Musculus also remarks that the Pope's high claims and great sounding titles are useless, so long as his works contradict his words.
38.— [But if I do though, etc.'] Our Lord here concludes His reply to the Jews : " If I do the works of my Father, then, though ye may not be convinced by what I say, be convinced by what I do. Though ye resist the evidence of my words, yield to the evidence of my works. In this way learn to know and believe that I and my Father are indeed one, He in Me, and I in Him, and that in claiming to be His $on I speak no blas- phemy."
We should note here, as elsewhere, our Lord's strong and repeated appeals to the evidence of His miracles. He sent to John the Baptist, and desired him to mark His works, if He would know whether He was " the coming One," — " Go and tell John what ye have seen and heard, the blind receive their sight," etc. Just so He argues here. (Matt. xi. 4.)
Let us note the close and intimate union that exists between the First and Second Persons of the Trinity : " The Father is in Me, and I in Him." Such language can never be reconciled with the views of Socinians.
" By these words," says Bloomfield, "our Lord meant com- munion of mind and equality of power. It is plain that the Jews clearly understood that He claimed and ascribed to Himself the attributes of Godhead, and made Himself equal with the Father."
Chrysostom remarks, that our Lord seems to say, " I am nothing different from what the Father is, so however as that I remain Son ; and the Father is nothing different from what I am, so however as that He remains Father. He that knows Me has known the Father, and learned the Son."
89 .—[Therefore. ..sought. ..take him.'] Here we see the utter insen- sibility of our Lord's hardened enemies to any argument or appeal to their reason. In spite of what He had now said, they showed a determination to go on with their wicked designs, and tried again to lay violent hands on Him. Nothing seems to harden the heart, and take away the reasoning faculty, so com- pletely as obstinate resistance to plain evidence.
! [But he escaped.. .hand.] This would be literally rendered, "And He came forth out of their hand," as in Luke iv. 30; and at viii. 59 of this Gospel. The escape seems to have been effected by miracle. A restraint was put on the hands of His enemies, and their eyes were temporarily blinded.
40. — [And went... again.. .Jordan. ..John. ..baptized.] I know not to what the expression " again " can refer here, except to the time when our Lord began His ministry by coming to be baptized by John at Bethabara, beyond Jordan. (See John i. 28.) I do not find that He had been there again during the three years oi Bis»