John Chapter 8:54-59

We continue. The goal here is (finally) to finish this chapter. We are still not half-way through the gospel. It seems like this is really slow-going, but the unique material in John requires additional analysis; my hope is that I’m doing it some justice. As has become the trend, the last part of the previous post included for continuity, since we are breaking the posts in mid-conversation.

Text

[Thus] “The Jews” said to him, “Now we know you have a demon. Abraham died, and the prophets (died), and you say ‘If you do not keep my teaching, you will not taste death forever’. (53) Are better than the father of us Abraham, who died? Or the prophets who died? What do you make yourself?” (= “what do you make yourself to be”, or “who do you think you are?”)

54 ἀπεκρίθη Ἰησοῦς, Ἐὰν ἐγὼ δοξάσω ἐμαυτόν, ἡ δόξα μου οὐδέν ἐστιν: ἔστιν ὁ πατήρ μου ὁ δοξάζων με, ὃν ὑμεῖς λέγετε ὅτι θεὸς ἡμῶν ἐστιν:

55 καὶ οὐκ ἐγνώκατε αὐτόν, ἐγὼ δὲ οἶδα αὐτόν. κἂν εἴπω ὅτι οὐκ οἶδα αὐτόν, ἔσομαι ὅμοιος ὑμῖν ψεύστης: ἀλλὰ οἶδα αὐτὸν καὶ τὸν λόγον αὐτοῦ τηρῶ.

56 Ἀβραὰμ ὁ πατὴρ ὑμῶν ἠγαλλιάσατο ἵνα ἴδῃ τὴν ἡμέραν τὴν ἐμήν, καὶ εἶδεν καὶ ἐχάρη.

Jesus answered, “If I will glorify myself, my glory is nothing. It is my father who glorifies me, who you say is our God. And you do not know him, but I know him. And if I say I don’t  know him, I will be like (lit = equal to) you, a liar. But I know him and I keep his word/message. Your father Abraham rejoiced exceedingly, in that he somehow saw my day, and he saw and rejoiced.” 

It’s always tricky to get the aorist subjunctive into an English sentence that does justice to the subjunctive, as it mixes a past action with uncertain or unreal conditions. That is what we get in the last half of Verse 56, which I very clumsily rendered as “he somehow saw my day“. This is  followed by two aorist verbs, “he saw” and “he rejoiced”, both singular actions completed in the past. The subjunctive can also be used for emotional states, but then it would be more appropriate for the second clause, for the exultation rather than the seeing. The point is that Abraham was able, somehow, to see Jesus’ day. The somehow is meant to convey the unreal or uncertain condition, so I guess that makes sense. “Abraham, even though he died centuries ago, somehow, via some unspecified mechanism, saw Jesus’ day, and he saw and rejoiced”. The repetition of “he saw” is more or less necessary to confirm that the unspecified mechanism did indeed function properly, so we can use the aorist and so state with certainty Abraham, indeed, saw Jesus’ day. 

Is it just me, or is this all getting a tad repetitious? Those in the audience don’t know God, so they don’t understand Jesus.

But one aspect of this that we have not noted is the way Jesus seems to separate himself from God. The father is the one who glorifies, and he glorifies Jesus. Jesus keeps his father’s word. Here is where/how/why it becomes difficult to believe that John was not fully aware of the Synoptic gospels. After all, we started this gospel with “and the Logos was God”, an assertion of the identity of the “two” who in fact were one. They are not the same, but the Logos is God. When reading this one needs to keep in mind that the idea of the Trinity is still several hundred years in the future. The Trinity is strictly speaking biblical; the Trinity is an inference compose from the amalgamation of “The Logos was God” and “It is my father who glorifies me”. Now, I have to admit that I’ve probably spent too much time messing around with Plato, Augustine, and Aquinas, so my perspective may be a bit overly-formal and perhaps downright archaic. However, some of this is just plain historical analysis where we have to understand what the text actually says, and it says that the Logos was God and the father glorifies the son. Those two statements are not exactly contradictory or mutually exclusive, but they are also not fully compatible with each other–unless you posit the Trinity. Then the two statements make sense in relation to each other. But then we have to ask ourselves if John truly had this intention in mind when he wrote? I am not at all sure how we can make that statement.     

