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

And greater works than these will he show him.—[The theme of all that follows to John 5:30. Comp. here the striking parallel, 14:12: “Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that believeth in Me, the works that I do shall he do also; and greater works than these [μείζονα τούτων] shall he do; because I go unto the Father.”—P. S.] Tholuck: “Here appears for the first time that use of ἕργα which is peculiar to John’s reports of the discourses of Christ. In John Christ designates as ἕργον, for the fulfilment of which He came, the communication of life to the world ( John 4:34; John 17:4); all actual operations for this object he calls ἕργα, such as the miracles ( John 10:32; John 10:38; John 15:24; John 9:4), and His ordinary labors for salvation, as here. It is further to be considered that just these ἕργα here named were proofs of the Messiah, for the doctrine of the Messiah and raiser of the dead, in its external positive shell, the people possessed.” The greater works of which Christ here speaks, lie in the same line with the work which Christ has just performed. The fundamental thought is the restoration of a life mortally damaged. The Father restores impotent life by healing springs, miraculous remedies, angels of health: Thus He is the example to the Son. But Ho also shows Him to what purpose He has now appointed Him Saviour. And with the first, the further greater works, the quickenings of the dead, are announced, for He must finish His work, John 5:36.

That ye may marvel.—Faith they might withhold, astonishment He will compel. [ἵνα expresses not only the result, but the (divine) intention.—P. S.] They suppressed and dissembled the impression which the miracles at the pool of Bethesda had made, and ignored the miracle itself. To this His expression refers, Ye shall at last break out in astonishment [of shame]. Calvin: “Oblique ingratitudinem per-stringit, quod illud tam splendidum virtutis Dei specimen contemserant.” Ye. Meyer: “The [unbelieving] hearers;” Tholuck: “The present unbelieving generation, viewed in identity with the future, as in John 6:62; Matthew 23:39.” Yet the present hearers form the foreground (see Matthew 26:64).

[Godet, II, p35, regards John 5:19-20 as the most remarkable Christological passages in the N. T, and ably defends against Reuss their agreement with the ideas of the prologue.—P. S.]

John 5:21-29. As the Father raiseth up the dead, etc.

John 5:21-23 collect in a unity the total quickening working of the Son of God, spiritual and bodily, including the spiritual and bodily judgment, yet with special reference to his historical evangelic working at that time. (So also Luthardt and Tholuck). John 5:24 is the first personal address and practical application. Then John 5:25-27 treat of the spiritual quickening and judging of men by the Son. John 5:28-29 refer to the quickening and judging as completed in the body. Finally John 5:31-47 are again personal address and application. [This view of the passage as progressing from the general to the particular, and from the moral or spiritual resurrection in this life to the general resurrection of the body in the life to come, was indicated by Augustin (though not consistently), and is held (though with various modifications) by Calvin, Lampe, Lücke, Tholuck, Olsh, De Wette, Meyer, Hengstenb, Godet, Alford, Wordsworth.—P. S.]

Various constructions:

1. Most suppose that in John 5:21-27 the subject is only the moral operation of Christ in general; in John 5:28-29 the real universal raising of the dead is added as the consummation. This division is the prevailing one (Calvin, Jansen, Lampe, Lücke, [Meyer], etc.)

2. Even in John 5:28-29 the moral resurrection alone is to be understood (the Gnostics, Eckermann, Ammon, Schweizer, Baumgarten-Crusius [Reuss].

3. The whole passage, John 5:21-29 is to be understood (especially in opposition to the Gnostics) of the bodily resurrection, and the judgment in the strict sense (Tertullian, Chrysostom), etc, (Erasmus, etc. Schott, Kuinoel, etc.^[FN60])

Against this go (1) the manifold features of an operation already beginning and pre-eminently spiritual (“ye may marvel,” John 5:20, etc.); (2) the distinctly different characterizing of the resurrection proper in John 5:27-28.

