Pulpit Commentary - John 3:1

Pulpit Commentary - John 3:1 - 3:36

Online Resource Library

Commentary Index | Return to PrayerRequest.com | Download

Pulpit Commentary - John 3:1 - 3:36

(Show All Books | Show All Chapters)

This Chapter Verse Commentaries:

3:1 - 3:36

EXPOSITION

This is the first of the eleven discourses recorded by this evangelist, and for the most part addressed to the cultivated, hierarcical party in Jerusalem, who questioned him in an unfriendly spirit. On the sources of these records, and the degree to which John's subjectivity coloured his record of them, see Introduction.

Joh_3:1

But there was a man of the Pharisees. Is this narrative introduced, as Baur thinks, to give a specimen of wrongly directed faith, to which Christ did not entrust himself? and was the evangelist busy at once on his great mission of undervaluing the Jewish parties and nation? Certainly not. We have a clear proof that, in the case of the genuine inquirer, Christ did open His very heart; and to a "ruler of Jews," to a "Pharisee," to a "teacher of Israel," he deigned (because he knew what was in the man, and required nobody's help) to unveil the deepest realities of the kingdom of God and of the salvation of man. Baur is not correct in making Nicodemus out to be a specimen of unbelieving Judaism and unsusceptible Pharisaism, seeing that the later notices of this Sanhedrist show that he became a disciple of Jesus, if secretly, Nicodemus was attracted, as others had been, by the "signs" which Jesus had wrought; but he had gone further and deeper than they, and Jesus "knew it." A controversy has arisen on the point—Did our Lord, by these penetrative glances, manifest his Divine nature, assume a Divine prerogative, or exercise a lofty, penetrative human gift? Westcott, on the philological ground of the contrast in meaning between γινώσκειν and εἰδέναι , urges that the former word, used here, represents knowledge acquired by processes of inquiry and perception, as distinct from the latter, which is reserved for absolute and settled knowledge. Godet, on theological grounds, urges that the phrase refers to the human faculty of observation rather than to the Divine prerogative of heart-searching. There are, however, many other indications of this same thought-mastery, which the evangelists appear to regard as proofs of Divine power; so that I think the real significance of the passage is an ascription to Jesus of Divine power. The supernatural in mind, the superhuman mental processes of Jesus, are part of the proof we have that, though he was Man, he created the irresistible impression that he was more than man. Thus Nathanael and Thomas found these to be the most irresistible proofs of the supreme Divine perfections of their Master (cf. Joh_1:49; Joh_4:17; Joh_6:61; Joh_11:4, Joh_11:14; Joh_13:11; Joh_21:17; and also Rev_2:2, Rev_2:9, Rev_2:13, etc.). "The man of the Pharisees" furnishes (Godet) a test for determining the authenticity of the narrative. If the lines of the following discourse, which move from the first fundamental conditions of admission into the kingdom of God to the deepest principles of Divine character, and the grounds and consequences of reconciliation with God, are such as meet the standpoint and correct the deductions of the Pharisee, we have, then, all but demonstrative evidence that this conversation did not evolve itself out of the consciousness of the second century. The Pharisaic party was excited by the ministry of John implies a certain timidity, and perhaps unworthy reticence. These are relative terms. Much moral courage must have been required for a ruler of the Jews (a phrase only applicable to a man of high ecclesiastical rank) to have dreamed of doing what he is reported to have done here and elsewhere. The Talmud mentions a Nicodemus ben Gotten, who was also called Bonai, a disciple of Jesus, of great wealth and piety, who survived the destruction of Jerusalem, and therein lost nil his fortune. The hint that he was an old man in this year renders his survival till A.D. 70 improbable, but not impossible by any means. The identification is not complete. The Talmud does not speak of him as a Sanhedrist, though it gives curious details, which imply that he must have been a priest in the temple, and had the charge of providing the water supply for the pilgrims (Geikie, 1:584; Winer, 'Real.,' 2:152).

Joh_3:2

This man came to him^{£ by night, and said unto him. To suppose, with many commentators, that the night is here symbolic of the mental condition of the man, is far-fetched. Thoma, here intent on his principle of the fabricated character of the Gospel, compares this to King Saul (Paul's ancestor!) going by night to Samuel—a type of Christ! There is more probability that the night of the Last Supper was in the mind of John, and that these two nights, the one at the beginning, the other at the close of the ministry of Jesus—nights of extraordinary significance—were impressed ineffaceably on his memory, and, to some extent, contrasted with each other. Nicodemus did not fear the Lord or his disciples, but his own colleagues, whose excitement had already betrayed their sentiments. Without "believing on his Name," they had come to some conclusions, and Nicodemus with them. Rabbi, said he, we know. He does not conceal a common sentiment at that moment agitating his own class in society, and he bestows the honorific title of Rabbi, "my Master," which, as coming from a learned doctor to a humble peasant, was a remarkable testimony to the effect Jesus had indirectly exerted beyond the circle of his immediate hearers: that thou art a Teacher come from God. The phrase,
ἀπὸ Θεοῦ
, precedes "the Teacher come." Certainly it yields to Jesus great dignity. He is God-sent, like the prophets of old. He has a right to teach. His doctorate is a heavenly diploma; and Nicodemus draws a wiser conclusion than the many did who, in some sense, believed on his Name. They were rushing heedlessly forward to further conclusions. Nicodemus saw a grand authority as a Teacher of men, a Heaven-sent Messenger, in the Lord Jesus, and he came to this conclusion from the settled persuasion that no man can tie the signs which thou art performing, if God be not with him. This confession was true, indicating candid and honest inquiry and a teachable mind. It was the very truth which Peter in subsequent times gave to Cornelius as explanation of the healing and beneficent powers of Jesus. Christ knew the whole man, understood at once the honesty of the inquiry, and did entrust himself to Nicodemus. There was more faith in this modest inquiry, in this honest scepticism of his own position, than in the clamours and hosannas of the fickle crowd.

