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Commentary Index | Return to PrayerRequest.comRobertson Word Pictures - John 3:25 - 3:25
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This Chapter Verse Commentaries:
A questioning (zētēsis). Old word from zēteō. See Act 15:2 for the word where also zētēma (question) occurs. Zētēsis (process of inquiry) means a meticulous dispute (1Ti 6:4).
With a Jew (meta Ioudaiou). So correct text, not Ioudaiōn (Jews). Probably some Jew resented John’s baptism of Jesus as implying impurity or that they were like Gentiles (cf. proselyte baptism).
About purifying (peri katharismou). See Joh 2:6 for the word. The committee from the Sanhedrin had challenged John’s right to baptize (Joh 1:25). The Jews had various kinds of baptisms or dippings (Heb 6:2), “baptisms of cups and pots and brazen vessels” (Mar 6:4). The disciples of John came to him with the dispute (the first known baptismal controversy, on the meaning of the ceremony) and with a complaint.