It is a question whether the distinction between the first and second resurrection, Revelation 20:5-6 (the disputing of which in Hengstenberg’s exposition of the Revelation has great weight, it seems, with Tholuck), is also to be found intimated here. Olshausen thought he found the intimation of it in John 5:25; but the expression and now is, contradicts this. The first resurrection, however, though it may not be literally expressed here, is nevertheless here fully implied in the gradualness of the resurrection. In other words, a resurrection which proceeds by organic unfolding from within outward, and from the centre of humanity to the circumference, must give us to expect a distinction between the first fruits of the resurrection and the universal final manifestation of the resurrection power, (see 1 Corinthians 15:22-24).

John 5:21. As the Father raiseth up the dead.—It is a question how this is to be understood: whether improperly of quickenings and restorations in the general sense ( Deuteronomy 32:39; 1 Samuel 2:6) according to the earlier books of the Old Testament; or of the future work of resurrection according to the later books, especially the Apocrypha ( 2 Maccabees 7) [ Job 13:2; Sap16:13], or of an omnipresent motion of reviving in the whole province of the working of the Father in general. Undoubtedly the last is meant. Raising up, quickening, bodily and spiritual, spiritual and bodily, is a fundamental tendency of the government of the Father in nature, history, and theocracy. Hence the tokens of His quickening agency in His healing agency, of outward quickening through inward and the reverse, and the constant development of strong and stronger facts, like the teaching by facts in the Old Testament, Romans 4:17. Meyer: “Ἐγείρει καὶ ζωοποιεῖ might be expected in the reverse order (as in Ephesians 2:5-6).” The bodily healing itself, however, serves to awaken spiritual life, and in general the first raising up must precede the quickening, in order to lead to the last, most proper raising. Tholuck: “Ἐγείρειν gives the negative idea of the abolition of death, ζωοποιεῖν, the positive.”

Even so the Son quickeneth [ζωοποιεῖ].—As the redeeming and judging consummator, the finisher of the work of the Father.Ζωοποιεῖν here involves ἐγείρειν; yet the idea of the spiritual quickening, as the decisive one, predominates. Meyer would have only spiritual awakening asserted in the οῦς θέλει, Tholuck justly finds bodily also; by which again are meant not simply the particular raisings of dead persons by Jesus. The present tense denotes at the same time the particular case (that present) and the law (all present). Whom he will.—Calvin: Referring to His purpose. Meyer: Referring to faith, John 5:24. We refer οὕςθέλει to the tribunal of the Jews which would restrain Him in that work. He asks not for your judgment for that is no judgment of God; it is not ye that administer the judgment of the Father, but the Son. This explains the connection with what follows. [Alford refers whom He will, not to any selection out of mankind, nor to the Jewish prejudice that their nation alone should rise from the dead, but rightly makes it to mean, that in every instance where His will is to vivify, the result invariably follows. So also Bengel: “Nunquam ejus voluntatem destituit effectus.” Ewald refers θέλει to God, which is unnatural.—P. S.].

John 5:22. For neither^[FN61] doth the Father judge any one.—Explanations of the connection: 1. In the full power of the Son to quicken whom He will, His power to judge is already manifest (Lücke, De Wette, Meyer). 2. Not the θέλειν, but the ζωοποιεῖν is corroborated, and this by the fact that the Son is Judge. He who is the Judges, must also be the quickener (Luthardt, Tholuck). 3. Assuredly, however, the θέλει is confirmed, as the unlimited freedom of the Son to spread life in the region of death; though the connection of the ideas of quickening and judging remains to be considered. Those who, according to their hierarchical statutes, would hinder the Son in His raising and quickening, thereby set themselves up to judge the world already, so far as in them lies, and condemn it to death. And further their judgment against the Son is a sentence of condemnation, against the world. But only as an unauthorized encroachment upon the judgment which the Father has committed to the Son. That is to say, the judgment and the last day are not now immediately to follow upon the sin and death of the old world, but the universal ministration of grace, quickening, and salvation intervenes, and unbelief towards the Son alone forms the inner judgment, and brings on the last day. Κρίνειν here is condemnation [pronouncing sentence of spiritual death] ( John 3:17; John 5:24; John 5:27; John 5:29) in distinction from ζωοποιεῖν.—The whole judgment, not “the whole condemning” (Meyer), but the total work of judging, in which acquitting is included. Committed to the Son.—The new, the gospel economy of salvation; the representation of the Father by the Son—for the glorifying of the Father in the Son.

