{"commentary":{"id":"jamieson-fausset-brown","name":"Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary","website":"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jamieson-Fausset-Brown_Bible_Commentary","licenseUrl":"https://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/mark/1.0/","licenseNotes":null,"licenseNotice":null,"englishName":"Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary","language":"eng","textDirection":"rtl","sha256":"db3d4c8b3c1f32ef9d1430a57392e02bda3a17aac1f9bbe398461de021a3cb13","availableFormats":["json"],"listOfBooksApiLink":"/api/c/jamieson-fausset-brown/books.json","listOfProfilesApiLink":"/api/c/jamieson-fausset-brown/profiles.json","numberOfBooks":66,"totalNumberOfChapters":1187,"totalNumberOfVerses":17056,"totalNumberOfProfiles":0,"languageName":"English","languageEnglishName":"English"},"book":{"id":"JHN","commentaryId":"jamieson-fausset-brown","name":"John","commonName":"John","introduction":"THE author of the Fourth Gospel was the younger of the two sons of Zebedee, a fisherman on the Sea of Galilee, who resided at Bethsaida, where were born Peter and Andrew his brother, and Philip also. His mother's name was Salome, who, though not without her imperfections (Mat 20:20-28), was one of those dear and honored women who accompanied the Lord on one of His preaching circuits through Galilee, ministering to His bodily wants; who followed Him to the cross, and bought sweet spices to anoint Him after His burial, but, on bringing them to the grave, on the morning of the First Day of the week, found their loving services gloriously superseded by His resurrection ere they arrived. His father, Zebedee, appears to have been in good circumstances, owning a vessel of his own and having hired servants (Mar 1:20). Our Evangelist, whose occupation was that of a fisherman with his father, was beyond doubt a disciple of the Baptist, and one of the two who had the first interview with Jesus. He was called while engaged at his secular occupation (Mat 4:21-22), and again on a memorable occasion (Luk 5:1-11), and finally chosen as one of the Twelve Apostles (Mat 10:2). He was the youngest of the Twelve--the \"Benjamin,\" as DA COSTA calls him--and he and James his brother were named in the native tongue by Him who knew the heart, \"Boanerges,\" which the Evangelist Mark (Mar 3:17) explains to mean \"Sons of thunder\"; no doubt from their natural vehemence of character. They and Peter constituted that select triumvirate of whom see on Luk 9:28. But the highest honor bestowed on this disciple was his being admitted to the bosom place with his Lord at the table, as \"the disciple whom Jesus loved\" (Joh 13:23; Joh 20:2; Joh 21:7, Joh 20:24), and to have committed to him by the dying Redeemer the care of His mother (Joh 19:26-27). There can be no reasonable doubt that this distinction was due to a sympathy with His own spirit and mind on the part of John which the all-penetrating Eye of their common Master beheld in none of the rest; and although this was probably never seen either in his life or in his ministry by his fellow apostles, it is brought out wonderfully in his writings, which, in Christ-like spirituality, heavenliness, and love, surpass, we may freely say, all the other inspired writings.\n\nAfter the effusion of the Spirit on the day of Pentecost, we find him in constant but silent company with Peter, the great spokesman and actor in the infant Church until the accession of Paul. While his love to the Lord Jesus drew him spontaneously to the side of His eminent servant, and his chastened vehemence made him ready to stand courageously by him, and suffer with him, in all that his testimony to Jesus might cost him, his modest humility, as the youngest of all the apostles, made him an admiring listener and faithful supporter of his brother apostle rather than a speaker or separate actor. Ecclesiastical history is uniform in testifying that John went to Asia Minor; but it is next to certain that this could not have been till after the death both of Peter and Paul; that he resided at Ephesus, whence, as from a center, he superintended the churches of that region, paying them occasional visits; and that he long survived the other apostles. Whether the mother of Jesus died before this, or went with John to Ephesus, where she died and was buried, is not agreed. One or two anecdotes of his later days have been handed down by tradition, one at least bearing marks of reasonable probability. But it is not necessary to give them here. In the reign of Domitian (A.D. 81-96) he was banished to \"the isle that is called Patmos\" (a small rocky and then almost uninhabited island in the Ægean Sea), \"for the word of God and for the testimony of Jesus Christ\" (Rev 1:9). IRENÆUS and EUSEBIUS say that this took place about the end of Domitian's reign. That he was thrown into a cauldron of boiling oil, and miraculously delivered, is one of those legends which, though reported by TERTULLIAN and JEROME, is entitled to no credit. His return from exile took place during the brief but tolerant reign of Nerva; he died at Ephesus in the reign of Trajan [EUSEBIUS, Ecclesiastical History, 3.23], at an age above ninety, according to some; according to others, one hundred; and even one hundred twenty, according to others still. The intermediate number is generally regarded as probably the nearest to the truth.