John 12:37-50

V b

ANTITHESIS BETWEEN SELF-HARDENING ISRAEL AND THE WORLD, THAT BOTH STANDS IN NEED OF SALVATION AND IS READY TO RECEIVE IT,—OR THE WITHDRAWAL OF CHRIST AND THE EVANGELIST’S REVIEW OF HIS OFFICIAL LABORS

(John 12:37-50.)

37But though he had done so many miracles [had wrought so many, or, so great signs]45 before them, yet they believed not on [in] him: 38That the saying of Esaias [Isaiah] the prophet might be fulfilled, which he spake, ‘Lord, who hath believed our report? and to whom hath the arm of the Lord been revealed’ [Isaiah 53:1]? 39Therefore [On this account, or, For this cause] they could not believe, because that 40[omit that] Esaias [Isaiah] said again, ‘He hath blinded their eyes, and hardened46 their heart; that they should not see with their eyes, nor [and] understand with their heart, and be converted [turn themselves],47 and I should heal48 them.’ 41These things said Esaias [Isaiah], when [because]49 he saw his glory, and spake [he spoke]50of him. 42Nevertheless among the chief rulers also [Yet even of the rulers] many believed on [in] him; but because of the Pharisees they did not confess him 43[omit him], lest they should be put out of the synagogue [excommunicated]. For they loved the praise [glory] of men more than [rather than at all]51 the praise [glory] of God.

44[But] Jesus cried [aloud] and said, He that believeth on [in] me, believeth not on [in] me, but on [in] him that sent me. 45And he that seeth [beholdeth] me seeth 46[beholdeth] him that sent me. I am come a [omit a, ins. as] light into the world, that whosoever [every one that] believeth on [in] me should not abide in [remain in the] darkness. 47And if any man hear my words, and believe [keep them]52 not I judge him not: for I came not to judge the world, but to save the world. 48He that rejecteth me, and receiveth not my words, hath one that judgeth him [his judge (with him)]: the word that I have spoken, the same shall [will] judge him 49in the last day. For [Because] I have not spoken of [from] myself; but the Father which [who] sent me, he gave me a [omit a] commandment, what I should say, and what I should speak. 50And I know that his commandment is life everlasting: whatsoever I speak therefore, even as the Father said [hath said unto me, εἴρηχέν μοι], so I speak.

EXEGETICAL AND CRITICAL

The entire section is an epilogue of the Evangelist on the public ministry of Jesus and its result in the Israelitish nation; a result already announced by the lamentation, John 1:11. Even the concluding words from John 12:44 are to be regarded throughout as an epilogue (according to Coccejus and many others, Lücke, Tholuck, Olshausen, Meyer).

We reject therefore as unfounded 1. the supposition of Chrysostom and all the ancients (among the moderns Kling), that Jesus once more addressed the people publicly in these words; 2. the modification of this hypothesis in Lampe and Bengel, who affirm that on His departure from the temple, in the very act of withdrawal from the Jews, He shouted out these words to them from afar; 3. the conjecture of Besser and Luthardt, who hold that He uttered these remarks respecting the Jews in the presence of the disciples; 4. finally, the fancy of De Wette, who supposes these reminiscences to have grown under the hand of the Evangelist into a regular discourse—one, however, not delivered by Jesus. The main support of assumptions of this kind has been found in the ἔκραξε καὶ εἴπεν, John 12:44. But the first word is employed by John in (tho sense of loud, public declarations (John 1:15; John 7:28; John 7:37), and docs not necessarily signify a shout from a distance, or a final, vehement outcry. And as for the aorists, it is not necessary to regard them, with Tholuck, as resumptive Pluperfects. On the contrary, the whole is a resume en gros of the life of Jesus, in which summary the account of the unbelief and obduracy of the great, mass of the Jewish people and its rulers is contrasted with the account of Christ’s holy testimony to Himself.

John 12:37. But though He had done such, etc.—Τοσαῦτα Lücke, De Wette: So great; Meyer, Tholuck: so many, so too the E. V. Its proper signification is: such signs as these He did; hence the nature of the signs itself determines whether so great or so many should be understood. The passages John 6:9; John 14:9; John 21:11 certainly seem, as Meyer remarks, to be in favor of the interpretation: so many; yet the generalness of the term is doubtless indicative of quality as well.

Yet they did not believe in Him.—In disobedience to the purpose of God in the signs, and to the divine attestation of Jesus.