The point here is that when John says things like “the father glorifies me”, he is very much aligned with the Christology of the Synoptics, wherein the father and son were separate entities. These are the sorts of comparisons that need to be made. There is certainly a vast discussion of the difference between “Blessed are the poor” and “Blessed are the poor in spirit”. There is an enormous debate about differences in wording, but not so much about the implications of the words used. I mentioned Ehrman’s book, Jesus Before the Gospels–which I do recommend; in it he discusses at some length whether we can trust stories, or aspects of stories, but then he falls back on his buried assumptions about the historicity of much of the NT. This shows up when he discusses  those facts that we can take as given–as data. Anyone who remembers–or doesn’t–geometric proofs, the givens are the statements set out at the beginning that can be accepted as true and accurate. Ehrman doesn’t really look at his givens; rather, he believes we can build our house on the foundation of Jesus was from Nazareth without really examining the various gospels to see if this is actually a valid conclusion. I believe it is not. I believe the texts overwhelmingly indicate that Jesus was born, raised, and lived in Caphernaum, and that his extended family lived there too. Now, whether or not Jesus was born/raised in Nazareth really does not have much impact on the rest of it, but it’s a great example of simply accepting an assumption as something that has been proven.

In the final analysis, these verses further John’s position that “The Jews” have misunderstood Jesus.  

54 Respondit Iesus: “Si ego glorifico meipsum, gloria mea nihil est; est Pater meus, qui glorificat me, quem vos dicitis: “Deus noster est!”,

55 et non cognovistis eum. Ego autem novi eum. Et si dixero: Non scio eum, ero similis vobis, mendax; sed scio eum et sermonem eius servo.

56 Abraham pater vester exsultavit, ut videret diem meum; et vidit et gavisus est ”.

57 εἶπον οὖν οἱ Ἰουδαῖοι πρὸς αὐτόν, Πεντήκοντα ἔτη οὔπω ἔχεις καὶ Ἀβραὰμ ἑώρακας;

58 εἶπεν αὐτοῖς Ἰησοῦς, Ἀμὴν ἀμὴν λέγω ὑμῖν, πρὶν Ἀβραὰμ γενέσθαι ἐγὼ εἰμί.

59 ἦραν οὖν λίθους ἵνα βάλωσιν ἐπ’ αὐτόν: Ἰησοῦς δὲ ἐκρύβη καὶ ἐξῆλθεν ἐκ τοῦ ἱεροῦ.

So “the Jews” said to him, “Five hundred years and have you seen Abraham?” (58) Jesus said to them, “Amen, amen I say to you, before Abraham became, I am there.” (59) So they picked up stones in order to throw them at him, but Jesus hid, and went out of the temple.

So “the Jews” more or less made my point, that how did Abraham see Jesus half a millennium prior to Jesus birth? But then Jesus picked up on my other point that the Logos was there in the beginning. So here, I think, it would behoove me to reconsider my earlier point about John had the intent to introduce the concept of the Trinity. Granted, there are not yet Three Persons, but we have Two who seem to be the same and yet different, separate but equal, as it were. Jesus said Abraham had seen Jesus’ day, meaning the present time when Jesus is on earth and so can be seen, but now he adds that he was before Abraham became; that is, Jesus existed before Abraham was born. This is another way to say that “in the beginning was the Logos”. This sort of concept might seem to indicate that the author of John was, to some degree, familiar with some of the concepts of Greek philosophy; by “Greek philosophy” I mean the formal study of Plato and Aristotle and the principles of being, existence, soul, time, and the like. Augustine and Aquinas were familiar with these concepts, and they imported this sort of thinking into Christianity. The merger of Greek and Hebrew thought was never complete and this caused all sorts of problems in the Later Middle Ages. And throughout, there were Christians who were arguably Platonists, and Christians who abhorred Plato and his argumentation and insisted on doctrines of faith that did not rely on rational proof. The end result of this tension was the Reformation, although that did not solve anything; the philosophical questions and conundrums–mutually exclusive absolutes being a big one–remain, but we now understand that they don’t really matter. This is summed up nicely by the Roman Church when it declared that something was a mystery that was beyond human comprehension, so just drop it. Kind of a cop-out, but also eminently practical. We can get on with our lives.

