《Lange’s Commentary on the Holy Scriptures – John (Ch. 4~Ch. 8》(Johann P. Lange) 04 Chapter 4

DOCTRINAL AND ETHICAL

1. The advancing opposition of the darkness to the light of the world, in its most diverse forms.

2. Christ, the quickening life, is the central thought of chapters4–7 In the fourth chapter He presents Himself as the refreshment of life, the fountain of peace; in the fifth, as the fountain of healing, the healing quickener of the sick and the dead, even to resurrection; in the sixth, as the sustaining and nourishing bread of life; in the seventh, as the hidden, mysterious spirit-life, whence the fresh fountain-life of the spirit flows. After this the idea of light comes forward. In the eighth chapter Christ is the preserving, enlightening light, the day of the word; in the ninth, the awakening, quickening light, the light-star of the world, by which the blind receive sight, and those who profess to see, become blind; in the tenth, the shepherd through life to death; in the eleventh, the resurrection from death to eternal life; in the twelfth, the transfigurer of death into the seed of full and glorious life.

3. As the fourth chapter presents Christianity in contrast with sacred antiquities (Jacob’s well), and with the places and services of the temple in the ancient time, so this fifth chapter unfolds it in contrast with ancient miraculous localities and curative resorts.

4. The very first public attendance of Christ at a feast had been followed by a hostile demonstration of the Jews; and this second one brings them already to the commencement of capital process against Him. This contrast of the feasts of the Jews and the feasts of Christ runs through the whole fourth Gospel; the former preparing death for Christ, the latter quickening the world with miracles of life. A contrast which reminds us of autos-da fe,^[FN84] Maundy Thursday=bulls, and Saint Bartholomew nights on the one hand, and the true evangelical festivals of the faith on the other.

5. The man healed at the pool of Bethesda is not only parallel, but also in some respects a contrast, to the man healed at the pool of Siloam. The most important point of contrast is the indolence and sleepiness of the one and the brightness and energy of the other. But just this makes the former case the more suitable type of the general resurrection. The Revelation -animating principle in Christ raises up not only living believers, but also in the last day the most lifeless unbelievers; though a whole age intervene between the first and the general resurrection.

6. The fountain of Bethesda an example of earthly sources of healing, a symbol of the divine source; the pool and hall of Bethesda an example of watering-places, hospitals, etc, a symbol of the theocracy; the hall of Bethesda, visited by Christ, a representative of the church, the dispensary of divine grace in the sinful world.

7. The Sabbath of the Jews and the Sabbath of Christ. Christ here gives the deepest warrant for the higher Sabbath work, in opposition to a dead Sabbath rest. God’s creating, and God’s working in His creation, are different things. And the most important works of God in His Sabbath are His festal works of love for the restoration of man. So with this festal Sabbath work of Christ. The Sabbath of the Christian should follow the example. [Comp. Exeg. Notes on John 5:16.—P. S.]

8. The two accusations brought against Jesus before the Jewish court mark the two positive fundamental motives of the persecution of Him, which come out stronger and stronger in the progress of the Gospel history. The first is His offending against their statutes, particularly their Sabbath laws; the second is His manifestation of Himself (as Son of God), offending against their deistic theology. But we must not overlook two corresponding negative motives: (1) Their anger at His refusal to embrace and yield Himself to their chiliasm; (2) their envy at His greatness and consideration with the people. These different motives may be reduced to the single motive of the offence He gave their hierarchical malignity. This offence was (1) objective; a statutory offence, both (a) ecclesiastical, with reference to the Sabbath, and (b) theological, with reference to the doctrine of the unity of God. The offence was (2) subjective; an official offence, in that (a) He does not fall in with their ideas, is not a Messiah to suit their worldly ambition, and (b) He eclipses them before the people, rousing their envy. The opposition may also be expressed in Johannean terms, as the hostility of darkness to light (of lie to truth), of hatred to love, of death to life.

