to John's care. He said, " Woman, behold thy son." (John xix. 26.) The Yirgm Mary was an erring woman, hke all other believing women, but we must not lay more blame on her than Scripture warrants.
On the other side, it is useless to deny that our Lord's words were intended, as Chrysostom, Theophylact, and Euthymius say, to be a rebuke to Mary. She erred here, perhaps from aflfection- ate desire to bring honour to her Son, as she erred on other occasions. The words before us were meant to remind her, that she must henceforth leave our Lord to choose His own times and modes of acting.- The season of subjection to her and Joseph was over. The season of his public ministry had at length begun. In carrjing on that ministry, she must not presume to suggest to Him. The utter contrariety of this verse to the teaching of the Roman Catholic Church about the Virgin Mary is too palpable to be explained away. She was not without error and sin, as Romish writers have dared to assert, and was not meant to be prayed to and adored. If our Lord would not allow His mother even to suggest to Him the working of a mira- cle, we may well suppose that aU Roman Catholic prayers to the Virgin Mary, and especially prayers entreating her to " command her Son," are most offensive and blasphemous in His eyes.
The Greek expression, rendered "what have I to do Avith thee," would be translated literally, "what to me and thee?" It is an elliptical expression, of which the full meaning probably is, "What is there in common to me and thee ? " " My thoughts," as Bengel says, " are one thing, and thine another." — It is the same phrase that is used in an interrogative form in Matt. viii. 29 ; Mark i. 24, v. 7 ; Luke viii 28 ; and in an imperative form in Matt, xxvii. 19.
[Mine hour is not yet come.] The simplest and most reason- able view of these words is to refer them to Christ's "hour" or time for working a miracle. It is like the expression, " my time is not yet full come." (John vii. 8.) Our Lord did not tell Mary that He would not work a miracle. But He would have her know that she roust not expect Him to do mighty works to please His relatives after the flesh. He would only work a miracle, upon this or any other occasion, when the fitting season f3r it, the time appointed in God's counsel, had arrived.
There is a curious idea maintained by Augustine, Wordsworth, and others, that our Lord here referred to the hour of His cruci- fixion, and that He meant, " My hour is not yet come for recog nizing thee and honouring thee publicly as my mother, but 1 shall do it one day on the cross." This however seems a very far-fetched and improbable application of the words.
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L. — [His mother saUh.,.do it] Two tilings are very noteworthy in this verse. One is the meekness v^^ith which the Yiigin Mary submitted to the gentle rebuke which came from our Lord's mouth, in the last verse. The other is the firm faith which she still exhibited in our Lord's power to work a miracle in order to supply the lack of wine, and in the probability of His working it.
Dyke observes, " The direction which Mary gives to the ser vants belongs to us all. We must perform simple obedience to Christ in all things ; His sayings mu^t be our doings. No rea- soning of the matter must there be, no inquiry, as into men's commandments and speeches ; but this must suffice, ' Christ hath said it.' This is the bhnd obedience which Jesuits yield to their superiors, but it is the obedience that belongs to Christ. Many will do something that Christ says, but not whatsoever He says."
It is not, perhaps going too far to say, that after observing her Son's perfect life and perfect wisdom during tliirty years at Nazareth, Mary spoke the words before us with special confidence, and with a greater depth of meaning than appears on the sur- face of the sentence. — "Whatsoever He says deserves attention. Whatsoever He says, do it." — At any rate the verse contains a deep practical lesson for the whole Church of Christ. Whatso- ever Christ says, let us obey and do.
G. —[Six water-pots... .after the manner. ...Jews.] St. John mentions these details in describing the miracle, with a special reference to Gentile readers. He meant them to understand that there was nothing remarkable in the circumstance that there were six large water-pots of stone in the place where the feast was held. The peculiar customs of the Jews about ceremonial washings and purifyings, made it necessary to have a large supply of water at hand. The words of St. Mark throw light on the verse before us : — " The Pharisees, and all the Jews, except they wash their hands oft, eat not, holding the tradition of the elders," &c. (Mark vii. 3, &c.) The presence of the six water-pots, therefore, could not arise from coUusion or pre-arrangement. It was a natural consequence of Jewish habits in our Lord's times.
[Two or three firlins apiece.] Many fooHsh and unprofitable r^-niarks have been built on this expression, as to the very large quantity of wine w^hich our Lord must have created when the miracle we are considering was wrought. It might suffice to reply that there is much uncertainty about th5 precise quantity of liquid which the ancient measure, which we here render " firkins," contained. But the best and safest answer is, that we must not measure the demands of a Jewish marriage feast, which perhaps lasted several days, and included a large number of guests, by the feasts of our own times.
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