\n\nAs to the date of this Gospel, the arguments for its having been composed before the destruction of Jerusalem (though relied on by some superior critics) are of the slenderest nature; such as the expression in Joh 5:2, \"there is at Jerusalem, by the sheep-gate, a pool,\" &c.; there being no allusion to Peter's martyrdom as having occurred according to the prediction in Joh 21:18 --a thing too well known to require mention. That it was composed long after the destruction of Jerusalem, and after the decease of all the other apostles, is next to certain, though the precise time cannot be determined. Probably it was before his banishment, however; and if we date it between the years 90 and 94, we shall probably be close to the truth.\n\nAs to the readers for whom it was more immediately designed, that they were Gentiles we might naturally presume from the lateness of the date; but the multitude of explanations of things familiar to every Jew puts this beyond all question.\n\nNo doubt was ever thrown upon the genuineness and authenticity of this Gospel till about the close of the eighteenth century; nor were these embodied in any formal attack upon it till BRETSCHNEIDER, in 1820, issued his famous treatise [Probabilia], the conclusions of which he afterwards was candid enough to admit had been satisfactorily disproved. To advert to these would be as painful as unnecessary; consisting as they mostly do of assertions regarding the Discourses of our Lord recorded in this Gospel which are revolting to every spiritual mind. The Tubingen school did their best, on their peculiar mode of reasoning, to galvanize into fresh life this theory of the post-Joannean date of the Fourth Gospel; and some Unitarian critics still cling to it. But to use the striking language of VAN OOSTERZEE regarding similar speculations on the Third Gospel, \"Behold, the feet of them that shall carry it out dead are already at the door\" (Act 5:9). Is there one mind of the least elevation of spiritual discernment that does not see in this Gospel marks of historical truth and a surpassing glory such as none of the other Gospels possess, brightly as they too attest their own verity; and who will not be ready to say that if not historically true, and true just as it stands, it never could have been by mortal man composed or conceived?\n\nOf the peculiarities of this Gospel, we note here only two. The one is its reflective character. While the others are purely narrative, the Fourth Evangelist, \"pauses, as it were, at every turn,\" as DA COSTA says [Four Witnesses, p. 234], \"at one time to give a reason, at another to fix the attention, to deduce consequences, or make applications, or to give utterance to the language of praise.\" See Joh 2:20-21, Joh 2:23-25; Joh 4:1-2; Joh 7:37-39; Joh 11:12-13, Joh 11:49-52; Joh 21:18-19, Joh 21:22-23. The other peculiarity of this Gospel is its supplementary character. By this, in the present instance, we mean something more than the studiousness with which he omits many most important particulars in our Lord's history, for no conceivable reason but that they were already familiar as household words to all his readers, through the three preceding Gospels, and his substituting in place of these an immense quantity of the richest matter not found in the other Gospels. We refer here more particularly to the nature of the additions which distinguish this Gospel; particularly the notices of the different Passovers which occurred during our Lord's public ministry, and the record of His teaching at Jerusalem, without which it is not too much to say that we could have had but a most imperfect conception either of the duration of His ministry or of the plan of it. But another feature of these additions is quite as noticeable and not less important. \"We find,\" to use again the words of DA COSTA [Four Witnesses, pp. 238, 239], slightly abridged, \"only six of our Lord's miracles recorded in this Gospel, but these are all of the most remarkable kind, and surpass the rest in depth, specialty of application, and fulness of meaning. Of these six we find only one in the other three Gospels--the multiplication of the loaves. That miracle chiefly, it would seem, on account of the important instructions of which it furnished the occasion (John 6:1-71), is here recorded anew. The five other tokens of divine