressed feelings, so long smothered by the unresisted blasts of the world, unfold like the rose-leaves before the Sun of Righteousness; and each and all are filled and transpierced with its gladdening, beautifying light.” Comp. also the note of Alford, who closely follows Stier.—P. S.] John 16:11. With respect to judgment, etc. [περὶδὲκρίσεως, ὅτιὁἄρχωντοῦκόσμουτούτουκέκριται].—Act the third. Elucidation of the judgment. The prince of this world appears therein as judged. The judgment executed upon the devil through the death and resurrection of Christ, is the central appearance of all God’s judgments in the history of the world until the end of the world; an appearance fully illuminated by means of the spiritual manifestation of the cross, or the accursed tree,—to which Satan brought Christ,—as the sign of victory. Thus the Holy Ghost subverts the old view of the world, which made misfortune and the cross a sign of reprobation, but held the momentarily successful issue of Satanic plots to be a sign of the favor “of heaven.” To that principiary judgment, consummated on the cross, the victory over the tempter in the wilderness (Matthew 4.), and that over the traitor in the midst of the disciples (John 13:30), were introductory: it must, however, as the consummation, be distinguished from those. This principiary consummated judgment has been in process of development throughout the world’s history ever since the time of Christ and shall become evident on that day when the world is judged. [For a full and able practical exposition of this conviction of judgment see Hare’s fourth Sermon (pp. 162 ff.) and his ample notes. Luther is quite in his element here, when, in his bold, defiant, triumphant tone, he carries on as it were the word of God, and applies it to his own times. “Christ,” says he, “here speaks very grandly and boldly. Not only, He says, shall all emperors, kings, princes, or others, who rage against God’s word, be condemned along with their judgment, but the prince of this world himself, who has more might and strength in his little finger than all the world together. And the gospel shall not only be judge over flesh and blood, nay, not only over some of Satan’s angels or devils, but over the prince himself, who has the whole world mightily in his hands, and is the all-wisest, mightiest and thereto the all-fiercest enemy of God and His Christians, so that everything which is great, mighty and wicked among men is nothing in comparison with him….Therefore it behooves us not to dread or care for their judgment and condemnation, because we hear that it shall not harm us, but is already powerless, being condemned by God’s contrary judgment, so that they shall not work or effect anything against us, however fiercely they rage against us with their condemnation, persecution and murder, but must finally and forever remain under condemnation, which is passed against them both by God, and by us who judge after and by His word. And Christendom shall maintain the supreme judgment, and shall abide, as it has done hitherto, in spite of the devil and the world.” This is the same spirit that breathes in Luther’s “Ein’ feste Burg.”—P. S.] John 16:12-15. The Holy Ghost as the Spirit of the development of Christianity, and of the revelation of the future. John 16:12. I have yet many things to say unto you, but ye cannot bear them now. [Ἔτιπολλὰἔχωλέγεινὑμῖν, ἀλλ’ οὐδύνασθεβαστάζειυἀρτι].—Ye cannot bear them now. Βαστάζειν. Cannot bear them mentally; i.e. in the first place, ye are intellectually unable to comprehend them; doubtless, however, it also means, ye are morally incapable of supporting them. What is Jesus’ meaning? Interpretations: 1. New articles of doctrine are intended. Tradition and its dogmas. Roman Catholic exegetes, Meyer also in measure. The latter does not pretend that the πολλά are specified, but he too conceives of the relation of new to old as additional (“for neither can we imagine the oral instruction of the Apostles to be fully set down in their Epistles”); he does not consider the new as an organic development of the old. 2. Sufferings to be endured by the disciples. 3. New forms of truth, in itself already familiar. Thomas Aquinas: “Non nova fidei mysteria, sed novo tantum modo (sc. altiori) docebit.” 4. New developments and applications of truth already known. Ancient Protestant interpretation, Lόcke. 5. The entire ecclesiastical development of doctrine. Hegelian exegetes. Against this view Tholuck remarks: “The latter extension is manifestly in opposition to the context. Doubtless the promises made to the apostolic disciples, including those contained in the Sermon on the Mount and in Matthew 10, must admit of an application to the disciples generally;—they can, however, only relatively be thus applied; even Hofmann, II., 2, 245 ff., says in reality nothing more than this. Now the persons here addressed are none other than those μάρτυρεςἀπ’ ἀρχῆς, John 15:27, those to whom John 17:18 applies, for whom He prays first, John 17:9, reserving His petitions for other believers on Him until later, John 16:20.” Against the “development view” see Tholuck still further, p. 387. We agree with him in thinking that reference is not again had to the general development of Christian doctrine; that having already been treated of in John 14:26. Tholuck, with justice, directs attention to the expression: τὰἐρχόμεναἀναγγελεῖ; the term ἀναγγελεῖ, be it observed, occurs three times in succession. Hence 6. Christ has in view the apocalyptic disclosures of apostolic Christianity in its more developed stage; revelations, for instance, concerning the perfect emancipation of Christianity from Judaism, Acts 10, set forth also in the life of St. Paul, Ephesians 3:8-9; preλminently those eschatological revelations reposing upon evangelical premises, which appear in the Revelation of St. John, in the Epistles to the Thessalonians, Romans 11:25; 1 Timothy 4:1. Thus Albertus M.: “Non solum futura in tempore, sed magis ζterna, ad quorum amorem inflammabunt.” Tholuck. The ζterna are not to be excluded, we admit; the ultima, however, occupy the foreground of the picture. Of course these proclamations of things to come are principially contained in the communications hitherto made to the disciples, especially in the eschatological discourses of the Lord. Nevertheless, the theocratic and apocalyptic revelations as subsequently received by the Apostles (Acts 10; 2 Thessalonians 2; the Apocalypse), constituted new matter in the development of the kingdom of God, never before revealed with such distinctness. John 16:13. But when He, the Spirit of truth, is come, He will guide you into the whole (full) truth. [Ὅτανδὲἔλθῃἐκεῖνος, τὸπνεῦματῆςἀληθείας, ὁδηγήσειὑμᾶςεἰςτὴνἀλήθειανπᾶσαν].—See the Textual Notes. Lachmann’s reading suits the apocalyptic items of apostolic experience far better than does that of Tischendorf: ἐντῇἀληθείᾳπάσῃ. The emphatic position of πᾶσα is indicative of the new points of revelation.—On The Spirit of truth, see John 14:17. [Rightly understood, this important passage proves the sufficiency of the Scriptures. The πᾶσαν after τ. ἀλ. expresses the truth in its completeness or totality; comp. John 16:22 : τὴνκρίσινπᾶσαν. The article is important: the whole truth, the full truth. The A. V. (into all truth), and all the preceding E. Versions, as also Luther in his G. V. (in alle Wahrheit, instead of die ganze or volle Wahrheit), miss the sense of the original by omitting the article. It is not omniscience or any kind of speculative or scientific truth which is promised, but the full knowledge of living, practical truth as it is in Christ, and as it relates to our soul’s salvation. The Bible is not a universal encyclopζdia of knowledge, but an infallible guide of religious faith and moral practice. Luther corrects his faulty translation in his comments. “This truth,” he says, “which the Holy Spirit is to teach them, is not such a doctrine and knowledge as reason of itself can understand and hit upon…for the Holy Spirit and Christ’s Church do not concern themselves with things which are subject to man’s understanding and which belong to this temporal life and to worldly rule…but treat of far other matters, how God’s children are to be begotten out of sin and death unto righteousness and everlasting life, how God’s kingdom is to be established and the kingdom of hell to be destroyed, how we are to fight against the devil and to overcome him, how to cheer, strengthen and uphold faith, so that a man shall continue alive in the midst of death, and even under the consciousness of sin shall preserve a good conscience and the grace of God.” Alford: “All the truth, viz. on those points alluded to in John 16:12….The Lord had told them the truth and nothing but the truth, in spiritual things, but not yet the whole truth, because they could not bear it. This the Spirit should lead them into, open the way to it, and unfold it by degrees. No promise of universal knowledge, nor of infallibility, is hereby conveyed; but a promise to them and us, that the Holy Spirit shall teach and lead us, not as children, under tutors and governors of legal and imperfect knowledge, but as sons (Galatians 4:6), making known to us the whole truth of God. This was in a special manner fulfilled to them, as set to be the founders and teachers of the churches.”—Yet in a certain sense, the Spirit of God alone can lead us into all truth, even in temporal and human things, since the love of truth is inseparable from the love of God, and the perfect knowledge of truth from the knowledge of God, which comes from the Spirit of God, the true illuminator of the human intellect darkened and distorted by sin and its bosom companion, error. See some excellent remarks on this passage by Hare, 1. c. Note B., pp. 224 ff.—P. S.] For He shall not speak of Himself. [Οὐγὰρλαλήσειἀφ’ ἑαυτοῦ, ἀλλ’ ὃσαἂνἀκούει (ἀκούσῃ) λαλήσει, καὶτὰἐρχόμεναἀναγγελεῖὑμῖν].—See above John 14:26. Luther: “Thus He imposeth a limit and measure (a basis and principle) to the preaching of the Holy Ghost Himself; He is to preach nothing new, nothing other than Christ and His Word;—to the end that we might have a sure sign, a certain test, whereby to judge false spirits.” Thus the Spirit is conditioned by the Son, as the Son is by the Father, John 5:19. Whatsoever He hath heard [heareth; on the different readings, ἀκούει, ἀκούσῃ, ἀκούσει, see Text. Notes.—P. S.].—I.e. such historical things as He, as the Spirit of believers and of the Church, has heard from Christ, either directly or indirectly: 1. Heard from Christ (Olshausen, Kling, etc.); 2. from God (Meyer); 3. from both (Luthardt [Alford, Godet]). A hearing from God on the part of the Spirit, a hearing independent of history, is not a clear idea at all; it would, moreover, set the revelation of the Spirit, as a separate one, by the side of that of the Son.—Things to come.—See notes on John 16:12. [Tὰἐρχόμενα are especially the eschatological doctrines scattered through the Acts and the Epistles and most fully in the Apocalypse; see Revelation 1:1; Revelation 22:6; Revelation 22:20.—P. S.] [John 16:14. He will glorify me, ἐκεῖνοςἐμὲδοξάσει.—The Son reveals and glorifies the Father, the Spirit reveals and glorifies the Son. ἐκεῖνος is emphatic and clearly implies, as this whole discourse does, the personality of the Holy Spirit, ἐμέ is also emphatic. The Spirit alone gives us a living knowledge of Christ as our Lord and Saviour, and makes us partakers of His very life and all His benefits. The sole aim of the Son is to glorify the Father, the sole aim of the Spirit to glorify the Son. A mysterious rivalry, so to speak, of divine love, whose very essence is to do all for the beloved. How much more should man’s sole aim and end be to glorify God.—P. S.] For He will take of what is Mine [ὃτιἐκτοῦἐμοῦλήμψεταικαὶἀναγγελεῖὑμῖν].—This, too, in reference to what the Spirit shall proclaim. Everything that shall appear until the arrival of the great Epiphany, is not only actually enclosed in Christ, but also germinally expressed in His word. [Alford. “This verse is decisive against all additions and pretended revelations subsequent to and besides Christ; it being the work of the Spirit to testify and to declare the things of Christ, not anything new and beyond Him. And this declaration is coincident with inward advance in the likeness and image of Christ (2 Corinthians 3:17-18), not with a mere external development.” Comp. also Wordsworth in loc.—P. S.] John 16:15. All things that the Father hath, etc. [Πάνταὃσαἔχειόπατήρ, ἐμάἐστιν̇διὰτοῦτοεἶπονὑμῖνὅτιἐκτοῦἐμοῦλαμβάνεικαὶἀναγγελεῖὑμῖν].—As the entire ante-Christian revelation of the Father, through the medium of the creation and the Old Testament, is embraced in Christ (Colossians 2:3; Colossians 2:9; 2 Corinthians 1:20), so Christ is also the source of the entire post-Christian development of the new world until the Epiphany, together with all the revelations concerning that advent. Jesus Christ, the same yesterday, to-day, and forever, Hebrews 13:8. [Here again, as in John 15:26, we have an incidental, but all the more convincing argument for the Trinity, both in its internal relation, as a living intercommunion and interpenetration of Father, Son, and Spirit in self-communicating infinite love, and in its external, self-revealing action upon the world for its salvation. The essential unity of Father, Son, and Spirit is implied in πάντα—ἐμάἐστιν and ἐκτοῦἐμοῦ, the tripersonality is clearly taught in the verbs ἔχει of the Father, εὶπον of the Son, λαμβάνει and ἀναγγελεῖ of the Spirit. Christ distinguishes Himself both from the Father and from the Spirit, and yet claims the whole fulness of the Father (πάνταὅσαἔχει), as His own (comp. Colossians 2:3), and communicates His fulness to the Spirit. The unlimited πάντα reveals His consciousness of the astounding grandeur of His person and mediatorial work. At the same time we must infer from this passage a certain subordination, not indeed of essence (for this is one and the same, and is incapable of division or multiplication), but of dignity and office; for the Son derives His life from the Father (comp. John 5:26 ἔδωκεντυἱῶζωὴνἕχεινἐνἑαυτῷ), and the Spirit takes and receives His fulness from the Son. The present λαμβάνει (the true reading against λήψεται of Elz., which is a correction from John 16:14) indicates a standing relation and permanent function, which necessarily precedes the future ἀναγγελεῖ and refers, like the future δοξάσει and λήμψεται, John 16:14, to the economical Trinity, the pentecostal and post-pentecostal action of the Spirit in His relation to the exalted Saviour and to the Church. Calvin correctly: “Hic non tam de arcana et intrinseca, ut sic loquar, potentia disserit guam de injuncto sibi erga nos officio. Denique suas divitias prζdicat, ut nos ad fruendum invitet.” Olshausen: “This passage has special importance for the proper conception of the Scripture doctrine of the Trinity (comp. Matthew 28:19), in that it clearly exhibits the living, interexistence of Father, Son and Spirit, and is equally opposed to the Arian subordination and to a mechanical, wooden, though orthodox co-ordination of the persons of the trias.” Meyer explains the whole passage: “I have a full right to designate the divine truth which He (the Spirit) will reveal as My property, for all which the Father has, i.e., according to the context, the whole possession of the truth of the Father (der gesammte Wahrheitsbesitz des Vaters) belongs to Me as the Son who was in intuitive communion with the Father (John 1:18), who came out from the Father (John 8:42), who am consecrated (John 10:30) and sent to fulfil His work, who also continually live and move in the Father and the Father in Me (John 17:10). Observe the emphatic and comprehensive πάνταὃσα, as the major proposition to the conclusion from the general to the particular; hence the less to be restricted to the announcement of the future (with Grotius and Hengstenberg).” Alford: “This verse contains the plainest proof by inference of the orthodox doctrine of the Trinity.”—P. S.] AND ETHICAL1. The first subject which has engaged our attention is the relation which the disciples sustain to the departure of the Lord, chap. 13. In reference to this the καινὴἐντολή is given them. Then follows an intimation of relation to the Lord in heaven. In view of that, they have received the promise of the Holy Ghost; first as the Spirit of Christ and the Church in general, subsequently as the Spirit of knowledge and enlightenment, chap 14. By means of this Spirit they are to abide in Christ, like the branches in the vine, in order to the production of true fruit. In order, first, to the production of brotherly love, the specific fruit of Christianity. This brings us to a consideration of the mutual relationship of the disciples, and, further, to their attitude towards the ungodly hatred of the world. In view of this latter, the Holy Ghost is promised them, as the Spirit of martyr faithfulness, chap John 15:26 to John 16:6 After which, their relation to the divine destiny of the world is treated of. In order to the realization of this, the Spirit of victorious strength, mighty to the overcoming of the world, is promised them, chap John 16:7-11. Finally, the discourse turns upon their relation to the development of Christianity in the world and the development of the world in Christianity, a process to continue until the consummation of all things. In reference to this last-named relationship, they receive the promise of the Spirit of apocalyptical annunciation, chap John 16:12-16. It is then promised them that they shall celebrate a new life in spiritual communion with Christ, chap John 16:17-27, and in conclusion the Lord bestows upon them a momentary foretaste of the Pentecostal feast, with a view to strengthening them for His departure, chap John 16:28-33. 2. Chapter 15 contains a dissertation upon the glorification of this present life through its conversion into an heavenly one, by means of that spiritual fellowship with the heavenly Christ which is enjoyed by the disciples here. This heavenly life shall be revealed in a two-fold manner: (1) by the cordial brotherly love and fellowship of Christians; (2) by the fact that they, by their spiritual life, excite the hatred of the whole ungodly world, yet manfully stand their ground against it and overcome it with the testimony of Christ, in the strength of the Holy Spirit. 3. Christ the real Vine. Earthly things mere shadows and similitudes of heavenly realities.—The most prominent symbols of Israel in the Old Testament are the palm tree (see Psalms 92:12), the olive tree (Jeremiah 11:16), and especially the vine, or the vineyard (see Genesis 49:11; Isaiah 5:1 and the New Testament parallels; Jeremiah 2:21; Ezekiel 17:6-8, etc.). The vine, first cultivated and improved by Noah, though he was not the first to drink of its fruit (Matthew 24:38; see Calwer Naturgeschichte), was especially fitted to be the symbol of Israel by the contrast of its insignificant appearance and its fine and generous nature (baseness and dignity); by the contrast of its immense need of culture and training and its generous fruit which not only refreshes, but inspirits man; by the contrast of its useless, dead wood and the fulness of blessing which waits upon its living branches; by the fair shade of its magnificent leaves, the sweet perfume of its delicate blossoms, the healthful, even healing refreshment of its generous clusters, the festive effect of its juice and its wine upon the human intellect and heart (Psalms 104); by the contrast of its natural tendency to put forth its strength in luxuriant branches and its tendency when under cultivation, to bear rich fruit; finally, by the contrast of its misgrowth as evidenced by sour, wild grapes and its thriftiness as evinced in sweet, ripe clusters. But being the symbol of Israel, it is also, together with Israel itself, the symbol of the New Testament kingdom of God. Hence Christ is the real Vine in respect of His connection with mankind, in particular, the believing portion of mankind, the Theocracy, the kingdom of God, the Church. In this figure there appears the true idea of the universe, and particularly of the kingdom of God. It is a noble plant; hence it demands the care which we perceive to have been exercised by divine Providence in the history of the world, and it is destined to bring to maturity the precious fruit of refreshment to the human heart, the fruit of the divine and blessed life of love, the fruit of heavenly, festal mirth and joy attendant upon that life. But the simile, as enlarged upon in the text, will be our best informant as to the manifold relations of the life of Christ, adumbrated in the symbol of the vine. Believers are regarded as the branches, in respect of their close connection with the Lord. Their need of suffering finds a parallel in the demand of the branches for the pruning knife. Their remaining in the Vine is considered as a remaining in it, not in respect of the external connection of the wood simply, but in respect of the internal connection consisting in the fruit-bearing impulse; in view of this latter connection, the wild wood on the vine itself is degenerate and must needs be lopped off. This entry is longer than a Bible module can hold. The rest is at https://www.sermonindex.net/commentary/lange/ AND ETHICAL(On John 16:16-33.) 1. In the preceding section Christ clearly distinguishes His presence with the disciples from the future presence of the Holy Ghost with them. But now He reveals to them the prospect of Himself speedily being with them again in a new form. By this can be meant, in the first instance, nothing else than the Resurrection, with its manifestations; that, however, is at the same time a symbol and pledge of the general fact of their future meeting;—of their meeting by means of viewing Christ in spirit, of their meeting on the way to the Father and in the Father’s House, and of their meeting in the Parousia. With the Holy Ghost He Himself shall re-appear to them in His glory. The new day of Christ is but one day, and also the eternal seeing of Him again in faith is essentially one seeing. 2. A little while [John 16:16]. The one and the other μικρόν are symbolical of the alternation of Good Friday and Easter periods in the Church; an alternation regularly continuing until the day of Christ’s appearing. The Apostles studied this μικρόν their whole lives long; but when proclaiming, as they did, ever and anon, during the tribulations of the early Church: the Lord cometh quickly, it is the last time, the last hour, they announced a religious date, established through the fellowship of the Christian spirit with the Spirit of God and Christ, before whom a thousand years are as one day and one day as a thousand years (2 Peter 3:8); and it is a decided mistake of modern exegetes to be continually regarding this religious date of a lofty, apostolic view of the world, as a chronological date of chiliastic error. The same Paul who, in a religious sense, proclaimed: “The Lord cometh quickly” (1 Thess.), in the second Epistle to the Thessalonians opposed the chronological misunderstanding by the declaration: The Lord cometh not so soon; and the same John who wrote the words: “It is the last hour” (1 John 2:18), did in Revelation likewise depict the grand succession of the ages until the appearing of Christ. 3. John 16:20. The distress of the disciples, the joy of the world. And the joy of the disciples? Here the Lord has not carried out the parallel, for the joy of the disciples is to be the Evangel for the world, and only to the impenitent portion of the world shall it be an occasion of lamentation. Hence homilists, in completing the second antithesis also, are but conditionally correct. Only the impenitent world with its distressful lamentations, forms a contrast to the joy of the disciples. 4. [John 16:21] The sufferings of Christ were the birth-pangs of the Theocracy, which made themselves felt in the disciples, the true children of the Theocracy. Christ’s resurrection, however, was, in reality, the birth of the eternal man into the eternal world, simultaneously with which birth the new mankind, as a whole, was born into the world. When He died, the great work of God was finished; when He rose, the eternal God-Man was perfected. With Him the Church, the new mankind, was born. On this birth see Revelation 12:1; on the First-born, Colossians 1:18; on the congenitive humanity, Colossians 3:1. Comp. the note on Cl. 1 of John 16:22, p. 497. 5. John 16:22. All Christianity is an alternation of mourning and joy, as the natural life is an alternation of joy and sorrow; parting grief and joy of meeting, in the highest sense. Joy not to be taken away. An alternation in spiritual, as in natural things, but in an inverse order. 6. Verily, verily, etc. (John 16:23): the solemnly asseverated, absolute hearableness of prayer in that degree in which it is prayer; and His Amen a prophecy of a hearing, spoken by the Spirit of prayer. 7. The Christian life is a spiritual life in which inquiries and researches are transformed into entreaties and experiences, John 16:24. That great day of New Testament spiritual life is a day when men shall live in the communion of the Father, the Son and the Holy Ghost, a day when men shall walk in the manifestation of heaven upon earth. See notes to John 16:23. 8. Perfect joy, and life in the Spirit are one. An exhortation to Pentecostal prayer. See note to last clause of Joh 16:24. 9. [John 16:25. To a man in an unenlightened state, every discourse, even one which in a direct manner presents ideas to the mind, becomes a parabolic speech; to a man in a condition of enlightenment, every discourse, even the figurative, parabolical one, becomes an undraped word of revelation; just as the unconverted man has, in addition to the [Mosaic] Law another Law in the Gospel, while the converted man finds, added to his Gospel, another Gospel in the Law. Law and symbol are the indivisible forms of revelation for the pious of tender age; the law for the heart and conscience, the symbol for the understanding; whereas, on the other hand, the Gospel and spiritual speech are the inseparable forms of revelation for the believer who has attained to maturity; see note to John 16:25. Life in the Spirit is a life in the ever new revelation, in the everlasting Gospel, Revelation 14:6. 10. [John 16:26. In the life of the faithful, Christ’s intercession coincides with the immediate prayer of the Holy Spirit within the heart (Romans 8:25), in which latter prayer the manifestations of the Father’s love are announced. 11. [John 16:28. The one half of the life of Christ,—namely, His personal coming, as the Son of God, from the Father—is the key to the other half—His going, in divine glory, to the Father. 12. [John 16:29-30. The disciples, in obtaining from the Lord their first general view of His entire life and course, also experienced a foretaste of the Holy Spirit. For the Holy Spirit is the divine life in its central unity. Hence the first illumination touching the life of Christ and of all the divine manifestations in general, completed in the ascension, is the instrumentality for the reception of the Holy Ghost; as the anointing of the Holy Ghost is the instrumentality for the full, undivided view of the life of Jesus in its unity. The unit is needful and unity indispensable. This is so much a law of life, that always with the dismemberment of the patchwork of knowledge, life takes its departure, but with its centralization, life is evolved. For this cause, poly-history is an inanimate, true science a living, thing. For this cause, legality through ordinances is lost in death, while from central saving faith it develops an abundant life in God-like virtues. Even the pantheistic feeling of all-oneness (Alleinsgefόhl) displays a rich shimmering of spirit; but a shimmering as false as pantheism itself, in its antagonism to personality. We do not doubt that the disciples had, in that moment, a glimpse of Pentecost. 13. This glimpse was, however, the last moment of their pre-Pentecostal enthusiasm. Enthusiasm is the blossom of the new life—a blossom, in prophetic times, so gloriously unfolding in the prophetic word. But enthusiasm must first pass through mortal suffering, to the end that it may set into fruit, into fire-proof disposition of mind. Such trial, therefore, was now imminent even upon the disciples, according to John 16:32. 14. John 16:33. Christ’s peace in the faithful on earth, is heaven upon earth. They have this peace in Him; in the world they have anguish. What is yet wanting to the fulness of peace, shall be supplied by the courage and confidence inspired by the thought that He has overcome the world. Peace is made entire by cheerful confidence, as salvation through patience, Romans 8:26; see 1 John 5:4. 15. Christ alone, and yet not alone in His hour of suffering. See note to last clause of Joh 16:32. 16. The farewell-discourses of Jesus: discourses speaking peace, warning, consolation, victory. John 16:33. AND (On John 16:16-33.) How heaven and earth are now through Christ already made one in reality, with a view to their one day becoming one in actual manifestation also.—The great word of the Lord: a little while; 1. A little while and ye shall not see Me; 2. a little while and ye see Me again.—How we, in company with the disciples, have to make a lifelong study of the words: a little while.—Alternation betwixt Good Friday and Easter periods: 1. In the life of Christ, 2. in that of the Church, 3. in that of the individual Christian, 4. in that of the whole present age of the world.—The history of the natural birth of man, a symbol of the history of the higher life.—Christ, as the First-born from the dead, is the First-born for the kingdom of everlasting life.—The blossom of the highest heavens in the low, earthly world.—The brightest day (John 16:23), preceded by the darkest hour (John 16:32).—The Christian life as the joy of fresh seeing: 1. The seeing of Christ again, perfect joy; 2. perfect joy a pledge of all Christian re-seeing, John 16:22.—And on that day: 1. Easter-day as Sunday, 2. Sunday as Easter-day.—The new and great God’s Day of the Resurrection: 1. One day as a thousand years; 2. a thousand years as one day.—How all our questioning and searching should terminate in faithful prayer, John 16:23.—Acceptable prayer, John 16:23-24.—Prayer in the name of Jesus.—The distinction of parabolic speech and spiritual speech: 1. In the word of Revelation 2. in the word of the Church; 3. in the ear of the Christian.—Tokens of salvation in fidelity to Jesus: 1. Prayer urged in His name guarantees us His intercession; 2. love to Him is our guaranty that the Father loves us; 3. the belief that He has come unto us from the Father is our guaranty that He has gone for us to the Father; 4. the word that He has spoken unto us is our guaranty that He will tell us all things.—The blissful moment of the disciples a foretoken of their darkest hour.—Even though the congregation be scattered, Christ standeth firm on the battle-ground.—Christ alone and not alone.—How Christ hath armed His people for their warfare, John 16:33. The Christian’s peace in the tribulation of the world: 1. How the peace of Christ and tribulation in the world demand one another; 2. the peace of Christ a source of tribulation in the world; 3. tribulation in the world a token of the peace of Christ.—The peace of Christ as a victory over the tribulation in the world: 1. How, as peace in Christ, it calls forth tribulation in the world; 2. how, as peace through Christ, it inspires courage and cheerfulness, and exalts a man above the tribulation of the world. On the Pericope Jubilate (Gospel for the Third Sunday after Easter), John 16:16-23. Christianity, as the highest vicissitude betwixt sorrow and joy, contrasted with the worldly life as the highest vicissitude of joy and sorrow.—The word of the Lord, a little while: 1. An enigma to the disciples (John 16:16-19); 2. a prophetic type in the mouth of the Lord (John 16:19-22); 3. a blissful contemplation and experience in the new life of the children of His Spirit.—The natal hour of the natural man a type of the natal hour of the kingdom of God: 1. Symbol of the woman; 2. symbol of the child.—Every human being a token of the change between sadness and joy in the kingdom of God: 1. With anguish expected and born; 2. jubilantly received and welcomed into life.—The winning of life from out the peril of death: 1. In the natural life; 2. in the spiritual life.—Out of supreme renunciation the fulfilment of all desires, John 16:23.—The weeping and lamenting of the godly,—how it is changed into filial entreaties, proffered with heavenly confidence.—In the way of Christ all lost, all gained.—The heaviest hour (John 16:21), the womb of the most glorious day (John 16:23).—The word of the Pericope: Be joyful!On the Pericope Rogate (Gospel for the Fifth Sunday after Easter), John 16:23-30. The new life of the faithful in the day of salvation: 1. A new speaking of believers to the Lord (ask nothing, ask in the name of Jesus); 2. a new speaking of the Lord to believers (not through parables, but through the immediate word of the Spirit); 3. a new order of conversation (He anticipates all their questions with His answers).—The day of salvation: 1. A day of blissful silence in view of the revelation of Christ (John 16:23); 2. a day of blissful prayer in view of the revelation of the Father (John 16:26).—The new life a praying in the name of Jesus: 1. A new craving, in contemplating His heavenly personality, for the full manifestation of the personal kingdom; 2. a new praying, trusting in the victorious right of His personality; 3. a new striving in the strength emanating from His personality.—The old and the new order of things in the Kingdom of God: 1. A communion of disciples, a communion of apostles (John 16:23); 2. a praying in general, an asking in His name; 3. an asking for the renunciation of all things; an asking for the granting of all things; 4. a parabolic word, a word of spirit and knowledge; 5. the consciousness of human love to the Lord, the consciousness of being divinely loved by the Father; 6. belief in the mission of Christ, belief in the life of Christ as perfected in the humiliation and exaltation.—How Christ’s discourse concerning the Pentecostal time procured for the disciples the first blissful ante-celebration of that Pentecostal time.—The word of the Pericope: Pray!Starke: Of the disciples’ state of mourning and rejoicing.—Hedinger: Our tribulation is temporal, 2 Corinthians 4:17; Isaiah 54:7; Psalms 30:5.—Men are always desiring to know how it shall fare with them in the world; here they are informed: They shall experience a constant alternation of joy and sorrow.—Men often do not understand the best consolation, it being, for the most part, enveloped in what appears to them the greatest cross.—Cramer: It is a vexatious order of things in this world, that the godly weep, and the wicked laugh, believers mourn, and sinners rejoice, Job 21:7; Jeremiah 12:1; Psalms 73:3. But there shall follow a different alternation in which all will be reversed.—The best cometh last.—Woman is saved through child-bearing, if she abide in the faith, 1 Timothy 2:15—If the physical birth be so hard, what must the spiritual be!—O blissful pains, blessed labor! 2 Corinthians 12:10.—Worldly joy is unstable, and an evil hour sweepeth all away, but the joy of eternal life hath no end, 1 Peter 1:4.—On John 16:26. Teachers particularly, as also other Christians, must accommodate themselves to the weak as much as is possible, and deal with them according to their simplicity, if they desire that their labor should not be in vain among them.—Hedinger: God leads from one glory to another, until the face of Christ is fully uncovered.—There is still much of the knowledge of God, our heavenly Father, in arrears to us; but what we do not learn here, we shall certainly know in heaven.—As wine issues from grapes when they are pressed, and as spices, when bruised, give forth a powerful odor, so the tribulation of believers beareth glorious fruits, Ephesians 6:13.—Nowhere in the world is there rest for a child of God, but (everywhere) anguish only; in Christ, however, his Redeemer, he finds peace. Lisco: The spiritual (and not simply spiritual) re-seeing, i.e. the new spiritual fellowship with Jesus, is for His people the ground of an indestructible joy.—Gerlach: The death of Christ, with all its effects upon His people, was the birth-pain of the new man upon earth; from His death there issued forth a new mankind unto the resurrection.—The joy which at that time sprang up, was an imperishable one, for the new man was, through Christ’s resurrection, born forever, i.e. the redemption, with its infinite, eternal results, might not cease, but must grow into infinitude. The last words (ye shall ask me nothing) are to be understood similarly to Jeremiah 31:34. The condition upon which ye then, after the Holy Ghost has led you into the whole truth (John 16:13), shall enter, sustains the same relation to your present one that the condition of a mature and intelligent man bears to that of a child, who must frame a separate question with regard to each thing, because he is ignorant of the centre and connection of the whole.—The whole, full meaning of the name of Jesus was first explained to them by His death and glorification.—In the filial relationship itself, the free love of the Father is sovereign, so that in that relationship we have free access to Him.—Braune: Jesus does not say: a child; He says,—that a man is born—a man, still undeveloped, yet present, with all his hopeful powers, dispositions and destinies, in the child. The very pangs pierced the spring of out-gushing joy.—Tears are oft-times the dew-drops on the grass and the flower, by which names man is designated, Isaiah 40:7; Isaiah 26:17; Isaiah 66:7; Jeremiah 4:31.—Every affliction (religiously applied), is a birth, in which the new man, or some gracious addition to the new man, is born.—Where religion is, there is prayer; but as the one varies, so also does the other. In Homer the Priest is called a Pray-er. Heubner: The application of this saying to parting and meeting is very obvious and almost worn out. But the saying is deeper. It is the key to the knowledge of divine Providence.—(In sooth, the highest meeting of blessed spirits in the kingdom of Christ has the most perfect depth and is a final aim of Providence.)—The words: “A little while,” contain much consolation for those who are in bodily distress, poverty, sickness,—for those who sorrow, etc.—The impatient man, indeed, would fain object: that is no μικρόν—it is a μακρόν—Why does God part good men?—Hear His word, 1. Thou mourner; 2. thou child of fortune; 3. thou presumptuous sinner, 4. thou faithful and godly Christian!—We should regard the thought of the future meeting not simply as a joyous one, but also as a thought full of solemnity and warning. For many a one the re-seeing of others will be fearful.—Our spiritual life, also, is subject to vicissitudes. At one time we see Christ; at another we see Him not. The Christian’s art is patiently to wait. John 16:17-18. God’s ways are often dark sayings to us also. The joy of the world is a brief joy, the suffering of the just is a brief suffering.—The recollection of sufferings endured out of love to, and for the sake of, God, is that which gives sanctity and dignity to joy. John 16:21. This simile reveals the tender interest which Jesus felt in mother-woes and mother-joys. Hence it must be refreshing to sensitive and pious mothers. Jesus bestowed a glance upon them. (Veith.)—Worldly joy and the dead Christ; spiritual joy and the living Christ.—Vigorous pangs are an indication of vigorous births; it is so also in spiritual things.—(Fenneberg): The children of God have three kinds of birthdays: 1. The natural one. Then they weep; their kinsmen rejoice, 2. The new birth. Then, also, do they often weep piteously; the angels in heaven rejoice. 3. The day of death (celebrated among the martyrs in the ancient Church as a birth-day). Their end is not without tears and woe, but after that an eternal rejoicing begins. Jubilate-Pericope. [John 16:16-23. Heubner: The grief of the Apostles at their separation from Jesus: 1. Description (source, effects). 2. Application.—The tender love of Jesus for His weak, mourning disciples.—Of prayer in Jesus’ name: No Christian prayer remains unheard.—Kant would not pray; but in his last hours he folded his hands. Spinoza could not pray, and wept because he could not.—Ability to pray is a sure indication of our own inner life, of our Christian condition. When we pray and learn to pray in Christ’s name, there begins a new period in our life.—Prayer makes the spirit serene. John 16:25. (Luther): His words were dark and recondite to the disciples; it was as if He spoke with them in an unknown tongue; for as yet they had no experience of what He told them and knew not what sort of a kingdom Christ would establish. Hence, in accordance with the judgment of Jesus, an entirely new life-period must set in at such time as we begin to pray in Jesus’ name, nay, to call upon Himself.—In the same sense in which He now leaves the world—personally, therefore—He had come forth from God. John 16:30. Now we know, etc. Whence did they know this? Because Jesus could thus read their hearts. Rogate-Pericope. [23–30. Heubner: Spirit of Christian prayer.—Close connection of our praying with our whole Christian piety,—Prayer the breath of spiritual life.—Doubts as to the blessing of prayer.—Causes of the non-hearing of prayer.—Prayer as the highest honor. John 16:32. When thou art deserted of all, fear not, so God but be with thee.—Who stands with Christ, and cleaves to Him, takes part in His victory. Gossner: The humble and ingenuous man, failing to understand some passage in God’s word, asks and learns; the proud and disingenuous man takes occasion thereat to despise or reject that word. John 16:19. Jesus advances to meet those who honestly desire truth and helps them out of their doubts. He anticipates their questions.—All is brought forth in anguish.—He Was taken from them then (at His ascension); not so joy, Luke 24:52.—Since that time they do ever see Him in spirit; He is at home with them; they are His house and His dwelling-place, John 14:23; Hebrews 3—There is a saying that people who have seen spectres are never glad any more, so long as they live. One who has seen Him can never grow sad. It is a privilege of God’s children to pray to the Father in Jesus’ name.—This promise: Whatsoever ye shall ask in My name, etc., presupposes that our hearts and minds are in harmony with the Saviour. John 16:27. Men, have such sorry thoughts about the Father, as if He were a hard man, with whom a legion of intercessors must speak for us and constrain and compel Him, as it were. But the Son of the Father tells a very different tale about Him. John 16:28. Thus must we too leave the world, if we would approach the Father.—His eternal outgoing, or birth from the Father, His coming and being born in the flesh as Man, His regeneration (birth of glorification)—by means of His death, resurrection and ascension—unto an everlasting, divine-human life in glory, are three births worthy of our wonder and admiration and constraining our worship. Schleiermacher: The glorifying of the Lord forms part of the essential and imperishable work of the Holy Ghost.—The form of the Redeemer is set up for all ages in imperishable glory within the souls of the faithful, through the work of the Spirit whom He has poured out upon His Church.—The Father loveth you because, etc. The Father loveth us in the Son and will also be loved only in the Son.—I am not alone. He would comfort us with this truth,—that though we, from weakness, should leave Him alone, He yet is not alone, but His Father is with Him.—How could we derive comfort from the thought that the Lord has overcome the world, if we were not assured that He has overcome the world in our hearts. Besser: The final aim of all God’s dealings with Christians, especially of all our experience in prayer, is this: “that our joy may be perfected.” Not seeing occasions sorrow, seeing occasions joy. It is a blessed thing that back of the little while of sorrowful not seeing, so soon over and gone, there lies a future of joyful seeing which shall never pass away.—The seeing again: The Pentecostal coming and seeing forms the central point, that of Easter is preparatory thereto, that of the last day is its completion.—And thus did the ancient Church understand the matter, for she has taken the Gospels for the four Sundays from Jubilate to Exaudi all out of the farewell-discourse in which Easter and Pentecost tones ring out together.—His speech is triply incomprehensible to them: in the first place, they know not what sort of a seeing shall succeed the not seeing; in the second place, they meditate fruitlessly upon the marvellous because (“because I go to the Father”) and are unable to lay hold on the glorious fruit of His departure; lastly and thirdly (this they purposely thrust forward as particularly enigmatical), the hasty alternation between seeing and not seeing, the little while, they regard as wonderful exceedingly.—The sigh of St. Bernard: O thou little, little while, how long thou art! And the still more ancient sigh of David: Lord, how long! (Psalms 6:3; Psalms 13:1-2; Psalms 89:47).—We must have patience if we would arrive at the true Jubilate.—Psalms 30:11.—Isaiah 26:17-20.—In those forty hours of travail the disciples wept and wailed as if there were on earth none but sinners godlessly laughing in their sin and sinners helplessly weeping over their sin (Stier).—“There is none whom the heavenly Father calleth Benjamin (son of my right hand), whom the Church, his mother, hath not first called Benoni (son of my sorrows)” (J. Gerhard).—Revelation 12—John 20:20, comp. with Luke 24:52.—A white sheet (carte blanche), says Spener, subscribed beneath with His holy name, to be filled in above by ourselves with our petitions.—“If I do not deserve that my prayer should be heard, nevertheless Christ, in whose name I offer the same, doth abundantly deserve a hearing.” (Luther).—If ever a request is denied us, it is because it is out of tune with the grand petition: Grant us but salvation.—“Whoso saith ‘Our Father,’ doth embrace in this one prayer the forgiveness of sins, justification, sanctification, redemption, sonship and heirship to God, brotherhood with the Only-begotten One, and the whole plenitude of the gifts of the Holy Spirit” (Chrysostom). John 16:26-27. How should He not love those who become one with Him in the love of the Beloved?—“Threefold is the way which Christ trod for the salvation of the children of men: The way of love (from heaven to earth), the way of obedience (unto the death on the cross), the way of glory (return to the Father”).—J. Gerhard. (According to John 16:28, however, the way is a twofold one.)—Ye shall be scattered, Zechariah 13:7; Matthew 26:31.—The Father is with me. John Huss comforted himself with this saying in his lonely dungeon. John 16:33. It is the peace of Shiloh (Genesis 49:9-10; Isaiah 9:6-7; Revelation 5:6), of the celestial Solomon, Son 8:10.—“Peace in Christ is that on which all Christian essence reposes. This peace shall have no end in time, but is itself the end of all our holy endeavors” (Augustine).—In order that we might have peace in Him, did the Lord speak these things. His word brings us peace.—Peace must triumph over anguish.—“’Tis won! ’Tis won! He crieth; danger and trouble are over. We need not struggle and war. All is done already. The world, death and the devil lie vanquished and prostrate; heaven, righteousness and life are victorious” (Luther).[Craven: From Augustine: John 16:16-22. The bringing forth is compared to sorrow, the birth to joy, which is especially true in the birth of a boy.—And your joy no man taketh from you: their joy is Christ.—Nor yet in this bringing forth of joy, are we entirely without joy to lighten our sorrow, but, as the Apostle saith, we rejoice in hope: for even the woman, to whom we are compared, rejoiceth more for her future offspring, than she sorrows for her present pain. John 16:23. The word whatsoever, must not be understood to mean anything, but something which with reference to obtaining the life of blessedness is not nothing. That is not sought in the Saviour’s name, which is sought to the hindering of our salvation; for by, in My name, must be understood not the mere sound of the syllables, but that which is rightly signified by that sound. He who holds any notion concerning Christ, which should not be held, does not ask in His name. But he who thinks rightly of Him, asks in His name, and receives what he asks, if it be not against his eternal salvation: he receives when it is right he should receive; for some things are only denied at present in order to be granted at a more suitable time. John 16:24. This full joy is not carnal, but spiritual, and it will be full when it is so great that nothing can be added to it.—And this is that full joy, than which nothing can be greater, viz. to enjoy God, the Trinity, in the image of Whom we are made. John 16:26. At that day ye shall ask in My name: What shall we have to ask for in a future life, when all our desires shall be satisfied? Asking implies the want of something. John 16:30. He asked questions of men not in order to learn Himself, but to teach them. John 16:31. He reminds them of their weak tender age in respect of the inner man. [From Chrysostom: John 16:21. He shows that sorrow brings forth joy, short sorrow infinite joy, by an example from nature; A woman when she is in travail hath sorrow, etc.—By this example He also intimates that He loosens the chains of death, and creates men anew. John 16:23. It was consolatory to them to hear of His resurrection, and how He came from God, and went to God: the one was a proof that their faith in Him was not vain; the other that they would still be under His protection. [From Gregory: John 16:33. As if He said, Have Me within you to comfort you, because you will have the world without you.—From Bede: John 16:21. As a man is said to be born when he comes out of his mother’s womb into the light of day, so may he be said to be born who from out of the prison of the body, is raised to the light eternal.—From Alcuin: John 16:20. This speech of our Lord’s is applicable to all believers who strive through present tears and afflictions to attain to the joys eternal. While the righteous weep, the world rejoiceth; for having no hope of the joys to come, all its delight is in the present. John 16:21. The woman is the holy Church, who is fruitful in good works, and brings forth spiritual children unto God.—As a woman rejoiceth when a man is born into the world, so the Church is filled with exultation when the faithful are born into life eternal.—From Theophylact: John 16:24. For when your prayers shall be fully answered, then will your gladness be greatest. John 16:27. The Father loves you, because ye have loved Me; when therefore ye fall from My love, ye will straightway fall from the Father’s love. [From Burkitt: John 16:16-22. How unreasonable it is to arrogate to man’s understanding a power to comprehend spiritual mysteries, yea, to understand the plainest truths, till Christ enlightens the understanding. John 16:20. The different effects which Christ’s absence should have upon the world, and upon His disciples. John 16:22. The joy of the saints may be interrupted, it shall never be totally extinguished. John 16:28. To pray in the name of Christ, Isaiah , 1. To look up to Christ, as having purchased for us this privilege; 2. To pray in the strength of Christ, by the assistance of His grace, and the help of His Spirit; 3. To pray by faith in the virtue of Christ’s mediation and intercession. John 16:25. The clearest truths will be but dark mysteries, even to disciples themselves, till the Holy Spirit enlightens their understandings. John 16:30. The knowledge and experience of Christ’s omniscience, may and ought fully to confirm us in the belief of His Deity. John 16:32. God was with Christ, and will be with Christians in a suffering hour, in His essential presence, in His gracious and supporting presence. John 16:33. Hence learn, 1. That the disciples of Christ in this world must expect and look for trouble; 2. The remedy provided by Christ against this malady: In Me ye shall have peace. Christ’s blood has purchased peace for them, His word has promised it to them, and His Spirit seals it up to their souls.—I have overcome the world, I have taken the sting out of every cross, the venom out of every arrow. [From M. Henry: John 16:16. It is good to consider how near to a period our seasons of grace are, that we may be quickened to improve them while they are continued.—The Spirit’s coming was Christ’s visit to His disciples, not a transient, but a permanent one, and such a visit as abundantly retrieved the sight of Him.—Thus we may say of our ministers and Christian friends, Yet a little while, and we shall not see them. It is but a good night to them whom we hope to see with joy in the morning. John 16:18. The darkness of ignorance and the darkness of melancholy commonly increase and thicken one another; mistakes cause griefs, and then griefs confirm mistakes.—Though we cannot fully solve every difficulty we meet with in scripture, yet we must not therefore throw it by, but revolve what we cannot explain, and wait till God shall reveal even this unto us. John 16:19. The knots we cannot untie, we must bring to Him who alone can give an understanding.—Christ takes cognizance of pious desires, though they be not as yet offered up.—This intimates to us who they are that Christ will teach: 1. The humble that confess their ignorance. 2. The diligent that use the means they have. John 16:20. Believers have joy or sorrow, according as they have or have not a sight of Christ.—The disciples were sorrowful and yet always rejoicing (2 Corinthians 6:10); had sorrowful lives, and yet joyful hearts. John 16:21-22. Applicable to all the faithful followers of the Lamb, and describes the common case of Christians—1. Their condition and disposition are both mournful; sorrows are their lot, and seriousness is their temper. 2. The world, at the same time, goes away with all the mirth. 3. Spiritual mourning will shortly be turned into eternal rejoicing.—The sorrows of Christ’s disciples in this world are like travailing pains, sure and sharp, but not to last long, and in Order to a joyful product.—Christ’s withdrawings are just cause of grief to His disciples. When the sun sets, the sunflower will hang the head.—Three things recommend the joy: 1. The cause of it; I will see you again. 2. The cordialness of it; Your heart shall rejoice. 3. The continuance of it; Your joy no man taketh from you.—Note—1. Christ will graciously return to those that wait for Him, though for a small moment He has seemed to forsake them, Isaiah 54:7. 2. Christ’s returns are returns of joy to all His disciples.—Joy in the heart is solid, secret, sweet, sure. John 16:23-27. An answer to their askings is here promised, for their further comfort. Now there are two ways of asking, asking by way of inquiry, that is the asking of the ignorant; and asking by way of request, and that is the asking of the indigent. Christ here speaks of both—1. By way of inquiry, they should not need to ask. 2. By way of request, they should ask nothing in vain.—The promise itself is incomparably rich and sweet; the golden sceptre is here held out to us, with this word, What is thy petition, and it shall be granted?—We are here taught how to seek; we must ask the Father in Christ’s name.—Perfect fruition is reserved for the land of our rest; asking and receiving are the comfort of the land of our pilgrimage. John 16:24. Here is an invitation to them to petition. It is thought sufficient if great men permit addresses, but Christ calls upon us to petition. John 16:26-27. Here are the grounds upon which they might hope to speed, which are summed up in short by the Apostle (1 John 2:1). We have an Advocate with the Father—1. We have an Advocate; 2. We have to do with a Father. John 16:27. The character of Christ’s disciples; they love Him, because they believe He came out from God.—See what advantage Christ’s faithful disciples have,—the Father loves them, and that because they love Christ.—Believers, who love Christ, ought to know that God loves them, and therefore to come boldly to Him as children to a loving Father. John 16:28-33. Two things Christ here comforts His disciples with: 1. An assurance that, though Ho was leaving the world, He was returning to His Father; 2. A promise of peace in Him, by virtue of His victory over the world. John 16:29-30. Two things they improved in by this saying (John 16:28): 1. In knowledge, Lo, now Thou speakest plainly; 2. In faith, Now we are sure.—When Christ is pleased to speak plainly to our souls, and to bring us with open face to behold His glory, we have reason to rejoice in it.—Observe—1. The matter of their faith; We believe that Thou camest forth from God; 2. The motive of their faith—His omniscience.—Those know Christ best, that know Him by experience.—These words, and needest not that any man should ask Thee, may speak either: 1. Christ’s aptness to teach; or, 2. His ability to teach.—The best of teachers can only answer what is spoken, but Christ can answer what is thought. John 16:31-32. As far as there is inconstancy in our faith, there is cause to question the sincerity of it, and to ask, “Do we indeed believe?” John 16:32. Many a good cause, when it is distressed by its enemies, is deserted by its friends.—If we at any time find our friends unkind to us, let us remember that Christ’s were so to Him.—Those will not dare to suffer for their religion, that seek their own things more than the things of Christ.—Even then, when we are taking the comfort of our graces, it is good to be reminded of our danger from our corruptions.—A little time may produce great changes, both concerning us and in us.—Yet I am not alone, because the Father is with Me. A privilege common to all believers, by virtue of their union with Christ—1. When solitude is their choice; 2. When solitude is their affliction.—While we have God’s favorable presence with us, we are happy, and ought to be easy, though all the world forsake us. John 16:33. It has been the lot of Christ’s disciples to have more or less tribulation in this world. Men persecute them because they are so good, and God corrects them because they are no better.—In the midst of the tribulations of this world, it is the duty and interest of Christ’s disciples to be of good cheer.—Never was there such a conqueror of the world as Christ was, and we ought to be encouraged by it; 1. Because Christ has overcome the world before us; 2. He has conquered it for us, as the Captain of our salvation. [From A Plain Commentary (Oxford): John 16:16. He shows that on His departure depended His mysterious presence. John 16:29-30. Faith admits of degrees; and one of the periods is here marked when the disciples made a clear advance in this heavenly grace. John 16:33. It was not the object of the present Divine Discourse to gratify curiosity, or to solve doubts (for that was reserved for the Holy Ghost); but to administer heavenly consolation. [From Stier: John 16:16-24. There is, as for Himself the breaking through death into life, so for the disciples a deeply penetrating, fundamental change from sorrow to joy.—As this way of the disciples through sorrow to joy between the cross and the resurrection of our Lord was already for themselves something preparatory and typical, it becomes to us a type of the way which all His future disciples have also to pass through;—a way through that godly sorrow which at first distinguishes them fully from the world, into the joy of faith, and life in the Holy Ghost. John 16:20. This rejoicing of the world is the keenest sword to weakness and unbelief, as well as to the true dependence of the sorrowful disciples trusting in God (Psalms 42:10).—The sorrow is itself to become joy; it is not merely to be lost in, or exchanged for, joy, but the subject and ground of the sorrow becomes the subject and ground of the joy. The cross of our Lord is glorified into an eternal consolation; out of the sorrow at the cross and the sepulchre, because in it there was the believing and loving seeking of the Crucified, is born their joy in the Living, Risen One.—Those who weep, bear already the precious seed which rises again into sheaves of joy—“on the flood of tears we float out of ruin.” John 16:21. Under the cross of their Lord the disciples learned to sorrow for sin, as they had never been taught before. They saw and they tasted with Christ, as far as in them lay, the sin of the world, and they saw, moreover, their own sin in it.—The way from sorrow to joy was to the first disciples as the pangs of birth for the outburst of resurrection-gladness. None of us appropriates, in true personal experience, the joy of Easter and Pentecost until the passion-sorrow has first prepared the way. John 16:22. “One feast followed another after the passion, in which they had Sorrow: at the resurrection He saw them again, but (we would add) they saw not Him yet in full clearness, they had not their full joy through fear of the Jews; first at the ascension, when they saw Him go to the Father (βλεπόνωναὐτῶν, Acts 1:9), their hearts rejoiced; but this also would have vanished as a beautiful dream if the Comforter had not assured them at Pentecost that no man should take from them their joy.” (Beck.)—The last fulfilment of this promise reaches forward to the end of the church’s victory, and this joy of the heart is the contrast of the world’s joy turned into mourning (Isaiah 45:13-14).—The world which, with or without Christ, would evade the thought of sin and death, the deepest ground of all sorrow, can secure its joy only by the dissipation of its inmost nature, and by becoming deaf to its voice. Therefore its joy is loud, while yet silent joy is alone genuine and profound.—The world is satisfied without satisfaction.—We lose not the heart’s peace in the midst of all the tribulation which may befall.—The root and principle and strength of their joy cannot be touched, however afflictions may come.—The child bearing woman is (further) the Church through the Spirit within her.—As the sum of all: Every disciple of Jesus through his entire life, the Church of Christ as a whole down to the end of the days, learns and experiences in the cross of Christ that true sorrow which genders joy, receives and enjoys this as the fruit of the resurrection and Pentecost in a progressive measure ever approaching perfection—until the great Day dawns, which will be followed by no night. John 16:23. In the eternal glory, which will be the final issue of all temporal adversity, all our past doubts will be solved, all our complaints silenced, and all our questioning answered for ever. John 16:23-24. Now, in the bright hope of that great day, ask and pray as ye have never done before!—As in the Old Testament way of holiness the problem had ever been to learn better how to pray, so also we have in the practice of prayer in the name of Jesus the only way of progress toward perfect holiness, knowledge and joy of heart. All the discourses, exhortations, encouragements of our Lord, find their ultimate aim in directing us to perfect prayer.—Ask, so shall ye receive! Many, alas, who only half pray, and do not urge their knocking even to pressing in, cannot afterward receive even what they have prayed for! But persistent prayer “obtains for me the blessing that I can receive, and appropriates that which the Father gives,—actually obtains the hand which enables me to lay hold of and receive the heavenly gifts.” (Rieger.) John 16:26. The state of perfection which knows no need is not yet; there is still the asking, and yet it is the same day. We seal every prayer with a doxology reaching forth, in confident and tranquil trust, toward the future eternity; and thus it is already the same day in the light of which we ask and receive the answer. John 16:27. This word most decisively overturns that false notion concerning the redemption which attributes to the Father a wrath which is to be extinguished, and not also that reconciling love which from eternity needed not first to be propitiated.—Christians who believe, to whom Christ has revealed this in all its clearness, cannot too often be reminded of this; “think not too little of the love wherewith ye are loved!” Not merely has the Father Himself already loved them as He loves all the world and every creature, but He loves them with that especial love which He bears to those in whom He finds Christ’s word, and through faith in it Christ Himself, who stand before Him clothed in the garment of the righteousness of His Son. John 16:28. To what end did He come into the world, but to become the Saviour of sinners? Again, to what end and in what way does He return to the Father, but that He may accomplish eternal redemption through death, and diffuse from on high the fruits of His redeeming work? John 16:31-32. It is true that ye do believe, but how soon will my passion make manifest your real and great weakness! John 16:32. “Whosoever well ponders this, will hold firm his faith though the world shake, nor will the defection of all others overturn his confidence; we do not render God His full honor, unless He alone is felt to be sufficient to us.” (Calvin.) John 16:33. In these last words He “condenses the sum of the instruction which He had ministered to the disciples at the last supper.” (Nitzsch.)—Tribulation is certainly not alone “the violence and enmity of the world, which causes grief and anxiety to the disciples.” For all this would not interrupt our peace, if the persecution did not meet with and excite weakness of faith, and the temptation sinful desire, in us. We must call to mind the θλίψις of the woman in child-birth, a tribulation from within and of herself.—Who is he, where is there one, that overcometh the world, except he that believeth that Jesus is the Son of God? “In Him all overcome who rejoice to be the world overcome by Him.” (Nitzsch). [From Barnes: John 16:20. The apparent triumphs of the wicked, though they may produce grief at present in the minds of Christians, will be yet overruled for their good. John 16:31. When we feel strong in the faith, we should examine ourselves. It may be that we are deceived; and it may be that God may even then be preparing trials for us that will shake our faith to its foundation. John 16:32. Pain is alleviated, and suffering made more tolerable by the presence and sympathy of friends; He died forsaken.—It matters little who else forsakes us, if God be with us in the hour of pain and of death.—The Christian can die, saying, I am not alone, because the Father is with me. John 16:33. The world is a vanquished enemy. Satan is an humbled foe. And all that believers have to do is to put their trust in the Captain of their salvation, putting on the whole armor of God.—From Owen: John 16:30. There was doubtless much darkness and error in their mind, much unbelief and sin yet to be eradicated from their heart; but yet their words were sincere, their love deep and tender, and their faith, imperfect as it was compared with its power after their baptism of the Spirit, embraced all His declaration. John 16:32. God the Father did not leave His beloved Son to enter alone upon His great redemptive work, but was with Him through all the scenes of His bitter agony. [The Father was ever with the Son; but was not His presence hidden from the consciousness of Jesus in the last hour, when He exclaimed, My God, why hast Thou forsaken Me?—E. R. C.]. John 16:33. Here is the ground of all faith, confidence, and hope; only as the soul rests in Jesus, can it attain to that spiritual peace which is the foretaste of blessedness above.] Footnotes: [Here follow a number of themes for sermons, which are omitted.—P. S.] THE HIGH-, PRAYER OF CHRIST ON BEHALF OF HIS PEOPLE. A PRAYER FOR THE OF HIS NAME EVEN TO THE OF HIS PEOPLE AND THE WORLD, OR UNTIL THE OF THE WORLD AS WORLD. CHRIST, IN HIS SELF- FOR THE WORLD, THE TRUTH AND OF THE SHEKINA AND ALL THE OF GOD IN THE WORLD. OF THE PRAYER, OF OF SPIRIT, OF . THE GOAL John 171These words spake Jesus, and lifted up his eyes to heaven and said [and having lifted up … he said], Father, the hour is come; glorify thy Son, that thy [the] Son also [omit also] may glorify thee: As [According as] thou hast given him [gavest him, ἔδωχας] power over all flesh, that he should give eternal life to as many 2as thou hast given him [that whatsoever, or, all which thou hast given him, he might give to them life eternal, ἵναπᾶνδδέδωχαςαὺτῷ, δώσειαὐτοῖςζωὴναἰὠνιον]. 3And this is life eternal [the eternal life, ἡαἰὠνιοςζωή], that they might know thee the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom thou hast sent [didst send]: 4I have glorified [I glorified, ἐδόξασα] thee on the earth: I have finished [having finished, or, by finishing, τελειώσας] the work which thou gavest [hast given, δέδωχας] me to do. 5And now, O Father, glorify thou me with thine own self with the glory which I had with thee before the world was.6I have manifested [I manifested] thy name unto the men which [whom] thou gavest me out of the world: thine they were, and thou gavest them [unto] me; and they have kept thy word. 7Now they have known [they know] that all things whatsoever [even as many as] thou hast given me are of [from] thee. 8For I have given unto them the words which thou gavest me; and they have received them, and have known [they received them and knew] surely that I came out [forth] from thee, and they have believed [and believed] that thou didst send me. 9I pray for them: I pray not for the world, but for them which [those whom] thou hast given me; for they are thine. 10And all mine [all things that are mine, τὰἐμὰπἀντα, neut.] are thine, and11thine are mine; and I am [have been] glorified in them. And now [omit now] I am no more [longer] in the world, but [and, χαί] these are in the world, and I come [am coming] to thee. Holy Father, keep through thine own name those whom [keep them in thy name which ἐντῷὀνὁματίσουᾧ ?] thou hast given me, that they may be one 12[even] as we are [omit are]. While I was with them in the world [omit in the world] I kept them in thy name: those that thou gavest me I have kept [I kept them—ἐτήρουν—in thy name which thou hast given me, and guarded, watched over—ἐφύλαξα—them], and none [not one] of them is lost, but the son of 13perdition; that the Scripture might [may] be fulfilled. And [But] now come I [I am coming] to thee; and these things I speak in the world, that they might 14[may] have my joy fulfilled [made full] in themselves. I have given [δέδωχα] them thy word; and the world hath hated [hated, ἐμίσησεν] them, because they are not of the world, even as I am not of the world. 