John 12:38.—That the word [ὁ λόγος] of Isaiah, etc.—“It is in the very presence of unbelief and of hinderances cast in the way of the kingdom of God that both Jesus and the apostles most frequently appeal to the word of prophecy. For prophecy exhibits the divine ὡρισμένον (comp. Luke 22:22 with Matthew 26:24), while it demonstrates the fast that oven these seeming contradictions in history must be co-included in the divine counsel, John 13:9; John 17:2.” Tholuck. The passage is Isaiah 53:1 according to the Septuagint. According to Meyer, Jesus is introduced in this passage as addressing God, κύριε. According to Luthardt, it is a lament of the Evangelist and of those like-minded with him, and ἀκοή means the message that we actually receive from Jesus. If, however, we adhere to the context, it is the lament of the prophet, in his own name and that of his colleagues, over his time. But the emphasis is upon the words: that it might be fulfilled.—Herewith, undoubtedly, the lament of the prophet becomes indirectly, and as a type, the lament of Christ (comp. Psalms 22:1). The prophets might lament over two things: 1. That men did not believingly receive their ἀκοή (the message heard by them—the prophets—or the message which penetrated the ears of the hearers); and 2. that men did not suffer their prophetic wonders whereby they made plain the arm of the Lord, i.e, interpreted the great deeds of God, to be the means of revealing to them these deeds in their significance. All this unbelief which opposed itself to them as an incipient hardening, is now fulfilled in the perfect obduracy manifested by the Jews towards Jesus: towards His preaching and His revelation of the arm of the Lord in His miracles (by the arm of the Lord, Augustine and others incorrectly apprehend Christ Himself); hence the lament of the prophets is also fulfilled in the words of Jesus and His people. The saying is most significantly chosen from the beginning of the prophecy about the suffering Messiah, Isaiah 53:0. The hardening began to be accomplished in the face of the sufferings of the prophets; its fulfilment is completed in the crucifixion of Christ on the part of the Jews and in the rejection of the Crucified and Risen One.

John 12:39. On this account they could not believe, because Isaiah said again.—According to Meyer διὰ τοῦτο—ὄτι, therefore, on this account, has reference to what has gone before, i.e. the saying of John 12:38 contains the ground for the saying John 12:40. On the other hand, according to Theophylact and many others, also Tholuck and Luthardt, διὰ τοῦτο is preparative;—it announces the cause, i.e. the inability to believe of John 12:39 explains why they did not believe according to John 12:38. This interpretation seems to be supported by the sequence of the dicta; first Isaiah 53:1, then Isaiah 6:10, and Tholuck remarks: “After the fact of their unbelief is declared, the reason of it is assigned in the fate of hardening decreed them by God.” But their divinely decreed destiny, as a judicial infliction, presupposes their guilt in voluntarily choosing unbelief, as it is also remarked by Tholuck: “The fact that the guilt of the parties involved is not excluded in such an actus judicialis Dei in the Scriptural sense, is most plainly set forth by the history of Pharaoh, in which it is said in six places: he hardened himself, and in six others: God hardened him.” Moreover it is not necessary to regard Isaiah 53:0 as the thought-sequence of Isaiah 6:0; with regard to facts the train of ideas may be inverted, and thus it is doubtless here. Fast upon the ουκ ἐπίστευσαν follows the οὐκ ἠδύναντο πιστεύειν as a judgment. Undoubtedly, therefore, διὰ τοῦτο is to be explained in accordance with Meyer. As in the prophet the preaching of the prophet was the object by means of which the judgment of hardening should be brought upon Israel, so in the evangelical history it was the manifestation of Jesus by word and deed. That which might and should have been a savor of life to the Jews, became a savor of death to them; and herein was accomplished their judgment of hardening. As the most speaking type of this judgment the passage Isaiah 6:9-10 is repeatedly cited: Matthew 13:14; Acts 28:26; Romans 11:8 (comp. Luke 2:34).

The quotation from Isaiah 6:9-10 varies from the letter of the original text, but in a way that is agreeable to its sense. There the prophet is commissioned to occasion obduracy by his preaching; here it is said, by way of historical report: He hath hardened them. I.e. the secondary or instrumental cause mentioned by Isaiah is omitted by the Evangelist, because in the latter, Christ, in accordance with John 12:41, is at once the secondary cause and the author of this hardness. According to Isaiah, God is the author or efficient cause, in His revealed form, His δόξα; according to John, Christ is the author, in His divine glory, as the Christ of the Old Testament. Hence there is no foundation in the text for the assertion of Meyer (and Tholuck) that not Christ, but God, is to be understood as the subject; the interpretation of Morus and others who consider the nation itself as the subject, likewise does violence to the text. According to Meyer, on the other hand, Christ is, in the sense of the Evangelist, the speaker in Isaiah, God the hardener, while ἰάσοηαι has reference to Christ. The assumption that the hardener cannot also be the healer, is a groundless one. According to Tholuck ἰάσομαι should also be referred to God, having, as a negligence in expression, remained in the first person; Grotius and others, and Luthardt are correct in considering the whole as referring to Christ. The “negligence” is, however, conscious breviloquence; to be supplemented is: and as it is further written, That I should heal them. This turn, however, has its foundation in the fact that the negation of καὶ ἰάσομαι, etc. is not to lapse into the historical past like the items of the hardening, and that there is present to the mind of the Evangelist a distinction between Christ as the retributive God of revelation and the historical Saviour.

John 12:41. These things said Isaiah because [ὄτι] he saw his glory.—Meyer: “According to Isaiah 6:1, it was indeed the glory of God that was seen by the prophet (God sitting upon His throne, attended by seraphim, etc.); in accordance with the idea of the Logos, however, the theophanies are appearances of the Logos.” Rather, the Logos who is about becoming incarnate, is Himself one with the δόξα of the Father, although this again in the abstract is distinguished from the δόξα of Christ (comp. Hebrews 1:3); and hence too the δόξα of God is one with the Angel of the Presence (see Luke 2:9), although Christ again has also His divine-human δόξα. His essential estate is the μορφή θεοῦ. The seeing of Christ on the part of the prophet was not cognitive (Origen), but visionary (Tholuck). Vatablus and others have, in opposition to the context, referred αὐτοῦ to God.—And he (not dependent upon ὄτι, the prophet) spoke of Him.

