John 8:2

Joh_8:2

And early in the morning He came again unto the Temple

The Temple

We have in our version only one word, Temple, with which we render both ἰερόν and ναός, but there is a very real distinction between the two, and one the marking of which would often add much to the clearness and precision of the sacred narrative.

Ἱερόν (= templum) is the whole compass of the sacred enclosure, the τέμενος, including the outer courts, the porches, porticoes, and other buildings subordinated to the Temple itself. But ναός (= aedes), from ναίω, habito, as the proper habitation of God (Act_7:48; Act_17:24; 1Co_6:19): the οι (Mat_12:4; cf. Exo_23:19) is the Temple itself, that by especial right so called, being the heart and centre of the whole; the Holy, and the Holy of Holies, called often ἀγίασμα. (1Ma_1:37; 1Ma_3:45). This distinction, one that existed and was acknowledged in profane Greek, and with reference to heathen temples, quite as much as in sacred Greek, and with relation to the Temple of the true God (see Herodotus 1.181-3; Thucydides 5.18; Act_19:24-27) is, I believe, always assumed in all passages relating to the Temple at Jerusalem, alike by Josephus, by Philo, by the Septuagint translators, and in the New Testament … The distinction may be brought to bear with advantage on several passages in the New Testament. When Zacharias entered into the Temple of the Lord to burn incense, the people who waited His return, and who are described as standing without (Luk_1:10) were in one sense in the Temple too--that is, in the ἱερόν, while he alone entered into the ναός, the Temple in its more limited and auguster sense. We read continually of Christ teaching in the Temple (Mat_26:55; Luk_21:37; Joh_8:21), and perhaps are at a loss to understand how this could have been so, or how long conversations could there have been maintained, without interrupting the service of God. But this is ever the ἱερόν, the porches and porticoes of which were eminently adapted to such purposes, as they were intended far them. Into the ναός the Lord never entered during His earthly course: nor, indeed, being made under the law, could He do so, that being reserved for the priests alone. It need hardly be said that the money changers, the buyers and sellers, with the sheep and oxen, whom the Lord drives out, He repels from the ἱερόν, and not from the ναός. Irreverent as was their intrusion, they yet had not dared to establish themselves in the Temple properly so called. (Mat_21:12; Joh_2:14). On the other hand, when we read of another Zacharias slain between the Temple and the altar (Mat_23:35) we have only to remember that Temple is ναός here, at once to get rid of a difficulty, which may perhaps have presented itself to many--this, namely, Was not the altar in the Temple? How, then, could any locality be described as between these two? In the ἱερόν, doubtless was the brazen altar to which allusion is here made, but not in the ναός, in the court of the House of the Lord (cf. Josephus, Antiq. 8.4, 1), where the sacred historian (2Ch_24:21) lays the scene of this murder, but not in the House of the Lord, or ναός, itself. Again, how vividly does it set forth to us the despair and defiance of Judas, that he presses even into the ναός itself (Mat_27:5), into the adytum which was set apart for the priests alone, and there casts down before them the accursed price of blood. Those expositors who affirm that here ναός stands for ἱερόν should adduce some other passage in which the one is put for the other. (Abp. Trench.)

And He sat down and taught

Christ as a religious Teacher

I. HE WAS DEVOUTLY STUDIOUS. It was from the solitudes of Olivet where He had spent the previous night that He goes into the Temple. To preach the gospel three things are essential, and these can come only by solitude.

1. Self-formed conviction of gospel truth. The gospel is the power of God unto salvation; but how is it to be wielded--by Bible circulation, recitation of its contents, or repeating the comments of others? All these are useful, but conviction is indispensable. Heaven has so honoured our nature that the gospel, to win its victories, must pass as living beliefs through the soul of the teacher. The men who teach it without such convictions--conventional preachers--can never enrich the world. They are echoes of old voices, mere channels through which old dogmas flow. But he who speaks what he believes and because he believes, the doctrine comes from him instinct and warm with life. His individuality is impressed upon it. The world never had it in that exact form before. Now, devout solitude is necessary to this. Alone with God you can search the gospel to its foundation, and feel the congruity of its doctrine with your reason, its claims with your conscience, its provisions with your wants.

2. Unconquerable love for gospel truth. There is an immense practical opposition to it. Mens pride, prejudice, pleasures, pursuits, and temporal interests are against it. It follows, therefore, that those who think more of the favour of society than of the claims of truth, will not deal with it honestly, earnestly, and therefore successfully. The man only who loves truth more than even life, can so use it really to benefit mankind. In devout solitude you can cultivate this invincible attachment to truth, and you may be made to feel with Paul, I count all things but loss for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ,

3. A living expression of gospel truth. Our conduct must confirm and illumine the doctrines which our lips declare. For this there must be seasons of solitude. When Moses talked with God the skin of his face shone. But in devout seclusion our whole nature may become luminous. John the Baptist gained invincible energy in the wilderness; Paul prepared for apostleship in Arabia; and in Gethsemane Jesus was prepared for His work.