15I pray not that thou shouldest take them out of the world, but that thou shouldest keep them from the evil [the evil one, ἐχτοῦπονηροῦ ?]. 16They are not of the world, even as I am not of the world. 17, Sanctify them through thy truth [in the truth]: thy word is truth. 18As thou hast sent [didst send] me into the world, even so have [omit even so have] I also sent 19[or, even so I sent] them into the world. And for their sakes [or, for them, in their behalf] I sanctify myself [mine own self], that they also might [may] be sanctified through [in] the truth. 20Neither pray I for these alone [Yet not for these alone do I pray], but for them also which shall believe [but also for those who believe, τῶνπιστευόντων] on [in] me through their word; 21That they all may [may all] be one; as thou, Father, art in me, and I in thee, that they also may be one in us: that the world may believe that thou hast sent [didst send] me. 22And the glory which thou gavest [hast given, δέδωχας] me I have given [δέδωχα] them; that they may be one, even as we are one: 23I in them, and thou in me, that they may be made perfect in [perfected into, τετελειωμένοιεἰς] one; and [omit and] that the world may know that thou hast sent [didst send] me, and hast loved [didst love, or, lovedst] them, as thou hast loved [didst love, or, lovedst] me. 24Father, I will that they also, whom [that what] thou hast given me, be with me where I am; that they may behold my glory, which thou hast given me: for thou lovedst me before the foundation of the world. 25O [omit O] righteous Father, [and (yet), χαί] the world hath not known thee [knew thee not]: but I have known [knew] thee, and these have known [knew] that thou hast sent [didst send] me. 26And I have declared [I made known] unto them thy name, and will declare it [make it known]; that the love wherewith thou hast loved [didst love, or, lovedst] me may be in them, and I in them. AND [Introductory Remarks.—The seventeenth chapter, the simplest, and yet the deepest and sublimest in the whole Bible, contains the sacerdotal or high-priestly prayer of our Lord, so called because He here intercedes for His people and enters upon His function as the High-Priest in offering His own life as a perfect sacrifice for the Bins of the whole world. Dr. Lange (see Doctr. and Ethic. below). justly claims for it also a prophetical and kingly character. There are several prayers of Jesus recorded in the New Testament: the model prayer for His disciples (Matthew 6:13), brief thanksgivings (Matthew 11:25-26; John 6:11; John 11:41-42); the petition in Gethsemane (Matthew 26:39; comp. the similar petition John 12:2); and the exclamation on the cross: “Father, forgive them,” “Eli Eli,” “Father, into Thy hands.” The sacerdotal prayer, spoken in the stillness of the night, under the starry heavens, before the wondering disciples, in view of the approaching consummation of His work, for Himself, His apostles, and His Church to the end of time, is peculiarly His own, the inspiration of His grand mission, and could be uttered only by Christ, and even by Christ only once in the world’s history, as the atonement could occur but once, but its effect vibrates through all ages. It is not so much the petition of an inferior, or dependent suppliant, as the communion of an equal, and a solemn declaration of His will concerning those whom He came to save. While praying to the Father He teaches the apostles (Bengel: orat Patrem, simulque discipulos docet). He prays as the mighty Intercessor and Mediator standing between earth and heaven, looking backward and forward, and comprehending all His present and future disciples in one holy and perfect fellowship with Himself and the eternal Father. The words are as clear and calm as a mirror, but the sentiments as deep and glowing as God’s fathomless love to man, and all efforts to exhaust them are in vain. See the quotation below sub B.—P. S.] A. The time of the High-priestly prayer of Jesus. It is indicated with the going forth over the brook Kedron [18:1]. The crossing of the brook Kedron was the act and sign of final decision. It is not necessary to understand the going forth as a going forth from the Supper-room, for the precincts of the city probably extended, in single residences, down into the valley. B. Worth of the prayer. The highest estimation was accorded it by ancient theologians. Luther: “It is, verily, an exceeding fervent, hearty prayer; a prayer wherein He discovereth, both unto us and to the Father, the abysses of His heart and poureth forth its treasures.” Spener, according to Canstein (Spener’s Leben, p. 146), would never preach on this chapter; he declared that a true understanding of it mounted above the ordinary degree of faith which the Lord is wont to communicate to His people on their pilgrimage. The evening before his death, however, he caused it to be read to him three times in succession. Chytrζus called it precatio summi sacerdotis. Similarly, Melanchthon (see Lόcke, II., p. 692), Lampe, Bengel [see quotation on p. 511], Herder and others have expressed their admiration of the prayer. [Barnes: “It is perhaps the most sublime composition to be found anywhere.” Owen: “It is Christ’s almighty fiat, addressed to the Father, as Him from whom He came forth, and as the one that had covenanted to save and bless all who by the drawing of His ineffable love had come to Jesus.” Tholuck: “If in any human speech divinity is manifest, and sublimity is joined to condescending humility, it is in this prayer.” De Wette: “Here all the parting discourses are summed up and raised to the highest pitch of thought and feeling. It is beyond a doubt the sublimest part of the evangelical tradition, the pure expression of Christ’s lofty consciousness and peace of God (unstreitig das Erhabenste was uns die evang. Ueberlieferung aufbewahrt hat, der reine Ausdruck von Jesu hohem Gottesbewusstsein und Gottesfrieden).” This testimony has all the more weight on account of the skeptical tendency of De Wette. Luthardt (II., 354): “Neither in the Scripture nor in the literature of any nation can there be found a composition which in simplicity and depth, in grandeur and fervor may be compared to this prayer. It could not be invented, but could proceed only from such a consciousness as the one which speaks here. But it could be preserved and reproduced by a personality so wholly devoted and conformed to the personality of Jesus as the Evangelist.” Ewald (p. 386 f.): “A prayer such as the world never heard nor could hear … For Himself He has little to ask (John 17:1-5), but as soon as His word takes the character of an intercession for His own (6–26), it becomes an irresistible stream of the most fervent love … Sentence rushes upon sentence with wonderful power, yet the repose is never disturbed.” Meyer (p. 587) calls it “the noblest and purest pearl of devotion in the New Testament (die edelste und reinste Perle der Andacht im N. T.).”—P. S.] Bretschneider, on the other hand, has opened the way for the most unfavorable opinions of modern, negative criticism. He calls it an “Oratio frigida, dogmatica, metaphysica.” [Rationalists and the advocates of the mythical and legendary hypothesis of the life of our Lord can do nothing with this prayer. Renan (Vie de Jιsus, p. 275, 12th ed.) disposes of all the parting discourses, John 13-17, in a short footnote, categorically declaring that they cannot be historical, but must be a free fiction of John in his own language. So also Strauss, Weisse, Baur, Scholten. Such a view, which stands and falls with the whole fiction-theory of the Johannean discourses of Christ, is not only revolting to all religious feeling, but plainly incompatible with the depth and height, the tenderness and fervor of this prayer. If John, or whoever was the author of the Gospel, invented it, he must have been conscious of his own fiction and intention of deceiving the reader. That a person in such a frame of mind and heart could produce such a prayer as this, is a psychological and moral impossibility. That the prayer, as the discourses of Christ generally, was not only translated from the Hebrew into the Greek, but freely reproduced in John’s mind, and received his peculiar coloring, may be admitted without impairing the faithfulness as to the thoughts and spirit, especially if we take into consideration that the Paraclete reminded the apostles of Christ’s words and opened to them their full meaning (John 14:26; John 15:26; John 16:13-14). Godet (II., 367) justly remarks against Reuss, that the internal miracle of a faithful reproduction of the long discourses of Christ is less inexplicable than the artificial composition or fiction of such a master-piece.—P. S.] C. Historical truth of the prayer and its relation to the agony in Gethsemane. The modern criticism of Bretschneider, Strauss, Baur pretends to discover a contradiction between the triumphant mood of Jesus in this prayer and His dejection in Gethsemane. This rests partly on the false assumption that in Gethsemane Christ petitioned for the averting of His death. See, in opposition to this view, Comm. on Matthew [p. 481, Am. Ed.] Since there can be no question of a change of resolve, but only of a change of mood, we have simply to recognize the profundity and gloriousness of Jesus’ psychical life in the great contrasts presented by His mental frames. [Sudden transitions of feeling belong to human nature, and cannot appear strange in Christ who was peculiarly sensitive and sympathetic, yet in all these changing moods retained equilibrium and self-control, comp. John 11:33 ff. On the apparent inconsistency between the calmness and repose of the sacerdotal prayer and the subsequent agony in the garden, which was but the anticipation of the sufferings of the cross, comp. also the sensible remarks of Meyer, p. 588, Hengs-tenberg, III. 143, and Godet, II. 507 f.—P. S.] D. But why did not John append the psychical combat of Jesus in Gethsemane to this prayer? A presentation of that was, like a presentation of the Supper, foreign to his plan, and the omission must be justified by that plan. The victory of Jesus, in His spiritual sorrow, over Judas (John 13:31), involved the victory in Gethsemane, as also His victory on the cross. Moreover, John had related the prelude consisting of the suffering of Jesus in the circle of disciples, and the scene in the Temple-precincts (John 12:27), and could assume the Church’s familiarity with the conflict in Gethsemane, to which familiarity Hebrews 5:7 also bears testimony. [Besides Christ Himself points to the agony, John 14:30, in the words: “The prince of this world cometh, and hath nothing in Me.”—P. S.] E. Symbolism of the prayer: With eyes upraised to heaven. An evidence that He seeks His home above, where the Father is. The observation that, in an astronomical sense, there is no above or beneath, is a worthless one here. Heaven, as the place where the Divine glory is manifested, constitutes the above, in antithesis to earth. Christ prays aloud, in order to the consolation and elevation of the disciples, for here, too, the rule holds good, that the human reference and design of prayer does not vitiate its directness and subjectivity. See John 11:42. Augustine: Tanti magistri non solum sermocinatio ad ipsos, sed etiam oratio pro ipsis discipulorum est ζdificatio. F. Progression of the Prayer:1. Christ first prays for His own glorification, John 17:1-5. 2. Then for the preservation of His disciples, John 17:6-19. 3. Finally for the congregation of believers, which they are to lead to Him; for their unity and perfection in the kingdom of glory, that the whole world may believe through them, may attain unto knowledge and, as world, vanish out of existence, John 17:20-24. 4. The conclusion sums up the whole in the thought that Christ’s love in the disciples shall become the full presence of Christ in the world. [The connecting idea of the three parts is the work of God, as accomplished by Christ, carried on by the apostles, and to be completed in the church, to the glory of God.—P. S.] John 17:1. These words spake Jesus and having lifted up His eyes, etc. [ΤαῦταἐλάλησεὁἸησοῦς, καὶἐπάραςτοὺςὀφθαλμοὺςαὐτοῦεἰςτὸνοὐρανὸνεἶπε. The double καί (text. rec.) is not carelessness (De Wette), but solemn circumstantiality of expression (Meyer). But ἐπάρας without καί is better authenticated than ἐπῇρεν with καί—P. S.].—With this expression the Evangelist connects the prayer of Jesus with the farewell discourses, making it the sealing of the same. Prayer the blossom of holy speech; meditation the root of prayer. [Christ prayed aloud, partly from the strength of emotion which seeks utterance in speech, partly for the benefit of His disciples (John 17:13), that He might lift them up to the throne of grace and reveal to them and to the church the love and sympathy of His heart. Such reflection, especially in a prayer of intercession for others, is quite consistent with the deepest spirit of devotion (comp. on John 11:42). The occasion made an indelible impression on the mind of John, who depicts here also the gesture and heavenward look of the praying Lord.—P. S.] To heaven.—Calvin: Quia c�lorum conspectus nos admonet, supra omnes creaturas longe eminere deum. See the beginning of “Our Father.” We could not absolutely infer from this remark by itself, that Jesus offered up His prayer in the open air, as Rupert and others affirm. Since that fact, however, is otherwise established, the expression gains in significance. [In prayer the eye of faith is always instinctively directed to heaven, as heaven is everywhere open, and angels are ascending and descending. Heaven is the abode of the Hearer of prayer and Giver of every good gift. Every prayer of faith is a spiritual ascension. Christ addresses God here as “Father,” πάτερ, simply, six times in this prayer, not “Our Father,” as in the Lord’s Prayer, which is intended for the disciples, nor “My Father,” where He prays for Himself only. Bengel: “Talis simplicitas appellationis ante omnes decuit Filium Dei.” He is the Only Begotten Son of His,. Father, we the common children of our Father (comp. John 20:17). The name of Father is the most endearing under which we can know and address God, and which calls out all our feelings of filial trust and gratitude. Christ probably used the Aramean word ΰַ ?αָּ ?ΰ, Abba, which passed into the devotional vocabulary of Christians, Romans 8:15; Galatians 4:6.—P. S.] The hour is come [ἐλήλυθενἡὥρα].—The great, unique hour of decision by death and resurrection, which are inseparable; the hour whose aim and consummation is the glorification [12:23; 13:1, 32]. Glorify Thy Son [δόξασόνσουτὸνυἱόν—σου placed first to give force to the petition which, being the prayer of the Only Begotten Son, can not be refused—ἵνα (καὶ) ὁυἱός (σου) δοξάσῃσέ.—P. S.]. δόξασον, conduct Him into the state of δόξα of glory. See John 17:5. This glorification of the Son was fulfilled in the Resurrection and Ascension, the “unbounding” of Christ; similarly, the thence-issuing glorification of the Father was fulfilled through the outpouring of the Holy Ghost and the establishment of the Church and of the gospel ministry. The interpretation of Didymus [De Wette, Reuss]: Manifest Me to them who know Me not, is expressive of but one consideration: the effect of Christ’s exaltation. “The communication to mankind of the true consciousness of God” (Baur) is, apprehended monotheistically, a glorification of the Father. [Stier: “These words are a proof that the Son is equal to the Father as touching His Godhead. What creature could stand before his Creator and say, ‘Glorify Thou me, that I may glorify Thee?’ ”—The Son glorifies the Father, not by adding to His glory, but by making it known to men through the Holy Spirit, who makes known and thus glorifies the Son.—P. S.] John 17:2. According as Thou gavest Him, etc. [Καθὼςἔδωκαςαὐτῷἐξουσίανπάσηςσαρκός].—The power over all flesh, received by Christ, in His divine-human person, from God, 13:3], and in spirit exercised by Him through His spiritual victory, is the measure and index of His hope of glorification. The infinite power of His personality over mankind, the infinite verification of that power in the self-humiliation of His love, shall be the measure of His infinite glorification.—Over all flesh [πάσηςσαρκός].—An Old Testament expression [col basar=all mankind], not found elsewhere in John. A solemn emphasizing of the universalism of His destination for the whole human race; the designation applied to mankind is significant not only of its antithesis to the spiritual life of Christ, but also of its susceptibility of salvation. This power over all flesh is expressive, therefore, of the magnitude of His expectations with regard to the spread of His gospel. See Philippians 2:6 ff. That all which Thou hast given Him, to them He should give, etc. [ἴναπᾶνὅδέδωκαςαὐτῷ, δώσῃ (al. δώσει) αὐτοῖςζωὴναἰώνιον].—A select number is not here meant by this; the peculiar expression (πᾶν, αὐτοῖς) brings out the fact that the Father has given Him a great, unitous collectivity in the creation;—a mass limbing and sundering into individual members, as men, successively exercising, and departing in, faith, come into possession of eternal life. The collective mass of created beings, souls destined for salvation, is necessarily broken up into individual members, for every man must singly attain to saving faith; this individualization, however, is but conducive to a higher unity. See John 17:21. His glorification is, it is true, an end in itself; nevertheless, it also aims at the bliss of believing humanity; and the one design is inseparable from the other. The design of the creation of the world is the glorification of God and Christ in the blessedness of men; such, likewise, is the design of the redemption. The Father is to be glorified by the diffusion of salvation in Christ, the dissemination of eternal life. John 17:3. Now this is the eternal life [αὕτηδέἐστονἡαἰώνιοςζωή].—Ζωὴαἰώνιος see John 1:4; John 3:16; John 3:36. According to the Prologue, the Logos appears in the fundamental forms of light, life, and love; and His absolute life (1 Timothy 6:19) is communicated to believers, through the Holy Ghost, as the fundamental impulse and might of eternal life. Life is an appearing from within outwards, in the form of self-development; eternal life is an eternal self-rejuvenating and appearing; it is life in the eternity of God, inclusive of all times and spaces; the eternity of God in the power of life; an unobstructed self-developing beyond the ζons. The believer has the unity of eternity in the manifoldness of life and the manifoldness of life in the unity of eternity “If we define life as the undisturbed self-development of the idea implanted in the being, the term signifies, subjectively, self-gratification, bliss,—objectively, the glorification of the finite life in the divine.” Tholuck. John 15:1-3. This is, αὕτηδέἐστιν Not metonymically: hoc modo paratur (Beza, etc.), but by way of explanation: heroin it consists, in respect of its principle. That they must know Thee [ἵναγινώσκωσί (γινώσκουσί). σέτὸνμόνονἀληθινὸνθεὸν]—the distinctive truth of the O. T.—καὶὁνἀπέστειλαςἸησοῦνΧριστόν—the distinctive truth, of the N. T.]. ἵνα. Eternal life at the same time an eternal unobstructed striving or further striving, toward a goal continually attained and as continually set afresh. See the Textual Notes. The tendency toward the knowledge of God is not distinct and separate from that toward the knowledge of Christ; they are in reality one; the essential, true tendency of man. To this bias there is an objective and a subjective definitiveness. I. The objective. Meyer after Lόcke: A (confessionally distinct) summary of belief in antithesis to the polytheistic (τ. μόνονἀληθ. θεόν), and Jewish κόσμος (which latter rejected Jesus as the Messiah). The distinction of the true God and His Ambassador emphasizes the personality of God and Christ, and lays stress upon the knowledge of it as the condition of life and development for the human personality (in opposition to Pantheism). The objective definitiveness of the expression requires that Christ should speak of Himself in the third person; He subsequently returns to ἐγώ—The only true God [τὸνμόνονἀληθινὸνθεὸν comp. μόνοςσοφὸς, Romans 16:27; μόνοςὅσιοςκύριος., Revelation 15:4.—P. S.]. The only essential, real God;—ἀληθινός in antithesis to the unreal, symbolical and mythical gods of the world, not of the Gentile world alone, but also of later Judaism in its estrangement from the faith of revelation, 1 John 5:20; Revelation 5:7; 1 Thessalonians 1:9. It is the God of revelation in Christ, the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, Ephesians 1:3; not in antithesis to the Old Testament idea of God or to the idea of Christ, but in antithesis to all false and obscured belief in God; hence God as He reveals Himself in Christ, distinct as to His divine consciousness and distinguished from Christ.—And Him whom Thou hast sent, Jesus Christ. Tholuck: Not Moses, not a prophet, could have been named in this co-ordination, by the side of God, but He only who could say: “he that seeth Me, seeth the Father.” Calvin: Sensus est, Deum mediatore tantum interposito cognosci. At the same time, however, the modification of God’s and Christ’s personality must be observed. Where God is rightly known, He is known as the μόνοςἀλ̇ηθινός where Jesus is rightly known as the Sent of God, He is known as the Χριστόνς. In opposition to this, Tholuck says: According to the Christological view, the Father is not known along with the Messiah, but in Him, John 10:38; John 14:7-8; John 18:19. But it is just in the distinction of the two personalities that true knowledge of God in Christ is consummated. Several explanations present themselves: (1) Augustine, Ambrose [Hilary] and others: As though it were written: Ut te et, quem misisti, Jesum Christum, cognoscant solum verum deum. This is contrary to the text, though from the distinction of Christ from God the Arians and Socinians draw an unjust inference against the divine nature of Christ, the knowledge of God being indissolubly connected with the knowledge of Christ. (2) The two terms are nomina propria in undivided unity (Tholuck, Luthardt). In such case, however, too great a portion of the weight of the passage would be transferred from the objective to the subjective side, the knowing. (3) Τὸνμόνον, etc. is predicate to σε, Χριστός is predicate to: “Whom Thou hast sent,” Jesus (Clerikus, Nφsselt and others).(4) Χριστός is the subject; the predicate is contained in ὅνἀπέστειλας (De Wette). The last two interpretations lay too great stress upon the ideal on the objective side. We must not apprehend the modifications as predicates, declarative of doctrine, but as definitions, explanatory of the nature of Father and Son, or definitive nomina appellativa. II. Subjective definitiveness of the sentence. “The schools, after the precedent of Augustine, held γινώσκειν to be a proof of the beatitudo intuitiva ζternitatis; in the Hegelian period it was considered to prove the dignity of speculative science. But even Greek exegesis recognizes the practical value of the term; Cyril: τὴνἐνἕργοιςπίστιν, Calov.: notitia practica, better: experimental knowledge. See John 6:19.” Tholuck. Still, we cannot overlook the fact that the whole experience of faith is teleologically leveled at its consummation in contemplative knowledge (Matthew 5:8; 1 Corinthians 13:12). John recognizes no knowledge that is not practical, but also no practice whose aim is not seeing. The term knowing is so centrally poised between believing and seeing, as to embrace both, as well as mark the transition from the first to the second.John 17:4. I glorified Thee on the earth [ἐγώσεἐδόξασαἐπὶτῆςγῆς, τὸἕργοντελειώσας (rec. ἐτελείωσα). The aorists are proleptical and should not be rendered as perfects as in the E. V.—P. S.]—Foundation of the foregoing petition. This not in the sense of urging His claims to being, glorified by the Father on the score of legal merit, but in a sense that presents Him as intimating that, by His glorification of the Father, He has prepared the moment of His own glorification, and that He may now expect such glorification as a recompense agreeable to the fundamental law of the kingdom of love and righteousness. In John 17:1 He modified the succession thus: Father, glorify the Son, that the Son may glorify Thee; now He says: I glorified Thee, now do Thou glorify the Son. To avoid a mingling of the conceptions, we must admit the question to be here of a preliminary glorification of the Father through the Son. And this is Christ’s meaning; He says: I glorified Thee on the earth, and in elucidation of these words He acids: I have finished the work, etc. In His doctrine and life Ho had manifested the Father conformably to the grace and truth of the latter, John 1:17. He could lay this work before the Father as finished and complete. Augustine and Gerhard understand by these words the sacrifice of Christ’s death, of which He speaks, say they, as from the stand-point of its consummation. “Most commentators, even Grotius, at least consider it (the death-sacrifice) to be jointly included by prolepsis; Socinian exegesis alone absolutely excludes it. The fact that John 17:6-9 speak exclusively of Christ’s doctrinal ministry is not decisive in favor of such exclusion.” Tholuck. It is more decisive, however, that Christ here reckons His death as comprising one point in the Father’s glorification of the Son. Hence it is doubtless in the more limited sense that He has been speaking of the work which the Father has commanded Him to do; in a sense similar to that of the words: I must work as long as it is day; the night cometh, etc., John 9:4. Now, however, this work is brought to a conclusion; He makes His high-priestly offering of Himself and seals that with His Passion. The Passion comes under consideration as the conclusion of His obedient doing. See also the καὶνῦνδόξασονμὲσύJohn 17:5. And now glorify Me, Thou, Father, with Thyself [καὶνῦνδόξασόνμεσύ, πάτερ, παρὰσεαυτῷτῇδόξῃᾖεἶχον].—Although the mortal suffering of Jesus should indirectly conduce to the glorification of the Father (see John 17:1), it must be primarily a glorification of the Son; His glorification by death, resurrection and ascension. Christ henceforth conducts Himself passively; the Father assumes the active. With Thyself, i.e. not simply in heaven, but in His submissive resignation to God, in His going to the Father, in His being in God (Colossians 3:3), in antithesis to His life in the world hitherto. He has glorified the Father in this world and from this world; the Father is to glorify Him in the other world and from the other world. [παρά denotes closest proximity and equality with personal distinction, “with Thyself as Thy fellow;” comp. 1:2.—P. S.] With the radiance of glorification [τῆδόξῃ, the glory].—It is the real glory which Christ, as the Son of God and the λόγος possessed, as the medium of the world, before the existence of the world; at once the ideal radiance of glorification which He then, as the future divine-human Lord of glory, had in the view of God, and the ideo-real radiance of glorification of His eternal nascency and advent from the beginning. For Christ in His glorification, did not merely receive back that which He once possessed in the μορφὴθεοῦ (Philippians 2:6; John 1:1); He also newly received a glory destined Him from the beginning and from the beginning in embryo, as the ideo-real fundamental impulse of the world (see the Prologue). Accordingly, the interpretation which apprehends this δόξα ideally alone, as significant of the destinatio divina (the Socinians, Grotius, Baumg.-Crus.), is inadequate; and inadequate is also the view which would limit the reference of the words to a re-reception of the original real glory (Meyer after some ancients). Be it observed that the future divine-human glory was assured to the Son along with His eternal Logos-glory. It is a question how the δόξα which, according to John 1:14, He manifested even in the state of humiliation, must be distinguished from that other δόξα. The divine highness or majesty consists in the limitless, unobstructed self-manifestation of God in omnipotence and omnipresence or in creative working and appearing; the divine lowliness, or self-divestment of Christ, consists in a self-limitation within the divinely appointed limits of judgment and suffering,—limits actualized in the counter-operations of the world against the Holy One; this self-limitation is carried to impotence, as the antithesis to omnipotence, and to death, as the antithesis to omnipresence:—only, however, that it may thus be all the more gloriously manifested in the δόξα of grace and truth. First, omnipotence and omnipresence stood forth, limitless, and grace and truth were, as yet, hidden; then grace and truth advanced; so boundless these, that omnipotence and omnipresence appeared to vanish behind them. The new condition of Christ, however, will consist in the glorifying of His grace into omnipotence, and of His truth into omnipresence, or of His self-divestment into majesty. Dogmatically defined: At first, alone the “physical” attributes of God are, in the Logos,’ exhibited in the creation of the world. In the redemption of the world, the “ethical” attributes are exhibited in the self-humiliation of Christ. In the glorification of the world, the “ethical” and “physical” attributes are to shine united, as a manifestation of the majesty of Christ. And so the new glory of Christ shall be an eternal synthesis of the gloria mediatoria (which Lampe considers as the sole meaning of the text) and the primordial majesty (Hebrews 1:3); this latter, however, must not be described as the quality “by which God is God,” unless we are prepared to understand by it the glory of God as the sum of all His attributes. John 17:6. I manifested Thy name to the men, etc. [ἐφανέρωσάσουτὸὅνοματοῖςἀνθρώποιςοὓςἔδωκάςμοιἐκτοῦκόσμου] Here begins the intercession for the disciples. He introduces it with a rationale; they are not simply worthy of His intercession; God’s eyes must be fastened upon them as bearers of His name and Christ’s work. The great work of manifestation must in them be protected and secured.—Manifested Thy name.—Such, in one word, was Christ’s work hitherto. The name of God, its specific self-manifestation in the Son, and, with that name, the God of Christ, the personal, heavenly Father, was distinctly manifested to men by the word, work, and life of Christ. The prophetic office of Christ is completed in an absolute manifestation of God. Though the disciples were not yet enlightened to gaze into this revelation, it, nevertheless, was finished, as regarded its objective elements.—The men whom Thou gavest me.—[οὕςἕδωκάςμοιἕκτοῦκόσμου] The disciples (see John 17:8; John 17:11, and John 16:30). God gave them to Him through His election, through the attraction drawing them to the Son, and through the power of His calling. Christ then defines the process of development exhibited in their conversion:— 1. Thine they were [σοὶἦσαν]. Not merely in the general cense in which all things belong to God (Cyril), but as Israelites without guile (see John 1:47; John 3:21); per fidem Veteris Test. (Bengel.) 2. Thou gavest them to Me.—[καὶἐμοὶαὐτοὺςἕδωκας]. The before-mentioned considerations of this giving became manifest and realized in the calling, John 10:27. 3. And they have kept Thy word. [καὶτὸνλόγονσουτετήρκαν]. Though it is still necessary that they should be sifted, they have stood the main test, and have not suffered themselves to be entangled in the apostasy of Judas. To Christ’s eyes, they do already issue victorious out of temptation (see John 8:51). 4. Now they know that all, etc. [νῦνἕγνωκαν (Alexandrian form for ἐγνώκασιν) ὅτιπάντα, κ. τ. λ.]. Their fidelity has been rewarded by the beginnings of a higher faith-knowledge, or cognition of faith, as they have already testified. See John 16:30. Their knowledge is the knowledge that everything which has been given to Christ, i.e., His doctrine (De Wette), and particularly His work (Luthardt), is of God; i.e., they know God in Christ. They know the words of Christ to be divine by the works, the works by the words; the latter method Christ brings out with special prominence (as the higher way of knowledge, see above, John 14:11), in order to explain how they have attained to their faith-knowledge. They have received in faith Christ’s words which He gave them. From this trust in the divine words confided to them by Him, there has sprung a true cognition of the divine nature of Christ (they truly knew that I am come forth from Thee, John 17:8), and thereby a belief in His divine mission to the world, in which mission theirs should now be rooted, has been mediated (they believed that Thou didst send Me). The Aorists [ἕγνωσαν and ἐπίστευσαν] jointly serve as an elucidation of the Perfect: νῦνἕγνωκαν.—Such are the reasons why He prays for them. [John 17:8. For I have given them the words which Thou gavest me, ὅτιτὰῥήματαἅἕδωκάς (gavest; so A. B. C. D.) Lachm., Tischend., Alf., Westc. versus δέδωκάς, hast given, which is supported by ΰ. L. X. and text. rec.) μοι, δέδωκααὐτοῖς. “On the truth of this saying stands the whole fabric of creeds and doctrines. It is the ground of authority to the preacher, of assurance to the believer, of existence to the church. It is the source from which the perpetual stream of Christian teaching flows. All our testimonies, instructions, exhortations, derive their first origin and continuous power, from the fact that the Father has given to the Son, the Son has given to His servants, the words of truth and life.” Bernard, Progress of Doctrine in the N. T. (1867) p. 25.—P. S.] John 17:9. I pray (am praying) for them; I pray not (am not praying) for the world, etc.—[ἐγὼπερὶαὐτῶνἐρωτῶοὐπερὶτοῦκόσμουἐρωτῶ, ἀλλὰπερὶὥνδέδωκάςμοι, ὅτισοίεἰσιν]. The grand stress of this intercession is contained, 1. In the ἐγώ; 2. in the fact that the proposition, I pray for them, is first simply laid down, then 3. negatively expressed: not for the world; 4. positively expressed: but for them; the motives assigned being: they have been given Me by Thee, and they are Thine. The expression: not for the world, is doubtless of dogmatic moment (which Meyer denies); it is, however, destitute of a predestinarian import (Calvin, Lampe; pro quibus Christus non orat, pro iis non satisfecit, and others; see John 17:20; Matthew 5:44; Luke 23:34).” It is significant of the purely dynamical view of the world and arrangement of the Gospel. By means of this dynamical principle, first concentrated in Christ and henceforth to be concentrated in His apostles, the world, as world, is to be clean done away with. Christ does not work by a fire of sparks, sprinkling them incidentally, one here and one there; His working is a concentrated central fire of absolute, positive resurrective force, which fire takes hold of the world in the centre of her receptive susceptibility, in order to her transformation. It is the strict vital law of the concentration of the divine power of the Gospel, archetypally declared in the calling and isolation of Abraham, typically set forth in the separation of Israel, and still continuing in the regulations which Christ has made for the development of His church (see Acts 1:4; Acts 1:8). But the expression of Christ does not bear simply an ideo-dogmatical emphasis; it has, resulting from the ideo-dogmatical, also an affectionate emphasis: I pray, above all things, for these, who are Thine as the fruit of the Old Testament, and Mine as the firstlings of the New Testament; similarly, the expression has a religious force: the δόξα of Thy name is concerned; that δόξα is henceforth entrusted to them; it must be secured in them, must, through them, become universal in the world as the principle of the world’s glorification. This expression of supreme entreaty, however, is simultaneously the expression of confidence: in them Thy divine work and Mine shall be made secure in the world. [Bengel, Meyer, Stier, Luthardt, Alford, etc. explain in substance: I am not praying for the world now and in this manner (hoo loco, tempore, et his verbis), but I shall do so afterwards, John 17:20-21. But this appears somewhat trivial, and does not give the exclusion the full force. The words οὐπερὶτοῦκόσμουἐρωτῶ, are intended to justify and to emphasize the intercession of Christ for His own. The whole sacerdotal prayer is not offered for the outside world at all but only for His disciples, first for those whom He had already called out of the world (6–19) and then for those who should hereafter come out of the world and believe in Him (περὶτῶνπιστευόντων, John 17:20 ff.). The world appears, even in John 17:20-21; John 17:23, not as an object of intercession, but as a hostile force, against which He asks the protection of the Father. Yet by the preservation and perfection of Christ’s church in holiness and unity, which is the direct object of this prayer, the world itself is at last to be brought to believe in the divine mission of the Son, ἵναὅκόσμοςπιστεύῃὅτισύμεἀπέστειλας, John 17:21; John 17:23. Hence the exclusion of the world is not absolute (in the sense of supralapsarian commentators), but relative. On proper occasions Christ did pray for the ungodly world, even His murderers (“Father forgive them,” Luke 23:34, adding, however, as a motive not, as here, “they have known,” John 17:11, but on the contrary, “they know not what they do”); and He especially commands us to pray for our enemies (Matthew 5:44), as Stephen prayed for the persecuting Saul (Acts 7:60). For Christians we should pray that God may preserve them from the world and the devil, for the ungodly world, that it may cease to be worldly and believe in Christ.—P. S.] John 17:10. All things that are Mine are Thine.—[τὰἐμὰπάντασάἐστιν, καὶτὰσὰἐυά. The E. V. “All Mine is Thine” may be understood of persons only, while all things, the Godhead itself included, are meant. Comp. Alford.—P. S.] He gives prominence to the worth possessed by the disciples as the objects of His intercession. As Christ’s property, they are the property of God; as God’s property, they are the property of Christ; and since He is glorified in them, the δόξα of Christ, which is the δόξα of God, must be protected in them. John 17:11. And I am (henceforth) no more in the world [κἀιοὐκέτιεἰμὶἐντῶκόσμῷ ?]. This is the motive for His urgent, provident petition. He is departing out of the world, they remain in the world and so will be needing special protection. The words: and I come to Thee [κἀγὼπρὸςσὲὲρχομαι], cannot be regarded as a mere repetition of the declaration: “I am no more,” etc. On the contrary, the position and task of the disciples in the world shall be assured by Christ’s coming to the Father with His intercession. In the first place, the going away of Christ is expressed, as perilous for the disciples who remain here; and, secondly, His going home is intimated, as the indemnification for the disciples, whose position and task are here. Hence the apostrophe: Holy Father [πάτερἅγιε]. God is to be the holy Father to Christians in this world when Christ has gone away. God, in His holiness, is entirely separated from the unholy world, in order that He may belong entirely to the world that is to be sanctified: so, the Holy. He is the holy Father (John 17:11) of the Son who sanctifies Himself for His own, i.e., goes away from both them and the world, in order to be entirely devoted to them and, through them, to the world (John 17:19), that they too may in this sense be sanctified in His truth, John 17:17. The petition itself: keep them in [better than through of.—E. V.] Thy name, etc. [τήρησοναὐτοὺςἐντῶὀνόματίσου.] In the revelation for Christian knowledge, as in Christian knowledge of revelation,—in that consciousness of God which Christ entertained. Which (whom) Thou, etc. [ᾧ (οὕς) δέδωκάςμοι.] The reading ᾧ (see Text. Notes) is by Meyer and others, supported by Cod. D., considered to stand by attraction for ὅ and to relate to the name of God [ἐντῶὀνόματίσου]. We must acknowledge that we have difficulty in reading: “Thou hast given me Thy name,”—the name of the Father and that of the Son not being mingled. From this difficulty the Recepta [which reads οὔς, whom] has doubtless arisen. We, therefore, prefer to read ᾧ as Dativ. instrum. [by which], in perfect accordance with the sense of Joh 17:6; John 17:12, and interpret the passage thus: through My manifesting Thy name unto them, in Mine office as Thine Ambassador, they did believe on Me and are thus become Mine. On the glorification of the Father through Christ as His Ambassador, through whom the Father operated, the glorification of the Son is founded. Since, however, the instrumental construction is scantily supported and a stronger expression might be expected for it, we suffer the interpretation given in the translation [den, which] to stand, only explaining the term: which Thou hast given Me, by: which Thou, with Thy revelation, hast confided to Me. [Stier says that ᾧ can bear no proper meaning. One feels tempted with Bengel and Godet to read ὅ, and to refer this not to ὅνομα, but to the disciples, as equivalent to οὕς, just as in John 17:2, πᾶνὅδέδωκας—αὐτοῖς), and John 17:24, if ὅ be the proper reading there. But ὅ is very poorly supported, though it may more easily have been changed by mistake into ᾧ, than into οὕς. The reading of the text. rec. (sustained by D.2 and Vulg.) is no doubt the easiest and falls in best with the style and general sentiment of John, comp. John 17:6; John 17:9. But inasmuch as ᾧ has all the weight of external testimony (ΰ. A. B. C., Syr., etc.) and is adopted by the best critical editors (Lachmann, Tregelles, Alford, Tischendorf, Westcott), we must give it the preference. The name must mean the essential revelation which the Father made to the Son, and the Son to the world (Luthardt), or rather the peculiar attribute of Saviour, Jehovah our Righteousness. (Alford and Wordsworth). There is, it is true, no strict parallel passage where God is said to have given His name to His Son, but an approach to it, Exodus 23:21 : “My name is in Him,” viz., the angel of the covenant; comp. Isaiah 9:6; Jeremiah 23:6, and especially Philippians 2:9-10, “God hath given Him a name (ὅνομα, but not His name) above every name, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow.”—P. S.] The motive of the prayer is: whom Thou hast given Me. As the name of the Father is given Him for the disciples, so the disciples are given Him for the name (the Gospel of the New Covenant is for the called of the Old Covenant in the wider sense, and contrariwise). Purpose of the prayer: ἵναὧσινἕν. Meyer makes the ἵνα relate to ὃδέδωκάςμοι, instead of to τήρησον, as is usual. The latter reference, however, is the more obvious one, for the full development of the unity of believers arrives as the fruit of their conservation. It is a question of consummate oneness (see John 17:22). That they may be one as we [ἵναὧσινἓνκαθὼςἡμεῖς]. Throughout the high-priestly prayer, Christ brings into view the oneness of the disciples as the mark of their matured discipleship: the sign that they are one in the name of the Father of Christ. The living, known name of God has this unifying power. As it is the bond of union between the Father and Son, it is, in like manner, to be the bond of union among the disciples. In the true, living consciousness of God is the divine life of love, the unity of divine revelation and human religion, the unity of human faith and the unity of human ethics, Ephesians 4:6. [Alford: “The oneness here is not merely harmony of will or of love,—as some have interpreted it, and then tried to weaken the Oneness of the Godhead by the καθώς,—but oneness by the indwelling of the Spirit of Christ, the gift of the covenant (1 Corinthians 6:17), and ultimately oneness of nature, 2 Peter 1:4, where the ἐπαγγέλματαδεδώρηται answers to the ὄνομαὅδέδωκάςμοι here.” Godet: “Les mots comme nous signifient que, comme c’est par la possession de essence divine que le Pθre et le Fils sont un, c’est par la commune connaissance de cettle essence (le nom) que les disciples peuvent aussi rester un et κtre individuellement gardιs.” Yet the community of the spiritual life derived from Christ, must be added to the community of knowledge.—P. S.] John 17:12. While I was with them (in the world) [ὅτεἥμηνμετ’ αὐτῶν]. Further explication of the words, John 17:11.—I kept them [έφύλαξα]. Ἐγώ with emphasis. Held them fast in Thy name. Their natural inclination tended ever out of the bounds constituted by the consciousness of God and by Christ’s view of the world; His faithfulness held them fast within these limits, and, as souls given Him by the Father (see the Textual Note), He watched over them faithfully. Φυλάσσειν is an intensified expression of His vigilant care over them. He guarded them as the faithful Shepherd of the souls entrusted Him by the Father.—And none of them perished except the son of perdition [καὶοὐδεὶςἐξαὐτῶνἀπώλετοεἰμὴόυἱὸςτῆςἀπωλείας. Christ does not say, “I lost none “(comp. John 18:9, where no exception is made). “Judas lost himself.” Even after the betrayal he might have been saved if he had in true penitence fled to the cross.—P. S.] Not simply a painful recalling of the traitor (Tholuck), but also the account-rendering of a faithful and good conscience concerning Judas, and, as such, appropriate at this moment. The son of perdition.—A Hebrew expression: the properly of perdition, the prey of perdition, comp. John 12:36; Matthew 13:12. But the specific child of perdition, in whom the ἀπώλεια (see Matthew 7:13) of the Jews was concentrated, was also the instrument of perdition (see 2 Thessalonians 2:10).—That the Scripture might be fulfilled [ἵναἡγραφἡπληρωθῇ ?]. Here, as in John 12:38; John 13:18, consolation is found in contemplating the decree of divine judgment. It was, however, not fated that Judas should become a child of perdition, but that, as such, he should be lost from the circle of disciples in accordance with the righteous judgment of God.What passage of Scripture is here intended? According to Lόcke and Meyer [Godet], Psalms 41:10, on account of the citation of that passage, John 13:18; according to Euthymius Zigabenus, Psalms 109:8 (see Acts 1:20); according to Kuinoel the whole mass of prophecies relative to the death of Jesus. We are of opinion that the passage Isaiah 57:12 is the one meant (see Leben Jesu ii., p. 1412). It should be noted that the passage Psalms 41:10 was already fulfilled in the occurrence referred to John 13:18. But Isaiah 57:12-13 treats specifically, in typical prophecy, of the perdition of the destroyer. John 17:13. To Thee, and speak these things [νῦνδέπρόςσεἔρχομαι, καὶταῦταλαλῶἐντῷκόσμῳ ?]. I.e., I can no longer watch over them, as I have done hitherto, in visible, individual intercourse. Henceforth something else must guard them. But what shall this be? His joy shall become perfect in them, and shall be their guard. His joy is that complete consciousness of God which is to be imparted to them by the Holy Ghost, as the source of the most untrammeled vital movement in their spirits (see chap. 16). I speak these things,—I now, being still in the world and heard by them as well as by Thee, do confidentially carry this petition before Thee, that, etc. I.e., not simply: Through My intercession they shall be assured of Thy protection and hence be filled with perfect gladness,—but rather: My intercession shall awaken the spirit of prayer in them and open their hearts for the reception of the Holy Spirit of perfect joy, for whom I am suing on their behalf. And if Thou keep them thus, by the bestowal of the Spirit of joy, He will watch over them as I have done until now. John 17:14. I have given them Thy word [Ἐγὼδέδωκααὐτοῖςτὸνλόγονσου]. The prayer for the preservation of the disciples now divides itself into two petitions; the one is for their negative protection from the Evil One in the world, the other for their positive sanctification in the truth. First the negative portion, the protection, is discussed. Christ having given them His word, they are taken from the world and hence are become, equally with Himself, objects of the world’s hatred. The ungodly consciousness of the world gravitates outwards into the impersonal; consequently the divine consciousness of Christ and His people, gravitating, in its impulse of faith and love, toward the absolute personality of God, is odious to the world. The antithesis: I, and: the world, contains the most concise expression of this fact. The world hateth them, properly: hath conceived a hatred for them (ἐμίσησεναὐτούς). Luther: “The world’s hatred is the true livery of Christians, which they wear on earth. John 17:15. I pray not that Thou, etc. [οὐκἐρωτῶἵναἄρῃςαὐτοὺςἐκτοῦκόσμου, ἀλλ’]. The petition regarding the protection of the disciples from the world, likewise divides itself into two parts, a negative and a positive. They are to remain in the world, but are to be preserved from the world. Luther: “What I want is not that they also should pass out of the world with Me, for I have still more to accomplish by means of them; they must increase My little flock.”—That Thou shouldst take them out of the world, i.e., neither by actual death nor by ascetic mortifications. Christ has here rejected monkery also, as a form of life un-suited to His disciples, they having attained their majority. They are to be in the world, but not of the world. The petition runs thus: that Thou shouldst keep them from the Evil One. The question as to whether ἐκτοῦπονηροῦ is to be construed as neuter [the evil.—E. V.] or as denoting Satan [the Evil One], is decided by Olshausen, Baumg.-Crusius in the former, by Lόcke and Meyer [Alford] in the latter sense with reference to “the Prince of this world,” John 12:31; John 14:30; John 16:11, and to 1 John 2:13-14; 1 John 3:12; 1 John 5:18-19. If we add to these chapters 8:44, we find that John merges the whole world in personal relations, as regards evil also; the world, as world, lies in the Wicked One; it has its pole in Satan; this is in conformity to the purely dynamical view of the world. The expression τηρεῖνἐκ, Revelation 3:10. John 17:16. They are not of the world [ἐκτοῦκόσμουοὐκεἰσὶνκαθὼςἐγὼοὐκεἰμὶἐκτοῦκόσμου]. Motive for the following positive petition. They no longer have their vital principle in the world, but, like Christ and through Him, in the Father; therefore He prays that they may be perfected, in accordance with this their divine birth and kind. Sanctify them in the truth [ἀγίασοναὐτοὺςἐντῇἀληθείᾳ, as the element in which the ἁγιάζειν takes place]. Explanations: 1. Chrysostom, Euthymius [Lόcke, Godet, Wordsworth]: Make them holy through [ἐν instrumental, as in the E. V.] the gift of the Holy Ghost, and by true doctrine. 2. Luther: Adverbially construing in the truth: Make them truly [ἀληθῶς] holy [in distinction from the present imperfect holiness.—Hengstenberg. Against this is the article, and still more the following ὁλόγος, etc.—P. S.] 3. Erasmus, Calvin: Take them away from the fellowship of the world. 4. Theophylact, Lampe: Separate them for the office of the ministry. The phrase, That they also may be sanctified (John 17:19), must be defined pursuant to the holiness of God, John 17:11, and the self-sanctification of Christ, John 17:19. Now God is holy in withdrawing Himself from the ungodly world, in order to reveal Himself in a godly, kingly-priestly people, Leviticus 11:44-45; 1 Peter 3:16. In conformity thereto, Christ sanctifies Himself; He departs out of the world in His self-humiliation, in order to enter into the world in His majesty. On the basis of this fact, the disciples are to be sanctified, the word of God in them, through the Holy Ghost within them, being converted into perfect truth, i.e. into a unitous light, a principially developing luminous and vital view and vital power, ever emancipating them more completely from the world in order to conduct them into the world, as emancipators, with the gospel. The expression ἐντῇ is generally apprehended as denoting instrumentality: By means of or by virtue of the truth; Meyer, on the other hand, maintains it to mean: That He would furnish them, in this their vital sphere of truth, with holy consecration, i.e. inspiration, illumination, through the Holy Ghost. This view, however, brings the holy consecration into dubious antithesis to the truth. Doubtless the word, already possessed by the disciples, must be supplemented by the Holy Ghost with His consecration, but it is to the end that the word may for them be rendered living truth, at once the vital sphere and the instrument of their sanctification. Now Apostolic sanctification is always both moral and official sanctification. The further thought-sequence, however, proves that the official sanctification should be emphasized in this place. The rationale of the petition follows: Thy word is truth. [ὁλόγοςὁσὸςἀλήθειάἐστι. Cod. B. reads ἡ, the truth, but all other authorities omit the article.—P. S.] Truth, this time without the article, as predicate of the word. The word of God is, in the abstract, pure truth, a lively word, the source of light and the light-impulse to perfect enlightenment; and so, what it is in itself, it must become in the disciples. See John 4:24; John 18:37; 1 John 5:16; 2 John 1:1 ff. John 17:18-19 contain the further assignment of motives for the whole intercession of Christ on behalf of the disciples.—As Thou didst send Me [καθὼςἐμὲἀπέστειλαςεἰςτὸνκόσμον]. First motive of the entire petition: that God would keep and sanctify the disciples. He is the great, unitous Messenger of God, in whom God’s whole apostolate to the world is contained and who has been really consecrated for it by God (John 10:36); from Him they now are to become apostles, who, being divinely consecrated to His apostolate, ramify and go forth with the same into all the world. See John 15:9; John 20:21; 2 Corinthians 5:20. The Aorist ἀπέστειλα corresponds in part with the proleptical character of the high-priestly Prayer,—as from the stand-point of that consummation of which He is in spirit assured,—in part with the fact that the commissioning of the disciples had its beginning simultaneously with their calling (Matthew 10), although this commissioning, graded hitherto, was to continue in gradual development until its perfection, John 20:21; Matthew 28:19; Acts 1, 2 The καθὼςἐμέ is placed first as the basis and degree of the mission of the disciples. John 17:19. And for them I sanctify Myself [καὶὑπὲραὐτῶνἐγὼἁγιάζωἐμαυτόν, ἵνα, κ.τ.λ. The sense of καὶ here is: And, to make their sanctification (John 17:17) possible, I sanctify Myself. Mark the difference between the active ἁγιάζω and the passive ἡγιασμένοι and between ἐγὼ ?—ἐμαυτόν and αὐτοί=Christ sanctifies Himself by His inherent holiness, Christians are sanctified by another power.—P. S.] The specific, high-priestly element of the intercession as the concluding motive. Christ is already sanctified by the Father (John 10:36), in coming into the world; He now sanctifies Himself unto the Father, in leaving the world and, by His death, going unto the Father on behalf of His disciples, in order to lay the foundation for their sanctification. This entry is longer than a Bible module can hold. The rest is at https://www.sermonindex.net/commentary/lange/ SIXTH SECTION The Lord in the circle of His foes, as the Light overtaken by the Darkness; the lofty Judge or the personal Judgment, whilst He is judged; victorious in His outward succumbing; how He carries out His judgment, to the victory of Light and Salvation (John 18, 19)I CHRIST AS THE OF LIGHT UPON THE OF THE WORLD AGAINST AND OVER HIS PERSON; OVER AGAINST HIS , HIS , HIS VIOLENT HELPER. THE MAJESTY OF THE , IN TO THE OF THE ; THE OF THE , IN TO THE OF THE SEIZERS; THE TO THE DECREE OF THE FATHER, IN TO THE AID OF PETER. THE OF PETER’S DEED OF , AND THE VANITY AND OF VIOLENT MEANS FOR THE OF ENDSJoh_18:1-11(Matthew 26:36-56; Mark 14:32-52 Luke 22:39-53.) 1    When Jesus had spoken these words, he [Having spoken these words, Jesus] went forth with his disciples over the brook Cedron, [the torrent Kidron] where 2was a garden, into the which [into which] he entered, and his disciples. And [But] Judas also, which [who] betrayed him, knew the place; for Jesus oft-times resorted thither with his disciples. 3Judas then, having received a band of men [the band of soldiers, i.e., the garrison of the fort,] and officers from the chief priests and Pharisees, cometh thither with lanterns and torches and weapons.4Jesus therefore, knowing all things that should come [were coming, τὰἐρχόμενα upon him, went forth, and said unto them, Whom seek ye [do ye seek]? 5They answered him, Jesus of Nazareth [the Nazarene, τὸνΝαζωραῖον]. Jesus saith unto them, I am he [Ἐγώεἰμι]. And [Now] Judas also, which [who] betrayed him, stood with them. 6As soon then as he had said [he said, εἶπεν] unto them, I am he, they went backward, and fell to the ground. 7Then asked he them again [Again therefore he asked them], Whom seek ye [do ye seek]? And they said, Jesus of Nazareth [the Nazarene]. 8Jesus answered, I have told you that I am he: if therefore ye seek [are seeking] me, let these go their way: 9That the saying might be fulfilled, which he spake, Of them which [those whom] thou gavest [hast given, δέδωχας] me have I lost none [I lost none, or, not a single one of them, οὐχἀπώλεσαἐζαὐτῶνοὐδένα]. 10Then Simon Peter having a sword drew it, and smote the high priest’s servant, and cut off his right ear. [And] The servant’s name was Malchus. 11Then said Jesus unto Peter, Put up thy [the] sword into the sheath: the cup which my [the] Father hath given me, shall I not drink it? AND [Now follows the history of the Passion, chaps. 18 and 19, and the Resurrection of our Lord, chaps. 20 and 21, where we have the parallel accounts of the Synoptists. Yet John omits several items (as the agony in Gethsemane, anticipated in 12:27, and 13:21; but he mentions the garden, 18:1), and supplies other interesting facts (as the commending of the mother of Jesus to John), and in the parallel accounts a number of minute, circumstantial details (18:2, 10, 13, 24, 28; 19:14, 20, 41, etc.) which betray the eye-witness of the scenes described. But it is wrong to say with Hengstenberg that John merely meant to give supplements to the Synoptic history of the Passion with such common traits as are necessary to show the connection, comp. the remarks of Godet, 2p. 5, 69 f.—P. S.] John 18:1. Jesus went forth [ἐξῆλθεν]. Not precisely forth from the city (Meyer), but forth from the city precincts, which extended to the brook Kedron. Ἐξῆλθενπέραν. Leben Jesu, 2 p. 1347 ff. [David, betrayed by Ahithophel, one of his body-guard, took the same course over Kedron in his flight from the rebellious Absalom, 2 Samuel 15:23, and thus furnished a type to which Jesus Himself pointed, John 13:18.—P. S.] Beyond the brook [or rather torrent] Kidron [or Kedron. See Text. Note]. Kidron, the name of a brook or torrent, χέμαῤῥος, [from χεῖμα and ῥέω, winter-flowing, winter-torrent, formed by the winter-rains, but dry in the summer.—P. S.]; also a wady, Joseph. Antiq. VIII. 1, 5. χִ ?γְ ?ψεֹ ?κ [from χָ ?γַ ?ψ, to be black, dirty], the Black, the Black Brook [from its color.] We must distinguish between the valley of Kedron and the Kedron itself, as well as between the Kedron as a torrent, and as a spring brook. “The vale of Kedron is the most important valley in the northern portion of the plateau of the wilderness of Judah. It takes its rise on the north side of the city of Jerusalem, upon the great water-shed between the Mediterranean and the Dead Sea, at an elevation of about 2,500 feet above the ocean; it surrounds the north and east sides of the city, turning by the well of Rogel, at a sharp angle to the southeast, toward the Dead Sea. Forming, at first, but a shallow, trough-shaped depression, it burrows deeper, and deeper and, from the point where it turns to the southeast, becomes a wild, untrodden, narrow chasm, opening south of the Ras el Feshka, towards the Dead Sea. No traveller has ever yet traversed its whole extent. In the middle of its course, between Jerusalem and the Dead Sea, there is a much-visited point, the cloister of St. Saba.—The brook Kedron, which flows through the valley, has no regular water-course; it is only a winter-torrent [formed by the water which flows into the valley from the hills north and east of Jerusalem], Over and above this, the valley does not lack perennial springs; on the eastern declivity of southern Moriah there is the well of Mary, etc., and at the junction of Hinnom with the valley of the Kedron we find the well of Rogel” (L. Vφlter). According to Robinson, the Kedron does not flow unceasingly even in winter; one may stay several years in Jerusalem without seeing any water in this deep bed. As the dividing brook between Jerusalem or Moriah, Zion and the Mount of Olives, the brook, like the valley, possesses some significancy. Upwards from the well of Rogel near Jerusalem, the valley is called the valley of Jehoshaphat (“the Lord judgeth”). According to the Jews (with reference to Joe 3:2), as also according to the Mohammedans, the last judgment will be held in this valley. Simultaneously with Christ’s passage of the Kedron, a passage infinitely more momentous than that of Cζsar over the Rubicon, doubtless the last judgment was principially decided, together with the redemption. Passages in which the Kedron is mentioned: 2 Samuel 15:23; 1 Kings 15:13; 2 Kings 23:4; 2 Kings 23:6; 2 Kings 23:12; Nehemiah 2:15; 1Ma 12:37; Joseph. Antiq. XVIII. 1, 5; IX. 7, 3; De Bello Jud. V. 6, 1. Comp. the article Kedron in Winer and that in Zeller’s Wφrterbuch fόr das christliche Volk; books of travel, particularly Robinson 2 p. 35 [Am. ed. vol. I. 268–273; (Valley of K.), and I. 232, 273 (Brook of K.). Also art. Kidron, in Smith’s Dict. of the B., II. 1533 ff., Hackett &Abbot’s ed., where Robinson’s accurate description is quoted.—P. S.] As a torrent alone, the Kedron’s waves were dark and turbid; and in the time of the temple-worship the blood of the sacrifices likewise flowed into it and darkened it; hence, doubtless, the name. It was probably the Stephen Gate or Mary Gate of the present day, through which Jesus had descended into the valley for the purpose of crossing the Kedron (Leben Jesu, ii. p. 1427). There was a garden. On Gethsemane [i. e., Olive-Press, from gath, press, and schamna, oil] see Comm. on Matthew [pp. 478, 482, Am. ed.]. The different designations are worth noting. Matthew: Jesus cometh unto a country-place called Gethsemane similarly Mark; Luke: to the mount of Olives; John: there was a garden.[This notice of John to every reader of the Synoptic Gospels would at once suggest the scene of Gethsemane. On the doubtful typological reference to the garden of Eden, where the first Adam was tempted by the serpent and fell, while in Gethsemane the second Adam bruised the serpent’s head, see the fathers, Lampe, Hengstenberg, and Wordsworth.”—P. S.] Himself and His disciples.—The more minute account in Matthew and Mark. John 18:2. But Judas also, His betrayer, knew the place.—Thus John passes over the conflict in Gethsemane. It is his intention to exhibit it in its glorious issue, the majestic repose of Christ.—For Jesus often resorted thither with His disciples.—According to Luke, it was a habit of Jesus to go thither. The Synoptists jointly say that He there collected His thoughts in prayer. According to John, the place also served as a meeting-ground for Jesus and His disciples; probably He was wont to be met there by His adherents generally. The remark “refers to previous festal visits.” Meyer. Comp. Comm. on Mark [p. 5, Am. ed. Dr. Lange conjectures there that Mark, whose mother had a house in Jerusalem, owned a country seat at the foot of the Mount of Olives, perhaps even the garden of Gethsemane.—P. S.] Instrumental in throwing light upon the base character of Judas is the fact of his reckoning that Jesus, in His divine strength of character and fidelity to prayer, would assuredly be found, even on this occasion, in Gethsemane. John 18:3. Having received the band of soldiers and officers, etc. [ὉοὖνἸούδαςλαβὼντὴνσπεῖραν—see Text. Notes—καὶἐκτῶνἀρχιερέωνκ. φαρισαίωνὑπηρέταςἔρχεταιἔρχεταιἐκεῖ, κ. τ. λ..]—See Comm. on Matthew. “According to Josephus, XX. 3, 4, the city governors were accustomed, at the feast, tostation a τάξιςστρατιωτῶν (in the Castle Antonia) near the avenues to the temple, in case of an insurrection; and for this reason—for fear, namely, that the adherents of Jesus might free Him by force—a detachment is here permitted to accompany the Jews. The Levitic ὕπηρέται of the Sanhedrin accomplish the arrest itself; they were sent out for a similar purpose, John 7:45. Under these circumstances, it is not at all probable that the detachment of soldiers also pressed into the garden.” (According to John 18:12, the thing is very probable, since they at once co-operate in the arrest.) “The strength of the cohorts conformed to circumstances. Some of those under Titus contained 1000 men, others 613 foot-soldiers and 120 horsemen. Moreover, in the usage of Polybius, σπεῖρα is equivalent to manipulus, the third of a cohort.” Tholuck. [There were ten cohorts or companies in every Roman legion, but varying in number according to circumstances. According to Josephus (De Bello Jud., III. 4, 2) five of eighteen σπεῖραι contained 1000 men each, and the others 600. Robinson (sub σπεῖρα), with Kuinoel, understands here and John 18:12 the temple guard of Levites who performed the menial offices of the temple and kept watch by night. So also Baumgarten-Crusius and Bδumlein. But the σπεῖρα is here and John 18:6 expressly distinguished from the ὑπηρέταιἐκτῶνἀρχιερέωνκ. φαρισαίων, furnished by the Sanhedrin. The objection that Roman soldiers would have led Jesus to their own officers, not to the chief priests, does not hold; for Jesus was to be condemned first by the ecclesiastical authorities. It is not necessary to suppose that the whole garrison of the fortress Antonia, whether it consisted of 1000 or only of 300 men, was present; a small detachment with the captain (χιλίαρχος, John 18:12) was sufficient. Comp. note on Matthew 27:27, p. 513. The combined power of the Romans and the Jews was brought into requisition against the one unarmed gentle Jesus. The military preparation (μετὰφανῶνκαὶ. λαμπάδων—mark the accumulative καί) indicates the bad conscience of Judas 1456and the Sanhedrin.—P. S.] John 18:4. Jesus, therefore, stepped forth.—Not out of the garden (Lampe, Meyer),—Mark pretty plainly decides against such an interpretation—nor out of the depths of the garden merely (De Wette, Tholuck [Alford: from the shade of the trees into the moonlight] and others), but, agreeably to His purpose, out of the circle of disciples, in advance of it, in order to protect it (Leben Jesu, II., p. 1456, Schweizer). This is indicated also by the design of the question: Whom do ye seek? John 18:8. [Stier: “When men sought Jesus to make Him a King, He fled: now that they seek Him to put Him to death, He goes forth to meet them.”—P. S.]—Whom do ye seek?—According to Hug, He put this question to the end that the temple-officers also might learn His name and that it might consequently be rendered impossible for Him to be put out of the way anonymously; the design, however, manifestly presents itself in what follows. They are to be dismayed at the distinct consciousness of their intention to seize Jesus, and, their commission being thus narrowly defined, they shall be in duty bound to let the disciples go. John 18:5. But Judas also, etc.—The band of disciples was stationed within the garden in two divisions, like a watch. The three intimates of Jesus were in the back-ground, the eight others near the entrance. From the stand-point of these latter, to whom Matthew belonged, the most striking occurrence was the pressing of the troop, with Judas at their head, into the garden; from the stand-point of the three, Jesus’ hastening to meet the throng. To these external circumstances of position, supervenes a diversity of mental view; the Synoptic tradition and Mark, the disciple of Peter, regarding primarily the impudent boldness of the traitor, whilst it was the design of John to throw into relief the majestic preparedness of Christ and His fidelity to the disciples. Jesus, then, anticipated Judas’ plot of betraying Him with a kiss, inasmuch as He rendered that plot entirely superfluous; this fact, however, forms no reason for supposing that Judas did not carry out the agreement and that the Judas-kiss is a tradition. It did but become a meaningless farce through Jesus’ declaration of Himself. Hence, it is this that John wishes to indicate, viz., that the Judas-kiss was frustrated in its design by the magnanimous self-presentation of Jesus, and at the same time, that Judas, together with the enemies, was felled to the ground through Christ’s word. As the two brushed past each other, the kiss became an abortive, scarce-accomplished signal, and the traitor was cast back upon the line of the foes. [Ἐγώεἰμι, I am He. Words of cheer and comfort to the trembling disciples on the stormy lake, Mark 6:50, and after the resurrection, Luke 24:39; words of terror here to His enemies, overpowering the armed military and priestly band. So His rebuke, with the majesty of His presence, silenced the profane traffickers in the temple. Comp. also the impression made upon the ὑπηρέται, 7:46. What will be the effect of the same I am, when spoken by the Lord of glory on the day of judgment! Augustine: Quid judicaturus faciet, qui judicandus hoc fecit? Bengel (on John 18:8): Bis dicit: Ego sum; si tertio dixisset, non cepissent illum. Tertio dicet olim.—P. S.] John 18:6. And fell to the ground [ἀπῆλθανεἰςτὰὀπίσω—started back in dismay—καὶἔπεσανχαμαίχαμᾶζε].—Explanation of this fact: 1. A miracle of Jesus; by which He meant to prove the freedom of His self-surrender (ancient exposition).2. The fact is to be referred to the disciples who had retired and cast themselves upon the ground with a view to concealing themselves (Paulus)! 