John 5:2

John frequently used the "historic (dramatic) present" tense to describe past events. Therefore this verse does not prove that he wrote his Gospel before the fall of Jerusalem. Wallace is one scholar who believed that it does prove this. [Note: Wallace, p. 531.] He pointed out that the equative verb estin, used here, nowhere else in the New Testament is clearly a historical present. Perhaps this is the one place where it is.

The Sheep Gate was evidently a gate in the north part of Jerusalem’s wall just west of its northeast corner (cf. Nehemiah 3:1; Nehemiah 3:32; Nehemiah 12:39). Various Greek manuscripts refer to this pool as Bethesda, Bethsaida, Bethzatha, and Belzetha, but the first name is probably the correct one. It means "house of outpouring" or perhaps "house of mercy." [Note: See the map "Jerusalem in New Testament Times" at the end of these notes.] The modern name is St. Anne’s pool. Evidently there were two pools with a covered colonnade or portico on all four sides of the complex and a fifth colonnade that separated the two pools. [Note: J. Wilkinson, Jerusalem as Jesus knew it: Archaeology as Evidence, pp. 95-104.]