And here we see the result of this tension in Verse 59. “The Jews” felt the abyss of irreconcilable truths: how could Jesus exist now and yet have been seen by Abraham. There was no clear answer, and there still isn’t. Baffled by this inability to understand, they fall into the all-too-human universal solution: violence. Destroy what you cannot understand. But the real kicker is Jesus’ reaction: he hid. In Luke, when Jesus found himself hemmed in by angry townsfolk, Jesus simply passed through the crowd, apparently while still visible, although that is conjecture on my part. Here, he hid. That makes one consider the logistics of such an act. The Temple was enormous, something like 3-5 American football fields according to Ehrman’s book that I’m reading. So, assuming it was full of people during the festival (Sukkoth), are we to assume further that he ducked into the crowd? It’s plausible. What I want to know is whether the floor was paved or not. If so, where did they get the stones?  

57 Dixerunt ergo Iudaei ad eum: “Quinquaginta annos nondum habes et Abraham vidisti?”.

58 Dixit eis Iesus: “ Amen, amen dico vobis: Antequam Abraham fieret, ego sum”.

59 Tulerunt ergo lapides, ut iacerent in eum; Iesus autem abscondit se et exivit de templo.

John Chapter 7:45-53

In which we conclude the chapter.

Text

On the last day, the biggest of the festival, Jesus stood and cried out, saying, “If someone thirsts, let him come to me and drink. (38) The one believing in me, according to what the scripture/writing says, ‘Drink from the rivers flowing from the (belly/womb) of living waters’.” (39) And this he said about the spirit which those believing in him were likely to receive. For the spirit was not yet (given), since (lit = “that”) Jesus was not yet glorified 

From the crowd thus hearing these speeches/words (logos) they said, “He is truly a prophet.” (41) Others said, “He is the anointed one.” Still others said “But the anointed does not come from Galilee.” (42) “Does not the writing say that (he is) from the seed of David, and from the village Bethlehem whence David (came), comes the anointed.” (43) Thus there was a division in the crowd about him. (44) Some said they were wishing to apprehend/sieze/arrest him, but no one laid hands on him.

Text in maroon included for continuity 

45*)=ηλθον οὖν οἱ ὑπηρέται πρὸς τοὺς ἀρχιερεῖς καὶ Φαρισαίους, καὶ εἶπον αὐτοῖς ἐκεῖνοι, Διὰ τί οὐκ ἠγάγετε αὐτόν;

46 ἀπεκρίθησαν οἱ ὑπηρέται, Οὐδέποτε ἐλάλησεν οὕτως ἄνθρωπος.

47 ἀπεκρίθησαν οὖν αὐτοῖς οἱ Φαρισαῖοι, Μὴ καὶ ὑμεῖς πεπλάνησθε;

48 μή τις ἐκ τῶν ἀρχόντων ἐπίστευσεν εἰς αὐτὸν ἢ ἐκ τῶν Φαρισαίων;

49 ἀλλὰ ὁ ὄχλος οὗτος ὁ μὴ γινώσκων τὸν νόμον ἐπάρατοί εἰσιν.