3. Mythical (Strauss).4. Psychological: there is no question of a prostration of all. The foremost ones were confounded at finding Jesus so suddenly—not sleeping, but waking—, presenting Himself so composedly; even before this, they were paralyzed, as it were, with awe of Him; now, when they would fain seize Him, a horror of awe over-powers them and, recoiling, they fall, one upon another (Lόcke, Tholuck and others).5. Here, also, it is an unjustifiable antithesis that causes the clashing of the miracle and its natural instrumentality, or of the objective, conscious agency of Christ and the subjective element of awe and fear (as, for instance, Meyer). The effect of the self-presentation of Christ could not arrive unexpectedly to Him, nor, hence, be undesigned. That is the miracle. Neither, however, can Jesus’ miracle be regarded as a magical operation upon the bodies of them that fell; its channel was terror of conscience, as was the case in the death of Ananias, Acts 5 (see Leben Jesu, p. 1457 ff.). Tholuck cites kindred instances, when before Mark Antony, Marius, Coligny, the murderers recoiled, panicstruck (p. 408; see, too, Heubner on this passage). On New Testament ground the following belong here: Luke 4:30; John 8:59; John 7:44-46; John 10:39; Matthew 28:4; Acts 5:5; Acts 5:10 in reference to a bad conscience; analogous phenomena occurred even in the circle of Jesus’ friends, according to Luke 5:8; Matthew 28:9; Matthew 28:17, etc.—Analogous effects of the manifestation of Jehovah, of the Angel of the Lord, or Christ, see in the Old Testament in the history of Balaam, Manoah, Isaiah, Daniel, as also in the New Testament at the commencement of Revelation. John 18:7. Then asked He them again.—This second question, in conjunction with the self-surrender of Jesus, has an effect upon the troop as elevating as that of the first question and the self-presentation of Jesus was depressing. This, also, is in analogy with the convulsing and reanimating effects, as experienced by the Apocalyptists, of a divine revelation, Daniel 10:10; Revelation 1:17. These men (Daniel and John) were prostrated by the holiness of the Lord, in the consciousness of their sinfulness, lifted up again by His grace, in the element of their faith. Our case is somewhat similar,—the temple-officers being, on the one hand, the instruments of a godless, devilish plot, but also, on the other hand, the ministers of an existing order of things and the instruments of Divine Providence. John 18:8. If, therefore, ye seek Me.—The saying of Jesus is directly declarative of the security of the disciples, partly by way of logical deduction, partly as a command; it is, at the same time, indirectly the disciples’ discharge from the present outward alliance of suffering. But the great utterance has also a deeper background. See Isaiah 63:3. Bengel and others assume, without foundation, that some had already laid hands on the disciples. That there did exist an inclination for such a step, however, is evinced by the episode of the fleeing youth in Mark and by the maid who denounced Peter, in the history of the latter’s denial. John 18:9. That the saying might be fulfilled.—Christ’s declaration, John 17:12. The keeping of the disciples from being lost consisted finally in their preservation from captivity in the present situation, since the over-mighty temptation might have been the ruin of the souls of some among them. (This connection not recognized by Schweizer). [Alford: “An unquestionable proof, if any were wanted, that the words of John 17 are no mere description of the mind of our Lord Jesus at the time, but His very words themselves. This is recognized even by De Wette. On the application of the saying, we may remark that the words unquestionably had a deeper meaning than any belonging to this occasion; but the remarks so often made in this commentary on the fulfillment of prophecies must be borne in mind;—that to ‘fulfil’ a prophecy is not to exhaust its capability of being again and again fulfilled:—that the words of the Lord have many stages of unfolding;—and that the temporal deliverance of the Apostles now, doubtless was but a part in the great spiritual safe-keeping which the Lord asserted by anticipation in these words.” See also a good note of Webster and Wilkinson in loc.—P. S.] John 18:10. Simon, then—Peter. [ΣίμωνοὖνΠέτρος. Lange: Simon now—Peter].—We bring out in the translation the trait that John inserts his οὖν of manifold import between the names Simon and Peter, thus emphasizing the Simon. To Simon it was natural to act in the way related. Comp. Comm. on Matthew, on this place; John 21:15. An explanation of the circumstance that John alone mentions the name of the disciple who was the author of the sword-blow, see in the Comm. on Matthew on this passage [p. 486, Am. ed.]. Similarly, John alone mentions the name of Malchus. [One of the circumstantial details so frequent in John’s account of the history of the passion, which confirm his authorship. John knew the high-priest, John 18:15, and so probably also his servant Malchus (=King). The Synoptists who wrote earlier may have had prudential reasons for not mentioning the name.—P. S.] Peter wished, by this blow, to prove his readiness to risk his life for his Lord and to fulfil his vow, recorded John 13:37; in all probability it was also his design to give a signal to the friends of Jesus and the Lord Himself to rise in arms against the foe. Upon the particular circumstances comp. the Synoptists. [Peter’s zeal was honest and well-meaning, but impulsive, hasty, imprudent, and mistaken in the selection of means. Hence the rebuke of our Lord, who here condemns for all time to come the use of carnal weapons and physical force in the defence of truth and promotion of His kingdom. The Romish church has imitated Peter in his weakness rather than his strength, and often invoked the arm of the secular power in the bloody persecution of heretics; thus making herself responsible for it in spite of her professed principle: ecclesia non sitit sanguinem. Comp. my Hist. of the Apost. Church, p. 677.—P. S.] John 18:11. Jesus unto Peter.—It is again significant that John here makes use only of the name Peter (without Simon). Christ’s deliverance against the action of Peter, as given by John, does not exclude the words related by Matthew from conforming the more closely to the original expressions. The words of Jesus, as recorded by John, are expressive of the voluntary surrender of Jesus to the will of the Father, and they most decidedly look away from the doing of men. Mark passes over the direct disapproval awarded to Peter, his guide; Luke relates how Christ remedied the offense; Matthew brings out the theocratical points of Jesus’ saying.—The cup which My Father, etc. Comp. Matthew 20:22; Matthew 26:39 [Comm., p. 479, Am. Ed.]. In His prayer He has sacredly bound Himself to drink the cup. [“The cup is a striking allusion to the prayer in Gethsemane; for the image does not elsewhere occur in our Evangelist.” Alford. So also Paley, (Evidences, B, H., c. 4), Bengel, Webster and Wilkinson (comp. their note in loc.), Wordsworth, and others.—P. S.] AND ETHICAL1. The arrest of Jesus in Gethsemane. John omits the directions of Jesus to His disciples as to their conduct in Gethsemane; the Passion of His soul; the reproof to His sleeping disciples; the kiss of Judas; the reference of Peter to the twelve legions of angels; the protest of Jesus against His seizers; the healing of Malchus recorded by Luke; the episode of the fugitive youth related by Mark. On the other hand, he gives prominence to the fact that Jesus went voluntarily to meet His apprehenders; that the multitude fell to the ground at the sight of His majesty; that He surrendered Himself prisoner, while securing a free exode to the disciples. He names Peter as the one who drew the sword, mentions the name of the servant, Malchus, who was wounded by him, and, with the words, “who drew the sword,” refers the saying of Jesus, “shall I not drink the cup?” etc., to His psychical passion. On Gethsemane, see Comm. on Matthew, p. 478, Am. Ed. 2. Gethsemane, as John paints it, presupposes the Gethsemane according to the Synoptists, and from the latter it is possible to deduce the former. I.e., in the kingdom of God, a mighty assurance of victory admits the inference of a mighty conflict, and a mighty conflict that of a mighty assurance of victory. 3. The passage of Jesus over the brook Kedron, a step of the highest, world-historic import. An expression of His constrainedness in spirit, His freedom of will, His decision of heart. 4. Paradise and the Garden. The first and the second Adam. The serpent and the traitor. The defeat and the victory (attaching, in a greater degree, to the Synoptical version). The ancient typology, constituting the Garden of Gethsemane an antithesis of Paradise, is fully warranted here, so long as it does not, by enlarging upon minute, degenerate into trifling. 5. The sudden attack upon the Lord in the sanctuary of prayer, a speaking sign: 1. That the hatred of the world was levelled at the praying heart of Christ and His flock,—that they fell upon Him on account of His piety; 2. that in this respect, also, He was to form the central point of the experience of the faithful: of the experience of Daniel (John 6:7), of the first Christians, the Huguenots [Puritans, Covenanters], etc.6. Judas knew the place also. How the spiritual experiences of false men and hypocrites redound to their ruin. He knew the place. But in what a base and imperfect way he knew the Lord, is proved by his equipment and march with the whole multitude. 7. In all religious persecutions, cohorts, legions and armies are transformed into gens-d’armes, police soldiers, myrmidons and executioners’ assistants. 8. The drawing up of the world against Christ, and the sword stroke of Peter for Him: Symbols of the impotence of His fleshly opposers, as of His fleshly defenders. 9. The majesty whereby the self presentation of Christ casts His foes to the ground. A divine operation (see the Introduction), yet with a human instrumentality. See Note to John 18:6. At the same time an expression of His freedom in His surrender, which freedom, according to the Synoptists, He also declared by a decided protest. 10. Christ’s submitting to be taken captive by His enemies, in order to the protection and deliverance of His people, a symbolic individual type, in which His faithfulness as a Redeemer is reflected. AND 1. See Commentary on Matthew, Mark, Luke.—Gethsemane in profoundest gloom and brightest light, (comparison of the Johannean version with the Synoptical).—Gethsemane as a place of victory: 1. Revelation of past victory, a. over inward temptation, b. over Judas (chap. 13). 2. Consummation of present victory, a. over the slanderous array and over treason (in that He voluntarily presents Himself to His enemies); b. over the haughtiness of the foe (by levelling them to the earth and ensuring the safety of the disciples); c. over the carnal zeal of the disciple. 3. A foretoken and life picture of all the future victories of Christ (free advance of the strong, secure shelterment of the weak, glorious correction of the passionate, dissipation of falsehood and treachery, disarming of violence, overcoming of the world through voluntary suffering).—The brook and the garden: 1. How insignificant! 2. How memorable!—Judas and Peter in the Gethsemane of the Lord.—But Judas also knew the place. How even this knowledge and recollection of his disciple life becomes his ruin. The fearful judgment in the misuse of spiritual experiences.—The equipment of Judas, or how well and yet how poorly he knew his betrayed Lord: 1. His place of prayer and fidelity to prayer, but not the blessing of His prayer; 2. His power, but not His superiority and omnipotence: 3. His innocence, yet not His holiness; 4. His clemency, yet not His love and earnestness; 5. His human dignity, but not His divine majesty.—The betrayer of Christ a traitor out and out: 1. To the sanctuary, 2. to his fellow disciples, 3. to his nation, 4. to humanity, 6. to himself.—Treason toward the sanctuary: 1. How all the secrets of the church of Christ are, by means of apostate members, betrayed to the world; 2. how all the plots of treason are brought to nought and transformed to a judgment upon the traitors.—The array of myrmidons against Jesus: 1. Called out by mendacious and vain fear; 2. terrible in its weapons and lamps, over against the Defenceless One; 3. made a laughing-stock through the light of truth with which Christ goes to meet it; 4. shown up in its impotence; 5. limited in its operation; 6. given free course in its plot, but only in order to the carrying out of the counsel of God.—How Christ baffles the plots of His foes by freely meeting and anticipating them [the plots 1. of craft (slander, falsehood), 2. of violence].—The majesty which Christ manifests in treading the way of His deepest humiliation.—The sublime freedom of spirit with which He resigns His outward freedom.—Why so calm, so grand in His surrender? Because He is conscious that He is not abandoning Himself to the impotence of His enemies, but confiding Himself to the omnipotence of His God.—The dignity of the pious in suffering, the foretoken of his triumph.—The terrors of Christ: 1. Origin: a. Terrors of divine holiness, b. terrors of human dignity. 2. Effect: In the conscience, in the psychical life, in the marrow and bone. 3. Signs: Tokens of inner judgment, foretokens of future judgment.—Whom seek ye?—If ye, then, seek Me, let these go.—Fulfilment of Scripture: 1. In the most universal sense, 2. in the most special sense.—The upshot of things in Gethsemane: Betrayed, surprised, made captive: 1. Christ seems betrayed, but the kingdom of darkness has betrayed itself; 2. He seems surprised, but henceforth He stands sovereign in the midst of the camp of the foe; 3. He seems a captive, but the adversary is the captive.—The sword of Simon and the cup of Christ.—Simon took the sword, Peter received the reprimand.—Christ’s defence the defence of His people. Starke: Zeisius: That which the first Adam marred in the garden by the fall, the second Adam, Jesus Christ, regained and set in order in the garden by His guiltless passion.—The iniquity of the traitor was made all the more discernible by his betraying Christ to death in the very place where he had seen His deeds and heard the words of life.—The wicked man oft-times misuses his knowledge of the ingoings and outgoings of the righteous; let a man take care in whom he confides, Psalms 57:6.—The Lord Jesus has hallowed even the kind of suffering that His children endure when they must allow unfaithful souls a knowledge of their circumstances, Psalms 41:6; Psalms 41:9.—No one hates Christ and His party more bitterly than a hypocrite who has thrown off the mask.—Zeisius: When Jesus, in His suffering, hath so oft evinced His stout heartedness and advanced to meet His foes, why, O Christian mine, art thou in fear of the world and the devil, even whilst this conquering Lion of the Tribe of Judah is by thy side and fighteth for thee?—The first Adam, falling into the hands of divine justice, fled and hid himself, and God must needs call, saying: Adam, where art thou? but here the second Adam, being about to be delivered into the hands of His enemies, crieth out: Here am I.—What is more common now than Joab’s greeting and Judas kiss, Jacob’s voice and Esau’s hands? John 18:8 : 1. Because He wished them preserved for a greater work; 2. to the end that men might not imagine that His death would not suffice for the redemption of mankind; 3. because they were not yet strong enough to withstand the like temptation; 4. He desired to prove that He had power and authority over His enemies.—Our fate does not depend upon the might or numbers of the enemy, but upon the permission which they receive from God, to injure us, 2 Chronicles 32:7.—Lord Jesus, when the world, death and the devil would fain swallow us up, speak Thou the word of command: Let these go, Psalms 105:15.—Osiander: God setteth a bound to persecutions.—Zeisius: When Peter should have watched, he slept, and when he should have been quiet, he made resistance through carnal zeal; thus we always have by nature a sufficient leaning towards evil.—God overrules even the errors of His children, so that no greater harm shall result from them than He has resolved to permit, Genesis 20:2; Genesis 20:6. Gossner: In the garden of Eden man fell through lust and pride, in the garden of Gethsemane he was to be raised up again through mourning, anguish and humiliation.—What time their glory flashes in upon children of God and glimpses so heart-ravishing are theirs, they should not misuse this their blessedness, nor vaunt themselves of it.—When the Saviour saith: Let my people go, their sorest enemies must suffer this word to stand, and His people to go.—Thus, in the midst of the press, Christ looketh on the Father and taketh the suffering that men inflict upon Him, as coming, not from them, but out of the hand of the Father, without whose counsel and consent not a hair of our heads can be harmed. Heubner: Over the brook Kedron, as David once fled before Absalom. John 18:4. This question attests (therefore) His innocence and undismayedness.—The morally good man will never deny his own identity, even though he be in mortal peril; conscious of his dignity he will freely say who he is, trusting in God. There is something debasing and dishonoring in a denial of one’s identity.—These words, Let these go, are important to us also. “Jesus procures His disciples entire freedom and security; the power of this authoritative word shows itself even at the present day. The enemy had not left a disciple on earth if this word was not still in force. This word is the cause of the continued existence of disciples,—faithful ones, whom the world, against its will, must behold passing to and fro, and yet must let go.” Burk, Fingerzeig II., p. 393.—Shall I not, etc. Violently to hold the righteous back from his suffering for duty’s sake, is to hold him back from his glory and salvation. John 18:12. Bound as to the hands was Jesus; unbound in spirit. [Craven: From Augustine: Chap. 18. John 18:1-2. There the wolf in Sheep’s clothing, permitted by the deep counsel of the Master of the flock to go among the sheep, learned in what way to disperse the flock, and ensnare the Shepherd. John 18:6. Where now is the band of soldiers, where the terror and defence of arms? Without a blow, one word struck, drove back, prostrated a crowd fierce with hatred, terrible with arms. What shall He do when He cometh to judge, who did thus when He was going to be judged? John 18:8. So now having shown His power to them when they wished to take Him and could not, He lets them seize Him, that they might be unconscious agents of His will.—He commands His enemies, and they do what He commands; they permit them to go away, whom He would not have perish. John 18:11. Peter was to be admonished to have patience: and this was written for our learning.——From Chrysostom: John 18:1. Why does not John say, When He had prayed, He entered? Because His prayer was a speaking for His disciples, sake.—He goes to the place which was known to the traitor; thus giving no trouble to those who were lying in wait for Him, and showing His disciples that He went voluntarily to die.—That it might not be thought that He went into a garden to hide Himself, it is added, But Judas who betrayed Him knew the place: for Jesus often resorted thither with His disciples.John 18:3-9. They had often sent elsewhere to take Him, but had not been able; whence it is evident that He gave Himself up voluntarily; as it follows, Jesus, therefore, knowing all things—,went forth, etc.John 18:8. Even to the last hour does He show His love for His own.——From Alcuin: John 18:1. Where there was a garden, that the sin which was committed in a garden, He might blot out in a garden.——From Herbert: John 18:5. Judas, dost thou betray Me with a kiss? Canst thou find hell about My lips and miss Of life, just at the gates of life and bliss? [From Burkitt: John 18:3. How active was Judas, and how watchful was His bloody crew, even at that time when Christ’s disciples could not keep their eyes open. John 18:4. Lord, how endearing are our obligations to Thyself, that when Thou knewest beforehand the bitterness of that cup which the justice of God was about to put into Thy hand, Thou didst not decline to drink it for our sakes. John 18:7. Obstinate and obdurate sinners will not be reclaimed by the most evident and convincing, by the most miraculous and surprising, appearances of God against them. John 18:8. Christ is so tender of His followers, that He will not put them upon trials, or call them forth to sufferings, till they are ripe and prepared for them. John 18:10. How doth a pious breast swell with indignation at the sight of an open insult offered unto the Saviour! John 18:11. The rebuke which Christ gave St. Peter for what he did; though his heart was sincere, yet his hand was rash; good intentions are no warrant for irregular actions.—The cup which My Father hath given Me, shall I not drink it? Learn 1. That oft-times the wisdom of God is pleased to put a very bitter cup of affliction into the hand of those to drink, whom He doth most sincerely love; 2. That when God doth so, it is their duty to drink it with submission. [From M. Henry: John 18:1. Our Lord Jesus took His work before Him: the office of the priest was to teach, and pray, and offer sacrifice; Christ, after teaching and praying, applies Himself to make atonement.—Having by His sermon [and prayer] prepared His disciples for this hour of trial, and by His prayer prepared Himself for it, He then courageously went out to meet it: when He had put on His armor, He entered the lists, and not till then. John 18:2. Jesus oft times resorted thither: He would do as He was wont to do, and not alter His method, either to meet the cross or to miss it, when His hour was come. John 18:1. Where there was a garden: He would set us an example in the beginning of His passion, of retirement from the world.—He went over the brook Cedron; the notice taken of it intimates that there was something in it significant; and it points at 1. David’s prophecy concerning the Messiah (Psalms 110:7), that He shall drink of the brook in the way; 2. David’s pattern, as a type of the Messiah; in his flight from Absalom, particular notice is taken of his passing over the brook Cedron.—He had His disciples with Him, 1. Because He used to take them with Him when He retired for prayer; 2. They must be witnesses of His sufferings, and His patience under them; 3. To show them their weakness: Christ sometimes brings His people into difficulties, that He may magnify Himself in their deliverance. John 18:2. Mention is made of Judas’ knowing the place, 1. To aggravate his sin, that he would betray his Master notwithstanding his intimate acquaintance with Him: thus has Christ’s holy religion been wounded in the house of its friends, as it could not have been anywhere else; many an apostate could not have been so profane as he is, if he had not been a professor; he could not have ridiculed Scriptures and ordinances, if he had not known them; 2. To magnify the love of Christ, that, though He knew where the traitor would seek Him, thither He went to be found of him; what He did, was not by constraint, but by consent. When others were going to bed, He was going to prayer, going to suffer. John 18:4-6. He received His enemies with all the mildness imaginable toward them, and all the calmness imaginable in Himself. John 18:5. I am He; He has hereby taught us to own Him, whatever it cost us; not to be ashamed of Him or His words; but even in difficult times, to confess Christ crucified.John 18:6. They went backward; they did not fall forward, as humbling themselves before Him, but backward, as standing it out to the utmost.—.When He struck them down, He could have struck them dead, but He would not; because 1. The hour of His suffering was come; 2. He would give an instance of His patience and forbearance with the worst of men, and His compassionate love to His very enemies—in striking them down, and no more. He gave them both a call and space to repent. John 18:7-9. Having given His enemies a repulse, He gives His friends protection.John 18:7. There are hearts so very hard in sin, that nothing will work upon them to reduce and reclaim. John 18:8. When Christ exposed Himself, He excused His disciples, because they were not, as yet, fit to suffer.—Herein Christ gives us 1. A great encouragement to follow Him; for though He has allotted us sufferings, yet He considers our frame; 2. A good example of love to our brethren and concern for their welfare. John 18:8. Let these go their way; He intended to give a specimen of His undertaking as Mediator; when He offered Himself to suffer and die, it was that we might escape. John 18:9. The safety and preservation of the saints are owing, not only to the divine grace in proportioning the strength to the trial, but to the divine providence in proportioning the trial to the strength. John 18:10. Peter’s 1. Rashness; 2. Good-will; 3. Ill-conduct; He 1. had no warrant from His Master for what he did; 2. transgressed the duty of his place, and resisted the powers that were; 3. opposed His Master’s suffering, notwithstanding the rebuke he had for it once; 4. broke the capitulation His master had lately made with the enemy; 5. foolishly exposed himself and his fellow disciples to the fury of this enraged multitude; 6. he played the coward so soon after this (denying his Master), that we have reason to think that he would not have done this, but that he saw his Master cause them to fall on the ground.—God’s over-ruling providence in the direction of the stroke, that it should do no more execution than cut off his car.John 18:11. We must pledge Christ in the cup that He drank of; It Isaiah 1. but a cup; a small matter comparatively, be it what it will; 2. a cup that is given us; 3. given us by a Father.——From Scott: John 18:1-9. Even the malice of our Lord’s enemies did not render them more ready to crucify Him, than His love to sinners made Him ready to meet those sufferings. John 18:6. “The day of His wrath” will come, when all who oppose, yea, when all who do not obey, His Gospel, shall be driven backward and perish for ever. In the meantime He spares and warns His adversaries; yet neither His terror, nor His forbearance, will deter [sinful] men in general from their purpose.——From A Plain Commentary, (Oxford): John 18:6. He lifts up for an instant the mantle which screened His Divinity, and lo, they are unable even to stand in His presence! John 18:8. This was because He must needs tread the winepress alone, and of the people there must be none with Him (Isaiah 63:3); lest it should even enter into the dreams of any that the price of Man’s Salvation was paid by some other Sacrifice besides that of Christ only. John 18:9. This is [at the first glance] a somewhat surprising statement: for our Saviour, when He uttered the words referred to, was speaking of eternal, not temporal death; [but] what might have been the conduct, what would have been the fate, of the others, if they had now been separated from their Lord, and dragged away to a terrible death. [From Krummacher: John 18:3. The superfluous torches and lanterns, in the light of the full moon, manifest their conscience-smitten fears.—Officers from the chief priests and Pharisees; It becomes, indeed, people of this class unconditionally [?] to obey the command of those who are set over them. Yet they are not mere machines, incapable of guilt in so doing, but answerable, as well as all other men, to God the final judge, for their moral conduct; their obedience ought to be limited by the well-known maxim—“We must obey God rather than man;” and their duty it therefore was, in the present case, to prefer dying by the hand of the executioner, to the doubtful praise of having done their duty in the perpetration of the most heinous of crimes. John 18:5-6. “I am He !” Great and significant expression! It was never uttered by the Saviour without being accompanied with the most powerful effects. “It is I!” exclaimed He to His astonished disciples, when walking on the waves of the sea; and as, at the sound, the raging storm immediately subsided, so a flood of peace and joy poured itself into the hearts of His followers. “I that speak unto thee am He!” said He to the Samaritan woman at Jacob’s well; and immediately she left her water-pot and hastened back Sychar, as the first evangelist to the borders of Samaria. “I am He!” was His testimony at the bar of the Sanhedrin; and the conviction that He was really the Messiah smote the minds of His judges so powerfully that it was only by means of the stage-trick of rending his clothes, that the high priest was able to save himself from the most painful embarrassment: and here, on hearing these words, the whole band of officials start, give way, stagger backward, and fall to the ground as if struck by an invisible flash of lightning, or blown upon by the breath of Omnipotence.—Their prostration in the dust before Him, points out to unbelievers the situation in which they will one day be found. John 18:8. If ye seek me, let these go their way; how well the Lord was able to preserve the most perfect self-possession in every situation, however terrible; and, with His anxiety to complete the work of redemption, to mingle the minute and inconsiderable with the stupendous and sublime, while girding Himself for His mysterious passage to the cross, He does not forget, in His adorable faithfulness, to rescue His disciples from the approaching storm. John 18:10. “Well done, Simon!” we are ready to exclaim, “only go on as thou hast be-gun.” But that which appears to us as such an amiable trait in Peter, is only a confused mixture of self-love, arrogance, and folly; while the fire of our natural enthusiasm for Simon’s act proceeds likewise from only short-sightedness and blindness. John 18:11. The cup which My Father hath given Me, shall I not drink it? In the cup was the entire curse of the inviolable law; all the horrors of conscious guilt, all the terrors of Satan’s fiercest temptations, and all the sufferings which can befall both soul and body. It contained likewise the dreadful ingredients of abandonment by God, infernal agony, and a bloody death, to which the curse was attached. Christ has emptied it, and not a drop remains for His people. The satisfaction He rendered was complete, the reconciliation effected. “There is now no condemnation to them that are in Christ Jesus.” [From Barnes: John 18:8. The wisdom, caution, and prudence of Jesus forsook Him in no peril, however sudden, and in no circumstances, however difficult or trying.——From Jacobus: John 18:8-9. Nothing can occur contrary to His eternal plan; not even the mad fury of His foes can overreach His wisdom, or overmatch His provision.——From Owen: John 18:7. If it be asked how they could proceed to arrest and maltreat a person, before whom they had fallen prostrate as before a superior being, the answer is to be found in the transient influence which fear exerts upon the mind, and the probable fact, that this sudden repulse was represented by the leaders as effected by demoniacal agency at the instance of Jesus. [John 18:11. (Matthew 26:52-54). The cause of Christ is not to be defended by carnal weapons.] _____________ II christ over against annas and calaphas. the clarity and serenity of the lord over against the inquisition of the high priest and maltreatment on the part of the servant. the two disciplines in the high priestly palace, and the tottering and falling peter 18:12–27(Comp. Matthew 26:57-75; Mark 14:53-72; Luke 22:54-65.) 12Then the band and the captain [,] and [the] officers of the Jews took Jesus, and bound him. 13And led him away [led him] to Annas first; for he was father-in-law to [of, τοῦ ?] Caiaphas, which was the high priest that same year [who was high priest that year]. 14Now Caiaphas was he, which [But it was Caiaphas who] gave counsel to the Jews, that it was expedient that one man should die for the people. 15And Simon Peter followed Jesus, and so did another disciple [And Simon Peter and (the) other disciple followed Jesus]: that disciple was known unto the high-priest, and went in with Jesus into the palace [court-yard, αὐλήν] of the high priest. 16But Peter stood at the door without [was standing outside at the door]. Then went out that [the] other disciple, which [who] was known unto the high-priest, and spake unto her that kept the door, and brought in Peter. 17Then saith the damsel [maid-servant] that kept the door unto Peter, Art not [omit not] thou also one of this man’s disciples? He saith, I am not. 18And the servants and [the] officers stood [were standing] there, who had made [having made, πεποιηχότες] a fire of coals, for it was cold; and they warmed [were warming] themselves: and Peter stood [was standing] with them, and warmed [warming] himself. 19The high-priest then asked Jesus of [about, or, concerning, περί] his disciples, and of [about] his doctrine. 20Jesus answered him, I spake [have spoken, λελάληχα openly to the world; I ever [always] taught in the [a] synagogue, and in the temple, whither the Jews always resort [whore all the Jews come together, assemble]; and in secret have I said [I spoke, ἐλἀλησα] nothing. 21Why askest thou me? ask them which heard me [Ask those who have heard, τουςἀχηχοότας], what I have said [I spoke, ἐλάλησα] unto them: behold, they [these, οὗτοι] know what I said 22[εἶπον]. And when he had thus spoken [said this], one of the officers which stood by [who was standing by, παρεστηχώς] struck Jesus with the palm of his hand [or, struck Jesus on the face, ἔδωχενῥάπισματῷἸησ], saying, Answerest thou the high-priest so? 23Jesus answered him, If I have spoken [spoke, ἐλάλησα] evil, bear witness of the evil: but if well, why smitest thou me? 24Now Annas had sent him [Annas therefore sent him, ἀπέστειλενοὖν bound unto Caiaphas the high-priest. 25And Simon Peter stood and warmed [was standing and warming] himself. They said therefore unto him, Art not [omit not] thou also one of his disciples? He denied it [omit it], and said, I am not. 26One of the servants of the high-priest, being his kinsman [being a kinsman of him] whose ear Peter cut off, saith, Did not I see thee in the garden with him? 27Peter then denied again; and immediately the [a] cock crew. AND Joh_18:12. Then the band and the captain, etc. Manifestly, the Jewish guard and the Roman soldiers take Jesus prisoner in concert; the soldiers under their chiliarch even have the precedence on the occasion. Hence an incorrect distinction is made in saying; “not until this moment, when the prisoner must be led through the city, does the military troop rejoin the Jewish watch” (Tholuck). [Luthardt (II., 383): “He before whose aspect and ἐγώεἰμι, the whole band had been terrified and cast to the ground, now suffers Himself to be taken, bound, and led away…. To apprehend and bind One, all gave their help, the cohort, the chiliarch, and the Jewish officers…. Only by the help of all did they feel themselves secure. And thus it was ordered, that the disciples might escape with the more safety. Jesus suffered Himself to be bound, to show thereby the complete surrender of His will, and also in this form of suffering to be our example (Genesis 22:9; Psalms 105:18).”—P. S.] John 18:13. Led him to Annas first.—See Comm. on Matthew. On Annas see Coram, on Luke 3:2 [p. 55, Am. Ed.], and the article Annas in Winer (at Josephus Ananos). [Annas (Ἄνανος) was appointed high-priest in his 37th year, A. D. 7, by Quirinus, the governor of Syria, but was obliged to give way to Ismael, A. D. 14. After two more changes, Joseph Caiaphas, the son in law of Annas (John 18:13; Joseph. Antiqu. XVIII. 2, 1), was appointed to the office, and continued till A. D. 37. Annas seems to have retained the title and part of the power of that office. In Luke 3:2, he is mentioned before Caiaphas, and in Acts 4:5, he is called high-priest. Some hold that he was high-priest dejure, Caiaphas de facto. Wieseler maintains that both were at the head of the Jewish hierarchy, Caiaphas as actual high-priest, Annas as president of the Sanhedrin.—P. S.] The preliminary leading of Jesus to Annas recorded by John alone. Different suppositions: The house of Annas was situated near the gate, or they led Jesus, as in triumph, to Annas; Annas was the examiner (Ewald); he was president of the Sanhedrin (Lichtenstein and others). All destitute of evidence, confronted with the supposition suggested by John himself, viz., that the Jews still regarded Annas as the true high-priest in a legitimistic sense, even after Caiaphas had been forced upon them as his successor (Leben Jesu II., p. 1468). The expression relative to Caiaphas: “high-priest of that year” (see John 11:49), appearing here for the second time, it would seem that the Evangelist had adopted it as an ironical characterization, current in the popular mouth, of the high-priesthood as desecrated by the Romans. With this observation, as well as with the very obvious notion that the high priestly-father-in-law and son-in-law occupied the same house as well as navigated the same boat, and that, accordingly, their common palace had a common aula or court-yard, in which Peter perpetrated the denial, the difficulties that here present themselves are removed. Meyer justly asserts (in company with Olshausen, Ebrard, Bleek, Baumg.-Crusius, Neander, Luthardt [Wieseler, Stier, Alford, also Chrysostom and Augustine]), that, according to John, the denial of Peter John 18:16-18, the examination John 18:19-21, and the maltreatment John 18:22-23, took place in the dwelling of Annas; likewise justly, that it is impossible to follow the older harmonistics in assuming the leading to Caiaphas to be pre-supposed in John 18:15. Tholuck, on the other hand, persists in the assumption that the presentation before Annas receives nothing but a passing mention, as is discernible from the πρῶτον; the Aorist John 18:24 having therefore to be read as a Pluperfect (in accordance with Calvin, Lόcke, De Wette, Hase and others), in spite of Meyer’s characterization of this as “violent” and Ebrard’s and Bleek’s as “neck-breaking.” Luther takes for granted a blunder of the transcriber, who, as he thinks, should have made John 18:24 immediately follow John 18:14. Manifestly, however, the examination before Annas, as described by John, is an entirely different one from that before Caiaphas, as given by the Synoptists. For John the greatest weight attached to the pre-examination by Annas, for Matthew and Mark to the official chief examination by Caiaphas, for Luke to the legalizing final examination in the morning. See Comm. on Matthew. After the above remarks, the assumption of a discrepancy, entertained by Meyer, Baur and others, falls to the ground; such an assumption is also to be found in Euthym. Zigab., Casaubonus, Stier, Ebrard, p. 541. “It has been fabricated (says Meyer) that Annas and Caiaphas resided in one and the same house.” But an extremely obvious, probable conjecture which, in the simplest manner, solves a difficulty, is something very different from a fabrication. [Augustine, Theophylact, Euthymius, Alford, Hengstenberg, Godet adopt the same easy conjecture. Annas and Caiaphas would naturally occupy different departments of the same (official) palace; and hence the sending from one to the other was quite possible and probable.—P. S.] John 18:14. Now it was Caiaphas who gave counsel to the Jews.—Wherefore this notice? The Evangelist, in relating that Jesus was led to Annas first, already announced that He would be brought before Caiaphas also. He, however, designs forthwith to intimate what fate impended over Jesus at the hands of both of them. It was an evil omen that the people intended taking Him before Caiaphas, him who had already pronounced sentence of death upon Him. But it is also characteristic of the enmity of old Annas that Jesus was led to him even before He was brought to Caiaphas; the announcement of this fact is appropriately accompanied by the statement that he was the father-in-law of that murderous Caiaphas. John 18:15. And the other [another] disciple.—Modest self-designation of John, as chap, 20:2, 3, 4, 8, comp. John 1:40. The article is wanting only in A. D., etc. [also in B. ΰ* See Text. Notes.—P. S.]. On the omission of the article several untenable hypotheses are founded: 1. That it was an unknown disciple (Augustine, Calov., Gurlitt); 2. a citizen of Jerusalem (Grotius); 3. Judas Iscariot (Heumann). [Absurd. 4. James, the brother of John (P. Cassel, 1871).—P. S.] The notice that all the disciples had fled, does not conflict with the fact that they subsequently took heart again and that some of them returned. It is characteristic of the friendship of the two, Peter and John, that they here go voluntarily together, not on an official mission. Peter at first takes the lead. But at the street-door of the court (the αὐλείαθύρα), their relative positions change. John is admitted into the court yard, being known to the high-priest, while Peter remains without. See Comm. on Matthew [p. 491, Am. Ed.]. “John’s acquaintance with the high-priest gains in probability if we may suppose, from John 19:27, that he owned a house in Jerusalem. That the Jews had portresses instead of porters is shown also by Acts 12:13.” Tholuck. Joseph. Antiq. VII. 2, 1. John 18:16. And brought in Peter.—That is, John did this, not she who kept the door (as Grotius and others have it). John 18:17. Art thou also? [Μὴκαὶσύ, as well as the ἄλλος, John 18:16].—“The καί contains the pre-supposition that John, whom she nevertheless had, for acquaintance’ sake, admitted along with the rest, is a disciple of Jesus.” Meyer. According to Mark, the girl does not say this until she has fixed her eyes upon Peter, according to Luke, not until she has examined him by the light. Hence it appears to result that she now grows doubtful as to whether she should have let him in, or whether she ought not to denounce him. This circumstance would, however, cast doubt on the supposition of Meyer, who holds the question of the maid to have been put in a totally unsuspecting mood. At all events she does not seem to have inferred the discipleship of Peter from the mere fact alone of his connection with John.—(One) of the disciples of this man [ἐκτῶνμαθητῶντοῦἀνθρώπουτούτου.]—Contemptuously [Meyer]. Not compassionately (Chrysostom and others). Meyer conjectures that John went, together with Jesus and those who were about Him, into the interior of the house, i.e. out of the hall into the chamber of examination. This is improbable, though he occupied a position which enabled him to perceive what was going on in the chamber as well as what passed in the hall. I am not [οὐκεἰμί].—On the three different denials of Peter, see Comm. on Matthew, at the history in question, [p. 498, Am. ed.] “It may surprise us that John remains unmolested while Peter’s temptations are repeated: but the reason of this should be sought less in the timorous embarrassment of this latter disciple than in the boldness with which he stepped in amongst the menials.” Tholuck. Nevertheless, an assumed boldness is a characteristic symptom of fear. John 18:18. Now Peter was standing with them [?)ἦν… μετ’ αὐτῶνἐστώς]. The fact of his now standing, now sitting, seems to testify to his inward disquiet, equally with the temerity of his mingling in the crowd of servants and myrmidons and warming himself at their coal-fire. John 18:19. The high priest then. Annas. The examination of Annas, in shrewd calculation, starts from the most general point. The Lord’s disciples or adherents first form the subject of interrogation. Then follows inquiry as to the doctrine by which Jesus gained them. He desires to ascertain what is to be thought of, or, perchance, feared from, the followers of Jesus, hoping, from the answers of the latter, to gain foothold for an accusation. He, however, manifestly uses, as a stand-point, the malevolent assumption that Jesus has founded a secret association by means of secret teachings; this the answer of Jesus demonstrates. The distinction between this examination and the subsequent one by Caiaphas is obvious. At the latter, they sought to prove that He was a public blasphemer against the sanctuary, etc.John 18:20. I have spoken frankly to the world. [ἐγὼ ?—emphatic, some one who—παῤῥησίᾳλελάληκατῷκόσμῳ. Meyer. παῤῥησίᾳ is to be apprehended subjectively: without reserve, plainly—not publicly, openly, which it does not mean. When accompanied, however, by to the world, the quality of publicity is, in an indirect manner, most, strongly expressed. The term: To the world, means, in the first place, the Jewish world, and characterizes it in respect of the two central points of publicity: in the synagogues and in the temple. In a synagogue [ἐνσυναγωγῇ ?—without the article—there being many synagogues] is modified by πάντοτε, at all times; in the temple [ἐντῷἰερῷ, the one temple at Jerusalem]; by the addition, where all the Jews assemble [ὅπουπάντεςοἵἸουδαῖοισυνέρχονται]. Both clauses signify: in complete connection with synagogue and temple; and so the assumption is made that the mountain, field, and lake sermons of Jesus have likewise preserved this connection.—And in secret I spoke nothing [καὶἐνκρυπτῷἐλάλησαοὐδέν]. These words do not conflict with Matthew 10:27, or with the fact that Jesus taught the disciples in confidential conversations. The warnings against the Pharisees in the sermon on the mount, for instance, He Himself publicly repeated in the temple, and, Matthew 10:27, characterized every confidential saying as destined for publicity. This entry is longer than a Bible module can hold. The rest is at https://www.sermonindex.net/commentary/lange/ IV CHRIST ON THE LIGHT OF , OR THE OF THE CURSE OF THE OLD WORLD. CHRIST THE CROSS-BEARER. THE IN THE MIDST OF THE . THE : THE KING OF THE JEWS, A WRITING OF INTO A WRITING OF HONOR. THE BOOTY OF THE , ALSO A OF . THE OF LOVE. THE LAST DRAUGHT. THE WORD OF VICTORY: IT IS ! John 19:17-30(Matthew 27:32-56; Mark 15:20-41; Luke 23:26-49) And they [They therefore, οὖν] took Jesus and led him away. 17And he bearing his [own] cross went forth into a place called the place of a skull [the so called Place of a Skull, εἰςτὸνλεγόμενονΚρανίουΤόπον] which is called in the [omit the] Hebrew Golgotha: 18Where they crucified him, and two others with him, on either side one [and with him two others, one on each side], and Jesus in the midst. 19And Pilate wrote [also, χαί] a title [or, an inscription], and put it on the cross. And the writing was, JESUS OF [THE , ὁΝαζωραῖος THE KING OF THE JEWS. 20This title then read many of the Jews; for the place where Jesus was crucified was nigh to the city: and it was written 21in Hebrew, and Greek, and Latin [in Hebrew, Roman, Greek]. Then [Therefore] said the chief-priest of the Jews to Pilate, Write not, The King of the Jews; but that he said, I am King of the Jews. 22Pilate answered, What I have written I 23have written. 23Then the soldiers, when they had crucified Jesus, took his [upper] garments, and made four parts, to every soldier a part; and also his coat [the inner garment, tunic, τὸνχιτῶνα]: now the coat was without seam [but the tunic was seamless, ἄραφος, woven from the top throughout. 24They said therefore among themselves, Let us not rend it, but cast lots for it, whose it shall be: that the Scripture might be fulfilled, which saith, ‘They parted my raiment [garments] among them, and for my vesture they did cast lots.’ [Psalms 22:18. These things therefore the soldiers did. 25Now there stood by the cross of Jesus his mother, and his mother’s sister [Salome, John’s mother, see the Exeg.], Mary the wife of Cleophas [Clopas, ήτοῦΚλωπᾶ ?], and Mary [the, ῆ ?] Magdalene. 26When Jesus therefore saw [Jesus therefore seeing] his mother, and the disciple standing by, whom he loved, he [omit he] saith unto his mother, Woman, behold thy son! 27Then saith he to the disciple, Behold thy mother! And from that hour that [the, ὁ ?] disciple took her unto his own home.28After this, Jesus knowing that all things were now accomplished [finished, τετέλεσται, as John 19:30], that the Scripture might be fulfilled [accomplished, τελειωθῇ ?] 29saith, I thirst. Now [omit Now] there was set a vessel full of vinegar: and they filled a sponge with vinegar, and put it upon hyssop, and put it to his mouth [so putting a sponge filled with the vinegar upon a stalk of hyssop, they raised it to his mouth]. 30When Jesus therefore had received the vinegar, he said, It is finished: and he bowed his head, and gave up the ghost [yielded up his spirit]. AND [John’s account of the crucifixion is brief and comprehensive, yet with several original details of the deepest import. On his relation to the Synoptists in this section, see the full analysis of Dr. Lange in Doctr. &Ethic, below, No. 1.—P. S.] John 19:17. And bearing His own cross, etc. Αὑτῷ [for Himself] τὸνσταυρόν emphasized. [See Text. Note, “As conquerors bear their own trophies, so Christ bears the symbol of His own victory.”—P. S.] Thus He went forth [ἐξῆλθεν]. Out of the city, Hebrews 13:12. Golgotha. See Comm. on Matthew 27:33. [On the words Golgotha, Cranion, Calvaria, Calvary, Mount (?) Calvary, see my Textual Note 3. The vexed question of locality is fully discussed by Dr. Lange and myself in the Commentary on Matthew, pp. 520, 521, with reference to the principal arguments for and against the traditional site of the crucifixion, i.e., the spot where now stands the Constantinian or, perhaps, post-Constantinian “Church of the Holy Sepulchre,” which lies within the walls of the present city and in the north-western quarter, not far from the Damascus Gate. Robinson is the chief authority in opposition, G. Williams in defense, of the popular tradition. The former has still the best of the argument. The other writers on the subject, Ritter, Raumer, Tobler, Winer, Schubert, Bergren, Arnold, Kraft, Friedlieb, Furrer, Lange, etc., among the Germans, Wilson, Barclay, Finley, Olin, Lewin, Tristram, Stanley, Fergusson, etc., among English and Americans, are divided in opinion or leave the matter doubtful. James Fergusson (art. Jerusalem in Smith’s Bible Dictionary, and also in a special pamphlet On the Site of the Holy Sepulchre, in answer to the Edinb. Rev.) has recently propounded the startling theory that the place of crucifixion was Mount Moriah, on the very spot where now stands the Mosque of Omar, or as the Moslems call it, the Dome of the Rock; and, further, that this building is the identical church of the Holy Sepulchre which Constantine erected over the rocky tomb of Christ. But this theory, besides leaving the disappearance of Constantine’s church and the substitution of the present Church of the Holy Sepulchre unexplained, is set aside by the extreme improbability that the temple area was outside of the city and a place of execution. Lange is disposed to identify Golgotha with the hill Goath, Jeremiah 31:39, which was outside of the city, east of the Sheep Gate. My colleague, Prof. Dr. Hitchcock, informs me that by personal examination in 1870 he came independently to the same conclusion. Perhaps it is best that the real locality of crucifixion should be unknown: it is too holy to be desecrated by idolatrous superstitions and monkish impostures and quarrels such as, from the age of Constantine to this day, have disgraced the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, to the delight of Mohammedan Turks, and to the shame and grief of Christians. The apostles and evangelists barely allude to the places of our Lord’s birth, death, and resurrection: they fixed their eyes of faith and love upon the great facts themselves, and upon the ever-living Christ in heaven. Only this is more or less certain from the Gospels, viz.: that the place of the crucifixion was out of the city (John 19:17; Matthew 28:11; comp. Hebrews 13:12, ἔξωτῆςπύλης); yet near the city (John 19:20); apparently near a thoroughfare and exposed to the gaze of the passing multitude (as may be inferred from Mark 15:29 and John 19:20); probably on a little conical elevation (hence probably the name: ‘Skull,’ or ‘Place of a Skull’), but not on a mountain or hill (as the popular term Mount Calvary would imply); and that it was near the Lord’s sepulchre (John 19:41), which was in a garden and hewn in a rock (Matthew 27:60).—P. S.] John 19:18. But Jesus in the midst. [μέσονδὲτόνἸησοῦν]. This was Pilate’s arrangement, and designed to mock the Jews (see 1 Kings 22:19). Meyer maintains that it was an arrangement of the Jews’, the Jews being the crucifiers. Against this view we have to observe: 1. That the two thieves were not executed as Jewish heretics; 2. that the consummating of the crucifixion, as a Roman punitory act, must have been left to the Romans 3. that it further reads: Pilate wrote also—namely, to complete the mockery of the Jews. [Christ was crucified between the two robbers who represent the two classes of the human family: both guilty before God and justly condemned to death, but the one repenting, and saved by faith in the crucified Redeemer, the other impenitent, and rushing to ruin by unbelief. On the archζology of crucifixion, see the Notes on Matthew, pp. 522 f. Crucifixion was one of the most painful and disgraceful modes of death. It was unusual among the Jews, and applied among the Greeks and Romans (till the fourth century) only to slaves and gross criminals, as rebels and highway-robbers. Cicero calls it the most cruel and abominable punishment (crudelissimum teterrimumque supplicium). The cross consisted of two pieces of wood, generally put together transversely at right angles in the form of a T. The longer beam was planted in the earth, and provided with a projecting bar like a horn in the middle for the body to rest upon, which somewhat relieved the sufferings, and prevented the hands from being torn through. There were, however, various forms of the cross (crux commissa, cr. immissa, cr. decussata). The victim was first undressed, the arms tied with ropes to the cross-beam, the hands fastened with iron nails, the feet tied or nailed to the upright post. In this unnatural and immovable position of the body, he suffered intensely from thirst, hunger, inflammation of the wounds, and deep anguish in consequence of the rushing of the blood towards the head. Death followed slowly from loss of blood, thirst, and hunger, gradual exhaustion, and stiffening of the muscles, veins, and nerves. The loss of blood, however, was small, since the wounds in the hands and feet did not lacerate any large vessels, and were nearly closed by the nails. The sufferers lingered generally twelve hours,—sometimes, according to the strength of their constitution, to the second or third day. The bodies were left hanging on the cross until they decayed or were devoured by ravenous beasts and birds. But the Jews were accustomed to take them down and bury them. Constantine the Great, from motives of humanity, and especially from respect to the cross of Christ as the sign of victory (Hoc signo vinces), abolished crucifixion in the Roman empire, and since that time it has almost disappeared from Europe. What a wonderful change! Through the death of Christ the cross has been transformed from a symbol of shame into a symbol of glory and victory, and one of the richest themes of poetry. Well may we exclaim with Venantius Fortunatus, in his famous Passion-hymn, Pange, lingua: Crux fidelis, inter omnesArbor una nobilis!Nulla talem silva profertFronde, flore, germine:Dulce lignum, dulces clavi,Dulce pondus sustinens.“Faithful cross! above all other, One and only noble Tree! None in foliage, none in blossom, None in fruit thy peers may be: Sweetest wood and sweetest iron, Sweetest weight is hung on thee.”—P. S.] John 19:19. Pilate wrote also [or, Moreover Pilate wrote, ἔγραψεδὲδὲκαὶ ?].—After sentence was pronounced, and as a formulation of the same. On this account, however, it is as little the Pluperfect (Tholuck) as it is a formula manufactured during the crucifixion only. In a word, Pilate first arranged the manner of the execution—between two thieves—and then wrote the superscription. See Comm. on Matthew. Τίτλος[=ἐπιγραφή, from the Latin titulus, inscription], the customary Roman term for such superscriptions (Wetstein). Jesus the Nazarene [Ἰησ. ὁΝαζωραῖοςὁΒασιλευςτῶνἸουδαίων, Jesus Nazarenus Rex Judζorum. All the four Evangelists give the inscription on the cross, but with slight variations, on which see Wordsworth in loc.—P. S.] The manifest double meaning of the superscription was the final expression of the suit. In the sense of the man Pilate, it meant: Jesus, the King of the Jewish fanatics, crucified in the midst of Jews, who should all thus be executed; in the sense of the Jews: Jesus, the seditionary, the King of rebels [and pseudo-prophets]; in the sense of the political judge: Jesus, for whose execution the Jews, with their ambiguous accusation, may answer; in the sense of the divine irony which ruled over the expression: Jesus, the Messiah, by the crucifixion become in very truth the King of the people of God.John 19:20. Was read by many of the Jews.—Whereby they were forced to reflect upon that treason to the Messianic idea, of which the high-priests were guilty. The place was near the city.—On Sunday afternoon the populace are fond of walking out of the city, particularly in the direction of new suburbs. So the Jews on their festivals. Towards Golgotha the beginnings of the new city were forming,—Bezetha. Leben Jesu, 2. p. 1573. In Hebrew, etc.—Here also the Evangelist has in view the triumph of the Divine Spirit over human sin and malice. The inscription, in this threefold form, must symbolize the preaching concerning the Crucified One in the three principal languages of the world: in the language of religion [Hebrew], of culture [Greek], and of the State [Latin—the language of law and government].John 19:21. Then said the high-priests to Pilate.—A proposal to alter the title. They feel the sting of the inscription, and therefore prosecute their calumny. Jesus was to be more definitely characterized as a seditionary in the Roman sense, one whom Pilate himself had sentenced. John 19:22. What I have written, etc. [ὅγέγραφα, γέγραφα. The first perfect denotes the past action, the second that it is complete and unchangeable.—P. S.]. Pilate feels secure again, and once more assumes the air of unshakeable authority and of the firm Roman. His declaration, however, contains at the same time the continuation of the idea that he lays the dark riddle of this crucifixion upon their consciences, that he does not acknowledge Jesus to be guilty in their sense, and that they need reckon upon no forbearance on his part. “Analogous formulζ from Rabbins, see in Lightfoot.” Meyer. “Agreeably to his character ἀκαμπὴςτὴνφύσιν, as Philo calls him, Pilate adheres to his resolution.” Tholuck. John 19:23. Took His upper garments.—“The only earthly leavings of the Redeemer do not fall to the share of His people, but, in accordance with Roman law, to the executors of the death-sentence. By the ἱμάτια may be understood the upper garment, the girdle, the sandals, perhaps the linen shirt; these are divided amongst the Roman guard, consisting of four men (Acts 12:4).” Tholuck. But the tunic, etc. [ἦνδὲὁχιτὼνἅραφος].—According to lsidor. Pelusiota, the like was worn by the lower classes in Galilee. This statement, however, might readily be abstracted from our passage. The Evangelist seems to see in this body-vest a homely work of art, wrought by loving hands. [χιτών], tunica, is an inner garment, worn to the skin like a shirt, mostly without sleeves, fastened round the neck with a clasp, and usually reaching to the knees. Sometimes two were worn for ornament or comfort. It was worn also by the Jewish high-priest and priests (but as an outer tunic, a broidered coat, chethoneth thashpez), and is described by Josephus, Antiq. lII. 7, § 4. The fathers (as also Roman commentators and Bishop Wordsworth) see in the seamless coat of Christ a symbol of the unity of the church.—P. S.] John 19:24. In order that the Scripture might be fulfilled, Psalms 22:19 (18), according to the Septuagint. A typical prophecy. See Comm. on Matthew. The apparent identicalness in the parallelismus membrorum of the Psalmist does not preclude our Evangelist’s right to make the distinction he does—it being a question of the interpretation of an unconsciously prophetic, a typical, speech. These things therefore the soldiers did. As the soldiers knew nothing of those words of the Psalmist, their fulfilment of them is the more strikingly a divine inspiration. The same idea as John 12:16. [John 19:25-27. Peculiar to John. A scene of unique delicacy, tenderness and sublimity. A type of those pure and spiritual relationships (the sacred Wahlverwandtschaften) which have their origin in heaven and are deeper and stronger than those of blood and interest. The cross is the place where the holiest ties are formed, and where they are guarded against the disturbing influences of sin. “Das kreuz ist es, das Herzen zicht und bindet,Wo Tiefverwandtes wunderbar sich findet” A few simple touches reveal a world of mingled emotions of grief and comfort. The mother pierced in her soul by the sword (Luke 2:35), the beloved disciple gazing at the cross, the dying Son and Lord uniting them in the tenderest relation! The first words furnished the keynote to that marvellous Stabat Mater dolorosa of Jaeopτne (1306), which, though disfigured by Mariolatry, describes with overpowering effect the intense sympathy with Mary’s grief, and is the most pathetic, as the Dies Irζ is the most sublime, product of Latin hymnology. It is the text for some of the noblest musical compositions, which will never cease to stir the hearts of men.—P. S.] John 19:25. Now there stood by the cross [εἱστήκεισανδὲπαρὰτῷσταυρῷ, in the Vulgate: Stabat juxta crucem mater ejus, from which the Stabat Mater took its rise, as the Dies irζ from the Vulgate’s rendering of Zep 1:15.—P. S.].—According to the Synoptists (Matthew, Mark), the women mentioned stand afar off. According to Lόcke and Olshausen, they were there previously; according to Meyer, there is a difference which must be settled in John’s favor. But it is manifestly necessary to distinguish two stages in the proceedings attendant upon the crucifixion: the tumult of the crucifixion itself, amidst which no friends could approach, and the subsequent sufferings on the cross. See Comm. on Matthew [p. 529]. We read with Wieseler (Studien u. Kritiken, 1840, p. 648): His mother (Mary) and His mother’s sister (Salome); then Mary—the wife of Clopas—and Mary Magdalene. Leben Jesu; Introduction to this Comm. [p. 4]. So also Lόcke, Ewald [Meyer and Alford]; in old times, the Syrian, Ethiopian and Persian translations, as also the texts of Lachmann, editio minor, Tischendorf, Muralt. [Also Westcott and Hort, who punctuate without a comma after Κλοπᾶ, thus: ἡμήτηραὐτοῦκαὶἡἀδελφὴμητρὸςαὐτοῦ, Μαρίαἡμήτηραὐτοῦκαὶἡἀδελφὴτῆδμητρὸςαὐτοῦ, ΜαρίαἡτοῦΚλ. καίΜαριὰμἡΜαριὰμἡμαγδ .—P. S.]. The opposite side is taken by Luthardt, Ebrard [Hengstenberg, Godet] and others. [Thus we have not three women (Mary, her sister Mary of Clopas, and Mary Magdalene), as is usually assumed, but four, arranged in two pairs: Mary and her sister (viz. Salome), Mary of Clopas and Mary the Magdalene. See the list of the apostles, Matthew 10:2 ff.; Luke 6:16 ff. Consequently John, the son of Salome, was a cousin of Jesus and a nephew of His earthly mother. This double relationship explains the more readily the fact that Jesus intrusted her to John rather than to His half-brothers, who at the time were yet unbelieving. Apocryphal traditions make Salome now a daughter, now a sister, now a former wife, of Joseph.—P. S.] Wieseler’s hypothesis is upheld by the following facts: 1. It is not supposable that two sisters had the same name. [Some conjecture that Mary was only a step-sister. But I know of no example even of step-sisters or step-brothers bearing precisely the same name without an additional one to distinguish, them. Hengstenberg escapes the difficulty by the arbitrary assumption that sister here denotes sister-in-law.—P. S.] 2. In a precisely similar manner John elsewhere paraphrases his own name. [Nor does he introduce his brother James by name.—P. S.] 3. According to Matthew 27:56; Mark 15:40, Salome really was among those women [who stood by the cross; and it is not likely that John should have omitted his own mother, the less so as he introduced himself.—P. S.] The wife of Clopas [ἡτοῦΚλωπᾶ ?].—Clopas=Alpheus, Matthew 10:3. The mother of the so-called brethren of Jesus, i.e. His cousins. [The identity of Κλὡπᾶ (which sounds like an abridgement of Κλεοπ́ατρος) with the Hebrew name Αλφαῖος, δַ ?μְ ?τַּ ?ι (Matthew 10:3), is by no means so certain as Dr. Lange with most commentators (also Meyer) assumes, but quite doubtful on account of the difference, of letters, and the improbability that John should use the Aramaic, and Matthew and Mark the Hellenistic form. Ελωπᾶς sounds rather like an abridgement of Κλεόπατρος and maybe the same with the Κλεόπας, mentioned Luke 14:18. But even in case of the identity of Clopas and Alpheus, it does not follow that James and Joses, the sons of Alpheus and a certain Mary (Matthew 27:56; Mark 15:40; Mark 16:1; Luke 24:10), were cousins of Jesus, unless we identify this Mary with the sister of the mother of Jesus, which Lange does not. Nor is it certain that ἡ means the wife of; it may also mean the daughter of, the Klopas mentioned Luke 24:18 (as Ewald).—P. S.] John 19:26. Woman, behold thy son [Τύναι, ἴδεὁυἱόςσου]—Woman instead of mother. See John 2:4. The word here denotes particularly the character of woman in her helplessness and need of comfort. It must be remembered, however, that Mary deserved the name of “woman” in the ideal sense also. As Christ was the Son of Man, or the Man, so she, though approximately only, not in the perfection of sinlessness, was the ideal woman. [The second Eve, the Woman, whose Seed here bruised the serpent’s head, Genesis 3—P. S.]. Thus the name “woman,” the greeting of the woman who in spirit shares His crucial agony, is likewise a title of dignity. But besides this, Christ has sufficient reason for not exposing Mary to the mockery or persecution of the enemy by saluting her with the name pf “mother.” The explanation recently (for instance in Piper’s Jahrbuch, article “Maria”) enlarged upon with ever-increasing grotesqueness, and which claims that with this saying Christ renounced His mother at the cross, goes, in its gradual development, from Luthardt, who is more precisely the author of it, back to Hofmann. It is expressive of a Monophysite view which takes the bold flight of afterward annulling even the historical fact. People holding this view apparently conceive of the status majestaticus not as the centre of the glorification of the human life, but as a sort of Oriental court raised to heaven. In connection with this view it would be better to represent the Logos in His birth as born not of Mary, but merely through her, in accordance with some of the ancients. That it is the desire of Jesus to give Mary a son in His stead in a special sense, results from the fact that the Alphζides also were her sons. And what sons! Nevertheless, Mary was to have a still richer compensation after the departure of Jesus than could be given by the Alphζides; John was destined to make this compensation. And he indeed stood alone by her in this moment, as her support; thus should he stand by her from this time forth. The thing, the unique adoptive relationship, already existed de facto, being born beneath the cross of Christ; consciousness, a name, and the sanction of Christ must be added to it. According to Tholuck, the ἀδελφοί were as yet unbelieving. In regard to this, see John 7:5 [and my counter-notes, p. 241.—P. S.]. According to others, they were not so well off as John. But had there been question of a mere pecuniary provision for His mother, Christ would not have deferred its settlement until now. Mary needed a son in the sense of the higher soul-life, just as Jesus had Himself been refreshed by a friend. The friend of Jesus was fitted to be the son of Mary. Behold thy mother [Ἴδεἡμήτηρσου]!—We may primarily understand both sayings of Jesus in such a manner as to make them express the same idea: ye shall henceforth cleave together as mother and son. But not in vain are they divided into two sayings. If we apprehend them as consolations, the word: “Behold thy son!” signifies: in him shall be thy support; the word: “thy mother:” thou shalt become a sharer in her maternal blessing. If we apprehend them as admonitions, commands, the case presents a different aspect: the mother is enjoined to live for the son, the son for the mother. The one signification, however, is inseparable from the other. On both sides love and blessing are one in personal relationship. [Alford: “The solemn and affecting commendation of her to John is doubly made,—and thus bound by the strongest injunctions on both. The Romanist idea, that the Lord commended all His disciples as represented by the beloved one, to the patronage of His mother, is simply absurd. The converse is true: He did solemnly commend the care of her, especially indeed to the beloved disciple, but in him to the whole cycle of disciples, among whom we find her, Acts 4:14. No certain conclusion can be drawn from this commendation, as to the ‘brethren of the Lord’ believing on Him or not at this time. The reasons which influenced Him in His selection must ever be far beyond our penetration:—and whatever relations to Him we suppose those brethren to have been, it will remain equally mysterious why He passed them over, who wore so closely connected with His mother. Still the presumption, that they did not then believe on Him, is one of which it is not easy to divest one’s self; and at least may enter as an element into the consideration of the whole subject, beset as it is with uncertainty.” John’s relation to Mary as established beneath the Cross, was that of a sacred friendship and spiritual communion (comp. Matthew 12:47-50), and interfered neither with John’s relation and duty to his natural mother Salome, nor with Mary’s relation to the “brethren” of Jesus, whatever view we may take of them. I have so often discussed this vexed question, especially in this vol. p. 241 and in the Com. on Matthew, pp. 456–460, that it is unnecessary to say more.—P. S.] Took her unto his own home [ἔλαβενὁμαθητὴςαὐτὴνεἰςτὰἴδια],—John gladly apprehended the word of Christ in that meaning also which carried an obligation with it. The expression: from that hour, cannot be weakened. Yet it is neither necessary to infer that John had a house of his own in Jerusalem, nor that he kept house for himself alone. “If he received Mary into his dwelling, into his family circle—consisting of Salome and perchance his brother, εἰςτᾶἴδια would be perfectly correct.” Meyer. [So also Alford. Ewald well observes: “It was for the Apostle in his later years a sweet reward to recall vividly every such minute detail,—and for his readers it is, without his intention, a sign that he alone could have written all this (dass nur er diess alles geschrieben haben kφnne).” Against the misunderstanding of this most touching scene by such men as Scholten and Weisse, see the just remarks of Meyer, p. 630.