[Alford: “Αὐτοῦ of Christ. The Evangelist is giving his judgment,—having had his understanding opened (Luke 24:45) to understand the Scriptures,—that the passage in Isaiah is spoken of Christ. And indeed, strictly considered, the glory which Isaiah saw could only be that of the Son, who is the ἀπαύγασμα τῆς δόξης of the Father, whom no eye hath seen.”—Wordsworth: “The Evangelist here says that Esaias (Isaiah 6:1-9) saw the glory of the Son. St. Paul says (Acts 28:25) that he heard the words of the Holy Spirit. There is one glory, therefore, of the Holy Trinity: and the glory of the Father is the glory of the Son, and is the glory of the Holy Ghost. (Theoph.) The glory of the Ever-blessed Trinity appeared to Isaiah, when he heard the Angelic Holy, Holy, Holy (Isaiah 6:3); and the glory of the Trinity is here called the glory of Christ, because Christ is God. (Cyril).—There is a remarkable resemblance to this passage in the Book of Revelation (Revelation 4:8-11), compared with Revelation 5:12-14, where the glory ascribed to the Holy Trinity, and the worship paid to the Holy Trinity, is ascribed and paid to Christ; and is therefore a clear evidence of His Divinity.”—P. S.]

John 12:42. Yet even of the rulers many believed in him.—The Evangelist limits and explains the preceding sentence. In relating that many even of the rulers (Sanhedrists) believed on Christ, he cannot mean such people as Nicodemus and Joseph of Arimathea (Meyer). We must appreciate the fact that John distinguishes between the wider sense of the word “believe” (John 8:30) and its more limited sense (John 7:5; John 20:27). Manifestly, it is belief in the wider sense of the term, inward historical recognition (“almost faith”), that is here meant. The Evangelist then proceeds to explain how it happened that the great commotion and awakening in the nation did not ripen into a great conversion.

But because of the Pharisees they did not confess (it or him), etc.—The counteraction of Pharisaism in its broadest sense is meant. They did not confess, did not come forward with the confession of their belief, for fear of excommunication. But excommunication seemed so frightful to them because they loved honor among men better than any (ἤπερ emphatically) honor with God. This means in the first place objectively the honor which men bestow by their recognition, in contrast to the honor given by God. This signification is, however, not exclusive of the subjective sense in which we interpret that honor of men to be of a human kind, but the honor of God of a divine sort, 2Ma 14:42; Romans 3:23.

John 12:44. But Jesus cried aloud and said.—A perfect antithesis to the honor-seeking partyism of the Jews, which was the cause of their unbelief, is now presented to us by the Evangelist in Jesus’ testimony to Himself, as the expression of His mental disposition or mind. In the first place, the setting forth of the person of Christ was free from ambition; it was a setting forth of the glory of God. He sought singly and alone the glory of God. Belief in Him should be a belief in the living God to the same extent as if it were no belief in Christ, i.e. as if belief in His human, individual appearance were fully merged in the divine glory of revelation of which He was the Mediator. And thus, also, in correspondence with the above, His appearance should be to those who saw Him the image of the appearance of the Father who sent Him.

So, moreover, the sending of Him was free from selfish aims; being designed purely for the salvation of those to whom He was sent. Being, as Light that came into the world, in principle purely a shining of God, so He was, in respect of His aim, absolutely the deliverance of believers from darkness, John 12:46.

Further, therefore, the operation of Christ was likewise purely and exclusively of a redeeming species without admixture of a condemning agency. This shining unto salvation and deliverance from darkness is in so great and exclusive a degree the aim of His mission that He is able to say: He that shall have heard My word and not have kept it (which will be proved at the Day of Judgment) shall not be judged by Me. I.e. He came solely and alone (in His one appearance as the Saviour of the world) to save. But the word of God which the unbeliever has not kept, but which holds him fast in the evil consciousness of his unbelief; the consciousness within him of the divine mission that he has slighted—that shall judge him at the last day (the ἐσχάτη ἡμέρα, comp. John 6:39-40).

And this is then, finally, purely and absolutely a judgment of God, devoid of any humanly turbid, individual admixture, because He has not spoken of Himself, but entirely in accordance with the ἐντολή of God by which He was conducted;—and that, as it regards the purport (the εἰπεῖν) of what He said, as well as the form, the human treatment and argument (the λαλεῖν). The ἔντολή, however, is not simply the commission laid upon Him at His sending; it is God’s law for Him—a law continually in operation, fitting itself to each moment; it is the voice of God within Him (“an individual court of appeal”). But as this life-law of the speech of Christ is principally a commandment of God, so it is, in regard to its end and aim, eternal life; i.e. it contains, imparts, is productive of, eternal life; it develops into eternal life in the obedience of faith. And Christ, being fully conscious that He stands, with every word, between the God who has commissioned Him and the eternal life of the soul, says nothing in false selfism, but gives utterance to all things as the Father has told them to Him. i.e. even in expression, His word is thoroughly in accordance with God. So Christ could testify of His works that they were pure from all self-seeking and selfism, as though He vanished out of each one; disappearing first as a principle, in presence of the causal all-agency of the personal God, and then theologically before the aim of bringing salvation to souls as the perfect Mediator. This is one side of the divine-human revelation—and this, as a clear mirror, is contrasted by John with the sombre picture of that ambitious, selfish, utterly falsified party righteousness which rejected the Lord. In contemplating this we may not overlook the other side, namely, that this pure revelation of God was accomplished by the very perfection and perfect distinctness of the human individuality of Christ.