II. HE WAS SUBLIMELY COURAGEOUS. On the previous day His life had been threatened and His arrest attempted, yet with a noble daring He goes early in the morning to the same scene. Distinguish this spirit from what the world calls courage.

1. Brute courage is dead to the sacredness of life. Soldiers hold life cheaply, and their courage is an animal and mercenary thing. But Christ deeply felt and frequently taught the sanctity of life. He came not to destroy mens lives, etc. What shall it profit, etc.

2. Brute courage is indifferent to the grand mission of life. The man of brute valour is not inspired with the question, What is the grand object of my life? Am I here to work out the great designs of my Maker or to be a mere fighting machine? On the contrary, Christs regard for the grand mission of His life made Him courageous. He came to bear witness to the truth; and to fulfil this work He willingly risked His own mortal life.

3. Brute courage is always inspired by mere animal passion. It is when the blood is up the man is daring, the mere blood of the enraged tiger or the infuriated lion. When the blood cools down the mans courage, such as it is, collapses. Not so with the valour of Christ, which was that of deep conviction of duty. As Luther, Dr. DAubigne informs us, drew near the door which was about to admit him into the presence of his judges (the Diet of Worms), he met a valiant knight, the celebrated George of Freundsberg, who, four years later, at the head of his German lansquenets, bent the knee with his soldiers on the field of Pavia, and then, charging to the left of the French army, drove it into the Ticino, and in a great measure decided the captivity of the King of France. The old general, seeing Luther pass, tapped him on the shoulder, and shaking his head, blanched in many battles, said kindly, Poor monk, poor monk! thou art now going to make a nobler stand than I or any other captain have ever made in the bloodiest of our battles. But if thy cause is just, and thou art sure of it, go forward in Gods name and fear nothing. God will not forsake thee. A noble tribute of respect paid by the courage of the sword to the courage of the mind. Nothing is more necessary for a religious teacher than courage, for his mission is to strike hard against the prejudices, self interests, dishonesties, etc., of the masses. No man without valour can do the work of a religious teacher. The popular preacher must more or less be cowardly conciliatory. Dead fish swim with the stream; it requires living ones with much inner force to cutup against the current.

III. HE WAS SUBLIMELY EARNEST. Early in the morning He did not indulge Himself sleep--I must work, etc. Two things should make the preacher earnestly diligent.

1. The transcendent importance of His mission--to enlighten and regenerate is perishable spirits that are in a morally ruinous condition. What is involved in the loss of one soul?

2. The brevity of life. How short the time, even in the longest-lived for this greatest of human understandings.

IV. HE WAS BEAUTIFULLY NATURAL. He sat down, etc. There was nothing stiff or official. All was free, fresh, and elastic as nature.

1. He was natural in attitude. Modern rhetoric has rules to guide a public speaker as to his posture, etc. All such miserable directions are not only unlike Christ, but degrading to the moral nature of the speaker, and detrimental to his oratorio influence. Let a man be charged with great thoughts, and those thoughts will throw his frame into the most beseeming attitudes.

2. He was natural in expression. He attended to no classic rule of composition; the words and similes He employed were such as His thoughts ran into first, and such as His hearers could well understand. To many modern preachers composition is everything. What solemn trifling with gospel truth!

3. He was natural in tones. The tones of His voice, we may rest assured, rose and fell according to the thoughts that occupied His soul. The voice of the modern teacher is often hideously artificial. Just so far as a speaker goes away from his nature, either in language, attitude, or tone, he loses self-respect, inward vigour, and social force. (D. Thomas, D. D.)

We must do good against great opposition

That is a poor engine that can only drive water through pipes down hill. Those vast giants of iron at the Ridgway waterworks, which supply this city day and night, easily lifting a ton of water at every gush, so that all the many thirsty faucet mouths throughout our streets cannot exhaust their fulness; those are the engines that I admire. (H. W. Beecher.)

The Biblical Illustrator, edited by Joseph S. Exell (c. 1880s–1900s) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

§ 82.—THE WOMAN TAKEN IN ADULTERY, Joh_8:2-11.