—P. S.] John 19:28. I thirst [Μετὰτοῦτοεἰδὼςὁ ’Ιησοῦςὅτιἤδηπάντατετέλεσται, ἵνατελειωθῇἡγραφὴ, λέγειΔιψῶ ?].—Different views: 1. Prevailing ancient interpretation: ἵνατελ. is referable to λέγειδιψῶ. Since He knew that all things were accomplished, He said, in order to fulfil the Scripture in that particular also: I thirst (Chrysostom, Theophylact and others). Beza: Vehementissima quidem siti pressus, sed tamen de implendis singulis prophetiis nostraque salute potius quam de ulla siti sollicitus. This manner of fulfilling the Scripture is in accordance neither with the view of the Lord nor the delineation of John (see John 19:24). Then, too, it would have to read thus: As He knew that the Scripture was fulfilled, with the exception of one particular, He said—in order that this one thing also might be fulfilled, etc.,—irrespective of the fact that in John 19:32 ff. additional unfulfilled particulars Nos. 2 and 3 would present themselves. 2. Intensified apprehension of the foregoing explanation: as vinegar was given Him to drink, the drink was demanded as ultima pars passionum, with reference to Psalms 69:22, which passage, as others also suppose, is here had in mind (Theodorus of Heraclea, Gerhard, Marheineke). 3. Christ did not drink for the sake of fulfilling the Scripture, but the Evangelist interprets His drinking as a fulfilment of Scripture; ἵνατελειωθῇἡγραφή is therefore a parenthesis, containing the explanation of the Evangelist (Piscator, Grotius, Lόcke). 4. The final sentence (ἵνα, etc.) is not parenthetic, nor is it to be applied to what follows, but to that which precedes it: in the consciousness that His passion is finished, i.e. finished unto the accomplishment of the Scripture, He now says: “I thirst” (Michaelis, Semler, Knapp, Tholuck, Meyer and others). This interpretation seems to us the correct one. Hitherto Jesus has passed through one temptation and anxiety after another and, absorbed in the hot conflict in which He saw the fulfilment of the divine decree in accordance with the Scripture, has forgotten the burning thirst that has preyed upon Him since His last draught at the Supper. Now, with the presentiment of victory, His thirst makes itself felt, and He, being no legal ascetic, nor despising a service rendered by the hand of sinners, requests and partakes of the last, sorry refreshment. The expression: “that the Scripture might be accomplished,” does not mean: for the bare fulfilling of the Scripture hath He passed through all these things,—but: in the fulfilling of Scripture as the expression of the divine counsel, He found that which was His perfect tranquillization and exaltation in view of all these things, Luke 22:22, Matthew 26:54. According to Hofmann, Jesus demanded a refreshment conducive to the prolongation of life, in order thus to demonstrate the freedom of His departure. This would be drinking for a theologico-apologetic purpose. Tholuck more pertinently remarks that the τελειοῦν of the divine βουλή was but the very (likewise the very) τελειοῦν of the γραφή,—hence τελειοῦν instead of πληροῦν. John 19:29. A vessel therefore was standing there [σκεῦοςἔκειτοὄξους—sour wine, or vinegar and water—μεστόν].—The Evangelist’s οὖν might here mean: Jesus’ glance had fallen upon the vessel containing the beverage and had suggested to Him the prospect of refreshment. From a strict interpretation of the word, however, a higher signification results. Christ’s complaint, His last craving, must not fail of satisfaction. It was necessary, therefore, that provision should have been made before-hand; it was to be expected that satisfaction was nigh at hand. The stupefying draught that was offered Him at the beginning of His suffering (Matthew 27:34; Mark 15:23), Jesus had rejected. See Comm. on Matthew. But the pure, sour soldiers’ wine, vinegar-wine, He now receives to His refreshment. “The most distressing thirst torments the crucified. The soldiers give Him some of the beverage [ὄξος] which they are wont to drink (posca, vinum acidum); saturating a sponge with it, they put the sponge upon a hyssopstalk (which in the East attains a height of from one to one and a half feet. ‘Γσσώπῳ, that is καλάμῳτοῦῦσσώπου, see Matthew 27:48), and thus convey it to His mouth as He hangs upon the slightly elevated cross.” Matthew 27:48 is a parallel passage. The touch in Luke 23:36 really seems indicative of a third, derisive presentation of vinegar-wine on the part of the soldiers, situate between the first and the last. See Meyer on the passage, and Comm. on Luke 23:26 [p. 373. Am. Ed.]. John 19:30. It is finished.—Τετέλεσται. The expression of the consciousness, John 19:28. Bengel: Hoc verbum in corde Jesu erat John 19:28, nunc ore profertur. It is possible that He required the reviving refreshment to aid Him in pronouncing the last words. The sublime word, finished, refers to His work, as commanded Him according to the counsel of God (delineated in the Scripture). And yielded up the (or His) spirit [καὶκλίναςτὴνκεφαλὴνπαρέδωκεντὸπνεῦμα].—Expressive of a free dying. The characteristic word for this exode is itself preserved by the Evangelist Luke: Father, into Thy hands. Comp. John 10:18. Gerhard and the older Lutheran exegetes declared that the death of Jesus was not a suffering, but a deed. Tholuck: “This can be said only in the ethical sense,—in which sense it can be predicated of all His suffering—not in the physical sense (comp. Thomasius, Christol. Dogmatics, II., p. 225 with 218); in itself it is merely the expression of self-surrender, trusting in God, as Psalms 31:6, whence the expression is derived.” But of a certainty, also the expression of a thoroughly unique, free dying which was at once suffering and deed in the ethico-physical sense. See John 10:18. [“The παραδιδόναι was strictly a voluntary and determinate act—no coming on of death, which had no power over Him.” (Alford.) On the physical cause of Christ’s death, comp. the remarks in Comm. on Matthew, p. 523, and the treatise of William Stroud, M. D., on the Physical Cause of Christ’s Death and its Relation to the Principles and Practice of Christianity. Second ed. with Appendix by Sir James Y. Simpson, London, 1871 (504 pp.). Dr. Stroud endeavors to demonstrate that the immediate cause of the Saviour’s death must be traced neither to the ordinary effects of crucifixion, nor the wound inflicted by the soldier’s spear, nor an unusual degree of weakness, nor the interposition of supernatural influence, but to the vicarious agony of His mind culminating in the exclamation, “My God, My God,” etc., and producing rupture of the heart, which is intimated by a discharge of blood and water from His side, when it was afterwards pierced with a spear. “It was the death of a pure and perfect human being sustaining and discharging the penalty due to human depravity, and thereby acquiring an equitable claim to see the travail of His soul and to be satisfied, by becoming the author of eternal salvation to all that obey Him.” See more of this below on John 19:34, p. 597.—P. S.] AND ETHICAL1. In the history of the crucifixion of Jesus, as subsequently in that of His burial, John gives special prominence to the considerations of the fulfilment of Biblical prophecies and types. In correspondence with Scripture, Pilate was constrained to make the superscription: The King of the Jews; in accordance with Scripture, the division of the clothing took place, accompanied by the casting of lots for the body-vest; in further accordance, Jesus, at the approach of His death, felt that all things were accomplished, to the fulfilling of the Scripture; and thus the manner of His taking down from the cross must itself have reference to two passages of Scripture. But not for the sake of the fulfilment of the Scripture did all these things happen, but because in the providence of God they must happen, they were preceded by the presages and fore-glimpses of Scripture. The reference to Scripture, however, is designed to be expressive of two things: the objective veracity of God, who, in the ordering of the crucial sufferings, is consistent with Himself, and the unconditional trust of Christ and His people, that above all human arbitrariness and malice in the crucifixion, the providence and faithfulness of God were ruling. Many items in the history of the crucifixion, the Evangelist assumes to be already familiar,—especially the history of Simon of Cyrene, the presentation of the intoxicating myrrh-wine, the mockings of the Crucified One, the conduct of the thieves, the darkening of the land, the earthquake, the rending of the vail in the temple, the testimony of the Gentile captain, Matthew’s indication of extraordinary occurrences in the spirit-world, the agitation of the people, as recorded by Luke, as also the majority of the seven last words. With pleasure, however, he dwells—first upon the trait of Christ’s bravely and resolutely taking His cross on His own shoulders (αὑτῷ), upon the contest which Pilate and the Jews continued over the Crucified One, upon the significant superscription, and similar features. But for him there lay special preciousness in the recollection that Jesus, in His last hour, instituted filial relations between him, His friend, and His mother. 2. The word: The King of the Jews, was a fulfilment of the entire Old Testament—hence there are no particular citations here. According to the original accusation of the Jews, it was designed to denote His mortal offence. It then, in accordance with Pilate’s meaning, denoted the occasion of His death, being intended as a mockery of, and sarcasm upon, the Jews. In the sense of the Scripture, however, it denotes His divinely appointed destiny of death, and in the sense of the Spirit, the eternal gloriousness and fruit of His death. Jesus of Nazareth, the King of the Jews: the word of the cross, glorified by the Spirit into a word about the cross. Pilate did not suspect that his writing, like his saying, Ecce Homo, did, under the providence of God, take significance, when he wrote, in the three most important languages of the world, this sermon over the cross. 3. The references to the fulfilments of Scripture in Christ’s suffering are nought but celestial lights shining into the darkness of the crucial passion. All is spiritualized, or transillumined by the Spirit, in order to be by the Spirit glorified, as God’s counsel, foreknowledge, ordinance, disposition, and judgment upon the blindness of the world,—glorified, I say, unto salvation. 4. If Mary is meant to be a symbol of the Church, then Christ, with His institution of this adoption, hath made His bosom-friends the veriest sons of the Church, and the Church their mother. Hence a form of the Church which is at extreme variance with the Johannean mind, cannot be the true one. Mary may, however, far rather be called a symbol of the Theocracy, which has been finally comprehended in her heart. In that sense the institution would mean: the Theocracy, i.e. the theocratic side of the Church, is always to have a spiritual son,—children of the Spirit; the children of the Spirit are always to have a motherly authority over them in the ecclesiastical communion. 5. As Peter, who recognized in Christ the Renewer of the old Theocracy, the King of the Divine Kingdom, was pre-eminently entrusted with the foundation and care of the Church of Christ, so to John, who in Christ saw pre-eminently the manifestation of the personal God, the portrait of eternal love, was confided the foundation and care of a holy family of the friends of God as the innermost vital focus within the Church. 6. The thirst of Jesus, His last suffering. A sign (1) that He has passed through all His sufferings and may now receive the draught of refreshment; (2) that He departs from earth and from those who have crucified Him, not proudly and coldly, but humbly, warmly and lovingly; (3) that He would be no pattern in self-chosen torments and penances; (4) that He still speaks in the consciousness of His divine spiritual power, as if it were at once a begging and a commanding; (5) that He is making preparation for the end. 7. It is finished. See the Homiletical Hints. Hebrews 10:14. The word as (1) a prophetic word (all scripture fulfilled); (2) a high-priestly word (the expiatory sacrifice completed); (3) a kingly word (the kingdom of heaven founded); (4) a unitous word (the work of redemption accomplished as the founding of the new creation, the world of the eternal Spirit). 8. The share of John in the account of the seven last words of Jesus. 9. The three languages on the cross, the three ground-tongues of theology. AND See the Synoptists.—The grand fulfilments of the divine counsel in the Passion of Christ, attested by the most significant fulfilments of Scripture (John 19:31-37 must be considered in this connection).—Christ’s suffering in its fundamental features: 1. As an act of suffering: the bearing of His cross and going forth (without the gate, Hebrews 13:13; out of the old communion) unto Calvary; 2. as an experience of suffering—with the thieves, in the midst of the thieves; 3. as a glorification of suffering: Jesus of Nazareth, the King of the Jews (the King of sufferers, of the people of God, of kings), in all the languages of the world.—The superscription of Pilate: 1. As the word of Pilate: Continuation of his mockery of the Jews;—the Jews a robber-folk, whose Head is already crucified. 2. As a word of the Spirit, unconsciously to the writer: The Messiah, the King of the people of God. Or, 1. As an assumed title of guilt, the property of malefactors in the old world; 2. as a personal title of honor, the property of the King of righteousness in the new world. Or as the explanation and glorification [Erklδrung und Verklδrung) of the cross of Christ.—This superscription read many of the Jews, for the place was nigh unto the city: 1. The word concerning Christ is still read by many legal men; 2. for the place where He is testified of is nigh to the city. [The evangelical Church by the side of the Church of legality].—How the priests would fain alter the writing concerning Christ.—The demand of the priests and the declaration of Pilate.—Pilate and the soldiers are compelled to work together for the fulfilment of the Scripture.—Soldiers, also, are under the providence of God, even in slaying, and dividing spoil. Contrast of Christ’s adversaries and His friends at His crucifixion.—How they must glorify Him together; those unconsciously, these in grateful love.—Founding of the spiritual house of the mother and son beneath the cross.—The rich legacy of the poor Jesus. The blissful presentiment of the dying Jesus that His day’s work is accomplished in accordance with the Scripture (or in accordance with the counsel of God): 1. Expressed in the evening draught which the great Laborer taketh as He quitteth work; 2. expressed in His evening song before He goeth to sleep: It is finished. It is finished: 1. It, not this and that: all that lays the foundation of the new, eternal world of God. 2. It is, not it is being (Hebrews 10:14). 3. Finished. As a spiritual act, as a vital conflict, as a mortal suffering, as a triumph of Christ and the salvation of God—conducted to the goal τέλος).—The word, It is finished: 1. As the Evangel of Christ; 2. as the confession of the Church; 3. as the jubilation of the believing heart; 4. as an excitation to every work of faith; 5. as a prophecy of the Last Day. Starke: Christians must make many a painful pilgrimage out of the city, out of the land,—nay, even to the gallows and the stake, for the sake of their faith—but courage! press onward! ye have a noble Predecessor.—Take comfort, thou pious man, if thou art accounted godless; Jesus was numbered with the transgressors that thou mightest be declared the child of God and righteous, Isaiah 53:12.—The vain lust of titles must be renounced in following the crucified Jesus. Though the world should crucify our honor and our good name; though she should nail above our head the superscription: this is a fool, a dreamer, an odd fellow, a heretic, etc., we must be satisfied with being called the children of God and having our names written in heaven.—Christians, read the Holy Scriptures diligently; there ye find your King, and His nature, will, and benefits. John 5:39,—Zeisius: The science of divers kinds of tongues, especially of the Hebrew and Greek, is to be recognized as a particular benefit of God, and is exceedingly useful for the investigation of Holy Scripture, that having been written in these two languages, 1 Corinthians 12:10.—Pilate may have diligently framed the superscription in ambiguity, knowing Jesus to be innocent. Underlying this fact, however, was a special providence of God, who took care that His Son should have the right superscription, since He suffered the death of the cross as the Messiah or anointed King of Israel.—Behold God’s rule over the hearts of men; in this His sway over them He hath employed even His own enemies for the furtherance of His glory: yea, His foes must sometimes promote the glory of His children with the very things wherewith they have striven to dishonor them, Psalms 110:2.—If the writing of an earthly judge cannot be altered, how much less shall that be erased which God Himself has written in a Testament and Word.—Cramer: Christ is poor in the beginning, middle, and end of His life, that through His poverty He might make us rich.—Zeisius: The nearer Christ, the nearer the cross, and the heavier our afflictions.—Osiander: Fervent love to God and the Lord Jesus regardeth no danger.—With this speech on the cross, the Lord Jesus (1) intended to show how He beareth on His heart a care even for our bodily circumstances, and considereth such care a part of His mediatorial office; He therewith (2) designed to confirm the fifth commandment and to set all children a good example, as to how they should care for their poor and forsaken parents; He hath therewith (3) shown that it is not contrary to the sense of the fifth commandment if we extend its limits somewhat farther than the letter of it seemeth to require; He hath (4) designed to hallow the natural love existing between friends and relatives; He hath (5) sanctioned guardianships; He hath (6) approved of testaments; He hath (7) taught thereby how every one ought to strive to make this painful life more endurable to his neighbor by rendering him loving aid; He hath (8), particularly in the person of John, enjoined it upon the hearts of all the teachers of His Church to have a care for poor and destitute persons; He hath (9) shown how we should seek to accomplish through others the good that we ourselves are unable to perform; He hath (10) assured all whom He recognizeth as His mother and His brethren that He will not forsake or neglect them either.—Christ’s eyes, amid the turmoil, are fixed upon believers, Psalms 33:18.—No man deriveth harm, but rather profit, from entering into the fellowship of Christ’s shame and suffering.—Hedinger: God provideth physically and spiritually for them that belong to Him.—Cramer: A Christian should settle well his household affairs before he dieth.—Canstein: It is love’s way to interest itself for those it leaves destitute, and to endeavor to bring about by means of others such things as it cannot do itself.—Lampe: It is right that those who are preparing themselves for death, should not forget to care for their families.—Happy is he that espouseth the cause of the widows and orphans and doeth them good; he doeth God’s will and shall inherit the blessing, Psalms 41:1 ff.; Exodus 22:22 ff.—Hear, dear Christian! that Jesus hath thirsted, and let it cause thee to guard the more vigilantly against all excess in drinking.—Hall: Christian mine, if thou too art tried with hunger and thirst in this world, comfort thyself with the thought that thy Saviour did also complain of the same on the cross. Ah, what a refreshment will this be to thee!—Τετέλεσται; In this one word everything appertaining to the purchase of our salvation is expressed and concluded. By this we see that the Master with the tongue of the learned, Isaiah 50:4, is before us,—He who can bring all things into one word, and yet it is plena enuntiatio, a complete declaration, a word above all words, a regular aphorism (as they call a concise saying, briefly and wittily expressed), short and yet intelligible: a true apophthegm (a momentous and pregnant saying). Upon hearing this declaration, it is finished, we are constrained to ask: what is finished? This question is easily answered if we do but consider the Person who made the declaration. It is accomplished—all that Christ was bound to do and to accomplish—and thus this word refers us to the whole course of His life. In consideration of the preceding 28th ver., the word τετέλεσται may be complemented after this fashion: herewith is the Scripture, in that which it hath prophesied concerning Me, fulfilled, Luke 18:31; Luke 22:37. If we take into account the passages Hebrews 5:9; Hebrews 10:7, it may also be thus paraphrased: Herewith is the counsel and will of God concerning our salvation accomplished, namely, as regards the purchase of it; and in consideration of the declaration of Christ, Matthew 5:17, τετέλεσται means as much as: Now is the law fulfilled.—He now, as it were, nodded unto Death, bidding him come on; yea, He asserted by this bowing of His head, that He would become obedient to His Father unto death, Philippians 2:8.—Cramer: Hath Christ finished it?—then we need not achieve it.—Zeisius: Christ’s consummatum, it is finished, hath been a blessed thing for us.—Osiander: Christ’s death is our life; in dying we enter into true life, Hebrews 2:14. Gerlach: The most horrible of all torments, the most burning thirst,—a circumstance expressly predicted of the suffering Messiah, Psalms 22:15; comp. Psalms 69:21.—Lisco: Pilate indignantly refuses the request of the Jews that Jesus should be characterized in the inscription as a deceiver.—The faithful love of those who clave to Jesus shunneth not that pain of deepest sympathy which is occasioned by the spectacle of His sufferings, Luke 2:35. Braune: Conscious of his injustice and of the innocence of Jesus, angry with those who had driven him to commit that injustice, he says: what I have written, I have written; this is the formula of deciding magistrates:—With this decree the matter rests.—It was written in Roman—Latin—, the judicial tongue; in Hebrew, the popular tongue; in Greek, the tongue in general use.—Duties, those, even, that are apparently of the least account, must be fulfilled up to the very last breath. The Christian should die like a general, upon his feet, fighting, giving orders, 1 Timothy 5:8.—Thus the gap that death makes, is best filled. For love is strong as death (Son 8:6).—Think you, it would have been stronger, greater, worthier of His love, to repress the need He felt of quenching His burning thirst? Here we see how free His heart is from pride and rancor, passions by which many another apparently grows great and strong.—Whoso bindeth his soul and his soul’s life to Christ’s life, ways, walks, sufferings, can say, when faint in death: it is finished! What soul hath been converted unto God from its sins and is reconciled to Him, can exclaim: it is finished!—This word, it is finished! was uttered by Jesus, not at the close of His activity, in the high-priestly prayer, in Gethsemane, but at the end of His suffering.—But was He already risen for our justification? He had not yet sent the Comforter into the hearts of His people. But in the holy instant of death, by the light of eternity, His eye beheld the finished work of redemption, in its readiness for prosecution and spiritualization. Thus through suffering and tribulation is attained the triumph of the kingdom of God. Gossner: What a procession! What a cross-walk! What a march! God’s Only-begotten One, under the burden of the cross, the tree whereon the curse lay, marcheth to the bitterest death. Thus do men send Him back to His Father from whom He proceeded—laden with cross, curse and shame; as a malefactor. What a journey, followed by consequences most rich in blessing!—And He bare His cross! Why that was our cross, and He appropriated it to Himself, as though it were His own; He embraced it with such love and patience as it had been His life, and it brought Him death—but to us life.—Neither can the coat of Christ’s righteousness be divided and cut into pieces—every soul must have it whole.—His nakedness on the cross is an evidence that He shunned no kind of humiliation for us.—The pagan Roman soldiers did not divide the coat of Christ, but Christians have made many rents and divisions over Christ’s coat, that they might establish their own opinions and their own righteousness.—Those under the cross composed the family of the Saviour; it had melted away to so few; that was His little Church whereunto He reckoneth Himself, wherewith He abideth, with which His Spirit resteth on earth. —His bowed head lifteth up the head of each one of us. He Himself inclined His head with the consciousness that He should soon raise it again, as He had foretold. Heubner: God, whose hand guided the finger of Pilate, meant this superscription to be a challenge to all unbelieving Jews and all mankind to acknowledge this Jesus of Nazareth as their King. All languages, all tongues, are to resound with His praise and confess that He is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.—Pilate’s firm determination is indicative of God’s irrevocable decree. If all the world remonstrate against Christ’s royal dignity—God hath willed it, and there is an end of it, Psalms 2—Christ hung naked on the cross. This is very significant; He hung thus (1) In order to show how thoroughly the world had stripped Him of all that He owned, and covered Him with shame; (2) in order to present Himself to all as the Innocent and Pure One who can support the glances of all.—Mary, the mother of Jesus, stood beneath the cross: Now was fulfilled the prophecy of Simeon, Luke 2:35.—What feelings must have pierced her maternal heart! This was the origin of the ancient church-hymn: Stabat mater dolorosa.—Of such strength is womanly nature capable. An example for all Christian men and women, admonishing them not to be ashamed of Jesus, often to go beneath His cross, that they may become worthy of those women who went before them. Rambach, in loc., p. 1063, compares Mary and Eve. Eve stood in Paradise beside the pleasant tree of the knowledge of good and evil. Mary stands beside the ignominious tree of the cross. The former looked upon the forbidden tree, and its fruit conduced to her death; the latter looks upon the promised tree of life, and is refreshed by its fruit in her mortal anguish.—Our death too, when God calleth, must be voluntary. It is the Christian’s art to die willingly. [Craven: From Ambrose: John 19:26. Mary, as became the Mother of our Lord, stood before the cross, when the Apostles fled, and with pitiful eyes beheld the wounds of her Son.——From Augustine: John 19:17. Great spectacle! to the profane a laughing-stock, to the pious a mystery. Profaneness sees a King bearing a cross instead of a sceptre; piety sees a King bearing a cross, thereon to nail Himself, and afterwards to nail it on the foreheads of kings. John 19:18. Even the cross was a judgment seat; for the Judge being the middle, one thief, who believed, was pardoned, the other, who mocked, was damned: a sign of what He would once do to the quick and dead,—place the one on His right hand, the other on His left. John 19:20. These three were the languages most known there: the Hebrew, on account of being used in the worship of the Jews; the Greek in consequence of the spread of Greek philosophy; the Latin, from the Roman empire being established everywhere. John 19:22. O ineffable working of Divine power, even in the hearts of ignorant men! Did not some hidden voice sound from within, and, if we may say so, with clamorous silence,—saying to Pilate in the prophetic words of the Psalm, Alter not the inscription of the title?John 19:26-27. This truly is that hour of the which Jesus, when about to change the water into wine, said, Mother [Woman], what have I to do with thee? Mine hour is not yet come. Then, about to act divinely, He repelled the Mother of His humanity, of His infirmity, as if He knew her not: now, suffering humanly, He commands with humane affection, her of whom he was made Man. Here is a moral lesson. The good Teacher shows us by His example that pious sons should take care of their parents. The cross of the Sufferer is the chair of the Master. John 19:28. He who appeared Man, suffered all these things; He who was God, ordered them.——From Chrysostom: John 19:17. He carried the badge of victory on His shoulders, as conquerors do. John 19:18. And two others with Him; What they did in wickedness was a gain to the truth. To convert a thief on the cross, and bring him into paradise, was no less a miracle than the rending of the rocks. John 19:23-24. Behold the sureness of prophecy. The prophet foretold not only what they would part, but what they would not. They parted the raiment, but cast lots for the vesture. John 19:25. Observe how the weaker sex is the stronger; standing by the cross when the disciples fly. John 19:26. Though there were other women by, He makes no mention of any of them, but only of His Mother, to show us that we should specially honor our mothers. John 19:26-30. Observe how imperturbable He is during His crucifixion, talking to the disciple of His Mother, fulfilling prophecies, giving good hope to the thief; whereas, before His crucifixion, He seemed in fear. The weakness of His nature was shown there, the exceeding greatness of His power here. He teaches us too, herein, not to turn back, because we may feel disturbed at the difficulties before us; for when we are once actually under the trial, all will be light and easy for us. [From Burkitt: John 19:17. Why could not Christ bear His own cross, who was able to bear the sins of the whole world, when hanging upon the cross? 1. Probably, the Jews’ malice provided Him a cross of an extraordinary greatness; 2. He was much debilitated and weakened, with His long watching and sweating the night before; 3. The sharp edges of the cross grating His late whipped and galled shoulders, might occasion the fresh bleeding of His wounds; 4. Thereby He gave the world a demonstration of the truth of His humanity, that He was in all things like unto us. John 19:18. It had been a sufficient disparagement to our blessed Redeemer to be sorted with the best of men, but to be numbered with the scum of mankind is such an indignity as confounds our thoughts. John 19:19. Pilate, who before was His judge, and pronounced Him innocent, is now His herald to proclaim His glory.—Pilate did that for Christ which none of His own disciples durst do. No thanks to him for this; because the highest services performed to Christ undesignedly shall neither be accepted nor rewarded by God. John 19:22. Surely the constancy of Pilate at this time must be attributed to special divine Providence. How wonderful was it that he who before was as inconstant as a reed, should now be fixed as a pillar of brass! [His so called constancy was nothing but the natural outworking of the fear excited by the threat to accuse him before Cζsar; his persistence in retaining the inscription would not only gall the Jews but be an effectual bar to any charge of his having neglected the Imperial interests. The true homiletical inferences from this passage are that 1. Those who attempt to accomplish their ends by improper influences, brought to bear on rulers, generally over-reach themselves; 2. God over-rules the arts of the wicked for their own punishment and His glory. E. R. C.] John 19:26. He calls her woman, and not mother: not that He was ashamed of, or unwilling to own her as His mother, but either 1. Fearing that calling her by that name should augment and increase her grief and trouble, or, 2. To intimate His change of state and condition, that, being ready to die and return to His Father in heaven, He was above all earthly relations. John 19:26-27. The Lord never removes one comfort, and takes away the means of subsistence from His people, but He raises up another in the room of it.—Such as are beloved of Christ, shall be peculiarly honored by Him, and be employed in the highest services for Him. John 19:30. It is finished: 1. My Father’s eternal counsel concerning Me is accomplished; 2. The scriptures are now fulfilled; 3. My sufferings are now ended; 4. The fury and malice of My enemies are now ended; 5. The work of man’s redemption and salvation is perfected.—He bowed His head, and gave up the ghost: Christ was a volunteer in dying. [From M. Henry: John 19:17. Whatever cross He calls us out to bear at any time, we must remember that He bore the cross first, and by bearing it for us, bears it off from us in a great measure, for thus He hath made His yoke easy, and His burden light.John 19:18. Observe what death Christ died; 1. The death of the cross, a bloody, painful, shameful, cruel death; 2. He was nailed to the cross, as a sacrifice bound to the altar; 3. This entry is longer than a Bible module can hold. The rest is at https://www.sermonindex.net/commentary/lange/ V CHRIST THE OF DEATH, THE VERY LIFE IN DEATH. THE CORPSE OF JESUS, TO HIS FOES AN OBSCURE SIGN OF , TO HIS FRIENDS A –SIGN (A SIGN THAT HE IS THE TRUE –LAMB AND THAT IS WITHIN HIM), TO HIS A , SIGN. THE BURIAL IN THE GARDEN AND IN THE NEW . THE OF THE VICTORY OF CHRIST John 19:31-42.(Matthew 27:57-66; Mark 15:42-47; Luke 23:50-56.) 31    The Jews therefore, because it was the preparation [it was preparation day, παρασκευή comp John 19:42], that the bodies should [might] not remain upon the cross on the sabbath day [sabbath], (for that sabbath day was a high day [for great was the day of that sabbath, ἦνγὰρμεγάληήήμέραἐκείουτοῦσαββάτου],) besought Pilate that their legs might be broken, and that they might be taken away. 32Then came the soldiers [The soldiers therefore came], and brake [broke] the legs of the first, and of the other which [who] was crucified with him. 33But when they came to Jesus, and saw that he was dead already, they brake [broke] not his legs: But one of the soldiers with a spear pierced his side, and forthwith came there [omit there, or34 read: there came] out blood and water. 35    And he that saw it bare record [he that hath seen it, hath born witness, ὁἑωρακὼςμεμαρτύρηκεν], and his record [witness] is true [ἀληθινή]; and he knoweth that he saith [what is] true [ὰληθῆ ?], that ye [also, καὶὑμεῖς] might believe [may believe, πιστεύσητε]. 36For these things were done [came to pass], that the Scripture should [might] be fulfilled, ‘A bone of him shall not be broken.’ [Exodus 12:46; Numbers 9:12; Psalms 34:20. 37And again another Scripture saith, ‘They shall look on him whom they pierced.’ [Zechariah 12:10. 38    And after this [these things, ταῦτα] Joseph of Arimathea, being a disciple of Jesus, but secretly [though in secret, or, concealing it, κεκπυμμένοςδέ] for fear of the Jews, besought Pilate that he might take away the body of Jesus: and Pilate gave him leave. He came therefore, and took the body of Jesus [took away his body]. 39And there came also Nicodemus, (which [who] at the first came to Jesus [to him, πρὸςαὺτόν] by night) and brought [bringing, φέρων] a mixture of myrrh and aloes, about an hundred pound weight [a hundred pounds, λίτρας weight]. 40Then took they [They took therefore] the body of Jesus, and wound it in linen clothes with the spices, as the manner of the Jews is [as is the custom of the Jews] to bury. 41Now in the place where he was crucified there was a garden; and in the garden a new sepulchre [tomb], wherein was never man yet laid [in which no one had ever been laid]. 42There laid they Jesus therefore because of the Jews’ preparation day [day]; for the sepulchre [tomb] was nigh at hand. AND Joh_19:31. The Jews therefore.—The οὖν again characteristically indicates the next concern which troubled the Jews as Jews. The observance of the ceremonial law was their first thought after the work of the crucifixion was accomplished. Rupert: Magnifici honoratores Dei, cum in conscientia mala reposuissent sanguinem Justi.That the bodies might not remain on the cross [ἵυαμὴμείνηἐπὶτοῦσταυροῦτάσώματα].—On the Roman custom see the Commentary on Matthew. The Jewish ordinance in regard to the bodies of persons hanged on a tree Deuteronomy 21:22 f.; Josephus, De Bello Jud., IV. 5, 2—Because it was the Preparation day [ἐπεὶπαρασκενὴἧν]—I. e. because preparations must be made for keeping holy the Sabbath, on which day no bodies were allowed to remain hanging on the tree.—For great was the (feast-) day of that (Paschal) Sabbath [ἧνγὰρμεγάληἡἡμέραἐκείνουτοῦσαββάτου]—(Comp. John 7:37). Elucidating parenthesis. I. e. it was not a simple Sabbath of the current year, but its sanctity was increased by its falling in the Paschal season. This was true of the day in any case, whether, in accordance with the view of the disharmonists, the first paschal day was still to arrive and coincided with the Sabbath (Meyer and others), or whether, according to the view represented by us, the Sabbath in question fell upon the second Jewish passover-day. Meyer thinks that as the second passover-day it could have been called μεγάλη only because, in accordance with Leviticus 23:10, the feast of sheaves (Wieseler, Synopse, p. 344, p. 385) was celebrated on this day (16 Nisan). This reference, however, he asserts, John must have indicated. On the other hand, the first feast-day possessed, according to Leviticus 23:7-15, the character of a Sabbath also. But the case is simpler in its bearings. The Sabbath, being the principal holiday of the Jews, derived additional importance from every other festivity coincident with it, hence also from the second solemn passover-day. If, on the other hand, the passover-day had been the decisive motive, John would not have mentioned the Sabbath as a motive. That their legs might be broken, etc. [ἵνακατεαγῶσιναὐτῶντὰσκέληκαὶαρθῶσιν]—Said in a perfectly general way, whence it follows that they were hastening the removal and as yet possessed no certain knowledge as to the death of Jesus. The shattering of the legs with clubs, crucifragium [σκελοκοπία], was a customary form of accelerating death—a procedure as harsh and brutal as crucifixion itself (Lactantius, Instit. IV. 26; Lipsius, Ad Plaut. II. 4, 63). It also appears as an independent punishment, Sueton., Aug. 67 [Seneca, De Ira, iii. 32, etc.]. “The supervention of a coup de grace, by which (not by the crucifragium in itself) death was occasioned, cannot be proved, least of all from John 19:34 (contrary to Michaelis, Hug and others).” Thus Meyer [p. 633], while Tholuck, following Quintil., Declam. vi. 9, and other instances in Hug, declares in favor of the customariness of the death-stab in cases where death seemed to have already taken place, but where the soldier wished thoroughly to assure himself of the fact. In accordance with the presentation of our Gospel, the breaking of the legs must be conceived of as a deadly process. It is omitted, as the more difficult task, in cases where the stab of a lance is sufficient to complete the signs of death by means of an easy death-stroke. John 19:32. The soldiers therefore came [ἧλθονοὖνοἱστρατιῶται, κ. τ. λ.].—Two soldiers simultaneously break the legs of the thief on the right and the thief on the left. With Jesus they consider this superfluous—therefore, to make assurance doubly sure, they pierce Him with the lance. His death is thus doubly and trebly warranted: once by the cognition of the soldiers, then by the mortal spear-stroke, finally by His burial on the part of His friends. From John 20:27 Tholuck infers besides (less securely) that the wound was the breadth of a man’s hand.—The soldier stood with his right hand opposite the left side of the Crucified One. John 19:34. Blood and water [καὶἐξῆλθενεὐθὺςαἷμακαὶὔδωρ]—We must preface the explanations of this fact by the statement that the Evangelist looks upon it as one of great moment. See John 19:37. [“The strong asseverations of the Evangelist, show that he regarded the circumstance as very extraordinary, perhaps as supernatural. He writes of it like a person who hardly expected to be believed. Yet the effect he describes is exactly (?) that which we now know was most likely to result from preceding causes. Thus his accuracy of observation and the honesty and veracity of his testimony are most remarkably corroborated.” Webster and Wilkinson.—P. S.] Different explanations: 1. The modern explanation of the fact as a NATURAL phenomenon. This interpretation is made the more difficult by the circumstance that the blood does not flow out of dead bodies, neither does it separate into blood and water [or placenta and serum] (as it does in a vessel after venesection). First assumption: Death was produced by the spear-thrust, and the forth-flowing of the blood (or of a reddish lymph) must demonstrate Christ’s corporeality, in contradiction of the Docetζ (Hammond, Kuinoel, Olshausen). This view is combated by the presupposition of the disciple and the ancient Church that Jesus was dead, and by the separation of blood and water. [See also against this view, Stroud, on the Physical Cause of Christ s Death, p. 141 f. It is certain, however, that, had Christ not been already dead, the infliction of such a wound in the heart by the spear of a Roman soldier must have produced death; and this fact in any case sets aside the Gnostic docetic view according to which Christ suffered and died only in appearance, as well as the older rationalistic view that Christ recovered from the effects of the crucifixion, and that His resurrection was merely an awakening from a trance.—P. S.] Second assumption: The flow of blood and water from the body of a dead person is physiologically explained: a. By the presence of extravasations, or bloodblisters, in which the globules and serum have become separated one from the other (Ebrard). b. By the serum in the pericardium (Gruner, De Jes. Christi morte vera non simulata, etc., Halle, 1805), to which yet other serous reservoirs on the side of the heart may be added (see Tholuck, p. 439). [The Gruners, two physicians, father and son, held that the blood issued from the heart, the water from the pericardium, i. e. the membrane which envelops the heart. So also Kipping (De cruce et cruciariis, pp. 187–195), Bishop Watson (Apology for the Bible), Barnes, Webster and Wilkinson, and Owen. To this theory it is objected that the quantity of liquid or reddish lymphatic humor in the pericardium is usually so minute as to be scarcely perceptible. “Haller states that a small quantity of water, not exceeding a few drachms, has frequently been found in the pericardium of executed persons; but, except under very peculiar and morbid, circumstances, the eminent anatomists John and Charles Bell deny the occurrence altogether.… Naturally the pericardium exhibits scarcely anything which deserves the name of liquid; but after some forms of violent death, more especially when attended with obstructed circulation, it may contain a little serum, either pure or mixed with blood.…For the statement of the Gruners, that after death accompanied with anxiety the pericardium is full of water, there is no evidence.” Stroud, 1 c. p. 138, 139.—P. S.] 2. The apprehension of the fact as a miracle (Origen and the ancient Church generally, Meyer, Luthardt). [Bengel: quod sanguis exiit, mirum; quod etiam aqua, magis mirum; quod utrumque statim, uno tempore, et tamen distincte, maxime mirum. So also Alford who, with Meyer, stops with the recognition of a miracle, without indulging in allegorizing.—P. S.] 3. Between the assumption of a miracle unassisted by any physiological instrumentality, and that of a natural phenomenon, there lies the assumption that we have to do with a primitive phenomenon, i. e. a unique appearance based upon the unique situation. Meyer [p. 635] says: “A natural explanation in a higher sense is assigned for this phenomenon by Lange (Leben Jesu, II. p. 1614 f.); he assumes it to be explicable by the process of transformation which, as he affirms, the body of Christ was undergoing. A spinose conception in which there is not only an absence of clearness” (a fact equally true of the transformation itself, but which, nevertheless, does not render that transformation spinose), “but also imperiling the essential and necessary point of the actual death of Jesus” (i. e., hazarding its being swallowed up in the resurrection), “and moreover representing the details of the assumed transformation as occurring in very sensuous and materialistic wise” (say, rather, in bodily and corporeal fashion). Meyer thinks he has warrant for citing against this view, 1 Corinthians 15:51-53. The following propositions may assist to an apprehension of the case: (1) After the death of Jesus, either corruption or transformation must have been preparing. (2) Corruption He did not see, hence it is transformation that was in course of preparation. (3) If this was preparing, the fact must of necessity make itself known by a sign transpiring in His wounded body,—a sign such as we are unacquainted with in other corpses. (4) That this sign is a unicum, concerning which we can find nothing in the history of extravasations, pericardia, etc. is a circumstance perfectly in order. 4. The mythical interpretation of Baur and others may be passed over (comp. Meyer [p. 637]). 5. [Symbolical and allegorical] interpretations of the phenomenon [which may be connected with either of the preceding ones, especially with No. 2.—P. S.]. With reference to 1 John 5:6 : Symbol of the two sacraments of grace: Apollinaris, Ambrose (De Sacram. cp. I. aqua ut emundaret, sanguis ut redimeret, Augustine, the R. Catholic exegetes, Luther). Otherwise Baur: The death of Jesus symbolized as the source of spiritual life. Similarly Luthardt. The Evangelist has indeed said nothing of this meaning himself. He has laid stress upon the unexpectedness of the phenomenon, however. [Other symbolical explanations: (1) Calvin: reference of the blood to expiation; of the water to regeneration. He, however, denies the miraculous character of the fact. Isaac Watts: “My Saviour s pierced side Poured out a double flood: By water we are purified And pardoned by the blood.” Toplady: “Let the water and the blood From Thy riven side which flowed, Be of sin the double cure, Cleanse me from its guilt and power.” (2) According to E. Swedenborg, blood signifies the proceeding Divine truth for the spiritual man, and water the Divine truth for the natural man. (Apocalypse Explained, No. 329).—P. S.] [Additional Remarks on the effusion of blood and water. This is properly a question for physicians to settle, but they differ as much as theologians. Comp. besides the dissertation of the Gruners already quoted, Thomas Bartholinus, De Latere Christi aperto, etc.; Hieronymus Bardus, Epist. ad Thom. Bartholinum, and the Reply of Bartholinus; William Stroud, M. D., The Physical Cause of the Death of Christ, 2d ed. with an Appendix by Sir James Y. Simpson, M. D. (London, 1871). The last work is probably the best and contains more curious information than any other. Dr. Stroud, as already mentioned on p. 587, traces the physical cause of the death of Christ to a sudden rupture of the heart, produced by intense agony of mind endured in behalf of sinners. He uses this verse as an argument for his theory. Rupture of the heart is followed by an effusion of blood (sometimes as much as a quart or much more) into the pericardium, where it quickly separates into its solid and liquid constituents, technically called crassamentum and serum, but in ordinary language blood and water. The soldier, in approaching the body of Christ and inflicting the wound for the purpose either to ascertain or to insure His death, would purposely aim at the heart, and, transfixing the lower part of the left side, would open the pericardium obliquely from below; that capsule being distended with crassamentum and serum, and consequently pressed against the side, its contents would, by force of gravity, be instantly and completely discharged through the wound, in a full stream, of clear watery liquid intermixed with clotted blood, exactly corresponding to the sacred narrative: “and immediately there came forth blood and water.” The difficulties of commentators have arisen mostly from the gratuitous assumption that the blood which flowed from the wound of Christ was liquid, and the water pure, and, to account for so marvellous an occurrence, recourse was had either to miraculous agency, or to other equally untenable suppositions. “Blood and water” simply denote the crassamentum and serum of blood which has separated into its constituents. See pp. 399 ff., and the instances adduced in illustration. Ewald (Geschichte Christus’, 3d ed. 1867, p. 584f.), without entering into the matter, likewise assumes that a sudden rupture of the heart (ein plφtzlicher Herzbruch) was the immediate physical cause of the death of Christ, and explains from it the loud terrible cry of anguish on the cross.—P. S.] John 19:35. And he that hath seen it hath borne witness [καὶὁἑωρακὼςμεμαρτύρηκεν].—According to Weisse, Schweizer, and others, a later reporter, distinguishing himself from John, here betrays himself. But it is the Evangelist who himself makes a distinction between an oral, evangelistic testimony, continued during many years, and his written iteration of the same at a later period—conscious that said testimony contains an extraordinary statement. He then distinguishes the substance of his testimony as essential truth (ἁληθινή), because the thing must so occur, as a fulfilment of the divine word, and the form of his testimony, ἀληθῆ. His testimony is, however, continually, and so in this instance also, designed to produce faith in Christ (see John 20:31), namely, the confirmation and consummation of his readers belief in the higher divine nature of Christ. Not, as some have supposed, that ye may believe in the death of Jesus as an event which really transpired (Beza and others); or in the true corporeality of Christ, in opposition to the Docetζ (Hammond, Paulus, and others). Meyer thinks that Gnosticism might have fastened even sooner upon the mysterious, enigmatical outflow (?). John 19:36. A bone of Him shall not be broken [Ὀστοῦνοὐσυντριβήσεταιαὐτοῦ ?].—The first fulfilment of Scripture was of a negative sort: it was the fulfilment of the typical provision that not a bone of the paschal lamb should be broken, Exodus 12:46; Numbers 9:12. As the suffering Christ was the antitype of the paschal lamb (1 Corinthians 5:7), it was necessary that this typical trait also should be fulfilled in Him. John 19:37. Whom they pierced [Ὄψονταιδἰςο͂νἐξεκέντησαν].—(Zechariah 12:10.) The εἰςὅν by attraction in the place of εἰςἐκεῖνονδν. Second, positive fulfilment of a Scriptural passage by the spear-thrust. The passage freely cited after the original text which the Septuagint has weakened (“Whom they have insulted”). Properly: They shall look up to Me ΰֵ ?μַ ?ι Whom they have pierced. The reading ΰֵ ?μַ ?ιε found in many manuscripts is probably an exegetical correction, as it seemed obvious that Jehovah cannot be pierced; hence likewise the figurative conception of the Septuagint. The passage in question is one of the exceedingly pregnant Messianic passages of the second half of Zechariah. The Messiah here appears in the light of the self-manifesting Jehovah Himself. The piercers are the Jews, standing, however, as representatives of the whole human race. “They have pierced Me,” i. e. they have consummated their enmity against My highest manifestation and approach. “They shall look upon Me whom they have pierced,” i. e. their eyes shall be opened in regard to their conduct and they shall perceive whom they have outraged,—they shall regret it, or it shall become a matter of regret to them. This prophecy has had a general fulfilment in the turning of the believing world to the Crucified One. It shall, however, be fulfilled in the most universal sense, in regard to the whole world, at the Last Judgment (Revelation 1:7). The beginning of this consternation of the world upon discovering that it has thrust at God, whilst it supposed itself to be piercing a criminal, in dealing the Messiah the heart-thrust, is significantly seen by the Evangelist in the fact that we have been considering. The spear-thrust was the final heart-blow and death-blow which, after many blows and stabs, the whole race of man inflicted upon the Messiah; it was therefore the concentrated symbol of His crucifixion in general. Hence, there immediately appeared a sign, such as is not met with in other corpses;—a sign in which the higher nature of Christ, the incipient manifestation of His glory, announced itself. That which is related concerning murdered persons, namely, that their wounds bleed afresh when the murderers approach their bodies, did actually happen here in the highest sense. That the phenomenon made one of the many signs that perplexed and dismayed the people at Golgotha, may be securely assumed from the prominent mention which this occurrence and its effect receive at the hands of John. This involves the complete overthrow of the natural [rationalistic] explanation. An ordinary appearance could not thus have operated. See John 8:28; John 12:32; Acts 2. John 19:38. Joseph of Arimathea.—Comp. Matthew 27:57. After the Jews had induced Pilate to have the bodies taken down, Joseph presented his request and arrived at precisely the right moment to take the corpse which had been accorded him, down from the cross. So Meyer rightly, in opposition to De Wette who finds a difficulty here, as likewise in opposition to Lόcke, who apprehends the ἄρῃ and ἧρεν as relating to the carrying away of the body which the soldiers, had taken down. With this interpretation Meyer asserts that he has settled a difference which would otherwise exist, making this statement “unauthorized” by the side of Luk 23:53; Mark 15:46. About a hundred pounds weight [ὡςλίτραςέκατόν].—See Comm. on Matthew, at the parallel passage. [A proof of the greatness of their love produced by the death of Christ.—P. S.] John 19:40. As is the manner of the Jews [καθὼςἔθοςἐστὶτοῖςἸουδαίοιςἐνταφιάζειν].—Contrast: The custom of the Egyptians, who took out the brain and bowels, or at least steeped the body for seventy days in natron. See Winer, “Embalming,” Meyer. The Egyptian anointing was designed for the preservation of the bodies as mummies: the Jewish anointing formed a consecrated and beautiful transition of the corpse from death to corruption. On the fact that there is nothing surprising in the superabundance of one hundred pounds of aloes and myrrh for the anointing, see Tholuck. John 19:41. In the place [ἐντῷτόπῳ ?], i.e. in the district. According to Matthew 27:60, it was Joseph’s garden. Comp. Luke 23:53; John 19:30; Mark 11:2. John 19:42. On account of the preparation-day [διὰτὴνπαρασκευὴντῶνἸουδ.].—An intimation that if haste had not been urgent, they would have given Jesus more honorable burial in another place. Thus the very haste of the preparation-day was providential. Jesus should be interred in a new grave, in a manner the most extraordinary. The circumstance must serve at the same time to manifest Joseph s great alacrity in sacrifice. AND ETHICAL1. The Johannean relation. John omits the trait of their rolling a great stone in front of the door of the sepulchre; he does not mention that Mary Magdalene and Mary the mother of James seated themselves over against the sepulchre;that the Jews, with the co-operation of Pilate, sealed the sepulchre on the Sabbath and set a military watch upon it (Matt.); that Pilate, before presenting Joseph with the body of Jesus, inquired of the centurion whether Jesus were dead (Mark); the approach of a greater number of acquaintances to view the death of Jesus; the inspection of the sepulchre by the women, and their Friday evening preparation of ointments for the formal interment of Jesus which they appointed to take place after the Sabbath (Luke). On the other hand, he brings out the fact that Jesus was glorified in His death as the true Paschal Lamb, glorified no less by another mysterious fulfilment of Scripture, and specially glorified by the open emergence of His hitherto secret disciples, Joseph of Arimathea and Nicodemus, and the princely sepulture which they, in pious rivalry of love, have prepared for the Lord. 2. Great was the day of that Sabbath. A stroke of that Jewish hypocrisy which strains out gnats and swallows camels, similar to John 18:28. In removing the bodies, however, in accordance with the instinct of an evil conscience, they are peculiarly interested in having the body of Jesus conveyed “out of sight and mind” of the people; in causing, along with the odious Man, the very name of Him, as also their work upon Him, to be hurried, with all possible expedition, beneath the sod. But here, as in the composition of the superscription, contingencies occur, which cross, modify and enfeeble their plots. They can not hinder Jesus, upon His descent from the cross, from being significantly distinguished from the thieves and honorably sepulchred. 3. Paschal Lamb. Ye shall break not a bone of Him. On the uncertainty of typology in regard to the meaning of this provision, see Tholuck, p. 430. We assume that the provision originally belonged to the expression of the most hurried preparation of the Paschal Lamb, as at the instant of flight or departure. Then at the same time it was expressive of the utterly undivided participation of the house-congregation or domestic church in fellowship and sacrament (Tholuck, p. 430). This type was fulfilled in Christ. The hurried removal from the cross—an expression of the Sufferer s speedy transportation to glory—prevented the breaking of the legs, and henceforth the whole undivided Christ should be the spiritual and vital food of the Church of His salvation. 4. John 19:34; John 19:37. Blood and water. See the Exeg. Notes, and Leben Jesu, p. 1611. 5. The association of Joseph of Arimathea and Nicodemus: a sign showing how the complete development of malice and unrighteousness impels all nobler natures into the camp of Christ; and how the darkest hours of the kingdom of God are invariably the natal hour of a new discipleship. That glory of the Jewish world, to which they cleaved, being turned to shame in their eyes, they are become free from their earthly goods and know not how better to spend them than in the service of the love of Christ. One offers the abundance of his precious spices, which constituted an important household treasure among the Orientals; the other offers his garden and his family-vault to be the resting-place of an excommunicate, outlawed, crucified Man: both sacrifice their safety, position, authority, their old associations and, greatest sacrifice of all, their old Jewish hierarchal pride, and their old Messianic hope and entire view of the world. To them all things are involved in midnight gloom; but the innocence and righteousness of Christ they see, shining as the broad day in the midst of this darkness.—Moral loathing and abhorrence of the mask of hypocritical godlessness are able to burst the strongest bonds of deference to human opinions, and to generate the highest sacrificial courage. 6. The pious observance op the Sabbath on the part of Jesus’ friends, on the occasion of their burial of Him, a testimony against those who, with the charge of Sabbath-breaking, introduced His persecution unto death. 7. The repose of Jesus at once a slumber of death and a mystery of transformation unto resurrection. AND See the Doct. Notes and the Synoptists. From the moment of Jesus’ death, all things take a turn.—The glorification of Jesus begins with the glorification of His holy corpse: 1. Through special divine protection (break no bone); 2. through special heavenly signs (blood and water); 3. through special human reverence and care (the interment).—God watcheth over His own in death as in life.—How, in the funeral of the Just One, the victory of His life-battle is reflected.—The desire of the Jews to remove the, bodies from Golgotha: The expression of (1) a legal, slavish zeal; (2) an hypocritical sanctimoniousness; (3) a bad conscience.—The last heart-thrust which Christ received from the world: 1. A collective expression of all that the world has done to Him; 2. a pursuing of His life into the jaws of death (a violation of His corpse); 3. and yet a “mercy-stroke,” inasmuch as it is to secure His corpse from mutilation; 4. above all, a testimony of God to His death and unique nature (His transition to a new life).—The two great fulfilments connected with the one spear-thrust of an unsuspecting soldier: 1. The fulfilment of all the types of the Law in one feature (John 19:36). 2. The fulfilment of all the words of the Prophets in one single prophetic word.—Jesus, the unbroken Paschal Lamb for believing Israel, is at the same time the pierced Divine Image for unbelieving Israel.—The revealing of the Crucified One, the repentance of the world.—Nothing but the sight of Christ’s breaking heart could melt the heart of sin.—The death of Jesus the life of the world: 1. His falling asleep, her awaking (as His eyes close, hers open); 2. the end of His heart-grief, the commencement of hers; 3. His corpse, her quickening.—The stately sepulture of the Lord, or the princely disciples of the Crucified One.—The thank-offerings which immediately glorify the redemptive and expiatory offering of Christ.—The operation of the cross of Christ: 1. Comprehension of the cross; 2. courage for the cross; 8. sacrifices to the cross; 4. witnesses to the cross.—The great calm after the great storm: 1. The quiet Sufferer. 2. The quiet grave. 3. The quiet Sabbath. 4. The quiet mystery of life (or becoming). 5. The quiet presentiment. 6. The quiet turning of all things. Starke: Osiander: See how hypocrites act! fierce sticklers are they for external matters and ordinances, but in the weightiest matters, those that concern the soul and salvation, they care not for the fear of God. Matthew 23:23.—Quesnel: In vain doth the sinner seek to bury the remembrance of his sins—sin shall ever rise up against him, Jeremiah 17:1; Genesis 42:21.—O how many think only how to conceal their sins, but not to be penitent for them! Job 31:33-34. A foot-soldier, and not a horseman, as painters are wont to depict the man who pierced Jesus.—Canstein: Let us look in faith, love and gratitude unto Him whom we ourselves have pierced, in order that we may rejoice when He is seen of us with our bodily eyes, Hebrews 12:2.—Quesnel: Jesus will come to judgment in the same flesh in which He was crucified, that He may confound His foes, John 5:27; Acts 17:31.—Zeisius: Thus God is able to raise up quickly unto His people, though they be, with Christ, forsaken of all men, persons who interest themselves for them with the greatest care and diligence, such as they would never have thought on. In sorest need, therefore, take heart, Jeremiah 38:7 ff.—The love of an upright, friend remains constant even in death.——Hedinger: Excellent compensation of weakness through strength! Abraham’s faith was great, the thief’s was great, the centurion’s was great. The first saw Christ in the life, the second in dying, the last in death, amid many miracles. But there is nothing to surpass Joseph and Nicodemus—they believe on Him in the grave. O power of God in the faithful! O strength in the weak, we praise thee! 2 Corinthians 12:9.—Godly, wise and brave undertakings of a true Christian, though apparently never so bold and perilous, are furthered to a good end through the help of the Almighty.—Like to like,—one lover of Jesus joineth company with another. Mark this, O man, and do thou likewise, Sir 13:20-21.—Bibl. Tub.: O that yet other fearful Nicodemuses might at the cross and in the sepulchre of Jesus crucify and bury their fear of man; then would amendment be of rapid growth in all ranks, Psalms 27:1; 1 Peter 3:13.—Though not many rich and noble are called, there still are some who willingly lay out their possessions in the service of Jesus, Luke 7:5.—Zeisius: O how well do the rich do when they spend their riches on Christ, His glory and His needy members! that they do good and grow rich in good works, 1 Timothy 6:18-19.—Osiander: We must not carelessly cast away the bodies of Christians; such a course is contrary to love and the hope of resurrection; but we must honorably commit them to the earth.—Gardens are pictures of death and resurrection—graves do suit them well: it is therefore not unfit that church-yards should have trees planted along their sides, and that they should be made to resemble gardens—Osiander: Christ hath hallowed our graves and made sleeping-rooms of them, in which the bodies rest until they are awakened again unto everlasting life, Romans 6:4. Lisco: John 19:38. Publicly and boldly doth the hitherto timorous love to Jesus now come forward; it leapeth over all considerations and scruples and toucheth the dead body of Jesus without any dread of becoming defiled after the law, through contact with a corpse, and that the corpse of a reputed malefactor. Braune: The fear of man is overcome; so openly they act. Delay is at an end; they make haste. They are not ashamed before all witnesses to make common cause with the Galilean women.—Joseph had had it hewn out for himself and Jesus entereth it before him; thus Jesus consecrateth the graves of His people, to the end that they may dread them the less. Gossner: The stab was given by one soldier only, and here it says: They have pierced Him. How is this? the soldier was but the instrument; they, sinners, all of them, from the first to the last, did guide the soldier’s hand and the crime is imputed to them.—Love now breaketh through all fear of man, and where there was most to fear, fear vanisheth, so that he dreadlessly espouseth the cause of Him who was killed on the cross and rejected by the whole world,—espouseth it, say, at a time when, to all appearance, there was nothing to hope for from Him whom, living, he was either ashamed or afraid openly to confess.—This of itself was a beautiful fruit of the death of Jesus, that His secret disciples were made open ones, the weak, strong.—The love of the Slain Lamb driveth out all fear.—Christ liked and deserved a new grave, because He was a Dead Man without an equal; for all the children of Adam die from guilt, He guiltlessly. [Craven: From Augustine: John 19:34. That blood was shed for the remission of sins, that water tempers the cup of salvation.—O death, by which the dead are quickened; what can be purer than that blood, what more salutary than that wound! John 19:38. In performing this last office to our Lord, he showed a bold indifference to the Jews, though he had avoided our Lord’s company when alive, for fear of incurring their hatred.—Chrysostom: John 19:31. The Jews who strained at [out] a gnat and swallowed a camel, after their audacious wickedness, reason scrupulously about the day. John 19:34. When thou approachest the awful cup, approach as if thou wert about to drink out of Christ’s side.—From Theophylact: John 19:34. To please the Jews, they pierce Christ, thus insulting even His lifeless body. But the insult issues in a miracle; for a miracle it is that blood should flow from a dead body. John 19:40. Even now, in a certain sense, Christ is put to death by the avaricious, in the person of the poor man suffering famine. Be therefore a Joseph, and cover Christ’s nakedness.—From Herbert: John 19:34. Pierced His side;If ye have anything to send or write, (I have no bag, but here is room) Unto My Father’s hand and sight (Believe Me) it shall safely come. That shall mind, what you impart; Look, you may put it very near My heart. Or if hereafter any of My friends Will use me in this kind, the door Shall still be open; what he sends I will present, and somewhat more, Not to his hurt. Sighs will convey Anything to Me. Hark, despair, away. [From Burkitt: John 19:31. Hence note the cursed hypocrisy of these Jews; they look upon themselves as strictly bound to observe an outward ceremony, but their consciences never scruple to violate the most weighty precepts of the moral law. John 19:34. No cruelty was omitted towards Christ, either dead or alive, which might testify the great desert of our sin, nor was there any needful evidence wanting, which might make clear the truth of His death. John 19:38-42. Grace doth not always make a public and open show where it is; but as there is much secret treasure unseen in the bowels of the earth, so is there much grace in the hearts of some saints, which the world takes little notice of.—We read of none of the apostles at Christ’s funeral; fear had put them to flight; but Joseph and Nicodemus appeared boldly: If God strengthen the weak, and leave the strong to the prevalency of their own fears, the weak shall be as David, and the strong as tow. John 19:41. A sepulchre in a garden, to expiate Adam’s sin committed in a garden. John 19:42. Of what use our Lord’s burial is to us His followers: It shows us the amazing depth of His humiliation, from what and to what His love brought Him, even from the bosom of His Father to the bosom of the grave, It may also comfort us against the fears of death; the grave could not long keep Christ, it shall not always keep us; it was a loathsome prison before, it is a perfumed bed now; he whose head is in heaven, need not fear to put his feet into the grave. Awake and sing, thou that dwellest in the dust, for the enmity of the grave is slain by Christ. [From M. Henry: John 19:31. Passover Sabbaths are high days; sacrament-days, supper-days, communion-days, are high days, and there ought to be more than ordinary preparation for them, that these may be high days indeed to us, as the days of heaven.—The pretended sanctity of hypocrites is abominable; they made no conscience of bringing an innocent and excellent person to the cross, and yet scrupled letting a dead body hang upon the cross. John 19:32. One of these thieves was a penitent, and had received from Christ an assurance that he should shortly be with Him in paradise, and yet died in the same pain and misery that the other thief did: the extremity of dying agonies is no obstruction to the living comforts that wait for holy souls on the other side of death. John 19:33. Whatever devices are in men’s hearts, the counsel of the Lord shall stand:—It was fully designed to break His legs, but, God’s counsel being otherwise, see how it was prevented. John 19:34. Through this window, opened in Christ’s side, you may look into His heart, and see love flaming there, love strong as death; see our own names written there.