DOCTRINAL AND ETHICAL

1. The pause between the end of the prophetic and the beginning of the high-priestly ministry of Christ, is marked by the Evangelist with an epilogue, which excites the certain expectation that the close of the second half of the Gospel will also be furnished with its epilogue, as a conclusion to the entire Gospel and also as a companion piece to the prologue (see the Introduction and chap 21)2. Had Jesus been simply a Prophet, His work would have been accomplished with the announcement of judgment made by Him within the temple after the rulers of the people had tempted Him and hardened themselves against Him within that building (see Comm. on Matt. p. 418, etc. Am. Ed.). But the bond of fellowship with His nation, the bond of high-priestly compassion, now drew Him forth again from His concealment to the hour of the Paschal sacrifice.

3. The grief of the disciple that Israel hardened himself in face of the full and perfect unfolding of the life of the prophetic Christ, John 12:37.

4. The pacification of the Evangelist in submissive contemplation of God’s word and providence, John 12:38-41. Analogous is the lament of the Prophet and his pacification in which the Evangelist merges himself.

5. The lament of the Prophet (Isaiah 53:0) abstractly considered. The unbelief of the Jews in the time of Isaiah impenitently opposed itself to the preaching of the prophets as well as to the arm of the Lord,—His wonders and signs of judgment. Hence the prophet saw in the sufferings of the prophethood the type of the suffering servant of God, the Messiah. And hence the greatest of the Evangelists, in passing to the sufferings of Christ, reverts to that lament of the greatest of the prophets. He knows that lamentation to have had its perfect fulfilment in the face of the sufferings of Christ and in those sufferings. Isaiah, in prophetic spirit, saw the beginnings of unbelief of the Messianic promise, the beginnings of impenitence and obduracy, the beginnings of the suffering prophethood and of judgment accelerated by the preaching,—and depicted the future in advance; John witnessed the fulfilment of all this in the life of Jesus.

6. Unbelief, as an unwillingness to believe, was punished even in Isaiah’s time with the inability to believe, the judgment of obduracy. It is the solicitous operation of the word of God which, with a holy and even healing purpose, drives the beginnings of judgment towards their completion. The Evangelist, like the Prophet, becomes tranquillized in adoring this judgment.

7. The Evangelist, with equal meaning, explains the unbelief of the Jews, which brought about the sufferings of Christ, by the introduction to Isaiah 53:0, and the judgment of impenitence upon the Jews by the vision Isaiah 6:0. Consequent upon the judgment of impenitence was the destruction of the city, the climax of which was reached by the burning of the temple; Isaiah himself had seen the temple totter at the revelation of the glory of Christ, the house being filled with smoke at the appearance of the seraphim. Hence these are doubtless symbolical angels of fiery judgment, as, in like manner, the cherubim are symbolical angels of divine providence under its historical veil, in great storms especially; an explanation certainly more obvious than the usual interpretation of שׇׂרׇף.

8. Christ, in the Old Testament, the manifestation of the δόξα of God, as also the Angel of the Presence (see Notes on John 1:14).

9. But the Evangelist is also necessitated to assign the human, ethical reason for that divine judgment in the unbelief of his nation. He therefore repeatedly gives prominence to the inclination to believe, found not only in the greater part of the people but also in many of its rulers. It is a fact of the highest significance that fear of the Pharisees, of the enmity of the Pharisaic party against Christ, was the ruin of everything and prepared for the nation its tragic fate. It is a statement of startling gravity that all the causes of the general apostasy were concentrated in the one sin of fear; and that the different phases of fear: the fear of man, the fear of spectres, the fear of shame and suffering, were concentrated in the one form: the fear of Pharisaic excommunication. Such fearful ruin can the dominion of a Pharisaic terrorism effect. This has been again demonstrated by the history of the Reformation. And the true courage of belief and conviction is as holy and replete with blessing as that fear, in spite of all its pretended holiness, is fatal and damnable. The emotion of fear was, however, grounded on the impulse of ambition, slavish devotion to the honor of Jewish patriotism, irreproachable orthodoxy, Pharisaic righteousness. Yet the ultimate reason of this wordly ambition in hypocritico-spiritual apparel, was the lack of a knowledge and sense of honor with God, the lack of true, inward spiritual life and of a prayerful spirit,—spiritual lethargy, spiritual death under the mask of the most fiery life.