power are distinguished from among the many recorded in the three other Gospels by their furnishing a still higher display of power and command over the ordinary laws and course of nature. Thus we find recorded here the first of all the miracles that Jesus wrought--the changing of water into wine (Joh 2:1-11), the cure of the nobleman's son at a distance (Joh 4:43-54); of the numerous cures of the lame and the paralytic by the word of Jesus, only one--of the man impotent for thirty and eight years (Joh 5:1-9); of the many cures of the blind, one only--of the man born blind (Joh 9:1-12); the restoration of Lazarus, not from a deathbed, like Jairus' daughter, nor from a bier, like the widow of Nain's son, but from the grave, and after lying there four days, and there sinking into corruption (John 11:1-44); and lastly, after His resurrection, the miraculous draught of fishes on the Sea of Tiberias (Joh 21:5-11). But these are all recorded chiefly to give occasion for the record of those astonishing discourses and conversations, alike with friends and with foes, with His disciples and with the multitude which they drew forth.\"\n\nOther illustrations of the peculiarities of this Gospel will occur, and other points connected with it be adverted to, in the course of the Commentary. \n\n\n\nNext: John Chapter 1\n\n","order":43,"numberOfChapters":21,"sha256":"2a03297b1e3a6f9e0b82a13c39c82e2202f9e979c173750344c480c63057d8a0","firstChapterNumber":1,"firstChapterApiLink":"/api/c/jamieson-fausset-brown/JHN/1.json","firstChapterReference":{"commentaryId":"jamieson-fausset-brown","book":"JHN","chapter":1},"lastChapterNumber":21,"lastChapterApiLink":"/api/c/jamieson-fausset-brown/JHN/21.json","lastChapterReference":{"commentaryId":"jamieson-fausset-brown","book":"JHN","chapter":21},"totalNumberOfVerses":680},"chapter":{"number":2,"content":[{"type":"verse","number":3,"content":["no wine--evidently expecting some display of His glory, and hinting that now was His time.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":4,"content":["Woman--no term of disrespect in the language of that day (Joh 19:26). \n\nwhat . . . to do with thee--that is, \"In my Father's business I have to do with Him only.\" It was a gentle rebuke for officious interference, entering a region from which all creatures were excluded (compare Act 4:19-20). \n\nmine hour, &c.--hinting that He would do something, but at His own time; and so she understood it (Joh 2:5).\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":6,"content":["firkins--about seven and a half gallons in Jewish, or nine in Attic measure; each of these huge water jars, therefore, holding some twenty or more gallons, for washings at such feasts (Mar 7:4).\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":7,"content":["Fill . . . draw . . . bear--directing all, but Himself touching nothing, to prevent all appearance of collusion.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":9,"content":["well drunk--\"drunk abundantly\" (as Sol 5:1), speaking of the general practice.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":10,"content":["the good wine . . . until now--thus testifying, while ignorant of the source of supply, not only that it was real wine, but better than any at the feast.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":11,"content":["manifested forth his glory--Nothing in the least like this is said of the miracles of prophet or apostle, nor could without manifest blasphemy be said of any mere creature. Observe, (1) At a marriage Christ made His first public appearance in any company, and at a marriage He wrought His first miracle--the noblest sanction that could be given to that God-given institution. (2) As the miracle did not make bad good, but good better, so Christianity only redeems, sanctifies, and ennobles the beneficent but abused institution of marriage; and Christ's whole work only turns the water of earth into the wine of heaven. Thus \"this beginning of miracles\" exhibited the character and \"manifested forth the glory\" of His entire Mission. (3) As Christ countenanced our seasons of festivity, so also that greater fulness which befits such; so far was He from encouraging that asceticism which has since been so often put for all religion. (4) The character and authority ascribed by Romanists to the Virgin is directly in the teeth of this and other scriptures.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":12,"content":["Capernaum--on the Sea of Galilee. (See on Mat 9:1). \n\nhis mother and his brethren--(See on Luk 2:51, and Mat 13:54-56).\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":14,"content":["CHRIST'S FIRST PASSOVER--FIRST CLEANSING OF THE TEMPLE. (Joh 2:13-25)\n\nin the temple--not the temple itself, as Joh 2:19-21, but the temple-court. \n\nsold oxen, &c.