Joh_3:3-21

5. The revelation of earthly and heavenly things to one who knew that God was with him.

Joh_3:3-12

(1) The conditions of admission into the kingdom of God. New birth of the Spirit.

Joh_3:3

Many explanations have been offered of the link of connection between the suggestion of Nicodemus and the reply of Jesus. Many expansions or additions have been conjectured, such as the following, suggested by Christ's own language elsewhere: "You, by the finger of God, are casting out devils; then the kingdom of God has come nigh unto us. How may we enter upon its further proofs?"—a view which would demand a deeper knowledge of the mind of Christ than we have any reason to suppose diffused at this period. Others (Baumlein) have supposed Nicodemus to have said, "Does the baptism of John suffice for admission into the kingdom?"—a suggestion which would be most strange for a Pharisaic Sanhedrist to have extemporized. At the same time, it may be proved that the rabbis regarded proselytism as a "new birth," and one produced or brought about by circumcision and baptism. Others, again, have put further words into the reply of Jesus, such as, "The kingdom of God is not in the miracles which I am working; it is in a state of things which can only be appreciated by a radical spiritual change" (Lucke). Similarly Luthardt. Nicodemus was thinking of the kingdom of God evinced by miraculous signs; and Jesus points him to the inner reality rather than to the outer manifestation. Godet sees the Pharisaic position in the question of Nicodemus, "Art thou the Messiah? is the kingdom of God near, as thy miracles seem to indicate?" He was assuming that, as a Pharisee, he had nothing to do but walk in the light, the dawn of which was revealed to him in the signs of a divinely sent Teacher. All these views embrace a large amount of possible conjectural truth; but they ignore the play upon the words of Nicodemus, which the answer of Jesus involves, showing that a sharp, clean retort followed the speech of the former. "We know that NO MAN IS ABLE to do these signs which thou art working EXCEPT GOD, BE WITH HIM. Verily, verily, I say unto thee, EXCEPT ONE be born anew, HE IS NOT ABLE to see the kingdom of God." The form of both protasis and apodosis in each sentence closely corresponds, and this correspondence suggests the fact of an immediate repartee. adopting even the form of the question or assertion of the ruler of the Jews. To the "we know" of Nicodemus, comes the "I say unto thee" of Jesus. To the general sentiment of Nicodemus Christ gives a personal application. In place of speculation concerning his own relation to God and to the kingdom, Christ searches in the heart of his questioner for spiritual susceptibility. Over against the general proposition about God being with the Worker of these signs Christ sets the practical truth and Divine possibility of any man seeing the kingdom of God. To the suspicion of Jesus being the Messenger and Minister of God, he opposes the supposition of being born from heaven, or anew. From ancient times commentators have been divided as to the meaning of the word
ἄνωθεν
—whether it should be rendered "from above" or "anew," "again." The first was favoured by Origen and many others down to Bengel, Lucke, Meyer, Baur, Wordsworth, Lange, based on the local meaning of the word in numerous places; e.g. "from the top" (Mat_27:51), "from heaven above" (Jas_3:15, Jas_3:17; Joh_3:31; Joh_19:11). Moreover, John uses the idea of birth from God, or by his will supervening on the life of man, and the consequent conference upon it of a new beginning (Joh_1:13; 1Jn_3:9; 1Jn_4:7; 1Jn_5:1, 1Jn_5:4, 1Jn_5:18). The great point on which our Lord insists is the Divine spiritual origin of the life of which he has so much to say. Several of the English versions, Coverdale's—and second edition of the Bishops' Bible—have adopted this rendering, with the Armenian and Gothic versions. The Revised version has placed it in the margin. Against it is to be brought the use of the verb
ἀναγεννᾶσθαι
(1Pe_1:3, 33, and in Justin, 'Apol.,' 1Pe_1:6)—a word which corresponds with this clause,
ἄνωθεν γεννηθῆναι
, and yet could scarcely be translated "to be born from above," but, "to be born again." The second rendering, giving a temporal value to
ἄνωθεν
, was adopted by Augustine, Chrysostom (who uses both views), the vulgate, Luther, Calvin, Tholuck, Godet, Westcott, Moulton, Weiss, and Luthardt, and is sustained by the fact that Nicodemus was led by it to an inquiry about (
δεύτερον γεννηθῆναι
) a second birth. If the expression had had no ambiguity about it, and merely conveyed the idea of a heavenly birth, his mistake would have been greater than it was. There are, moreover, numerous passages confirming the temporal sense of
ἄνωθεν
(Wettstein and Grimm both quote from Josephus, 'Ant.,' Joh_1:18. 3; and Artemidorus, 'Oneiroc.,' Joh_1:13); and the
παλιγγενεσία
of Tit_3:5 points in the same direction. The Jewish rabbi ought to have been familiar with the idea of the "new heart" and "right spirit," and the marvellous and mighty change wrought in men by the Holy Spirit; but the spiritual idea had been overlaid by rabbinic ritualism, and all the hopeless entanglements of ceremonial purity which had been reacts to do duty for spiritual conformity with the Divine will. Archdeacon Watkins reminds us that the Syriac version here gives the rendering "from the beginning," or "anew," and lays great stress on this solution of the ambiguity in the Greek word. The statement of Christ is very remarkable. A man must be born anew, must undergo a radical change, even to see the kingdom of God (cf. Mat_18:3). The true kingdom is not a Divine government of outward, visible magnificence, sustained by miraculous aid—a physical sovereignty which shall rival and eclipse the majesty of Caesar. When the kingdom shall come in its genuine power, the carnal eye will not discover its presence. The man born anew will alone be able to appreciate it. The Jews boasted that they were born of God (Joh_8:41), but could not understand that they needed vital, fundamental, moral renewal—a second birth, a new beginning. Let the opening of Christ's Galilaean ministry be compared with this bold utterance. There in public discourse he called upon all men everywhere to "repent," to undergo a radical change of mind, and that because the kingdom of heaven was at hand.
Μετάνοια
portrays the same change as
παλιγγενεσία
; but one term denotes thai; change as a human experience and effort, the other as a Divine operation. Neither repentance nor regeneration commended itself to the rabbinic mind as a necessity for one who was exalted by privilege and ennobled by obedience. The phrase, "kingdom of God," is not a mode of representing truth to which this Gospel calls frequent attention. Still our Lord to Pilate (Joh_18:36) admits that be is himself the Head of kingdom which is "not from hence"—not resting on this world as its foundation or source. In Matthew the whole of the mission of Christ among men is repeatedly portrayed as "the kingdom of heaven." And from the time when the Lord ascended until now, various efforts have been made to realize, to discover, to embody, to emblazon, to crush, to ignore, that kingdom and its King. This great utterance is a key to much of the history of the Church, and an explanation of its numberless mistakes. Moreover, it supplies an invaluable hint of the true nature of the kingdom of God. Thoma insists on the other rendering of
ἄνωθεν
, and compares it with the Philonic doctrine, "that the substance of the
νοῦς
is not attributed to that which is created, but is breathed into the flesh from above (
ἄνωθεν
) by God …Aim, O soul, at the bodiless essence of the spirit world as thy inheritance." These ideas, he thinks, John has placed into the lips of Jesus. The two classes of ideas are fundamentally distinct. Philo contrasts the sensuous and the intellectual; Christ is contrasting nature and grace.