10. In contrast to the gloomy picture of fatal and damnable ambition presented by Pharisaic Judaism, which denied the honor of God in Christ and finally blasphemed it and covered it with shame on the cross, appears the bright image of the mind and self-presentation of Christ. He sought nothing for Himself, with human selfism and selfishness, but made His life a pure sacrifice for the glory of God and the salvation of the world. So it is with His personality: it is the pure ideality of His essence as the manifestation of God, John 12:44. Thus with the sending of Him: it is the pure ideality of His appearance: the glorification of the manifestation of God, John 12:45. With His aim: it is the pure ideality of the transfiguration of the substantial world, of the enlightenment of the darkened world of sin, John 12:46. With His operation: it is the pure ideality of redemption, John 12:47. With the judicial operation of His word: it is the pure ideality of His coming to judgment, John 12:48. So it is with the motive, the aim and even the expression of His word, i. e. the pure ideality of His obedience, life and conduct even to the expression of His word itself, John 12:49-50.

11. We may sum up this résumé of the self-presentation of Jesus in these words: Jesus was the pure, perfect, divine-human hypostasis; transparent as crystal in respect of the motive of His life, the manifestation of the Father, hence pure devotion, in His love, to that portion of the world that will receive salvation,—the pure outpouring of eternal life. He was, however, just this complete personality because His presentation by the Father was equally distinct with His own presentation of the Father; i.e. He was the complete divine-human individuality, the complete character. And He gave proof of His perfect personality as well as of His perfect individuality because He, in perfect subjectivity, continually transformed the general ἐντολή into the momentary ἐντολή of His consciousness, or kept the will of God in unison with His own will. (Comp. Leben Jesu, II. p. 1292.)

ΗOMILETICAL AND PRACTICAL

The Evangelist’s retrospect of the public ministry of Christ and its apparently frustrated result.—This retrospect in the light of prophecy.—Yet they believed not. The yet of unbelievers and the yet of believers, Psalms 73:1 : 1. An antithesis in which the reality of human freedom is expressed; 2. the glory of divine judgment and divine grace; 3. decision for eternity; 4. a contrast, as betwixt heaven and hell.—The shocking obduracy of the Jewish nation in view of Christ’s full, divine revelation of life.—How unbelief is changed from guilt to judgment: 1. Unwillingness to believe, as a crime demanding judgment; 2. inability to believe, as the judgment upon the crime.—The fault contained in the unbelief of the Jews a warning to all times.—The form of their fault: 1. Fear the cause of their unbelief; a. as a fear of excommunication; b. of excommunication by the Pharisees. 2. Ambition the foundation of their fear a morbid delight in the fame of piety, righteousness, orthodoxy, etc. 3. The want of knowledge, of spiritual life and of a sense of God’s honor the foundation of their morbid ambition.—The frightful effects of a Pharisaic ordinance of excommunication 1. As displayed in our history; 2. in the history of the middle ages; 3. as resulting from the very nature of such an ordinance.—The curse of the fear of man, especially in matters of faith.—The ultimate and deepest cause of all evil the want of a sense of God’s glory, Romans 1:21.—Unholy party spirit in its fatal effects: 1. Characteristics of such party spirit: mutual belying, deception, exciting, fettering. 2. The fatal effects; a. fear; b. denial; c. universal ruin.—The rarity and gloriousness of true frankness in the service of truth.—Christ the Glory of God in the Old Testament.—That the Jews despised the glory which God gives, was manifest in that they despised Christ, who, in His righteousness, revealed the glory of God.—Jesus cried aloud. The solemn protestation of Jesus against the charge of having arrogated to Himself a peculiar glory as a false prophet.—The gloriously effulgent picture of the life of Jesus, who rejoiced in sacrifice, contrasted with the selfishness of His contemporaries: 1. They sought their own profit, honor, life, etc.; He lived but for the cause of God. 2. They, therefore, were slavishly dependent one upon another; He stood free in God. 3. They, under the mask of zeal for the glory of God, sought to mar and obliterate the radiant image of His glory; Christ glorified the honor of God and His mercy to His enemies by His perfect joyfulness in meeting shame.—Christ the pure manifestation of God: 1. In His essence; 2. in His aim; 3. in His work; 4. in His word.—Christ the pure manifestation of God in the clear distinctness of His personal nature.—What distinguishes Christ’s testimony to Himself from all self-praise: 1. His remounting unreservedly to the source of His life, the Father; 2. His single aiming at His life’s goal, the salvation of the world.—How the unbeliever is unable to rid himself of the despised word of salvation, bearing it with him, as an inward judgment, to the Last Day, which day shall convert it into an outward judgment also.—The Last Day a revelation of inward judgment.—Christ’s clear law of life an admonition to us to make our darkened life-law clear.—Christ’s law of life as the law of His freedom.—The Evangelist’s retrospect of the prophetic work of Christ a proof that His high-priestly and kingly work was yet to follow.—The deep grief and the sublime pacification of Prophet and Apostle (Isaiah, John) in regarding the unbelief of their times.

Starke, Canstein: What happens, happens not because it has been foretold, but it was foretold because God foresaw that it would happen.—The truth of righteous and divine obduration.

John 12:42. Hedinger: Blessed is the man to whom the world, with all her rags of honor, is crucified, and who holds her to be worth no more than a thief on the gallows, Galatians 4:16.—Cramer: True, unfeigned belief must always be in harmony with a man’s confession.—Quesnel: Stand we in whatsoever circumstances or situation we may, we are on no account to attach ourselves to them; we must place our dependence on nothing that men can deprive us of, if we desire to obtain and keep that which God alone can give.—Canstein: Christ always appeals to the Father when defending Himself against His enemies. So may faithful servants of the word, finding themselves in contempt and adversity, trust in the ministry which they have received from God.