—When Christ, the second Adam, was fallen into a deep sleep upon the cross, then was His side opened, and out of it was His Church taken, which He espoused to Himself.—The blood and water that flowed out of it were significant: 1. Of the two great benefits which all believers partake of through Christ—justification and sanctification; blood for remission, water, for regeneration; blood for atonement, water for purification; 2. Of the two great ordinances of Baptism and the Lord’s Supper.—Now was the rock smitten (1 Corinthians 10:4), now was the fountain opened (Zechariah 13:1), now were the wells of salvation digged, Isaiah 12:3. Here is the river, the streams whereof make glad the city of God.John 19:36. Christ our passover is sacrificed for us, 1 Corinthians 5:7. He is the Lamb of God (John 1:29), and, as the true Passover, His bones were kept unbroken.John 19:38-42. Come and see a burial that conquered the grave, and buried it; a burial that beautified the grave, and softened it for all believers! John 19:38. It was Joseph’s honor that he was a disciple of Christ, his weakness that he was so secretly.—Some who in lesser trials have been timorous, yet in greater have been very courageous.—The impotent malice of those that can but censure, and revile, and clamor, is sometimes more formidable even to wise and good men than one would think.—When God has work to do, He can find out such as are proper to do it, and spirit them for it. John 19:39-40. Since God designed honor for His body, they would put honor upon it. John 19:40; John 19:42. In conformity to this example, we ought to have regard to the dead bodies of Christians. The resurrection of the saints will be in virtue of Christ’s resurrection, and therefore in burying them we should have an eye to Christ’s burial. John 19:41. In a garden Christ began His passion, and from a garden He would rise, and begin His exaltation.—He was buried in a new sepulchre: this was so ordered, 1. For honor; He that was born from a virgin-womb, must rise from a virgin-tomb; 2. For the confirming of the truth of His resurrection. John 19:42. What is to be done on the evening before the Sabbath, should be so contrived that it may neither intrench upon Sabbath-time, nor indispose us for Sabbath-work. [From Scott: John 19:31-42. Comparing the sacred oracles with the events which occur in the Church and in the world, our faith will be increased even by the most discouraging transaction.—From A Plain Commentary (Oxford): “If the Jews that stood by said truly of Him at Lazarus’ grave, Behold how He loved him! when He shed a few tears out of His eyes; much more truly may we say, Behold how He loved us! seeing Him shed both blood and water in great plenty out of His heart.” (Bishop Andrewes.) John 19:38-42. Surely, this entire history has consecrated expensive funerals, and given a solemn sanction to care bestowed on burial-places, forever! [From Krummacher: John 19:34. In the water and the blood are represented the most essential blessings of salvation: the water has a remote reference to baptism, but it chiefly symbolizes the moral purifying power of the word of Christ; the blood points out the ransom paid for our guilt, as well as the atoning sacrifice.—The blood flowed separately from the water; justification must not be mingled with, much less exchanged for, personal amendment. John 19:38-39. Marvellous things occur in the vicinity of the cross. Two individuals, belonging to the first ranks in society, who, when Jesus still walked abroad in the majesty of His supernatural acts did not venture to make known their favorable impression respecting Him,—now, that the termination of His course seems to have stamped Him as a pitiable enthusiast, honor Him as their King before all the people. The germ of faith which, all at once, manifests itself so gloriously and so fully developed, had long lain in their hearts; from out of the thunder-cloud that brooded over Calvary, abundant grace has proceeded.—Christ crucified must be the object of our affections; therefore detach Him from the accursed tree, and deposit Him in your hearts, as your only consolation in life and death. John 19:42. There they laid Jesus; The curse is removed from a sinful world, Deuteronomy 21:22-23.—Christ by His burial has consecrated and shed light upon the darkness of our graves.—From Jacobus: John 19:34-35. Our faith weeps, yet triumphs, as it sees the death-blow fall upon our Substitute, for in this we see our release.] [Wordsworth, on John 19:41 : “Christ changes the valley of the shadow of death into a garden. Christ’s human body was laid in a natural garden. His human soul was in a spiritual garden (Luke 23:43), and by His death and burial He has prepared a garden for the souls and bodies of all who depart hence in the Lord; and He will make them to be like the dew of herbs (Isaiah 26:19), and to rise up and blossom in a glorious spring time. He provides Paradise, or a garden, for the departed soul (Luke 23:43), and He makes the grave itself to be a garden of Paradise; from which at the great Day the bodies of the faithful, which have been sown in hope, will rise in vernal beauty, and be united for ever in unfading glory to their souls.”—P. S.] Footnotes: John 19:35—[Cod. Sin. reads ἀληθής, but against most authorities.—P. S.] John 19:38.—ὉἸωσὴφἀπὸἈριμαθαίας. In support of the article A.J. Δ.; for the omission of the second ὁ before ἀπό A. B. D., etc. [Tischend., Alf., Westcott and Hort omit both articles, and read simply, with ΰ and B: ἸωσὴφἀπὸἈριμαθαίας—P. S.] John 19:38.—[I read with ΰ.3a B. L. X., etc., Lachm., Treg., Alf., Westc. and Hort, ἦλθενοὗνκαὶἧρεντὸσῶμααὐτοῦ. The text. rec. (with Vulg.) has τοῦἸησοῦ instead of αὐτοῦ. Tischendorf ed. 8, follows the reading of ΰ.*: ἧλθονοὖνκαὶή̔ροναἠτόν: “they came therefore and took him away.”—P. S.] John 19:41.—[A. D. Orig., Tischend., Tregelles and Alf., read ἐτέθη), was laid; but ΰ. B. Cyr., Westcott read: ἦντεθειμένος, had been laid; comp. Luke 23:53—P. S.] [The aor. with augm. syllab. from κατάγνυμι, see Buttmann, II. 97, Winer, p. 68 (§ 12).—P. S.] [So also Wordsworth (after the fathers). As Eve was taken from the side of sleeping Adam, so the church and the sacraments of the eucharist (blood) and baptism (water) emanated from the pierced side of the crucified Christ.—P. S.] [There is a Swedenborgian Commentary on the Gospel of John by Rev. J. Clowes, 3d ed. London, 1853. It has only recently come into my hands, but presents very little that might have been worth quoting in this work. It consists almost entirely of extracts from Swedenborg’s writings, bearing or the “spiritual” sense of the spiritual Gospel.—P. S.] SEVENTH SECTION The finished victory of Christ over the world and the kingdom of darkness, and His manifestation in the circle of His disciples. Christ demonstrates His victory by banishing the last remnants of darkness, grief and unbelief from His Church and making it sure of His resurrection John 20I HOW THE RISEN ONE DOTH BY THE GRAVE-SIGNS PREPARE HIS PEOPLE FOR THE SIGNS OF HIS LIFE John 20:1-10(Matthew 28:1-15; Mark 16:1-11; Luke 24:1-12.) 1[And, or, But on] The first day of the week [sabbath week] cometh Mary [the ἡ ?] Magdalene early, when [while] it was yet dark, unto the sepulchre [to the tomb], and seeth the stone taken away from the sepulchre [out of the tomb]. 2Then she runneth, and cometh to Simon Peter, and to the other disciple whom Jesus loved [as a friend, ἐφίλει], and saith unto them, They have taken away the Lord out of the sepulchre [tomb], and we know not where they have laid him. 3Peter therefore went forth [ἐξῆλθεν], and that other disciple, and came to the sepulchre [and were going toward the tomb, καὶἤρχοντοεἰςτὸμνημεῖον]. 4So they ran [And they were running, ἔτρεχονδέ] both together: and the other disciple did outrun [προέδραμε Peter, and came [ἦλθε] first to the sepulchre. 5And he stooping down, and looking in, saw the linen clothes lying; yet went he not in. [And stooping down, 6he seeth (παρακύψαςβλέπει) the linen clothes lying; yet he did not go in]. Then cometh [also] Simon Peter following him, and went into the sepulchre, [tomb] and seeth the linen clothes lie [and beholdeth the linen clothes lying, κ. θεωρεῖτὰὀθόνιακείμενα, comp. John 20:11]. 7And the napkin, that was about his head, not lying with 8the linen clothes, but wrapped together in a place by itself. Then [Then therefore, τότεοὖν] went in also that [the, ὁ ?] other disciple, which [who] came first to the sepulchre [tomb], and he saw, and believed. 9For as yet they knew not [or, For not even yet did they know, οὐδέπωγὰρᾔδεισαν] the Scripture, that he must rise 10again from the dead. Then [So] the disciples went away again unto their own [omit own] home. AND On the various presentations of the resurrection-history see Comm. on Matthew [p. 541, Am. Ed. The literature, p. 542]. In particular also Doedes, De Jesu in vitam redittu, 1841; Tholuck, Glaubwόrdigkeit der evang. Gesch., 5. Abschnitt. Ebrard, p. 575; the author’s Leben Jesu, II. 3, p. 1669. [On the chronology of the events of the Resurrection Meyer says (p. 643 note): “It is impossible to harmonize the differences between John and the Synoptists, and those between the latter, but the grand fact itself and the principal features of the history stand out all the more sure.” So also Alford in loc., who sees in the very failure of harmonistic attempts a strong corroboration of the truth of the evangelical narratives. “It is quite impossible that so astounding an event, coming upon various portions of the body of disciples from various quarters and in various forms, should not have been related, by four independent witnesses, in the scattered and fragmentary way in which we now find it. In the depth beneath this varied surface of narration rests the great central fact of the resurrection itself, unmoved and immovable. As it was this above all other things to which the Apostle bore their testimony, so in their testimony to this we have the most remarkable proof of each having faithfully elaborated into narrative those particular facts which came under his own eye or were repeated to himself by those concerned. Hence the great diversity in this portion of the narrative:—and hence I believe much that is now dark might be explained, were the facts themselves, in their order of occurrence, before us. Till that is the case (and I am willing to believe that it will be one of our delightful employments hereafter, to trace the true harmony of the Holy Gospels, under His teaching of whom they are the record), we must be content to walk by faith, and not by sight. We must also remember in this case, that our Evangelist is selecting his points of narrative with a special purpose,—to show us how the belief of the disciples was brought out and completed after the unbelief of Israel; comp. John 20:30-31.”—P. S.] John 20:1. The first day of the Sabbath-week [τῇδὲμιᾷτῶνσαββάτων].—On the μία [=πρώτη, see Mark 16:9] τῶνσαββάτων [σάββατα=week], see Comm. on Matthew, Matthew 28:1 [p. 544]. [The first day of the week is now properly called, on account, of the Lord’s Resurrection, the Lord’s Day, ἡκυριακὴἡμέρα (Revelation 1:10). It has taken the place of the Jewish Sabbath: the substance remained (weekly day of holy rest), the form changed (from the seventh to the first day of the week) with reference to the great fact of the Resurrection whereby our redemption or the new creation was completed. On that day the Lord appeared to His disciples with His peace-greeting, and on that day He sent His Holy Spirit, and founded the Christian Church. The Christian Sabbath blends the memories of creative and redemptive love, is the connecting link between paradise lost and paradise regained, the continuation of Pentecost, and the preparation and pledge of the eternal Sabbath-feast (σαββατισμός, Hebrews 4:9) in heaven.—P. S.] Cometh Mary the Magdalene.—See Comm. on Matthew, chap. 28. [540 ff.], particularly Matthew 27:61 [534, 537]. [On Magdalene see my notes on John 11:2, pp. 340, 341. Also the beautiful Easter hymn, “Pone luctum, Magdalena!” “Mary! put thy grief away,” or, “Still thy sorrow, Magdalena,” in Daniel’s Thes. hymnol., II. 365, and my Christ in Song, Lond. ed. p. 200 ff.—P.S]. The exclusive mention of the Magdalene finds its explanation not simply in the fact that John received the following report from her lips (Tholuck), but also in the desire of the Evangelist to make her peculiar experiences illustrative, in concrete form, of a chief manifestation of the Risen One; a similar motive induces his detailed description of the experience of Thomas. That she, moreover, did not go alone to the grave, is demonstrated by the οἴδαμεν John 20:2; though, according to Meyer, Brόckner and Ebrard [Alford], this expression sprang from the fellow-feeling of those nearest to Jesus. Tholuck rightly rejects this interpretation of the plural, since she is speaking to disciples who are as yet ignorant of the grand fact which she announces—viz. the absence of the Lord’s body from the sepulchre. Meyer groundlessly makes a counter-poise of the οὐκοἶδα John 20:13. [In John 20:13 Mary Magdalene speaks in her own name]. Early, it being yet dark [πρωΐ, σκοτίαςἔτιοὔσης].—From this touch, compared with the account of Mark, John 16:2, “at the rising of the sun,” it is clearly proved that she, in the impatience of her longing, must have hastened in advance of the other women, Mary the mother of James, and Salome. [So also Luthardt and Ewald]. See Comm. on Mark [p. 156 Am. Ed.] The stone lifted away (moved away) out of the tomb [βλέπειτὸνλίθονἠρμένονἐκτοῦμνημείου—the stone had been fitted into the mouth of the tomb which was hewn in a rocky elevation, see Mark 15:3-4.—P. S.].—The stone now lies sideways by the opening of the tomb, which is conceived of as a perpendicular excavation. See Comm. on Mark [p. 156 Am. Ed.] John 20:2. And cometh to Simon Peter, and to the other disciple.—A characteristic historical trait. So soon as she perceives the opening of the sepulchre, like lightning comes the thought—the body is stolen;—so deep is her conception of the unfathomable iniquity and treachery of the foe. Women usually seek counsel and help from men. We need not (with Bengel) infer from the repetition of the καὶπρός, that the two disciples were not together. Mary was in want not only of the one, but also of the other. Whom Jesus loved [as a friend, ο͂νἐφίλειὁ ’Ιησοῦς].—Whom He honored with His particular friendship. The other disciple: See John 1:35-40; John 18:15; John 20:8. Whom Jesus loved: John 13:23; John 19:26; John 21:7; John 20:20. They have taken away the Lord [ἧραντὸνκύριονἐκτοῦμνημείου].—A fore judgment of fear in the love not yet perfect; an error, starting up and vanishing on the way to truth. John 20:4. So they both were running together [ἔτρεχονδὲοἱδύοὁμοῦ. Mark the change of the aorists and the descriptive imperfects in John 20:3-4; comp. John 4:30. The characteristic details, John 20:4-8, the liveliness, circumstantiality, and inner truth of this narrative betray unmistakably an eye-witness. Such things cannot be invented.—P. S.] A lively picture of their excitement. The going turns to running, the moderate running to a running with all their might, in which John takes the lead of Peter. The characteristicalness of these facts, presented in accordance with the lively recollection of John, is uninventibly striking and significant. We cannot, however, infer that Peter, as the elder, possessed less of general physical strength (Tholuck). Elasticity in running is a quality peculiar to youth. According to Lampe and Luthardt, Peter’s consciousness of guilt helped to make him slower. This assumption, truly, is not vindicated by John 20:6. And yet at that moment, at sight of the empty sepulchre, the pressure on heart and conscience which weighed him down, perchance, at first, might be lifted. John 20:5. Yet he did not go in [οὐμέντοιεἰσῆλθεν].—On the way to the tomb, John’s pace was more winged than that of Peter. On reaching the grave, however, he seems to be fettered first by the fear of a sad discovery, then by awe, and his astonishment at the orderly disposed linen clothes, i.e. the sign of the foreboding of another issue than that conjectured by Mary Magdalene. According to Ammon, his entrance was prevented by a fear of defilement; according to Meyer, by natural dread. The former view is contradicted by his stooping down; the latter by his narrow observation of the signs in the sepulchre. The contemplative disciple stands still, lost in meditation upon the new signs. Now, therefore, Peter steps forward, as the one endowed with more practical decision, and goes before him into the sepulchre. Precisely similar is the trait presented John 21:7, where John is the first to recognize the Lord, Peter the first to hasten to him by swimming. Hence, it would seem, Peter alone is mentioned Luke 24:12. (By Strauss and Baur this trait is explained as originating in tendencies in favor of John.)—Aorist, Imperfect, and Present forms alternate right significantly in this lively narrative.—And he beholdeth, θεωρεῖ, in contradistinction to the βλέπει of John—the three signs in the sepulchre giving proof of a thoroughly tranquil occurrence, in contrast to a tumultuous ravishment: 1. The grave-clothes are not carried away as they naturally would have been if the body had been stolen. 2. The linen-clothes and the napkin, which latter enwrapped the head (see John 11:44; Luke 19:20), are separated and laid away in an orderly manner. 3. The napkin is even lying, wrapped together, in a place by itself. John 20:8. Then went in, therefore, the other disciple also [τότεοὗνεἰσῆλθεκαὶὁἄλλοςμαθητὴςὁἐλθὼνπρῶτοςεἱςτὸμνημεῖον].—The precedence of Peter puts an end to John’s fear, or rather, as we think, to his contemplative standing still. Hitherto he seems to have been disturbed by not seeing the head-cloth from his station on the outside of the sepulchre, because of its being laid in a separate place. And he saw and believed [καὶεἶδεκαὶἐπίστευσεν].—These signs were sufficient to make him believe in the resurrection of Jesus. He believed, differently construed: 1. What Magdalene reported (Augustine, Theophylact, Erasmus, Luther, Bengel and others). 2. The resurrection signs (Chrysostom, Euthymius, Lόcke and others). John 20:9. For not even yet did they understand the scripture [οὐδέπωγὰρᾕδεισαντὴνγραφὴνὅτιδεῖαὐτὸνἐκνεκρῶνἀναστῆναι—comp. Psalms 16:10; Psalms 110; Isaiah 53:8; Isaiah 53:10; Zechariah 6:12-13; Acts 2:24 ff; Acts 8:32-33].—The declarations of Jesus concerning His resurrection could not have become absolutely doubtful to them, except in reference to their literal meaning. A figurative interpretation so readily suggested itself to their little faith, recollecting, as they did, the figurative phraseology in which Jesus was wont to express Himself. Therefore we need not suppose, with Meyer, that His declarations were not so distinct as reported by the Synoptists. The Johannean ones see John 2:21; John 8:28; John 10:18; John 12:24; John 12:32; the farewell-discourses. Their understanding of the Old Testament was not sufficiently advanced to induce them, on the strength of its predictions, to expect a literal resurrection of the Messiah. Yet but these signs, here given, were needed to give John the resurrection faith,and henceforth the meaning of the Scripture might become entirely clear to them. See Luke 24:26 ff., Luke 24:46; Acts 1:3. Tholuck: “Whilst this their πιστεύειν, though a religious one, did nevertheless rest on the sensuous substratum of appearance [ocular evidence], that upon the foundation of Scripture was the higher, for it mediated a consciousness of what the idea of a crucified Messiah demanded.” John 20:10. So the disciples went away again unto their home [ἀπῆλθονοὐνπάλινπρὸςαὐτοὺςοἱμαθηταί].—Anxiously they awaited the further issue; John tranquillized at bottom. It is not stated that Peter also believed already. Probably the special appearance of Jesus, vouchsafed him on that Easter-day (Luke 24:34; comp. John 20:12; 1 Corinthians 15:5), served not only for his personal tranquillization in respect of his fault, but also for the confirmation of his faith. AND ETHICAL1. The diversities, like the intertwinings, of the single features of the resurrection history in the accounts of the four Evangelists, are the highest proof of the truth and the infinitely powerful effect of the fact: a portrait of the highest stirring of soul and spirit in humanity. A real Easter-motet. Thus do different combatants report concerning the culmination of the battle and the form of the victory. 2. The resurrection of Christ had not only to burst through the bonds of death, the closed gate of the sepulchre, and the seal and the guard of the world, but also the grief and little faith of the disciples. (See my book: Der Herr ist wahrhaftig auferstanden: die Losung der christlichen Gemeinde unserer Zeit. Zόrich, 1852.) The belief in the resurrection, far from issuing, as a mythicized idea, from an enthusiastic hope of the disciples, as Strauss has affirmed, was obliged to force its passage through something entirely opposite, namely the disconsolateness of the disciples. Of a truth, supreme salvation is nigh unto extreme hopelessness, if the latter do not precipitately rush upon the sword but wait patiently for the Lord,—then, however, salvation comes to hopelessness always from above, as a gift of deliverance; hopelessness may prophesy of salvation, may prepare a worthy place for salvation, but it cannot be the parent of it. In face of the resurrection, however, unbelief concentrates and consummates itself, in seeking here to reduce the highest fact of the highest energy of life to a bare idea and symbolism of life; in seeking in this passage, where the union betwixt personal and actual life and the idea of life celebrates its consummation, to perpetuate the Adamitic conflict between idea and fact. See 1 Corinthians 15. 3. The grand subjective revolution, prepared on the first Easter-day in the soul-life of the hopeless band of disciples, and upon which the establishment of the Christian Church rests, presupposes the grand objective revolution of things in the life of the Lord: the resurrection. And this individual revolution in the life of the Lord is at the same time, in respect of its dynamical working as well as its ideal value, the universal revolution of things in the life of humanity, Ephesians 1:19 ff. Christ’s resurrection our resurrection. Ullmann: Was setzt die Stiftung der Kirche Christi durch einen Gekreuzigten voraus? Stud. u. Krit. 1832, III. 579. 4. The resurrection attested and glorified itself as a divine fact, most of all by the thorough change which it effected in the view of the cross-death and sufferings of Jesus, and, indirectly, in the view of the cross and death in general. By it the cross of the curse is become the cross of reconciliation,—the sign of the deepest disgrace, the sign of highest honor. 5. The portrait of the Magdalene in her transition from deepest desolation to supreme joy. She was fitted, in her loving grief for the Lord and His body, to become the first Easter messenger. 6. The hasting of the Magdalene to Peter and John, and the cleaving together of these two gives us an impression of the gentle, placable spirit which the suffering of Christ had developed in the hearts of the disciples. Peter is not shunned now by a Magdalene’s and a John’s enthusiasm for the Lord, although he has denied Him,—for he is a repentant Peter. In a similar manner the whole band of disciples bear with the doubting Thomas until he has arrived at the full resurrection faith. 7. The perplexed, excited, hurrying, running disciples are first composed by the order in the empty sepulchre of Jesus. They feel that there a calm spirit has ruled. And here is presented to us in concrete touches the whole contrast of the calm, mysterious resurrection of Jesus and the immeasurable commotion confronting it in the circle of disciples; primarily a commotion full of anguish,—stormy; then growing calmer, yet still fluttering. The life of the Risen One is infinitely calm and tranquil in its self-certitude, blissfully moving within itself, like God Himself. As Christ held it no robbery to be equal with God, neither did He think it robbery to be risen. His heart is become celestially tranquil and firm, the spiritual fixed star of the spirit-realm; hence the fixed point that, with mighty shock, moves and transforms the whole human world. 8. The characteristics of Peter and John (see Exeg. Note to John 20:5) on the way of their glorification. 9. The first sign of the resurrection is the stone rolled away; the annihilation of the wicked counsel of the world, the frustration of the league of the powers of this world, the annulment of all the old authorities that rise in rebellion against the truth and the faith. (Psalms 2; Acts 4:25 ff.; Ephesians 1:21.) The second sign of the resurrection is the empty sepulchre. The grave kept not the body of Christ; that body is ravished from it along with His spirit. The personal principle is not swallowed up by matter; it elevates and preserves matter by its dynamic power, making it its heavenly organ. The third sign of the resurrection are the fairly disposed and ordered grave-clothes, as a sign of the ruling of the highest, clearest presence of mind amid the horrors of the night-dark sepulchre. The spark of faith of both Apostles kindles at this sign. 10. As the Scripture (of the Old Testament) prophetically points forward to the facts of the life of Jesus, so the life of Jesus points back to the Scripture concerning the future resurrection. The life of Jesus the key to the Old Testament. Special consideration must be directed to Scripture sayings such as Psalms 2; Psalms 16; Psalms 110; Isaiah 53:11; Daniel 9:25. To types such as Genesis 22. Jonah. Sayings in regard to death, such as Isaiah 25:8; Hosea 13:14; comp. Acts 2:25-34; John 8:32-33; John 13:33; John 13:35. 11. Then the disciples went home again. The walk from the tomb of the Risen One a going home in a higher sense. AND See the Synoptists, Matthew, Mark, Luke. The Doct. Notes.The portrait of the Magdalene in the light of the resurrection. The mourning Magdalene, John 20:1-11. The Magdalene rejoicing (as though heaven were already won), John 20:11-18. Magdalene at first the messenger of dismal alarms,—at last the messenger of heavenly joy.—Jerusalem’s messenger of joy, comp. Isaiah 40:1; Isaiah 40:9.—The mistakes of a soul stirred with love must themselves become guiding stars to truth: 1. The mistakes of the disconsolate Magdalene, John 20:2; John 20:13; John 20:15. 2. The mistakes of the enraptured Magdalene (thinking herself to have already attained the supreme, the heavenly goal) John 20:17.—Magdalene and Thomas, or the saddest of the sad changed to the happiest of the happy: 1. Immeasurable grief takes the one out of the circle of female disciples, the other out of the circle of male disciples. 2. “Rabboni;” “My Lord and my God.”—Magdalene and John in their conduct toward the fallen Peter, or how as mourners they are become tender-hearted, Matthew 5—How the disciples of Jesus go to His sepulchre: 1. How differently (Magdalene otherwise than the two men; Peter otherwise than John). 2. How unanimously (disciples, both male and female, and the women even in advance. Fallen ones and less guilty ones).—How the love of Christ hath made the first breach through the old fear of His people: 1. The fear of the world, the foes (guard). 2. The fear of the night, of the terrors of the grave. 3. The fear of spirits and of the other world itself.—The resurrection signs preceding the appearance of the Risen One (Doct. Note 9): 1. As signs of the weakness of the disciples (of their need of this leading from faith to sight). 2. As signs of the wisdom of God (sight is not to bring about faith, but faith sight).—The first sign of the life of the Risen One, heavenly repose and presence of mind, John 6:17 ff.—The linen clothes laid aside, or the signs of a change of apparel in the sleeping-chamber of the grave.—The investigating disciples (Peter in the sepulchre, Thomas about the body of the Lord).—The budding faith of the disciples: 1. Experimental faith, 2. Scriptural faith, 3. Spiritual faith.—Then the disciples went home again: 1. Tranquillized in regard to the mistake of Magdalene (her statement that the body was stolen). 2. Awaiting further disclosures. 3. Blessed and prepared at bottom to go home, by their budding faith. Starke: The plural σαββάτων is probably used here in reference to the seven weeks that were to be reckoned to Pentecost and that began to be reckoned from this day in particular: for these were peculiarly denominated weeks, and hence Pentecost was called the Feast of Weeks; it appears, therefore, from the above, that this day was at once the day subsequent to the great Paschal Sabbath, the beginning of the significant heptality of weeks,—which lasted until Pentecost, and represented the whole new economy and spiritual harvest,—and the third day after the death of Jesus.—True Christians find no time unseasonable for seeking Jesus; when the whole world is securely sleeping, they wake unto the Lord.—Zeisius: What a despondent, unbelieving thing the human heart is! many a time that which should bring comfort and joy, is productive but of terror and harm, Luke 2:9.—Believers have fellowship one with another in joy and sadness.—Love demands that we should follow our friends to the grave, and it is edifying so to do; we must not remain there, however, but must wait on our calling, until we ourselves are carried to the grave, Sirach 38. Gerlach: Each one was initiated into this wondrous mystery in a peculiar manner: Magdalene, after a scrupulous trial by the angels and then by means of the first personal manifestation of Jesus; Peter and John, who should have been the first to believe, by the sight of the sepulchre; the weaker women only by the angels (?); the disciples on the way to Emmaus, with anxious, comfort-seeking, burning hearts, by the circumstance of Jesus’ opening the Scripture to them; then all the still unbelieving disciples by Christ’s appearance in their assembly. In each of these dispensations there lies a peculiar, tender regard for the persons whom it concerns. Braune: Our Sunday is the Lord’s Resurrection Day, the first day of the creation, when light came into being. The New Testament exhibits distinct tokens of its observation; on it the Corinthian Church was commanded to lay up savings as collections for the church at Jerusalem (1 Corinthians 16:2); on that day Paul journeyed not, but preached (Acts 20:7, on a Sabbath—the first day of the week. [Luther’s version has the word Sabbath in these two instances.]) Gossner: But the stone that had troubled her before, when it lay in front of the sepulchre, troubles her again, now that it is moved away. Heubner: Mary Magdalene, one of the last to leave the grave, is the first to visit it again.—In great distress, seek counsel and help of upright brethren.—Love gave wings. [Craven: From Gregory: John 20:3. Peter and John ran before the others, for they loved most.—From Theophylact: John 20:4-8. Peter is practical and prompt, John contemplative and intelligent, and learned in divine things. Now the contemplative man is generally beforehand in knowledge and intelligence; but the practical, by his fervor and activity, gets the advance of the other’s perception, and sees first into the divine mystery. [From Burkitt: John 20:1. Though her heart did burn with an ardent zeal and affection to her crucified Lord, yet the commanded duties of the Sabbath were not omitted by her; she kept close, and silently spent that holy day in a mixture of grief and hope.—What magnanimity and courage is found in this weak woman; she followed Christ courageously, when His disciples left Him cowardly; she accompanied Him to His cross, she followed His hearse to the grave, when His disciples durst not appear; and now very early in the morning she goes to visit His sepulchre, fearing neither the darkness of the night, nor the presence of the watchmen. Learn thence, That courage is the special gift of God, and if He gives it to the feebler sex, even to timorous and fearful women, it is not in the power of man to make them afraid. John 20:2. But why had not the Virgin Mary, His disconsolate mother, this privilege conferred on her, rather than Mary Magdalene, who had been a grievous sinner? Doubtless this was for the comfort of all true penitents, and administers great consolation to them. John 20:5-7. When Christ arose from the grave, He left His grave-clothes behind Him; whereas, when Lazarus arose, he came forth with his grave-clothes about him; this teaches us, that Christ arose never to die more, but to live and reign forever; therefore He left His grave-clothes in the grave, as never to make use of them more. [From M. Henry: John 20:1. Love to Christ, if it be cordial, will be constant.—Mary’s love to Christ was strong as death, the death of the cross, for it stood by that; cruel [fast-holding] as the grave, for it made a visit to that, and was not deterred by its terrors.—We must study to do honor to Christ in those things wherein yet we cannot be profitable to Him.—Love to Christ will take off the terror of death and the grave. If we cannot come to Christ but through that darksome valley, even in that, if we love Him, we will fear no evil.—Early; They that love Christ will take the first opportunity of testifying their respect to Him.—Those who would seek Christ so as to find Him, must seek Him early; 1. Solicitously, with such a care as even breaks the sleep; 2. Industriously, we must deny ourselves and our own repose in pursuit of Christ; 3. Betimes, early in our days, early every day; My voice shalt thou hear in the morning.—They that diligently inquire after Christ while it is yet dark, shall have such light given them concerning Him as shall shine more and more.—Surprising comforts are the frequent encouragements of early seekers.—They that are most constant in their adherence to Christ, and most diligent in their inquiries after Him, have commonly the first and sweetest notices of the divine grace.—God ordinarily gives Himself and His comforts to us by degrees; to raise our expectations and quicken our inquiries. John 20:2. One would expect that the first thought that offered itself should have been, Surely the Lord is risen. When we come to reflect upon our own conduct in a cloudy and dark day, we shall stand amazed at our dullness and forgetfulness, that we could miss of such thoughts as afterward appear obvious.—Weak believers often make that the matter of their complaint, which is really just ground of hope, and matter of joy.—The communication of sorrows is one good improvement of the communion of saints.—Peter, though he had denied his Master, had not deserted his Master’s friends; by this appears the sincerity of his repentance, that he associated with the disciple whom Jesus loved. And the disciples keeping up their intimacy with him as formerly, notwithstanding his fall, teaches us to restore those with a spirit of meekness, that have been faulty. John 20:3. It is well when those that are more honored than others with the privileges of disciples, are more active than others in the duty of disciples.—Do others tell us of the comfort and benefit of ordinances? Let us be engaged thereby to make trial of them. John 20:4. What haste we should make in a good work, and when we are going on a good errand: Peter and John consulted neither their ease nor their gravity, but ran to the sepulchre.—He that got foremost in this race, was the disciple whom Jesus loved in a special manner, and who therefore in a special manner loved Jesus. Sense of Christ’s love to us, kindling love in us to Him again, will make us to excel in virtue.—He that was cast behind was Peter, who had denied his Master, and was in sorrow and shame for it, and this clogged him as a weight. John 20:5. The warmest affections are not always accompanied with the boldest resolutions; many are swift to run religion’s race that are not stout to fight her battles. John 20:6. Though John out-ran him, Peter did not therefore turn back, or stand still, but made after him as fast as he could; and while John was with a deal of caution looking in, he came, and with a deal of courage went into the sepulchre.—Observe how God dispenses His gifts variously. John could out-run Peter, but Peter could out-dare John; some disciples are quick, and they are useful to quicken them that are slow; others are bold and they are useful to hearten them that are timorous. John 20:6-7. When we rise from the death of sin to the life of righteousness, we must leave our grave-clothes behind us, must put off all our corruptions. John 20:8. It is good to be emboldened in a good work by the boldness of others.—John got the start of Peter in believing; Peter saw and wondered (Luke 24:12), but John saw and believed: a mind disposed to contemplation may perhaps sooner receive the evidence of divine truth than a mind disposed to action. John 20:9. What was the reason of their slowness to believe? Because as yet they knew not the scripture. John 20:10. Where were the angels when Peter and John were at the sepulchre? This favor was showed to those who were early and constant in their inquiries after Christ, and was the reward of them that came first, and staid last, but denied to them that made a transient visit. [From Scott: John 20:2. Under a large proportion of preaching, by men called Christian ministers, we are ready to say, “They have taken away the Lord and we know net where they have laid Him;” but the broken-hearted disciple cannot be thus contented, though others be filled with admiration of the preacher’s eloquence, genius, or learning.—From A Plain Commentary (Oxford): John 20:1. “Good proof gave she of that love; she was last at His cross, and first at His grave: staid longest there, was soonest here; could not rest till she were up to seek Him: sought Him while it was yet dark, before she had light to seek Him by.” (Bishop Andrewes.)—From Owen: John 20:5. John’s remaining without, may in part be attributed to the precedence, which, as the older and leading disciple, he modestly yielded to Peter. John 20:9. That He MUST rise again from the dead; the necessity was founded upon the immutable word and promise of God (Psalms 16:10), upon the principle of life inherent in Jesus as the Eternal Son of God, and upon the redemptive economy, by which Christ was to rise from the dead and become the first-fruits of them that are held in the power of the grave (1 Corinthians 15:20).)] Footnotes: John 20:2.—[Loved as a friend, ἐφίλει, comp. John 11:3. Otherwise ὃνἠγάπα, John 19:26; John 21:7; John 21:20.—P. S.] John 20:2.—[τὸνκύριον is the usual reading. Some Greek MSS., as Augustine observes (Tract in Joa. cxx. 6), insert μου, dominum meum,—P. S.] John 20:5.—[παρακύπτειν is to stoop down or to bend forward, in order to look at any thing more closely. The intention the E. V. has expressed here (and John 20:11) by adding in italics and looking in.—P. S.] John 20:6.—[The first καί is omitted in the text. rec. with A., but is supported by ΰ.3a B. L. X. and the 11 century supplement of Cod. D. (see Alford).—P. S.] John 20:6.—[The E. V. obliterates the difference between βλέπει (sieht), the cursory glance of John, John 20:5, and the stronger θεωρεῖ (beschaut), the intense gaze of Peter, John 20:6. See Tittman, Synon. p. 3 sq. 120 sq. The more minute distinction between κείμενατὰὀθόνια, John 20:5, and τὰὀθόνιακείμενα, John 20:6, cannot be rendered in English and does not affect the sense. The position of ὀθόνια in John 20:6 corresponds to τὸσουδάριον, John 20:7.—P. S.] II HOW THE RISEN ONE CHANGES MARY ’S INTO BLESSED PEACE AND MAKES HER HIS EASTER- John 20:11-18(Matthew 28:1-15; Mark 16:1-11; Luke 24:1-12) 11    But Mary stood without at the sepulchre weeping [But Mary was standing (εἱστήκει) without by the tomb weeping] : and as she wept, she stooped down, and looked into the sepulchre [she stooped down into the tomb, παρέκυψενεἰςτὸμνημεῖον], 12And seeth [beholdeth, θεωρεῖ, not βλέπει, see John 20:5-6] two angels in white sitting, the one at the head, and the other at the feet, where the body of Jesus had lain. 13And they say unto her, Woman, why weepest thou? She saith unto them, Because they have taken away my Lord, and I know not where they have laid14 him. And when she had thus said [Having said this, ταῦταεἰποῦσα], she turned herself back, and saw [beholdeth, θεωρεῖ ?] Jesus standing, and knew not that it was Jesus. 15Jesus saith unto her, Woman, why weepest thou? whom seekest thou? She, supposing him to be the gardener [that it was the gardener, ὅτιὁκηπουρόςἐστισ], saith unto him, Sir, if thou have [hast] borne him hence, tell me where thou hast laid him, and I will take him away. 16Jesus saith unto her, Mary. [!] She turned herself, and saith unto him [in Hebrew] Rabboni; which is to say, Master [Rabboni! (which is to say, Teacher!)] 17Jesus saith unto her, Touch me not ; for I am [have] not yet ascended to my [the] Father: but go to my brethren, and say unto them, I ascend unto my Father, [omit (,)] and your Father; [,] and to [omit to] my God, [omit (,)] and your God. 18Mary [the] Magdalene came [cometh, ἔρχεται] and told the disciples [bringing tidings, ὰγγέλουσα, to the disciples] that she had seen the Lord, and that he had spoken [said] these things unto her. AND Continuation of the history of the Magdalene. First manifestation of the Risen One. John 20:11. But Mary was standing by the tomb. [Μαριὰμδὲεἱστήκει (al. ἱστήκει)πρὸςτῷμνημείῳἔξωκλαίουσα]—Εἱστήκει: she was standing as if rooted to the spot. The Evangelist has omitted to mention that she immediately followed the two disciples. Whether she met them at the grave, the narrative says not. She comes, and again finds the empty tomb. She now stations herself in front of it, as though, all too late, she would become its guardian. It is the plastic expression of her thought, her grief. Now as she wept [ὡςοὖνἔκλαιεν].—Her weeping is in reference to her idea that the body of Jesus has been stolen; hence she glances ever and anon down toward the empty place where He has lain. John 20:12. And she beholdeth two angels. [καὶθεωρεῖδύοἀλλέλους].—The angelic appearances in the resurrection history, a sign of the thoroughly new, wonderful epoch of this event. The truth and objectivity of her vision are supported by the slender impression which these appearances seem to make upon her in her present mood; the internal, subjective conditions, by the circumstance that the two apostles saw no angel, and the other women only one. [Alford adopts the rather fanciful remark of Luthardt: The angels were in white because from the world of light; they sit, as not defending, but peacefully watching the Body; at the head and the feet, for the Body of the Lord was from head to foot in the charge of His Father and of His servants—P. S.] John 20:14. She turned back. [ἐστράφηεἰςτἀὀπίσω], i. e., to look towards the garden, and to see if some one would not appear and give her information. And knew not that it was Jesus. [οὐκἤδειὅτιἸησοῦςἐστίν.—There is foundation on both sides for her non-recognition. On the one hand, Jesus has altered: He is the Risen, the Transformed One. The external feature which, in addition to the one already mentioned, some assume, is less certain. “She thinks the gardener (John 19:41) of Joseph of Arimathea is before her, and that he has assigned the body another place. The circumstance that the Risen One was clothed with the subligaculum, or loin-strip, which crucified persons wore, and the same also that field and garden laborers were in, the habit of wearing, might incline her the more to this opinion.” Tholuck (following Hug). Kuinoel, Paulus, and others have even clothed Him in the dress of the gardener. On the other hand, Magdalene’s faculties were concentrated within; she was in a visionary mood rather than in one favorable to acute observation; irrespective of the fact that her mind was not in the slightest degree predisposed to expect the appearance of the Lord. In a similar manner, the eyes of the disciples journeying to Emmaus were holden. Meyer denies the holdenness of the eyes in the present case (Grotius); perhaps because he imagines it to be the fruit of some magical working. [Drδseke assigns as a reason because her tears wove a veil, and because the seeking after the dead prevents us from seeing the living. She was wholly absorbed in the thought of the absent Lord.—P. S.] John 20:15. If thou hast borne Him hence [εἰσὺἐβάστασαςαὐτόν].—She does no name Him. She takes it for granted that every one is thinking of Him only. Of course if the supposed gardener had carried away the Lord, he would understand her saying (Meyer); otherwise it were necessarily unintelligible to him She will go, she will bring the body. Her as suming a posture with a view to hurrying away in a certain direction, is evident from the following: “she turned herself.” We cannot infer from these words that she turned directly to the grave again. She gives herself credit for sufficient strength to enable her to carry the corpse and deposit it in the tomb again. For at this very time it should be receiving anointment at the hands of the women. John 20:16. Mary [Μαριάμ].—His voice had the same unique sound as before (see Luke 24:35; comp. 30, 31); especially the call by name (Isaiah 43:1). Since the voice of every human being in a healthy condition is the expression of the man within him, we can infer the impressiveness of Jesus’ voice without having a more definite conception of it. Recollections of things that address themselves to the ear are the most enduring, observes Strauss in his Glockentφne. The manifestation of God begins with the hearing-wonder, and dies away in it. The expression of the voice is concentrated in the naming of a beloved name. Rabboni [Ῥαββουνεί].—With the infinite expression of the salutation—Mary—with which Christ makes Himself known to her, the word of recognition corresponds—Rabboni, my Teacher. The Evangelist cannot help reproducing the original Hebrew word in its sonorousness; therefore the interpretation. The solemnity of the passage is not contained in the explanatory supplement, but in the Rabboni. We can infer from that which follows that she meantime has fallen at His feet and embraced them, “like those women in Matthew 28:9, and the woman that was a sinner, Luke 7:39.” I. e., her own self at the time. John 20:17. Hold (Touch) Me not [Μήμουἅπτου. Noli me tangere.—In explaining this, reference should be had to John 20:22, where Thomas is directed by the Lord: φέρετὴνχεῖράσουκαὶβάλεεἰςτὴνπλευράνμου, and Luke 24:39, where He calls upon the disciples: ψηλαφήσατέμε. It is therefore not the act of touching, as such, which the Lord reproves, but the animus or motive of Mary. The scene has often been represented in pictures called Noli me tangere.—P. S.] Interpretations of the enigmatical μήμουἅπτου: 1. “Handle (Touch) Me not” [in the literal sense]: a. Strictly supernaturalistic: Jesus demands a greater reverence for His body now that it has become divine (Chrysostom, Erasmus and many others). Unseasonable devoutness and insufficient explanation of γάρ (“for I have not yet ascended”). b. Decidedly natural, in various apprehensions. Ammon: Jesus desired to spare her the touching of One levitically unclean; Paulus: His wounds still pained Him, therefore touching Him would have hurt Him! c. Spiritualistic: Weisse: He was still bodiless, a mere spiritual apparition (a ghost). d. Gnostic: Hilgenfeld: He as yet appeared only as a mere Man, being not yet reunited to the Logos, and therefore adoration was unseasonable. [Yet immediately afterwards He allows Himself to be called by Thomas: “My Lord and My God;” comp. also Matthew 28:9.—P. S.] e. Physiological. Because the new, glorified corporeality of Jesus was still so tender as to shun every vigorous grasp (Schleiermacher [and Olshausen, edd. 1 and 3]). f. Psychological: Handle Me not for the purpose of examining whether it be really Myself in the body, or My glorified spirit. Meyer (following J. Fred. von Meyer), Lόcke. [In this case the following words οὔπωγὰρἀναβέβηκα, κ. τ. λ., express the assurance of the Lord that He is still corporeally present with her, having not yet been translated to the Father in heaven.—P. S.] 2. “Hold Me not fast.” a. Supernaturalistic: Seek not thy comfort in My present appearance by terrestrial contact, but by spiritual communion (Aret., Grot., Neand. and others). [Also Augustine (Tract, cxxi. c. 3). “ ‘Noli Me tangere:’ id est, Noli in Me sic credere, quemadmodum adhuc sapis; noli tuum sensum huc usque pertendere quod pro te factus sum, nec transire ad illud per quod facta es. Quomodo enim non carnaliter adhuc in eum credebat, quem sicut hominem flebat?” Leo the Great, Serm. 74 (al. 72), c. John 4 : “Nolo ut ad Me corporaliter venias, net ut me sensu carnis agnoscas: ad sublimiora te differo, majora tibi prζparo: cum ad Patrem ascendero, tunc Me perfectius veriusgue palpabis, apprehensura quod non tangis, et creditura quod non cernis.” Calvin, Melancthon, De Wette, Tholuck, Luthardt, Hengstenberg, Godet hold substantially this same view. Alford: “She believed she had now gotten Him again, never to be parted from Him. This gesture He reproves as unsuited to the time, and the nature of His present appearance. ‘Do not thus—for I am not yet restored fully to you in body—I have yet to ascend to the Father.’ This implies in the background another and truer touching when He should have ascended to the Father.” Wordsworth (who has a long note here): “Cleave not to Me in My bodily appearance; do not touch Me carnally, but learn to touch Me spiritually. When the power of the bodily touch ends, then the spiritual touch begins, and that touch most honors Christ and profits us.” Wordsworth then applies the passage to Christ’s presence in the eucharist which is spiritual, not carnal.—Hengstenberg (III. p. 303) conjectures that Mary, in the mistaken notion that the partition wall between Christ and her had now fallen, desired to embrace Him; this the Lord withstood, because the process of glorification was not yet completed, and the separation still continued in part. Godet: “ἅπτεσθαι is to touch in order to enjoy, to attach one’s self to some one: This is not the moment to attach yourself to Me as I am before you in My human individuality.” Comp. below sub d.—P. S.] b. Historical: Tarry not with Me, but make haste and discharge the message; time enough later for handling, greeting, holding (Beza, Calovius, Bengel). c. Spiritualistic-mythical: Jesus was on the point of ascending, and did not desire to be detained by Mary (Baur, Kinkel: One of the numerous ascensions occurring in the period of the forty days was about to be performed). d. Christologico-psychological: Hold Me not as though we were in the perfection of the existence of that world beyond us, for I am not yet ascended, etc., to say nothing of thyself. (Leben Jesu II., 1661; III., 744 Hofmann, Luthardt, Tholuck. As regards the sense, similarly Luther and others at an earlier period.) [Similar to explanation 2 a, above.—P. S.]. On the fact that the term ἅπτεσθαι does not barely mean to touch, to handle, but that it also particularly denotes a hanging upon, a holding fast, see Tholuck, p. 434 [Krauth’s transl. p. 411]. Tholuck divides the interpretations into two classes, one of which discovers the reason for the repulse in the not yet glorified condition of Christ; while the other maintains that it lies in the glorified state of the Lord. According to the distribution into ἄπτεσθαι to lay hold of, and to hold fast, the former is by preference interpreted as signifying the catching hold of the knees, worshipping. Yet not exclusively. The design of Jesus’ speech was undoubtedly to limit the exuberance of Magdalene’s rapture, to deprive her of the new illusion which is persuading her that every difficulty and danger of her life is laid behind her, that external intercourse with Jesus is now to continue and that it is the supreme thing,—and so to guide her feeling into a practical channel. Hence the commission. To my brethren [πορεύουδὲπρὸςτοὺςἀδελφούςμου.]—So He calls the disciples by a new name of familiar co-ordination. Meyer: He means her to gather from this that His appearance is not as yet a super-terrestrial and glorified one. Glorification, however, does not put an end to the brotherly feeling. Bengel: The word is designed to speak peace to the disciples concerning their flight. Right, but too narrow. Christ breathes in the paradisaic peace of the new reconciliation. God is become the Father of the disciples; He greets them in the dignity of their new life—in which He will soon make them glad through the Spirit of adoption, as co-brothers in the new kingdom that is now founded, and as co-heirs. The relation of humanity to God is changed, the new Paradise is opened, together with the new Man there are born into the world His brethren in spe, He nevertheless remaining the Lord and King of them. Tholuck. It is the intimation of the relationship of reconciliation (Apollinaris, Luther, Bucer). I ascend [Ἀναβαίνω].—The imminent ascension spoken of as already present, since He even now finds Himself in the new heavenly state, or transition state, which is the condition of ascension. To My Father and your Father [πρὸςτὸνπατέραμουκαὶπατέραὐμῶν].—He does not say to our (as also elsewhere your Father, My Father, Matthew 6:9 : after this manner pray ye: Our Father), for the relation in which He stands to the Father is, in its character of an eternal, immediate, principial relation, specifically different from their mediate relation to the Father. Still this positive assurance is herein contained: My Father is also your Father now; ye shall be glorified along with Me.—To my God [θεόνμουκαὶθεὸνὑμῶν].—There; is the same contrast again on both sides in His generalizations. His consciousness of God is specifically unique and the source of theirs (Ephesians 1:3). But as in the resurrection, the Father has demonstrated Himself to be His almighty God, so in future, in their course of life and victory, He will prove Himself to be their God also.—Thus is Magdalene made the first Evangelist of the resurrection to the apostolic circle itself, the Lord having also first appeared to her. John 20:18. Magdalene cometh [ἜρχεταιΜαριὰμἡΜαγδαληνὴἀγγέλουσατοῖςμαθηταῖςὔτιἑώρακατὸνκύριονκαὶταῦταεἶπεναὐτῇ ?].—She is obedient to the commission. She first announces her joy that she has seen Him, then discharges His commission. According to Meyer, there is a difference between this commission and the passage Matthew 28:10. Progress, however, from the most general disclosure to a more special one never constitutes a difference. Otherwise, the announcement of His imminent ascension would also present a difference from the directly following revelations of Jesus in the circle of disciples, as recorded by John himself. AND ETHICAL1. Mary Magdalene, the first guardian of the Holy Sepulchre. The later and present guardians of it. 2. The angelic apparitions at the Birth, Passion, Resurrection, and Ascension of the Lord mark these moments as the great epochs in the life of Jesus. For the angelic world does, in general, emerge into view in the grand epochs of the Kingdom of God. Therefore particularly in the life of Abraham and in that of Moses; at the founding of the covenant-religion, and at the establishment of the Old Testament theocracy. For this reason, after the establishment of the New Covenant in the life of Jesus, there is a withdrawal of angelic apparitions in all the period through which the Church’s history extends; their return, however, is promised for the end of the world. The psychological reason is contained in the fact that in all those moments the human world is brought into closest proximity to the spirit-world; that the whole form of the visible world vanishes, to a greater or less degree, from the deeply moved elect on this side the gulf, and in the deep twilight of this world there uncloses within them a ghostly vision for the spirit-world See the author’s Positive Dogmatik, p. 578 ff. 3. That the perception of the angels in their objective manifestation was still conditioned by the liberation of a visionary faculty on the part of those who beheld them, results from the history of the resurrection. Peter and John see no angel here, the other-women see but one angel, Magdalene sees two angels. Similar relative degrees of visionary perception are announced John 12:28-29; likewise Acts 9:7; Acts 22:9. Comp. Daniel 10:7. 4. Christ’s superiority to the angels a doctrine taught by Scripture, Matthew 4; Matthew 26:63; Ephesians 1:21; Philippians 2:10; Hebrews 2:5 ff., Mary Magdalene, who was scarcely dogmatically instructed therein, here scenically sets forth, in accordance with the instinct of Christian vital feeling. 5. The fact of Mary’s recognizing the Lord by her ear rather than by her eye is entirely in agreement with the laws of manifestation; according to these laws, wonders which address themselves to the hearing are of earlier and more frequent occurrence and of later with drawal than such as appeal to the sight. Here, however, it is at the same time a testimony to the spiritual and divine character of Magdalene’s attachment to the Lord. She knows Him by the tone in which Christ calls her name. Through the human call she becomes aware of the divine call, the perception of which constitutes the most blissful experience of the elect. See Isaiah 43:1. 6. A dialogue most brief and yet most pregnant: Mary; Rabboni. 7. Hold me not. In no moment of blissful ecstasy may we forget that we are still on earth and still have a mission here. Even Mary must attain to a consciousness of the situation. The fact that Mary had not yet arrived at the goal was gently expressed by the Lord in the saying that He Himself had not yet reached it. At the same time there is here intimated the truth that spiritual communion with the Lord constitutes the essential part of a beatifying communion with Him, and is the condition of the bliss of beholding Him [face to face]. 8. The message entrusted to Mary. It is addressed to the brethren. It is a message concerning the imminent perfecting of Christ. He does not speak of His resurrection; He speaks of His imminent ascension. His eye glances forward to the supreme goal. He designates His glorification as an ascension to His Father, in His character as the Son of God; to His God, in His character as the glorified Son of Man. This His ascension is, however, to redound to the advantage of His brethren as well as His own good. Hence the saying runs: “and to your Father,” etc. It is to be observed that Christ connects His relation to God with that of His brethren, and also makes a distinction between the two. 9. The first Easter-message addressed by Christ to the apostolic circle itself, was discharged by a woman, a female disciple, who, without doubt, was formerly the great sinner. The first manifestation of Christ was apportioned to Magdalene, as was the first manifestation of the Angel of the Lord in the Old Testament to the Egyptian maid Hagar—doubtless for the reason that both, being in a condition most sorely needing consolation, first had need of the manifestation, and were moreover mentally disposed to receive it. [Hagar the bondmaid of Sarah, Magdalene once the bondmaid of sin.] “Wenn wir in hφchsten Nφthen sein.” (“When in the hour of utmost need.”) At such a time is evolved the ability of perceiving the most wonderful help. AND See the Doct. Notes. Mary Magdalene at the sepulchre of the Lord: 1. How disconsolate: a. she standeth chained to the spot, as the guardian of the sepulchre; b. she weepeth; c. she stoopeth down. 2. How comforted: a. she seeth the angels; b. she seeth the Lord; c. she is made a messenger of joy to the flock of disciples.—The spiritual unity in the great change experienced by Mary: 1. In all her desolation, love for the Lord remained the light of her life (her faith and her hope). 2. In all her bliss there remained the painful pressure of her longing after the consummation.—How the Lord crowneth love for Him: 1. She sought the Body of the Lord to anoint it and received the anointing of the Spirit from the Living One. 2. In her grief for the Body, she hoped in the Living One, and became a messenger of life to the whole Church of Christ in all ages.—The blessing of true mourning at the grave.—The saying, “Blessed are they that mourn”—most conspicuously fulfilled.—The angels at the feet and head of the dead and risen Lord.—While pious men weep, there is already prepared for them supreme consolation.—The threefold conversation of Mary indicative of three degrees of her Easter-joy: 1. With the angels, 2. with the Lord, 3. with the disciples.—The great school of the Spirit of Christ: 1. At first she thought it impossible to part from the body of Christ; 2. and soon she learns to let the Risen One Himself externally go home.—The mood of Mary when desirous of detaining the Lord, compared with the mood of Peter on the Mount of Transfiguration.—The message of the Risen One to His disciples: 1. Addressed to His brethren, 2. a message concerning His ascension on their behalf also, 3. the preparation for His appearing in the midst of them.—The first sermon about the Risen One: 1. Delivered by a soul that was nigh unto despair; 2. by a woman; 3. by a pardoned sinner.—How she discharges the message: 1. She speaks of her blessedness (I have seen the Lord). Then 2. she faithfully delivers the saying. Application: Thus in the true preaching of Christ, the testimony of experience and the commanded word must accompany each other.—The Christian life, until the consummation, an eternal alternation of beholding and renouncing (or of receiving and sacrificing; making holiday and working).—The mission to the brethren ever the precious heavenly fruit of the beholding of Christ’s glory. Starke: Even pious souls do often err when they yield too much to those emotions which are good in themselves, Luke 24:17 f.—O how many peek and pine without cause!—Hall: Holy desires always prosper, Proverbs 8:17.—To speak comfortably to the afflicted is praiseworthy, and in accordance with the custom of the angels, yea, of the great God Himself, Luke 7:13; 1 Thessalonians 5:14.—I bid.: Many a tender and humbled soul mourns over the loss of its Saviour and yet He, the while, is beside it, Son 3:1-4.—Hedinger: The greater and more intense the misery of a distressed soul, the nearer Christ is; but He is not immediately recognized in the darkness.—Canstein: It stands to reason that believers, Jesus being risen, should not weep nor be sorrowful, but put in practice the words of St. Paul: “Rejoice in the Lord away,” etc., Philippians 4:4.—Hall: Jesus knoweth His sheep by name, John 10:3. Whoso is a true sheep of Jesus, knoweth also the voice of his Shepherd, John 10:4.—Canstein: Christ’s voice still presses upon our ears and pierces into our hearts when He calls us by name.—Hedinger: Unto faithful hearts there suddenly ariseth a light of joy, Psalms 97:11; yet must they moderate their longing and be satisfied with the brief glimpse granted them. The Lord will not have them hang upon His gifts and friendliness, but upon Himself and His love.—Zeisius: Eve, the first woman, brought transgression into the world; Mary, on the other hand, was the first preacher of restored, eternal righteousness.—Bibl. Wirt.: Through Christ’s resurrection we are become His brethren and God’s children. Now if we be children of God, we are also His heirs and joint-heirs with Christ, our Brother, to eternal blessedness, Romans 8:17.—Cramer: As woman was the first to serve the devil, so she must be the first to serve Christ, 1 Timothy 2:14.—Hall: Unto the upright there ariseth light in the darkness, from the Gracious, Compassionate and Righteous One, Psalms 112:4. —Gerlach: The inquiry of the angels concerning a thing which they know, is to be understood similarly with Christ’s question to the blind men: what will ye that I should do unto you? Grief when uttered makes a man susceptible of consolation.—Before this speech of Jesus one manuscript inserts the words: “And she ran toward Him to lay hold of Him,” which, even if John did not write it, we of course are to supply mentally.—Father has particular reference to His divinity, God to His humanity. Here, for the first time, He significantly calls them brethren (comp. Matthew 28:10). Gossner: Angels ministered unto the Lord after His temptation: they likewise ministered unto Him in His death and at His resurrection, as well as at His birth and His ascension. They were present everywhere—upon every occasion—And behold, as Mary turneth away from every creature, even from the angels, she findeth and seeth Jesus standing!—We might at times become disconcerted at the greatness of the Lord and at our own amazing littleness and distance from Him, the while He is desiring to draw so near unto us and behaveth Himself so brotherly toward us. For the prevention of such feeling on our part there was no better means than His own positive declaration: I am your Brother, I am one of you, and I go, as such, unto our Father; for, I have one God and Father with you; My Father is your Father; My God is your God; I indeed claim the pre-eminence, yet do pretend, not with standing, to be one of you.—Our Brother is the Supreme Good; the Supreme Good is our Brother! Heubner: How brief is the season of tears; even whilst we weep, the Author of joy is at our side, ready to wipe away our tears.—Love hides itself in order that it may, on discovering itself, occasion us the more surprise and joy. What is this whole life of trial and misery—exile?—A hiding of the heavenly Father’s love.—The measure of affliction the measure of joy.—He who tendeth the heavenly plants of His Father, was in a certain sense the Gardener.—Strive that Jesus may one day call thy name too, that thou mayest not belong to those spoken of in Psalms 16:4.—Mary and Rabboni,—just two words constitute the entire heart-conversation, but they are words full of power.—(Justinus:) Moderate now thy craving for Me, for in heaven only shall our intimate, perfect connection begin,—earth is not the place of perfect union. Yonder alone shall the soul’s longing for Jesus be satisfied. Do not now accompany Me, do not now follow Me as if the old intercourse still lasted.—“St. Peter and St. John have no more than Mary Magdalene and I and thou! Take them all in a lump,—they are all brethren together.” (Luther.)—As yet we ascend not, but we shall one day ascend. Comp. Reinhard’s Himmelfahrtspred., 1809 and Theremin, Pred., 1819, III., 110–18—Hόter, Zeugnisse christlicher Wahrheit, Bielefeld, 1858; Mary Magdalene’s Easter-celebration: 1. The Easter-sorrow of Mary Magdalene; 2. her Easter-joy.—Ibid.: That none can rob us of the true Easter-joy: 1. The character or nature of Easter-joy; 2. the subject of Easter-joy, or the good whereat we rejoice on the Easter-feast. [Craven: From Augustine: John 20:13. And I know not where they have placed Him; it was a still greater grief, that she did not know where to go to console her grief.—From Gregory: John 20:11. To have looked once is not enough for love. John 20:12. She sought the body and found it not; she persevered in seeking; and so it came to pass that she found. For holy longings ever gain strength by delay; did they not, they would not be longings. John 20:13. The very declarations of Scripture which excite our tears of love, wipe away those very tears, by promising us the sight of our Redeemer again. John 20:15. Jesus saith unto her, Woman, why weepest thou? He asks the cause of her grief, to set her longing still more. For the mere mentioning His name Whom she sought would inflame her love for Him.—Perhaps, however, the woman was right in believing Jesus to be the gardener; was not He the spiritual Gardener, who by the power of His love had sown strong seeds of virtue in her heart?—But how is it that, as soon as she sees the gardener, as she supposes Him to be, she says without having told Him who it was she was seeking, Sir, if thou hast borne Him hence? It arises from her love; when one loves a person, one never thinks that any one else can be ignorant of him. John 20:18. So the sin of mankind is buried in the very place whence it came forth. For whereas in Paradise the woman gave the man the deadly fruit, a woman from the sepulchre announced life to men; a woman delivers the message of Him who raises us from the dead, as a woman had delivered the words of the serpent who slew us.—From Bede: John 20:18. In that Mary Magdalene announced Christ’s resurrection to the disciples, all, especially those to whom the office of preaching is committed, are admonished to be zealous in setting forth to others whatever is revealed from above. [From Burkitt: John 20:11. Note Mary’s carriage and behaviour towards her Saviour; this is discovered by her patient attendance; She stood without at the sepulcher; by her passionate mourning, weeping; by her unwearied diligence, she stooped down and looked into the sepulcher.—Learn 1. True love to Christ suffers not itself to be stinted or limited, no, not by the greatest examples; the weakest woman that truly loves Christ, may piously strive with the greatest apostle in this point; 2. Strong love is valiant and undaunted, it will grapple and encounter with the strongest opposition; Mary fears nothing in seeking of her Lord, neither the darkness of the night, nor the terror of the soldiers, nor the malice of the Jews: Love is strong as death, and the flames thereof are vehement. John 20:12. Such as sincerely seek the Lord, shall certainly find, if not the very thing which they seek, yet that which is much better for them; Mary did not find Christ’s dead body, but she finds two angels to testify that He was risen.—It is matter of comfort to the members of Christ, that angels do not wait upon the head only, but upon the feet also; and it ought to be matter of imitation also. John 20:13. The best company in the world will not satisfy or content such as are seeking for Jesus Christ, when they find not Him whom their souls seek; Mary now enjoyed the presence and company of two angels, but this did not satisfy her in the absence of Christ Himself, John 20:14. Christ may be present with, and very near unto, His people, and yet not be presently discerned by them; Jesus stood by Mary, but she knew not that it was Jesus; her not expecting a living Christ, was one cause why she did not discern Him. John 20:15. The soul of a sincere believer, 1. Is full of earnest and longing desires after Jesus Christ; 2. Is yet sometimes at a loss for Christ, and cannot tell where to find Him; 3. Whilst it is at a loss for Christ, its desires are often quicker and more stirring after Him. John 20:17. Our love to Jesus Christ is best shown, not by our human passionate affection to His bodily presence, but by our spiritual communion with Him by faith here on earth, in order to an immediate communion with Him face to face in heaven.