Joh_3:4

Nicodemus saith to him, How can a man be born when he is old? can he enter a second time into his mother's womb, and be born? The numerous endeavours to interpret the motive or mind of Nicodemus show almost as much misunderstanding of the naiveté of his amazement, as Nicodemus did of the deepest significance of this solemn utterance of the Lord. Two things are perfectly clear:

(1) Nicodemus saw a grave and amazing difficulty in the idea of a second birth of a man old, like himself, in years, prepossessions, habits of thought, ways of acting, social ties, ancestral and traditional customs, and in venerable ideas consecrated by long usage. He might have known the language of the prophets concerning circumcision of heart (Deu_30:6; Jer_4:4) and concerning a new heart and right spirit (Eze_36:26, Eze_36:27; Psa_51:10; Psa_86:4); but the full bearing of these prophetic ideas were beyond and different to the almost drastic form of Christ's call for spiritual change and "birth from the beginning." There is no necessity for us to accuse him either of "narrowness" (Meyer) or of imbecility (Reuss, Lucke), or to make such a charge react upon the spirit or temper of the evangelist in delineating him. It is enough that Nicodemus should have seen a grave difficulty; and Thoma here is justified in referring to the language of the apostles, when the narrow entrance into the kingdom was set forth under the image of the camel and the needle's eye; and to Mary, when she cried, "How can this thing be?" Moreover, the same perplexity, after eighteen hundred years of Christian experience, still encumbers this utterance of the Master.

(2) Nicodemus did not, by the form of his question, put such query to the Lord in any literal baldness or insolent worldliness. Surely such a view ignores all the tropical methods of speech current in the rabbinical schools. He virtually said," Birth such as you speak of is as impossible as the second physical birth of an old man, as preposterous as would be re-entrance into the womb of his mother for the purpose of a second birth." Christ had spoken of a fundamental change—one going right down to the very sources and beginnings of life. The Lord had used this difficult image, and propounded his view in a term capable of various interpretation. Nicodemus simply expresses his alarm and incredulity in terms of the image itself. It is little more than the language of the prophet, "Can an Ethiopian change his skin, or a leopard his spots?" Are you not proposing a natural impessibility? Must not the kingdom of God, which we thought we saw in thy advent and mighty deeds, be on this understanding hopelessly veiled from human vision? The "being old" shows that Nicodemus had gone through the metaphor to the condition of mind of which it was the subject. There was no greater physical difficulty in an old man re-entering his mother's womb than for a boy of twelve to do so; but being probably, not necessarily, an old man, and belonging to a society of grave, reverend elders, with the inveterate habits, practices, traditions, of long lives behind them, how impracticable and impossible does the notion of so complete a change appear to him! Hence his question. Westcott says admirably, "The great mystery of religion is not the punishment, but the forgiveness of sins; not the natural permanence of character, but spiritual regeneration."

