THE
PULPIT COMMENTARY, EDITED BY TIil!
VEHY REV. H. D. M. SPENCE, D.D., DEAN OF GLOUOll:8TEll;
AND BY THE
ItEV. JOSEPH S. EXELL, M.A.
TH1◄) GOSPEL OF ST. JOHN. Jfnttobuctfon anb @xpo1ftion Bv REV. H. R. REYNOLDS, D.D., 1'!11".BIDEN'l', AND PBOFE!ISOB OP THEOLOGY, OBESJIUNT OOLLEGE ; FELLOW Oi' UlllVEBl!lTY COLLEGE, LONDON,
l!1om ii etics BY REV. PROF. T. CROSKERY, D.D., LA'l'E l'ROl'ESBOR OF SYSTEMATIO TBll:OLOGY, MAGEE OOLLEGE, LONDONDERC.'\".
'f!1omflfes b~ 1:Tatious ~utbots. REV. PROF. J. R. THOl\lSON, M.A. REV. B. THO~IAS REV. D. YOUNG B.A. REV. GEORGE BR.OWN, ILi..
VOL. II,
NEW EDITION,
FUNK & WAGNALLS COMPANY LONDON AND NEW YORK 1907 THE
GOSPEL ACCORDING TO ST. JOHN. ------ ' EXPOSITION. viii. 59 from the text as a gloss, favours 11, CHAPTER IX. pause between the attempt to stone Jesus These chapters (ix. and x.) bring the conflict and the miracle. Lange has the incon- with the Jews to e. climax before the com- sistent remark that the ,rapcf:yow is "the par- mencement of the Perman ministry. They ticiple of the preceding thongh doubtful are doubtless closely connected with what ,ro;p71-ye11." If it were a gloss, the ,rctp71-ye11 had has preceded; but the note of time (eh. x. 22) been introduced by some copyist from the implies an interval of some months of ,rap&-yow, and therefore the latter can derive intense activity elsewhere-to have carried no meaning from the former. Admitting on the ministry of Christ from the Feast of the spuriousness of the gloss, the connection Tabernacles to the winter. If eh. x. 22 between the chapters is not close enough points be.ck, as Westcott argues by alteration to allow the supposition that, on the passing of the Receive<l Text and by special transla- out of the temple with his disciplee, the tion, to the preceding discourse, we are com- convers11otion and miracle took place. Godet pelled to dissociate the cure of the blind thinks that the most probable time was the man from the teaching of eh. viii., and to evening of the memorable day when our Lonl regard the opening verse of eh. ix. ns entirely and his disciples had returned to the temple. distinct from, and discontinuous with, the True, in Acts iii. 2 a congenital cripple stormy scene in the temple. Dr. Eustace sat at the gate of the temple, e.sking e. lms; Conder,• Outlines of the Life of Christ,' con- but in this place there is no mention of the siders the connection so close between the temple. Our Lord may he.,o "seen" this eighth, ninth, and tenth chnpters, e.s to bring beggar on any one of his peregrinations ove:r the entire series of instructions into one the slopes of Olivet or on the road to Beth- group, nnd to intercnlate e. considerable any, and now he seems to be in the company portion of the Inter Galilaie.n ministry and of the disciples, and with them nlone. They also thnt in Peraia between the seventh and are not apparently suffering from the recent eighth chapters. On that hypothesis, after excitement of the angry contest in tho temple- the break-up of the Sanhedrin on the last court. They have had time to recover them- great day of the Feast of Tabemaoles (oh. selves, and to draw from Christ, not as the rii.52), an absence of some months intervened eternal I AM, but as their "Rabbi," a solu- before Jesus (eh. viii. 12) age.in spoke to tion of II most pressing psychological and them, nnd said, "I am the Light of the theological puzzlo which has agitated all world," deriving his illustro.tion from '' the schools of thought. Yet tho reply of Jesus, Feast of Lights," which accompanied the en• involving e. fresh illustration of his being kainia of eh. x. 22. the "Light of the world," shows that the The removal of the closing words of oh. gre11ot utterances of the preceding discour:.e JOHN-II, B 2 THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO ST. JOHN. [cu. Ix. 1-41.