—Christ calls His disciples brethren, after His exaltation and resurrection; thereby showing that the change of His condition had wrought no change in His affection.—God for Christ’s sake has dignified believers with that near and dear relation of His being a Father to them in and through His Son. [From M. Henry: John 20:11. Where there is a true love to Christ, there will be a constant adherence to Him, and a resolution with purpose of heart to cleave to Him.—Where there is a true desire of acquaintance with Christ, there will be a constant attendance on the means of knowledge.—They that seek Christ must seek Him sorrowing (Luke 2:48), must weep, not for Him, but for themselves.—Weeping must not hinder seeking; though she wept, she stooped down, and looked in.—Those are likely to seek and find, that seek with affection and in tears. John 20:14. The Lord is nigh to them that are of a broken heart (Psalms 34:18), nearer than they are aware. They that seek Christ, though they do not see Him, may yet be sure He is not far from them.—Those that diligently seek the Lord, will turn every way in their inquiry after Him; Mary turned herself back, in hopes of some discoveries. John 20:15. Whom seekest Thou? When Christ knows that His people are seeking Him, yet He will know it from themselves; they must tell Him whom they seek.—She, supposing Him to be the gardener, saith, etc.; Troubled spirits, in a cloudy and dark day, are apt to misrepresent Christ to themselves, and to put wrong constructions upon the methods of His providence and grace. John 20:16. Mary; When those whom God knew by name in the counsels of His love (Exodus 33:12), are called by name in the efficacy of His grace, then He reveals His Son in them, as in Paul (Galatians 1:16).—Rabboni; Notwithstanding the freedom of communion which Christ is pleased to admit us to with Himself, we must remember that He is our Master, and to be approached with a godly fear.—Mary turned herself from the angels whom she had in her eye, to look unto Jesus; we must take off our regards from all creatures, even the brightest and best, to fix them upon Christ.—The soul that hears Christ’s voice, and is turned to Him, calls Him, with joy and triumph, My Master. John 20:17. Mary must not stay to talk with her Master, but must carry His message; for it was a day of good tidings, which she must not engross the comfort of, but hand it to others.—My brethren; Though Christ be high, yet He is not haughty; notwithstanding His elevation, He disdains not to own His poor relations.—My Father, and your Father; My God, and your God; There are such an advancement of Christians and such a condescension of Christ, as bring them very near together. John 20:18. When God comforts us, it is with this design, that we may comfort others. [From A Plain Commentary (Oxford): John 20:12. Christ’s resting-place is therefore between two Angels, like the mercy-seat, of old. Even in His death, He is found to have dwelt, as in ancient days, “between the Cherubim.” John 20:13. Woman, why weepest thou? “This case of Mary Magdalene is our case oftentimes: in the error of our conceit, to weep where we have no cause; to joy, where we have as little. Where we have cause to joy, we weep; and whereto weep, we joy. False joys and false sorrows, false hopes and false fears, this life of ours is full of.” (Bishop Andrewes.) John 20:15. Jesus saith unto her, Woman, why weepest thou? “Now, seeing Christ asks it again a second time, we will think there is something in it, and stay a little at it. The rather, for that it is the very opening of His mouth; the very first words that ever came from Him, and that He spoke first of all, after His rising again from death.…Thus say the Fathers; that Mary Magdalene standing by the grave’s side, and there weeping, is thus brought in to represent unto us the slate of all mankind before this Day, the Day of Christ’s rising again; weeping over the dead as do the heathens, who have no hope. But Christ comes and asks ‘Why weepest thou?’ as much as to say, ‘Weep not! There is no cause of weeping now.’ Henceforth, none shall need to stand by the grave to weep there any more.… So that this, ‘Why weepest thou?’ of Christ’s, (a question very proper for the day of the Resurrection,) wipes away tears from all eyes; puts off our mourning weeds, girds us with gladness, and robes us all in ‘white,’ with the Angels.” (Bishop Andrewes.) John 20:17. Take notice that our Lord makes mention of ascending, twice; of rising, not at all. And it is to teach us that Resurrection is nothing, nor is any account to be made of it, if Ascension go not with it.…“Never take cave for Resurrection! That will come of itself, without any thought-taking of thine. Take thought for Ascension! set your minds there! Better lie still in our graves, better never rise, than rise, and, rising, not ascend.” (Bishop Andrewes.) [From Barnes: John 20:17. Nothing was better fitted to afford them consolation than this assurance, that His God was theirs.—From Jacobus: John 20:13; John 20:15. Why weepest thou? How different are these words as spoken by Jesus from the same words spoken even by His Angels. Friends often ask the same thing, in our moments of anguish; but they can give no relief, and no arguments of theirs can cure the inward wound. But our blessed Lord reveals Himself in words of grace that go to the heart’s wound, and wonderfully heal. John 20:15. Whom seekest thou? Thus the adorable Saviour would draw her out to tell what she wants and whom she seeks for. So pleased is He to hear any poor sinner say, I seek Jesus.—Your Beloved is near you, though you have thought Him afar off. Who ever sought and did not find? But oh! instead of finding Him a corpse, you shall find Him a risen, living, glorious Redeemer. John 20:17. Go to My brethren; “This was a far greater honor than that which was denied her.” The gracious Saviour denies us nothing but for our greater advantage. [From Owen: John 20:15. I will take him away; She takes all the responsibility upon herself. If no one else will share her pious duty, she is ready to discharge it independent and alone. Noble woman! The Church to the end of time shall embalm thy memory, and point to thee as the most loving and faithful of that devoted band, who “—While Apostles shrunk, could dangers brave, Last at His cross, and earliest at His grave.”— John 20:17. “Do not stay here to embrace Me now, either to pay thy homage to Me, or to confirm thy faith, both which thou wilt have other opportunities of doing; for I am not yet withdrawn from your world, and ascended to the heavenly court of My Father, as you imagine I shall presently do, but I shall yet continue for a little while on earth, and give you further opportunities of seeing Me again; let nothing therefore detain thee any longer, but go immediately to My dear brethren and say unto them,” etc.—“Thou shalt possess Me again, but not as before, it shall be from this time and forever in the Spirit. The time of exalted and divine relationship is come.” (Stier.)] Footnotes: John 20:11.—The position of the words ἔξωκλαίουσα is in accordance with B. D. O. X., etc., Tischendorf [The rec. reads κλαίουσα before ἔξω. εἱστήκει with B.* D. etc. Tisch. Treg. Alf. ἱστήκει: ΰ. A. B.,3 etc., Westcott. πρὸςτῷμνη. μείῳ: A. B. D. Tisch. Alf. Westc. πρὸςτὸμνημεῖον: text rec. ἐντῷμνημείῳ: ΰ (See Tischendorf, Alford).—P. S.] John 20:14.—Καί before ταῦτα [E. text, rec] should be omitted in accordance with ΰ. A. B. D., etc. and the critical editions]. John 20:16.—The addition Ἑβραϊστί, in accordance with B. D. L. O. X. Δ. Sin., is received by Tischendorf [Tregelles, Alford, Westcott. Most MSS. read Ῥαββουνί (so Tischend. Alf. Treg.); some Ῥαββουνεί (so Westcott), some Ῥαββωνεί, some Ῥαβουνί.—P. S.] John 20:17.—[Μήμουἅπτου is the usual reading of the MSS. and Iren., Orig., etc., but Cod. B. and Tert. put μου after ἅπτου, and Westcott inserts this on the margin.—P. S.] John 20:17.—The first μου is wanting in B. D. X., Itala, Tischendorf. It was probably supplemented in imitation of the subsequent μου. [Treg. Alf. Westcott likewise read πρὸςτὸνπατέρα. without μου.—P. S.] [Late Professor of Practical Theology in the University of Berlin and Court-Chaplain and friend of Frederick IV, of Prussia. The Glockentφne were his first, the Abend Glockentφne his last work.—P. S.] [ἅπτομαι occurs thirty-five times in the New Testament, and is uniformly translated to touch in the E. V. It is used of touching the hand, the garment, the body, food, etc.—P. S,] [Not the better known commentator, but also an eminent Biblical scholar (though a layman. Senator of Frankfort on the Maine) and reviser of Luther’s German Bible.—P. S.] Tholuck’s classification of J. P. Lange, p. 436, rests upon a mistake. The conjunctures, in despair of the text, σύμουά́πτου (Gersdorf) and μἠσυπτόου, need merely be mentioned. [Beginning of a German hymn by Paul Eber (1547), see Schaff’s German Hymn Book, No, 336. English translation by Miss C. Winkworth.—P. S.] [The above is a literal rendering of the passage as it stands in Luther’s Version.] III How Christ Frees The Circle Of Disciples From The Old Fear, And, By The Breathing Of His Spirit, Raises Them To A Presentiment Of Their Apostolic Calling John 20:19-23(Mark 16:14; Luke 24:36 ff.; John 20:19-31, pericope for Quasi modo geniti).      19Then the same day at evening, being the first day of the week, when the doors were shut [When therefore it was evening on that day, the first of the week, and the doors had been shut, or, the doors being shut, οὔσηςοὖνὀψίαςτῇήμέρᾳἐκείνῃτῇμιᾷσαββάτων, καὶτῶνθυρῶνκεκλεισμένων], where the disciples were assembled [omit assembled] for fear of the Jews, came Jesus and stood in the midst, and saith unto them, Peace be unto you. 20And when he had so said, he shewed unto them his hands and his side. [And having said this, he showed unto them both his hands and his side]. Then were the disciples glad [The disciples therefore were glad], when they saw the Lord. 21Then said Jesus [he said] to them again, Peace be unto you: as my [the] Father hath sent me, even so send I you. 22And when he had said this, he breathed on them, and saith unto them, Receive ye the Holy Ghost 23 [lit., Receive Holy Spirit, Λάβετεπνεῦμαἅγιον]John 21 : Whosesoever sins ye remit, they are remitted [have been remitted, ὰφέωνται] unto them; and whosesoever sins [omit sins] ye retain, they are retained [have been retained, κεκράηνται]. AND The parallel-passage in Mark recounts how Jesus after His entrance into the circle of disciples, rebuked their unbelief; the parallel in Luke makes the entrance of the Emmaus disciples into the circle of apostles precede the Lord’s appearance, and makes Peter and the two journeyers to Emmaus exchange Easter-messages; Luke also hints at the gentle reproof of the disciples’ unbelief,—the feature more powerfully brought out by Mark He likewise reports, more explicitly than John, Jesus’ invitation to the disciples to touch His hands and His feet, His eating before them, and His exposition of the Scripture concerning His sufferings and resurrection. Tholuck justly remarks that Luke 24:44-49 bears a relation to John 20:22-23 in our passage. Individual traits in this section of Luke may belong to a later meeting, or have been amplified later; assuredly, nothing but the section beginning with 20:50 belongs to the last manifestation of Jesus. The most important thing remaining for John, was to supply the facts of Jesus’ appearing to the disciples as they were sitting with shut doors, His announcing to them His return by bestowing upon them His peace-greeting (John 14:27), and His re-ratifying of their apostolic calling (forfeited by their flight), accompanying this act by a breathing upon them, which was preparatory to the outpouring of the Spirit. John 20:19. When therefore it was evening on that day. [Οὔσηςοὖνὀψίαςτῇῆμέρᾳἔκείνῃτῇμιᾷσαββάτων.]—The evening of that Sunday, the first resurrection day. And the doors had been shut. [καὶτῶνθυρῶνκεκλεισμένωνὅπουἧσανοἱμαθηταί].—This circumstance is emphasized, as John 20:26; comp. Acts 12:13. 1. Unfounded softening of the expression. Calvin and others, Baumg.-Crus.: The doors had suddenly opened ad nutum divinζ majestatis ejus. According to Lόcke, the statement is even reducible to a mere unexpected, sudden appearing. 2. Unfounded intensification of the expression. He pressed bodily through the closed doors. In the interest of the [Lutheran] ubiquity-doctrine, Quenstδdt. 3. A miraculous appearing, unqualified as to its manner, indicative of the higher condition in which He found Himself subsequently to His transformation (Luke 24:31 : ἄφαντοςγενέσθαι; John 21:1; Mark 16:12 : φανεροῦσθαι. F. Kόhn: Wie ging Christus durch die Grabesthόr? 1838. Tholuck). A. Tholuck: The description leads to the conception “of an unconfinedness to the limits of space”—bounds of locality.—Primarily it indicates nothing but a simple power of the glorified life of Christ to move unrestrainedly, to appear and disappear;—His local definedness, which is one with bodily circumscribedness, remaining the while undestroyed. According to Baur, an immaterial constitution was ascribed to Jesus; according to Meyer, the body of Christ was not yet glorified; as according to Lόcke, who, in opposition to Olshausen (who distinguishes between the docetic and glorified body), remarks that a something intermediate betwixt the ethereal consistency of angels and material, corporeal solidity is to him inconceivable. Nevertheless, the idea of the body as dynamically transformed into the pure organ of the spirit is everywhere established in the New Testament (see 1 Corinthians 15:49). Peace unto you [Εἰρήνηὑμῖν].—The customary greeting is here filled with the weight of the resurrection-message and all that proclamation of salvation therewith connected; at the same time it is a fulfilment of the promise, John 14:27. See Exeg. Notes there. [Ministers are messengers of peace.] John 20:20. He showed unto them [Ἔδειξενκαὶτὰςχεῖραςκαὶτὴνπλευρὰναὐτοῖς].—See Luke 24:40. According to Meyer, a difference is constituted by the mention in that passage of the feet instead of the side. John 20:21. As the Father hath sent Me [καθὼςἀπέσταλκένμεὁπατήρ, κἀγὼπέμπωὑμᾶς].—Comp. Matthew 10; John 13; Matthew 16:19; chap. 18. The second εἰρήνηὑμῖν solemn, more definitely proclamatory of the infinite import of the salutation,—not, however, a farewell-greeting, as Kuinoel and others have interpreted it.—Even so send I you [κἀγὼπέμπωὑμᾶς].—Analogy of dynamical authority. The Father now sends Him out of the kingdom of resurrection and reconciliation to them; so likewise the Son sends them out of this kingdom to the world. That therewith their reinstitution into office is simultaneously expressed, in connection with an amplification of that office (henceforth they are witnesses for the Crucified and Risen One), is obvious, in accordance with the stronger analogy of Joh 21:15 ff. But as at the first bestowal of apostolic dignity, Peter took precedence of the others, so now the general restitution of the whole body precedes a more explicit restitution of Peter. Comp. John 17:18. John 20:22. He breathed on them [καὶτοῦτοεἰπὼνἐνεφύσησενκαὶλέγειαὐτοῖς. The verb ἐμφυσάω occurs in the N. T. only here, but is used in the Sept. to express the act of God in the original infusion of the spirit of life into man (Genesis 2:7 : ἐνεφύσησενεἰςτὸπρόσωποναὐτοῦπνοὴνζωῆς, καὶἐγένετοὁἄνθρωποςεἰςψυχὴνζῶσαν). “This act is now by God incarnate repeated, sacramentally, representing the infusion of the new life, of which He is become by His glorified Humanity the source to His members: see Job 33:4; Psalms 33:6; 1 Corinthians 15:45” (Alford).—P. S.] Different interpretations: 1. Simply the prophetico-symbolical heralding of the Holy Ghost (Theod. Mopsueste, Bullinger, Lampe, etc.). This view is contradicted by: a. the act, b. the Aorist Imperative λάβετε, c. the remark that in this case the act were but a repetition of the promise contained in the farewell-discourses. 2. It is the gratia ministerialis, rather than the former gratia sanctificationis, not, however, as yet, the pentecostal communication or gratia χαρισματική (Theophylact, Maldonat and others). 3. It is holy spirit (πνεῦμαἅγιον, without the article), but not yet the Holy Spirit, nor yet the Spirit of the new birth, of the world-mighty Jesus (Hofmann and Luthardt [also Gess]; see thereupon Tholuck and Meyer). 4. It is a quantitative, precursive communication of the Spirit, in accordance with Christ’s not yet perfected state of glorification (Origen, Calvin, Neander, Stier, Tholuck. Meyer: A veritable ἀπαρχή of the Holy Ghost). [Similarly Bengel (arrha pentecostes), Brόckner, Hengstenberg, Godet, Ewald, Alford. The full communication of the Holy Spirit did not take place before the day of Pentecost, comp. John 7:39; John 16:7; Acts 2.—P.S.]) We have to consider on the one hand the afflation, and on the other hand the design of this bestowal of the Spirit. The afflation is an afflatus with the new life of the resurrection, and so the symbol, as the commencement, of the communication of His resurrection-life, i. e. life in His Holy Spirit. The degree of this communication, however, is determined in accordance with their present need; they must even now have power to gather the Resurrection-Church and to distinguish it from the world, in like manner as it, as the substratum of the people’s Church shortly to be established, is to be thoroughly distinguished from the Israelitish Church. In respect of this consideration, this gratia is doubtless specially ministerialis. They have not yet the gift of communicating the Holy Ghost, but they do possess that of discerning the Holy Spirit when already communicated. John 20:23. Whose sins ye remit [ἄντινωνἀφῆτε].—By proclaiming and promising to them forgiveness while ye receive them into your fellowship.—They are (have been) remitted unto them [ἀφέωνταιαὐτοῖς].—See Text. Notes. Meyer’s antithesis: “They become (will be) remitted (according to the reading ἀφίενται) and they are (have been) retained (κεκράτηνται), is to be refuted first by the Codd. which read ἀφέωνται [perf. pass.=ἀφεῖνται.—P. S.], secondly by the exegetical demand that the two terms should form a parallel. Their remitting of sin and. retaining of sin will, as a prophetically ministerial act, rest upon corresponding acts of God, already accomplished in the Spirit,—not, however, have these acts as a result or, still less, effectuate them. They will be influenced in these acts by Christ; they will not influence Him. The term, remit sins [ἀφιέναι], is akin to the term, loose [λὐειν], Matthew 16:19; the term, retain [κρατεῖν], or retain together, is akin to the term, bind [δέειν]. See Comm. on Matthew at the passage designated, note (Leben Jesu, II., p. 889). The Lord does here but invert the expression, thereby indicating the now decided, New Testament stand-point, in which redemption [loosing], forgiveness, advances into the foreground. Here, then, as in those other passages, Matthew 16:19; Matthew 18:18, it is the potestas clavium in its broader sense, not merely, in accordance with the Heidelberg Catechism, the preaching of the holy Gospel and Christian penitential discipline (if it were confined to these, the latter branch would have to be considered as having reference also to reception into the Church: open the kingdom of heaven to believers), but in a still more extended sense in accordance with the Artic. Smalc.: Mandatum docendi evangelium, remittendi peccata, administrandi sacramenta, prζterea mandatum excommunicandi; in which summing up the second and fourth items should really be regarded as expressed in the third: administrandi sacramenta. In reality the stations of the potestas are these: 1. The preaching of the gospel; 2. establishment of the preliminary conditions of reception; 3. reception into the Church; 4. penitential discipline in the real sense of the term. In a narrower sense it is undoubtedly the potestas of reception through baptism and of reception through repentance and absolution, together with the potestas of the opposite denial of reception, or exclusion. The symbolic prefiguration of the administration of the Church by the administration of the keys of the house of David, Isaiah 22:22, is, in consciously symbolic terms, continued in the Revelation (John 3:7). See Tholuck, p. 441 ff.; Julius Mόller, Deutsche Zeitschrift, 1852, p. 55 [on the power of the keys, in an essay on the Divine Institution of the Ministry, reprinted in Mόller’s Dogmatische Abhandlungen (1870), p. 496 ff.—P. S.]. AND ETHICAL1. Christ, the Risen One, first appeared unto individual souls, then to the congregation of the faithful. We find a repetition of this in the history of the Church. 2. The night of Christmas, the darkness of Good Friday, the evening of the Supper, the first Easter evening; glorious hours of the ever brighter shining of the Dayspring from on high (Luke 1:79). At evening time it shall be light, Zechariah 14:7. 3. How Christ, as the Risen One, bursts though, the fear of the company of disciples: (1) the fear of the Jews; (2) the fear of His own ghost-like apparition; (3) the fear of the whole world (John 20:21); (4) the fear of the power of sin and guilt (John 20:23); (5) the fear of the terrors of judgment (“whosoesoever sins ye retain,” etc.). 4. The first Easter Church in its changing forms: a. a Church of secret, fugitive disciples, b. a Church of festive, glad believers, c. a Church of anointed and commissioned apostles. 5. How Christ cometh into the midst of His people: (1) in spite of closed doors: (2) with the salutation of peace; (3) with the firstling gift of the Spirit; (4) with the commission of the apostolic embassy; (5) with the bestowal of apostolic plenipotence. 6. The entrance of Jesus whilst the doors were shut, an evidence of His higher, glorified corporeality.7. The peace-greeting, or the transformation of the every-day formula of salutation into the loveliest, richest Evangel by the mouth of Christ. 8. The mission of the disciples from Christ measured in accordance with the mission of Christ from the Father. 9. The first gift of the Spirit, or how, in the Easter feast of Christ, the last shadows of Good-Friday (fear of the Jews) come in contact with the first light of Pentecost (He breathed on them). 10. The inseparable connection of apostolic plenipotence with the apostolic embassy. See Matthew 16:10; John 18:18. [11. Forgiveness of sins the fruit of the resurrection (and death of Christ). The triumph over death is also a triumph over sin—the cause of death.—P. S.] AND See Commentary on Mark, p. 163 f., Luke, p. 398 f. The Doct. Notes.Quasi modo geniti: or Christ the First-born from the dead, Colossians 1:18.—The transformation of the apostles’ fear of the Jews into the loftiest feeling of triumph over the whole world (John 20:21).—How all things ensue from the peace of the Risen One: 1. The joy, the mirth of the disciples; 2. spiritual life; 3. the evangelic mission; 4. apostolic spiritual severity and clemency in the administration of the Gospel.—When the doors are shut to the world, then are they (in the highest sense) open to the Lord.—The union of familiarity and majesty in the first manifestation of the Risen One in the Church.—The first great fulfilment of the promise, Where two or three are gathered together in my name, there am I in the midst of them.—The day of Christ’s heavenly birth from the dead, a birthday of all Christian blessings: 1. Of peace and joy in believing; 2. of Sunday and the feast-days (for now, for the first time, do the remaining festivals receive their true signification); 3. of religious worship (cultus), and of rest from labor, in the Spirit; 4. of the apostolic mission, and of preaching; 5. of New Testament discipline and social consecration.—The life-breath of Christ, the true mission to the world.—The judicial sentence of the apostolic Church: 1. In respect of its divine institution; 2. in respect of its historical obscuration; 3. in respect of its eternal import.—Or: 1. As a sacred power; 2. as an accountable right; 3. as a solemn duty.—The great word: Sent from Christ as Christ from the Father. Starke: The experience of an afflicted and tempted person may be very different in the evening from what it was in the morning.—The lying in wait of the wicked must conduce to the best interests of the godly, in this respect also, viz. that the godly refrain themselves from them, and hence are not led away by intercourse with them, nor condemned with them.—Zeisius: What a precious and unspeakable fruit of the merit and resurrection of Christ, is peace with God in the conscience!—Yea, peace and joy in the Holy Ghost are two particular, precious fruits of the resurrection of Jesus and of His spiritual kingdom.—Hall: When Christ, the Morning Star, riseth upon the soul and discovereth Himself unto it, nothing but joy can spring up.—Zeisius: So soon as Christ rose from the dead, He instituted the office of the ministry: of what exceeding importance then must this office be.—Hall: He who desires that Christ should entrust to him the great embassy of His Gospel must likewise first receive His Spirit.—A testimony of the divinity of Jesus Christ, for the Holy Ghost is God, and therefore no one can give that Holy Ghost who is not himself God, John 15:20.—In the evening and at night Jesus did take in hand many momentous things for our sake: He was born in the night, He suffered Himself to be taken prisoner in the night, He instituted the Lord’s Supper in the night, and in the evening, when He was risen from the dead, He instituted the ministry of the New Testament. If we pondered these things every evening, we should make a holier use of the evening hours, and not perform so many works of darkness in the night! Braune: In so far as we are sinful, Christ is sent unto us from the Father, but in so far as we are redeemed, we are sent, as His witnesses, unto others, that we may be co-laborers, not in our, but in His work. Amid the consciousness of our weakness and frailty, we should hold fast the sense of the loftiness of our calling as redeemed ones, and by the former feeling be but the more impelled to suffer ourselves to be redeemed and reconciled to God, to the end that the latter feeling may become true and strong; whoso but suffereth himself to be redeemed will draw others also into this beatific fellowship.—“He breathes on them;” like a friend’s breath upon the cheek, shall the Holy Spirit of God come unto man’s spirit.—Unto sanctified [consecrated] personalities the Redeemer commits the forgiveness of sins; these commissioned ones are a terror and vexation to the wicked, but friends to the good. That which the Redeemer here says concerning the remitting and retaining of sins may be compared with what He says of loosing and binding for the Kingdom of Heaven, Matthew 16:19; Matthew 18:18.—Sanctified [consecrated] personalities are, as St. Paul says of the Gospel, 2 Corinthians 2:16, unto some a savor of life unto life, unto others a savor of death unto death. Gossner: He, therefore, who is sent from Christ, who is Christ’s messenger, must needs have received the peace of Christ, which is higher than all reason, must likewise needs have received the Spirit of Christ, and this seal of the Spirit and of peace must give evidence of itself in him by the devolving of peace and anointing from him to others again, by others being filled and anointed therewith. All this is contained in that little word as.—But when ministers make their appearance who have nothing to recommend them save that they are puffed up by the spirit of this world, what will they accomplish? They will puff up others also with the same spirit of the world. Heubner: In the evening. H. Mόller, Herzenssp. p. John 241: The Saviour will visit us in the evening. When the sun of the world hath set in our heart, the Sun of Righteousness ariseth.—Christians have often enough been obliged to assemble in secret; the Waldenses, for example, the Moravians, the Reformed in France, and others.—If Jesus come not into the assembly of Christians, it is cold, heartless, unfruitful.—Christ’s peace-greeting was the spoil of victory—spoil which He won by death and resurrection.—Whoso hath followed Christ unto Golgotha, to him doth He shout His word of peace.—Augustine; Cicatrices tituli gloriarum.—Crucifixion and resurrection are inseparable—one is incomplete without the other. This is the sum of Christianity.—The disciples were glad; Behold the power of the appearing, the peace, of Jesus. From His peace comes joy.—Peace is indispensable to the mission of Jesus. A man must have Jesus’ peace in his own heart if he would be a messenger of peace to others; he must first be redeemed himself, if he would preach redemption to others. Luther, in the postil to Quasimodog. Sunday, XI. 1040, writes this to all true Christians, after applying it to the Apostles and the ministry; they can meet these requisites, not by their own strength, but in Christ’s name, in the might of the Holy Ghost.—Schleiermacher, Pred. iii. p. 563.—Couard, ii. p. 326.—Marheineke, ii. p. 45. [Craven: From Augustine: John 20:19. If thou comprehendest the mode [of entering] it is no miracle: when reason fails, then is faith edified. John 20:20. The nails had pierced His hands, the lance had pierced His side. For the healing of doubting hearts, the marks of the wounds were still preserved.——From Chrysostom: John 20:21. He shows the efficacy of the cross, by which He undoes all evil things, and gives all good things; which is peace.—To the women above there was announced joy; for that sex was in sorrow, and had received the curse.——From Gregory: John 20:21. I love you, now that I send you to persecution, with the same love wherewith My Father loved Me, when He sent Me to My sufferings. John 20:23. The disciples who were called to such works of humility, to what a height of glory are they led! Lo, not only have they salvation for themselves, but are admitted to the powers of the supreme Judgment-seat.——From Bede: John 20:21. A repetition is a confirmation: whether He repeats it because the grace of love is two-fold, or because He it is who made of twain one. [From Burkitt: John 20:19. It has been no strange thing in the Church, that the best members of it have been put to frequent their assemblies with great fear, and been forced to meet in the night with great caution, because of the fury of the persecutors.—Let Christ’s disciples meet together never so privately, and with never so much hazard and jeopardy, they shall have Christ’s company with them. John 20:21. The repetition of, Peace be unto you, was not more than needful to signify His firm reconciliation to the disciples, notwithstanding their late cowardice in forsaking Him.—As My Father hath sent Me, so send I you; By the same authority, and for the same ends, in part; namely, to gather, govern, and instruct My Church. John 20:22. He breathed on them, and said, Receive ye the Holy Ghost; When Christ sends forth any about His work, He will furnish them with endowments answerable to their vast employment; and the best furniture they can have, is the Holy Spirit in His gifts and qualifications suitable to their work. John 20:23. There is a twofold power of remitting sins; the one magisterial and authoritative; this belongs to Christ alone: the other ministerial and declarative; this belongs to Christ’s ambassadors.—“Christ first conferred the Holy Ghost upon His apostles, and then said, Whose sins ye remit, they are remitted. Thereby intimating that it is not they, but the Holy Ghost by them, that puts away sin; For who can forgive sin, but God only?” (Augustine). The power of forgiving sin, that man hath, is only to declare that if men be truly and really penitent, their sins are forgiven them for the sake of Christ’s satisfaction. [From M. Henry: John 20:19. The disciples of Christ, even in difficult times, must not forsake the assembling of themselves together, Hebrews 10:25.—It is a comfort to Christ’s disciples, when their solemn assemblies are reduced to privacy, that no doors can shut out Christ’s presence from them.—His speaking peace, makes peace, peace with God, peace in your own consciences, peace with one another; all this peace be with you; not peace with the world, but peace in Christ. John 20:20. Conquerors glory in the marks of their wounds.—Christ’s wounds were to speak on earth, that it was He Himself, and therefore He rose with them; they were to speak in heaven, in the intercession He must ever live to make, and therefore He ascended with them, and appeared in the midst of the throne, a Lamb as it had been slain, and bleeding afresh, Revelation 5:6. Nay, it should seem, He will come again with His scars, that they may look on Him whom they pierced.—When Christ manifests His love to believers by the comforts of His Spirit, assures them that because He lives, they shall live also, then He shows them His hands and His side.—A sight of Christ will gladden the heart of a disciple at any time; the more we see of Christ, the more we shall rejoice in Him; and our joy will never be perfect till we come there where we shall see Him as He is.John 20:21. Christ was now sending the disciples to publish peace to the world (Isaiah 52:7); and He here not only confers it upon them for their own satisfaction, but commits it to them as a trust to be by them transmitted to all the sons of peace, Luke 10:5-6.—He sent them authorized with a divine warrant, armed with a divine power; sent them as ambassadors to treat of peace, and as heralds to proclaim it; sent them as servants to bid to the marriage:—hence they were called Apostles—men sent.John 20:22. What Christ gives, we must receive, must submit ourselves and our whole souls to the quickening, sanctifying influences of the blessed Spirit; receive His motions, and comply with them; receive His powers, and make use of them; and they who thus obey His word as a precept, shall have the benefit of it as a promise; they shall receive the Holy Spirit as the guide of their way, and the earnest of their inheritance. John 20:23. Two ways the apostles and ministers of Christ remit and retain sin, and both as having authority: 1. By sound doctrine; 2. By a strict discipline, applying the general rule of the gospel to particular persons. [From A Plain Commentary (Oxford): John 20:19. Peace be unto you! Can we forget that this was the salutation of Shiloh (that is, “Peace”), even “the Prince of Peace” Himself? of Him who is delared to be “our Peace:” who bequeathed His peace to the disciples; and promised that Peace should be their abiding portion; and directed them to salute with “Peace” every house into which they entered. Peace was the subject of the angels’ carol on the night of the Lord’s nativity: behold, Peace is the first word He pronounces in the hearing of His disciples now that He is risen from death. John 20:22. O most solemn and mysterious incident, as well as most solemn and prevailing words! The action of our Saviour here described may have shown emblematically (as Augustine suggests) that the Holy Ghost proceedeth from the Son. It may further have served to show that this was He by the breath of whose mouth all the hosts of heaven were made; and especially (as Cyril supposes), that Christ was the same who, after creating man in the beginning, “breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and he became a living soul.” But more than that is here intended. For it is to be thought that, at the time of man’s creation, “together with his soul, or the principle of his natural life, he received also the grace of the Holy Spirit as a principle of the Divine Life to which he was also designed.” (Bishop Bull). That is, the soul of man received from the very first “the peculiar impress of the Holy Spirit super-added,” as Clement of Alexandria writes. And Basil, expressly comparing the Divine insufflation upon Adam with that of Christ upon the Apostles, tells us that it was the same Son of God “by whom God gave the insufflation: then indeed, together with the soul, but now, into the soul.” Eusebius is even more explicit. “The Lord” (he says), “renews mankind. That grace which man enjoyed at first, because God breathed into his nostrils,—that same grace did Christ restore when He breathed into the face of the Apostles, and said, Receive the Holy Ghost.”—At the first institution of certain mysteries of the Faith, there was not wanting the outward emblem of an inward grace; which grace was afterwards conveyed without any such visible demonstration. Thus, at the Baptism of Christ, “the Holy Ghost descended in a bodily shape like a dove upon Him.” And now, at the ordination of His Apostles, our Lord is found to have “breathed into” their faces, when He would convey to them the gift of the same Blessed Spirit. From Barnes: John 20:19. True Christians will love to meet together for worship; nothing will prevent this. John 20:21. As My Father hath sent Me; As God sent Me to preach, to be persecuted, and to suffer; to make known His will, and to offer pardon to men; so I send you.——From Jacobus: John 20:19. Glad; So He had promised to them (John 16:20), “Your sorrow shall be turned into joy.”] Footnotes: John 20:19.—Συνηγμένοι [assembled: text. rec. with E.G. K. L. Vulg.] is omitted in accordance with ΰ. A.B.D., etc. Lachmann, Tischendorf. An exegetical addition. [Treg., Alf., Westc. likewise omit it.] John 20:20.—[The text. rec. omits the καί before τὰςχεῖρας with ΰ. D.; but Lachm., Tischend. (in former edd., not in ed. 8), Treg., Alf., Westc. retain it with A. B. Syr.—P. S.] John 20:21.—[ὁ ’Ιησῦς is omitted by ΰ. D. L. X., Treg., Tischend.; bracketed by Alford and Westcott; retained by Lachmann and Lange with A. B.—P. S.] John 20:22—[The absence of the article before πνεῦμα may indicate the partial or preparatory inspiration, as distinct from the pentecostal effusion. See the Exeg.—P. S.] John 20:23.—The reading ἀφέωνται in accordance with A. D. L. O. X., Lachmann—in opposition to the reading ἀφίενται, B. E. G. K„ etc., Tischendorf. On ἀφέωνται instead of ἀφεῖνται, see Winer, p. 91. [Tischend. ed, 8, Treg., Westc. and H. read ἀφέωνται, Alford ἀφίενται. ἀφιέωνται. is also found Matthew 9:2; Matthew 9:5; Mark 2:5; Luke 5:20; Luke 5:23; Luke 7:47; 1 John 2:12. The old grammarians differ as to this form, some declaring it to be identical with ἀφῶνται. (as Homer has ἀφέη for ἀφῆ, others regarding it as the perf. pass, ἀφεῖνται. Winer adopts the latter view, Gr. p. 77, ed. 7. The bearing of this reading on the sense is important; see the Exeg.—P. S.] [Similarly Bengel: ἀφίενται— κεκράτηνται, remittuntur— retenta sunt: illud, prζsens; hoc prζterilum. Mundus Est sub peccato.) [An important remark. Ministerial acts are not creative but declarative of the preceding acts of Christ and the Holly Spirit. Dean Alford remarks in loc, that ministers have the power of the keys “not by successive delegation from the Apostles,—of which fiction I find in the New Testament no trace” (—the italics are Alford’s—), “but by their mission from Christ, the Bestower of the Spirit, for their office when orderly and legitimately coferred upon them by the various Churches. Not however to them exclusively,—though for decency and order it is expedient that the outward and formal declaration should be so:—but in proportion as any disciple shall have been filled with the Holy Spirit of wisdom, is the inner discernment, the κρισις, his.”—P. S.] V Design Of The Gospels Facts. Testimony Concerning Christ, And Life In His Name John 20:30-3130 And [moreover] many other signs truly did Jesus in the presence of his disciples, which are not written in this book: 31But these are [have been] written, that ye might [may] believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God; and that believing ye might [may] have life through [in] his name. AND According to Lόcke, De Wette, Meyer, John here closes his entire book, and chap. 21 is an appendix. In our opinion, he here concludes the history of the Passion and Resurrection, insomuch as that history was designed to perfect the faith of the disciples—just as John 12:37, he evidently closes the history of the public prophetic ministry of Jesus; as John 1:18, He manifestly closes the Prologue, and, similarly, John 21:24 the Epilogue. These different concluding formulas betoken a construction of the Gospel so well organized and thoroughly digested, that in view thereof, the conception which regards the verses under consideration as forming a conclusion to the entire Gospel must appear a too external conception of our Gospel. [John 20:30. It is a question how the expression: πολλὰκαὶἄλλασημεῖα, etc., should be interpreted. The word has been referred to resurrection signs, signs in attestation of the resurrection, by Chrysost., Theophylact, etc., Kuinoel, Lόcke, Olshausen, etc. Against this view it is remarked by Meyer and others: (1) The term σημεῖα is too general to support such an interpretation. The verse, however, does not touch upon the great mass of the σημεῖα, but upon such as were done by Jesus in the presence of His disciples, in the circle of the eleven in particular; τεκμήρια, Acts 1:3. (2) Πολλὰκαὶἄλλα is alleged to be contradictory to this interpretation; Christ, according to the Gospel as well as according to 1 Corinthians 15., having appeared a few times only. But the words are not spoken of the appearances in themselves, but of the σημεῖα which occurred on the occasion of these appearances. To these σημεῖα, then, there must be reckoned His making of Himself known to Thomas by means of a miracle of knowledge, to Mary through the word of recognition: Mary. But besides these signs, recorded by St. John, yet others must be added to the list, viz.: His making of Himself known to the Emmaus disciples through the breaking of bread; to Peter, as to James, in a mode with which we are unacquainted; to the five hundred brethren in Galilee, by a majesty of sudden appearance which threw many of them upon their knees; to the disciples on the Mount of Olives, by His ascension; to Paul, by His manifestation from heaven. These instances certainly might justify the expression of the Evangelist; (3) however, ἐποίησεν is said to contradict this view. Tholuck remarks that this term cannot be used concerning appearances. It may, however, be applied to manifestations of miraculous knowledge, of celestial might, of divine Providence, which manifestations accompanied every appearance. Then (4) this view is said to be disfavored by the expression: ἐντῷβιβλ. τούτῳ, these words being alleged to prove that John has in view the contents of his entire Gospel. Since, however, the Evangelist is speaking of resurrection-signs, he has reference to that part of the book which contains statements relative to the resurrection. So early a commentator as Euthymius introduced the other explanation of the σημεῖα (see Lόcke, 802). He first interprets them correctly, as significant of the resurrection-signs, but then states that the word may also be generally construed, as signifying the whole mass of the wonderful signs of Christ, previous and subsequent to the resurrection. And thus do Jansen, Wolf, Bengel, Lampe, Tholuck, etc. (see Meyer, 661) now interpret the term. [So also Hengstenberg, Godet, Alford: Miracles in the most general sense, by which Jesus proved His Messiahship.—P. S.] This interpretation is contradicted by (1) The circumstance that John has already submitted his resume relative to the earlier signs, John 12:37; (2) the fact that he is here speaking of signs done by the Risen One in the presence of the disciples;—objections irrespective of the necessity involved by this interpretation, for regarding chap. 21 as a foreign addition or clumsily adjusted appendix, and this in the absence of otherwise sufficient grounds. John 20:31. But these have been written [ταῦταδὲγεγραμμέναἵνα, κ. τ. λ.].—These signs—namely, these manifestations of the δόξα of Christ. According to Tholuck and Meyer, the selections from the miracles performed by Jesus presented throughout the entire Gospel. Against this view, see the preceding Exeg. Note. Be it also observed that this Gospel was not written for the purpose of converting to the faith those who were not yet believers (Hilgenfeld), but with a view to confirming believing Christians in the faith. Hence, also, the expression πιστεύσητε is to be taken emphatically, like the exhortation to believe addressed to Thomas, and the chief emphasis lies upon: καὶἵναπιστεύοντες, etc. They are to be confirmed in their faith in Christ by faith in the resurrection, and in that faith have perfect life. [Alford: “The mere miracle-faith, so often reproved by our Lord, is not that intended here. This is faith in Himself, as the Christ the Son of God; and the Evangelist means that enough is related in this book to be a ground for such a faith, by showing us His glory manifested forth.—P. S.] The Christ, the Son of God. Both in the fullest meaning of the words, in accordance with the Prologue. May have life in His name [ζωὴνἔχητεἐντῷὀνόματιαὐτοῦ ?].—Entire, perfect life in the name perfected through the resurrection. [The ὄνομα, the revealed being of Christ, divine essence in human form, is the object of faith, and the ground of the ζωή. The Gospel of John has indeed a tendency, but not such an one as the Tόbingen School ascribes to it. Its tendency is the aim of all sound preaching and theological writing, namely, by the faithful exhibition of truth to produce and to strengthen faith in Christ, and thus to lead men to the possession of the true life which is identical with true happiness. To John, his task as an historian was the same with his task as an apostle—salvation in Christ.—P. S.]. AND ETHICAL1. Here, as well as John 21:25, the Evangelist has made a distinct deliverance concerning the principle of his evangelical historiography,—particularly of his presentation of the resurrection-history. His great anxiety was not to write down everything that he knew about Jesus; his aim was, rather, in a selection of significant facts to present his view of the glory of Christ, in order to the quickening, revival, and increase of faith in Christian readers, but especially in order to the furtherance of the full vitality and life-certitude of faith in the ideal knowledge (the name) of Christ. The same is true, although not in the same degree, of the Synoptists. This is the character of religious, particularly of the evangelical, objective-subjective historiography; it is the first task of modern Gospel criticism to rise to an appreciation of this character. The atomistic conception of chroniclers, book-makers, transcribers, supplemented, human-tendency writers does not reach up to the christological idea of the Evangelist. 2. That ye may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God. This they did already believe, and yet they must believe it now more fully than over. A peculiar emphasis, however, rests upon the following: And that, believing [or, as believers], ye may have life in His name. The name of Christ in believers is the full, clear, ideal contemplation of Christ in lively knowledge; therewith the full truth, certainty, vigor, and blessedness of the new life is given. 3. That which John says of his own writings is true of all the Gospels. Their authors, therefore, are indeed tendency writers, but of a divine tendency, entirely opposed to the human, fraudulous, manifoldly egotistic tendencies which the Tubingen critics have dared impute to them, or, what is still worse, to the Holy Ghost who guided them. 4. The remark of John is in the broadest sense characteristic of Holy Scripture in general. It has a religious purpose, and is therefore written from a religious impulse, in a religious spirit, under the guidance of the Spirit of God. All the religious truth of Holy Writ, however, aims at the truth of God in Christ. Christ the marrow and star of Holy Scripture. AND The many signs of Jesus in His showings after the resurrection also.—The immeasurable fulness of the life of Jesus.—The simple presentation of the same in speaking signs.—The unity and-diversity of the four evangelic portraits of Jesus.—In particular, of the Risen One.—Portrait of the Risen One by the hand of John.—Purpose of this resurrection-history.—Of this Gospel.—of the four Evangelists.—Of the whole of Sacred Writ,—How one must read the Holy Scriptures in the same spirit in which they are written.—How perseveringly and devoutly? Until faith has become perfect life in a clear knowledge of Christ.—How many sluggishly stand still in the beginnings of faith, without pressing onward to the full vital consciousness of a certain knowledge. We are to have life in Christ’s name.Starke: The Holy Scriptures are not imperfect, but perfect unto salvation in all things pertaining to faith and life, 2 Timothy 3:16-17.—Zeisius: Learn here whereunto the Holy Scriptures (the’ greatest treasure upon earth) are given us by God,—namely, that from them we may learn to believe and be saved. [Craven: From Chrysostom: John 20:31. And that believing ye might have life through His name, i.e. through Jesus, who is Life.—From Burkitt: John 20:31. The great point concerning Christ, to be known and believed from the Scriptures, is this, that Jesus, the Son of the Virgin, is the promised Messiah, the Anointed of the Father, He in whom all the types and shadows of the law are accomplished; and that this Jesus is for nature co-essential, for dignity co-equal, and for duration co-eternal with the Father; one in essence, equal in power and glory. Thus believing that Jesus is the Son of God, and accompanying that belief with a holy life, if we believe well, and live well, we shall have life through His name.—From M. Henry: John 20:31. The duty of those that read and hear the Gospel: to believe, to embrace the doctrine of Christ, and that record given concerning Him, 1 John 5:11.—The great gospel-blessedness which we are to hope for—That believing we shall have life through His name.[From A Plain Commentary (Oxford): John 20:31. “It is the real Incarnation of the Eternal Word,—the actual coming in the flesh of the Son of God, born, dead, and risen for our salvation,—which is the sole basis of our religion. This great fact, and not any particular proposition concerning it, in the totality of its objective character, and in the consequent totality of its applicable virtue and influence; this is the real Article of a standing or falling Church.” (Dr. W. H. Mill.)] [From Owen: John 20:31. In His name; “Eternal life is obtained by believers in virtue of Him, upon the claim established by Him in whom they believe.” (Webster and Wilkinson.) ] Footnotes: John 20:30.—[μὲνοὑ ?̓ν—quidem igitur, yea and, or moreover. Lange, nun auch. The meaning is, to guard against taking this Gospel as a complete account of the signs of Jesus.—P. S.] John 20:30.—[Truly is intended to give the force of καί after πολλά and before ἁ ?̔λλα=et quidem alia, and indeed many other signs.—P. S.] John 20:31.—The addition αἰώνιον after ζωήν in C*D. L. Sin., etc., not satisfactorily established. [A. B. C, X., etc., Vulg. Syr. Cyr., etc., omit αἰώνιον, read ζωήν without αἰώνιον, and so do Tischend., Alf., Treg., Westc. Its insertion from other passages is more easily accounted for than its omission.—P. S.] III TO THE GOSPEL. CHRIST’S POST- RULE IN THE WORLD UNTIL THE OF THE WORLD, OR UNTIL CHRIST’S COMING AGAIN; IN ITEMS OF THE -HISTORY John 21.I THE OF THE RISEN ONE AT THE SEA, AS A SYMBOL OF THE FUTURE AND CONDUCT OF CHRIST TOWARDS THE CHURCH IN THIS WORLD John 21:1-14.1    After these things Jesus shewed [he manifested] himself again to the disciples at the sea [lake] of Tiberias; and on this wise shewed he himself [and he manifested himself in this manner]. 2There were together Simon’ Peter, and Thomas called Didymus, and Nathanael of Cana in Galilee, and the sons of Zebedee, and two other 3[others] of his disciples. Simon Peter saith unto them, I go [ὑπάγω] a fishing. They say unto him, We also go [come, ἐρχόμεθα] with thee. They went forth, and entered into a [the, τό] ship immediately [omit immediately]; and [in] that night they caught nothing. 4But when the morning was now come [when the morning was already coming on, πρωΐαςδὲἤδηγενομένης Jesus stood on the shore; but the disciples knew not that it was Jesus. 5Then Jesus saith unto them, Children, have ye any meat [any fish, or, anything to eat, προσφάγιον]? They answered him, No. 6And he said unto them, Cast the net on the right side of the ship, and ye shall [will] find. They cast therefore, and now they were not able to draw it for the multitude of [the, τῶν] fishes. 7Therefore that disciple whom Jesus loved saith unto Peter, It is the Lord. Now when Simon Peter heard that it was the Lord, he girt his fisher’s coat unto him, [girded on his outer garment], (for he was naked,) and did cast [threw] himself into the sea [lake]. 8And the other disciples came in a little ship [in the boat, τῷπλοιαρίω], (for they were not far from land, but as it were 9 [only about] two hundred cubits,) dragging the net with [the] fishes. As soon then as they were come to land [or, went on shore], they saw [see, βλέπουσιν] a fire of coals there, and fish laid [lying, ἐπικείμενον] thereon, and bread. 10Jesus saith unto them, Bring of the fish which ye have now caught. 11Simon Peter went up [on board], and drew the net to land full of great fishes, an hundred and fifty and three: and for all there were so many, yet was not the net broken [the net was not broken, or, rent]. 12Jesus saith unto them, Come and dine [breakfast, ἀρισήσατε] And none of 13 the disciples durst ask him, Who art thou? knowing that it was the Lord. Jesus then cometh, and taketh [the] bread, and giveth them, and [the] fish likewise. 14This is now the third time that Jesus shewed [manifested] himself to his disciples, after that he was risen from the dead. AND On the genuineness of Chap, 21., see the Introduction, p. 31. Along with the genuineness, we maintain the organic appertinency of the chapter to the entire Gospel, in antithesis to the view which debases it to an appendix. See the Introduction, p. 46; Leben Jesu, 3, p. 752. In respect to the discussions on the subject, see Lόcke II., p. 805; Meyer [p. 662 ff.]; Tholuck, p. 445 and others. [The last chapter is generally regarded as a mere Appendix. Dr. Lange views it as the Epilogue which corresponds to the Prologue, (John 1:1-18), and presents, in typical outline, the post-resurrection history of Christ, His perpetual, spiritual presence in, and guidance of, the Church; as the Prologue presents His history before the Incarnation, and the body of the Gospel, His earthly history. Lange’s exegetical and doctrinal commentary of this plain, unassuming, yet most significant chapter, is exceedingly rich and ingenious, and leaves but little room for additions. Dr. V. W. Krummacher, the prince of German pulpit orators, told me in Elberfeld, on Easter Monday, 1844, after delivering a magnificent discourse on John 21:1-14, that he had prepared no less than fifteen different sermons on this section, and had found it inexhaustible in homiletical wealth. The other sections are equally rich. Ch. 20. is the Gospel for Easter Sunday. Ch. 21 the Gospel for the Easter-Week, as irradiated by the Sun of the Resurrection. It is a picture of Christian life, and the life of the Church, with its contrasts and changes,—festive joy and hard work, poverty and abundance, failure and success, humility and loftiness, activity and rest, losing and finding the Lord, longing for Him and rejoicing in His presence. On the genuineness of this chapter, I add the testimonies of an English and an American scholar. Canon Westcott (in his excellent Introduction to the Study of the Gospels, Boston ed., p. 258,) says: “This last chapter (21) of his Gospel is in every way a most remarkable testimony to the influence of St. John’s person and writings. Differences of language, no less than the abruptness of its introduction and its substance, seem to mark it clearly as an addition to the original narrative; and the universal concurrence of all outward evidence, no less certainly establishes its claim to a place in the canonical book. It is a ratification of the Gospel, and yet from the lips of him who wrote it; it allows time for the circulation of a wide-spread error, and yet corrects the error by the authoritative explanation of its origin. The testimony, though upon the extreme verge of the Apostolic period, yet falls within it, and the Apostle, in the consciousness (as it seems) of approaching death, confirms again his earlier record, and corrects the mistaken notion, which might have cast doubt upon the words of the Lord.” Ezra Abbott, in his and Hackett’s ed. of Smith’s Bibl. Dict., vol. II, p. 1430, note b., maintains, with the best German commentators, that the 21st ch. contains almost all the peculiarities of John’s style, and that the points of difference are insignificant, compared with the striking agreement. He adds: “On the supposition, however, that the Gospel is not genuine, this Appendix presents a problem which seems to admit of no reasonable solution. What motive could there have been for adding such a supplement to a spurious work after the middle of the second century? Was it needful, fifty years or more after the Apostle’s death, to correct a false report, that it was promised him that he should not die? Or what dogmatic purpose could this addition serve? And how is its minuteness of detail, and its extraordinary agreement in style with the rest of the Gospel to be explained? It may be said that it was designed to give credit to the forged Gospel, by a pretended attestation. But was the whole chapter needed for this? And what credit could a fictitious work of that period derive from an anonymous testimony? Had such been the object, moreover, how strange that the Apostle John should not be named as the author! The only plausible explanation, then, of John 21:24-25, seems to be, that they are an attestation of the trustworthiness of the Gospel, by those who first put it into general circulation—companions and friends of the author, and well known to those to whom it was communicated; and the only plausible account of the first 23 verses of the chapter is, that they are a supplementary addition [?], which proceeded directly from the pen, or substantially from the dictation of the author of the rest of the Gospel.” The Johannean origin of John 21 is denied or doubted by Grotius, Clericus, Hammond, Semler, Paulus, Lόcke, De Wette, Credner, Bleek, Baur, Keim, Scholten, etc; defended by Wetstein, Lampe, Eichhorn, Kuinoel, Hug, Guericke, Tholuck, Schleiermacher, Olshausen, Luthardt, Ebrard, Hengstenberg, Godet, Alford, Westcott, Wordsworth, (who, in a long note, p. 362, maintains a view somewhat similar to that of Dr. Lange). The latest hypothesis brought, out by Prof. Cassel, (1871), is that John wrote the 21st chapter, and endorsed the rest, which was originally written by his brother James. The first is true, the last is a worthless fancy.] [The only argument worth mentioning against the Johannean origin of chap. 21, is derived from a few rare and unimportant expressions, as ἔρχεσθαισύν (John 21:3) for the usual Johannean ἀκολουθεῖν; πρωΐαςγενομένης (4) for πρωΐ and ἐξατάζειν (12); φέρειν (18) for ἄγειν. But these peculiarties are natural and easily explained from the context, and are more than counterbalanced by the number of Johannean words and phrases, as μετάταῦτα (John 21:1), ἡθάλασσατῆςΤιβεριάδος (1), ὀψάριον (9, 10, 13),παιδια. (5), μέντοι. (4), the double ἀμήν (18). Ναθαναήλ, (2) for Bartholomew, the form ΘωμᾶςὁλεγόμενοςΔίδυμος (2), ΣίμωνΠέτρος (2, 3, 7, 11, 15), ὁμαθητὴςὅνἠγάπαὁἸησους (7), as well as by the unanimous testimony of the manuscripts and ancient versions, which contain the whole chapter as an integral part of the Gospel. The only-question is as to John 21:24-25, whether they are likewise from John, or an attestation by the hand of his surviving pupils and friends. Lange regards also these last two verses as Johannean with the exception of the phrase: “And we know that his testimony is true.” They conclude the Epilogue, and correspond to the conclusion of the Prologue, John 1:18, and the conclusion of the main body of the Gospel, John 20:30; John 20:30.—P. S.] John 21:1. After these things—[Μετὰταῦτα],—I.e., which, in Jerusalem, had already secured the confirmation of the disciples in the faith. [Several days must have elapsed since the last meeting, (John 20:26), for the disciples had in the meantime, according to the Lord’s direction, returned to Galilee. (Matthew 28:7; Matthew 28:10; Matthew 28:16; 1 Corinthians 15:6) Afterwards they again proceeded to Jerusalem, to witness the ascension from Mount Olivet, (Luke 24:50 ff.; Acts 1:1-12), and to be filled with the promised Spirit (Acts 2).—P. S.] Jesus manifested Himself [ἐφανέρωσενἑαυτόν].—Is an indication of His higher manner of appearing intended? De Wette finds in the expression the indication of a ghostly existence;—Luthardt that of a moving in a sphere of the invisible; this, Meyer impugns. The ghostliness, of course, cannot exclude His bodiliness, nor can His invisibility exclude His power of appearing. Nevertheless, we believe that something is meant here, other than the higher manner of appearing. In accordance with John’s method of using πάλιν, the word seems indicative, not of His third manifestation after the resurrection, but of a second new, higher manifestation of His glory at the Lake of Gennesareth, in contradistinction to that first manifestation of His glory at the same Lake, of which we have an account in chap. 6. At the Lake of Tiberias [ἐπὶῆςθαλάσσηςτῆςΤιβεριάδος]—The demonstrations of the Risen One still connect themselves with the old life-order of the disciples, especially the disciples in the wider sense. Agreeably to this order of life, from the Easter-feast [Passover] in Jerusalem they returned to Galilee, preparing themselves shortly afterwards for attendance upon the Feast of Pentecost. This old order of life, observed by the disciples, was, however, oh the point of being dissolved, inasmuch as they brought their festal journeys into harmony with the new interest. Accordingly, after the Paschal Feast, they remained yet a Sunday in Jerusalem, and returned thither a long while before the Pentecostal Feast. But for the intervening time, Jesus had appointed His principal meeting with the circle of disciples, in the broader sense of that term, in Galilee, and His promise was fulfilled according to Matthew 28; comp. 1 Corinthians 15. That meeting, however, was doubtless preceded by Jesus’ first manifestation in Galilee, at the lake, seven disciples being present. We find those busied again with their domestic trade; this circumstance points to the earliest period subsequent to their return home. They were, temporarily, without further occupation and instruction; they must wait for the Lord. The direction to tarry in Jerusalem (Luke 24:49) applies to the period following the ascension. Now He manifested Himself on this wise [ἐφανέρωσενδὲοὔτως],—In the following, stress is laid, not particularly upon Christ’s issuing forth from invisibility, but upon the miraculous manner in which He made Himself known to the Apostles, and communed with them. John 21:2. There were together [ἧσαςὁμοῦκ.τ. λ.. The witnesses of the Resurrection, the recipients of the Holy Ghost, returned to their humble work in Galilee, fishing together, probably for the last time! So festive joys and hard work alternate in the life of the Christian.—P. S.]—It is noteworthy that Thomas is here mentioned after Simon Peter, as the second disciple. Further we find Nathanael, or Bartholomew, and the two sons of Zebedee (John and James); together with these, two others of His disciples are enumerated without special designation. Our first inference would be, that these were Andrew, the brother of Peter, and Philip, the friend of Nathanael. From the circumstance that the disciples are not named, Meyer thinks fit to infer that they were disciples in the broader sense; John 21:1 seems to contradict this. John may have omitted the names of the two disciples for two reasons: 1. Because he would otherwise have been obliged to mention the sons of Zebedee by name, also; 2. Because, it was his desire, by speaking, at the close, of two disciples, to induce his readers to make the computation of the seven. Or is their anonymousness to serve the symbolical purpose of the Epilogue? Or was he unwilling, by naming the two, to give prominence to the four remaining ones, who had no part in this feast.? Something enigmatical still attaches to this anonymousness. Contemplative natures, such as John’s, are undoubtedly dreamily forgetful in certain moments and relations; it is, therefore, not necessary to infer the two nameless ones to have been disciples in the wider sense. Here only does he mention the sons of Zebedee together. John 21:3. Simon Peter: I go a fishing [ὑπάγωἁλιεύειν].—Peter is foremost in outside enterprises also. And thoroughly decided in his own mind, without asking others; I go.—We also go (come) with thee [ἐρχόμεθακαὶἡμεῖςσὺνσοί].—The expression of their cordial, friendly cleaving to him. And in that night they caught nothing [καὶἐνἐκείνητῇνυκτὶἐπίασανοὐδέν].—The night season is the most favorable time for catching fish, Luke 5:5. Yet there were unsuccessful nights; such an one was this. [A symbol of the utter failure of the fishers of men without Christ, as John 21:6 illustrates their abundant success with Christ.—P. S.] John 21:4. But when the morning had already dawned.—[According to the other reading, was about dawning. See Text. Note.—P. S.] It was the time of the dawning.—Jesus stood on the shore [ἔστηἸησ. εἰςτὸναἰγιαλόν]—He had taken His station on the shore (εἰς). They saw the form standing on the shore without recognizing it. Comp. John 20:14; Luke 24:16. John 21:5. Children.—Παιδία does not stand for the Johannean τεκνία (see John 13:33), not even in the sense of 1 John 2:13. Jesus, wishing in His character of the Unknown One to address the fishermen first as a stranger, speaks to them in the universal, familiar language of seafaring men, with the dignity, we may conjecture, of a superior: Young men! Boys! 2Ma 8:20; Nonnus, Euthym. Zigabenus; see Leben Jesu 2., p. 1712; Tholuck. ‘Have ye any relish? or, have ye anything to eat? [μήτιπροσφάγιονἔχετε].—Properly speaking, anything to eat with bread, προσφάγιον, [but especially fish, like the Attic ὄψον], namely, with their morning-bread, or breakfast. By the sea, fish were their usual προσφάγιον with their bread. According to Tholuck, [ they regard the questioner as some one wishing to purchase fish for his own breakfast. The j same is the opinion of Meyer; Jesus, on the other hand, takes for granted, as His last words I show us, that they have caught nothing, and intimates that if the contrary were the case He would not need to interpose. It is manifest, however, that the question is primarily intended i merely as an expression of human interest, and; for the introduction of what follows. John 21:6. Cast the net on the right side of the ship [βάλετεεἰςτὰδεξιὰμέρητοῦπλοίουτὸδίκτυον, καὶεὑρήδετε].——Comp. Luke 5:4. There- the Lord commands! the disciples to launch out into the deep, here to cast the net on the right side of the ship, whence we might conclude that they had drawn the net after them on the other side, or, discouraged, had drawn it up out of the water with the intention of steering towards the shore. No longer able to draw it up [οὐκέτιαὐτὸἑλκύσαιἴσχυον].—To draw the net up over the water, or to themselves (ἑλκύειν)—a feat naturally more difficult than to drag it, closed, after them in the water itself (σύειν). John 21:7. It is the Lord [ὉΚύριόςἐστιν]. John first recognizes Him, with the mind’s eye, by His manner of acting, and then, with the bodily ear, by His speech, as also, with the bodily glance, by His specific appearance. Simon Peter then hearing that it was the Lord.—Again the characteristic picture of the two disciples, as in John 20:4 ff. Each disciple is in advance of the other; John with the swift drawing of love, the eagle-glance of recognition, Peter with the spirited, decided act.—For he was naked [ἧνγὰργυμνός].—This assertion does not operate to the exclusion of the loin-cloth, or a fisherman’s shirt, even. Reverence, however, commands him to put on the upper garment, ἐπενδύτης (ξְ ?ςִ ?ιμ), fisher’s frock; this was without sleeves; it extended to the knees and was worn over the χιτών. He girded the garment on account of his swimming, for it was in this manner he reached the land; Grotius and others make him walk upon the water as aforetime. John 21:8. As it were two hundred cubits, or 300 feet=½ stadium. John 21:9. They saw a fire of coals laid.—[Βλέπουσινἀνθρακιὰνκειμένηνκαὶὀψάριονἐπικείμενονκαὶἄρτον].—The coal-fire was laid, broiling fish were spread thereon as a relish (ὀψάριον), and moreover they saw bread. For καὶἅρτον, we doubt not, is to be referred simply to βλέπουσιν. Mysterious preparation. Interpretations: 1. Brought forth out of nothing: Chrysostom, Theophylact, Grotius, Calov and others. 2. Prepared by the ministry of angels: Nice-phorus, Luthardt, etc. 3. Jesus either conveyed the meal thither Himself, or procured others to place it there: Meyer. Against this view, Tholuck: “Peter cannot have conveyed it thither, but neither can Jesus have procured it by means of others, if we must regard the perception of the Risen One not as an external, common, sensuous perception, but as conditioned by the inner sense” (?). Lόcke: “A lack of clearness invests the miracle with an air of wild adventure.” But had not Jesus friends every where along the lake? Could He not appear to them, and, in a mysterious manner, arrange something similar to the making ready of the she-ass in Bethphage and of the furnished room in Jerusalem? To this day Christ often, through the medium of wonderful providences, cares thus for the maintenance of His people by operating influentially upon foreboding souls. Here, therefore, as the Master and Father of the house, He has provided a breakfast for them (and that not merely in a vision). Comp. Luke 24:30. John 21:10. Bring of the fish.—[Ἐνέγκατεἀπὸτῶνὀψαπίωνὦνἐπιάσατενῦν].