50 λέγει Νικόδημος πρὸς αὐτούς, ὁ ἐλθὼν πρὸς αὐτὸν [τὸ] πρότερον, εἷς ὢν ἐξ αὐτῶν,

51 Μὴ ὁ νόμος ἡμῶν κρίνει τὸν ἄνθρωπον ἐὰν μὴ ἀκούσῃ πρῶτον παρ’ αὐτοῦ καὶ γνῷ τί ποιεῖ;

52 ἀπεκρίθησαν καὶ εἶπαν αὐτῷ, Μὴ καὶ σὺ ἐκ τῆς Γαλιλαίας εἶ; ἐραύνησον καὶ ἴδε ὅτι ἐκ τῆς Γαλιλαίας προφήτης οὐκ ἐγείρεται.

53 [[Καὶ ἐπορεύθησαν ἕκαστος εἰς τὸν οἶκον αὐτοῦ… ]]

So the servants/officers came to the archpriests/high priests and Pharisees, and they (high-priests) said to them (the officers), “On what account do you not arrest him?” (46) The servants answered, “No man ever spoke thus.”  (47) The Pharisees said to them, “And do you wander?” (as in, follow him in error?) (48) Has never one of the leaders believed in him, nor one of the Pharisees? (49) But this crowd which (is not) not believing the law is accursed.” (50) Nikodemos, the one having come said to him (Jesus), was one of them (presumably Jesus’ followers), said, (51) “Does not our law judge a man if he is not heard first, and unless it may be known what he did?” (52) They answered and said to him, “Unless you are from Galilee also? Seek and know that a prophet is not raised from Galilee. (53) [[ And each went away to his own home… ]]  

Verse 53 is simply not in some mss traditions. It really does seem like a gloss that was incorporated into the text. A gloss is a marginal comment left by a copyist or editor or someone reading the text. At some point, a copyist who may not actually know Greek (or Hebrew, or Latin, or whatever language) ends up including the gloss in the main body of the text. There was a situation within the last decade or so where a scrap of an old text if Isaiah (IIRC) was found, one that was older than anything we had. It was a fragment, but it showed that a chunk of the text, 2-3 lines (IIRC) that had been in the HS for centuries was actually a gloss that got incorporated as if it were legitimate. And apparently the first part of Chapter 8 isn’t included, either. More on that when we get to Chapter 8.

Nikodemos, of course, is the Pharisee who secretly came to Jesus in Chapter 3. He is the one who wondered how a man of his advanced age could return to the womb to be born again as Jesus said was necessary. The syntax is a bit garbled here, and I used the Vulgate as a check on the translation. Antecedents, in particular, are a bit hazy. Hence I added parenthetically that he was presumably one of Jesus followers rather than one of the Pharisees as I understood it at first reading. But hey, I’m still learning this stuff, too. 

Mainly, though, this continues the motif of the schismatic crowd that we discussed in the last post. The word used to describe the people interacting with the High Priests and Pharisees actually means a “rower”, but that mutated–understandably enough–into “servant”, and then into the servant of a man-at-arms–which the British, I believe, called a batman (referring to a cricket bat?)–and then to an aide-de-camp to an officer and then the officer himself. So take your pick. If the high priests are asking why these servants had not arrested anyone (i.e., Jesus), we have to conclude that these may have been officers rather than servants, individuals who could act on their own authority. But this is a bit suspect, since the Temple authorities were the ones in charge of keeping the peace, and it’s a bit of a question of how much authority they had. Ergo, it seems unlikely that there was a group that had the authority to act independently on such issues. So this seems most likely to be ahistorical.

