Online Resource Library
Commentary Index | Return to PrayerRequest.com | DownloadHeinrich Meyer Commentary - John 5:16 - 5:17
(Show All Books | Show All Chapters)
This Chapter Verse Commentaries:
Joh_5:16-17. Διὰ τοῦτο ] on account of this notice referring to Jesus, and then ὅτι , because He that is. See on Joh_10:17.
ἐδίωκ .] not judicially, by means of the law (Lampe, Rosenmüller, Kuinoel), of which the sequel says nothing, but in a general way: they made Him the object of their persecutions.
ταῦτα ] these things, such as the healing of the paralytic.
ἐποίει ] he did, not ἐποίησεν .
ἀπεκρίνατο ] The means by which He met the διώκειν of the Jews, whether that then showed itself in accusations, reproaches, machinations, or otherwise in overt acts of hostility. This Aorist occurs in John only here, Joh_5:19; Joh_12:23.
ὁ πατήρ μου , κ . τ . λ .] My Father is working even to this moment; I also work. This expression is not borrowed from Philo (Strauss); Jesus alludes to the unresting activity of God for human salvation[205] since the creation was finished, notwithstanding the divine rest of the Sabbath (Gen_2:1-3) observed after the six days’ work. This distinct reference (not generally “to the sustaining and government of the world”) is presented in the activity of Christ answering to that of God the Father. “As the Father,” that is, says Jesus, has not ceased from the beginning to work for the world’s salvation, but ever works on even to the present moment,[206] so of necessity and right, notwithstanding the law of the Sabbath, does He also, the Son, who as such (by virtue of His essentially divine relationship of equality with the Father) cannot in this His activity be subject to the sabbatical law, but is Lord of the Sabbath (comp. Mat_12:8; Mar_2:28). Olshausen and de Wette import this in the words: “As in God rest and action are united, so in Christ are contemplation and activity.” But there is no mention of rest and contemplation. According to Godet, Jesus says, “Jusqu’à chaque dernier moment où mon père agit, j’agis aussi;” the Son can only cease His work when He sees the Father cease. But in this case we should have simply ἕως (Joh_9:4), and not ἕως ἄρτι ; ἕως ἄρτι means nothing more nor less than usque adhuc (Joh_2:10, Joh_16:24; 1Jn_2:9), the now limiting it still more distinctly than ἕως τοῦ νῦν (Lobeck, ad Phryn. pp. 19, 20).
κἀγὼ ἐργάζομαι ] is not to be again supplemented by ἕως ἄρτι . I also (do not rest, but) work. The relation of both sentences is not that of imitation (Grotius), nor of example (Ewald), but of necessary equality of will and procedure. The asyndeton (instead of “because my Father,” etc.) makes the statement all the more striking. See on 1Co_10:17.
[205] Jesus accordingly does not deny that God rested on the seventh day after the six days of creation (against Ammon); but He affirms that since then He is ever active, even on the Sabbath-days, for man’s redemption. Nor does He speak of the law concerning the Sabbath as not of divine institution (Baur), as of no obligation, or as abrogated; but He as the Son stands above it, and is as little bound by it as the Father, who ever continues to work, even on the Sabbath. This against Hilgenfeld (Lehrbegriff, p. 81; Evang. p. 270; and in his Zeitschrift 1863, p. 218), who considers that, according to this Gospel, Jesus, passing by the O. T. representation of God, rises to the absolutely transcendental essence, exalted above all contact with the finite, and manifest only to the Son; and that the evangelist, following the Gnostics, refers the history of the creation to the Demiurge, as distinct from the most high God. This is not the “eagle height” of John’s theology.
[206] ἓως ἄρτι carries our view of God’s working, which began with the creation, onwards to the present moment, the moment wherein Jesus has to defend Himself on account of Sabbath-breaking. In conformity with this redemptive work of God the Father onwards until now, and which was interrupted by no rest, He also works. The inference that herein is implied a divine rest at a future period, as Luthardt thinks,—who regards the day of Christ’s resurrection as the then approaching Sabbath of God’s redemptive work,—is quite remote from the text. Ἕως ἄρτι includes the survey of the entire past down to the moment then present, without any intimation of a change in the future, which, if intended, should appear in the context, as in Joh_16:24.