9. The self-offence of Christ before the judgment-seat, in respect to its Wisdom of Solomon, which is especially striking in the interchange of the third and first persons, is a master-stroke, eclipsing all human rhetoric. In respect to its matter, it is the divine depth of the doctrine of the organic nature and process of the resurrection, from its origin in Christ, through the awakening and quickening wrought by Him, to the full regeneration of the world; the organic difference and contrast also between the first resurrection and the second being indicated thereby. In respect of its issue or effect, the discourse marks a victory, after which the Jewish court drops the action, but does not abandon it.

10. The discourse of Christ speaks of the Father in His deepest nature and work: as being life in and of Himself and giving life; of the nature of the Son as corresponding to the essence and operation of the Father; and of this in particular, as bringing with it a corresponding moral administration. The discourse then exalts the economy of the Son as an administration of saving quickening (a time of grace), which suspends the old judgment, and presents the new judgment of the Son purely as a condemnation to be left unquickened by the Son. It presents the healing work of Christ as a basis and presage of the awakening of the dead, the spiritual awaking as the introduction and beginning of the bodily; and it exhibits this last in its double aspect of the consummation of life and the consummation of damnation. It declares the final purpose of the judgment: The glorifying of the Son for the glory of the Father. Next it treats of the great testimonies which accredit this mission of Christ: The testimony of a historical office (John); the testimony of the Father in miracles, and in the holy Scriptures; and in particular the testimony of Moses. Finally it holds up the contempt of these witnesses as punishing itself by preventing the Prayer of Manasseh, misled and obstructed by the false witnesses of human ambition, from perceiving the witness of the Holy Ghost, and so deprives him of all witnesses of power and blessing, and plunges him through unbelief into condemnation. “The Revelation -awakening of the dead of Israel in the time of the Messiah had been predicted by Isaiah (26:19) and Ezekiel (37); and the general resurrection of the righteous and the wicked, by Daniel (12:2), pointing, in immediate connection, to the Messiah intrusted with the judgment of the world; comp. Psalm 2:8; Psalm 110:6; Isaiah 45:23-24; Isaiah 46:13, 21; Joel 3:1; Malachi 3:2. But as the kingdom of God among Israel had to begin inwardly, before it could appear in outward glory, so the resurrection of the dead and the judgment; he alone who is spiritually quickened has the pledge, and the beginning, of the bodily resurrection to life; by faith or by unbelief each one already pronounces his own sentence, John 3:18. In token of the spiritual and the future bodily resurrection, and of the unity of the two, Jesus at that time raised dead persons to life,” etc. Gerlach.

11. The quickening work of Christ. He who would hinder Him in it, passes judgment, because he closes the day and the work of grace. But Christ does not suffer Himself to be hindered, because the Father, with His quickening power, gives Him commission to perfect His quickening. This judging is the reverse side (the medium) of His quickening. In proportion as He cannot and does not quicken, condemnation exists; either still exists, or exists anew.

12. The different witnesses of Christ. If the testimony of the Baptist here seems subordinate to the testimony of the Scriptures, it is not his testimony as such, but only his testimony by itself, in distinction from the entire testimony of the Old Testament, of which his is the completion.

13. Christ, in picturing the Jews thinking they have eternal life in their sacred books, characterizes every false estimate of ecclesiasticism or the objective church. The general perversion of this spirit is objectivism, a person’s alienating his religion from himself, and thinking he has his life as an external treasure in ecclesiastical objects and means; whether the mere outside, the letter, of the holy Scriptures, or the mere elements of the sacraments, or the mere official processes of church discipline. The essence of this objectivistic churchliness is lifelessness, unspiritual ness, residing first in the spiritually dead persons, and thence making the objects dead likewise. The objectivism of the Jews had a double form. They thought they had their life in the Scriptures, and in their traditional theology, or the traditions of the elders. Christ intimates the second point, but gives the prominence to the first, because the Scriptures have, besides the letter that kills, a spirit that quickens; and because this spirit is their true life, in which they testify of Christ. The same sort of exaltation of the legal canonical authority of the Bible over the living revelation of God in voices and visions, and especially in Christ, shows itself in various ways even in the Protestant theology. The true ground, however, is not the opposite extreme of a subjectivism which loosens off from the Scriptures, but a subjective spirit of faith which inwardly unites itself with the testimony of holy Writ.

