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Jesus went up to Jerusalem.

a

2 Now there is at Jerusalem

xii. 39.

by the sheep [market] a pool, which is called in the a Neh. Hi. 1 : Hebrew tongue Bethesda, having five porches. 3 In these lay a great multitude of impotent folk, of blind, halt, f better, [gate]. Not expressed in the original.

thing in this chapter to determine the nature of this feast, I cannot attach any weight to most of the elaborate chronological arguments which have been raised on the subject. It can hardly have been a Passover, both because it is called a feast, not the feast, as in ch. vi. 4, and because if so, we should have an interval of a whole year between this chapter and the next, which is not probable. Nor can it have been the Dedication, in the winter; for then the multitude of sick would have hardly been waiting in the porches of Bethesda. The feast of Purim would nearest agree with the subsequent events; and it seems as if our Lord did not go up to Jerusalem at the Passover next following (ch. vi. 4; vii. 1), so that no difficulty would be created by the proximity of the two feasts, unless, with De Wette, we believe that the interval was too little for what is related ch. vi. 1-3 to have happened. But it may be doubted, (1) whether it was a general practice to go up to Jerusalem at the Purim (2) whether our Lord would be likely to observe it, even if it was.

No rea

son need be given why St. John does not name the feast; it is quite in accordance with his practice of mentioning nothing that does not concern his subject-matter. Thus the Passover is mentioned ch. ii. 13, because of the buying and selling in the temple; again, ch. vi. 4, to account for the great multitude, and as eminently suiting (see notes) the subject of His discourse there; the feast of Tabernacles, ch. vii. 2, because of the practice alluded to by our Lord in ver. 37; that of the Dedication, ch. x. 22, to account for His being in Solomon's porch, because it was winter; but in this chapter, where there is nothing alluding to the time or nature of the feast, it is not specified. Jesus] and probably His disciples: for the same expression is used ch. ii. 13, whereas we find, ch. iii. 22, that His disciples were with Him; compare also ch. vii. 10 and ch. ix. 2. 2.] The expression there is has been thought to import that St. John wrote his Gospel before the destruction of Jerusalem. But this must not be pressed. He might have spoken in the present without meaning to be literally accurate with regard to the moment when he was writing. The locality given means, probably, near the sheep

gate,-mentioned by Nehemiah, see reff. The situation of this gate is unknown;it is traditionally supposed to be the same with that now called St. Stephen's gate; but inaccurately, for no wall existed in that quarter till the time of Agrippa. Eusebius, Jerome, and the Jerusalem Itinerary speak of a sheep-pool, as indeed the Vulgate renders here. Bethesda,-in Syriac, the house (place) of mercy, or of grace. Its present situation is very uncertain. Robinson established by personal inspection the fact of the subterranean connexion of the pool of Siloam (see ch. ix. 7 note) and that called the Fountain of the Virgin; and has made it probable that the Fountain under the grand Mosk is also connected with them; in fact that all these are but one and the same spring. Now this spring, as he himself witnessed, is an intermittent one, as indeed had been reported before by Jerome, Prudentius, William of Tyre, and others. There might have been then, it is obvious, some artificially constructed basin in connexion with this spring, the site and memory of which have perished, which would present the phænomenon here described.

I have received an interesting communication from a traveller who believes that he has identified Bethesda in the present pool of Siloam. It appears from his account that there are still visible four bases of pillars in the middle of the water, and four corresponding ones in the wall, shewing that at one time the pool has been arched over by five equal porches. This pool is, as above noticed, intermittent, and is even now believed to possess a certain medicinal power. See the account of my informant at length at the end of vol. i., edn. 5, of my Greek Testament. The spot now traditionally known as Bethesda is a part of the fosse round the fort or tower Antonia, an immense reservoir or trench, seventy-five feet deep. But, as Robinson observes, there is not the slightest evidence that can identify it with the Bethesda of the N. T. This pool is not mentioned by Josephus. having five porches] Probably these were for the shelter of the sick persons, and were arches or porticos, opening upon and surrounding the reservoir: see above. 3. withered] Those who were afflicted with the loss of vital power in any

LL 2

b Matt. ix. 6.

Mark ii. 11.
Luke v. 24.

e eh. ix. 14.

