John 21:14 - Exposition

This is now —or, as Meyer puts it, this time already is— the third time that Jesus was manifested (passive, not active, as in John 21:1 ) to the £ disciples, after that he was risen from the dead ; or, when he had been raised from the dead. The implication is that there had up to this time been no other manifestation to groups of his disciples than those which John bad related. Therefore those other occurrences mentioned by Luke, Matthew, and Paul must be supposed to lie still in the future. That there were other manifestations is not obscurely hinted by the word ἤδη . The appearances to the women, to Cephas and James, are not of the class so carefully described by John. The εἶτα τοῖς δώδεκα of 1 Corinthians 15:5 , etc., might be regarded as this third manifestation to the disciples (Luthardt). Godet agrees that the two appearances in Luke (Emmaus and Peter) are not reckoned by John, any more than that made to Mary Magdalene. The statement, "to the disciples," is clearly the explanation. Paul mentions the appearance

Since Luke and Paul (Godet) omitted the narrative before us, John is here repairing the omissions of tradition. It seems quite as reasonable to place this third revelation to a group of apostles as the third of Paul's enumerations. John is explicit in recording appearances to the special, combined, and chosen witnesses, while he not only implies, but mentions, other manifestations. Paul recites the special manifestations of various kinds, and gives most important details dropped by other traditions. The apocryphal ' Gospel according to the Hebrews,' as related by Jerome ('Cat. Script. Eccl. "Jacobus"'), quotes the passage which refers to the interview between James and the risen Lord. Gregory of Tours ('Hist. Francorum,' 1.21) refers to the tradition as though he had taken it from some analogous but not identical source. If the previous manifestations of the risen Lord were made to love, to thought, to earnest though trembling inquiry, to spiritual vision only, so here we find that, amid the ordinary duties of life and the activities and disappointments of daily service, the Lord manifests himself. The eye of love and the heart of rock are made ready for special assurances of the Master's presence and power to help and guide disciples throughout that mysterious future in which they are to feel and realize his words, "Lo! I am with you always, even to the end of the world."