14. The crown of the address of Jesus in this judicial hearing is the gradually developed idea of the essential judgment, in which Moses himself, to whom Christ’s accusers appeal against Him, will appear against them as their accuser.

HOMILETICAL AND PRACTICAL

In proportion as Christ, the Light and the Life, attracts kindred, susceptible souls, He repels the haters of light.—The awaking and the working of the powers of darkness in Israel against the Lord.—Christ’s act of healing in the little Bethesda (house of grace), and His discourse of the great Bethesda of the Father and the Son.—The reflection of the legalistic spirit of the Jews in the capital action which they brought against Christ: 1. They are scandalized by His entrance into the emblematical “house of mercy” with a substantial work of mercy (eclipsing the medicinal bubbling and the angel). 2. They charge against Him His festal work of charity on the Sabbath as a labor deserving of death, and as a bad example3. On the feast of Purim, the feast of the reversed lot (which gave safety to the Jews and destruction to the heathen, reversing what seemed to be decreed), they made a sinner’s lot of new life the lot of death for him4. His vindication, appealing to the example of his Father, they turn into a second and a heavier accusation5. When they cannot condemn Him, and are speechless, they turn their nonsuit into a reservation to persecute Him the more steadily.—On the feast-day, which the people are keeping with merry-making, Christ visits the hospital.—The most helpless of all attracts most Christ’s attention.—As the hand of justice touches the highest haughtiness, the hand of mercy touches the lowest misery.—The sufferer says: “I have no man;” and the Saviour stands by him.—The pool of Bethesda a type of favored localities in a religious community in which the highest miraculous aid has not yet appeared. The miraculous aid is (1) enigmatical (an angel troubling the water); (2) occasional (at a certain season); (3) extremely limited (to the one who steps in first;) (4) to many unavailable (the impotent).—Irresolution and impotence, the worst part of any malady (in melancholy, hypochondria, etc.): 1. It is itself disease2. It aggravates the other disease3. It hinders the cure4. It can make the cure uncertain again (“lest a worse thing come unto thee”).—Christ takes even the honest wish of a man of faint faith, for faith.—As here Christ’s word of power puts an impotent man upon his feet, so in the general resurrection it sets the universe upon its feet.—The cripple at the pool of Bethesda, compared with the blind man sent to the fountain of Siloam, John 9.—“He that made me whole, the same said unto me, Take up thy bed, and walk.” The feeblest confesssion, still a confession.—If it is lawful to be made whole, it must be lawful to go home with the bed.—The first word of Christ to the impotent man in Bethesda, and His second word to the healed man in the temple.—Christ’s self-defence (see Doctrinal Thoughts, No9).—“My Father worketh.” The difference between a festal, divine working and an unlawful, human laboring.—The working of God in the medicinal spring (or well of health) an emblem of the saving operation of God in general1. In its forms: a. The saving operation of the Father in the kingdom of nature. b. The saving operation of Christ in the kingdom of grace2. In its stages: a. Christ’s miraculous healing and raising of dead in general. b. The spiritual awakening and the organic unfolding of salvation in the New Testament dispensation. c. The finished work of salvation in the general resurrection.—The Lord’s highest justification made a capital charge against Him.