A majority of the best biblical scholars agree that this narrative of the adulteress, (including Joh_7:53,) though of apostolic antiquity, could scarce have been written by John. The external proofs are: 1. Its absence from a large share of the best manuscripts. 2. The absence of quotations of the passage in the earliest Christian writers. And, 3. The great variety of readings in the different copies of the passage. The internal proofs are: 1. Its unlikeness to the style of John, both in its general tenor and its particular terms. 2. The possibility of removing it from the text without producing any break. 3. Its discordance with the current of thought, so as to form an actual interruption. To the force of these arguments we are obliged to yield. In the entire context there is an open hostility between the Jews and Jesus; but in this passage there is on the contrary a state of pretended friendship and deference. They come with submissive air to receive from him, as authoritative judge, a legal decision, tempting him. This mode of tempting him is precisely of the same cast, and implies the same state of things, as we find in § 115. In some manuscripts, indeed, the passage is found at the end of Luke 21. The most suitable place for it is, perhaps, among the similar attempts at tempting in Mar_12:13-35. There can be no reasonable doubt of its forming a true part of Gospel history. The only questions are as to its authorship and place.

2. Early in the morning—See note on Luk_10:38.

Sat down—Quietly, and as an admitted teacher; unlike his position in the entire context.

Daniel D. Whedon (gen. ed.), Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1874–1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Section 1. (Joh 8:2-59.)

The Life the Light.

The first section, then, shows us sovereign grace in action, God Himself the only hiding-place of the convicted and condemned, and freedom therefore by the truth. Here where divine grace is so fully displayed, the history of the text is a lamentable illustration of how little that grace is realized by Christians themselves. We have but to take up indeed the writings of some of the earliest "fathers," to discover how soon the glory of its light became dimmed in the professing Church, -how soon the Judaism which combatted the apostle Paul from the beginning had overgrown or displaced the gospel which he preached. We may wonder indeed that it could venture to mutilate Scripture itself in such a manner as the MSS. and versions show has been done in this case; but this is what Augustine, as is well known, in a day little later than the earliest copies, charges against "some of little, or rather enemies to the true faith." We can, in fact, easily understand the motive which would lead to the omission of such a story as is here before us: who could imagine any bold enough to insert it where he did not find it? or the manufacture of so exquisite a piece of forgery as this would be? Indeed, few if any would venture to go quite so far as this. They speak of it rather as of some apostolic tradition, some fragment of true history, not perfectly preserved. They bow it out, in short, regretfully, but in no wise does this compensate for the greatness of the loss.

Of course, I am aware that there are difficulties urged, entirely apart from questions of the text. Thus Edersheim objects: "That a woman taken in the act of adultery should have been brought before Jesus (and apparently without the witnesses to her crime); that such an utterly un-Jewish, as well as illegal procedure should have been that of the Scribes and Pharisees, that such a breach of law, and what Judaism would regard as decency, should have been perpetrated to tempt Him; or that the Scribes should have been so ignorant as to substitute stoning for strangulation, as the punishment of adultery; lastly, that this scene should have been enacted in the temple, presents a veritable climax of impossibilities."

But much of this seems to be misconception merely; the rest a strange pledging oneself to what would be impossible for Scribes and Pharisees to do, mad with disappointed hatred against Christ, and bent upon compassing His destruction. As to the penalty of adultery being strangulation, "Michaelis," says Lange, "has justly denied the authority of the Talmud, and has asserted, on a comparison of Exo 31:14; Exo 35:2, with Num 15:32-35, that the formula ’put to death’ generally means stoned. Besides strangulation is frequently used first, only as an alleviation of the prescribed penalty, as in the burning in the middle ages."

As to bringing her for judgment to the Lord, there is no evidence of any formal trial instituted, such as would need the production of witnesses. The appeal is to a prophet who should know the mind of God rather than to a judge, who should decide as to the fact. The case was decided according to Moses, law; but were they to act as Moses commanded? Thus the illegality vanishes: they were not setting up a new court, even feignedly; but knowing the grace they cavilled at, they would make Him either act in opposition to this, or come out in opposition to the law itself.

As for their respect for decency or the temple, under the pressure of such an opportunity, they were the children of those who murdered Zacharias, perhaps on the very spot where the Lord was at this time: and it would be scarcely safe to theorize in regard to it.

The narrative is witness to itself in its inimitable beauty and simplicity, its union of holiness and grace. It is witness also in the place in which it stands, as the introduction to the chapter, the key to what follows in it. In all this part of John the doctrine develops out of a narrative, -some miracle or significant thing, the text (as we have called it) of the sermon following. Take the story of the woman away, you will not realize in the same way at all the meaning of what is left, a broken statue without a head. This one can hardly show aright except as we take up the chapter, and therefore we may go on to this at once.