John 5:23. That all men may honor the Son.^[FN62]—Teleology of the divine administration. The Father manifests Himself in the acts of the Song of Solomon, because He manifests Himself in the being of the Son. And the acts of the Son unfold themselves in the total works of salvation and judgment, to the end that the Son maybe honored and glorified as the Father, in order that the Father may be glorified in Him. He that honoreth not the Song of Solomon, etc.—Spoken most especially against the Sanhedrists.

[ John 5:23 is another argument for the divinity of Christ from His own mouth. Τιμᾷν does not necessarily imply acts of worship (προσκυνεῖν), but it expresses the sentiment of religious reverence from which worship flows. And as Christ claims precisely the same honor (καθώς) as is due to the Father, He puts Himself on such a footing of equality with Him as implies unity of essence; since monotheism is very jealous of the honor of Jehovah, as the only being entitled to the worship of the creature. There can be no two rival Gods. The worship of the Son is so far from interfering with the worship of the Father, that there can be no true worship of the Father without the worship of the Son. The Fatherhood of God is an unreal abstraction without the co-eternal Sonship of Christ. Comp. with this passage John 20:28; Philippians 2:10.—P. S.]

John 5:24. He that heareth my word.—Here is the first of the pregnant turns from the third person to the first, which we have pointed out above. Still more emphatic is the introduction of Christ’s reference to Himself by the Verily, verily. Expositors so entirely overlook this turning point of Christ’s description of Himself in His discourse that Tholuck here remarks: “The view is now directed to the commencement of the quickening process of time, John 5:24 in abstracto, John 5:25 in the historical development.” Rather is John 5:24 the practical application of what precedes, and John 5:25 the beginning of the distinction between the period of the spiritual resurrection and the epoch of the bodily. The hearing of the word of Jesus is put in the closest relation to the believing on the God that sent Him; the two are distinct, the two are one. A man cannot truly hear Him, without believing in God; believing in God depends upon a man’s hearing Christ. This gives the counter statement, John 12:47. Such an one has eternal life. Thus the operation of the word of Christ in believers is the act of imparting life, of quickening (see 1 Peter 1:23; James 1:18). The result of this quickening to eternal life is: He comes not into condemnation, and that because conversely he has passed from the state of a condemned one into life, i.e, from internal, essential death into internal, essential life.^[FN63] The death internally accomplished must pass through the judgment into death externally accomplished, the pains of damnation; the internally accomplished life transforms the judgment itself to an entrance into life, John 8:51. But not without effort, not without a transition does this great change take place. This most prodigious effort, bringing to pass the greatest work of God, is performed in the most silent passive way: Hearing the word of Jesus, believing the God in Him and above Him.

John 5:25. Verily, verily—an hour is coming (see John 4:23)—Second change of the grammatical person. Objective talk again concerning the Son. At first only concerning the spiritual resurrection, John 5:25-26. The hour which is one day to come, already is [νῦν ἐστιν]. In other words, these hours are in one another, coherent, because the things in hand are eternal. The whole resurrection exists in germ in the life of Jesus and His quickening work. The antithesis Isaiah, the hour as coming, the apostolic and New Testament period till the second advent, and the hour as already present, the time of the earthly ministry of Jesus. The awakening of mankind to new life virtually began with His earthly work; it developed itself on the day of Pentecost. Reference to the particular instances of His bodily raising of the dead, as well as to Matthew 27:52 (Olshausen), is not by this cut off (against Meyer); for in those signs the spiritual awakening power of Christ is manifest; but the primary subject is the spiritual awakening of men, for which the physical not only morally, but even dynamically and organically, prepares.—The dead [οἱνεκροί], therefore, are the spiritually dead ( Matthew 8:22.)

