66 CIII. viii.17 But they neither knew his Father nor him, 18 I am one that SECT. And it is written in your own law, for which 17 It is also writ you profess so sacred a regard, that the testi- ten in your law, mony of two men is to be admitted as true, two men is true. that the testimony of John and matters of the greatest consequence are without scruple to be determined by it. 18 (Deut. xvii. 6. and xix. 15.) Now I am [one] who bear this witness of myself, in a fact, bear witness of mythe truth of which I cannot but certainly know; that sent me beareth and the Father who sent me is another, and witness of me. surely a most credible Person, who also bears his testimony to me; thereby asserting the truth of every doctrine I teach, and the justice of every sentence I might pass. 19 20 self, and the Father thy Father? Jesus my Then said they to him, Where is this thy 19 Then said they Father, to whom thou so frequently appealest? unto him, Where is mention him plainly, that we may know how answered, Ye neithfar he is to be regarded, and produce him as a er know me, nor my witness. Jesus answered, You may well ask; Father: if ye had for it plainly appears by your conduct, that have known known me, ye should you neither know me, nor my Father, however Father also. you may boast an acquaintance with him; and indeed, if you had known me aright, and regarded me as you ought to have done, you would also long ere this have known who and what my Father is, in another manner than you now do; for I bear his complete resemblance, and it is my great business to reveal him to those who submit to my instructions. come. These words Jesus spake with the greatest 20 These words freedom, as he was teaching in the temple, in a spake Jesus in the certain part of it called the treasury, where the treasury, as he chests stood in which the people put their ple: and no man laid taught in the temgifts for the service of that sacred house, (see hands on him, for Mark xii. 41, sect. clix.) the stores of which his hour was not yet were laid up in chambers over that cloister : and though he so plainly intimated that God was his Father, and charged the Jews with being ignorant of him, in whom they boasted as so peculiarly their God, yet their spirits were kept under such a powerful, though secret restraint, that no one seized him; which was the more wonderful, as it was a place from whence it would not have been easy to have escaped without a miracle, and which was much frequented by his greatest enemies: but the true reason was, because his hour was not yet come in which he was, by Divine permission, to be delivered into their hands. They that rejected him should die in their sins; 67 21 Then said Je- Confiding therefore in the protection of SECT. sus again unto them, Divine Providence, Jesus then said to them CIII. 1 go my way, and ye shall seek me, and again, as he had done before (chap. vii. 33, 34, shall die in your sins: p. 52), I am speedily going away from among viii.21 whither I go, ye you, and you shall seek me, and inquire after cannot come. 22 Then said the himself? because he the Messiah in vain; but, as a just punishment John The Jews then said, with a very perverse 22 Jews, Will he kill and foolish contempt, What, will he kill himsaith, Whither I go, self, that he says, You cannot come whither I am ye cannot come. going? We shall not desire to follow him upon those terms. from above: ye are not of this world. : 23 And he said And he said to them yet more plainly, So vile 23 unto them, Ye are and malicious an insinuation as this evidently from beneath, I am shews that you are from beneath, the slaves of of this world, I am earth, and the heirs of hell; while, on the other hand, I am from above, and shall quickly return thither you are originally of this world, and your treasure and hearts are here; but as I am not of this world, my thoughts therefore naturally turn to that celestial abode from whence I came, and I incessantly labour to conduct men 24 I said therefore thither. But as to you I labour in vain: and 24 anto you, that ye therefore I just now said unto you, that you shall sins: for if ye be. die in your sins; and it is really a great and awlieve not that I am ful truth, and deserves another kind of regard he, ye shall die in than you give it; so that I yet again would call you to consider it; for if you believe not that I am [he] whom I have represented myself to be, you shall unavoidably die in your sins, and are in effect the murderers of your own souls. shall die in your your sins. That I am he, &c. .] There ening here, from ver. 21, is a very awful is evidently an ellipsis here, to be supplied rebuke to the folly of their answer, ver. by comparing it with ver. 12. Compare 22, as if our Lord had said, "It very ill John