Joh_3:5

Jesus answered, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man (any one) have been born (out) of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God. This memorable utterance has been the occasion of much controversy, arising from the contested sanction thus supposed to be given to the opus operatura of baptism, and to the identification of water baptism with Spirit baptism. Expositors have asserted that the rite of water baptism is not merely regarded as the expressive symbol and prophecy of the spiritual change which is declared to be indispensable to admission into the kingdom, but the veritable means by which that baptism of the Spirit is effected. Now, in the first place, we observe that the sentence is a reply to Nicodemus, who had just expressed his blank astonishment at the idea that a fundamental change must pass over a man, in any sense equivalent to a second birth, before he can see the kingdom of God. Our Lord modifies the last clause, and speaks of entering into the kingdom of God rather than perceiving or discerning the features of the kingdom. Some have urged that
ἰδεῖν
of Joh_3:3 is equivalent to
εἰσελθεῖν εἰς
of Joh_3:5. The vision, say they, is only possible to those who partake of the privileges of the kingdom. But the latter phrase does certainly express a further idea—a richer and fuller appreciation of the authority and glory of the King; just as the "birth of water and of the Spirit" conveys deeper and further thought to Nicodemus, than did the previously used expression,
γεννηθῇ ἄνωθεν
. The first expression was dark in the extreme; the latter pours light upon it. "Birth of water" points at once to the method so frequently adopted in Jewish ceremonial, by which a complete change of state and right before God was instituted by water. Thus, a man who had not gone through the appropriate and commanded lustrations was unfit to present his offering, to receive the benediction sought by his sacrificial presentment; the priest was not in a fit state to carry the blood of the covenant into the holy place without frequent washings, which indicated the extent and defilement of his birth stain. Nicodemus for probably thirty years had seen priests and men thus qualifying themselves for solemn functions. So great was the urgency of these ideas that, as he must have known, the Essenes had formed separate communities, with the view of carrying out to the full consummation the idea of ritual purity. More than this, it is not improbable that proselytes from heathen nations, when brought into covenant relation with the theocratic people, were, at the very time of this conversation, admitted by baptismal rites into this privilege. To the entire confusion of Pharisee and Sadducee, John the Baptist had demanded of every class of the holy people "repentance unto remission of sins," a demand which was accepted on the part of the multitudes by submitting to the rite of baptism. The vastly important question then arises'—Did John by this baptism, or by any power he wielded, give to the people repentance or remission of sins? Certainly not, if we may conclude from the repeated judgment pronounced by him self and by the apostles after him. Nothing but the blood and Spirit of Christ could convey either remission or repentance to the souls of men. John preached the baptism of repentance unto remission, but could confer neither. He taught the people to look to One who should come after him. He sharply discriminated the baptism with water from the baptism of the Spirit and fire. This discrimination has been repeatedly referred to already in this Gospel. Thus the Fathers of the Church saw distinctly that there was no regenerating efficacy in the water baptism of John, and the Council of Trent elevated this position into a canonical dogma. It is most melancholy that they did not also perceive that this judgment of theirs about the baptism of John applied to water baptism altogether. Christ's disciples baptized (not Christ himself, Joh_4:2) with water unto repentance and remission; but even up to the day of Pentecost there is no hint of this process being more than stimulus to that repentance which is the gift of God, and to the consequent pardon which was the condition of still further communication of the Holy Spirit. The great baptism which Christ would administer was the baptism of Spirit and fire. The references to the baptism of the early Church are not numerous in the New Testament, but they are given as if for the very purpose of showing that the water baptism was not a necessary or indispensable condition to the gift of the Holy Ghost. Cornelius and his friends received the sacred bestowment before baptism. The language of the Ethiopian ennuch shows that he had received the holy and best gift of Divine illumination and faith before baptism. Simon Magus was baptized with water by Philip, but was in the gall of bitterness and un-spirituality. There is no proof at all that the apostles of Christ (with the exception of Paul) wore ever baptized with water, unless it were at the hands of John. Consequently, we cannot believe, with this entire group of facts before us, that our Lord was making any ceremonial rite whatsoever indispensable to entrance into the kingdom. His own reception and forgiveness of the woman that was a sinner, of the paralytic, and of the dying brigand, his breathing over his disciples as symbolic of the great spiritual gift they were afterwards to receive, is the startling and impressive repudiation of the idea that Christian baptism in his own name, or, still less, that that ordinance treated as a supernaturally endowed and divinely enriched sacrament, was even so much as referred to in this great utterance. But the entire system of Jewish, proselyte, and Johannine baptisms was in the mind of both Nicodemus and Christ. These were all symbolic of the confession and repentance, which are the universal human conditions of pardon, and, as a ritual, were allowed to his disciples before and after Pentecost, as anticipatory of the great gift of the Holy Spirit. No baptism, no "birth out of water," can give repentance or enforce confession; but the familiar process may indicate the imperative necessity for both, and prove still more a prophecy of the vital, spiritual transformation which, in the following verse, is dissociated from the water altogether. Calvin, while admitting the general necessity for baptism, repudiates the idea that the rite is indispensable to salvation, and maintains that "water" here means nothing different or other than "the Spirit," as descriptive of one of its great methods of operation, just as "Holy Spirit and fire" are elsewhere conjoined.

Joh_3:6

That which hath been born of the flesh, is flesh.
Σάρξ
is not the physical as opposed to the spiritual or immaterial. nor is
σάρξ
necessarily sinful, as we see from Joh_1:14, but as it often appears in John's writing and Paul's,
σάρξ
is the constituent element of humanity as apart from grace—humanity (body, intellect, heart, conscience, soul, spirit) viewed on its own side and merits and capacity, without the Divine life, or the Divine supernatural inbreathing. The being born of the flesh is the being born into this world, with all the privations and depravations, evil tendencies and passions of a fallen humanity. Birth into the theocracy, birth into national or ecclesiastical privilege, birth that has no higher quality than flesh, no better germ or graft upon it. simply produces flesh, humanity over again. When the Logos "became flesh," something more than and different from ordinary traduction of humanity took place.^£

Destitute of any higher birth than the birth of flesh, man is fleshly, psychical, earthly,
σαρκικός ψυχικός χοΐκός
(Rom_7:14-25), and, more than that, positively opposed to the will and grace of God, lashed with passions, defiled with debasing ideas, in enmity against God. Hence the birth "from the Spirit" is entirely antithetic to the birth from the flesh. That which hath been born of the Spirit, is spirit. There is a birth which supervenes on the flesh-be-gotten man, and it is supernaturally wrought by the Spirit of God. As in the first instance, at man's creation, God breathed into man the breath of life, and by that operation man became a living soul; so now the new birth of man is wrought in him by the Spirit, and there is a new life, a new mode of being, a new bias and predomimating impulse. "A spiritual mind which is life and peace" has taken the place of the old carnal mind. He is "spiritual," no longer "psychical," or "carnal," but able to discern the things that are freely given to him. The eye of the spirit is opened, unsealed, the
τὰ τοῦ πνεύματος
are revealed to him (1Co_2:12-16; 1Co_3:1-5). The reference to "birth of water" is not repeated, because the birth from water is relatively unimportant, and of no value apart from the Spirit-change of which it may be a picture, or even a synonym. More than that, the Spirit-birth, the Divine operation, is the efficient cause of that which, under the form of a human experience, is called
μετάνοια
. The human metanoia, rather than the new birth, is the great burden of our Lord's public address, as recorded in the synoptic Gospels. In both representations the same fact, the same condition and state of the human consciousness, is referred to. In "repentance," however, and in the moral characters which are the several preliminaries to the beatitudes of the Sermon on the Mount, a change is declared necessary for the constitution and inauguration of the kingdom of heaven. This change is there viewed from the standpoint of human experience, and urged in the form of a direct appeal to conscience. In this discourse to Nicodcmus the same change is exhibited on its Divine side, and as one produced by the Spirit of God. In the Sermon on the Mount "meekness," "poverty of spirit," "mourning," "hunger after righteousness," "purity of heart," the spirit of forgiveness and long suffering, are the moral conditions of those minds and hearts which would become the city of God and the light of the world (Mat_5:1-12). On this occasion, when addressing the learned rabbi, Christ sums all up in the demand for a birth from the Spirit—a new and spiritual recommencement of life from the Spirit of God. The clause found in the vetus Itala and the Syriac, quia Deus spiritus est, et de Deo natus est, is a gloss sustained by no Greek manuscript authority. Thorns here quotes two interesting passages from Philo, 1:533, 599, where the
νοῦς
is spoken of as given to man from above, and where the supremacy of the spiritual over the fleshly is made the only guarantee of admission into the world of spirit. But Philo obviously meant the intellectual rather than the moral element in human nature, and prized the ascetic process rather than the supernatural regeneration.

