respond with them; among these are presented the condescending love of Christ, shown in His seeking men, His tender relation as a man to John, His position of earnestness yet of forbearance toward His betrayer, His superhuman knowledge, His glorification in suffering, and the obstinate unbelief of the world. To this substance the peculiar character of the author's spirit, impressing itself on the language, has imparted a form which enlists the sensibilities in a high degree." "This Gospel speaks a language to which no parallel whatever is to be found in the whole compass of literature; such childlike simplicity, with such contemplative profundity; such life, and such deep rest; such sadness, and such serenity; and above all, such a breadth of love, an eternal life which has already dawned, a life which rests in God, which has overcome the disunion between the world that is and the world to come, the human and the Divine."1

1 Tholuck's Commentary on John, Introduction, § 5.

CHAPTER XIII.

ANALYSIS OF THE GOSPEL, WITH BRIEF EXPLANATORY

NOTES.

I. SIGNS TO THE UNBELIEVing world.-prologue.-TESTIMONY OF JOHN THE BAPTIST TO HIS PRE-EXISTENCE.-HIS TESTIMONY TO HIS OWN FOLLOWERS. POWER OF JESUS' WILL OVER NATURE. OVER THE WILLS OF MEN. -CONVICTION OF NICODEMUS.-FINAL AND COMPLETE TESTIMONY OF THE BAPTIST.-MESSIAHSHIP ACKNOWLEDGED BY THE SAMARITANS.-A COURTIER OF HEROD ANTIPAS CONVINCED.-HIS MIRACLES IN CONTRAST WITH FALSE MIRACLES. DIGNITY OF HIS CHARACTER, AND DIVINITY OF HIS PERSON ASSERTED BY HIMSELF.-GOD'S TESTIMONY TO JESUS IN HIS MIRACLES, AND THE PROPHECIES FULFILLED IN HIM.-MASSES OF THE PEOPLE CONVINCED.-HIS CHARACTER AS A PROOF.-DIVINE SONSHIP PROCLAIMED BY A VOICE FROM HEAVEN, ETC.-11. Evidence to st. JOHN AND OTHER APOSTLES IN PRIVATE, AND ESPECIALLY AS SEEN IN HIS SACRIFICE.-CONTINUED PRESENCE IN THE MISSION OF THE HOLY COMFORTER.-PRAYER FOR HIS FOLLOWERS.- -DIVINITY SEEN IN THE GARDEN OF GETHSEMANE.-IN HIS TRIAL BEFORE PILATE.-IN THE MANNER OF HIS DEATH.-IN THE DIVINE INTERPOSITION IN HIS BURIAL.-IN HIS RESURRECTION.

THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO ST. JOHN.

PART FIRST.-A series of proofs or signs that Jesus was the predicted Messiah, the appointed Saviour of the world; or, a record of what Jesus made known of Himself to convince the unbelieving. Chapters I. to XII.

I.]

1. Prologue. Messiah no other than the Eternal Word made Flesh. [Ver. 1-14. In the beginning1 was the Word,' and the Word was with God,

1

1 St. John, without tracing the genealogy of our Lord to Abraham as St. Matthew does, or to Adam as the evangelist Luke does, and without connecting the gospel with the prophecies of the Old Testament as Mark does, goes back as far as the finite powers of a mortal can reach. He penetrates the depths of the eternal past (passing by the creation of the world as an event of yesterday), and contemplates Christ as one with God, the invisible, incomprehensible Father. The "beginning," ȧpxý, is not the same spoken of Gen. i. 1, . In Genesis it denotes the origin of creation; here, a beginning before time. And the expression that the Word "was," in this beginning, denotes an enduring, timeless existence. 2 It is evident John uses this expression as a term known to his readers, and as

2

2 and the Word was God. The same was in the beginning with 3 God. All things were made by Him; and without Him was 4 not anything made that was made. In Him was life; and the 5 life was the light of men. And the light shineth in darkness; 6 and the darkness comprehended it not. There was a man sent 7 from God, whose name was John. The same came for a wit