4 For an

withered [8, waiting for the moving of the water.
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 And a certain man was there, which had an
infirmity thirty and eight years. 6 When Jesus saw him
lie, and knew that he had been now a long time in that
case, he saith unto him, Wilt thou be made whole?
7 The impotent man answered him, Sir, I have no man,
when the water is troubled, to put me into the pool: but
while I am coming, another steppeth down before me.
8 Jesus saith unto him, Rise, take up thy bed, and walk.
9 And immediately the man was made whole, and took up
his bed, and walked. And c on the same day was the
sabbath. 10 The Jews therefore said unto him that was

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gomit: see note.

of their limbs by stiffness or paralysis.
Of this kind was the man on whom the
miracle was wrought. "waiting for
the moving of the water," and the whole
of ver. 4.] The spuriousness of this con-
troverted passage can hardly be ques-
tioned. See the critical considerations
dwelt on in my Greek Test. 1 may men-
tion that the Vatican, Paris, Cambridge,
and Sinaitic MSS. omit it: while at the
same time the Alexandrine MS. contains
it, but with the important variation
of "an angel washed in" instead of
"went down into." 5.] Observe, he
had been lame thirty-eight years, not at
Bethesda all that time. 6.] knew,
namely, within Himself, as on other simi-
lar occasions. Our Lord singled him out,
being conscious of the circumstances under
which he lay there, by that superhuman
knowledge of which we had so striking an
example in the case of the woman of Sama-
ria.
Wilt thou be made whole ?]
Some would supply, "notwithstanding that
it is the sabbath." But this is very im-
probable, see ver. 17. Our Lord did not
thus appeal to his hearers' prejudices, and
make His grace dependent on them. Be-
sides, the "being made whole" had in the
mind of the man no reference to a healing
such as there would be any objection to
on the Sabbath; but to the cure by means
of the water, which he was there to seek.

The question is one of those by which He so frequently testified his compassion, and established (so to speak) a point of connexion between the spirit of the person addressed, and His own gracious

purposes. Possibly it may have conveyed
to the mind of the poor cripple the idea
that at length a compassionate person had
come, who might put him in at the next
troubling of the water. It certainly is
possible that the man's long and apparently
hopeless infirmity may have given him a
look of lethargy and despondency, and the
question may have arisen from this: but
there is no ground for supposing blame
conveyed by it, still less that he was an
impostor labouring under some trifling
complaint, and wishing to represent it
more important than it was. 7.] The
man's answer implies the popular belief
that whoever stepped in immediately after
the bubbling up of the water was made
whole no more than this.
:
Bauer asks

why the person who brought him there
every day, could not have put him in?
But no such person is implied. The same
slow motion which he describes here, would
suffice for his daily coming and going.
8.] The command, Take up thy bed, has
been treated as making a difference between
the man lame from his birth in Acts iii. 8,
who walked and leaped and praised God;
and this man, who, since sin had been the
cause of his disease (ver. 14), is ordered to
carry his bed, a present memento of his
past sin.' Possibly; but our Lord must

have had in his view what was to follow,
and have ordered it also to bring about
this his first open controversy with the
Jews.

10.] The Jews, never the multitude, but always those in authority of some kind, whom John ever puts forward as the representatives of the whole people

had conveyed

14 i Afterunto him,

Neh xiii. 19. Jer. xvii. 21, &c. Matt. xii. 2. Mark ii. 24: iii. 4. xiii. 14.

cured, It is the sabbath day: it is not lawful for thee to Exod. xx. 10. carry thy bed. 11 He answered them, He that made me whole, the same said unto me, Take up thy bed, and walk. 12 Then asked they him, What man is that which said Luke vi. 2: unto thee, Take up thy bed, and walk? 13 And he that was healed wist not who it was: for Jesus himself away, a multitude being in that place. ward Jesus findeth him in the temple, and said Behold, thou art made whole: sin no more, lest thing come unto thee. 15 The man departed, and told the Jews that it was Jesus, which had made him whole. 16 And therefore did the Jews persecute Jesus [kk, and sought to slay him], because he had done these things on the sabbath day. 17 But Jesus answered them, 'My Father fch: i render, passed away from him. render, After these things. k render, some.

h

in their rejection of the Lord.
it is
not lawful] The bearing of burdens on the
Sabbath was forbidden not only by the
glosses of the Pharisees, but by the law
itself. See Neh. xiii. 15-19: Exod. xxxi.
13-17: Jer. xvii. 21, 22. And our Lord
does not, as in another case (Luke xiii. 15,
16), appeal here to the reasonableness of
the deed being done on the Sabbath, saving
the sanctity of the Sabbath, but takes alto-
gether loftier ground, as being One greater
than the Sabbath. The whole kernel of
this incident and discourse is not, that it
is lawful to do works of mercy on the Sab-
bath but that the Son of God (here) is
Lord of the Sabbath. 11.] The

man's excuse is simple and sufficient; and
for us, important, inasmuch as it goes
into the depth of the matter, and is by
the Jews themselves accepted. He who
had power to make him whole, had power
to suspend that law which was, like the
healing, God's work. The authority which
had overruled one appointment of Pro-
vidence, could overrule another. I do
not mean that this reasoning was pre-
sent to the man's mind;-he very likely
spoke only from intense feeling of obliga-
tion to One who had done so much for
him;--but it lay beneath the words, and
the Jews recognized it, by transferring
their blame, from the man, to Him who
healed him. 12.] Not, who is he
that healed thee?' but they carefully bring
out the unfavourable side of what had
taken place, as malicious persons always
do. 13.] Difficulty has been found
here from the supposed improbability

a worse e Matt. xli. 45. [ch. viii. 11.]