1. The Lord returns from the mount of Olives to the temple, and the people flock around Him. His manifest victory over the rulers on the previous days has discouraged open attempts upon His Person; while all the more it has shown the necessity of some bold stratagem to make Him commit Himself in the eyes of the people as an offender against the law, for which they were zealots. It was just the time for such an effort as we find here, which if it were in some respects extreme, only made manifest the more the extremity to which they had been brought. As against the Friend of publicans and sinners also, their plot was well conceived. He had dared, as they murmured, to assume the prerogative of God in forgiving sins, and would evidently not be intimidated from the course He was pursuing by any fear of consequences. Yet He had not as yet ventured to pronounce the pardon of one openly condemned by Moses’ law. Here was a new case therefore for Him to decide, in which He might easily come into collision with it. Did He not go after that which was lost until He found it? They would bring one lost indeed to Him, and see if He would take the burden of such: "a woman taken in adultery, in the very act!" The law had decided what was to be done: would He venture to annul its sentence? But if not, His reception of sinners must receive some modification; if He did -as they surely rather hoped -His followers would have to make open choice between Him and Moses, and the crowd would certainly drop off from Him.

The temptation is obvious, and they had much reason to expect success. Had He not in His sermon on the mount contrasted His own sayings with those of the ancients? And perhaps they had already heard such a saying as that "the law and the prophets were until John." Such things, doubtless exaggerated and multiplied by common rumor, would encourage them in their hope, as they came forward with their appeal to the Teacher for His judgment. Their surprise must have been great when, instead of answering them, "Jesus, stooping down, wrote with His finger on the ground." The common version adds: "As though He heard them not;" and others have given a similar interpretation. But He could not have repeated such an action with such a meaning. On the contrary, though we have nothing of any words which might be written, it is plainly the sentence itself which they are to find in the ground. But they do not understand Him, and as they continue asking, He lifts Himself up at last, and faces them.

No: He does not reverse Moses’ sentence; let it be carried out: only let there be spotless hands to execute it. "Let him that is without sin among you cast the first stone at her." The sentence of the law is right: yes! but on whom really is the sentence of the law? who shall escape it, if it be strictly applied? Manifestly, it is as a teacher, not a judge, that He is answering. They might say, Is law and order to come to a stand-still, because there are no spotless hands to execute it? Plainly not: nor, if the Lord were speaking as a judge, would it seem to have been in place to require any such thing. The judge in a given case has to do with the accused, and not with the executioner. But the Lord distinctly refuses to take such a place in Israel: "Man," He says to one who would have put Him in it, "who made Me a judge or a divider over you?" But if, as here, He is appealed to as a teacher, He will answer as a teacher; and then very differently. In this character, it is with the appellants that He has first of all to do, and not directly with the accused; and this is accordingly His course at this time. They would exhibit Him as one in opposition to Moses; He makes them realize that He alone it is who understands Moses, and uses the law with them for the purpose for which it was given, making them feel the sharp edge of its universal condemnation, in order that they may realize their need of that grace at which they cavil, and which He had come to declare and minister to men. "He that was without sin" was indeed the man the law was seeking. For the lack of finding one, the death it threatened brooded over all; and none could see the face of God and live. Here was the first thing they needed to realize, in order to know the joy of that open face of God, which revealed in grace in the Person of the Son, brought life instead of death -eternal life.

"And again He stooped down, and wrote upon the ground." There it was indeed that man’s sentence was written: that ground out of which man was taken, to which he must return, -dust to dust. Was that sentence upon the woman merely? Was it only upon the gross transgressor? There was the law’s settlement of the question: "the man that doeth them shall live in them"; "the soul* that sinneth it shall die." Ah, yes: if the glory of God were in the face of Moses, they could not look upon it there: grace was the sinner’s only refuge; it was theirs.

{*That is, "the person": a common use of the word soul in Scripture, and which is still preserved to our day. See for the argument as to the death-penalty of the law the notes on Exo 34:1-7.}

But they will not bow themselves to this. They stand in the light convicted, but only to flee out of it into the covering darkness. "And they, having heard that, went out one by one, beginning with the elder ones until the last; and Jesus was left alone, and the woman where she was in the midst."

Thus the attack has failed; the would-be accusers are silenced; they leave behind them even the sinner herself: it has become impossible for them to touch her. On her part, she remains: the light which they have found so intolerable reveals no more as to her than she has known already. Guilty, lost, she was and is: the retreat of her accusers has not altered that; to what it has left her as yet she knows not. He has not reversed Moses’s law, whose words have yet inexplicably for the moment freed her. To herself He has not yet spoken. What will He say -what can He -with whom there is an authority that can make the leaders of the people bend and give way before it? Now she hears His voice again, and to herself, questioning, "Where are those thine accusers? has no one condemned thee?" And she says, "No one, Lord." He says again: "Neither do I condemn thee: go thy way; henceforth sin no more."