--for the convenience of those who had to offer them in sacrifice. \n\nchangers of money--of Roman into Jewish money, in which the temple dues (see on Mat 17:24) had to be paid.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":15,"content":["small cords--likely some of the rushes spread for bedding, and when twisted used to tie up the cattle there collected. \"Not by this slender whip but by divine majesty was the ejection accomplished, the whip being but a sign of the scourge of divine anger\" [GROTIUS]. \n\npoured out . . . overthrew--thus expressing the mingled indignation and authority of the impulse.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":16,"content":["my Father's house--How close the resemblance of these remarkable words to Luk 2:49; the same consciousness of intrinsic relation to the temple--as the seat of His Father's most august worship, and so the symbol of all that is due to Him on earth--dictating both speeches. Only, when but a youth, with no authority, He was simply \"a SON IN His own house\"; now He was \"a SON OVER His own house\" (Heb 3:6), the proper Representative, and in flesh \"the Heir,\" of his Father's rights. \n\nhouse of merchandise--There was nothing wrong in the merchandise; but to bring it, for their own and others' convenience, into that most sacred place, was a high-handed profanation which the eye of Jesus could not endure.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":17,"content":["eaten me up--a glorious feature in the predicted character of the suffering Messiah (Psa 69:9), and rising high even in some not worthy to loose the latchet of His shoes. (Exo 32:19, &c.).\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":18,"content":["What sign showest thou unto us, seeing that thou doest these things?--Though the act and the words of Christ, taken together, were sign enough, they were unconvinced: yet they were awed, and though at His very next appearance at Jerusalem they \"sought to kill Him\" for speaking of \"His Father\" just as He did now (Joh 5:18), they, at this early stage, only ask a sign.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":19,"content":["Destroy this temple, &c.--(See on Mar 14:58-59).\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":20,"content":["Forty and six years--From the eighteenth year of Herod till then was just forty-six years [JOSEPHUS, Antiquities, 15.11.1].\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":21,"content":["temple of his body--in which was enshrined the glory of the eternal Word. (See on Joh 1:14). By its resurrection the true Temple of God upon earth was reared up, of which the stone one was but a shadow; so that the allusion is not quite exclusively to Himself, but takes in that Temple of which He is the foundation, and all believers are the \"lively stones.\" (Pe1 2:4-5).\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":22,"content":["believed the scripture--on this subject; that is, what was meant, which was hid from them till then. Mark (1) The act by which Christ signalized His first public appearance in the Temple. Taking \"His fan in His hand, He purges His floor,\" not thoroughly indeed, but enough to foreshadow His last act towards that faithless people--to sweep them out of God's house. (2) The sign of His authority to do this is the announcement, at this first outset of His ministry, of that coming death by their hands, and resurrection by His own, which were to pave the way for their judicial ejection.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":23,"content":["in the feast day--the foregoing things occurring probably before the feast began. \n\nmany believed--superficially, struck merely by \"the miracles He did.\" Of these we have no record.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":24,"content":["did not commit--\"entrust,\" or let Himself down familiarly to them, as to His genuine disciples.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":25,"content":["knew what was in man--It is impossible for language more clearly to assert of Christ what in Jer 17:9-10, and elsewhere, is denied of all mere creatures.\n\n\n\n\nNext: John Chapter 3\n\n"]}],"introduction":"FIRST MIRACLE, WATER MADE WINE--BRIEF VISIT TO CAPERNAUM. (Joh 2:1-12)\n\nthird day--He would take two days to reach Galilee, and this was the third. \n\nmother there--it being probably some relative's marriage. John never names her [BENGEL].\n\n"},"thisChapterLink":"/api/c/jamieson-fausset-brown/JHN/2.json","thisChapterReference":{"commentaryId":"jamieson-fausset-brown","book":"JHN","chapter":2},"nextChapterApiLink":"/api/c/jamieson-fausset-brown/JHN/3.json","nextChapterReference":{"commentaryId":"jamieson-fausset-brown","book":"JHN","chapter":3},"previousChapterApiLink":"/api/c/jamieson-fausset-brown/JHN/1.json","previousChapterReference":{"commentaryId":"jamieson-fausset-brown","book":"JHN","chapter":1},"numberOfVerses":20}