[5131] However pictorial, the sketch of this given by Keim (Jesu von Nazara,' iii. 1, pp. 131 &c.) is - as too often - somewhat exaggerated.
[5132] By a strange concurrence the coin, which on Christ's demand was handed to Him, bore the image' of the Emperor. It must, therefore, have been either a foreign one (Roman), or else one of the Tetrarch Philip, who exceptionally had the image of Tiberius on his coins (comp. Schürer, N.T. Zeitgesch. p. 231). Neither Herod nor Herod Antipas had any image' on their coins, but only the usual devices' of the Maccabaean period. And the coins , which the Roman emperors had struck specially for Palestine, bore till the time of Vespasian, in accommodation to Jewish prejudices, no image of any kind.
[5133] St. Mark xii. 17.
[5134] xethamazon, according to the better reading in St. Mark.
[5135] St. Mark xiii. 41-44; St. Luke xxi. 1-4.
[5136] Sheqal. vi. 5; v. 6.
[5137] Midd. i. 1.
[5138] Jos. Ant. xvi. 4. 4; 7. 1.
[5139] Babha B. 10 b.
[5140] Jewish tradition, though it ever had painfully thrusts forward the reward, has some beautiful legends, allegories, and sayings about the gifts of the poor. One quotation must here suffice (Bemidb. R. 14). It is to the effect, that , if on who is poor, doeth charity, god says of him: This one is preventing Me. he has kept My commandments before they have come to him. I must recompense him. In Vayyikra R. 3, we read of a woman, whose offering of a handful of flour the priest despised, when God admonished him in a dream to value the gifts as hiaghly as if she had offered herself. Yet another quotation from the Mishnah. The tractate Menachoth closes with these words: Alike as regards burnt-offerings of beasts and those of fowls (those of the poor) and the meat-offering, we find the expression "for a sweet savour," to teach us, that to offer much or to offer little is tha same, provided only that a person direct mind and heart towards God.'
[5141] St. John xii. 20-50.
[5142] See ch. vi.
[5143] St. Matt. xxiv.
[5144] We mark here also the utter absence of all legendary embellishments as evidence of truth. So far from yielding to what, even in a book like the present, is a temptation, the narrative of the Evangelist is peculiarly meagre and void of details. We may note that only proselytes of righteousness,' who had submitted of circumcision, would be allowed fellowship in the regular worship.
[5145] St. John xii. 23.
[5146] vv. 24-26.
[5147] vv. 27, 28 a.
[5148] Concurrebat horror mortis et ardor obedientiæ. - Bengel.
[5149] Quid dicam? non, quid eligam? - Bengel.
[5150] Professor Westcott has declared himself in favour of regarding this clause, not as a question, but as a prayer, But this seems to me incompatible alike with the preceding and the succeeding clause.
[5151] St. John vii. 28 b-33.
[5152] vv. 34-36 a.
[5153] This is another evidence of the Aramaic education of the writer of the Fourth Gospel. Yet another is the peculiar Judaic use of the word {hebrew}, hour, in ver. 27. But the idea of Prince of this world' has no analogon in the {hebrew} (or Metatron) of Rabbinism, to whom, strangely, the designation {hebrew} (in Zech. ii. 4 A.V., Babha B. 75 b, and in Ps. xxxvii. 25, Yebam. 16 b, about middle) is applied. And this is, on the other hand, quite as characteristic of the Gospel which, under Jewish forms, bears a totally contrary spirit.
[5154] It is another mark of Jewish authorship, this use of the word Law,' to denote the whole Scriptures.
[5155] Lux ipsa manet; sed non semper in vobis.
[5156] Ambulandum, non disceptandum. Fides non est deszes, sed agilis in luce.
[5157] St. John xii. 36 b.
[5158] St. John vii. 37-43.
[5159] Is. liii 1.
[5160] Is. vi.