The Pulpit Commentary — John — Volume 2 — Section 368

EXPOSITION. CHAPTER XVIII. and separates the city on its ea.stem side from Scopss e.nd the Mount of Olives. It reaches B. THE Hoos RAS co111E. its deepest depression at the point where it Ver. 1-ch. xix. 42.-1. The outer glori- joins the Valley of Hinnom near the well of fication of Christ in hiB PaBaion. Rogel, contributing to the peculiar physical Vere. 1-11.-(1) The betrayal, tl,emajeaty conformation of the city. The stream is in of liiB bearing, accompanied by llintB of the summer dry to its bed, and Robinson, Grove, bitter cup. e.nd Wo.rren conjecture, in agreement with nn Ver. 1.-When J'es11B had spoken these old tradition, that there is, below the present words-i.e. had offered the prayer, and com- surface of its bed, e. subterra.neous water- muned with his Father touching himself, course, whose waters may be heard flow- his disciples, and his whole Church-he went ing. The stream ta.lres a sudden bend to forth with his disoiples ; i.e. from the resting- the south-east at En-Rogel, o.nd makes its place chosen by him on his way from the way, by the convent of 8aba., to the Dead "guest-chamber" to the Valley of Kedron; Sea. It is not without interest that thiJ, it may have been from some comer of the note of place given by St. John alone-for vast temple area, or some sheltered spot the three other evangelists simply speo.k o.f under the shadow of its walls, where he "the Mount of Olives "-brings the narrative uttered bis wondrous discourse and inter- into relation with the story of David's flight cession. He went over the ravine-or, from Absalom by the same ronte and also strictly speaking, winter-torrent-of Ke- the Jewish expectation (Joel ill. 2), and dron. 1 The stream rises north of Jerusalem, Mohammedan prediction, that here will take place the final judgment (Smith's 'Diction- 1 Tischendorf (6th edit.), oa the authority ary,' o.rt. "Kedron," by Grove; 'Pictorial oft(*, D, reads Toii K,lipoii, with two ancient Palestine,' vol. i. ; Robinson, 'Bib. Res.,' i. versions, "of the cedar;" A, S, .i., Vulgate, 269 : Winer's 'B. Real wiirterbuch,' a.rt. and other versions, Tou Ktlipo\v, corresponding "Kedron;" Dean Stanley's 'Sinai and with ~ so for as Tou is concerned. The 'TOIi' Palestine;' 'The Recovery of Jerusalem,' Kllipow of the T.B. and R.T., and the great by Co.pt. Warren and Ca.pt. Wilson, eh. i. bulk of uncials and cursives, looks like a mis- and v.). Where WBS a garden. This refer- taken modification of Tou into 'T01v, on the ence is in agreement (Matt. xxvi. 36; :Ofark supposition that Kllipo,v was genitive plural. xiv. 32) with the synoptic description of Whereas Josephus uses the word as nomina- the X?>plov, " parcel of ground," small fo.rm, tive singular, and uses it in the genitive, or ohveyard, enclosed from the rest of K,1ip01vor. If K,lipov be the true text, it is the hillside, and called "Gethsemane" equivalent to "of the cede.r;" if,..;; K,lipo,v, then we must translate "of the Kedron." 6; N eh. ii. 15). Westcott suggests, in We,tcott and Hort, Tregelles, Alford, and favour of 'TOIi' Kllipo,v, that the two no.mes of margin of Revised Version give preference to " the ced11rs" BDd " the Kedron " may he. ve the plural form," the cedars; '' Meyer, Lach- been originally interchanged, and as some m1mn, Lange, and Godet to the siagule.r, cedars were known at one time to have been which is the more probable,as the word would in the valley, the dark colour of the foliage then be a trauslitero.tion of the He brow word of cedars may have led to the adoption of Jii7p, the blook stream, so frequently the Hebrew name. Lange thinks thn.t the mentioned in the Olu Testament (2 Se.m. blood of the sacrifices found its we.y into it, .lv. 23; 1 Kings xv. 13; 2 Ki11gs xxiii. 4- e.nd darkened it. 380 THE GO~JIEL ACCORDING TO ST, JOHN. [on. xvm, 1-40.