His voice [τῆςφωνῆςτοὖυἱοῦτοῦθεοῦ].—The word of Christ figuratively represented, or rather designated as an awakening call in its total effect upon spirit and body together. And also φωνή for the sake of the succeeding antithesis. Precise antithesis: οἱνεκροὶἁκούσονταιτῆςφωνῆς, and οἱνεκροϊἀκούσονταιτῆςφωνῆς. All the dead must hear the word of the Song of Solomon, but unbelievers stop with the hearing of the φωνή (see John 12:28; Acts 9:17; comp. Acts 22:9; Acts 26:14). The others, on the contrary, are persons who have simply heard, actually heard. Hebrews, therefore, who has heard, shall live; for the call of Christ is a call of creative life and a summons to life eternal. Meyer: If the passage be referred to bodily resurrection, the οἱ ἀκούσαντες, Isaiah, on account of the article, utterly inexplicable. On the attempts to adjust this to that interpretation, see Meyer (p232). [Alford also regards οἱ, “they who have heard it” or “hear it”, (not ἀκούσαντες merely, “having heard it”), as conclusive in favor of spiritual awakening in this verse. Godet says that the article divides the dead into two classes, those who hear, and those who having ears, yet hear not (12:40). He sees in John 5:25 a reproduction of the thought of John 5:24 under a more dramatic and solemn form, the images being borrowed from the future physical resurrection to paint the spiritual resurrection. Christ appears here as the only living one in a world of spiritual death and desolation. Comp. the magnificent vision of the dry bones made alive by the breath of Jehovah, Ezekiel 38—P. S.]

John 5:26. As the Father hath life in himself, even so gave he to the Son also to have life in himself.—The Son in his incarnation, (comp. John 10:18), or the λόγος ἕνσαρκος; but on the ground of His essential nature as λόγος ἅσαρκος. Tholuck: “If the emphasis lay on ἑν ἑαυτῷ, to give prominence to the self-subsistence of the life, this assertion would be in contradiction to ἕδωκε; it must therefore be assumed that ἕχειν ἐν ἑαυτῷ only serves to express more emphatically in the Johannean idiom the idea of possession, as in John 5:42; John 6:53, etc. Comp. the formula μένοντα ἕχειν” But after all the emphasis does evidently lie on the repeated ἐν ἑαυτῷ, and the thing spoken of is not a thing which Christ has in common with Christians, but a thing which He has in common with the Father. Between the primal originalness which pertains to the Father (to be carefully distinguished from the aseity or self-subsistence of the triune God, which pertains to all three persons), and the permanent possession of life, which is communicated to believers, lies yet the great mystery, that Christ is in Himself the second personal principle of all life. Euthym. Zigabenus: πηγάζει. He has an essential, absolute power of regeneration, not only for Himself, but also for the life of the world.

[“Εδωκε refers to a historical fact, the incarnation, and τῷ υἱῷ to the God- Prayer of Manasseh, the Saviour of the world. But this communication of life to the incarnate Son is itself only the temporal manifestation of an eternal self-communication of life by the Father to the pre-existent Son; and οὕτως implies an underlying equality of essence. To have life in Himself just as the Father has it in Himself, and to be an independent source of life to others, cannot be said of any creature or mere man. We all live and move and have our being in God, and are absolutely depending on Him. The Nicene doctrine of the eternal generation of the Son by the Father is not a mere idea, but a fact, as the eternal subordination of the Son to the Father is a fact. Both are acts of divine love, the one of the Father to the Song of Solomon, the other of the Son to the Father. By the generation the Father gives eternally His own self-existing independent life, i.e, His all to the Song of Solomon, by His subordination, the Son gives Himself to the Father. “To give all, to return all, this is love. God is love. He loves divinely, and is beloved divinely.”—P. S.]