—Irrespective of the question whether the prepared repast is sufficient or not, they are commanded to add to it some of their own fish (which, however, they have caught in pursuance of His directions alone). Euthymius: In order to preserve the miraculous draught from all appearance of a φαντασὶα; Meyer: In order to the exigent completion of the meal. We think that it was likewise in order to the revelation of a new order of things. Here, as everywhere, the symbolical transparency of the story comes to light. John 21:11. An hundred and fifty and three [ἑκατὸνπεντήκοντατριῶν].—The Evangelist’s primary intention in reporting the number of the whole mass of great fishes was, manifestly, to render prominent the miraculousness of the fact that the net was nevertheless untorn. The trait that the number (153), as a number, is not symbolical, speaks very decidedly in favor of the historic truthfulness of the narrative in opposition to the assumption of its being a tradition (Strauss), or the work of an apocryphal narrator. The attempt has indeed been made to construe the number materially as a symbolical one. Ammonius: The number 100=the Gentiles, 50=the Jews, 3=the Trinity.Jerome and Kφstlin: Oppian counted 153 species offish, ergo the universality of species=the universality of the nations entering the net of the Gospel. “Which statement, as far as Oppian is concerned rests upon a mistake.” Recently, some one has even, conceived it to be his duty to work out the name: of Simon [son of] Jonas, by means of numerical allegory (Theol. Jahrb. 1854, p. 135). We do not consider the number as symbolical, but the numbering does appear to us in that light. The elect, who form the main element of the Church, are’ great and numbered fishes. And great and numerous as the elect of the congregated mass may be, they are not the ones who break the net Of the Church. It is the maxim of all the elect: first Christ, then the Church. John is moreover always fond of stating numbers; for instance, the 200 cubits, John 21:8; John 6:10, etc. John 21:12. (But) none of the disciples durst ask Him [οὐδεὶς (δὲ) ἐτόλματῶνμαθητῶνἐξετάσαιαὐτὸνΣὺτίςεἶ; εἰδότεςὄτιὁΚύριόςἐστιν].—The ἐτόλμα is not pleonastic (Kuinoel), not expressive of velle (Lampe), or of a fear of doubt (Augustine and others), but of reverence, in connection with a quiet, blissful assurance in regard to the presence of Jesus (εἰδότες, etc.). [Comp. John 4:27.—P. S.]. What was so particularly new to them at this manifestation of the Risen One was the feature of His partaking of a meal with them once more, like a house-father, after having miraculously prepared it for them. John 21:13. Jesus Cometh therefore [ἔρχεταιΙησοῦς].—As the disciples have been standing on this side of the coal fire, and have been called to approach by the Lord (δεῦτε, John 21:12), so the Lord has stood on the other side,—probably with that expression of reserve suitable t o the unknown person in whose character He wished first to meet them,—and now He advances nearer and more familiarly to them. And taketh the bread [καὶλαμβάνελτὸνἄρτον]—Why is the customary thanksgiving not mentioned? 1. Jesus wished to omit τὰἀνθρώπινα (Euthymius). 2. Luthardt; The table-communion of Jesus with His people is a silent one in this ζon. 3. Meyer: The Evangelist is not describing a regular repast, such as is spoken of, Luke 24:30, but a breakfast, that was partaken of standing. As it appears, it is also, however, the intention of Christ not to make Himself positively known as yet by the expression of the prayer of thanksgiving. And probably there is a symbolical reason for this. Peter who has denied Him, declaring that he knew Him not, must be made to recognize Him again, as the Anonymous One, by His conduct. At all events, the reserve of Jesus seems designed, by means of a continually increasing solemnity, to prepare the minds of the disciples for the ensuing act. Yet the manifestation has a purpose which touches the disciples in general; hence there follows a sort of conclusion, in order to the distinction of the general disciples meal from the conference with Peter, and that concerning Peter and John. John 21:14. This third time now Jesus manifested himself [ΤοῦτοἤδητρίτονἐφανερώθηἸησ. τοῖςμαθηταῖςἐγερθεὶςἐκνεκρῶν].—With these words John ranks the present manifestation of Jesus—as a more general one, allotted to the circle of disciples (incomplete though that was in numbers)—with the two manifestations recorded in chap. 20. Luthardt very properly remarks: “The appearings therein reported by John are by Paul summed up in εἶτατοῖςδὠδεκα, 1 Corinthians 15:5;’.’ and only the well-known fear of harmonizing induces Meyer to maintain the existence of a difference which he decides in John’s favor. Manifestly, Paul has no interest in citing repeatedly those appearances of Jesus of which, the same persons were repeatedly spectators, intending, as he does, not to count the appearings of the Risen One, but to mention the witnesses as witnesses. [Alford’s remarks on this section are in the line of Lange’s thoughts, and worthy of attention: “Without agreeing with all the allegorical interpretations of the Fathers, I cannot but see much depth and richness of meaning in this whole narrative. The Lord appears to His disciples busied about their occupation for their daily bread; speaks and acts in a manner wonderfully similar to His words and actions on a former memorable occasion, when we know that by their toiling long and taking nothing, but at His word enclosing a multitude of fishes, was set forth what should befall them as fishers of men. Can we miss that application at this far more important epoch of their apostolic mission? Besides, He graciously provides for their present wants, and invites them to be His guests: why but to show them that in their work hereafter they should never want but He would provide? And as connected with the parable, Matthew 13:47 ff., has the net enclosing a great multitude and yet not broken, no meaning? Has the ‘taking the bread and giving to them and the fish likewise,’ no meaning, which so closely binds together the miraculous feeding, and the institution of the Lord’s Supper with their future meetings in His name and round His Table? Any one who recognizes the teaching character of the acts of the Lord, can hardly cast all such applications from him;—and those who do not, have yet the first rudiments of the Gospels to learn.”—P. S.] AND ETHICAL1. The significant manner in which John, seemingly by way of supplement, relates this single and unique meeting of the Risen One with the seven disciples by the Galilean Sea, culling it out of all the later showings of Jesus after His resurrection and emphasizing the individual, momentous items of the event, induces us to suppose that from the first he designed it to form the conclusion of his Gospel. That he at the same time, however, intended this conclusion as an Epilogue to the Gospel, is proved by the precursive close of the resurrection-history and the Gospel in its narrower sense, John 20:31. If we now take into consideration how symbolically transparent the individual facts of this Epilogue are from beginning to end (especially the miraculous draught of fishes, the institution of Peter, the destination of John), we shall not hesitate to bring the Epilogue into an antithetic relation to the Prologue of the Gospel, John 1:1-18. And if John has there sketched Christ’s pre-temporal rule in the world, finally represented, as it was, by John the Baptist, the recognition is obvious that he has designed to sketch here, in a speaking, evangelic fact, Christ’s post-temporal rule in the world, represented by the heptade of the Apostles, particularly by the destination of Peter and John in respect of their typical import for the Church. See Leben Jesu 2 p. 1723. 2. The resolve of Peter, to go a fishing. A symbol of the beginning of the apostolic mission. The seven disciples in a round, sacred number, a symbol of the apostolic Church. The Church is subdivided into an external, conspicuous part, and a mysteriously withdrawing, nameless part. Next to Peter are ranged Thomas, the apostolic searcher, and Nathanael, the representative of apostolic sincerity and simplicity. The sons of Zebedee retire into the back-ground; there is intimated, moreover, a nearer fellowship of John which forms the innermost, hidden, vital focus of the Church. Unanimity is the character of this fellowship. They go out together to catch fish. Into the sea. The sea a symbol of the world, of the life of the nations. 3. The unsuccessful night. A symbol of the times of waiting, of the apparently fruitless struggling and hoping, whereby the laborers of God are tried in their work. These trials are connected with the fact that the disciples must first be freed from their self-consciousness and brought to the point of fully renouncing their work and relinquishing all expectation of shining results. These humiliations, however, are connected with the necessity for distinguishing between an activity based upon human authority (Peter) and one drawing its inspiration from the word of Christ. A human and legal running produces no abiding fruit. 4. The unknown Man on the shore. Christ is always near His apostolic Church on this side of eternity. From the shore of the other world—the beyond—His eye is leveled upon their actions. And they are conscious of this fact in its general sense, but they do not immediately recognize the Lord in the new, concrete forms of life in which He approaches them, wishing to prepare them an apostolic blessing. 5. Children, have ye nothing to eat? Whenever the spirit of a new life-form of Christ discourses with the Church concerning her poverty, want of success, unavailing labor and fatigue, the moment of a new bestowal of blessing is being prepared. 6. Cast the net. It is always the old net that Christ tells His people to cast in a new way, in a new direction. This, Christ’s instruction, alone indicates the true treasure of blessing, and obedience to Christ’s instruction obtains the miraculous draught. 7. Christ has first unknown operated upon the Church by need and opportunity. His instruction has become of weight to her in the form of a pious, religious exhortation, or as a friendly counsel, and she has accorded it her confidence. In the result of miraculous blessing, however, the Lord is known as the author of that blessing, The Johannean eagle-glance first recognizes the i Lord, Petrine fiery courage rushes through the flood to meet Him; the Church hastes to meet the Lord. But the true Petrine spirits in the Church are those who hurry on in advance of the Ship of the Church with their works and deeds. The one kind of spirits haste before it with the glance of recognition, the other by act; both, however, abide in. full connection with the Ship. 8. The ship not far from land. Not far from the throne of the Lord and His coming. 9. The coal-fire and repast on the shore. There are continually recurring festive moments in the Church—moments when Christ holds a feast with His people, as though upon the heights of the new world. The goal is momentarily reached in a grand triumph, a grand manifestation of Christ. We would call to mind the time of Christ’s resurrection itself, the year 70 (destruction of Jerusalem), 312; the years 1517, 1700, 1813 (the time of the liberation of Germany [eclipsed for Germany by 1870 and 1871]) and similar periods. In a wonderful way the Lord has ever prepared a refreshing repast for His weary ones. 10. Bring of the fish. The Lord prepares refreshment for His Church from a synthesis of His gift of blessing (for the preparation of which He has always ministering spirits) and their labor of blessing [blessed labor]. 11. Simon Peter drew the net to land. Be of use! forward! to Christ! is the watchword of the Biblical Peter. It is not his intention to seize the net for himself, but to place it at the disposal of Christ. The net was full of great fishes. The word of the Church first catches the elect, those in a special degree receptive of salvation. The number 153. On the different interpretations see Exeg. Note in loc. We, as was previously stated, consider as symbolical, not the number, but the numbering. The elect are counted, man for man. See Jeremiah 7:6; Revelation 7:4. Thus also are the Einherier, the heroes of Odin in Valhalla, counted, according to German Mythology. (‘ “Five hundred doors and forty more methinks are in Valhalla.—Eight hundred heroes through each door shall issue forth against the wok to combat.’ ” Therefore 800 X 540. Grimnismal). The Church is continually edified by the number of true subjective converts and believers who have received a new name, not by her unnumbered masses.—Nevertheless the net brake not. The truly faithful do not break the net. The great fishes swim lustily along in the draught of the net. The fishing net is broken by sea-reptiles, crabs, dead fish that weigh upon one point. Vet the true spiritual net of the eternal Church has never yet been broken. 12. Come and partake of the repast. Times of refreshing in the kingdom of God. Christ the Master of the House, who giveth the invitation to the feast. Reverential sense of His presence. Full sufficiency. It is a breakfast, however, in order to further labor. Blissful stillness of the Church in the Lord’s nearness and in the assurance of His presence. 13. The third time, or the “lanifestations of the glorified Christ ever more glorious. 14. The present section shows us the Apostles Peter and John in the characters peculiar to them; the following sketches their destiny and lot in the Church. AND See the Doct. Notes. Christ’s first meeting again with His disciples by the Sea of Galilee.—The old life in the new light of the resurrection: 1. The old persons (Peter, etc.); 2. the old occupation (going a fishing); 3. the old surroundings (the Sea of Galilee); 4. the old vicissitudes and the old need (caught nothing); 5. the old connection (Christ); 6. the old miracles (the draught of fishes); 7. the old feasts (the repast). Everything in a new light of life, peace and hope.—Christ at the sea of Galilee, formerly and now: 1. The sea formerly the scene of His first miracles, acts and sufferings; 2. now the mirror of His glory. The two Easter-feasts in Galilee. 1. The Apostles’ feast by the sea; 2. the Church’s feast on the mountain (Matthew 28.).—Christ manifests Himself to the Apostles by the sea; for they must plunge into the sea of nations; to the Church, in the wider sense, on the mountain, for it is to be the firm city, stablished upon the mountain of the Lord.—The disciples, as sons of the resurrection, in their true unanimity: 1. How harmonious in their differences (all gladly following the foot of Peter, the glance of John). They all confess their need unanimously: “No;” but without complaint, John 21:5. There is no braggart among them and none who is disheartened. They are obedient in unison. Their faces are all set toward the Lord in one love; they are all filled and made happy with the one thought of His presence. 2. How rich in life and manifold in their unanimity (Peter, John: the disciples in the ship).—The Kisen One in the gradualness of His glorious manifestation : 1. The strange form in the morning twilight on the shore; 2. the sympathizing question; 3. the confident direction; 4. the mysterious preparation of a fire; 5. the condescending community of goods (bring hither of the fish); 6. the glorious invitation; 7. the complete manifestation in its familiarity and sublimity.—Christ considered in respect to the riches of His life amongst His people: 1. Mysterious, and familiar; 2. Master and Servant; 3. Host and Guest; 4. a heavenly Apparition and a festive Companion.—Transformation of the old form of life into the new in the kingdom of the Kisen One: 1. The old calling becomes a new symbol of life; 2. the old home a new vestibule of heaven; 3. the old need a new divine blessing; 4. the old labor a new religious service; 5. the old partnership a new fellowship in Christ; 6. the old discipleship a new apostolate.—The heavenly refreshment of the disciples, the preparation for a solemn conversation and revelation. Starke: Osiander: Handicrafts are well-pleasing to God; and godly craftsmen should assist one another in love and harmony, Psalms 128:1-2; Romans 16:1-2.—Cramer: A work goes on well and speedily when we set about it with united hands and hearts. Concord nourishes men, discord consumes them, Galatians 5:15.—Temptation faileth not to be present in the assemblies of believers, Sir 2:1.—It seemeth often unto godly Christians as if their diligence and labor were utterly in vain, and yet such seasons are but meant by God for the trial of their faith, Isaiah 65:23.—Osiander: God knoweth the right time.—Zeisius: Although Jesus is still so near to His people, His presence is not always recognized by them, nor the secret grace heeded.—God’s children are oft-times at a loss for food, but their Heavenly Father remedieth their case and nourisheth them, Matthew 6:26-27.—But He whose name is called Counsellor (Isaiah 9:6), gave them good counsel as to how they should do.—Behold how Jesus can by His blessing in an instant repay His people for the painful toil that they have deemed lost.—Zeisius: When we faithfully wait on our calling, the Lord careth for our preservation meanwhile; and when no more means are in our possession, He can quickly provide them.—Hedinger: How friendly and gracious are the ways of the Lord! even temporal blessings must speak of His love, Psalms 25:10.—Zeisius: The wonder-doing hand of the Lord knoweth neither measure nor limit, Psalms 106:28.—Ibid.: Unto our bodies, after toil and labor endured, the Lord doth grant needful refreshment; and after the brief toilsomeness of this time, He will in heaven eternally regale our souls.—Hedinger: Open, dear soul! the Lord would sup with thee, Revelation 3:20,—Zeisius: So many appearances of the risen Jesus; so many seals of our perfect redemption and reconciliation with God, Romans 4:24. Gerlach: The time was still when they, the Holy Ghost not yet being poured out upon them, must become sensible of the impotence of their own strength; Jesus still stood, like One partially unknown to them, beside their own efforts.—Braune: “But how the Redeemer hath hallowed all things into symbols of the universal activity incumbent upon us all in His kingdom! The prince and his vicegerents, the mighty and armed warrior, the calculating merchant, the intelligent husbandman, the careful housefather, I the tender mother, the faithful servant, the son, acquainted with his father’s will, the hospitable ouseholder, the peaceful gardener,—everything is drawn into this holy circle of refreshing pictures” (Schleiermacher).—In every calling Christ and His Spirit may be obtained, just in that calling; men need not fly to woods, vales, cloisters. The odor of sanctity can diffuse itself about every man’s profession as it did over the occupation of the disciples at the sea of Gennesaret.—At that draught [Luke 5:4 ff.] Peter said: “Lord, depart from me, I am a sinful man;” he said this in the weakness of his faith and of his knowledge, and in the confusion of his mind, as though the nearness of the Holy One brought danger to him. This feeling he had surmounted; though conscious still of being a sinful man, he was more strongly convinced that the proximity of Jesus is always and everywhere salutary.—Of what value was the intimation of the calm John: “It is the Lord!” To note and point out the divine in life is a signal service of love.—Yea, the Lord is my Shepherd, I shall not want (Psalms 23:1). Come, Lord Jesus, be our Guest; bless what Thou hast bestowed!Gossner: The right side is that of the elect. When the net is cast on that side, the fish enter into the net of themselves. The blessing that God puts in the mouth of the preacher along with His word, is really the source of all the fruit he produces.—It is the Lord! said the disciple whom Jesus loved,—he knew His Master first. A friend knows his friend by his walk, his step; so John knew the Lord by the fortunate draught of fishes. Ah, thought lie, the Lord hath played us this loving trick; I know Him, that is His way.—Peter forgot and deserted the net with the multitude of fishes—for all the trouble he had had with, it—so soon as he saw his Lord again and knew Him.—Whoso cleaveth so to the Lord and feeleth himself to be so attracted by Him that he can leave all for the Lord’s sake, he it is that loveth Him, John 21:7.—There is the table already spread. This was to paint His tender Providence vividly before their eyes, and to strengthen them in the faith, preparatory to their future calling, so that they might never feel afraid of lacking what was needful.—The net of the Church breaketh not—though never so many great fishes be in it—when it is drawn at the command of Jesus and by apostolic hands. But when men arbitrarily pull at, the net, and one pulleth right and another left, it breaketh. And now, alas! what men usually call the net of the Lord is sorely broken. But the Lord hath His net, the which is not broken. The Lord knoweth His own.—Jesus here manifests Himself as the Host, the House-father of His little Church. Heubner: Peter tarrieth not; he showeth his ardent love. Peter’s natural disposition now became sanctified by love to Jesus. Thus shall all nature be sanctified through grace. [Craven: From Augustine: John 21:3. The Apostles were not forbidden by their apostle-ship from earning their livelihood by a lawful craft, provided they had no other means of livelihood. John 21:11. In the first draught [Luke 5:6] the net was broken, to signify schisms; but here, to show that in that perfect peace of the blessed there would be no schisms, the Evangelist continues, And for all they were so great, yet was not the net broken.——From Chrysostom: John 21:7. The recognition of Jesus brings out Peter and John in their different tempers of mind; the one fervid, the other sublime; the one ready, the other penetrating.——From Gregory: John 21:3, The craft which was exercised without sin before conversion, was no sin after it; wherefore after his conversion Peter returned to fishing; but Matthew sat not down again at the receipt of custom.—They caught nothing; the fishing was made to be very unlucky, in order to raise their astonishment at the miracle after. John 21:4. The disciples, inasmuch as they were still upon the waves of this mortal life, were laboring on the sea; but the Redeemer, having by His resurrection thrown off the corruption of the flesh, stood upon the shore.——From Theophylact: John 21:3. In the night-time, before the presence of the Sun, Christ, the Prophets took nothing; for though they endeavored to correct the people, yet these often fell into idolatry. [From Burkitt: John 21:1. Jerusalem now becomes a forsaken place, a people abandoned to destruction: such places wherein Christ is most welcome to preach, shall be most honored with His presence. John 21:2-3. All human labors and endeavors are in vain, unless Christ, by His presence and blessing, crown them with success. John 21:4. Christ is not always discerned by us when He is present with us; it is a double mercy to enjoy His company, and to know indeed that it is He. John 21:6. When Christ is about to do great things for His people, yet will He have them exert all possible endeavors of their own; and the want of former success must not discourage from future endeavors. John 21:7. Cast himself into the sea; It is not a sea of water, no, nor seas of blood, that can keep a zealous soul at a distance from Christ. John 21:12-14. Christ is still bone of our bone, and flesh of our flesh; He has taken possession of heaven in our nature, sitting there in our glorified humanity, clothed with that body which hung in its blood upon the cross. [From M. Henry: John 21:1-14. Christ has many ways of making Himself known to His people; usually in His ordinances, but sometimes by His Spirit; He visits them when they are employed in common business., John 21:2. It is good for the disciples of Christ to be much together; not only in solemn religious assemblies, but in common conversation, and about common business; thus they both testify and increase their affection to, and delight in each other, and edify one another both by discourse and example.—Thomas; It is well, if losses by our neglects make us more careful afterward not to slip opportunities. John 21:3. It was commendable in them to go a-fishing; for they did it 1. To redeem time, and not be idle; 2. That they might help to maintain themselves, and not be burthen-some to any,—They caught nothing; Even good men may come short of desired success in their honest undertakings: we may be in the way of our duty, and yet not prosper. John 21:4. Jesus stood on the shore; Christ’s time of making Himself known to His people is when they are most at a loss: When they think they have lost themselves, He will let them know that they have not lost Him.—It is a comfort to us, when our passage is rough and stormy, that our Master is at shore, and we are hastening to Him.—The disciples knew not that it was Jesus; Christ is often nearer us than we think lie is, and so we shall find afterward, to our comfort. John 21:5. Christ takes cognizance of the temporal wants of His people, and has promised them not only grace sufficient, but food convenient.—Christ looks into the cottages of the poor, and asks, Children, have ye any meat? —He has herein set us an example of compassionate concern for our brethren; there are many poor householders disabled for labor, or disappointed in it, that are reduced to straits, whom the rich should inquire after thus, Have ye any meat? For the most necessitous are commonly the least clamorous. John 21:6. The right side; Divine Providence extends itself to things most minute and contingent.—Those that are humble, diligent, and patient, though their labors may be crossed, shall be crowned; they sometimes live to see their affairs take a happy turn after many struggles and fruitless attempts.—There is nothing lost by observing Christ’s orders.—Those are likely to speed well that follow the rule of the Word, the guidance of the Spirit, and the intimations of Providence; for that is casting the net on the right side of the ship.—When we are most at a loss, Jehovah-Jireh—the Lord will provide.—This miracle could not but put Peter in mind of a former one, Luke 5:4, etc.; later favors are designed to bring to mind former favors.—An encouragement to Christ’s ministers to continue their diligence in their work; one happy draught, at length, may be sufficient to repay many years’ toil at the Gospel net. John 21:7. They that have been with Jesus will be willing to swim through a stormy sea, a sea of blood, to come to Him.John 21:7-13. God dispenses His gifts variously: some excel, as Peter and John; others are but ordinary disciples;—yet both the eminent and the obscure shall sit down together with Christ in glory; nay, and perhaps, the last shall be first;—of those that do excel, some, like John, are eminently contemplative; others, like Peter, eminently active and courageous; some are useful as the Church’s eyes, others as the Church’s hands, and all for the good of the body.—If all the disciples had done as Peter did, what had become of their fish and their nets? And yet if Peter had done as they did, we had wanted this instance of holy zeal. Christ was well pleased with both, and so must we be.—There are several ways of bringing Christ’s disciples to shore to Him from off the sea of this world; some are I brought to Him by a violent death, as the martyrs, who threw themselves into the sea, in their zeal for Christ; others are brought to Him by a natural death, dragging the net, which is less terrible [but also less speedy]; but both meet at length on the safe and quiet shore with Christ. John 21:10. Christ would hereby teach us to use what we have; the benefits He bestows upon us are not to be buried and laid up, but to be used and laid out.—Ministers, who are fishers of men, must bring all they catch to their Master. John 21:11. The net of the Gospel has enclosed multitudes, three thousand in one day, and yet is not broken; it is still as mighty as ever to bring souls to God. John 21:12. Groundless doubts must be stifled, and not started.John 21:14. It is good to keep account of Christ’s gracious visits; for He keeps account of them, and they will be remembered against ns, if we walk unworthily of them. This is now the third; have we made a due improvement of the first and second? See 2 Corinthians 12:14. This is the third, perhaps it may be the last. [From Scott: John 21:1-14. Christ often permits His (ministerial) servants to labor for a time without visible success, to prove their faith and patience, to render them more observant of His directions, or more simply dependent on His assistance; and that their usefulness, when vouchsafed, may more evidently appear to be His work.——From A Plain Commentary (Oxford): John 21:2. Never more will it be said that “Thomas, one of the Twelve, called Didymus, was not with them when Jesus came!”—“Wisdom” (that is Christ), is about to “build her House:” wherefore “she hath hewn out her seven pillars.” Proverbs 9:1; comp. Galatians 2:9. John 21:3. Verily, the discovery that their Lord and their God could suffer the men He loved to remain in such a low state and precarious condition, should teach Christians for evermore to submit cheerfully to poverty, as well as to behold with a feeling akin to reverence, the brother of low degree.—They caught nothing; The “ministers and stewards of His mysteries,” in particular, are hereby taught that “except the Lord build the House, their labor is but lost that build it.” John 21:4. When the morning was now come,—Jesus stood on the shore; It was a symbol of the Eternal Morning, when Jesus (who is “the hope of them that remain in the broad sea!” Psalms 65:5) will at last appear: for the Church as yet waiteth, “until the day break and the shadows flee away.” No longer in the ship with His disciples,—He is seen standing on the fixed immovable shore! Thither “they shall go to Him, but thence He shall not return to them.”—Knew not that it was Jesus; The eyes of all “were holden that they should not know Him.” So enveloped was His risen Body with something that was Divine, something which He brought from the grave,—that it allowed not of human affection, but Divine Love to discern it. And it was done to accustom them to walk by faith, and not by sight. For thus it was that our Saviour was recognized by St. John now. The miracle was to be the evidence that it was He. John 21:6. The season for fishing prescribed by Nature, had already expired: it was now the season appointed by Grace. In truth, man’s extremity is ever found to be God’s opportunity. In the meantime, take notice that the necessity of human exertion is not to be superseded by the promise of Divine help. Paul must plant, and Apollos water, though God must give all the increase.—Not only when God commands, but as God directs, must the net be thrown, if we would, secure the prize we long for.—In things to all appearance indifferent, a Divine command overcomes all other considerations, and must be implicitly obeyed, if we would inherit a blessing. John 21:7. “It is St. John whose instinct of love penetrates the disguise, and tells Peter that it is the Lord. It might strike the recollection of both, how a few short years before, the same Lord had, in His mortal days, given a similar direction,—a like miraculous draught following: though then, they drew the net; but now they could not: then, the net brake; but now, for all the greater multitude of fishes, when it was drawn to land, the net was unbroken: then, the ship began to sink, and Simon Peter, affrighted, besought the Lord to depart from him, a sinful man; whereas now, as soon as ha heard that it was the Lord, and believed it was so, he plunged into the water to go to Him. These circumstances, symbolizing the greater power of the risen Lord, or rather, the greater power He obtained for the fishers of men when the mysteries of His Redemption were accomplished,—were not lost on St. John; who, ever calmer than St. Peter, while his emotions were the deepest, tranquilly remained with the rest in the vessel, -till it was brought to shore.” (Dr. W. H. Mill). John 21:8. Two hundred cubits; “So near are we, even in this troublous world, to the land of Everlasting Rest,” and to Him who there abideth. John 21:12. What did this meal signify but that heavenly banquet, of which it is promised that the redeemed shall partake hereafter, when they shall “sit down with Abraham, and Isaac, and Jacob, in the kingdom of heaven?” John 21:13. The disciples do not help themselves to food. It is still Christ that taketh,—Christ that giveth! All the spiritual refreshment of heaven will still be His gift! The very bliss of the Saints will be altogether from Him!…. And yet, besides the fish miraculously provided for the refreshment of the disciples, we find that, they were fed with some of the fish which they had themselves recently caught (John 21:10). O mystery of Divine Love, in reserve for those who have faithfully fed the flock of Christ committed to their care; if, throughout the ages, they shall be conscious of an augmentation of bliss from the souls of those to whom in life it was their privilege to minister! [From Barnes: John 21:2-3. God has made employment indispensable to man, and if the field of labor is not open in one way, ministers should seek it in another.——From Jacobus: John 21:3. As fishers of men they would toil all night, and without Christ they could do nothing. John 21:6. Christian ministers, as fishers of men, must follow His positive directions as to when and where and how, without first demanding the why and wherefore.John 21:17. Love does always make the sweetest discoveries of Christ; Zeal plunges even into the sea to reach (through fire and through water) the Master. John 21:10. Thus it is that His grace goes before, and our works follow. Happy day! when Christ’s ministers may bring to heaven of the multitudes whom they have caught by His grace. John 21:11. So is it with the multitudes which we may catch as fishers of men. The “hundred and forty and four thousand” will all be brought safe to heaven.—From Owen: John 21:3. Immediately; They were prompt and energetic men, who would not let the hours of the night—the most advantageous time for fishing—pass away unimproved, when once they had made up their mind to spend it in the manner here spoken of. [They were also persevering men. E. R. C. ] John 21:7. Girt his fisher’s coat unto him; Note “the reverence which observes, even at such a moment of excited feeling, the petty proprieties of clothing.” (Stier with Draeseke.) John 21:9-12. This twofold miracle of the draught of fishes, and the broiled fish and bread made ready for their repast when their labors were ended, symbolize the fidelity, zeal, and reliance upon Christ for success, with which the apostles and all who succeed them in the ministry of the word, were to labor in the work of saving souls, and the watchful providence with which He in whose service they are engaged, will supply all their temporal and spiritual wants.—“A type of that nearness and fellowship, to which the Lord would in future times condescend in His invisible relations with His people.” (Stier.)—“The great and glorious ingathering from the sea of nations, which in the latter day shall be made to the Lord Jesus Christ, the end of which will be a feast of most gracious fellowship with Him, an antitype of the Lord’s Supper, an early meal of the great resurrection morning which will be followed by a permanent day of eternal joy.” (Stier.)] Footnotes: John 21:1.—[’Ιησοῦς is retained by Tischend., Treg., Westc, in accordance with B. C, text. roc.; ὁ ’Ιησοῦς by Lachm., in accordance with N. A. L. X., etc. Alford omits it with D. M. There is no good reason for its omission, but there is for its insertion in a reading lesson beginning with ἐφανέρωσε—P. S.] John 21:3.—Εὐθύς [A. C.3 P. text, rec is to lie omitted in accordance with [N.] B. C D. L. X. A., etc.John 21:4.—The reading γινομένης instead of γενομένης, in accordance with C. E. L. (Tischendorf), is probably exegetical. The dawn may already have come, without its being yet day or morning. [Lachmann and Alford road γενομένης, (cum mane factum esset), which is supported by Cod. Sin., but Tregelles, Tischendorf, ed. 8., and Westcott and Hort γινομένης (cum mane esset futurum), which is supported by A. B. C*. E. L. (γειν A. B.). See Tischend — P. S.] John 21:4.—The preposition είς is supported by B. C. B., etc., Tischendorf; ἐπί by A. D. L., etc., Lachmann, Sin. Meyer: “ἐπί would more readily than εἰς be added as a gloss.” John 21:11.—γῆν in accordance with A. C. L. P. X. A., Lachmann, Tischendorf. This may be a correction of the Recepta ἐπὶτὴςγὴςγὴς E. G. K. M, etc.,John 21:12.—[Lange: esset das Morgenhrot, eat the morning meal, ἀριστάω is to take an early meal (ἀ ?̓ριστον, prandium, breakfast or lunch), before the δεῖπνον or chief meal (corresponding to our dinner), which was taken late in the afternoon or early in the evening, after the heat of the day was over, as is the custom now in largo cities, as Paris, London, New York.— P. S.] John 21:12.—[The text, rec, with ΰ. A. D. L, inserts δέ after οὐδείς, and Tischendorf (ed. 8., not before) retains it. Alford and Westcott reject it in accordance with B. C—P. S.] [Meyer regards the whole of John 21 as genuine, with the exception of Joh 21:25, (on which see below), and ably refutes the objections which, since Grotius, have been raised against the Johannean authorship.—P.S.] [No single English word adequately translates the Greek προσφάγιον and its German equivalent Zukost. The idea is that of some article of food added to what is regarded as the substantial part of the meal. The term relish, in one of its significations, more nearly expresses it than any other English word.—P. S.]. [Other mystical explanations of the number in Wordsworth in loc, who makes 153 expressive of the jubilee of the true Israel of beatified saints in heaven. Comp. also Meyer, p. 673. Calvin cuts off all such, calculations by the sober remark: Quantum ad piscium numerum spectat, non est aliquod in eo quζrendvim mystenium—P.S.] A German blessing invoked before meals: “Komm’, Herr Jcsu, sei unser Gast,Und segne was Du uns bescheret hast.” II THE RULE OF CHRIST IN HIS CHURCH, BY THE , WALK AND MARTYR–FATE OF PETER, OR THE DESTINY OF THE CHURCH IN RESPECT OF HER AND John 21:15-1915 So when they had dined [breakfasted, or, taken their morning meal, ὴρίστησαν], Jesus saith to Simon Peter, Simon, son of Jonas [John, Ἰωἀννου], lovest [ὰγαπᾶς] thou me more than these? He saith unto him, Yea, Lord; thou knowest that I love [dearly love, φιλῶ ?] thee. He saith unto him, Feed [βὐσκε] my lambs [τὰἄρνίαμου]. 16He saith to him again the [a] second time [δεύτερον], Simon, son of Jonas [John], lovest [ἀγαπᾶς] thou me? He saith unto him, Yea, Lord; thou knowest that I [dearly] love [φιλῶ ?] thee. He saith unto him, Feed [keep, tend, ποίμαινε] my sheep [τὰπρόβατἀμου]. 17He saith unto him the third time [τὸτρίτον], Simon, son of Jonas [John], lovest thou me [dearly, φιλεῖςμε]? Peter was grieved because he said unto him the third time, Lovest thou me? [dearly, φιλεῖςμε;] And he said unto him, Lord, thou knowest all things; thou knowest that I love thee [dearly, φιλῶσε]. Jesus saith unto him, Feed [βόσκε] my sheep [my little sheep, sheeplings, τὰπροβάτιάμου]. 18Verily, verily, I say unto thee, When thou wast young, thou girdedst [didst gird] thyself, and walkedst [and didst walk] whither thou wouldest: but when thou shalt be old, thou shalt stretch forth thy hands, and another shall gird thee, and carry thee whither thou wouldest not. 19 This spake he signifying by what [kind or manner of] death he should [was to] glorify God. And when he had spoken this [And having spoken this,] he saith unto him, Follow me. AND CRITICALgeneral remarksThe following transaction manifestly has reference to the three-fold denial of Peter, and takes the form of an apostolico-ethical trial, its object being the re-institution of that disciple. [It is well to read the questions of our Lord, the answers of Peter, and the commands of Christ in parallel columns: Questions.Answers.I.Ἀγαπᾶ ?̣ςμεπλεῖοντούτων;Ναί, Κύριε, σὺοἶδαςὃτιφιλῶσε.II.̓Αγαπᾶ ?̣ςμε;Ναί, Κύριε, σὺοἶδαζό́τιφιλῶσε.III.Φιλεῖςμε;Κύριε, πάντασὺοἶδας, σὺγινώσκειζό́τιφιλῶσε.CommandsI.Βόσκετὰἀρνίαμου.II.ΙΙοίμανετὰπρόβατάμου.III.Βόσκετὰπροβάτιάμου.—P.S.]The first consideration of significance is the three-fold inquiry of jesus together with the three replies of peter,—the counterpart of the three-fold temptation and denial. [This allusion (comp. John 13:38) is acknowledged by Augustine (“redditur negationi trinζ trina confessio, ne minus amori lingua serviat quam timori”), Wetstein (“ut illi occasionem prζberet, triplicis abnegationis maculam triplici professione eluendi”), Bengel (who, in his brief, pointed way, remarks to τὸτρίτον, John 21:17 : “numerus decretorius”), Meyer, Alford, Godet, and others. It is vainly denied by Hengstonberg, who strangely says (iii. 342), that there is, in this whole section, not the least reference to Peter’s denial, as this was completely done away with long before! This shows the disqualification of this harsh and angular, though learned and orthodox, divine to appreciate the nice and delicately fibred constitution of this Gospel.—P. S.] Then the three-fold address, “simon, son of Jonas [John, see Text. Note.—P. S.]. Assuredly this is not simply an expression of solemnity and deeply stirred love (Meyer),—it is intended as a reminder of’ the natural descent and weakness of Peter which were productive of his fall; this meaning, results surely from the antithesis, Matthew 16:17-18 : Simon, son of Jonas [John], and Peter, (see Comm. on Matthew, chap. 10 and chap. 16). Farther the Shadings of the thrie-repeated Question: (1) First, “lovest thou Me more than these love Me,”—with reference to the vow of Peter: “Though all should be offended in Thee,” etc., then the simple: “Lovest thou Me?” for the second and the third time. (2) The change ἀγαπᾶ ?̣ςμε; ἀγαπᾶ ?̣ςμε; φιλεῖςμε, i.e. “Lovest thou Me (ethically)?” “Art thou attached to Me as a friend (personally)?” The last question a searching entering into the twice-repeated assurance of Peter: φιλῶσε. Still farther the answers of Peter. After the first question, he avoids the danger of setting himself above his fellow-disciples, by evading the comparative in Jesus’ question; on the other hand he specializes the ἀγαπᾶ ?̣ς by replying: φιλῶσε. It is a modification, in which he expresses himself partly with more humility, partly with more fervor, as if he meant to say: though I should be wanting in the divine measure of love that belongeth to Thee, I nevertheless am personally attched to Thee from the bottom of my heart. He answers the second question in the same manner. At the third question of Jesus, he is grieved that Jesus asks him for the third time: φιλεῖςμε; and strengthens his former declarations, “Lord, Thou knowest it!” by the word: “Lord, Thou knowest all things, Thou knowest that I love Thee.” Of a very special significance, however, are the three Deliverances of the Lord in reply to the three answers of Peter: 1. βόσκετὰἀρνίαμου, 2. ποίμαινετὰπρόβατάμου, 3. βόσκετὰπροβάτιάμου. The nice, and yet important gradations in the distinction between ἀρνία, lambs, and πρόβατα, full-grown sheep, and προβάτια [see the Text. Notes], full-grown sheep which are, nevertheless, to be treated tenderly like lambs; and the distinction between βόσκειν, to lead to pasture, to provide with food, and ποιμαίνειν, to guide and govern as a shepherd. The first and most necessary thing (intellectually it is also the easiest, though it presents peculiar difficulties to an imperious, high-soaring mind) is this: to provide for the lambs, i.e., those of tender age in the faith, with spiritual sustenance, to lead them to the spiritual pasture (the office of a catechist). It is more difficult to guard and guide the full-grown sheep,—mature Christians,—to make them seek the right pasture, find the true spiritual food; most difficult of all: to offer to these fullaged members appropriate spiritual food. The Romish Peter has made a κατακυριεύειν of the βόσκειν and ποιμαίνειν; he has treated the προβάτια as ἀρνία, and has so thoroughly forgotten the instruction to provide spiritual nourishment for the πρόβατα, even as βόσκων, as to have, on the contrary, continually withdrawn such nourishment from them more and more, and forbidden it under various penalties. John 21:15. Simon, son of John [ΣίμωνἸωάννου. Lange reads Jonas; but see my Text. Notes and Comm. on Matthew 16:17, p. 295, footnote.—P. S.] The objections of Meyer and even Tholuck: “Yet not as though the apostolic name were refused him (De Wette, Stier),” are without proof. According to them, the thrice-repeated address: “Simon, son of Jonas,” [John], is merely expressive of solemnity. Solemnity, however, is always given with the momentous thought. [Godet agrees with Lange, who is right, that the address Simon, son of John, is intended to recall his natural character as distinct from that implied in his new and official name Simon Peter. So also Alford: “Σίμων̓Ιωάννου a reminiscence probably of his own name and parentage, as distinguished from his apostolic name of honor, Cephas, or Peter, see John 1:43. Thus we have Σ. Βαριωνᾶ, Matthew 16:17, connected with the mention of his natural state of flesh and blood, which had not revealed to him the great truth just confessed—and Luke 22:31, ‘Simon, Simon,’ when he is reminded of his natural weakness. See also Mark 14:37, and Matthew 17:25, where the significance is not so plain.”—P. S.] Lovest thou Me more than these [ἀγαπᾶ ?̣ςμεπλέοντούτων].—Strange interpretation: than these things, namely those appertaining to a fisher’s life, τούτων construed as neuter, Bolten. The reference of the expression to Peter’s setting up of himself above his fellow-Apostles, Matthew 26:33, is groundlessly denied by Meyer. [Bengel: Antea Petrus se plus his prζtiturum dixerat (Matthew 26:33), nunc autem simpliciter dicit ‘amo te;’ non addit, ‘plus his.’ ” So also Godet.—P. S.] Thou knowest that I love Thee [ΝαὶΚύριε, σὺοἶδαςό́τιΦιλῶσε].—Φιλῶσε—threefold expression of humility: 1. No making of comparisons. 2. Appeal to the knowledge of Christ. 3. Choice of the term of personal attachment. [Observe that the Lord twice asks ἀγαπᾶ ?̣ςμε, and once φιλεῖςμε, while Peter three times assures the Lord φιλῶσε. On the difference of the two terms, see the Text. Notes, and Dr. Lange’s preceding general remarks, to which I will add those of a few other commentators. Meyer: “Peter in his answer puts in the place of the ἀγαπᾶ ?̣ς (diligis) of the question, the expression of the personal heart-motion φιλῶ (amo, comp. John 11:3; John 11:5; John 20:2), injustice to his inmost feeling.” Alford: “The distinction between ἀγαπᾶν and φιλειν must not here be lost sight of, nor must we superficially say with Grotius, ‘Promiscuie hic usurpavit Johannes ἀγαπᾶν, et φιλειν ut mox βόσκειν et ποιμαίνειν (see below.). Neque hic quζrendas sunt sublititates.” If so, why do the Lord’s two first questions contain ἀγαπᾶ ?̣ς while Peter’s answers have φιλῶ ?—whereas the third time the question and answer both have φιλεῖν? This does not look like accident. The distinction seems to be that ἀγαπᾶν is more used of that reverential love, grounded on high graces of character, which is borne towards God and man by the child of God;—whereas φιλεῖν expresses more the personal love of human affection. Peter therefore uses a less exalted word, and one implying a consciousness of his own weakness, but a persuasion and deep feeling of personal love. (Hence it will be seen that in the sublimest relations, where, all perfections existing, love can only be personal, φιλεῖν only can be used, see John 5:20). Then in the third question the Lord adopts the word of Peter’s answer, the closer to press the meaning of it home to him.” Godet: “Le terme ἀγαπᾶν indique l’ amour complet, profond, ιternel, le mot φιλεῖν designe le simple attachement personnel, l’inclination affectueuse. Ce dernier sentiment, il (Pierre) se l’attribue sans hesiter.” Wordsworth: “Formerly Peter had professed ἀγαπᾶν, but it proved to be only a shortlived φιλεῖν. Now he only professes φιλεῖν, but Christ knows that it will be a long-lived ἀγαπᾶν, an ἀγἀπη in old age (John 21:18), an ἀγάπη stronger than death.”—P. S.] Feed My little lambs. [Or lambkins (ἀρνἶον dimint. of ἀρήν), Βόσκετὰἀρνίμου Pasce agnos meos. Christ speaks thus as the Arch-Shepherd (ἀρχιποιμήν (1 Peter 5:4). Comp. here John 21:16 : ΙΙοίμανε (a more comprehensive term which includes βόσκειν) τὰπρόβοτάμου, Custodi oves meas, Tend My sheep; and John 21:17 : Βόσκετὰπροβάτιάμου, Pasce oviculas meas, Feed My sheeplings. See Text. Note. How Peter understood the Lord’s trust, he shows himself, 1 Peter 5:2-3.—P. S.]—Love to Jesus, therefore, is the condition of the pastoral office to which he is now re-appointed. We may not, with Tholuck, obliterate the distinction of βόσκειν and ποιμαίνειν. ΙΙοιμαίνειν is undoubtedly akin to regere (Bellarmine and Corn a Lapide), but in an evangelical sense.—Τὰἀρνία, Revelation 5:6; not synonymous with τὰπρόβατα, as Tholuck is inclined to suppose. The distinctions of Bellarmine and other Roman Catholic exegetes, according to whom the lambs denote the laity, the sheep the clergy, must undoubtedly be rejected; that distinctions do exist, however, is proved even by Isaiah 40:11, and the distinction between immature and mature believers is obvious (Euthym. Zig., Wetstein and others); it suffers no diminution by the reading τὰπροβάτια in the third injunction, but only still further modification. Luthardt’s interpretation: The tending of individuals, care of the whole flock, training up of individuals for the whole flock, is etymologically unfounded. [Alford likewise insists on the nice shadings of meaning in the terms here used (on which see Text. Note): “We can hardly with any deep insight into the text hold βόσκειν and ποιμαίνειν to be synonymous (Grot. above, Lόcke, De Wette, Trench), or ἀρνία, πρόβατα, and προβάτια. The sayings of the Lord have not surely been so carelessly reported as this would assume. Every thing here speaks for a gradation of meaning. The variety of reading certainly makes it difficult to point out exactly the steps of that gradation, and unnecessary to follow the various interpreters in their assignment of them: but that there is such, may be seen from Isaiah 40:11 : 1 John 2:12-13. Perhaps the feeding of the lambs was the furnishing the apostolic testimony of the resurrection and facts of the Lord’s life on earth to the first converts; The shepherding or ruling the sheep, the subsequent government of the Church as shown forth in the early part of the Acts; The feeding of the πορβάτια, the choicest, the loved of the flock, the furnishing the now maturer Church of Christ with the wholesome food of the doctrine contained in his Epistles. But those must strangely miss the whole sense, who dream of an exclusive primatial power here granted or confirmed to him. A sufficient refutation of this silly idea, if it needed any other than the ἐλυπήθη of this passage, is found in the συμπρεσβὐτεροι of 1 Peter 5:1, where he refers apparently to this very charge: see note on Matthew 16:17 ff.” Wordsworth: “The command βόσκε, pasce, is repeated: it stands first and last (John 21:15; John 21:17) with ποίμαινε between, John 21:16. To provide wholesome food for Christ’s sheep and lambs is the first and last thing: the love of the shepherd who tends, and leads, and guards, and lays down his life for the flock, is the central spring of all, which shows itself in outward acts.” Godet rightly refers βόσκειν to the feeding of the flock, ποιμαίνειν to the general direction. The diminutives ἀρνία, lambkins, and προβάτια, sheeplings, are expressive of the tender affection of the Arch-Shepherd for His flock; comp. the term τεκνία, John 13:33. See also Bengel on John 21:15-16, who refers ἀρνία, προβάτια and πρόβατα to the different stages in Peter’s public life, and in the history of the Church.—P. S.] John 21:17. Lovest thou Me (dearly)?—Φιλεῖςμε; The change of expression in the third question, Tholuck [like Grotius] groundlessly makes a matter of indifference, considering the variation of ἀγαπᾶν and φιλεῖν as unintentional. [See the remarks above.—P. S.] Lord, Thou knowest all things [Κύριε, πάντασὺοὶδας, σὺγινώσκειςό́τιφιλῶσε].—Comp. John 16:30; Acts 1:24. John 21:18. Verily, verily I say unto thee.—Upon the solemn re-institution of Peter, follows the revelation of Jesus concerning the manner of his life, and his exode. The words of Jesus give the prophecy of Peter’s future in a simple life-picture of the contrast between youth and old age. Peter is a vigorous man, in the middle years of life, occupying, therefore, a position betwixt youth and old age. The prophecy attaches itself to this fact, just as the contrast of youth and old age is frequently made a symbol in the Old Testament also (Isaiah 40:30-31; Ezekiel 16; Hosea 11:1). The Lord employs the homeliest figure for the most mysterious disclosure. Yet allegorical traits mingle in the figure itself. That the young man girds himself, is agreeable to nature; it is likewise in accordance with nature that “a perfectly decrepid old man” stretches out his hands for help and lets himself be girded and led by another. But the traits: Thou didst walk, as a young man, whither thou wouldest, as an old man thou shalt be led whither thou wouldest not, in themselves point to the prophetic meaning. John gives the interpretation of the saying in John 21:19; he refers it to the martyrdom of Peter. This is the centre of the dark, significant saying; a meaning, however, that was not fully disclosed until Peter’s martyrdom took place. It was, however, intended that this saying should primarily furnish Peter himself with a leading thought, and this thought is undoubtedly a word concerning the development and future of Peter’s spiritual man—presented under the figure of the natural life—connected with the intimation of a fate big with suffering. Tholuck justly remarks that if the simile be intended to refer solely to the martyrdom of Peter, the protasis, the clause treating of his youth, seems really idle; and also incongruous, inasmuch as it indicates a whole period of his life, while the apodosis touches upon a moment only. But if, finally, in accordance with our conception, the Epilogue present a more general life-picture of the Church of Christ in the contrast of the Petrine and the Johannean type, then the saying will have a further application to the Petrine form of the Church. When thou wast younger [ό́τεἦςνεώτερος]—Meyer adds: “than now.” The words however simply denote, doubtless, the younger man, characterizing him with the collateral idea of one youthfully strong, enterprising, self-willed. According to Meyer, the middle state of Peter is left uncharaeterized. Its character, however, is that of transition, of gradual transformation from youth to old age. If, indeed, we here find only the martyrdom predicted, neither does the figure of the younger man constitute a trait of character. It undoubtedly denotes, however, the youthful conduct of Peter in his discipleship; not his state before he came to Christ (Gerh., Luthardt); nor does it include his present time of life. He girded himself in the acts of self-will of which the evangelical history testifies; he finally in self-will trod the way of denial. But when thou hast grown old [ὅτανδὲγηράσης], literally, gray.—Indicative at once of the last stage of Christian development (1 John 2:13) and of Peter’s life’s evening (2 Peter 1:14). Thou wilt stretch forth thy hands [ἐκτενεῖςτὰςχεῖράςσου].—An old man stretches out his hands for help foreign to himself. Accordingly, the outstretching of the hands is forthwith a symbol of submission to the power of another. The Christian grown gray in the faith resigns himself utterly to the leading of the Lord. (Acts 20:22.—“When I am weak, then am I strong”). The aged Apostle carried out this submission by a submission to the power of Roman authority, in which God ruled over him. The term ἐκτνεῖςτὰςχεῖράςσου has, by the Church Fathers and some moderns, been referred to the extending of the hands on the cross (Maier, De Wette, Hilgenfeld, and others); similarly, the girding has been considered to mean the binding upon the cross (Tertullian), or the girding of a cloth about the loins. This view is contradicted by the fact that the leading away does not occur until after the stretching forth of the hands. The effort has been made to meet this objection by the remark (Casaub., Wetst. and others) that cross-bearers, on being led forth, had their hands bound to the two sides of the cross. But this usage was not customary in the provinces. We need but hold fast this truth, namely, that the stretching forth of the hands, as a symbol of submission to another’s power, is once more significantly and plastically reflected in the outstretching of the hands of a crucified martyr. The whole occurrence is, in reality, a single life-picture. And another [καὶἄλλος].—The other unqualified: it is the figure of the objective might of Divine Providence, ruling through human instruments (John 19:11).—Will gird thee [ζώσεισε].—Make thee ready for thy last journey;—in accordance with the figure of binding: he will fetter thee (the symbolical act Acts 21:11 means also, it is probable: the girdle, as the symbol of free will, shall be changed into a fetter, as a symbol of the unfree will of a prisoner).—And will lead thee [καὶοἵσει].—That objective, earnest guidance which puts an end to self-will; more closely defined, apparently the leading away to martyrdom. Is a leading to the death of the cross distinctly intended? (Calvin, Beza, and others). Meyer finds only a violent death symbolized. However, it was the word of the Master, whose violent death had just consisted in crucifixion, and who had now purposely selected the figure of the outstretching of the hands, in order to express submission to the extremest fate. And death upon the cross was just this (“Even the ἐξεπέτασατὰςχεῖράςμου, Isaiah 65:2, is referred by Barnabas, Ep. chap. 12; Justin, Dial. c. Tr. C. 97, to the crucifixion of Christ.” Tholuck). Whither thou wouldest not [ό́πουοὐθέλεις], i.e. not as regards thy inner life and new man, which latter has just been active in the stretching forth of the hands, but as regards the old, expiring self-will of the natural life; comp. the legend of Peter’s flight from prisoa at Rome. Calvin: Nunquam enim tam soluto affectu obsequimur deo, quin caro velut funiculis quibusdam in contrarium nos retrahat. Augustine: Hunc invenit exitum ille negator et amator; prζsumendo elatus, negando prostratus, flendo purgatus, confitendo probatus, patiendo coronatus.—(The interpretation of the entire passage by Gurlitt and Paulus as a prophecy of actual senile weakness hardly needs mention). John 21:19. Signifying by what manner of death [σημαίωνποίω̣θανάτω̣ ?]—A Johannean expression, comp. John 12:33; John 18:32. By what (a) death,—bringing to view not only the kind of death, as martyrdom, namely, but also the distinguished species of that death. According to Tertullian (Scorp. 15, De Prζscr. 35, and Euseb. H. E. III.1), Peter was crucified. When John wrote, the crucifixion of Peter (67, or 68 A. D.) must already have been an event in ecclesiastical history well known in the Christian churches. Had Peter still been living, John would not thus have publicly interpreted the dark saying of Christ, even though he were himself perfectly cognizant of its meaning.—He was to glorify God [δοξάσειτὸνθεόν].—Martyrdom has a reflex lustre from the crucial death of Christ; it redounds in a peculiar degree to the glory of God. Hence the expression: δοξάζειντὸνθεόν was later a customary term for martyrdom (Suicer, Thes. 1. p. 949). [To suffer for Christ is to glorify God; but there is a martyrdom of life as well as of death; by the former John, by the latter Peter and Paul glorified God.—P. S.]. Follow me. [Ἀκολούθειμοι. This, in a wider sense, is the sum and substance, the beginning and end of Christian life, as an imitation of the life of Christ in its sinless perfection, its divine-human character, its prophetic, priestly, and kingly office, and in its states of humiliation and exaltation from the cross to the crown.—P. S.] Comp. John 13:36. Different interpretations: 1. Follow me in doctrine and till death (Cyril, Theophylact); 2. In the death of the cross (Euthym.); 3. In a martyr’s death (Meyer); 4. As ecumenical bishop or teacher (Chrysostom); 5. Reference at once to the guidance of the Church and to martyrdom (Ewald); 6. The words are to be taken literally: the Redeemer leads the disciple aside in order to a confidential communication (Kuinoel, Paulus, Thol., and others). Meyer in objection to this view: The words would thereby be stripped of all significance. The first question to be asked is, what they mean when considered in connection with the context; this done, the immediately subsequent: Peter turned himself about and saw, etc. following [ἐπιστραφεὶςὁΙΙέτροςβλέπειτὸνμαθητὴνο͂νἠγάπαὁἸησοῦςἀκολουθοῦντα, John 21:20] is decisive in favor of the primarily literal sense. It is to be considered, moreover, that Peter could not understand this saying of Jesus as distinctly referring to martyrdom, if he did not understand the previous saying as referring to the same. We suppose, however, the significance of this literal sense to have lain in the fact that Jesus retired to the background of the scene, as if for departure to the invisible world, and hence that the summons to Peter was a trial. The literal expression, therefore, has likewise a symbolical background. He must prepare himself for the possibility of the immediate decision of his fate; i.e. stand a test of absolute submission. (Leben Jesu, ii. pp. 17, 19. Luthardt). This assumption does not exclude the design of a further communication. On the contrary, such a communication was probably intended, since the imminent walk could not be a merely symbolical one. Had the communication, however, as strictly confidential, been designed to exclude John, that disciple would doubtless not have followed too. AND ETHICAL1. The re-instatement of Peter in his ministry, a life-picture of the appointment of the ecclesiastical ministry in general, as the first ground-form through which Christ wills to be present in His Church in the world, and by means of which He chooses to rule in the Church. a. Every calling and institution [ordination] is in reality a re-reception and re-instatement, no man having kept his gift of grace pure, and himself clean from denial. b. Every calling pre-supposes a previous discipleship, experience of Christ, leading, humiliation, and refreshment. c. Every calling takes place in an assembled apostolic congregation of believers. d. No calling ensues without previous trial (Examen rigorosum.) e. The main question is always the question of Christ: “Lovest thou Me?” with a forbearing recollection of the old nature (“Simon, son of Jonas”), its errors and dangers. Love to Christ is the decisive fundamental condition of the pastoral office. f. To the ethical love for Christ, resting upon piety (ἀγαπᾶν), there must be added a personal love for Him, resting upon historically grounded knowledge (φιλεῖν). g. The trial must lead the examinate to earnest self-examination, resulting in his confusion and sorrow; it must make him certain of his love for Christ and of his vocation, occasioning prayerful appeal on his part to Christ’s privity to the condition of his soul. h. It must be proved from the first that, with all his certainty of his vocation, he renounces all self-upliftment above those who are called along with him (he consequently renounces pride, envy, rivalry, false human emulation). The examiner, however, must know that he is to act by order of, and in the spirit of, the Lord. Finally, institution [the act of installation or investment] has, above all things, to give prominence to the feeding of the lambs, the catechising of those of tender age, the preliminary condition of which is the missionary halieutics [aptness to fish for men]. Only on this basis does it become an introduction into the real pastorate or presbyterial episcopate, or into the offiec of guiding the sheep, i.e. the adult Church. Neither can it stop at this, however; it finally becomes an installation in the evangelical Doctorate, the providing of the sheep, as adult sheeplings that need the spiritual nourishment of advanced knowledge, with strong meat, 1 Corinthians 3:2; Hebrews 5:12-13. See Ex. Note 1. 2. An ecclesiastical ministry that exalts itself above other ministries (“more than these”); that fails to hold fast the love of Christ as its fundamental condition, that pretends to regard Christ’s sheep (My lambs, My sheep, My sheeplings) as its own, that chooses to know of immature lambs only, not of mature sheep, and that desires but to lead (ποιμαίνειν) the whole flock, or rather to exercise lordship over it from on high (κατακυριεύειν), not to feed it (βόσκειν) in the green meadows of evangelical knowledge, does by these characteristics prove itself a sombre antitype or caricature of the Petrine ecclesiastical ministry. 3. The gradation of evangelical functions indicated by Christ, is not to be a gradation of hierarchical dignities; this is proved by the fact that Peter is forced to evade, as a temptation, the question: ‘Lovest thou Me more than these?’ But if anything ought to establish a hierarchical gradation, it would be the declaration, ‘I love Thee better than others;’ but not: ‘Thou hast granted me prerogatives above others,’ or, ‘The heathen world-city of Rome will give me these prerogatives,’ or, The reminiscence, called up by the ἀρνία of the old prerogatives of the levitic high-priests or the Roman pontifices. But who would dare declare unto the Lord: ‘I love Thee better than all others?’ Moreover, the institution of Peter is a re-instatement, of which, in this solemn form, only he, as the fallen one, had need, in order to a full restitution to the apostolic circle which, in general, had received the new sanction of the old calling on the very first Easter-evening (John 20:21). Hence this formal explication of the Petrine ministry is likewise an explication of the ministry received by all the Apostles. It applies to all the officially called servants of Christ to the end of time. 4. The announcement of Peter’s destiny, which succeeded the sanction of his calling, was primarily a prophetic revelation, to the effect that he was called to follow Christ in His sufferings, and that he should be trained up by the guidance of God. It further proved to be a more decided announcement of his martyrdom. In accordance with the symbolical character of this Chapter, however, it is at the same time a life-picture of the leading which the Lord bestows upon every individual servant in his vocation; finally, in its most universal application it is also, we doubt not, a prophecy that the official Church will incur judgment previous to the coming of the Lord. See Matthew 24:48; 2 Thessalonians 2:4; Revelation 12:1; Comp. Chap. 17; John 19:7; Chap, John 13:1. Comp. John 21:11. 5. Follow Me. One of the most mysterious moments in the whole resurrection-history. In a symbolical act, Peter must follow the Lord into the background of the scene, as if he were now to be translated with Him from the visible earth across the boundaries of the spirit-realm. Thus is the unconditional following, the readiness for death, of the servant of Christ, presented in a symbolical act. The type of martyrdom in the Church. See Exeg. Note in loc. AND See the Doct. Notes. The ecclesiastical ministry after Christ’s heart.—Apostolic ordination after Christ’s example.—How the Lord hath made Simon (son of) Jonas to be Simon Peter again.—The ministerial vocation in the Church conditioned by a holy examination: 1. By three questions in one. Infinite importance (always: Lovest thou Me?); 2. by one question in three. Perfect distinctness.—Love for Christ the decisive characteristic of His called servant: 1. As the condition of the recognition that His (His sheep) are His; 2. as the condition of true discrimination between lambs and sheep, as likewise of the sheep as sheep and as sheeplings (as adults and yet as having to be led further. Rightly dividing the word; ὀρθοτομεῖν 2 Timothy 2:15); 3. as the condition of true pastoral fidelity (in which a single ποιμαίνειν is accompanied by a twice-repeated βόσκειν).—The right examination of the official spirit must be to it an occasion of self-examination (and so of confusion, prayer, certitude of self).—Peter’s humility, the first token of his ripeness for the ministry,—his love for Jesus, the second,—his knowledge of Christ as the Trier of the heart, the third,—but, however, his love for Jesus, the one and all (as the root of his humility and of his knowledge).—Why no question is made of faith in this transaction. Because it must be present in a developed form: 1. In the form of humility, 2. of love, 3. of knowledge. Verily, verily: On the ministry in respect of its youthful, and in respect of its matured, character (girding one’s self, choosing one’s own Ways, making great pretensions; denying one’s self, suffering one’s self to be led, submitting to the guidance of the Lord).—Christ the Master of His servants: 1. In the establishment of their vocation; 2. in the foresight of their fate.—How the right conduct of the ministry should approve itself a government in which Christ wills to be present with the Church: 1. Christ in His works; 2. Christ in His suffering.—How the whole business of a servant of Christ is comprehended in the business of following Christ.—How Christ will be present with the Church and the world in the following of His people [in His people’s imitation of Him]. Starke: Hedinger: But what shall a shepherd of the sheep do without love? such [as are without love] are thieves and murderers, who, like the wolves, spare not the flocks.—Osiander: The apostolic office consisteth not in worldly dominion, but in the feeding of the sheep and lambs, which thing, Peter, as well as the other apostles, was obliged to do, so that he consequently was devoid of superiority to them, 1 Peter 5:2-3.—Zeisius: Christ having first recommended the lambs to Peter’s feeding, it results that Christian teachers should consider youth and simplicity as specially recommended to their care.—O how Jesus loves the souls of men, inasmuch as He will commit them to the feeding of none but those who first sincerely love Him.