John 12:46. The sun is a fair light; Christ, the Sun of Righteousness, many thousand times fairer.

John 12:47. A loyal servant of the Word is sent only to bring salvation.

John 12:48. Quesnel: It is never permitted to the servants of Christ to avenge themselves on the despisers of their preaching; it is God’s word; at the right time He will judge such conduct.

Gerlach: The guilt of the Jews assumed such magnitude in that they were not only inwardly estranged from Jesus and His revelation, but also, when, by the most glorious miracles, Jesus supported that highest proof (see chap John 7:17), they yet turned away from Him.—The discourse from John 12:44 is not a single one; in order to show the inexcusableness of Jewish unbelief John subjoins a summary of the Lord’s discourses; many reminiscences of former speeches. With John 12:44 comp. John 7:16; John 5:19; John 8:42.—With John 12:44 John 8:19; John 14:10; chap. 1.—With John 12:46 John 1:5; John 8:12; John 12:35.—With John 12:47-48 John 3:17; John 5:45, etc.—With John 12:49 John 8:28; John 8:38.—With John 12:50 John 6:39-40; John 10:11.—His revelation was nothing but light, life and love.

Braune: Elisha did twelve miracles, Elijah fewer still, and if we reckon up all the miracles of the prophets we find that seventy-four were performed by them; those of Moses are estimated at seventy-six. But although John chronicles but seven, he remarks, John 21:25, that the world would not contain the books that would have to be written if all the deeds of Jesus should be detailed. (Interesting from a theological point of view; homiletically a quantitative numeration of all the miracles would be unadvisable. As to the Number Seven of John the case is of course quite different). And yet the believed not on Him. Awful yet!—In sins of conscience the beginning is to fear and flee.—Without confession, faith soon wanes and its light threatens to become extinct.

Gossner: We fear the excommunication of men, but not the excommunication of God, of Christ.—This fear of an unrighteous excommunication may plunge us into eternal perdition, into the denial excommunication of God.—It is possible for a soul to be saved without external communion with the Church, without sacraments administered by priests, if it be unrighteously shut out from them.—Let us therefore fear nothing but excommunication from Christ in our hearts, nothing but separation from the love of Christ.—Faith is the name of the way that leads from darkness into light.

John 12:48. The hearing of God’s word is never without result; a man cannot remain neutral with regard to it; it is either, or—friend or foe—grace or judgment.

John 12:50. He preaches with exceeding joyfulness who speaks nothing from himself; when it is His (God’s) word and not the preacher’s babble or work of art.

Heubner: The secret, inward conviction of the divine mission of Jesus makes him so much the more culpable who is ashamed of acknowledging such a conviction.—The confession of the gospel, the confession of Jesus, is of particular worth in times when it involves shame.—How many dangers and hinderances to free confession there are in high positions! The fear of men, and ambition are the mightiest impediments to outspoken belief.—Pharisees. Entire parties may exert an influence in the repression and hinderance of the gospel.—To reject Jesus is to reject God.—His judging at some future day shall not be partial, as on account of personal injuries inflicted by unbelievers. The unbeliever will be condemned by his own conscience. Unbelief bears its judge within itself.—Christ left no particle of His duty undone. So it was no fault of His if men would not believe.

Schleiermacher: There is but one honor—and that is the honor which is in God’s sight; there is but one fear which does not debase men—and that is the fear that says: How should I do this great wickedness and sin against God? But we do commit sin against God and His Spirit, if we seal up within our hearts what we in their inmost depths account as truth, and put a bar to its outgoing and further operation. For as common property and possession the Lord has endowed us with all spiritual gifts.—Some are of opinion that it was the general design of the Lord to turn aside the belief of mankind in great measure from His own person and direct it towards Him who sent Him; others think: All the faith that He demands must be directed to Him and His person alone. Let us avoid the one and the other extreme, whilst we combine the two, for such was the Redeemer’s intention.—In view of His Passion and Death saith the Redeemer: I know that His commandment is life everlasting.

Besser: Perhaps the expression that so frequently and emphatically recurs in the discourses of the Lord, to the effect, namely, that God had sent Him, should also serve to designate Him as the Angel (Ambassador) of the Lord in the Scriptures of the Old Testament.—Stier: John knows no other true and full belief than that which makes confession.

[Craven: From Augustine: John 12:38. It is evident that the arm of the Lord is the Son of God Himself.

John 12:37-38. God predicted the unbelief of the Jews but did not cause it; He does not compel men to sin because He knows they will sin.

John 12:39-40. If any ask why they could not, I answer, Because they would not—it is the fault of the human will that they could not. They well deserved this—God hardens and blinds a man by forsaking and not supporting him.

John 12:42-43. As their faith grew, their love of human praise grew still more, and outstripped it.

John 12:44-45. He signifies that He is more than He appears to be.—We believe an Apostle, but we do not believe in an Apostle.

John 12:46. He saith to His disciples, Ye are the light of the world, but He does not say, Ye are come a light into the world that whosoever believeth in you, etc.; All saints are lights but they are so by faith [reflection] because they are enlightened by Him.