John 5:19 : Christianity the second, the spiritualized and glorified creation1. Christ the image of the Father; 2. His word the spirit of the creation; 3. His work the copy of the works of the Father.—The Son’s inability to do any thing of Himself, a paraphrase of His omnipotence to do whatever the Father does.—The Father’s speaking and showing to the Song of Solomon, an out-flowing of His love.—The Son’s hearing and doing, a proving of His reciprocal love.—The perfect harmony of Christ’s moral conduct with His essential nature.—“And He will show Him greater works than these.” The works of healing a fore-shadowing of the miracle of the resurrection.—The Son unrestricted in His quickening work (“quickeneth whom He will”); or, Christ’s ministration of grace amenable to no limitations: 1. To no abridgment of its day2. To no contraction of its field3. To no diminution of its wonders.—Every opposition to the saving work of Christ a condemnatory judgment, which would make (call in, administer) the judgment day itself.—The Father has committed judgment to the Son; implying: a. Every condemnation of the old dispensation, before the Son judged, is removed (it is a day of grace), b. The Son’s judging is but the consequence

and the reverse of His quickening (the manifestation of the self-condemnation of unbelievers).—The design of the merciful judgeship of Christ: 1. To glorify the Son above all ( Philippians 2:6-11). 2. To glorify the Father through the Son.—Only as men honor Christ as Song of Solomon, do they honor God as Father.—Only in personal homage to Christ does the brightness of the personal divine Being disclose itself to man (the personal essence is known through the essentially personal manifestation).

John 5:24 : “Verily, verily, etc. The sure way to the highest salvation for all1. The way: a. Hearing Christ’s word. b. Believing God in His sending of Christ2. The salvation: a. Having everlasting life. b. Coming not into condemnation. c. Being passed from death unto life.—The utmost passiveness of submission to God through Christ, the highest action.—All in the foundation of the Christian life has been already done, when any decisive beginning is made in the manifestation.—“The hour is coming, and now is.” All the future is included in the present of Christianity. This is true (1) in the history of Christ, (2) in the history of the church, (3) in the individual Christian.—In one hour of the eternal life all hours of the eternal future lie in germ.—The spiritual resurrection as the ground-work and the genesis of the universal resurrection.—All must hear the voice of Christ; but only those who hear aright, shall live.—The resurrection of all bodies must follow as by natural necessity from the operations of Christ, but the resurrection of hearts depends on voluntary faith, which Christ does not force.—Christ the dispenser of life, in the special sense, as Son of God.—Christ the Judges, in the special sense, as Son of Man. And yet at once life giver and judge in both relations.—Christ’s power to have life in Himself (see above).—“Marvel not” (comp. John 5:20); or, the most extraordinary manifestations of Christianity yet impend.—“The hour is coming in which all.” It is coming, (1) as the hour of the great trumpet which all must hear; (2) as the judgment-day of pure light, in which all must appear; (3) as the millennial summer, which brings everything to maturity.—Those who come forth on the day of the resurrection: 1. What all have in common (all come forth under the operation of Christ’s power; all must hear the voice of His power, follow its call). 2. How they differ and separate (in their relations to the operation of the grace and Spirit of Christ). a. The result of the manifestation: Some have done good according to the principles of the kingdom of God, have sealed their faith by works of love; the others have done evil, have sealed their unbelief in obduracy. b. The reward: The two classes come severally to the resurrection, the complete development, of the sentence which is in them.

John 5:30 : The judgment of Christ, a judgment of the Father also.—The witnesses who accredit the Lord: 1. He does not begin with His own testimony (but leaves this to follow other testimonies, without which it could not have its full weight). 2. He does not rest upon the official testimony of John, which ought to have satisfied the Jews, but could not satisfy Him (and so to this day He rests not on the official testimony of the church, though to men this must suffice for the beginning). 3. But He appeals to the testimony of the Father in His works (miracles of power) and in the Holy Scriptures (miracles of prophetic knowledge).