Joh_3:7

Marvel not that I said unto thee, Ye must be born anew. Nicodemus had revealed, by his expressions of countenance or unrecorded words, his surprise. This further explanation deepened the solemnity of the first assertion by a bold antithesis between the birth of flesh producing nothing but flesh, however high its culture, and the birth of spirit from the Spirit himself, the heavenly and Divine Originator of all genuine repentance, and the sole Cause of the new life. Nicodemus was clinging more and more eagerly to the old ideas of national privilege, of sacramental purification, of soundly taught principles and habits. He marvelled at such representation which took the heart out of all his previous training. The Messianic kingdom for which he had been looking and longing seemed to fade away in the clouds of an utter mysticism, and to vanish out of his power of recognition. Our Lord gently reproved the expression of his surprise, and reminded him of the previous utterance, "I said to thee, Ye," etc. Nicodemus had come in the name of others. Jesus replies, and reasserts the principles for the entire group of persons which Nicodemus might be supposed to represent. We must not fail to notice that, whereas in other parts of the discourse our Lord speaks in the plural first person, yet be discriminates himself from. others in this statement. He does not say, "We must," etc., but "Ye must," etc. He had no consciousness of personal need of regeneration, nor was he in the first case born as flesh from flesh. His flesh was itself the work of the Spirit.

Joh_3:8

The wind bloweth where it willeth, and thou hearest (his voice) the sound thereof, but thou knowest not whence it cometh and whither it goeth. Vulgate (followed by Wickliffe and the Rheims versions) is, Spiritus ubi vult spirat et vocem ejus audis, sed nescis unde veniat, aut quo vadat: sic est omnis qui natus est ex Spiritu. Augustine, though acquainted with the other rendering, approves of this; so Origen, Bengel. The great majority of commentators and versions have held that the former of the two translations is correct; that the first time the word
Πνεῦμα
is used, it refers to the wind, "the unseen similitude of God the Spirit—his most meet and mightiest sign;" and that, since the same word is used for the two things, Spirit and wind, the Lord, after the parabolic manner which he adopted (in the synoptic Gospels), took advantage of some gusts of roaring wind then audible, to call attention to the mystery and incomprehensibility of its origin or end, and to see a parallel between the unknown ways of the wind and the unknown points of application to the human spirit of the mighty energy of the living God. The passage, Ecc_11:5, may have been in his mind (though there "Spirit" is as likely to be the reference as is the motion of the "wind," and our ignorance of the way of the Spirit is akin to our ignorance of the formation of bones in the womb of her who is with child), and the adoption of the unusual word
πνεῖ
(cf. Joh_6:18; Rev_7:1; Mat_7:25; Act_27:40) is in support of the comparison between "wind" and the "Spirit;" while the
φωνή
, the "voice" or sound of the wind in trees or against any barriers, and the other effects that the rapid motion of the air produces, gives a lively illustration of the method in which the Spirit of God works in human minds, revealing, not itself, but its effects. The parallel is not peculiar to Scripture. It is further urged that the following clause, So is every one that hath been born^{£ of the Spirit—meaning, So doth it happen to every one who is born of the Spirit—suggests the analogy between
πνεῦμα
in its material sense, and
πνεῦμα
in its customary and deeper sense. Now, on the other hand, it appears to me that this latter clause is compatible with the older translation and application. There is a comparison, but it may be between the mysterious working, breathing of the Divine Spirit, whose "voice" or "word" may be heard, whose effects are present to our senses and consciousness, but the beginnings and endings of which are always lost in God,—and the special operations of Divine grace in the birth of the Spirit. There are numberless operations of the Spirit referred to in the Old Testament, from the first brooding of the Spirit on the formless abyss, to all the special and mighty effects wrought in creation, all the heightening and quickening of human faculty, all the conference of special strength upon men—their intellectual energies and Divine inspirations. Over and above all these, there is all the supernatural change wrought in souls by the Holy Spirit. Christ calls this a "birth of the Spirit," and declares that, according to all the mysterious comings and departings of the Spirit, leaving only manifold effects, so is the special Divine work which morally and spiritually recreates humanity. Pneuma is used three hundred and fifty times in the New Testament, and twenty times in this Gospel for "the Spirit;" and if the usage is reversed here, this is the solitary occasion. The word
θέλει
, is, moreover, more appropriate to a living Being than to the wind. There is another way which suggests itself by which the word
Πνεῦμα
may mean the same in both clauses: The breath of God bloweth where it listeth, etc., so is every one born of the breath of God. If this be possible, the form of the expression supplies a cooperating similitude drawn from the unknown origin and mighty effects of the unseen breath of heaven; and on this translation the comparison is drawn between all the ways of the Spirit and the special work of the Spirit in regeneration. An inference is deducible from either interpretation of this verse, incompatible with the theory that "birth from water" is equivalent to "regeneration in baptism." If the rite of baptism provided the moment and occasion of the spiritual result, we should know whence it came and whither it went. We might not know "how," but we should know "when" and "whence" the spiritual change took place. But this knowledge is distinctly negatived by Christ, who herein declares the moment of the spiritual birth to be lost or hidden in God. Physical birth is a deep mystery, both whence the "spirit" comes and whither it goes; the signs of the presence of life are abundant, but there is an infinite difference between the stillborn or dead child and the living one. Similarly, the commencement of the Spirit's creation within our nature is lost in mystery. We discern its presence by its effects, by consciousness of a new life and sense of a new world all around the newly born, but the Spirit-birth, like all the other operations of the Spirit, is hidden in God.