xiii. 19; Mark xiii. 6; and Acts becomes you to trifle and amuse yourselves xiii. 25. with such silly and spiteful turns, when your life, even the life of your souls, is at stake; and to talk of my killing myself, * Are in effect the murderers of your own souls.] The repetition of the threat 68 SECT. John viii.25 thou? And Jesus them, 26 I have many For he only spake what the Father had taught him. Then said they to him, in proud derision, Who 25 Then said they CIII. art thou, that such great regard should be paid unto him, Who art to thee, and that it should be so fatal a thing to saith unto neglect thee? And Jesus said to them, Truly, Even the same that I because I am still speaking to you to this very said unto you from 26 day in so plain and affectionate a manner. I the beginning. have many things to say and judge concerning things to say, and to youf, and justly might upbraid you with the ut- judge of you: but most severity, and pass an immediate sentence he that sent me is true; and I speak to of condemnation upon you: but, for the present, the world those I content myself with reminding you, that he things which I have who sent me is true; and, as I speak to the world heard of him. only those things which I have heard from him, he will finally verify my words, and it will be at the peril of your souls if you continue to treat me with such perverseness and contempt. 27 28 Father. These things were very intelligible, when 27 They undercompared with what he had said before; [yet] stood not that he so exceeding stupid were they, and so blinded spake to them of the by the prejudices of their minds, that they did not understand that he spake to them of God the Father as the Person who sent him. Jesus therefore said to them, I know that, not- 28 Then said Jesus withstanding all I have said, you will be still so unto them, When obstinate as to persist in your infidelity, till you proceed even to take away my life; but when, after all your professed desire of his appearance when by your unbelief and impenitency you are plunging yourselves into eternal death." Thus do those passages in our Lord's discourses, which to a careless reader might seem flat tautologies, appear, on an attentive review, to be animated with a most penetrating Spirit, and to be full of Divine dignity. A remark which will frequently occur, especially in reading those important discourses of Christ, which John has, through the infinite goodness of God to his church, recorded after they had been omitted by the other evangelists. Truly, because I am still speaking to you, I have many things to say and judge concern ing you.] I entirely agree with the learned Raphelius (Annot. ex Herod. p. 292-303), that all the difficulty of these words arises from a mistake in the pointing, as they stand in most copies; and I think his method of restoring the true reading and sense the easiest and justest I have ever met with. He would point them thus, Την αρχήν, ότι και λάλω υμίν, πολλα εχε περί υμών λαλείν και κρίνειν. All that know any thing of the Greek language, know that any often signifies indeed, or truly; and so the translation I have given is very literal, and makes a very good sense. Mr. Fleming would render it, I am, as I said unto you, The Beginning, that is, the Person spoken of, Gen. 1 1, and elsewhere, under, that title: but this, as well as our own version, is not any thing like a just and grammatical translation; though to be sure there is a sense in which Christ may most properly be called the Beginning. Compare Col. i. 18; Rev. i. 8; xxi. 6; xxii. 13. (See Fleming's Christology, Vol. I. p. 281.) I shall only add, that some would render it, The same I am speaking to you of: but the version here given is more agreeable to the original, and by a proper pointing would appear natural and easy, if what should be considered as one sentence had not been separated into two parts by `a wrong division of the verses. Reflections on the danger of neglecting Christ. 69 ye have lift up the and kingdom, you shall have lifted up that glo- SECT. Son of man, then rious Person, the Son of man, from the earth, shall ye know that CIII. I am he, and that I and hath even proceeded so far as to put him John do nothing of myself, to a violent death, instead of seeing his cause viii.28 but as my Father and interest overborne by that outrageous athath taught me, I speak these things. tempt, you shall then know, by some new and convincing tokens, that I am [he], and [that] I do nothing separately of myself, but, in exact agreement with him, speak all these things ac29 And he that cording as my Father has instructed me: And 29 sent me is with me: even now he that sent me is graciously present left me alone: for me, to bear his testimony to the truth of I do always those what I