John 5:32 : Christ sure of His divine credentials.—The misconduct of the Jews towards John the Baptist a presage of their misconduct towards the Lord: 1. Of John’s solemn mission (preaching repentance) they made a pleasant entertainment; and, conversely, of the glad tidings of Christ they made a tragic offence2. They separated John’s light from his fire, that they might dance with the visionary hope of an outwardly glorious Messianic kingdom; and in Christ they despised the light, that they might harden themselves in the fire of His love3. In the fickleness of their enthusiasm they soon gave John over to the caprice of Herod; and with the same fickleness they delivered the Lord to Pilate.—The misconduct of the spirit of the world and the spirit of the age towards the messengers of God.—Christ still attested, and more and more attested, by the words of Scripture and tokens of the life.—Marks of dead and false faith: 1. It adheres to the means of revelation (Scriptures, tradition, church, sacraments, ministry), and has no sense for their living origin, the personal God2. It adheres to the forms of those means, and has no heart to receive the personal centre of them, Jesus Christ, with His word3. It adheres to the particulars of the forms (the letters of the Scripture), and imagines it has eternal life in them, while it is full of antipathy to Christ and the life itself. Or: 1. It has a Scripture and tradition of Revelation, and no quickening power of it in the Spirit of the living God2. It has holy Scriptures, but no holy Scripture, the centre of which is the living Christ3. It thinks it has eternal life outside of itself in the means of grace, while it bears enmity to the life of the spirit in Christ, the very life itself.—This dead faith alienates itself more and more (1) from the Father, the source of Revelation, (2) from the living Christ, the word of Revelation, (3) from the life of the Spirit, the life of revelation.—Men cannot have eternal life merely outside of themselves, in external church privileges.—Even the Holy Scripture should not be exalted, in a legal spirit, above the living Christ.—A man’s study of Scripture must be vivified by the study of his own heart.—Faith, when merely external, may turn itself upon any means of revelation: (1) Turn from personal life to things, (2) from the inner life, the spirit, to the outer form, (3) from the centre of the life to the details of its exhibition.—The moral causes of dead faith: 1. Want of sense for the divine spiritual glory of Christ, for the purity of His life and the revelation of the Father in Him2. Morbid sensitiveness to the false spiritual glory (honor) of men3. Ambitious desire to take part in the mutual glorification of men; or, the want of that simplicity which constitute the true responsiveness to God through Christ, arising from the ambition of the heart, which is a false responsiveness to the honor of men.—Aversion to God and propensity to deify the world and self, the fundamental characteristic of sin and of heathenism, and the root of the perversion of the (theocratic and ecclesiastical) disposition to believe.—The condemnation of the false, legalistic faith: 1. It misses salvation in Christ, and falls over to false prophets and false Messiahs, and to anti-Christ at last2. It loses the honor which is from God, and comes to shame before the world itself3. It finds its heaviest condemnation in the law of the Lord itself, which it hypocritically professes to honor.—Unbelief, the soul of a dead and empty legalistic faith.—The spirit of legalism is much more completely condemned and overthrown by its own illegality (its lawlessness) than by Christianity.—Before the eyes of the world this, spirit is put to confu sion by the law, especially by the fundamental laws of humanity as laid down by Moses, far in advance of the judgment-day.—Christ in His first judicial appearance, and in His last.