Joh_3:9

Nicodemus answered and said to him, How can these things come to pass? He takes the position now of a learner, and does not by his query repudiate regeneration as absolutely impossible, but he asks the questions "why" and "how." He may reveal his continued ignorance of the subject matter, but he is willing to be taught. The idea we form of our Lord's reply is regulated by the strict meaning we assign to the question—(
πῶς
;) "how?" (cf. Rom_2:19, Rom_2:29, and note on Rom_2:12).

Joh_3:10

Jesus answered and said to him, Art thou the teacher of Israel, and perceivest thou not these things? The term "Israel" is used four times by John (Joh_1:31, Joh_1:49; Joh_12:13; and here). In each place the high dignity, calling, and glory of the nation chosen for the loftiest privilege and destiny are involved. Notice the article, "the Israel" of God. The article before
διδάσκαλος
gives a high distinction to Nicodemus. Schottgen and Lucke suppose some special office to be here referred to, either the president of the Sanhedrin, or the hakim, or chakam, "the wise man," who sat on his left in the public sessions, or the "father of the house of judgment," who sat on his right; but it may simply mean the teacher of Israel, who has come to me in representative fashion, and who is reminded that he should have been more intimately acquainted with the teaching of his own sacred books. Without doubt, the fact of human corruption, and the power of the Spirit of God to renovate, to change utterly down to the very core and heart of human nature, is a great dogma of the Old Testament (cf. Deu_10:16; Deu_30:6; 1Sa_10:9, where God gave Saul another heart; 1Sa_16:13, the effect upon David; David's own prayer, Psa_51:10; and the great promises of God by Ezekiel, Eze_11:19; Eze_18:31; Eze_36:26; Jer_4:4; Jer_31:33). Nicodemus, an illustrious man, a teacher of ethers, presumably acquainted with the teaching of the Scriptures, need not have been in such doubt and amazement at the searching words of Jesus.

Joh_3:11

Verily, verily, I say to thee, We speak that which we know, and testify that which we have seen. Lucke and Meyer think that our Lord here merely uses the pluralis majestaticus—uses it as St. Paul does, when clearly he was referring to himself alone. It is difficult to believe this in the curious and impressive change of person here adopted, and the return to the first person singular in Joh_3:12. There was some reason why Jesus, in making this particular saying, uses the plural.

(1) Luthardt says, "Christ and the Baptist."

(2) Luther and Tholuck, "Christ and the whole prophetic company."

(3) Stier, "The Three Persons of the blessed Trinity" (see Chrysostom, etc.).

(4) Hengstenberg, Godet, Westcott, Moulton, have in various ways recognized the fact that the company of the disciples already called into the spiritual kingdom, and alive to the mighty power of the Spirit in recreating humanity, were present at this interview. They stood there to affirm the reality of the truth of which their Lord was speaking. Nothing in this sentence is incongruous with the experience and practice of those who had appreciated and were already speaking of the necessity of radical change or spiritual regeneration and of genuine repentance. John in his First Epistle (Joh_1:1-4) uses some of the very phraseology of this solemn verse,
ὃ ἑωράκαμεν
…
μαρτυροῦμεν
. Our Lord, on this occasion, gave him permission to do so. The knowledge which he spake of, the vision to which he testified, was in its way and to a degree within the compass of any disciple who had been waked up by the Lord's words to crave an entirely new beginning of his life, a birth of the Spirit. And ye receive not our testimony. This melancholy assertion proves that from the very first (as John said in his "prologue" concerning all the ministry of the Logos, and all the testimony of the prophetic Spirit to the reality of the light) "the darkness reeeiveth it not." The first demand which the Divine Lord made was rejected, the first "testimony" was disbelieved. From the beginning the dark shadow of death fell on his path. Nicodemus, or those whom he represented, may have had their curiosity excited, but their entire attitude was non-admission of the fundamental principle, viz. the inward illumination and life he came to supply.

Joh_3:12

If I told you earthly things and ye believe not, how will ye believe if I tell you of heavenly things? Our Lord here drops the plural form of address, and returns to the singular. He is about to refer to matters in which the testimony of disciples was not available. It has sometimes been said that the "earthly" and "heavenly" things refer to the wind parable and its interpretation. But, on the supposition that there is a parable or metaphor in Joh_3:8, which we have seen reason to doubt, there would be no perplexity about the reception of the earthly illustration; none could in that day have made a moment's question touching the invisibility and incomprehensibility of the motion of the wind. The birth from water has been supposed by others to be the (
ἐπίγειον
) "earthly" thing of which he had spoken, as contrasted with the heavenly thing, the birth anew from the Spirit. But this also is improbable, for of all the things of which Jesus spoke, that was the least likely to have been rejected by the Pharisaic party. The "earthly things" are the subject matter of the discourse as a whole, in apprehending which Nicodemus manifested such obtuseness. The change, renovation of human nature, the new beginning "from the Spirit" of each human life, was indeed operated on the ground of an earthly experience, and came fairly within the compass of common appreciation. Though produced by the Spirit, these things were enacted on earth. When Nicodemus asks the question "how?" he launches the inquiry into another region. There is wide difference between the question "what?" and the question "how?" The one in physical science refers to the whole range of phenomena, and the answer states the facts as they present themselves to the senses; the other question inquires into what Bacon called the latens processus—into verae causae, into the movements and method of the creative hand. So the answer to the question "what?" may be an "earthly thing," the answer to the question "how?" a "heavenly thing." If Christ answer the "how" of his listener, he raises his mind to the "heavenly" and transcendental realities which Nicodemus and we too will have to receive on an authority which entirely outsoars that of daily experience or temporal phenomena. Truly he does proceed to do so, but the difficulty of acceptance is indefinitely augmented. The answer of Christ to the matters of personal experience, verifiable by conscience and affirmed by Scripture, was difficult to the master of Israel. The answer of Jesus to the question "how?" may prove far more formidable. It involves the revelation of "the Son of man," and the redemption by the cross, and the ascension of the Son of man into heaven, and the love of God to the world, and the gift of eternal life to faith.