Now we cannot say what, or if any work, was wrought in the woman’s soul. She utters no word which would entitle us to say that there was faith in her to lay hold of the grace that there was in Him for the chief of sinners. On His part He says nothing as to forgiveness of sins or of salvation. He has not come to judge the world, but to save the world. If the judges in Israel throw up her case, therefore, she is free. It is a great deliverance for her, and may be the type and prelude of one far greater. But the question as to this that remains does not at all affect the truth as presented to us here of God revealed in grace in the Person of the Son, in whom every soul hopelessly condemned and guilty may find refuge. Grace and truth are in Christ Jesus, and the Life is the Light of men. Whether she availed herself of it or not, on His side the sanctuary was opened; and in a world where righteousness was not, -where those who would claim it had to retire abashed and confounded from the presence of Him who for those accepting condemnation was but a hiding-place. The sanctuary is opened then in sovereign grace, though the actual bringing to God, and the work that brings there, have not as yet found adequate expression. Holiness is found, however, in its true relation and due order: no condemnation leading on to no more sin. Grace and not law is the power for holiness.

2. The Lord returns to His speech with the multitude, interrupted by the appeal of the scribes and Pharisees, in words which have plain reference to what has just taken place. In that temple which, up to the moment of His final rejection, He was accustomed to speak of as His Father’s house, where the Glory of old had tabernacled, and in the treasury in which the gifts of the worshippers were deposited, He openly claims that glory as His own. "I am the Light of the world," He says: "he that followeth Me shall not walk in darkness, but shall have the light of life." The Sun is indeed rising above the hills of Judea; and the nations far and wide are to enjoy its light. Not only so, but Israel herself is beginning to be seen as part of that world which has been lying in the darkness. Sin and unbelief have shut out from her the glory which was or should have been her own, and now are shutting out the fuller splendor into which that earlier light has broadened. Israel has not vindicated any peculiar claim to that for which she has as a nation had no eyes, no heart. Light is for those that have eyes, and for practical use. So now it is "he that followeth Me": his alone is the blessing; he "shall not walk in darkness, but shall have the light of life."

Christ is the Life which objectively is the Light of men. In His words and acts the manifestation of God, the world in its contradiction of Him was necessarily manifested also. He was the test and touchstone of all, and in His presence every thing stood out in its true character. But thus also Christ received in the heart, the life received, becomes subjectively the light for it. In His light it finds light, and thus in following Him it has the "light of life."

A full, divine claim; and the Pharisees from their side naturally at once challenge it. "Thou bearest witness concerning Thyself," they say: "Thy witness is not true." But it is plain that that can rightly mean only "invalid." Obviously, a man may speak truly concerning himself; but his testimony, if unsupported, is insufficient. The Lord tells them that He speaks from knowledge; whereas they have only ignorance to oppose to it. They ought to have been able to recognize His divine mission at least, and owning this, they would have recognized His ability to testify also. But with all their ignorance they judged after a fleshly manner: putting themselves self-confidently into the judge’s seat, for which they were incompetent; and ready to cut off, as in His case, those whom they ignorantly condemned. On His part, He was not taking the judge’s seat, as the case of the woman illustrated. (Had He come to judge, they would all have been cut off.) And yet He truly was the One competent to do so, always in the mind of the Father, and one with it.

And if He bore witness concerning Himself, He did not stand alone in this. His witness was valid, for the Father who sent Him was bearing witness also concerning Him. He speaks evidently of those works of power, of which elsewhere He says, "The Father that abideth in Me, He doeth the works": a witness they could not deny, yet would not accept. And still they meet His claim with their mere ignorance: "Where is Thy Father?" The way to know His Father was to know Himself; and indeed they knew neither.

So He spoke in the treasury of the temple, and the hand of God was still upon them: they could do nothing. No one laid hand upon Him; for His hour to deliver Himself up, which waited His will, not theirs, was not yet come.

3. There is still no ear and no heart. He can only tell them, therefore, that He is going away -going to that place inaccessible to them, of which He had elsewhere spoken. They would seek Him, though not in true repentance, thus with no answer: they would die in their sin.

The men of Judea in sarcastic mockery say, He must mean to kill Himself: for the suicide’s place of punishment is the only place they can think of where they cannot find Him. He tells them that they are from beneath, He from above: there is in them no work of God; the world in opposition to God has made them what they are: they are of it, as He is not. Thus they will die in their sins, because they will not by faith in Him lay hold of that mercy which God is holding out to them.