—Preachers should distinguish between lambs and sheep, i, e. children, youths and old persons, communicating to each his food: to the lambs, milk, to the adult in Christianity, strong meat, Hebrews 5:12 ff.—He that hath sinned much, ought often to examine his heart, as to whether it sincerely loves its God, or whether its repentance is nought but hypocrisy.—Zeisius: Jesus is the Searcher of the hearts and reins—comfort thyself therewith in every cross, temptation, and persecution: but beware lest thou follow sin in thy thoughts, words and works, for there is nothing hid before Him, nor doth ought remain unpunished, Revelation 2:23.—Lange: The Lord Jesus, by connecting the question concerning love toward Him with the announcement of Peter’s imminent sufferings, indicates that by the willing assumption of sufferings inflicted for His name’s sake, the sincerity and faithfulness of love, and, consequently, also the steadfastness of faith, are to be proved.—Zeisius: To die for Christ’s sake, disgraceful as it may appear in the eyes of the world, is equally honorable and precious in the sight of God and all the faithful, for there by is God praised, Psalms 116:15.—And sure, how can there be a death more glorious than one that is suffered for God’s and Christ’s sake, the King of all kings!—The cross which believers bear for love of their Saviour, hath a right fair name,—it is called the laud and praise, of God, Philippians 1:20. Gerlach: It was easier for a man like Peter to act, dare, sacrifice, than to wait, suffer, passively stand still. Jesus therefore promises him a high place in His Church, in doing and suffering; but in a doing in which he had shown himself so unskilful by his denial, and in a suffering which was in the extreme repugnant to his nature.—Lisco: In youth, in the fulness of intellectual power, zealous (but also in many respects self-willed) activity for the Lord is shown; in old age, however, manifold hindrances (but also purifications) are at work, and the highest pitch of self-denial is death for Christ. Braune: Living love to Christ impels to the most earnest participation in His work, and all the knowledge of the human heart, without love to Christ, leads to craftiness and makes a man a rogue. The Apostles are qualified only by their love for the Saviour.—Feed My lambs—feed My sheep, tender youth and vigorous age.—This, too, the Lord says three times with emphasis. Love makes the shepherd; Peter was to be a shepherd, like his Lord; the Lord elevates him to that office by this examination and humiliation.—When he was an old man, he wrote to the elders of his church (1 Peter 5:2-3): Feed the flock of Christ, etc.—Peter bears this intimation in mind in his second epistle (John 1:14).—This kept Peter’s enthusiasm for the Risen One young till he himself was old, for he exclaims, 1 Peter 1:3-4 : Blessed be God and the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, etc.—He knew that he should follow the Lord through shame to glory; to him the cross became a token of honor.—Vigorous souls are not terrified by a future full of dangers. beyond the stormy night, they see the glorious morning of eternity.—His life accords with his word, 1 Peter 4:12; 1 Peter 4:19. Gossner: This question is easily answered with “yes;” but if we think again, many a consideration will present itself.—Just so much as we lack in simple love, we fail of in daily bliss.—If thou wouldst be a true pastor and shepherd, love for Me must bring the thing about—else is it impossible. For a large measure of love is needed to serve the bodies and souls of men, and often to incur, in so doing, much danger, and to experience the grossest ingratitude.—Hence it is the extreme of temerity to take upon one’s self, or to seek, the office and ministry of a shepherd in the Church of Christ, without feeling love toward Jesus and solicitude for His flock.—When a man is still young, God hath no very high opinion of his abilities; but when one hath been longer acquainted with Him, He maketh one a larger sharer in His sufferings.—What a doctrine! What a religion! The Lord prophesieth to His disciples torture and death, and inviteth them to follow Him, and they do follow Him! They prefer to lay down their lives rather than leave Him. Heubner: The practice of Christ was entirely different from the subsequently invented church-penance, according to the canons of which, as Zinzendorf says, Peter would have been forced to kneel outside of the church-door for at least fifteen years.—The main thing is personal love, true, real love for the Person of Jesus. It is this very thing that many are horrified at; they cannot relish it at all; they scent directly I know not what manner of pietistic and mystical rubbish, and seek to dilute it and beat it down and circum-interpret it into a mere cold esteem, or keeping of His commandments.—The schoolmen apprehended the thrice-repeated feeding as feeding by doctrine, by example, by hospitality. The generality of men are concerned only about the unimportant worldly examination, but the passing of a heart-examination before Jesus does not enter into their heads.—How utterly distinct a character a man bears so long as he is bent upon being his own master; he follows his own self-will, the natural will; how different the man when his will has been taken away by grace and he belongs to God. Then the self-will of the flesh is entirely captive to the will of the Spirit. [Craven: From Augustine: “John 21:15. Our Lord asked this, knowing it: He knew that Peter not only loved Him, but loved Him more than all the rest [?]. While our Lord was being condemned to death, Peter feared, and denied Him. But by His resurrection Christ implanted love in his heart, and drove away fear. Peter denied, because he feared to die: but when our Lord was risen from the dead, and by His death destroyed death, what should he fear?—Feed My lambs; As if there were no way of Peter’s showing his love for Him, but by being a faithful shepherd, under the Chief Shepherd. John 21:17. Jesus saith unto him, Feed My sheep; As if to say, Be it the office of love to feed the Lord’s flock, as it was the resolution of fear to deny the Shepherd.—They who feed Christ’s sheep as if they were their own, not Christ’s, show plainly that they love themselves, not Christ; that they are moved by lust of glory, power, gain, not by the love of obeying, ministering, pleasing God. Let us love therefore, not ourselves, but Him, and in feeding His sheep, seek not our own, but the things that are His.—If we call our sheep ours, as they [sectarists] call them theirs, Christ hath lost His sheep. John 21:18-19. Whatever be the pain of death, it ought to be conquered by the strength of love for Him, who being our Life, voluntarily also underwent death for us.—If there is no pain in death, or very little, the glory of martyrdom would not be great.—He who denied and loved, died in perfect love for Him, for whom he had promised to die with wrong haste.—It was necessary that Christ should first die for Peter’s salvation, and then Peter die for Christ’s Gospel. [From Chrysostom: John 21:15-17. If thou lovest Me, have rule over thy brethren [?], show forth that love which thou hast evidenced throughout, and that life which thou saidst thou wouldst lay down for Me, lay down for the sheep. John 21:18. Christ reminds Peter of his former life, because whereas in worldly matters a young man has powers, an old man none; in spiritual things, on the contrary, virtue is brighter, manliness stronger, in old age; age is no hindrance to grace.—He says, Whither thou wouldest not, with reference to the natural reluctance of the soul to be separated from the body; an instinct implanted by God to prevent men putting an end to themselves.——From Alcuin: John 21:15-17. To feed the sheep is to support the believers in Christ from falling from the faith, to provide earthly sustenance for those under us, to preach and exemplify withal our preaching by our lives to resist adversaries, to correct wanderers. [From Burkitt: John 21:15-17. Christ puts Peter upon a threefold profession of his love unto Him, answerable to his threefold denial of Him True repentance ought to be, and will be, as eminent, in the fruit and effects of it, as the saint’s fall hath been.—Ministers who are called to take charge of Christ’s flock, have need of much love to Jesus Christ.—The best evidence of a minister’s love to Jesus Christ, is his conscientious care to feed, i.e., teach, instruct and govern the whole flock of Christ; lambs and sheep, weak and strong; the feeblest in the fold were purchased by the great Shepherd.—Such as would be faithful in their ministerial charge, ought to look upon their people as committed to them by Christ Himself, as loved of Him, and committed to their care by Him. John 21:15. Note the great modesty of Peter in his reply: once he vaunted Though all men, forsake Thee, yet will not I; but now his fall had taught him humility.—It is blessed thing, when we can and dare appeal to God’s knowledge. John 21:18. The ministers of Jesus Christ, when they undertake the charge of His flock, must prepare for suffering work.—Whither thou wouldest not; Human nature in Christ’s ministers, as well as in other men, reluctates sufferings, has an antipathy against a violent death.—When thou shalt be old; he timing of the saints’ sufferings is in Christ hands. John 21:19. The sufferings of the saints in general, and of the ministers of Christ in particular, do redound much to the glory of God. [From M. Henry: John 21:15-17. Herein Christ has given us an encouraging instance of His tenderness towards penitents, and has taught us, in like manner, to restore such as are fallen with a spirit of meekness.—We must not reckon it an affront to have our sincerity questioned, when we ourselves have done that which makes it questionable.—Peter was now upon his probation as penitent; but the question is not, “Simon, how much hast thou wept? How often hast thou fasted and afflicted thy soul?” but, “Dost thou love Me? Much is forgiven her, not because she wept much, but because she loved much.—Nothing but the love of Christ will constrain ministers to go cheerfully through the difficulties and discouragements they meet with in their work, 2 Corinthians 5:13-14. John 21:15 “Lovest thou Me more than thou lovest these, more than thou lovest these persons?” Those do not love Christ aright, that do not love Him better than the best friend they have in the world. Or, “more than thou lovest these things, these boats and nets;” those only love Christ indeed, that love Him better than all the delights of sense and all the profits of this world.—“Lovest thou Me more than thou lovest these occupations thou art now employed in? If so, leave them, to employ thyself wholly in feeding My flock.” (Whitby).—“Lovest thou Me more than these love Me, more than any of the rest of the disciples love Me?” We should all study to excel in our lore to Christ; it is no breach of the peace to strive which shall love Christ best; nor any breach of good manners, to go before others in this love.—Peter does not pretend to love Christ more than the rest of the disciples did.—Though we must aim to be better than others, yet we must, in lowliness of mind, esteem others better than ourselves; for we know more evil of ourselves than we do of any of our brethren.—Those who can truly say, through grace, that they love Jesus Christ, may take the comfort of their interest in Him, notwithstanding their daily infirmities. John 21:17. It is a terror to a hypocrite, to think that Christ knows all things; but it is a comfort to a sincere Christian, that he has that to appeal to; My witness is in heaven, my record is on high. Christ knows us better than we know ourselves, though we know not our own uprightness, He does.—Peter was grieved, when Christ asked Him the third time, Lovest thou Me? Because it put him 1. In mind of his threefold denial of Christ; 2. In fear, lest his Master foresaw some further miscarriage of his. John 21:15-17. The Church of Christ is His flock: in this flock some are lambs, young and tender and weak, others are sheep, grown to some strength and maturity; the shepherd here takes care of both, and of the lambs first.—It is the duty of all Christ’s ministers, to feed His lambs and sheep 1. Teach them; for the doctrine of the Gospel is spiritual food; 2. Lead them to the green pastures, presiding in their religious assemblies, and ministering all the ordinances to them; 3. By personal application to their respective state and case; not only lay meat before them, but feed them with it, that are wilful and will not, or weak and cannot, feed themselves.—When Christ ascended on high, He gave pastors; left His flock with them that loved Him, and would take care of them for His sake.—Simon Peter; a commission given to one convicted of a crime is supposed to amount to a pardon. John 21:18. When trouble comes, we are apt to aggravate it with this, that it has been otherwise; and to fret the more at the grievances of restraint, sickness and poverty, because we have known the sweets of liberty, health, and plenty. But we may turn it the other way, and reason thus with ourselves: “How many years of prosperity have I enjoyed more than I deserved and improved!” John 21:19. There is one way into the world, but many ways out, and God has determined which way we shall go.—It is the great concern of every good man, whatever death he dies, to glorify God in it.—When we die patiently, submitting to the will of God; cheerfully, rejoicing in hope of the glory of God; and usefully, witnessing to the truth and goodness of religion, and encouraging others, we glorify God in dying.—Follow Me; Expect to be treated as I have been, and to tread the same bloody path that I have trod before thee; for the disciple is not greater than his Lord.—They that faithfully follow Christ in grace shall certainly follow Him to glory. [From Scott: John 21:15-17. Our Lord will readily pardon the sins of His believing servants: but He will rebuke them, in one way or other; that they may be more sensible how greatly He abhors their offences, notwithstanding His mercy to their souls.—Those who “love the Lord Jesus in sincerity,” have a consciousness of it, notwithstanding all their defects.—Those who have been greatly tempted, and have had humiliating experience of their frailty and sinfulness, and who have had much forgiven them, generally prove the most tender and attentive pastors, and the best guides of young converts.—The Lord often leaves those whom He loves to pass through painful conflicts, as well as much experience of His compassion, in order to render them more gentle to their weak brethren, and the lambs of His flock. [From A Plain Commentary (Oxford): John 21:15. Ἀγαπᾶςμε; Lovest thou Me? “At this moment, when all the pulses in the heart of the now penitent Apostle are beating with an earnest affection toward his Lord, this word on that Lord’s lips sounds too cold. Besides the question itself, which grieves and hurts Peter, there is an additional pang in the form which the question takes, sounding as though it were intended to put him at a comparative distance from his Lord, and to keep him there; or at least, as not permitting him to approach so near to Him as he fain would. He therefore in His answer substitutes for it the word of a more personal love,—‘Thou knowest that I love Thee dearly.’ When Christ repeats the question in the same words as at the first, Peter in his reply again substitutes his ‘Hove Thee dearly’ for the ‘lovest thou’ of his Lord. And now at length he has conquered: for when his Master puts the question to him for the third time, He does it with the word which Peter feels will alone express all that is in his heart; and instead of the twice repeated ‘Lovest thou Me?’ His word is, ‘Dost thou love Me dearly?’ The question, grievous in itself to Peter, as seeming to imply a doubt in his love, is not any longer made more grievous still, by the peculiar shape which it assumes.” (Trench.)—Feed My lambs; The lambs are to be fed. Their daily portion of food (all that is needed for the soul’s health and strength, all that is included in that petition “Give us this day our daily bread,” is here especially spoken of.—Those “lambs,” saith “the great Shepherd of the sheep,” are “Mine.” O salutary thought for the pastor of souls, that the “sheep” and the “lambs” are not his but Christ’s! Not his;—therefore, like Jacob with the flock of Laban, he should be prepared to give account for all. Not his;—therefore must there be One above him, to whom they are a care as well as to himself; even “the Chief Shepherd,” who careth alike for him and for them.—“Woe be to the shepherds of Israel that do feed themselves! Should not the shepherds feed the flock?” (Ezekiel 34:2). John 21:16. Before, it was “Peed;” now, it is “Tend” or “Shepherd,” i.e. “Perform all a shepherd’s duties” by them; “Feed the flock, like a shepherd;” do all that should be done by a “shepherd of the sheep.” Call thine own sheep by name, and lead them out; and when thou puttest forth thine own sheep, go before them, that the sheep (knowing thy voice) may follow thee. Consider St. John 10:3-4. John 21:17. The Divine Speaker “seems to say that, in a Pastor, the first, the second, the third requisite, is love of Christ.” (Williams)—Feed My sheep; It is no longer “Tend,” or “Shepherd,” My sheep,—as in John 21:16; but “Feed” them,—the same word which was used above, in John 21:15, which was used above, in John 21:15, with reference to the little lambs. The same catechetical training, therefore,—the same careful attention to the soul’s natural cravings and acquired needs, which was enjoined on behalf of the “lambs” of the fold,—is here enjoined on behalf of the “sheep” also.—“Feed the flock of God which is among you, taking the oversight thereof, not by constraint, but willingly; not for filthy lucre, but of a ready mind; neither as being lords over God’s heritage, but being ensamples to the flock. And when the Chief Shepherd shall appear, ye shall receive a crown of glory that fadeth not away.” (1 Peter 5:1-4.) [From Barnes: John 21:15. Thou knowest that I love Thee; The expression of a humbled soul, a soul made sensible of its weakness and need of strength, yet with evidence of true attachment to the Saviour. It is not the most confident pretensions that constitute the highest proof of love to Christ.—Feed My lambs; It is not merely, therefore, the privilege,—it is the solemn duty of ministers of the gospel to countenance and patronize Sunday-schools.——From Jacobus: John 21:15-17. The test of ministerial love to Christ is a faithful care of the flock.—Thou knowest all things; The Divine Omniscience ought not to be a terror to the true Christian, but a comfort; for His all-searching eye can trace His own likeness wherever it is to be found, in the deepest depths of the soul.——From Owen: John 21:15-17. “There was no formal rebuke uttered, for the matter was already forgiven; this asking about his love was at farthest a most gentle and affectionate reproof.” (Stier.)—The gradation “1. Feed My lambs, i.e. help the weak; 2. Guide and guard My sheep, i.e. counsel the strong; 3. Feed My sheep, i.e. help the strong, for they too need feeding with the divine food of the word.” (Crosby.)—A descending gradation, the lambs, a term of endearment, being given first, and then in the repetition of the charge, the less emphatic term, sheep.” (Webster and Wilkinson.)—“Ministers ought to look upon Christ’s people as very seriously recommended to them, and therefore should very seriously mind their work about them; for there ore is this charge thrice laid on Peter, that he may mind it much.” (Hutcheson.) John 21:18. The phrase thou wouldest not, refers to the shrinking back of weak humanity from a violent death, but not to the unwillingness of Peter to die for Jesus.] Footnotes: John 21:15.—On the reading Ἰωάνα instead of Ἰωνᾶ, John 21:15-17, see John 1:42. [p. 91, Text. Note 7. Lachm., Tischend., Treg., Alf., Westc. and H., read Ἰωάννον or Ἰωάνον here and John 21:16-17, in accordance with ΰ.a B. C.1 D. L. Vulg. (ioharnis), Jerome, Ambrose, etc. Ἰωνᾶ is from Matthew 15:17. Lange adopts the latter, and translates Simon Jonas.—P. S.] John 21:15.—[The significant difference between ἀγαπᾶν and φιλεῖν which runs through this section, cannot well be rendered in English, unless we translate φιλῶσε: I dearly love Thee. Lange translates ἀγαπᾶν lieben, φιλεῖν lieb haben. ἀγαπᾶν, diligere, is used of the higher, reverential, constant, unwavering love, such as we ought to have to God as welt as to man, and such as Christ had to John (John 21:20) and His church; φιλεῖν, amare, means personal, emotional love and friendship. The Vulgate renders the former always by diligere, the latter by amare and osculari. In the Hebrew and Syriac there are not the same shades of difference, but the Lord may have expressed it by an additional word or emphasis; at all events we have to account for the difference in the Greek of John. See more in the Exeg. Notes.—P. S.] John 21:16.—[The difference between βόσκω (to feed, to pasture) and ποιμαίνω (from ποιμήν, to pasture, to tend, to provide for, to rule, a flock or herd), is obliterated in the E. V. βόσκω occurs nine times in the N. T., and is always translated to feed in the E. V., except Matthew 8:33 (kept). ποιμαίνω occurs eleven times and is rendered to rule, or to feed. βόσκειν, βοσκή, βόσκημα, victus, has reference mainly to the feeding, nourishing care (“die erniδhrende Hόtethδtigkeit,” Meyer, p. 675), and applies therefore specially to the lambs, while ποιμαίνειν is more general, and covers the providing and governing activity (“die fursorglich regierende Thδtigkeit,” Meyer); comp. Matthew 2:6; Acts 20:28; 1 Peter 5:2; Revelation 2:27; Revelation 7:17; Revelation 12:5; Revelation 19:15. See. the Exeg. Notes.—P. S.] John 21:16.—[ΙΙρόβατα, oves, sheep, is sustained in this verse by Codd. ΰ. A. D . X. Γ. Δ. Π, and adopted by Lachmann, Tregelles, eyer and Lange. προβάτια, oviculae, little sheep, sheeplings, Schδflein, (which is the proper reading in John 21:17, see note 5) has the authority of B. C., and is adopted by Tischendorf, Alford and Westcott; the last, however, gives πρόβατα in the margin. The difference between ἀρνία, πρόβατα, προβάτια is significant; see the Exeg. Notes.—P. S.] John 21:17.—ΙΙροβάτια, Tischendorf, in accordance with Codd. A. C. Lachmann reads πρόβατα, with ΰ. D. X. text, rec, but Tischendorf, Tregelles, Alford and Westcott adopt πρόβάτια with A. B. C, Syr.; comp. Ambrose (quoted by Tisch): pasce agniculos meos,pasce agnos meos, pasce oviculas meas). If πρόβάτια were better sustained in John 21:16, and πρόβατα in John 21:17, there would be a beautiful rising climax; little lambs, sheeplings, sheep.—P. S.] [In the face of the expression of Peter to presbyters and bishops, not to lord it over God’s heritage, but to feed the flock and to be ensamples to it (1 Peter 5:2-3).—P. S.] (Meyer makes a note of interrogation at this expression, as if those who were not perfectly decrepid did also suffer themselves to be dressed and girded by others.) [Scorp. John 15 : “Tunc Pelrus ab altera vincitur, cum cruci adstringitur.” Comp. the traditionary account of Peter’s Martyrdom in Euseb. II. 25; III. 1, and the notes of Heinichen.—P. S.] The Continuing Rule of Christ in his Church, Represented by The Ministry, Spiritual Life and Patriarchal Age of John; or the Destiny of the Church in Respect of her Predominantly Internal Character and Immortal Spiritual Life THE RULE OF CHRIST IN HIS CHURCH, BY THE , LIFE AND AGE OF JOHN; OR THE DESTINY OF THE CHURCH IN RESPECT OF HER AND LIFE John 21:20-23(John 21:20-24, pericope for the third day after Christmas or for St. John the Evangelist’s day.) 20 Then [omit Then] Peter, turning about [turning round], seeth the disciple whom Jesus loved following; which [who] also leaned on his breast at supper, and said, 21 Lord, which [who] is he that betrayeth thee? Peter [therefore] seeing him saith to Jesus, Lord, and what shall this man do [or, But how will it be with him? οὗτοςδὲτί] ? 22Jesus saith unto him, If I will that he tarry till I come, what is that to thee? follow [Follow] thou me. 23Then went this saying [This report therefore went] abroad among the brethren, that that disciple should not die [dieth not, was not to die, οὐκἀποθνήσκει]: yet Jesus said not unto him, He shall not die [dieth not]; but, If t will that he tarry till I come, what is that to thee? AND Joh_21:20. Following (also) [ἀκολουθοῦντα].—The following of John is to be explained as the result of the involuntary drawing of love. It Proves however, that John did not understand the Lord as wishing to make Peter the recipient of an exclusively confidential communication. Who also leaned on His breast at the supper [ο͂ςκαὶἀνέπεσενἐντῷδείπνῷἐπὶτὸστῆθοςαὐτοῦ ?].—Wherefore this addition? Interpretations: 1. It is intended to bring to mind the incident John 13:23 ff., when John inquired of the Lord on Peter’s behalf, and to demonstrate the fact that Peter has now grown far bolder, insomuch that he himself questions Christ, and that in behalf of John (Chrysostom and others). 2. It is designed as an intimation to this effect; namely that, peradventure, a lot so full of sufferings as Peter’s might not be intended for the disciple so pre-eminently loved by Jesus (Meyer). As if Jesus in partiality protected His particular friends from sufferings! 3. It is intended to assign the motive for John’s following. John, in referring to the fact that he was the confidant of Jesus at the Last Supper, doubtless means to intimate that it was allowable for him now, as the confidant of Jesus, freely to join Him. Peter himself had possibly understood the summons of Jesus as prefacing an instantaneous being “girded” by “another” for an entrance into the other world; John understood it as the prelude to a love-test to be administered at Christ’s withdrawal into concealment. John 21:21. But how will it be with this (man)? οὖτοςδὲτί; [sc.ἔσται] Meaning op the question:1. In accordance with the interpretation of the following as accomplished by martyrdom: How shall it be with this my fellow-combatant (Euthymius)? 2. In accordance with the literal interpretation of the following: Is he to be with us now? (Paulus). 3. What sort of a fate shall this man have in his calling? (Tholuck, Luthardt). 4. If Peter saw in the mysterious walk a test of joyful following, his first thought would be: John, without being called, exposes himself to a moment of difficulty. The question: Shall this man go too? had at the same time, then, the background: What shall become of this man? Motive of the question:1. Special love for John (Chrysostom, Erasmus, Luthardt). 2. A question prompted by curiosity and a certain jealousy (Lόcke, Meyer). 3. Disapprobation of a supposed unauthorized accompanying (Paulus and others). 4. Curiosity and interest as to John’s fate. “A want of concentration, an excess of natural vivacity, was certainly involved in Peter’s ability to turn away his eyes so quickly from himself and his own destiny, and fasten them upon another.” Tholuck. The self-consciousness with which Peter receives the disclosure and summons of the Lord, turns to compassion for John whose present and future task Jesus apparently fails to appoint. Between Jesus and John everything is understood of itself, tacitly, as it were, while between Jesus and Peter everything has to be expressed, discussed, in a degree stipulated. Now thinks Peter,—in all noble-mindedness, we may say,—the same course must be pursued with John, else will he come short in somewhat: he, therefore, must receive his instructions for now and for the future. Hence Christ, in His reproof, appeals to His will, not to a distinct instruction; while, indeed, indicating the substance of His will. [The words τίπρὸςδέ in the next verse imply a gentle rebuke (Bengel: hoc Petri curiositatem in ordinem redigit), and remind Peter of the distinctness of each man’s position and calling. Hence “Do thou follow Me,” instead of inquiring after him. See Meyer and Alford.—P. S.] John 21:22. If I will that he remain [Ἐὰναὐτὸνθέλωμένεινἕωςἕρχομαι, τίπρόςσέ;]—As we do not read that Jesus sent John back, or that He returned with Peter and John from the mysterious walk, we must (contrary to our first edition) admit that Tholuck is right in here rejecting the literal interpretation: “If I choose to leave him behind until I return from My walk with thee (Mark, Exerc. exeg. Similarly Paulus).” In these words, however, Christ enwraps the prophecy concerning John. That he remain—tarry,—μένειν “the opposite of ἀκολουθεῖν which was to be accomplished through martyrdom; therefore: to be preserved alive. Comp. Philippians 1:25; 1 Corinthians 15:6.” Meyer. Till I come [ἐωςἔρχομαι]. 1. To lead him out of Galilee to apostolic activity (Theophyl). 2. In the destruction of Jerusalem (Wetstein and others) 3. Reference to the near Parousia of Christ (Lόcke, [De Wette], Meyer). 4. In the destruction of Jerusalem as the beginning of the Parousia of Christ (Luthardt). [So also Bengel, Stier and Alford: “After the destruction of Jerusalem began that mighty series of events of which the Apocalypse is the prophetic record, and which is in the complex known as the coming of the Lord, ending, as it shall, with His glorious and personal Advent.” Bengel: “Joannes turn, quum Apocalypsin scripsit, Dominum, venire scripsit.”—P. S.] 5. Legendary interpretation: As expnessive of the mysterious surviving of the disciple until the end of the world. (Vulg.: Sic cum volo manere) see the Introduction [p. 12]. 6. Hypothetical: Until the last coming (Revelation 22:20). Tholuck: “The sentence hypothetically declares that not even the longest extension of the life-term of Peter’s fellow-disciple ought to be the occasion of jealousy.” [So also Trench, Miracles, p. 466, as quoted by Alford.—P. S.] Supposing the saying to be hypothetical, however, its prophetic meaning would be weakened. 7. The coming [of Jesus] to take [John to heaven] through the medium of an easy [natural] death (adventus gratiosus in artioulo mortis. Rupert, Grotius, Olshausen and others). [So also Lampe, Ewald, Wordsworth.] In opposition to this view Tholuck remarks: The characteristic καὶπαραλήψομαι is wanting. Nevertheless this interpretation alone forms a real antithesis; if ἀκολουθεῖν here mean: to follow the home-returning Jesus through the medium of martyrdom, and μένειν, on the other hand signify: to remain alive,—then to remain alive until I come, means also, until I come to take him. The destruction of Jerusalem, for instance, forms no contrast to martyrdom; neither does the Parousia itself. Such a contrast is presented, however, by a natural death. Natural death is the individual type, continuing throughout New Testament times, of the Parousia for the individual Christian (Matthew 24:44; John 14:3, etc.); and this Parousia of Christ in the death of believers, is a warranty to them of their participation in the general Parousia (1 Corinthians 15:51; 1 Thessalonians 4:15). Simultaneously with John’s remaining until the coming of Christ in the hour of his natural death, there is indicated, however, the remaining of the Johanneau type until the Parousia of Christ. John 21:23. This saying therefore went abroad [Ἐξῆλθενοὖνοὖτοςὁλόγοςεἰςτοὺςἀδελφοὺςὅτιὀμαθητὴςἐκεῖνοςοὐκἀποθνήσκει].—The above mentioned tradition, which not even the Gospel has been able utterly to do away with. See the Introduction. According to Baur, that tradition grew out of the Revelation; the statement is entirely without foundation. The tradition to the effect that John did but slumber in the grave and moved the earth with his breath, was a synthesis of the fact of his death and the precipitate apodictic interpretation of Christ’s word. Yet Jesus said not unto him [οὐκεἶπενδὲαὐτῷὁ̓Ιησοῦς].—This defense of Christ’s word against a precipitate interpretation is of the highest importance. It warrants the sure conclusion that John was still living when this was written; that consequently, it must have been written by him. Had John been dead, another author would have expressed himself positively against the interpretation of the brethren, giving, very probably, a different interpretation at the same time. The disciple, however, would not anticipate the mysterious purport of Christ’s saying which was as yet unfulfilled. [“So also Alford, whose note may be added: The following words are to me a proof that this chapter was written during John’s life-time. If written by another person after John’s death, we should certainly, in the refutation of this error, have read, ἀπἐθανενγὰρ, καὶἐτάφη, as in Acts 2:29.” This notion of John’s not having died, was prevalent in the ancient Church,—so that Augustine himself seems almost to credit the story of the earth of John’s tomb heaving with his breath. Tract 124:2. “The English sect of the ‘Seekers’ under Cromwell expected the reappearance of the Apostle as the forerunner of the coming of Christ.” Tholuck. See Trench on the Miracles, ed. 2, p. 467, note. The simple recapitulation of the words of the Lord shows that their sense remained dark to the writer, who ventured on no explanation of them; merely setting his own side of the apostolic duty over against that of Peter, who probably had already by following his Master through the Cross, glorified God, whereas the beloved disciple was, whatever that meant, to tarry till He came.” Wordsworth makes the following practical remark on John 21:23 : “The Holy Spirit, by commenting here on a fulfilled prophecy, that concerning Peter, teaches us to attend to the fulfilment of prophecy in our own times. And by only correcting an error with regard to an unfulfilled prophecy,—that concerning St. John, He teaches us not to speculate curiously on unfulfilled prophecies; but to wait patiently, till Christ comes to us in the events of history, and interprets His own prophecies by fulfilling them.”—P. S.] AND ETHICAL1. The foregoing section should, above all, be valued as an eloquent token of the authenticity of this Gospel. Every later writer would, in one way or another, have labored after additional emphasis. See the last Exeg. Note.2. The word of Jesus concerning John has been fulfilled, in a literal sense, in the circumstance of his dying a natural death at an advanced age. And it is in accordance with this fact, therefore, that we have to apply the saying in respect of its primary signification. That it, however, as well as the saying concerning Peter, was at the same time intended to designate John as a type of the post-temporal presence of Christ in the Church, is proved by the very fact that men gave vent to the feeling of the lofty significance of the saying, whose ideal sense they came short of, in mythical allegations touching the continuous on-living of John. See Exeg. Note to John 21:22. Further communications on this subject, as also concerning the dark counterpart of this tradition, the tradition of the Wandering Jew, see in Heubner, Joh. p. 542. 3. The higher sense of the saying, then, is expressive of a Johannean form of Christianity, just as the previous saying is significant of a Petrine form of the same. The words mean, therefore: (1) There shall always be friends of God, friends of Christ, inward—subjective,—intuitive Christians, in accordance with the characteristic of John, representative of the innermost presence of Christ in the Church. (2) In this form, the Christian spiritual life shall remain until Christ returns. (3) The more the Petrine characteristic of the Church recedes, the more prominent will her Johannean characteristic become. The Church shall attain to maturity. She shall be a bride adorned with her ornaments, Revelation 19:7-8. 4. Pauline Christianity may be regarded as a form of transition from the Petrine type to the Johannean. And so far as this, the schellingean distinction of the three Christian ages is correct. Only we must not identify Petrinism with Roman Catholicism, Paulinism with Protestantism (though in Protestantism, Paulinism has found its triumphant expression), and least of all must we make a synthesis of Protestantism and Roman Catholicism, affirming said synthesis to represent Johannean Christianity. The Petrine characteristic is the trait of the Church as influenced by law; as the confessing Church; the Pauline is the trait of the Church as influenced by the freedom of faith; as the witnessing Church; the Johannean, the trait of the Church as filled with the ideality of faith, working and keeping joyful holiday, the Church of the light, love and life of Christ, i.e. the Adorned Bride. These three degrees of development, however, denote but the one unitous post-temporal presence of the Spirit of Christ in the Church, in accordance with the ground-forms of that presence. Now the two primitively distinct ground-forms are Peter and John. See the discussions on this subject: Apostolisches Zeitalter, II., p. 649, and the concluding section of Schaff’s History of the Apostolic Church.5. John’s free joining in the following which Christ commanded Peter is likewise a characteristic of the Johannean essence. It is the involuntary drawing of love’s impulse and friendship’s right; the perfect humanity of the life of faith. The expression of this ripe spiritual fellowship with the glorified Lord makes so ghostly and yet so human an impression upon the world, that John passes, almost untouched, through its persecutions. He is exiled, but not killed. His keenest sufferings, however, are prepared him by the misconceptions of external circles of [religious] fellowship themselves, these latter stamping the Petrine as the statutory essence. He too, in his own way, is nailed to the cross like Peter, but not with heathen nails—ah no! with Christian or Judo-Christian; and, insomuch as this is true, with silver nails. 6. Here, then, belongs also the entire import of all Christian mysticism and speculation, in respect of their pure, ideal form. AND The solemnization of the resurrection of Jesus: A call to follow Him.—The following of Jesus not simply a following of the Crucified One, but also of the Risen One.—The disciples’ following of the Lord: 1. In its unity, 2. in its diversity.—How Peter, as he follows the Lord, hears the rustle of John’s foot behind him.—The question of Peter: Lord, but what shall this man do? 1. In the mouth of Peter himself: well-meant and yet not wholly warranted; 2. in the mouth of those who boast of Peter: ill-meant and unwarrantable.—How the most zealous servants of Christ frequently fail to understand His most intimate friends.—John, the friend of Jesus, the patriarch of all the friends of God and of Christ.—Christ’s presence in the world and Church through the medium of the love of His friends.—Friendship with Christ on earth an undying spring, enduring until the summer-time at the end of the world.—If I will that he tarry: Christ’s will the fate of His people (if we live, we live unto the Lord, etc.)—How the Lord has appointed such different careers to His people, yet deciding for all aright.—Christ can insure the longest life.—“What is that to thee?” In what sense we should concern ourselves about our Christian colleague, and in what sense we should avoid so doing: 1. As to his spiritual welfare, but not as to the external form thereof; 2. as to the will of God concerning his way, not as to a human regulation of his way; 3. in divine sympathy, not in human comparison or in human rivalry.—Christ’s conference with Peter in regard to the destiny of John: 1. The question of Peter; 2. the answer of Christ; 3. the proud interpretation of the disciples; 4. the modest correction of John.—The remaining of John until Christ’s coming again: 1. In its historical sense; 2. in its symbolical import. Starke: Lange: It becomes evident from this, that when Christ said to Peter, Follow Me, He advanced a few paces from him, desiring, in a prophetic manner, in conformity to which a secret matter was sometimes presented in outward gestures, to lead Peter, while claiming from him a bodily following for a short distance only, to a spiritual following, and, in particular, to a following to the death of the cross.—Zeisius: We all have, alas, an innate propensity to concern ourselves unnecessarily about others, rather than about ourselves. Therefore flee curiosity, Sir 3:22. It is one of the infirmities of believers to discover a kind of jealousy when they perceive others to possess gifts of grace, either physical or spiritual, in a greater degree than themselves, Jonah 4:1 f.—Bibl. Wirt.: Let every man wait on his vocation, not troubling himself as to what God will do or decree with others.—Lampe: Moreover, we perceive from these words 1. The humility of John, in not being willing to have so great honor ascribed to him; 2. his solicitude for the brethren, whom he sought to free from error. Geriach: John worked inward in the Church rather than outward.—Braune: Inscrutable and mysterious are the ways by which God leads us, until we are come to the end of them. Therefore abide by the testimony of Scripture, and attend every man to his own affairs.—Gossner: Why is it only to me that such things are said? That man gets off more easily. Before one can turn round, people are ready with questions like this: What shall this one and that one do? Johannes Mueller, Lebensgeschichte 1806, p. 34, writes: “The opinion now starting up again that the disciple whom Jesus loved, did not die, is found, if I mistake not, in Sulpitius Severus, also Hist. S., Lib. II. I have frequently met with it in Greek legends, monologues, and chronicles, with this addition, viz., that the dust upon his grave is moved by the breath of his mouth.” P. John 106: “In a work of the Patriarch Ephraim, of Antioch (p. 545, Photius, num. 229, p. 418 of the Augsburg Edition 1604) it is positively affirmed that John is still living; that he has vanished, and that in his grave nought was found but a delicious odor and a precious spring of healing balm. George of Alexandria informs us (Photius num. 96, p. 139) that to the monk Hesychius, a Syrian, there appeared St. Peter and St. John, and that the latter delivered a book to the young monk, who was afterwards called Chrysostom. Of the tradition’s having come into our parts also, thou wilt find a proof in Hόbner’s Salzburg, Part. I., p. 317.”—He who has promised to follow the Saviour can do nothing else than await His orders, composing himself to rest and be active as His Lord wills, and more than once to labor till he is weary. Heubner: The question as to ourselves should concern us so entirely to the exclusion of all else, as to keep us quiet when hundreds are threatening to get precedence of us. We, perhaps, think ourselves ripe (to go home), but there are reasons why God decrees otherwise with us. John 21:23 : It results from this verse that the apostles could not have been of the decided opinion that they would live to see the coming of Christ; otherwise they could not have ascribed such a destiny to John as a special prerogative.—The spirit of John shall never perish; it shall ever renew itself—never shall there be wanting loving and beloved Johannean souls. [Craven: From Augustine: John 21:22. Let action be perfected by following the example of My Passion, but let contemplation wait inchoate till at My coming it be completed.—From Chrysostom: John 21:22. Attend to the work committed to thee, and do it: if I will that he abide here, what is that to thee? [From Burkitt: John 21:20-22. There are two great vanities in man with reference to knowledge,—the one a neglect to know what it is our duty to know; the other, a curiosity to know what it doth not belong to us to know. John 21:23. How much the wisdom of God ought to be admired, in giving us a written word, and tying us to it, when we see erroneous traditions so soon on foot in the world, and our Saviour’s own speeches so much mistaken, and that by wise and holy men themselves in the purest times.—How great is the vanity and uncertainty of oral tradition! [From M. Henry: John 21:21. Peter seems more concerned for another than for himself: so apt are we to be busy in other men’s matters, but negligent in the concerns of our own souls.—He seems more concerned about event than about duty.John 21:22. Though Christ calls out some of His disciples to resist unto blood, yet not all. Though the crown of martyrdom is bright and glorious, yet the beloved disciple comes short of it.—It is the will of Christ, that His disciples should mind their own present duty, and not be curious in their inquiries about future events, concerning either themselves or others.—If we will closely attend to the duty of following Christ, we shall find neither heart nor time to meddle with that which does not belong to us. John 21:23. Hence learn, The aptness of men to misinterpret the sayings of Christ. The grossest errors have sometimes shrouded themselves under the umbrage of incontestable truths; and the Scriptures themselves have been wrested by the unlearned and unstable. [From Scott: John 21:22 : Follow thou Me; If we attend to this voice, even “death itself will be gain to us,” and we shall be ready for His coming.—[From Keble: John 21:21-22. “Lord, and what shall this man do? Ask’st thou, Christian, for thy friend? If his love for Christ be true, Christ hath told thee of his end: This is he whom God approves, This is he whom Jesus loves. Ask not of him more than this,Leave it in his Saviour’s breast, Whether, early called to bliss, He in youth shall find his rest, Or armed in his station wait Till his Lord be at the gate.” [From A Plain Commentary (Oxford): John 21:22. Our Lord’s words to Peter are made up of rebuke and counsel. What is that to thee?—which of us has not deserved the rebuke? Follow thou Me! which of us does not require the counsel? The heart and eye are thus called away from the problem which perplexes, the prospect which discourages, the thoughts which distract and paralyze; and a plain duty is proposed instead. Not speculation, is enjoined, but practice; not knowledge, but goodness; not another man’s matters, but our own.—“This was a transient stumbling in one who, but lately recovered of a great disease, did not walk firmly. But it is the common track of most, to wear out their days with impertinent inquiries. There is a natural desire in men to know the things of others, and to neglect their own; and to be more concerned about things to come, than about things present.” (Leighton.) [From Barnes: John 21:22. Hence we learn that 1. Our main business is to follow, and imitate the Lord Jesus Christ; 2. There are many subjects of religion on which a vain and impertinent curiosity is exercised; 3. Jesus will take care of all His beloved disciples, and we should not be unduly solicitous about them; 4. We should go forward to whatever He calls us, not envying the lot of any other man, and anxious only to do the will of God. [From Jacobus: John 21:22. The intimation was that “John was to wait patiently, to linger on year after year in loneliness and weariness of spirit, to abide persecution, oppression and wrong (Revelation 1:9), to endure the enmity of the wicked (1 John 3:13), and the sight of heresies abounding in the Church (1 John 2:18-26), as if to exemplify in himself all classes of the faithful, and the various modes of drinking the cup of Christ.”—Thou (emphatic); “They, measuring themselves by themselves, and comparing themselves among themselves, are not wise.” 2 Corinthians 10:12.—Each must do his own duty, which is not another’s, and whether another shall do his own duty or not.—Christian liberality is cramped with many by the constant asking of this question, “What shall this man do?” when the question should be, “What shall I do?” John 21:23. Let us fall back upon God’s word—study its precise terms—and bring out its very language more and more to the public understanding: and thus will many an error be stripped of its disguises, many a perversion of God’s will be exposed, and the Church shall “grow up in all things unto Him who is the Head.” [From Owen: John 21:23. “John was earlier than the other disciples prepared for the death of martyrdom, as the most perfect sacrifice of obedience to God, and of love to God and man; but that was the very reason why he was not to taste the martyr’s death. John consummated in his life and natural death what the martyrs sealed in their final sacrifice, namely, the victorious manifestation of the love of God and man.” (Stier.)] Footnotes: John 21:20.—[The text. rec. inserts δἐ after ἐπιστραφεὶς, with ΰ. D., so also Lange; but A. B. C. Vulg. omit it, so also Lachm., Tischond., Alf., Westc—P. S.] John 21:21.—[The text. rec. omits οὑν after τοῦτον, which is well supported by Orig., ΰ B. C. D. Vulg. Syr., and adopted by the critical edd.—P. S.] John 21:22.—[Noyes: “If it be my will (θέλω) that he remain till I come, what is it to thee?”] John 21:22.—[Alford, to bring out the emphatic position of σύ and μοι more fully, translates: “Do thou follow Me.”—P. S.] [So also Alford, who sees in this description of the beloved disciple a strong token of John’s hand having written this chapter. See chap, John 13:23.—P. S.] [Lange: Was soil aber dieser?] [Next to this might be ranked the unfounded view or Hengstenberg: the time of the decisive struggle between Christ and Rome, which commenced under Domitian.—P. S.] IV IV. The Testimony of John and the Testimony of the Church. Infinitude of the Evangelical History John 21:24-2524 This is the disciple which [who] testifieth [ὁμαρτυρῶν] of these things, and wrote [who wrote, ὁγράφας] these things: and we know that his testimony is true. 25And there are also many other things which Jesus did, the which, if they should be written every one, I suppose that even the world itself could not contain the books that should be written. Amen, [omit Amen.] AND Joh_21:24. This is the disciple [Οὐτόςἐστινὁμαθητής].—Self-designation of John, as in John 19:26. [A conclusion corresponding to the one John 20:31, and traced to John also by Meyer anti Alford.—P. S.] Of these things [ὁμαρτυρῶνπερὶτούτων].—Referring to the contents of the 21st chapter.—And who wrote these things [καὶὁγράψαςταῦτα].—Particularly, also, to the setting of the Christians right in regard to the tradition which had commenced to gather form. [Mark the difference of the tenses: μαρτυρῶν—the testimony continues, γράψας—the writing is an accomplished act.—P. S.] We know that his testimony [καὶοἴδαμενὄτιἀληθήςαὐτοῦἡμαρτυρίαἐστίν—Different interpretations: 1. Οἶδα [I know] μέν (Chrysostom, Theophylact). An exegetical conjecture (similarly Beza’s οἶδεν). 2. An indication of the ungenuineness of the conclusion or of the whole chapter (modern criticism). 3. John made himself one with his readers (Meyer). [So also Alford; comp. John 1:14; 1 John 4:14; 1 John 4:16; 1 John 5:18. 4. Probably a later addition from the Ephesian church. Not because, as according to Lόcke, “John never wrote in the first person, either of the plural or of the singular.” See on the contrary, John 1:14. But the corroboration of his own testimony with the words; We know that his testimony is true, would be too strikingly singular. The expression John 19:35 runs differently. We have therefore bracketed the words “we know,” etc., considering them to be the only later Ephesian addition in the whole chapter. [Meyer regards only John 21:25 as a later addition; Tholuck, Luthardt, Godet, etc., John 21:24-25; Lόcke, Bleek, Ewald, etc., the whole chapter; Lange, Alford and Wordsworth accept the whole as Johannean,—Lange, however, excepting the second clause of Joh 21:24.—P. S.] John 21:25. But there are also many other things [Ἐστιδὲκαὶἃλλαπολλὰ ?].—Mayer: “Apocryphal conclusion of the whole Gospel—after the addition of the Johannean supplement John 21:1-24.” The Evangelist thinks it important that he should remind his readers that he has not written as a chronicler, but has selected and arranged things in conformity to an organizing principle, as did also his predecessors, though not in the equal power of a concentrated, unitous, ideal view. That this note of the Gospel has not at all an apocryphal aspect, but would, on the contrary, be qualified, were more attention accorded it, to strip our modern criticism of many apocryphal opinions (particularly, of the continually recurring idea that the Evangelists were chroniclers, that their writings were grounded upon one another, etc.), is evident. If they should be written every one … one by one [ἄτινα (quippe quζ, utpote guζ, referring to the largo number) ἐὰνγράφηταικαθ’ ἕν (piece for piece), οὐδ̓αὐτὸνοἰμαιτὸνκόσμον (ne ipsum quidem mundum) χωηρ́σειντὰγραφόμεναβιβλία Comp. a somewhat analogous expression Ecclesiastes 12:12 : “Of making many books (or chapters) there is no end.” Different interpretations of χωρεῖν,capere: 1. Locally: Unable to hold (capacitas loci). Restricted by Ebrard: No place in literature. 2. Intellectually: Unable to understand (capacitas intellectus). Jerome, Augustine, Calov, Bengel (“hoc non de capacitate geometrica, sed morali accipiendum est”). 3. Figuratively and hyperbolically: Any number of books would not exhaust the subject. Similarly Godet: “Divin de sa nature, l’objet de l’histoire ιvangιlique est plus grand que le monde et que toutes les narrations que le monde pourrait contenir. L’ιcrivain exprime, par une image matιrielle, le vif sentiment qu’il a de la richesse infinie de cette histoire.”—P. S.] According to the conclusion of the Evangelist, the world itself would be unable to contain the books that would then be written continually (γραφόμενα). Even Tholuck agrees with Meyer (who refers to similar hyperboles in Fabricius ad Cod. Apocryph. I., p. 321) in thinking this proposition1 hyperbolical. The apparent hyperbolism of the expression, however, very clearly illustrates the pure infiniteness in the life-development of the Logos, by a quantitative, local measure. We make use of a hundred similar expressions without their hyperbolism being deemed improper or apocryphal, for instance: “O dass ich tausend Zungen hδtte” (“O that I had a thousand tongues”)—“Den aller Weltkreis nie umschloss” (“Whom the whole world did ne’er enclose”) —“The whole world lieth in wickedness—in the Evil One,” etc. Weitzel has entered the lists in defence of the propriety of the expression, Studienu. Kritiken 1849, p. 633; comp. my Leben Jesu III., p. 760. L uthardt: “For only an absolute external compass corresponds with the absolute contents of the person and life of Christ;” whereupon Meyer remarks: “Inevident to me!” “Aber, Freunde, im Raum wohnt das Erhabene nicht” (“But, O friends, the sublime dwelleth not in space”), says Schiller elucidatively. The Evangelist, however, in submitting his book to the Church, may well come forward with an unwonted οἶμαι in order, by a strong expression, to dissuade the reader from the chronistic apprehension of the Gospel, and to urge him to the historico-symbolical view which recognizes in the organically articulated selection of ideally transparent facts, the historical life-picture of the infinite fulness of the life of Jesus.This symbolical character, presented in pure but speaking facts, is possessed, in a peculiar degree, by the closing chapter, to which the closing words primarily have reference. The interpretation of Jerome, Augustine and others: The world would be spiritually incapable of grasping such books,—would apply even to the four small Gospels, though in sooth a Gospel developed in infinitum would pass the comprehension not only of the present world, but also of Christendom as it here exists. Here, however, emphasis is laid not upon the ζonic unfathomableness of the life of Jesus, but upon its ideal infinitude, in the symbolical explicitness of the evangelical history. AND ETHICAL1. The absolutely dynamical view of the world, as the specifically Christian view of it, is the fundamental feature and the key of the Johannean Gospel, of Johannean theology. The personal principle is the royal life-principle of the world. The personality of God in the personality of Christ, annihilates the power of the anti-personal, Satanic essence, and appoints the impersonal world to the service of life; it is diffused in the personality of the Apostles, in order that it, may lift the whole world out of the abyss into the light of glorification, in which the world, as the old world, vanishes, in order to shine forth again as the eternal House of the Father, the eternal City of God. In conformity to this dynamical view, Christ’s pre-temporal rule in the world is finally summed up in the testimony of John the Baptist; His post-temporal rule, in the ministry of the twelve Apostles; the draught of fishes of the seven; the simple contrast of the following disciple and the tarrying one; finally, in the type of a friendship with Christ which remains until the Lord comes. With this dynamical character, then, the apostolic presentation of the evangelical history also corresponds. That history is not chronistically, but ζonically, executed; not atomistically expanded, but principialiy concentrated; the whole infinitude and fulness of the signs of Jesus must be reflected in a concentric selection of speaking facts, translumined by the idea. Not in outward extension—in transparent concentration, the expression of eternal life is accomplished. 2. The great distance between John’s view of the essence of evangelical historiography and the opinions or prejudices of modern criticism, becomes evident from the foregoing, and from the last Exeg. Note.3. Even the Christian Gramma may err in the way of profuse book-making. Against this the Christian spirit of a John opposes its final words of warning; the like did the Preacher Solomon in the Old Testament (Ecclesiastes 12:12), and also Plato in Phζdrus 60. The Christian spirit-word does not aim at converting the world into a vast library of sacred writings, but into the Divine House of the adorned Bride of Christ and of the marriage of the Bridegroom. To this end, Christian literature, with its testimony concerning Christ, is indeed to work, drawing all literature into His service; but the more it extends itself through the world, the more it should concentrate itself, shaping itself into the transparent life-picture of the glory of God in Christ. AND The testimony of the friend of Jesus concerning his Lord and Master.—Together with the faithful testimony concerning Christ, the testifying disciple unconsciously immortalizes himself.—And we know that his testimony is true: 1. We know: a. we believe it, b. we not only believe it, we know it, c. we not only know it (in the sense of the world’s knowledge), we experience it. 2. We know, concerning his testimony, that it is sealed with the water and blood of Christ. 3. That it is true: a. true in spite of all the objections and contradictions of the world, b. true in the might of the Spirit who hath overcome the world.—How it is impossible, and yet possible, to depict the glory of Christ: 1. Impossible by the multitude of words, discourses and writings; 2. possible by the simple word of the Spirit concerning His great signs.—The evangelical life-picture of the Lord: 1. In respect of its finite form; 2. in respect of its infinite contents; 3. in respect of its New Testament, eternally new operation. Strke: That which by grace we have received from God and done for the honor of God, we may well make known to others, taking care only that all boastfulness on account of our own persons is avoided, 1 Corinthians 11. Braune: “An individual once appeared on earth who, merely by moral omnipotence, conquered remote times and founded an eternity of His own. It is that calm Spirit whom we call Jesus Christ. Only quiet teaching and quiet striving formed the melodies wherewith this higher Orpheus tamed human beasts and converted rocks into sanctuaries of God. And yet out of so divine a life,—as it were, out of a thirty years’ war against a perverse, insensible people,—we are familiar with but a few weeks. What transactions, what words of His may have been swallowed up from our knowledge before He became acquainted with the four writers of His history, those men by nature so dissimilar! If, then, out of so divine a life-book only scattered leaves have fluttered to us, so that perhaps greater deeds and words of that life are forgotten (?) than were detailed, repine not, nor pass judgment over the ship-wreck of little works and men, but recognize in that Christianity which nevertheless blossomed afterwards, the fulness with which the (All) Spirit yearly suffers the perishing blossoms to exceed in number those that thrive, without therefore forfeiting a future spring” (Jean Paul). Schleiermacher: “For a long time there has been a fable current among men, and even in these days it is (still) frequently heard; unbelief invented it, and little faith receives it. Thus it runs: ‘There shall come a time, and perhaps it is already here, when His right shall befall even this Jesus of Nazareth. Every human memory is fruitful but for a certain period; much doth the human race owe to Him, great things hath God accomplished by Him, yet He was but one of us, and His hour of oblivion, too, must strike. If He was in earnest in desiring to make the world absolutely free, He must likewise have willed to make it free from Himself, that God might be all in all. Then men would not only perceive that they have strength enough in themselves to fulfil the divine will, but in the true understanding of the same, they would be able to exceed His measure, if they did but wish. Yes, only when the Christian name is forgotten, shall a universal kingdom of love and truth arise, in which no germ more of enmity shall lie, such as has been sown from the beginning betwixt those that believe on this Jesus and the rest of the children of men.’ But it shall not be realized,—this fable; since the days of His flesh, the Redeemer’s image has been indelibly stamped on the race of men! Even though the letter might perish, which is holy only because it preserves us the image, the image itself shall last for ever; too deeply is it graven upon men ever to be effaced, and what the disciple said, shall always be truth: ‘Lord, whither shall we go? Thou alone hast words of eternal life!’ Heubner: The pernicious making and reading of books has been greatly prejudicial to the reading of the Book of Life, and to the Christian life. Luther himself on this account often wished his books done away with, Works i. 1938; xiv. 420; xv. Anh., p. 90; xx. 1031; xxii. 85. Yet doubtless only in a qualified sense. The books of faith should promote life,—hence should be, as living books, strictly articulated organisms of life. Their foundation and aim is the Book of Life. This is above all true of the Holy Scriptures, particularly of the Gospels, most particularly of our Gospel. [Craven: From Burkitt: John 21:25. The wonderful activity, industry, and diligence of the Lord Jesus Christ; He was never idle, but His whole life was spent in doing good. [From M. Henry: John 21:25. If it be asked why the gospels are not larger, it may be answered, I. It was not because they had exhausted their subject; II. Bat 1. It was not needful to write more; 2. It was not possible to write all; 3. It was not advisable to write much.[Schaff: John 21:24-25. Though but little has been written on the life of Christ by the Evangelists, that little is of more accountthan all the literature of the world, and has been more productive of books, as well as thoughts and deeds, than any number of biographies of sages and saints of ancient and modern times. The Gospels, and the Bible generally, rise like Mount Ararat high above the flood of literature; they are the sacred library for all nations, the literary sanctuary for scholars and the common people; they combine word and work, letter and spirit, earth and heaven, time and eternity. The eloquent tribute of an English divine to the influence of the Bible applies especially to the Gospel of John, and may appropriately conclude this Commentary. “This collection of books has been to the world what no other book has ever been to a nation. States have been founded on its principles. Kings rule by a compact based on it. Men hold the Bible in their hands when they prepare to give solemn evidence affecting life, death, or property; the sick man is almost afraid to die unless the Book be within reach of his hands; the battle-ship goes into action with one on board whose office is to expound it; its prayers, its psalms are the language which we use when we speak to God; eighteen centuries have found no holier, no diviner language. If ever there has been a prayer or a hymn enshrined in the heart of a nation, you are sure to find its basis in the Bible. There is no new religious idea given to the world, but it is merely the development of something given in the Bible. The very translation of it has fixed language and settled the idioms of speech. Germany and England speak as they speak because the Bible was translated. It has made the most illiterate peasant more familiar with the history, customs, and geography of ancient Palestine, than with the localities of his own country. Men who know nothing of the Grampians, of Snowdon, or of Skiddaw, are at home in Zion, the lake of Gennesaret, or among the rills of Carmel. People who know little about London know by heart the palaces in Jerusalem, where those blessed feet trod which were nailed to the Cross. Men who know nothing of the architecture of a Christian cathedral, can yet tell you all about the pattern of the Holy Temple. Even this shows us the influence of the Bible. The orator holds a thousand men for half-an-hour breathless—a thousand men as one, listening to his single word. But this Word of God has held a thousand nations for thrice a thousand years spell-bound; held them by an abiding power, even the universality of its truth; and we feel it to be no more a collection of books, but the Book.”—P. S.] Footnotes: John 21:24.—[The article before γράψας is omitted by ΰ1 A. C. X. Orig., Tischend., inserted by B. D. lat. (et qui scripsit.) Lachm., Treg., Alf., West. Cod. B. inserts καὶ before μαρτυρῶν.—P. S.] John 21:24.—[Dr. Lange brackets the last clause: καὶοί́δαμενὅτιἀληθήςαὐτοῦἡμαρτυρίαἐστίν, considering it an addition of the elders of Ephesus and friends of John, while he ascribes all the rest, including John 21:25, to John. See Exeg.—P. S.] John 21:25.—This verse is wanting in Cod. 63 [?],—a circumstance of no importance, however. (On the Sin. see Tischend.) [Lachmann, Tregelles, Alford, and Westcott retain John 21:25, except the concluding ἀμήν, Westcott, however, separates it from the preceding text. Tischendorf alone, ed. VIII., excludes it from the text on the sole authority of the Sinaitic MS. which indeed contains the verse, but, as he asserts, written by another hand, see his note, p. 965. But in the large quasi-fac-simile ed. of the Cod. which I have used all along, there is no perceptible difference. He then also corrects an error with regard to Cod. 63, which was quoted by Mill, Wetstein, Griesbach, Lange (in the preceding remark), etc., in favor of omission, but according to Scrivener, the last page of that Cod. with the 25th verse is lost. Tischendorf here gives too much weight to Cod. Sin. which he had the good fortune to discover. The omission, if such could be proven, has little weight in view of the many instances of carelessness on the part of the copyist, and of the filling up of the lacuna by the first corrector, who, according to Tischendorf, was cotemporary with the copyist. All other known MSS. contain John 21:25, though many state in a note that it was regarded by some as a later addition.—P. S.] John 21:25.—The reading ἅ in accordance with Codd. ΰ. B. D. * etc., Lachmann [Treg., Alf., West., instead of text rec. ὅσα which is retained by A. C.2 D. and expresses the quantitative relation, quζet quanta, quotquot, what and how many; comp, Revelation 1:2.—P.S.] John 21:25.—[Lachm., Alfd. χωρῆσαι, with A. B. C.2 D. text. rec.; Treg., Tisch., West. χωρήσειν, with ΰ. B. C *.—P. S.] John 21:25.—The ἀμήν of the Recepta (Codd. E. G. H. K. M. etc.) is wanting in Codd. [ΰ.] A. B. C. D. etc. [Amen is a liturgical or devotional addition, and justly omitted by Lachm., Treg., Alf., Westc. and H.—P. S.] On the various subscriptions: εὑαγγέλιονκατὰἸωάννην (A. C. E. [ΰa]); κατὰἸωάννην (B.) etc., comp. Tischendorf. K. M. U. X. [also ΰΓ.] have no subscription. [Tischendorf states that the subscription in ΰ is not written by the same hand, but by ΰ corr.la On the Latin subscriptions, see Tischend. p. 967.—P. S.] [So also Alford: “The purpose of this verse seems to be to assert and vindicate the fragmentary character of the Gospel, considered merely as a historical narrative:—for that the doings of the Lord were so many—His life so rich in matter of record,—that, in a popular hyperbole, we can hardly imagine the world containing them all, if singly written down; thus setting forth the superfluity and cumber-ousness of anything like a perfect detail, in the strongest terms, and in terms which certainly look as if fault had been found with this Gospel for want of completeness, by some objectors.”—P. S.] [Or, according to the other reading infin. aor. χωρῆσαι, which after οἶμαι without ἄν is pure Greek, and expresses more strongly the faith in the certainty of the fact stated than the fut. χωρήσειν.—P. S.] “Vom Himmcl steigend Jesus brachtDes Evangcliums ewige Schrift,Den Jungern las Er sie Tag und Nacht;Ein gφttlich Wort, es wirkt und trifft.Er stieg zurόck, nahm’s wicder mit,Sie aber hatten’s gut gefόhlt,Und Jeder schrieb so Schritt fόr Schritt,Wie er’s in seinem Sinn behielt.Verschieden: Es hat nickts zu bedeutenSie hatten nicht gleiche Fδhigkiten;Duck damit kinnen sich dic ChristenBis zu dem jόngsten Tage fristen.” (Goethe).] [Wordsworth puts into the first person singular οἶμαι, which John nowhere else uses in the Gospel, the intention of the writer to guard against the inference that John 21:25 was written by a person different from John, who wrote in the plural οί́δαμεν in the preceding verse. But this would have been done more effectually by using the singular in both cases. Godet conjectures that the subject of the οἶμαι is one of the apostles present with John at Ephesus, probably Andrew, who, with John, was the oldest disciple of Christ (John 1).—P. S.] [Lines of two celebrated German hymns. To these may be added similar expressions in English hymns, as, “Oh! for a thousand tongues to sing,” etc.“Had I a thousand hearts to give,” etc.“Were the whole realm of nature mine,” etc.But these and similar expressions are desires poetically expressed, while here we have a statement in prose.—P. S.] [I saw it in a respectable Magazine attributed to the Rev. F. Robertson, the late gifted preacher of Brighton, but I have been unable to verify the quotation and cannot vouch for its accuracy.—P. S.]