I just read in a book called The Gospel of The Lord by Michael F Bird that John’s gospel is generally considered largely without historical value. There are several and (almost) relevant inferences to be drawn. The first is that it confirms–or at least doesn’t contradict–what the conclusions I’ve drawn so far based simply on internal evidence. I have not read Bird’s entire book, so it may be that he draws the same inferences from the same evidence as I have. However, the way the information was presented it seemed rather that Bird was citing a fairly well-established tradition on this point, that a number of scholars concluded a number of years ago that this was the status of John as history. Wikipedia describes him as an Anglican priest, theologian, and NT scholar. I found a Tweet* in which he states that he believes in the infallibility of Scripture, which is interesting given his position on the historicity of John. However, I will not claim he has contradicted himself’; later in the fairly long book he could present his argument why the claim that John’s purportedly inaccurate historical information is actually accurate. Or, he could state that Scripture is theologically infallible even with historical inaccuracies. “Infallible” is not the same as “inerrant”, after all. And after reading some of his Tweets, he deserves a measure of respect. The fact remains that he took his Ph.D. in NT and not history. 

Another of the  relevant conclusions is that the opinion expressed is rather different from that put forward by JD Crossan. Dr Crossan argues not only for the historical value of John, but for the independence of John as a source, or as John having access to a legitimate and different historical source tradition that the Synoptics did not have, or at least did not use. But then, let’s never forget that Dr Crossan did not take his Ph.D. in history, either, and this is the crux of the problem: we have non-historians trying to write history. That is like me writing about NT theology, but my main thrust here is to look at the historical implications of the writing. I’ve given this caveat countless times before, but it bears repeating at semi-regular intervals: Any theory I may provide answers may not withstand serious scholarly scrutiny; my point and my intent is to ask the questions that need to be asked for a serious scholarly discussion of the historical Jesus, or the history of Christianity. They may slam me, but they really need to address me.  

One other thing occurs to me. What is the source material for the way Rome governed Judea/Palestine? I think it’s a lot of Josephus with some Philo of Alexadria mixed in, providing some incidental details. IOW, we don’t really have pagan sources for a lot of this stuff. Frankly, Josephus sometimes strikes me more as a gossip columnist than an historian. So if we’re getting most of our stuff from him, heaven help us. And never, ever forget (as authors often do) that the gospels are not historical documents, let alone actual historical writing. They were intended as a record of Revealed Truth, and not terribly concerned with grubby stuff like factual accuracy. As such, how much of the Passion Narrative can we trust? When discussing Mark, my suggestion was that the PN was designed to exculpate the Romans to placate the Romans in the aftermath of the Rebellion of 66-70, so the followers of Jesus could distance themselves from the rebellious Jews. I came to that conclusion ten years ago, it may need to be revised, but in any case serious questions remain.  

Anyway, one thing that this confusion about servants/officers may indicate is that John simply may not have been all that familiar with the way the Temple authorities were organized or conducted their affairs. John may be writing 80 years after Jesus, but he may also be writing 30-50 years after the destruction of the Temple, and there were likely changes in Roman rule in the interim. Which means there were probably changes in the way the Jewish authorities operated. So in talking about the servants/officers, John may not have  clear grasp of the levers of government as they existed in Jesus’ time, that is if he’s not just making stuff up. This detail about the rowers that appears nowhere else would make it seem that John is, indeed, not the most trustworthy of sources. This will matter later when we come to the issue of the day of Jesus’ execution. 

*Re: Michael F Bird. I Googled is name and a series of Tweets appeared in the results. I read some of them and found some interesting thoughts.  https://twitter.com/mbird12?lang=en

After reading through several years worth of Tweets, I am going to have to go back and revisit my opinion of him. However, this seems to be a good (bad?) case of his Ph.D. is in the NT, not history. There is a difference. And the difference matters. 

45 Venerunt ergo ministri ad pontifices et pharisaeos; et dixerunt eis illi: “Quare non adduxistis eum?”.

46 Responderunt ministri: “Numquam sic locutus est homo”.

47 Responderunt ergo eis pharisaei: “Numquid et vos seducti estis?

48 Numquid aliquis ex principibus credidit in eum aut ex pharisaeis?

49 Sed turba haec, quae non novit legem, maledicti sunt!”.

50 Dicit Nicodemus ad eos, ille qui venit ad eum antea, qui unus erat ex ipsis:

51 “Numquid lex nostra iudicat hominem, nisi audierit ab ipso prius et cognoverit quid faciat?”.