kk omit.

xiv. 10.

that some should not have told him,
seeing that Jesus was by this time well
known in Jerusalem. But this is wholly
unnecessary. His fame had not been so
spread yet, but that He might during the
crowd of strangers at the feast pass un-
noticed. Jesus passed on unobserved by
him just spoke the healing words, and
then went on among the crowd; so that
no particular attention was attracted to
Himself, either by the sick man or others.
The context requires this interpretation:
being violated by the ordinary one, that
Jesus conveyed himself away, because a
multitude was in the place:' for that
would imply that attention had been at-
tracted towards Him which He wished to
avoid; and in that case He could hardly
fail to have been known to the man and
to others. 14.] The knowledge of

our Lord extended even to the sin com-
mitted thirty-eight years ago, from which
this long sickness had resulted, for so it is
implied here. The some worse thing, as
Trench observes, 'gives us an awful
glimpse of the severity of God's judg-
ments;'- -see Matt. xii. 45. 15.] The
man appears to have done this partly in
obedience to the authorities; partly per-
haps to complete his apology for himself.
We can hardly imagine ingratitude in him
to have been the cause; especially as the
words "which had made him whole" speak
so plainly of the benefit received; compare
ver. 11 and note.
17. The true
keeping of the rest of the Sabbath was not
that idle and unprofitable cessation from
even good deeds, which they would en-

g ch. vii. 19.

worketh hitherto, and I work.

18 Therefore the Jews

sought the more to kill him, because he not only 1 had broken the sabbath, but said also that God was m his hch. x. 30, 33. Father, hmaking himself equal with God. 19 Then an

Phil. ii. 6.

i ver. 30.

ch. viii. 28:

xiv. 10.

swered Jesus and said unto them, Verily, verily, I say unto you, The Son can do nothing of himself, but what ix. 4; xii. 49: he seeth the Father" do: for what things soever he doeth, k Matt. iii. 17. these also doeth the Son likewise. 20 For the Father loveth the Son, and sheweth him all things that himself m render, his own.

ch. iii. 35.

2 Pet. 1. 17. 1 render, broke.

n render, doing.

force the Sabbath was made for man ;and, in its Jewish form, for man in a mere state of legal discipline (which truth could not yet be brought out to them, but is implied in this verse, because His people are even as He is-in the liberty wherewith He hath made them free); whereas He, the only-begotten of the Father, doing the works of God in the world, stands on higher ground, and hallows, instead of breaking the Sabbath, by thus working on it. 66 He is no more a breaker of the Sabbath than God is, when He upholds with an energy that knows no pause the work of His creation from hour to hour, and from moment to moment; 'My Father worketh hitherto, and I work;' My work is but the reflex of His work. Abstinence from outward work belongs not to the idea of a Sabbath, it is only more or less the necessary condition of it for beings so framed as ever to be in danger of losing the true collection and rest of the spirit in the multiplicity of earthly toil and business. Man indeed must cease from his work, if a higher work is to find place in him. He scatters himself in his work, and therefore he must collect himself anew, and have seasons for so doing. But with Him who is one with the Father, it is otherwise. In Him the deepest rest is not excluded by the highest activity." (Trench on the Miracles.) 18. The ground of the charge is now shifted; and by these last words (ver. 17), occasion is given for one of our Lord's most weighty discourses.

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

k

• render, in like manner.

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. 19.] The discourse is a wonderful setting forth of the Person and Office of the Son of God in His Ministrations as the Word of the Father. It still has reference to the charge of working on the Sabbath, and the context takes in our Lord's answer both to this, ver. 17, and to the Jews' accusation, ver. 18. In this verse, He states that He cannot work any but the works of God: cannot, by his very relationship to the Father, by the very nature and necessity of the case ;the working of himself being an impossible supposition, and purposely set here to express one-the Son cannot work of Himself, because He is the Son: His very Person presupposes the Father's will and counsel as His will and counsel,-and His perfect knowledge of that will and counsel. And this, because every creature may abuse its freedom, and will contrary to God: but THE SON, standing in essential unity with God, cannot, even when become Man, commit sin,-break the Sabbath; for His whole Being and Working is in and of God. for what things soever · · ] This clause converts the former proposition, and asserts its truth when thus converted. 'For it is the very nature of the Son to do whatever the Father doeth.' Also, to do these works in like manner; after the same plan and proceeding, so that there can be no discord, but unity. 20.] For (this last is ensured by the fact, that) the Father loveth the Son, and sheweth him (in this the Lord sets forth to us the unfolding of the will and purposes of the Father to [Mark xiii. 32: Acts i. 7] and by Him, in His Mediatorial office) all things that himself doeth (all the purposes of His

...

viii. 54.