Starke: Nova Bibl. Tub. The example of Christ in attending public worship at every opportunity, even though He had no need of it.—Ibid.: What is the world but a hospital, the abode of the bodily and spiritually sick—Zeisius: The world a very Bethesda.—Majus: Hospitals, asylums for poor and sick are most justly established and maintained.—Ibid.: From the wells of charity flow many healing waters.—The movings of the heavenly water of healing are not under our control, yet that we may expect and wait for them is itself a mercy.—Zeisius: Look into the mirror of this most wretched and patient sufferer, thou who art so discontented and impatient under sufferings hardly as many days, or even hours, protracted, as this man’s infirmity was years!—Hedinger: Patience, the best thing.—Tedious infirmities, veritable trials of patience.—Quesnel: The more we are deprived of human help, the better right we have to hope for the help of God.—Majus: Jesus looks graciously upon those at whom the proud world casts not a glance. Follow His example.—To visit and help the sick, a large part of love.—By questions God encourages our faith.—Though men cannot or will not help, yet God stands by with sure mercy.—Nova Bibl. Tub.: When Jesus speaks, it is done, etc. Psalm 33:9.—Zeisius: Help comes at last.—Hedinger: Hypocrites strain out gnats.—Quesnel: A servant of Christ, upon a noble achievement, must not wait for the applause of the people, but withdraw himself.—Canstein: All temporal benefits should promote our conversion.—Hedinger: If God take one cross off thee, be not sure another and greater may not be laid upon thee.—We must never take holiday from good works.—Canstein: The honor which the children of God have from God their Father, and from their sonship, is always an eye-sore to the ungodly.—If Jesus, our Head, is all life, we His faithful members are perfectly certain also to live forever.—Majus: God testifies in us and of us by the divine works which He performs in and through us.—On John 5:35. Zeisius: As a burning light, while lighting others, consumes itself, so Christian teachers should sacrifice themselves in the service of God and their fellow men.—How rarely are light and heat found together!—Quesnel: When a light arises in the church, it immediately gives forth a brightness in which people are glad but this lasts not long.

John 5:38 : And His word ye have, indeed, in books, in schools, and on lips, and outwardly hold it high, but have it not abiding in you.

John 5:39 : Even from the Old Testament Christ may be known.—He who departs from Christ, flies before life.—Teachers must seek not their own honor, but the salvation of men.—He who does not obediently receive the word of God, has no love for God.—Majus: It is by no means a mark of true doctrine, that it and its teachers are eagerly received by the multitude.—Ambition not only corrupts the desires, but also as it were, bewitches the judgment and sensibilities, so that in religion the man never yields to, but always resists, the light and truth,—Ambition is with many the cause of their hardening themselves against the preaching of the gospel.—A Christian, after the example of Christ, must not accuse the enemies of the truth to God, but pray for them.—Quesnel: Christ the key of the Old Testament.—The cavillers are mightily refuted on their own ground.—The appeal of the Son of God Himself to the written word should quicken in us the deepest reverence for the Holy Scriptures.

Braune: If God rested as the Jews would have men rest on the Sabbath, no sun would rise, no flower would bloom.

Heubner: Jesus never (as a rule) let, a feast go by without visiting Jerusalem: (1) To fulfil the duty of an Israelite; (2) to use the opportunity of preaching the word not only before the inhabitants of Jerusalem, but before all Israel, and before strangers; (3) to testify the truth there to the leaders at a time when He might appear before them without their venturing to lay hands on Him.—Evangelical clergymen also should use the high Christian festivals with conscientious fidelity, (1) because it may be expected that the Spirit of God will then be specially active; (2) because souls are then in more solemn mood than at other times; (3) because at least many will be present then, who at other times are not. At such festivals it is disclosed, of what manner of spirit a preacher is.^[FN85]—Bethesda, i.e, asylum, hospital, an emblem of the Christian church (primarily an emblem of the theocratic church of the law).—Jesus did not avoid such sad sights, the retreats of the diseased. In fact He was the physician.—There is a true waiting for divine help: waiting for that which God alone can do; but there is also a false waiting: waiting for that which we ourselves should do, or for the removal of that which should not hinder us at all.

