1,— [After these things.] This expression is indefinite. It only means that the appearance of our Lord, about to be described in this chapter, took place " after" His appearance on the eighth day following His resurrection. The time therefore, in the verse before us, is some day between the eighth and the fortieth day, when He ascended up into heaven. But what precise day we cannot tell. One thing at any rate we may be sure of. It was not the Sabbath day, or else the disciples would not have gone fishing. Even on the day following the crucifixion, Christ's disciples " rested according to the com- mandment." (Luke xxiii. 56.)
[Jesus showed Himself again.. .disciples.] A deep question naturally rises out of the expression before us. Where was our Lord on the days when He did not " manifest or show Him- self" to His disciples? It is evident that He was not with them always, and that He only visited them at intervals. Where was He then in the mean time ? — Not in heaven, we may be sure, because He had not yet ascended. But where was He on earth ? I speak of course of His human nature. As God, He is everywhere. But where was He, as a man? This is a mysterious matter, and one about which it is useless to speculate. Enough for us to know that our Lord was visi- ble, or invisible, and appeared suddenly in one place or another place, and assumed one form or another form, at His own will, after a manner that we cannot understand. But it is quite plain that, when we read the words in Acts, " being seen of them forty days " (Acts i. o), we must not suppose them to mean that our Lord was seen every day. It only means that during forty days He was seen at intervals. Each appearance, we doubt not, had its own special purpose and intention.
Chrysostom remarks, " It is clear from the words ' showed Himself,' that Christ was not seen (after His resurrection) un- less He condescended, because His body was henceforth incor- ruptible, and of unmixed purity."
[At the Sea of Tiberias.] Concerning this remarkable piece of water, sometimes called the Lake of Gennesaret, and some- times the Sea of Galilee, I have already said something in my note on John vi. 1. (Vol. 1, " Expository Thoughts on John," p. 329.) It is a fresh-water lake, through which the river Jor- dan runs, twelve and a half miles long and six and three-quar- ters broad, and remarkable in a geological point of view, as being six hundred and fifty-five feet below the level of the Mediterranean Sea.* In a theological point of view it must always be most interesting to a Christian, because some of our Lord's mightiest miracles were wrought on it, or close to it.
* I give the above measurements from Tristram's " Topogra- phy of the Holy Land," as I believe they are more trustworthy than those which I gave in the first volume of this work.