Luke vil. 14: ch. xi. 25, 43. Matt. xi. 27: ch. iii. 35: Acts xvii. 81.

doeth and he will shew him greater works than these, that ye may marvel. 21 For as the Father raiseth up the dead, and quickeneth them; 'even so P the Son quickeneth whom he will. 22 For the Father judgeth no man, but m hath committed all judgment unto the Son: 23 r that all men should honour the Son, even as they honour the Father. " He that honoureth not the Son honoureth not the Father which [hath] sent him. 24 Verily, verily, say unto you, He that heareth my word, and believeth viii. 51:

I

P render, the Son also.

¶ render, neither doth the Father judge any man.
I render, that all may.

secret counsel;-for with the Father,
doing is willing; it is only the Son who
acts in time); and this manifestation will
go on increasing in majesty, that the
wonder which now is excited in you by
these works may be brought out to its full
measure (in the acceptation or rejection of
the Son of God-wonder leading naturally
to the "honour" of ver. 23).
21.] It

is very important to observe the distinction
here between the working of the Eternal
Son (in creation, e.g.) as He is "in heaven"
with God, and His working in the state of
His humiliation, in which the Father should
by degrees advance Him to exaltation and
put His enemies under His feet. Of the
latter of these mention is made (ver. 20)
in the future, of the former in the present.
The former belong to the Son as His
proper and essential work: the latter are
opened out before Him in the process of
His passing onward in the humanity which
He has taken. And the unfolding of these
latter shall all be in the direction of, and
in accordance with, the eternal attributes
of the Son: see ch. xvii. 5; resulting in
His being exalted to the right hand of the
Father. So here, as it is the Father's
essential work to vivify the dead (see Rom.
viii. 11; 1 Sam. ii. 6 al.), so the Son vivifies
whom He will: this last whom He will not
implying any selection out of mankind, nor
said merely to remove the Jewish prejudice
that their own nation alone should rise
from the dead,-but meaning, that in
every instance where His will is to vivify,
the result invariably follows. Observe,

this quickeneth (maketh alive) lays hold of life in its innermost and deepest sense, and thus finds its illustration in the waking both of the outwardly and the spiritually dead. 22.] In the words neither doth is implied, that as the Father does not Himself, by His own proper act, vivify

$ omit.

xxviii. 18. ver. 27.

xvii. 2.

1 Pet. iv. 5.

n 1 John ii. 23. , o ch. iii. 16, 18: vi. 40, 47:

xx. 31.

any, but commits all quickening power to the Son:-so is it with judgment also. And judgment contains eminently in itself the "whom He will,"-when the act of quickening is understood-as it must be now-of bestowing everlasting life. Again, the raising of the outwardly dead is to be understood as a sign that He who works it is appointed Judge of quick and dead, for it is a part of the office of that Judge:—in the vivifying, the judgment is made: see below, ver. 29, and Ps. lxxii. 1-4. 23.] This being so, the end of all is, the honour of the Father in and by the Son. He (the Son) is the Lord of life, and the Judge of the world; -all must honour Him with equal honour to that which they pay to the Father:and whosoever does not, however he may imagine that he honours or approaches God, does not honour Him at all;-because He can only be known or honoured by us as 'THE FATHER WHO SENT HIS SON.'

24.] What follows, to ver. 30 inclusive, is an expansion of the two assertions in vv. 21, 22,-the quickening and the judging,-intimately bound up as they are together. There is a parallelism in verses 24 and 25 which should be noticed for the right understanding of the words. "He that heareth my word," in the one, answers to "the dead shall hear the voice of the Son of God" in the other. It is a kind of hearing which awakens to life,one accompanied by "believing Him that sent Me." And this last is not barely 'Him who sent Me,' but Him, the very essence of belief in Whom is in this, THAT HE SENT ME (see ch. xii. 44). And the expression believeth Him (not "on Him," which is quite unauthorized by the original) expresses that belief in the testimony of God that He hath sent His Son, which is dwelt on so much 1 John v. 9-12, where,

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