say, and to support and vindicate me : things that please and whatsoever you may foolishly surmise, the the Father hath not him. with Father has not left me alone, nor will he ever IMPROVEMENT. SUCH may our character ever be, as we desire the supports ver.29 of the Divine presence! Whoever be displeased, may we always do the things which please him; and with all diligence let us labour, whether present in the body, or absent from it, to be still approved and accepted of him! (2 Cor. v. 9.) Our blessed Redeemer is the light of the world. With how 12 much pleasure should we behold his rays! With how much cheerfulness should we follow, whithersoever he leads us; as well knowing that we shall not then walk in darkness; and God forbid we should ever choose to continue in it, as the shelter and screen of wicked works! May we, with all candour and humility, regard and submit to 17, 18 the testimony which the Father has borne to him in so express and incontestable a manner! Dreadful would be the consequence of our refusing to do it. The doom of these wretched Jews 21, 24 would be ours, to die in our sins. And oh, how insupportable will that guilty burden prove in a dying hour, and before the tribunal of God! How will it sink us into condemnation and despair! In vain shall those who now despise him then seek You shall then know that I am he.] This undoubtedly refers to the progidies attending his death, his resurrection, and ascension, the descent of the Spirit, the amazing miracles wrought by the apostles in his name, &c. But I am careful not to put such words into our Lord's mouth in the paraphrase as would have been unsuit able to the reserve which, on some of these heads, prudence obliged him to keep; or such as, in other instances, would have superseded farther inquiry into the meaning of what he said. I think it most natural to refer these to the notes, or to the paraphrase on some following passage. 70 Many believe and are inclined to follow him. SECT. admittance to the world where he is: thither they cannot come ; CIII. and if excluded from him, must be excluded from happiness. ve. 25 26 28 SECT. John Justly might it long since have been our case: for surely he has many things to say of us, and to judge concerning us, should he lay judgment to the line, and righteousness to the plummet, after his having been so long with us, yea, after we have, as it were, seen him lifted up and set forth as crucified among us. (Gal. iii. 1.) May this faithful admonition prevail to our conviction and reformation; that our everlasting condemnation may not farther illustrate the reasonableness, yea, the necessity, of it, and the madness of hardening our hearts against it! SECT. CIV. Our Lord continues his discourse with the Jews in the treasury, the day after the feast of tabernacles; and labours to convince them how vain their pretences to liberty and to the privileges of the children of Abraham were, while they continued to reject and persecute him. John VIII. 30—47. JOHN VIII. 30. JOHN VIII. 30. him. on HUS did Jesus warn the Jews of the dan- A these words, THU ger of rejecting him, and appeal to his heavenly Father as authorizing the whole of his many believed viii.30 administration; and, as he was speaking these words, many of his hearers were so struck with them, that they believed in him, and were strongly inclined to follow him as the Messiah. 31 Then Jesus, knowing the weakness and 31 Then said Jetreachery of the human heart, and the difficul- sus to those Jews ties which would lie in the way, if they atwhich believed on him, If ye continue tempted to put that inclination into practice, said to those of the Jews who were now ready to profess that they believed in him, If you con a Many believed in him.] One can hardly think that the ambiguity of the expression of the Son of man's being lified up (ver. 28) engaged them to this, in hope that it might intimate some exaltation to a temporal kingdom. It is more reasonable to believe that they felt their hearts impressed with what they heard from him in the whole preceding discourse. Yet it is observable, that in the series of it he advances no new proof of his mission so that probably these people were wrought upon by what they observed in the temper and conduct of Christ; bearing the perverseness of his enemies with so much patience, speaking of an ignominious and painful death with such holy composure, and expressing so genuine and lively a sense of his heavenly Father's approbation, and so sweet a complacency in it. And, perhaps, would ministers generally allow themselves to open with freedom the native workings of a heart deeply impressed with the gospel, the secret charm might subdue those whose subtlety and prejudice might be proof against the most conclusive abstract reasoning. |