Himself in the point cf view iu which His unbelieving enemies ought to have regarded Him, if they could not yet acknowledge His divinity. " I am among you a man speaking the truth : and yet ye seek to kill Me." — The attempt of Jews and Socinians to show that our Lord was not really God, founded on this text, is futile. Our Lord's real and true humanity no sound Trini- tarian thinks of denying.
41. — [Ye do the deeds of your father.] This means "You are doing the things that your' father the devil approves and suggests to you. You are showing yourselves genuine children of the devil, by doing his works." The word "ye" in the Greek is emphatic, and may possibly be intended to contrast with " I," at the beginning of the 35th verse.
[Then said they... not born of fornication.'] These words can hardly be taken literally. Our Lord was speaking to the Jews not as individuals, but as a nation and a class, and was speak- ing of their descent in a religious point of view. The question was, " Who was their father"? From whom did they get their spiritual character? To whom were their proclivities and ten- dencies to be traced?" This our Lord's hearers understood, and said, " We be not born of fornication ; we are not heathens and idolaters at any rate, even if we are not as good as Abra- ham."— That idolatry was called fornication, because it was unfaithfulness to the covenant God, a forsaking Him for false gods, is, I think, clear from many places in the Old Testament. See for instance Jeremiah ii. 1—20, and iii. 1 — 3. I think this was in the minds of the Jews, when they spoke to our Lord here. This is Augustine's view.
The notion of Euthymius, Rupertus, and others, that the Jews refer to other children of Abraham, by Hagar and Ketu- rah, and boast themselves his true children by Sarah, is not satisfactory. It is surely too much to charge Abraham with the sin of fornication, because he took Hagar to be his wife, at the instance of Sarah, and married Keturah after Sarah's death !
The notion of some, that the Jews refer here to the many mar- riages between Jews and Gentiles in the Old Testament times, (as seen in Ezra x. 1, etc.,) and repudiate them, is not proba- ble.
Some have thought that the Jews insinuated wicked doubts of our Lord's legitimate birth in this phrase. But it seems unlikely.
[We have one Father, even God.] The Jews here lay claim to be regarded as God's children. That God is called "the Father " of Israel in several places in the Old Testament, is undeniable. See Deut. xxxii. 6; 1 Chron. xxix. 10; Isai. lxiii. 16 and lxiv. 8 ; Mai. i. 6. But it is very clear that these texts specially refer to God's relation to Israel as a nation, and not to Israelites as individuals. The Jews, however, in their pride