John 12:47. I judge Him not, i.e. not now; now is the time of mercy, afterward will be the time of judgment.

John 12:49. He Himself is the Word which the Father speaketh.—From Chrysostom: John 12:37-38. The prophets had predicted this very unbelief, and He came [amongst other intents] that it might be made manifest.—That is expressive not of the cause but of the event; they did not disbelieve because Isaiah said they would, Esaias said they would because they would.

John 12:39. Could not, a common form of speech among ourselves; we say, I cannot love such a man, meaning only a vehement will.

John 12:39-40. He does not leave us except we wish Him; we begin to forsake first.—As it is not the fault of the sun that it hurts weak eyes, so neither is God to blame for punishing those who do not attend to His words.

John 12:43. The praise [glory] of God is publicly to confess Christ; the praise [glory] of men is to glory in earthly things.

John 12:47. I am not the cause of his judgment, but he is himself by despising My words.

John 12:48. That this (John 12:46-47) might not serve to encourage sloth, He warns of a terrible judgment about to come.——From Litany of the Church of England: John 12:37-40. “From all hardness of heart, and contempt of Thy Word and commandment, good Lord, deliver us.”

[From Burkitt: John 12:38-41. The reference is to Isaiah 6:3; whence a clear argument for Christ’s divinity may be drawn.

John 12:37. Let not the ministers of Christ be discouraged at their want of success, when they consider the small success of our Lord’s own ministry.

John 12:38. Isaiah’s complaint of the small success of his preaching, a prophecy of the like success that Christ and His ministers should have under the gospel.—The gospel in all ages has met with more that rejected it than have savingly entertained it.

John 12:38; John 12:40. When men close their eyes wilfully, it is just with God to close their eyes judicially.—The infidelity of a people is to be resolved into the perverseness of their own wills, and not to any judicial blindness wrought by God upon them antecedent to their own sin.—God’s act of hardening was consequential upon their sinning.

John 12:42. Even in times and places where infidelity most prevails, the ministry of the word shall not be altogether without fruit.—Fear of men has kept many from believing on Christ, and more from confessing Him.

John 12:43. They valued applause from men, more than God’s approving them; no greater snare to draw persons from duty than an inordinate love of their own reputation.—How often is the applause of men preferred before the commendation of God.

John 12:45. We do not see Christ aright unless we see Him to be truly God.—The Father is not to be seen but in the Son.

John 12:46. The dreadful judgment denounced by Christ against all unbelievers

John 12:46-47. Learn—1. Christ and His doctrine inseparable; 2. rejecters of Christ and His doctrine shall not escape the judgment of Christ at the last day; 3. were there no other witness against rejecters, the word preached would be sufficient.—The word preached is now the rule of living, hereafter it shall be the rule of judging.

[From M. Henry: John 12:37-41. The honor done to our Lord by the Old Testament prophets.—Two things said concerning untractable Israel —1. they did not believe; 2. they could not believe.—They could not believe because—1. they would not, a moral impotency like that of one accustomed to do evil, Jeremiah 13:23; Jeremiah 2:0. God had blinded their eyes, God is not the author of sin and yet, (1) a righteous hand of God sometimes to be acknowledged in the blindness of those who persist in sin as punishment for preceding resistance, (2) judicial blindness is threatened against those who wilfully persist in wickedness.

John 12:42-43. Many professed more kindness for Christ than they had, these had more than they were willing to profess.—A struggle between their convictions and corruptions.—There are more good people than we think there are—some are better than they seem.—The power of the world in smothering convictions.—Observe concerning these believers—1. wherein they failed—in not confessing Christ; 2. what they feared—disgrace and damage; 3. the ground of their fear—they loved the praise of men more than the praise of God.—Love of the praise of men—1. as a by-end in that which is good, will make a man a hypocrite where religion is in fashion; 2. as a principle in that which is evil, will make one an apostate where religion is in disgrace.

John 12:44. Jesus cried [aloud] and said: this intimates His boldness and earnestness in speaking.

John 12:44-46. The privileges and dignities of those that believe, they are brought into—1. an honorable acquaintance with God; 2. a comfortable enjoyment of themselves.

John 12:47-48. The peril of those that believe not; observe—1. who they are whose unbelief is here condemned—those who hear and believe not; 2. the constructive malignity of their unbelief—a rejection of Christ; 3. the forbearance of Jesus toward them; 4. their certain judgment at the great day.

John 12:49-50. The authority of Christ—1. His commission from the Father; 2. the design of that commission—life everlasting; 3. His own observance of the instructions thereof.—Our Lord learned obedience Himself before He taught it to us.—Those who disobey Christ despise everlasting life.

[From Doddridge: John 12:42-43. Strange infatuation! that the human mind should be capable of believing that there is a God, and yet of preferring the creature before Him.—From Scott: John 12:42-43. That will not be accounted true faith which does not overcome [worldly] ambition, and induce its possessors to confess Christ before His enemies.—Chief Rulers are especially in danger of prevaricating.—From A. Clarke

John 12:42-43. Many persons are liberal in their condemnation of the Jews who are probably committing the same sort of transgression under circumstances which heighten their iniquity.—It is possible for a man to credit the four Evangelists [the entire Bible] and yet live and die an infidel so far as his own salvation is concerned.