52 Responderunt et dixerunt ei: “Numquid et tu ex Galilaea es? Scrutare et vide quia propheta a Galilaea non surgit!”.

53 Et reversi sunt unusquisque in domum suam.

John Chapter 7:37-44 Updated

We continue with Jesus in the Temple. I have included the translation drom the last two posts to help with continuity and context. At least, it helps me!

Text

Jesus answered and said to them, “I have done one work and all marvel. (22) On account of this Moses has given you circumcision–not that it is from Moses but from the father and on the Sabbath you circumcise a man. (23) If a man receives circumcision on the Sabbath in order that the law of Moses not be loosed, why are you angry at me that I made a whole man sound on the Sabbath? (24) Do not judge according to appearances, but judge the judgement justly (= render a just judgement)

So some of the Jerusalemites said, “Is this not the man whom they seek to kill? (26) And he is speaking freely/frankly/openly and no one speaks to him. Never truly did the leaders know that he is the anointed one? (27) But we know whence he is (where is is from), But the anointed one when he comes no one will know whence he is”.

So Jesus cried out in the Temple teaching, and saying, “You know me and you know whence I am; and I have not spoken of myself (on my own authority), but (on the authority of) the one sending (who) is truthful, whom you do not know. (29) I know him, that I am beside him and he sent me”. (30) So they sought to press down on him (take hold of; apprehend) but no one laid a hand on him, since his hour had not yet come. 

From the crowd many believed in him, and they said, “The anointed one when he (perhaps) came (= comes) will he not make many signs, of (= more than) which he made?” (32) The Pharisees heard the crowd muttering about these things regarding him, and the archpriests and the Pharisees sent servants in order to lay hands on hum. (33) So Jesus said, “I am (= have) a short time with you, and I lead towards the one having sent me. (34) You seek me and you do not find [me], and I am where you are not able to come”. (35) So “The Leaders/Jews” said to each other, “Where does he intend to go, that we will not find him? Not to the diaspora of the Greeks does he intend to go and teach the Greeks? What is this story (logos) he tells, ‘You will seek me and you will not find [me], and where I am you are not able to go’?” 

[The text in maroon added for continuity]

37 Ἐν δὲ τῇ ἐσχάτῃ ἡμέρᾳ τῇ μεγάλῃ τῆς ἑορτῆς εἱστήκει ὁ Ἰησοῦς καὶ ἔκραξεν λέγων, Ἐάν τις διψᾷ ἐρχέσθω πρός με καὶ πινέτω.

38 ὁ πιστεύων εἰς ἐμέ, καθὼς εἶπεν ἡ γραφή, ποταμοὶ ἐκ τῆς κοιλίας αὐτοῦ ῥεύσουσιν ὕδατος ζῶντος.

39 τοῦτο δὲ εἶπεν περὶ τοῦ πνεύματος ὃ ἔμελλον λαμβάνειν οἱ πιστεύσαντες εἰς αὐτόν: οὔπω γὰρ ἦν πνεῦμα, ὅτι Ἰησοῦς οὐδέπω ἐδοξάσθη.

On the last day, the biggest of the festival, Jesus stood and cried out, saying, “If someone thirsts, let him come to me and drink. (38) The one believing in me, according to what the scripture/writing says, ‘Drink from the rivers flowing from the (belly/womb) of living waters’.” (39) And this he said about the spirit which those believing in him were likely to receive. For the spirit was not yet (given), since (lit = “that”) Jesus was not yet glorified 

A glance at the commentaries indicate that there are mss problems with Verses 38 & 39. Some have disputed the proper places to group some of the clauses, and the word “given” has to be supplied for Verse 39. The former has, apparently, been more or less resolved since all the crib translations agree on the sentence structure. As for supplying “given”, I have some (minor?) qualms about adding word. I suppose if the spirit is to be received in first clause, then there needs to be an indication that it was provided/given. My biggest problem with this is that the Vulgate does not attempt to add the word or clarify the Greek at all. But textual emendations and mss traditions are areas that I do not tread willingly as these require a specialization that I simply do not possess.  