John 5:27. And gave him authority to execute judgment, because he is Son of man [Καὶἐξουσίανἔδωκεναὐτῷκρίσινποιεῖ ν, ὅτιυἱὸςἀνθρώπουἐστίν].—Besides the power of life which the Father gave Him as Son of God, and from which proceeds the activity before mentioned, the Father gave Him the power of judgment also, because He is Son of man. We must note the distinction. And since assuredly the ideal judgment has been presented as a corollary of the saving and quickening work of Christ, the full power of judging in general, and of the solemn final judgment in particular, is here intended. This last is grounded especially in the fact that Christ is Son of man, as in particular the vicarious position and work of Christ in justification are grounded in the same.

Account must be made of the fact that in this passage alone υἱὸς ἀβθρώπου stands without the article.^[FN64] Different explanations:

1. The omission is unimportant, and the expression means here as elsewhere: the Messiah (Lightfoot, Lücke, etc.) Against this is the fact that the Son of Man with the article denotes the Messiah, and therefore the Son of God, and that as such He has been already here introduced. Of course the Son of Man is the Son of God in an undivided human identity; but here His being man is emphasized by itself as a new point.

2. Because He is man (Luther, Jansen, etc, Meyer). And how is He made Judge on this account?

(a) Luther, etc, De Wette [Reuss]: “The judgment is to take place with human publicity, therefore the Judge must be visible as man.”

(b) Bucer, etc.: “He humbled Himself to be made Prayer of Manasseh, therefore as man He is glorified.”

(c) Wetstein, Stier: “Man is to be judged by the lowliest, most loving Prayer of Manasseh,” Hebrews 2:17-18.

(d) Este, Meyer: “Because He is Prayer of Manasseh, and would not have had the authority to Judges, if it had not been given to Him” (merely, therefore, to make room for the “given”).

(e) Tholuck: “Because He is incarnate Redeemer, the judging also is given to Him in this redemption itself.

(f) The idea is no doubt a juridical principle: because He is to judge men, therefore He must have not only knowledge of Prayer of Manasseh, but also a human experience. As Son of Prayer of Manasseh, thus embodying the ideal of human life, He is the standard of the judgment, and virtually the judgment itself; as Son of Prayer of Manasseh, He has the whole experience of humanity, sin excepted (which is no pure experience), and as Hebrews, in that He has been tempted, is able to succor them that are tempted, He is able also to judge them that are tempted.^[FN65]

[By His incarnation Christ has so identified Himself with all the interests of humanity, as its Head and Saviour, that humanity belongs to Him: it is for Him to redeem, to save, to make alive, to Judges, to condemn. The final resurrection and judgment are only the completion of the process commenced in His becoming man for us, and for our salvation. Alford explains: Man is to be judged by Prayer of Manasseh,—by that Man whom God has appointed, who is the inclusive Head of humanity, and to whom mankind, and man’s world, pertain by right of covenant-purchase. Jacobus (Notes on John): This is the kindest arrangement, 1) because as mediator He must have the most tender regard for man; 2) because as man He would sympathize with us, as to all our temptations; 3) as God-Man He would have a fellow-feeling with us as well as with God.—P. S.]