"Who then is He?" they ask. He can only answer that He is just what He is saying to them. Of what use to go on telling them things for which they have no ear? And concerning themselves also He has much to say and to judge; but of what use? Still the True One has sent Him, and He has truly declared His words to the world. But they do not know of whom He is speaking.

Then He goes on to speak of His lifting up which they in their unbelief are going to accomplish. Then will come His manifestation and His vindication. And even now He who has sent Him is with Him, He cannot leave to Himself One who constantly does the things that please Him.

4. A wave of conviction passes over the multitude, and on hearing these words many, we are told, believed on Him; but the expression is no stronger than with regard to those who "believed on His Name" when at the feast-day they saw the miracles that He did; and of whom it is said that "Jesus did not commit Himself to them" (Joh 2:23-25). Of these also the Lord speaks doubtfully, and presently they resent His words and lapse into unbelief the fiercer for their disappointment in Him. Perhaps they had caught at the lifting up of which He had spoken, as exaltation by the people, followed as He had said it would be by the manifestation of Himself. The Lord’s words to them are certainly words well suited to turn them from any thought of mere political liberty to be gained, and to test them as to their need of a real salvation. Abiding in His word, He tells them, would prove them to be really His disciples. They would know the truth, and the truth would make them free. But at once they resist and resent this. They, the seed of Abraham, in bondage, needing to be made free? they cry: how can He speak of that? they were never in bondage to any! Spite of its notorious contradiction to the truth, their protest shows of what bondage they were thinking. But the Lord will not raise a question here, but goes deeper. "Verily, verily, I say unto you, Every one that practiseth sin is the bondman of sin;’" and this, though men often count it freedom, is the bitterest bondage. Hence, as this is the condition of man in general, the first thing that he needs is to be set free. There is no such thing in the spiritual realm as self-attained freedom: salvation from sin must be of God.

But what then must be the relationship to God of those who are the slaves of sin? Freemen towards God they cannot be, and yet, though rebels in heart and will, cannot escape from service. But unwilling service is again but bondage: the slaves of sin are therefore the slaves of God.

Man being what he is, what then can the law, the boast of the Jew, in fact, do for him? To the "soul that sinneth" it denounces death, and the shadow of this hangs over all. The covenant of Sinai is that "which gendereth to bondage, which is (typically) Hagar" (Gal 4:24); and freedom is unknown to it.

We see, therefore, to what the Lord is going on in the next words, seemingly disconnected as they are from what precedes them. "Now the bondman," He says, "abideth not in the house for ever; but the son abideth ever." The apostle’s illustration of Hagar and Ishmael cannot but come into remembrance; and the casting out of the bondwoman and her son was now soon to come to pass. Even this is but the dispensational shadow of the dread final rejection into outside darkness which the unsaved sinner, zealous law keeper as he may be, must surely experience.

"But the son abideth ever." He is in the freedom begotten of relationship, and not under the bond man’s law which may cast him out. The principle is general, but there is no application of it with regard to Christians, as the Christian status of sonship was not yet known. In fact, only Christ Himself can make free, and this is the Lord’s application of it here: "If therefore the Son shall make you free, ye shall be free indeed." For the Son is no mere servant in the Father’s house, but one in word and purpose with the Father; and His work is that salvation-work which alone can make free. Thus again to abide in His word leads into that communion with the Father and the Son, in which alone is found the mastery of all restraints and difficulties whatever. Blessed then is freedom such as this! for ever blessed He who brings us into it.

The Lord goes on to speak of how little their Abrahamic lineage was manifested in their ways, -how little they could really claim him for their father. And when they dare to go further, and resting on their national privilege would assert God Himself to be their Father, He shows they have no spiritual character corresponding to this, and the devil was indeed their father: murderer as he was from the beginning, and not abiding in the truth, which just as such found no reception from them. Convict Him of sin they could not, and yet they would not hear what they could not confute.

5. They turn upon Him with a two-fold thrust in answer to His double charge. To the first, that they are no true children of Abraham, they retort that He is a Samaritan. To the second, that their father is the devil, that He is Himself possessed with a demon. The Lord quietly puts it away with the remark that they are dishonoring Him who seeks His Father’s glory, not His own. But His Father seeks and judges. Then closing His assurance, still held out to whosoever will, of freedom by the truth, He takes up and removes the shadow which the law left hanging over its disciples, with His strongest form of affirmation: "Verily, verily, I say unto you, If a man keep My word, he shall never behold death."