John 5:4 : This and the whole passage would be a grand text for sermons at watering places, where it is rarely heard.—The angel. Even nature has invisible spiritual forces for her own secret spring. All proceeds from the spiritual world.—The judgment of a great physician, that a man cannot be a thorough theologian unless he also understand nature, nor a thorough naturalist unless he be also a theologian.—The healing powers in the kingdom of nature, emblems of the healing powers in the kingdom of grace.—Troubled the water. The first operation of the Spirit of God upon the soul seems even to be a troubling, disquieting; all is stirred up in the soul, the bottom of the heart is shaken up; but by that very means new energies are excited, life is quickened, and clearness comes.—Whosoever then first, etc. Watch the time!—Wilt thou? Jesus would have our earnest will.—Rise! The word of Jesus has power; what He commands, He gives.—True and false observance of the Sabbath.—God’s working is eternal: He is the living God, He is the absolute life, and this life is love. This flows forth without interruption forever.—The thought of the living God, the highest stimulus to work.—Unbelievers will marvel with terror and to condemnations, believers with joy and triumph in their glory.—Unwillingness in spite of the most pressing invitations is the cause of the misery of men.—(Luther:) In more secular callings, positions, and talents, it is less pernicious to be proud and ambitious, but in theology to be arrogant, haughty, and ambitious, does the utmost mischief.

Besser: (Brenz:) Wilt thou be made whole? So the Lord asks us in all our troubles, whether we would be delivered.—(Chemnitz:) The Lord speaks to the Jews exactly as if I should say to the Papists: It is not I, but the very fathers whose authority you allege in support of your superstition, that will accuse you of ungodliness. Or as if we should say to the pope: It is not we that accuse or condemn thee, but Christ Himself whose vicar thou callest thyself, Peter whose successor thou claimest to be, Paul whose sword thou pretendest to carry; these are they that accuse thee. (And Mary as surely impeaches mariolatry, as every true saint the distribution of the honor of Christ among the saints.)

Schleiermacher: How could it have been that so many refused to accept the Redeemer? There is unbelief on the one hand, irresolution on the other, and the two, in their innermost and deepest root, are one and the same. If man can come to a firm resolution to forsake the earthly and strive for the heavenly, the eye of the Spirit will soon open in him, enabling him to seek and to find the true fountain of healing whence eternal life proceeds.—We have life not in ourselves, but from Him and through Him.

[Schaff: John 5:1. Christ went up to Jerusalem at a feast: 1. Because it was a divine ordinance, and to teach us to attend religious assemblies ( Hebrews 10:25); 2. Because it was an opportunity for doing good. (From Henry.)—When Christ came to Jerusalem, He visited not the palaces, but the hospitals, for He came to save the sick and wounded. (The same.)

John 5:2-4. Nature has provided remedies, men must provide hospitals.—How many are the afflictions in this world, how full of complaints, and what a multitude of impotent folks! (The same.)—The earth is a great Bethesda. (Scott.)—The fathers, and the high Anglican, Wordsworth, regard the healing pool of Bethesda stirred by an angel, as a figure of baptismal water to which all mankind is invited, and whose virtue is never exhausted. But Christ healed the cripple simply by His word, John 5:8.—Matthew Henry calls Bethesda a type of Christ, who is the fountain opened.—Albert Barnes indulges in remarks against the frivolous amusements of modern watering places, where more than anywhere else men should be grateful for the goodness of God.

John 5:8. Rise, lake up thy bed and walk. Christ first gives, and then commands, He imparts the strength to do His will. Augustine: “Give what Thou commandest, and command what Thou wilt.” (Da quod jubes, et jube quod vis. Conf. x29. This sentence was especially offensive to Pelagius, as it was directly opposed to his view of the inherent moral ability of man.)

John 5:9. The day of rest was chosen by Christ as the fittest season for Divine acts of mercy. Thus He fulfilled the law and showed His oneness with the Father. God rested on that day from all His works of creation; but on that Day of rest He specially works in doing acts of mercy to the souls of His creatures in public worship. (Wordsworth.)

Ver14. Jesus escapes from the crowd; but finds us and is found by us in the temple. God is seen in solitude. (Wordsworth.)—They who are healed from sickness should seek the sanctuary of God, and give Him thanks for His mercy. (Albert Barnes.)—Sin no more, lest a worse thing, etc. The doom of apostates is a worse thing than thirty-eight years’ lameness. (Henry.)—From the healing of the sick at Bethesda we learn1. What misery sin has brought into the world; 2. How great is the mercy and compassion of Christ; 3. That recovery from sickness should impress us with the determination to sin no more, lest a worse thing happen to us. (Ryle.)