Joh_3:13-15

(2) The truth concerning the Son of man and his sacrifice.

Joh_3:13

And. The simple copula is here fuller significance. Olshausen regards it as "adversative," equivalent to "yet." Meyer, as a simple continuation of the previous statement. The
καὶ
has more than a mere conjunctive force. Lance puts it thus: "And yet you must be told heavenly things by him who, being the Heavenly One, is himself the first subject of this revelation." No one hath ascended into heaven. The past tense must be honestly considered. The word cannot refer to the future ascension of Jesus the Lord of glory to where he was before—to the glory which he had with the Father before the world was (Joh_17:5); nor can it refer, as the Socinian interpreters supposed, to a rapture into heaven of the Divine Man between his baptism and temptation, of which we have not the faintest trace either in Scripture or tradition; nor is it sufficient, with Hengstenberg and others, to regard it as a mere Hebraism for high and exalted intercourse with God and heavenly things. True, there have been many who have sought to climb the steep ascent (Gen_11:4; Isa_14:13); true also that rabbis spoke of Moses having "ascended into the heavens," by which (says Whitby) they meant "admission to the Divine counsels." The authority on which he depends is the late 'Targum on Son_1:5, Son_1:11, Son_1:12,' by which, however, all that is clear is that the Targnmist was referring to the ascent of Moses to the top of Sinai, i.e. above the multitude in the deserts, to the place whither Jehovah came to speak with him. But Exo_20:22, the canonical Scripture, makes it clear that it was "from the heavens" that Jehovah spoke with his servant. There are, however, other passages quoted by Schottgen from Jerusalem Targum on Deu_30:12, and from the 'Mishna,' in which Moses is said to have "ascended into heaven, and heard the voice of God;" but further inquiry leads us to judge that the Hebrew commentators were thinking of the going up to Sinai for his lofty revelations, and their followers have supposed that this process was a synonym of the revelations themselves. Many have thought to rise above the world to the beatific vision, but Jesus says none have done it in the only sense in which they would have been thereby fitted to discourse on the heavenly things. Two things are needed for this in the main—to be in heaven, and come thence charged with its Divine communications. Enoch, Elijah, may have been translated that they should not see death, but they are not so lifted into the abode of God that they might come thence charged with heavenly truth, and able to explain the "how" of Divine grace. No one hath ascended into heaven except he who has by living there as in his eternal home come down from heaven. Meyer, Luthardt, Westcott, etc., all call attention to other and analogous usage of
εἰ μὴ
, which fastens upon a part of the previous negative, not the whole assertion, and therefore here upon the idea of living in heaven and coming thence (Mat_12:4; Luk_4:26, Luk_4:27; Gal_1:7). Man, if he should presume to come with a full revelation of Divine and heavenly things, must come down from a height to which he had previously ascended; but no man has thus and for this purpose ascended, except he who has descended from heaven, having been there before his manifestation in the flesh, having been "in God." "with God," "in the bosom of the Father," and having come thence, not losing his essential ego, his Divine personality, even though calling himself the Son of man. For any other to have come down from heaven, it was necessary that he should first have ascended thither; but the Son of man has descended without having ascended. He calls himself "Son of man," and he claims to have come down from heaven without ceasing to be what he was before. Godet urges that, by the "ascended into heaven," he meant such lofty communion with God and immediate knowledge of Divine things as to differentiate him from all others, but that the phrase, "come down from heaven," implies previous existence in his native place, and that the Lord's filial intimacy with God rests on his essential sonship. Still, he conceives that Jesus asserts his own ascension in the spiritual sense to the heart of God, and his descent with consequent resultant knowledge, and expounds both statements by the explanation that as Son of man he is living the twofold life in heaven and on earth at the same time. By using the term, "Son of man," Christ emphasized the exalted dignity that is involved in the extent of his self-humiliation,, and complete sympathy with us. He was the second Adam, the Lord from heaven."^£ Who is (not was) in heaven. If this be only an early gloss, it throws light on the two previous clauses. It declares that, though he came down, and though his introduction to this world was an incarnation, yet that he is in the deepest sense still in heaven. Such language is a vindication of his claim to reveal heavenly things. Augustine says, "Ecce hic erat et in coelo erat, hic erat in carne, in coelo erat divinitate, natus de matre, non recedens a Patre." Again, "Si Paulus ambulabat in carne in terra et conversabatur in coelo, Deus coeli et terrae poterat esse et in coelo et in terra." Archdeacon Watkins says admirably, "If heaven is a state, a life, in which we are, which is in us, now in part, hereafter in its fulness, then we may understand, and with glad hearts hold to, the vital truth that the Son of man who came down from heaven was ever in heaven."