That’s all fine and good, but what does it mean? Verse 37 is clear enough, referring back to Jesus and the Samaritan woman back in Chapter 4, and it echoes things in the Synoptics. Jesus provides the water and/or bread of Life. These “living waters”, which we could probably understand as “waters of life”; it’s not exactly a one-for-once swap or exact correlation, but this is spiritual analogy and not a literal meaning. And we know what is meant by Life, even though we really don’t because we interpret it as the eternal life of the soul rather than the resurrection of the body as Jesus–or John and the evangelists–meant and understood the term. But what is the intent behind “the spirit likely to be received”? First, the Greek word mellō, here in the imperfect as emellon, is a slippery word. I chose “likely to” as a way to catch the sense of “it’s destined to happen” that is at the top end of meanings of the word in Greek. I generally don’t like to go to that extreme, but I’m not entirely sure I can explain why. Most of the “destined” uses come from the Iliad and Odyssey, and there was an understanding of fate and the will of Zeus right at the surface of consciousness that had faded–to some extent–by the Classical period. And the Latin has no real sense of destiny, but rather just a sense of what is going to happen as a matter of course, but in a very natural manner. Is this a reference to the coming of the spirit on Pentecost, as told in Luke/Acts? The spirit came only after Jesus had been executed and raised from the dead. Is that, like, really obvious that this is what it means? If so, then here we have additional evidence that John was very familiar with the Synoptics. No, there is no textual or literary connection, or any other obviously direct affiliation such as biblical scholars seem to require, but the reference seems pretty clear. Another of the clues that are often not discussed when talking about who knew what about which previous gospels?     

Updated 10/13//23:  A comment should be added about Verse 39. The “spirit which those believing in him were likely to receive. For the spirit was not yet (given), since Jesus was not yet glorified”. This has to be a reference to Pentecost and the descent of the spirit to those gathered in the upper room fifty days after the crucifixion. This is by way of saying that John was fully aware of the idea of Pentecost as we understand the term. Most likely he got this from having read Luke/Acts; but, if he had not, then it most likely means that the idea of the Spirit coming on that day was fully part of the beliefs of the new Christian Church.

37 In novissimo autem die magno festivitatis stabat Iesus et clamavit dicens: “ Si quis sitit, veniat ad me et bibat,

38 qui credit in me. Sicut dixit Scriptura, flumina de ventre eius fluent aquae vivae”.

39 Hoc autem dixit de Spiritu, quem accepturi erant qui crediderant in eum. Nondum enim erat Spiritus, quia Iesus nondum fuerat glorificatus.

40 Ἐκ τοῦ ὄχλου οὖν ἀκούσαντες τῶν λόγων τούτων ἔλεγον, Οὗτός ἐστιν ἀληθῶς ὁ προφήτης:

41 ἄλλοι ἔλεγον, Οὗτός ἐστιν ὁ Χριστός: οἱ δὲ ἔλεγον, Μὴ γὰρ ἐκ τῆς Γαλιλαίας ὁ Χριστὸς ἔρχεται;

42 οὐχ ἡ γραφὴ εἶπεν ὅτι ἐκ τοῦ σπέρματος Δαυίδ, καὶ ἀπὸ Βηθλέεμ τῆς κώμης ὅπου ἦν Δαυίδ, ἔρχεται ὁ Χριστὸς;

43 σχίσμα οὖν ἐγένετο ἐν τῷ ὄχλῳ δι’ αὐτόν.

44 τινὲς δὲ ἤθελον ἐξ αὐτῶν πιάσαι αὐτόν, ἀλλ’ οὐδεὶς ἐπέβαλεν ἐπ’ αὐτὸν τὰς χεῖρας. 

