John 18:1 - Exposition

When Jesus had spoken these words— i.e. had offered the prayer, and communed with his Father touching himself, his disciples, and his whole Church— he went forth with his disciples ; i.e. from the resting-place chosen by him on his way from the "guest-chamber" to the valley of Kedron; it may have been from some corner of the vast temple area, or some sheltered spot under the shadow of its walls, where he uttered his wondrous discourse and intercession. He went over the ravine —or, strictly speaking, winter-torrent— of Kedron . £ The stream rises north of Jerusalem, and separates the city on its eastern side from Scopas and the Mount of Olives. It reaches its deepest depression at the point where it joins the valley of Hinnom near the well of Rogel, contributing to the peculiar physical conformation of the city. The stream is in summer dry to its bed, and Robinson, Grove, and Warren conjecture, in agreement with an old tradition, that there is, below the present surface of its bed, a subterraneous watercourse, whose waters may be heard flowing. The stream takes a sudden bend to the southeast at En-Rogel, and makes its way, by the convent of Saba, to the Dead Sea. It is not without interest that this note of place given by St. John alone—for the three other evangelists simply speak of "the Mount of Olives " —brings the narrative into relation with the story of David's flight from Absalom by the same route, and also the Jewish expectation ( Joel 3:2 ), and Mohammedan prediction, that here will take place the final judgment (Smith's 'Dictionary,' art. " Kedron ," by Grove; 'Pictorial Palestine,' vol. 1.; Robinson, 'Bib. Res.,' 1:269: Winer's 'B. Realworterbuch,' art. "Kedron;" Dean Stanley's 'Sinai and Palestine;' 'The Recovery of Jerusalem,' by Capt. Warren and Capt. Wilson, John 1:1-51 . and 5.). Where was a garden . This reference is in agreement with the synoptic description of the χωρίον , "parcel of ground ," small farm, or olive yard, enclosed from the rest of the hillside, and called "Gethsemane" ( gath-shammi , press for oil). The traditional site of the garden dates back to the time of Constantine, and may be the true scene of the agony described by the synoptists. There are still remaining "the eight aged olive trees," which carry back the associations to the hour of the great travail. It is certain that the general features of the scene still closely correspond with what was visible on the awful night ('Pictorial Palestine,' 1.86, 98). Patristic and mediaeval writers, with Hengstenberg and Wordsworth, see parallels between the garden of Eden lost by man's sin, and the garden of Gethsemane where the second Adam met the prince of this world, and bore the weight of human transgression and shame, and regained for man the paradise which Adam lost. It is still more interesting to notice a further touch recorded by John: Into which —into the quiet retreat and partial concealment of which— he (Jesus) entered himself, and his disciples . We know from the other Gospels that they were separated—eight remained on watch near the entrance, and Peter and James and John went further into the recesses of the garden, and again, "about a stone's cast," in the depth of the olive-shade, our blessed Lord retired to "pray."