3

the name of a Being or Person. A grammatical exposition is of no further use than to exhibit a certain fitness in the application made of this term in the writings of this apostle (1 John i. 1; Rev. xix. 13). John might have employed the term which Solomon had used before him, "Wisdom" (Prov. viii. 22-31); but he preferred that of WORD, probably because it embraced an idea wanting in the other term, to wit, that God reveals Himself in this Being, that this Being was the expression of God, in some sense as the human spirit manifests itself in speech. It is not to be conceded for a moment that he gained the idea from any historical or external source whatever. He obtained it first in reality through the illumination of the Spirit revealing to him in Christ the doctrine of the true God. We learn through the writings of the Jewish Philo, of Alexandria, that there had been much speculation respecting the Logos, and, in the prevailing philosophy of the apostolic age, these subtle speculations were still rife. "Providence had so ordered it that in the intellectual world in which Christianity made its first appearance many ideas apparently at least closely related to it should be current, in which Christianity could find a point of connection for the doctrine of God revealed in Christ." (Neander's Kirchen., i. 3, p. 989.) The author of this Gospel, in his long residence in the Greek cities of Asia Minor, had been brought in contact with these ideas, and he sought to lead those who were busied with their speculations from their religious idealism to the recognition of that God who was revealed in the person of Christ. In the choice of an expression for the truth with which he was charged, he makes use of a term suited to all times, but specially adapted to the intellectual status of those around him, and to whom he primarily addressed himself. He placed the idea of the Divine Word in such express connection with the idea of Messiah that he points out the Messiah as Himself the incarnate Logos. The grand thought before the apostle's mind is that the pre-existent Word has appeared as a human person. He is not some sublime creature, some mysterious emanation brought forth at some fixed beginning, but was with God, and was God, the self manifestation from eternity of the Father, the pure perfect image of Himself.

The whole vast universe, intelligent and unintelligent, creatures spiritual and material, in all their various ranks and orders (Col. i. 16, 17). It was the Father, imaging Himself in the Eternal Word, who uttered the creative fiat.

2 The life that He imparted was the light of men; it was full of blessedness. All that we can imagine of the purity and joy of man in the innocence of paradise wearing the image and likeness of his Maker, and all that we can conceive of that confirmed state of holiness and bliss to which he would have been exalted had he not sinned, must be included in that light which was in, or accompanied, the life imparted to men.

The apostle turns another leaf in this apocalypse of the past. What means this darkness, ʼn σкоTía, but the creature turned away from God, having through sin lost the Divine light; collective humanity, like this globe when it was formless and void, and darkness was upon the face of the deep?

The evangelist here refers to John the Baptist, his first teacher, who had directed him to Jesus, and who, as the greatest of the prophets, came to complete

3

ness, to bear witness of the Light, that all men through him 8 might believe. He was not that Light, but was sent to bear 9 witness of that Light. That was the true Light, which lighteth 10 every man that cometh1 into the world. He was in the world, and the world was made by Him, and the world knew Him not. 11 He came unto His own, and His own received Him not. But 12 as many as received Him, to them gave He power1 to become 13 the sons of God, even to them that believe on His name: which were born," not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the 14 will of man, but of God. And the Word was made flesh," and dwelt among us, (and we beheld His glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father,) full of grace and truth.

2. Testimony of John the Baptist, acknowledged as one of the greatest prophets by the Jews, to the pre-existence and Messiahship of Jesus.

[Ver. 15-34. 15 John bare witness of Him, and cried, saying, This was He of whom I spake,' He that cometh after me is preferred before for He was before me. 8 And of His fulness have all we

16

me;

the testimony that Jesus was the light that should enlighten the whole world. If the long line of prophets were like stars, illuminating the darkness of the night, John the Baptist was the morning star, the harbinger of the Sun of Righteousness.