They meet it only with a shout of derision, for they know no removal of death save one, and without exercise of conscience know not even the sting of it -what makes death death. Abraham is dead and the prophets: is He greater, this man who will not permit, to His very disciples, even a taste of death?

But He answers: If He is but a man glorifying Himself, that glory is empty enough. Nay, but it is His Father glorifies Him, -He whom without true knowledge they call their God. On His part, if He denied the knowledge that He had of Him, He would be as false as they were now in professing that they knew Him. He did know Him, and kept His word. Then He looks back over the expectant ages awaiting Him whom now, being come, they refused, and affirms, "Your father Abraham rejoiced to see My day; and he saw it and was glad." "Thou art not fifty years old," they reply; "and hast Thou seen Abraham?" His answer is the full disclosure of His glory, the claim of the incommunicable title of Deity for Himself: "Verily, verily, I say unto you, Before Abraham came into being, I AM."

It is Immanuel; but there is no knee bent to Him, no loving homage tendered. They take up stones to stone Him; and He, hiding Himself for the moment from their sacrilegious violence, passes out of the temple.

F. W. Grant, The Numerical Bible (4th ed., 1903) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Joh 8:2. Παρεγένετο, was coming) as being expected.—ἐδίδασκεν, He was teaching) On this account His interrupters were the more intrusive: Joh 8:3.

Bengel's Gnomon of the New Testament — English translation (T&T Clark, Edinburgh, 1860) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

(2) And early in the morning he came again into the temple.—This agrees with His custom during the week preceding the Crucifixion. (Comp. Luk_21:37-38.) The words, “and He sat down and taught them,” are not found in the Cambridge MS., which is the oldest authority for the section.

A Bible Commentary for English Readers, edited by Charles John Ellicott (1878–1897) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

2. And early in the morning, &c.] Comp. Luk_21:37-38; ‘and in the day time He was teaching in the temple, and at night He went out and abode in the mount that is called the mount of Olives. And all the people came early in the morning to Him in the temple for to hear Him.’ The phrase for ‘all the people’ used by S. Luke is the phrase which occurs here: S. John never uses it. S. John uses the word for ‘people’ only twice; it occurs more than thirty times in S. Luke, and more than twenty times in the Acts. The word for ‘came early’ is a verb derived from the word for ‘early’ which occurs here: S. John uses neither.

sat down] To teach with authority. Comp. Mat_5:1; Mat_23:2; Mar_9:35.

The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges (gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne; Cambridge University Press, 1878–1918) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

And the Scribes and Pharisees,.... The members of the sanhedrim, who had been so miserably disappointed the day before, were no less diligent and industrious in their wicked way, seeking all opportunities, and taking all advantages against Christ; and fancying they had got something whereby to ensnare him, and bring him into disgrace or danger, they pursue it; and

brought unto him a woman taken in adultery; who, as some conjecture, might have been taken in it the day before, in one of their booths; being drawn into it through intemperance and carnal mirth, which at this feast they greatly indulged themselves in; which shows, that they were far from drawing the Holy Ghost at this time upon them; that on the contrary, they fell into the hands, and under the power of the unclean spirit: who this woman was, is not material to know; what is pretended to be taken out of the annals of the Spanish Jews, is no doubt a fable; that she was the wife of one Manasseh of Jerusalem, an old man, whose name was Susanna (d):

and when they had set her in the midst; of the company, as the Persic version reads, to be seen by all the people. This history of the woman taken in adultery, is wanting in the Alexandrian copy, and in other ancient copies; nor is it in Nonnus, Chrysostom, and Theophylact; nor in any of the editions of the Syriac version, until it was restored by De Dieu, from a copy of Archbishop Usher's; but was in the Arabic and Ethiopic versions, and in the Harmonies of Tatian and Ammonius; the former of which lived about the year 160, and so within 60 years, or thereabouts, of the death of the Evangelist John, and the other about the year 230; it was also in Stephens's sixteen ancient Greek copies, and in all Beza's seventeen, excepting one; nor need the authenticness of it be doubted of; Eusebius (e) says, it is in the Gospel according to the Hebrews; nor should its authority be called in question.

(d) Vid. Selden. Uxor Hebr. l. 3. c. 11. p. 377. (e) Hist. Ecless. l. 3. c. 39.

John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.

2 And early in the morning he came again into the temple, and all the people came unto him; and he sat down, and taught them.