[From Stier: John 12:39-40. The predicted judicial hardening [of the Jews] in the fulfilment of which, unbelief itself becomes only a new sign [to us] in proof.—The guilt of unbelief rested solely with Israel

John 12:37-43. Of the unbelieving there are, according to St. John, two classes—1. the unsusceptible and hardened; 2. those who confess not in spite of their [imperfect] belief—He knows no other genuine, and perfect faith than that which confesses.

John 12:50. The commission is, in its ground and aim, according to its design and indwelling power, life everlasting for all who believe.

[From A Plain Commentary (Oxford): John 12:46. It is evidently implied that He found all the world in darkness.—From Barnes: John 12:37. The Jews did not believe as a nation.

John 12:42-43. True faith is active—it overcomes the fear of man, it prompts to self-denying duties.

John 12:48. Hath one that judgeth him: He will carry his own condemnation with him, his own conscience will condemn him.—Learn that—1. a guilty conscience needs no accuser; 2. the words of Christ will be remembered by the rejecter; 3. this [rejection] will be the source of his condemnation; 4. the conscience of the sinner will concur with the sentence of Christ in the great day; 5. the word that Christ has spoken will be that by which the sinner will be judged in the last day.

John 12:50. His commandment is life everlasting, i.e. the cause or source of everlasting life.—The [one] reason of the earnestness and fidelity of Jesus—He saw that eternal life depended on faithful preaching.—Every minister should have a deep and abiding conviction that He delivers a message connected with the eternal welfare of his hearers; under the influence of this belief he should preach fearlessly.—The close of the public ministry of Christ; such a close as all His ministers should desire to make.

[From Ryle: John 12:37. Where there is the greatest quantity of the form of religion, there is often the greatest proportion of formality and unbelief.

John 12:38. It is a singular fact that the very chapter which the Jews have been most unwilling to believe should begin with the question—Who hath believed our report?—If the Jews had not been unbelieving, the Scriptures would have been untrue.—“Darkness does not blind men so much as light, unless God renews the mind by His Spirit.” [Rollock.]—Remark how seeing, understanding, being converted, and being healed, are linked together.

John 12:42. Many of the Chief Rulers believed: their faith was only of the head and not of the heart—they were cowards.

John 12:43. The same miserable motive is still ruining myriads of souls.—“They were not willing to part with their great places in the magistracy.” [Poole.]

John 12:48. There will be a resurrection of all faithful servants at the last day.

[From Owen: John 12:40. He hath blinded—hardened; this He did mediately or by the instrumentality of the truth; the indirect agency of truth when resisted to render the soul insensible to divine love is equally certain and dreadful in its results as though the effect were produced by a direct agency upon the heart.

John 12:50. His commandment contains in itself the germ and principle of eternal life, and when received into the soul results in everlasting salvation.

[From Whedon: John 12:40. Although God was the unwilling cause of their blindness, it was their wicked will that gave to the cause its effect.—Their perverse will transformed His mercy into judgment; his means of softening into results of hardening—thus does the same sun that melts the wax harden the clay.

John 12:42. A type fulfilled in nearly every age of advancement and beneficent resolution.

John 12:50. God’s divine, authoritative word implanted within our soul is eternal life in its very element and essence.]

Footnotes:

John 12:37; John 12:37.—[Tοσαῦτα may be understood of magnitude: so great, such (comp. Matthew 8:10, Luke 7:9; Revelation 18:17; Galatians 3:1), or of multitude: so many (Matthew 15:33; John 6:9; John 14:9; John 11:11). Lücke and De Wette decide for the former, Meyer and Alford for the latter. Lange translates such.—P. S.]

John 12:40; John 12:40.—[Tischendorf gives ἐπώρωσεν, instead of the πεπώρωκεν of Lach., in accordance with A. B* K. L. X., etc., and also א.II., as amended from ἐπηρώτησεν].

John 12:40; John 12:40.—[Tischenderf and Alford give στραφῶσιν in accordance with א. B. D.; the text. rec. reads ἐρ ιστοραφῶσι according to A. D. 2 E. F., etc.]

John 12:40; John 12:40.—The Future ἰάσομαι is to be preferred to the Subjunctive ἰάσωμαι, in accordance with the decided preponderance of authorities, Lachmann, Tischendorf. א. A. B. D., etc.]

John 12:41; John 12:41.—Ὅτι [because] is to he adopted in the place of ὅτε [when, text roc, E. V.] in accordance with [א. A. B. L., etc., Lachmann, Tischenderf [Alford, Westcott and Hort].

John 12:41; John 12:41.—[See Exegetical Notes].

John 12:43; John 12:43.—[See Exegetical Notes].

John 12:47; John 12:47.—Καὶ μὴ φυλάξῃ instead of καὶ μὴ πιστεύσῃ, in accordance with Codd. [א.] A. B. K. [L.M.], etc., Lachmann Tischendorf [Alford, Westcott and Hort], Jesus goes away after uttering this saying. [א. T. Δ. Δ. and Verss. give ἓως, in this verse; in John 12:36, א. B. D. L. give ςω.—P.S.]