[Marvel not at this. Bengel: “They are great things which He spake all along from John 5:21, and worthy of marvel; but greater and more marvellous are the things which follow: τοῦτο, this, is to be referred to what goes before. Jesus knew the feeling of wonder which had been jusst now raised in the mind of the Jews.”—P. S.] In which all that are in the graves.—[ John 5:28-29 evidently refer to the future general resurrection; hence πάντες οἱ ἐν τοὶς μνημείoις, and hence also the omission of the words, και νῦν ἐστιν, Christ rises now to the last and highest mediatoral act of His ἐξουσία.—P. S.]—The expression, in the graves, is to be taken strictly, i.e, of those who are bodily dead, yet not literally: of those only that are buried. It is not, however, the dust of the dead that is intended any more than it is the risen themselves (Tholuck), when it is said they shall hear His voice, but the souls of the dead on the way to resurrection. Their being in the graves signifies their need of entire reclothing or new embodiment in the day of the appearance of Christ. The subject here is evidently the general resurrection ( 1 Corinthians 15), which excludes neither the first resurrection ( Revelation 20), nor the gradual, organic reclothing ( 2 Corinthians 5). The distinguishing of those who have done good and those who have done evil, proves that the subject here cannot be the spiritually dead; and to the same effect is the expression: that are in the graves. Comp. Isaiah 26:19; Ezekiel 37:12; Daniel 12:2.

[Shall hear his voice.— 1 Thessalonians 4:16 : “The Lord Himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel and with the trump of God.” Comp. 1 Corinthians 15:52. The same voice, which ye hear this very moment for your spiritual resurrection, shall summon your dead bodies from the tomb for the final resurrection, and I shall award them, according to their deeds, eternal life, or eternal woe. Comp. the third stanza of the terrific Dies Iræ:

Tuba mirum spargens sonum,

Per sepulchra regionum,

Coget omnes ante thronum.

“Wondrous sound the Trumpet flingeth,

Through earth’s sepulchre it ringeth,

All before the Throne it bringeth.”—P. S.

John 5:29. They that have done good [lit. the good ταἀγαθά and the evil, τὰφαῦλα. The article gives the terms an absolute meaning.—Comp. Romans 2:7; Matthew 7:21; Matthew 25:31, sqq. also John 3:20, on the difference between ποιεῖν applied to good, and πράσσειν to evil]. At the last day righteousness of faith must have ripened into righteousness of life, and all will have had opportunity to make it their own, 1 Peter 3:19; 1 Peter 4:6. Unto a resurrection of life [εἰς ἀνάστασιν ζωῆς].—1. Meyer: “A resurrection to life locally conceived, i.e, a resurrection, the essential result of which is life, that Isaiah, the life in the kingdom of Messiah.” 2 Maccabees 7:14 ἀνάστασις εἰς ζωήν; Daniel 12:2]. 2. Tholuck (after Luthardt): “After the pregnant sense in which the promise of the ἀνάστασις occurs in John 6:40; John 6:44; John 6:54, it seems more correct to translate: life-resurrection, and damnation-resurrection, indicating that in this act the ζωή and the κρίσις respectively reach their summit.” No doubt correct. The one class come forth into the resurrection of life, into the final perfect manifestation of life; the other, into the final perfect manifestation of condemnation. This includes the first interpretation in the strongest form of expression. That Christ is here standing before a Jewish tribunal, is indicated by His bringing out in ever mightier prominence the thought of the divine judgment committed to Him. [Unto the resurrection of judgment, εἰςἀνάστασινκρίσεως.—A resurrection from death temporal to death eternal. Who can realize the awful idea! The resurrection of the wicked is expressly taught Daniel 12:2; Acts 24:15 (ἀνάστασις νεκρων, δικαίων τε καὶ ἄδίκων), and implied Matthew 10:28, (ψυχὴν καὶ σῶμα ἀπολέσι ἐν γεέννῃ); 25:34 ff.; Revelation 20:5.—P. S.]

John 5:30. I can of mine own self do nothing.—Having asserted so great things concerning the Song of Solomon, Jesus again speaks of Himself in the first person. Thus we have not here (and in John 5:31) a new train of thought according to John’s mode of connecting ideas (Tholuck), but the second turn of the discourse into self-assertion and personal application (other misapprehensions of the connection, see in Meyer, p237.) The portion John 5:30-39 treats of the true Messianism, the witnesses to it, and the unbelief which receives not the testimony. The portion John 5:41-47 treats of the false Messianism, which runs finally into anti-Messianism. I can do nothing, etc. See John 5:19.