Joh_3:14, Joh_3:15

And. Seeing that our Lord had claimed supreme right to speak of heavenly things, he proceeds at once to speak of them also. There may be many ways of taking the
καὶ
: supposing that it indicates a transition from the person of the Lord to his work. From his Divine and endowed humanity thus shown to be competent to explain and re veal heavenly things, he proceeds to his atoning sacrifice. These underlying links of connection are not mutually exclusive. Even as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, so must also the Son of man be lifted up. The narrative of Num_21:8, etc., is one of the rest curious in Scripture, and it was a great puzzle to the Jewish commentators, who felt that it was in apparent violation of the second command of the Decalogue. Moreover, in the days of Hezekiah the reverence paid to the serpent led to disastrous consequences and puritanic removal of the idolatrous snare. The Jewish divines consulted by Trypho were unable to explain it. Philo regarded it as a designed contrast to the serpent of the Book of Genesis, but he supposed the antithesis to be that between pleasure and righteousness or prudence ('De Leg. All.,' Gen_2:1.80). The Book of Wisdom (Gen_16:6), "The murmuring people were troubled for a while for warning, having a symbol of salvation … he that turned to it was saved, not by reason of that which he beheld, but by reason of the Saviour of all." Ferguson, in his 'Tree and Serpent Worship,' regards the narrative as an indication that within the bosom of Israel the worship of the serpent had been introduced and had left its traces. But the narrative itself shows that the serpent healing from the serpent bite was a Jehovistie symbol of Divine love and victory. The 'Test. XII. Patr. Benj.,' 9, refers to it as the type of the cross (cf. Php_2:9; Act_2:33). "Moses made a serpent of brass, and put it upon a pole, and it came to pass, that if a serpent had bitten any man, when he beheld the serpent of brass, he lived." The fiery flying serpent, with its poisonous bite and its deadly malice, was the vivid type of the evil of disobedience to the Divine command, infusing its malign venom into the whole nature of its victim. The serpent of brass was not venomous, though it bore the likeness of the deadly plague. It was not flying, gliding from tent to tent, but captured, still, hoisted triumphantly upon the pole, a sign of its conquest. The serpent in Hebrew and Christian literature throughout was emblematic of evil, not as in many Oriental religions, of healing or deliverance (see Gen_3:1; 2Co_11:3; Rev_12:9; and, properly translated, Job_26:13, Revised version); and it is possible to see in this type an anticipation of the "lifting up" of Jesus on the cross. There are several interpretations of the
ὑψωθῆναι
. Paulus urged that Jesus by it referred to the final glorification of himself; but if so, why was not the word
δοξασθῆναι
used? It may mean, with Bleek, Lechler, Godet, the exaltation upon the cross as the steppingstone to his glory, the way, not only to David's throne, but to the very throne of God—a conception profoundly different from the current Pharisaic notions concerning the Messiah. The word is used in Joh_8:28 and Joh_12:32, Joh_12:34 for the passion of the cross, although Peter (Act_2:33) and Paul (Php_2:9) used it for the glorification consequent upon the Passion. Surely the word does, if it is to correspond with Moses' exaltation of the serpent of brass, point to the exaltation of the cross, but to that as to the very throne of his power and glory. Tholuck says, "A word must have been used in Aramaic which admitted both ideas, and the word
ëÈ÷ÇæÀ
means in Chaldee and Syriac to 'lift up' and 'crucify.'" Many striking relations thus present themselves.

(1) The Lord was made in the likeness of sinful flesh, though without sin.

(2) The evil of sin was seen in him conspicuously revealed, but conquered; not only conquered, but transformed into a remedy. The enemy of man, the world itself, was crucified on the cross of Christ. Sin was nailed to the cross when, in the likeness of sinful flesh, the eternal Son of God made flesh submitted to all the shame of the flesh. "The world is crucified unto me," says Paul ("in the cross of Christ"), "and I to the world." Jesus says, "Even so must the Son of man be lifted up." The Son of man here on earth, but having always a Divine life in heaven, when revealed in human nature, subject to the laws and destiny of the flesh, "must" be lifted up. This pathway to his glory must pass through the blood and agony of the Passion. There was a needs be in the Divine counsel, in the purposes of Divine love, in the fall measure of the grace which was welling from the heart of God.

(3) The comparison, however, and relation between type and antitype is more conspicuous still in the fifteenth verse, where Jesus added: In order that whosoever believeth might have in him eternal life.^{£ Granting that the above is the true text, in our translation an instance occurs of the frequent absolute usage of
πιστεύειν
(
πιστεύειν ἐν αὐτῷ
is not a Johannine phrase, while we do find (Joh_5:39; Joh_16:33; Joh_20:31) that "life," "peace," are "in him"). On this ground, if we retain the
ἐν αὐτῷ
, we translate it as above. The object of faith is not specified; but he who believes, who looks with God-taught longing to the Christ, to the Son of man uplifted to save, sees God at his greatest, his best, and discerns the fullest revelation of the redeeming love. "Believing" corresponds with "looking" in the narrative of Num_21:1-35. Whosoever "looked, lived." Such looking was an act of faith in the promise of Jehovah; the otherwise despairing, dying glance of poisoned men was a type of the possibility of a universal salvation for sin-envenomed, devil-bitten, perishing men. Let them believe, and there is life. Let them understand the meaning of the Son of man thus exhausting the curse, and enduring in love the burden and penalty of human transgression, and they have straightway a life that is spiritual, fundamentally and radically new, a life heavenly and eternal. Thus can this vast change of which he had spoken to Nicodemus supervene. "How," asks Nicodemus, "can this be?" "Thus may it be," answers the Son of man. It is not necessary that all the mystery of the cross should have been perceived by Nicodemus, yet the subsequent references to this man make it highly probable that, when he saw Jesus suspended on the cross, instead of giving way to unbelief and despair, he was stimulated to an act of lofty faith (Joh_19:39, and note). In this great utterance we have the answer which Paul addressed to the Philippian jailer, and we have the argument of Paul in Rom_1:1-32, Rom_2:1-29, and we infer that the sources of the Pauline doctrine were to be found in the known teaching of the Lord himself.

Many commentators, beginning with Erasmus, and followed by Neander, Tholuck, Lucke, Westcott, and Moulton, have supposed that our Lord's discourse with Nicodemus ended with Rom_2:15, and that thenceforward we have the reflections in after times made by the evangelist, in harmony with the teachings which he had received from the Lord. This is urged on the ground that in Joh_1:18, and at the close of the present chapter (Joh_1:31-36), when reciting the testimony of the Baptist, it appears to the commentators that John has blended his own reflections with the words of the Baptist, adding them without break to the sentences which he does record (see notes). I am not prepared to admit the analogy; there is nothing in these words, if attributed to the Baptist, incompatible with the purely Old Testament position and transition standpoint to which he adhered. The argument drawn from the past tenses,
ἠγάπησεν
and
ἔδωκεν}}}