1 If we construe "that cometh into the world," or that was coming, v, with the true Light, i.e. the Saviour, then the meaning is that He was coming to enlighten all nations, and not the Jewish nation only.

2 The personal appearing now becomes more distinct, by the use of the pronoun He.

3" His own" here clearly forms an antithesis with the world, and means His own kindred or nation, according to the flesh.

4 It means not merely opportunity, or prerogative, but ability. It was this that mankind lacked.

It is only by regeneration of the Spirit that sinners of our race become sons of God. Men who are born of God have this birth accomplished in them by the power of the first born and only begotten Son of God, working faith in their hearts through the Holy Ghost.

6 The climax to which all before has been tending. The "flesh" here means the whole human nature, body and soul, in its weak and necessitous condition, in which He dwelt, okývwσev, tabernacled. His glory shone through this tabernacle, as the glow of lamps at night makes a tent in the desert, or in the military encampment, luminous in the surrounding darkness.

7 This testimony was borne subsequently to his baptism of Jesus and the appointed sign, designating Jesus as the Messiah, being given. When the Pharisees and Sadducees came to his baptism he had declared that there was One coming after him mightier than he.

8 He appeared officially after John, but was superior to him in dignity. "For He was before me," refers to the pre-existence of Christ. The verb in the original

17 received, and grace for grace. For the law was given by 18 Moses, but grace and truth came by Jesus Christ. No man

hath seen God at any time; the only begotten Son, which is in 19 the bosom of the Father, He hath declared2 Him. And this is the record of John, when the Jews sent priests and Levites 20 from Jerusalem to ask him, Who art thou? And he confessed, and denied not; but confessed, I am not the Christ. 21 And they asked him, What then? Art thou Elias? And he saith, I am not. Art thou that prophet? And he answered, 22 No. Then said they unto him, Who art thou? that we may give an answer to them that sent us. What sayest thou of 23 thyself? He said, I am the voice of one crying in the wilder

ness, Make straight the way of the Lord, as said the prophet 24 Esaias. And they which were sent were of the Pharisees. 25 And they asked him, and said unto him, Why baptizest thou then, if thou be not that Christ, nor Elias, neither that prophet? 26 John answered them, saying, I baptize with water: but there 27 standeth One among you, whom ye know not; He it is, who coming after me is preferred before me, whose shoe's latchet

refers to a fixed and permanent state of existence, and not to one upon which Christ entered, which is expressed by a different verb in the preceding clause. The employment of the two verbs, to be and to become, in their distinctive significations, is well observed in these verses, the one being used of our Lord's pre-existent and unchanging state as supreme Logos, the other of His becoming incarnate and dwelling among men." See Comm. of J. J. Owen, D.D., LL.D., in loco.

1 Origen and Erasmus regard the words of ver. 16-18 as those of the Baptist; so also Luther, Melanchthon, Lange, and others. But Tholuck, Hengstenberg, Alford, Schaff, and others, ascribe what is contained in these verses to the evangelist, on the ground of their distinctive Christian character. "Grace for grace," i.e., grace in continual accessions. Believers may partake of the inexhaustible fulness that is in Christ, and, as their capacity of receiving increases as they receive, may continue to receive without danger of ever exhausting the fountain.

2 It is only by Jesus Christ that the invisible Father has been manifested and can be known. He is 66 'the image of the invisible God" (Col. i. 15;

2 Cor. iv. 4).

3.

Record," μaprupía, for the most part, in the New Testament has the sense of testimony.

4 The party among the Jews hostile to Jesus, the Pharisees or representatives of. the Sanhedrin. The general title Jews, so common in this Gospel, was natural to one who had been so long absent from Judæa as the apostle, who was writing mainly for the Gentiles.

John was not Elijah in the sense of those who put the question, i.e., he was not that old prophet risen from the dead; and it may be that John was ignorant that, by coming in the spirit and power of Elijah, in him was actually fulfilled the prophecy of Malachi iv. 5.

6 Exalted in dignity above.