Ver. 2. And taught them] {See Trapp on "Joh 8:1"}

John Trapp, A Commentary or Exposition upon All the Books of the Old and New Testament (1647–1656) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

So at our Lord’s last passover Luke notes, Luk 21:38, that all the people came early in the morning to him in the temple, to hear him. Our Saviour’s early going into the temple to teach, and the people’s diligence in coming so early to him to hear, ought to check our slothfulness in sacred business. Multitudes of people came to him; for so the universal particle all must be expounded in a multitude of Scriptures.

He, after the manner of the Jewish teachers, sat down, and taught them. Of this custom of theirs, for their doctors, while they taught, to sit down, we have had occasion to speak before.

Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible (1683–1685) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

Now at daybreak. The word oryrou does not occur in John; prwi and prwia are our evangelist"s words for "early morning," though upo to is found in Luk_24:1 and Act_5:21. He came again to the temple (the temple courts ieron , not naov , is here used); and all the people came to him. The form pav o laov is a deviation from John"s usual phrase, although laov is found in Joh_11:50 and Joh_18:14. There is some ground for the deviation. The scenes of the previous day had been broken up into various groups. The favouring crowd from the provinces sympathized with a portion of the Jerusalem populace; then the hostile crowd at the beck of the authorities had been checked by the "officers" who had been themselves baffled and thunderstruck with the dignity and claims of Jesus. Great excitement had prevailed, and before the stormy scenes and recriminations of the previous day recommenced, the whole temple throng came unto him. If the eighth day of the feast was referred toi.e. if the great day of the feast were the eighth day the difficulty of the whole people having gathered about him is diminished, because there were special gatherings for the eighth day. (see notes, Joh_7:37) It might have seemed that they had composed their differences, and were now waiting some symptom and signal of the great Leader"s will. And he sat down, and was teaching them. This expression is synoptic rather than Johanninc; i.e. it belongs to the methods of the Galilaean ministry (Mat_5:1 Mar_9:35) rather than to the hostile encounters of the metropolis. (but see Mat_23:2) He was prepared for long discourse and various instruction. Here, as in Joh_7:14, the word edidaske is used without specifying the topic or theme on which he dwelt. The calm morning was soon overclouded, and the people violently excited, by a very ominous disturbance, planned with subtle care and malicious intention on the part of the authorities, who were ready at all costs and by any device to break the spell which Jesus was exerting over some of the people.

The Pulpit Commentary (1880–1919), ed. H.D.M. Spence-Jones & Joseph S. Exell — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

2. ὄρθρου δὲ κ.τ.λ. Comp. Luk 21:38; καὶ πᾶς ὁ λαὸς ὤρθριζε πρὸς αὐτὸν ἐν τῷ ἱερῷ ἀκούειν αὐτοῦ. S. John never uses πᾶς ὁ λαός, S. Luke frequently does. S. John uses λαός only twice; it occurs more than 30 times in S. Luke, more than 20 in the Acts: καθίζειν is frequent in the Synoptists and the Acts; only twice in S. John: καθίσας ἐδίδασκεν occurs Luk 5:3. He sat to teach with authority; Mat 5:1; Mat 23:2; Mar 9:35. Ὄρθρου, ὀρθρινός, ὀρθρίζειν occur Luk 24:1; Luk 24:22; Luk 21:38; none of them in S. John, who uses πρωΐ or πρωΐας and πρωϊνός (Joh 18:33, Joh 21:4; Rev 2:28; Rev 22:16). see on Joh 7:20.

Cambridge Greek Testament for Schools and Colleges (Cambridge University Press, 1896; 21 vols, various authors incl. Carr, Maclear, Plummer, Farrar, Lumby, Moule, M. R. James, Simcox) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

2. ὄρθρου is Lucan (Luk 24:1; cf. Act 5:21); Jn. does not use it, but has πρωΐ instead (18:28, 20:1, 21:4).

The frequent use of δέ in this section to the exclusion of Jn.’s favourite οὖν (see on 1:22) marks the style as non-Johannine.

παρεγένετο. D 1071 have παραγίνεται. The verb occurs in Jn. only once (3:22). ἦλθεν is read by fam. 13.

λαός is found in Jn. only twice (11:50, 18:14); he prefers ὄχλος, which some MSS. give here.

The clause καὶ πᾶς ὁ λαὸς … ἐδίδασκεν αὐτούς is omitted by fam. 13; while D om. καὶ καθίσας ἐδίδασκεν αὐτούς.

For καθίσας, as describing the attitude of Jesus when teaching, see on 6:3 (cf. Mar 13:3). Jn. generally specifies the nature of Jesus’ teaching in the Temple (cf. 7:28, 8:20), but at 7:14 he writes simply ἐδίδασκεν as here.

International Critical Commentary — older volumes (1896–1929), various authors — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.