John 5:17. What would become of the Sabbath unless God worked on the Sabbath? (Bengel.)—Christ speaks here as God who makes His sun to rise and His rain to fall, and clothes the grass of the field on the seventh day as well as on the other six. (Chrysostom.)—The law of the Sabbath is a law of a Being who never rests from doing good. (Theophylact.)—The Jews, understanding the law of the Sabbath in a carnal sense, imagined that God was wearied by the labor of the creation, and was resting from fatigue. As He works always without labor, so Christ. (Wordsworth.)—Jesus did not deny the obligation of the Sabbath law, but explained its constitution. The solemnities of the Sabbath were and are necessary to restore the human spirit, distracted by the diversity of earthly affairs, to the oneness of the Divine Being, but Christ, who ever reposed in this unity, observed a perpetual Sabbath, like the Father, and no activity could distract Him. (Olshausen.)—Christ nowhere sets aside the obligation of the fourth commandment, but places it on the right foundation, and shows us that works of necessity and mercy are no breach of the commandment. The error and danger of the present age is the opposite of the Jews. The experience of eighteen centuries proves that vital religion cannot flourish without the Sabbath. (Ryle.)

John 5:19. If the Son does the same things as the Father, and in the same manner, then let the Jew be silenced, the Christian believe, the heretic be convinced; the Son is equal with the Father. (Augustine.)—This is the strongest possible assertion of equality. If the Son does all that the Father does, then like Him, He must be almighty, omniscient, all-present and infinite in every perfection; in other words, He must be God. (Barnes.)

John 5:21-29. That form of Man which was once judged will judge all men. He who once stood before the judge will sit as Judge of all. He who was once falsely condemned as guilty, will justly condemn the guilty. Christ will be seen by the good and the wicked; God by the good alone. (Augustine.) All that are in the graves ( John 5:28), whether in costly sepulchres or with monuments of marble, or in lonely deserts, whether in the catacombs, or in the depths of the sea, whether their bodies have been embalmed, or burned to ashes and scattered to the winds of heaven, all must appear before the Judge “of tremendous majesty” for a final settlement of the accounts of this earthly life.—The immortality of the soul without faith in Christ, is only an immortality of misery.—Live always in view of the judgment to come, prepare for it in time.

“ Quid sum miser tunc dicturus,

Quem patronum rogaturus,

Qaum vix justus sit securus.

Recordare, Jesu pie,

Quod sum caasa taæ viæ;

Ne me perdas illa die!” (From the Dies Iræ.)

Wretched Prayer of Manasseh, what shall I plead,

Who for me will intercede,

When the righteous mercy need?

Recollect good Lord, I pray,

I have caused Thy bitter way;

Don’t forget me on that Day!

[ John 5:38-40. Different modes of searching the Scriptures, the one purely critical and heartless, mechanical, dwelling on the outside, confined to the letter, excluding the spirit, leading away from Christ; the other spiritual, experimental, penetrating to the marrow, leading to Christ. The former mode may he either hyperorthodox and superstitious, as with the Pharisees and Rabbinical Jews, or rationalistic and skeptical, as with the Sadducees and many nominally christian commentators.—The old Testament an unbroken testimony to Christ. So He read it, so we ought to read it.—Henry: “Christ is the treasure hid in the field of the scriptures, the treasure hid in the field of the scriptures, the water in their wells.”—Alford: “The Command[?] to the Jews to search the Scriptures, applies even more strongly to christians; who are yet, like them, in danger of idolizing a mere written book, believing that in the Bible they have eternal life, and missing the personal knowledge of Him of whom the scriptures testify.”—42. I know you. Christ knows men better than they know them.

John 5:44. worldly ambition a great hindrance to faith. (Henry.)

John 5:46. Moses leads to christ, the law is a school for the gospel ( Galatians 3:24).—]