From the crowd thus hearing these speeches/words (logos) they said, “He is truly a prophet.” (41) Others said, “He is the anointed one.” Still others said “But the anointed does not come from Galilee.” (42) “Does not the writing say that (he is) from the seed of David, and from the village Bethlehem whence David (came), comes the anointed.” (43) Thus there was a division in the crowd about him. (44) Some said they were wishing to apprehend/sieze/arrest him, but no one laid hands on him.

Language note: the word I rendered as “division” is schisma. I trust this is recognizeable as the root of “schism”. As fortune would have it, we just discussed the Great Schism of 1054 between the Catholic Church in the West, and the Greek Orthodox Church in the east. Otherwise, I probably wouldn’t have pointed out the word.  And note ἀκούσαντες τῶν λόγων…This form is the genitive plural of logos. My crib translations all translate this as “hearing his words”, and that is certainly not only legitimate but a darn good translation. But. If you note the Latin below, it does not say cum audissent haec verba; rather it says cum audissent hos sermones. Why does this matter. Because the Vulgate reads In the beginning was the Verbum which is the standard word for, well, “word”. Sermones, which we see below, is the plural of sermo, which is the root of “sermon”, and a sermon has more than one word; it is a collection of words. I hedged on the translation, giving both the Latin (first) and the Greek as following the standard English translations of the passage. In my first pass, I chose “speeches” rather than “words”, because it seemed to refer both to what Jesus and the others said. But, your mileage may vary. Bear in mind that I always attempt to point out alternatives to the “standard” translations. The powers-that-be certainly know there are enough “standard” translations; so why should I just add another one to the already-too-big pile?    

Here’s what I think is an interesting question, so let’s have a show of hands. How many of you think that John and his audience got the reference to Bethlehem because he and they  were familiar with the birth narratives of Matthew and Luke? I certainly do. I believe we can consider the birth in Bethlehem to be part of the background story that “everyone knew” by the time John wrote the gospel. I believe that John took it as given, which then enabled him to start his gospel with “In the beginning was the Logos…” FWIW, this is the only time John refers to Bethlehem; this can be used to argue against my theory, but I find the otherwise gratuitous use of Bethlehem a little too odd, otherwise. Plus we have the he said/she said thing with the crowd, so we also have the Galilee/Bethlehem thing as a bit of counterpoint to this, or sort of a reinforcement of the schism. We are not quite half-way through this gospel, and the desire to arrest Jesus is plain, even if we’re not completely clear on who composes this segment of the crowd or population.

One group that has not been mentioned is the Herodians who made an appearance in Mark 3:6 as a group interested in Jesus’ demise. They also show up in both Mark and Matthew in the “Render unto Caesar” pericope; there they are collaborating to some extent with the Pharisees to get Jesus to implicate himself with his own words. This is an interesting detail. It is present in the first two, but not the second two gospels. What does that mean? It would indicate that the earlier stratum of stories believed that Herod was the original antagonist of Jesus, whose role diminished and was dropped as inconsequential. Or it may mean that the role of Herod & Co was inconsequential from the start and only (barely) got mentioned by the Galilean group, and the Judeans or the non Galileans represented by Luke & John overlooked the connexion. It is intriguing regardless The detail of the Herodians may be an indication of the historicity of the “Render unto Caesar” event. It may not, but it’s these odd details that could easily have been left out that need some attention, or even explaining.

40 Ex illa ergo turba, cum audissent hos sermones, dicebant: “ Hic est vere propheta!”;

41 alii dicebant: “Hic est Christus!”; quidam autem dicebant: “Numquid a Galilaea Christus venit?

42 Nonne Scriptura dixit: “Ex semine David et de Bethlehem castello, ubi erat David, venit Christus”?”.

43 Dissensio itaque facta est in turba propter eum.

44 Quidam autem ex ipsis volebant apprehendere eum, sed nemo misit super illum manus.