John 7:19

The Jews brought two charges against Christ; one, that He broke the sabbath; the other, that He said God was His Father, making Himself equal with God. The latter He confirmed first by showing, that He did nothing in opposition to God, but that both taught the same. Then turning to the charge of breaking the sabbath, He says, Did not Moses give you a law, and none of you keep the law? as much as to say, The law says, You shall not kill, whereas you kill. And then, Why go you about to kill Me? As if to say, If I broke a law to heal a man, it was a transgression, but a beneficial one; whereas you transgress for an evil end; so you have no right to judge Me for breaking the law. He rebukes them then for two things; first, because they went about to kill Him; secondly, because they were going about to kill another, when they had not even any right to judge Him.

Or He means to say, that if they kept the law, they would see Him pointed to in every part of it, and would not seek to kill Him, when He came. The people return an answer quite away from the subject, and only showing their angry feelings: The people answered and said, You have a devil: who goes about to kill You? He who cast out devils, was told that He had a devil. Our Lord however, in no way disturbed, but retaining all the serenity of truth, returned not evil for evil, or railing for railing.

Wherein He left us an example to take it patiently, whenever wrong censures are passed upon us, and not answer them by asserting the truth, though able to do so, but rather by some wholesome advice to the persons; as does our Lord: Jesus answered and said to them, I have done one work, and you all marvel.

As if He said, What if you saw all My works? For all that they saw going on in the world was of His working, but they saw not Him Who made all things. But He did one thing, made a man whole on the sabbath day, and they were in commotion: as if, when any one of them recovered from a disease on the sabbath, he who made him whole were any other than He, who had offended them by making one man whole on the sabbath.

You marvel, i.e. are disturbed, are in commotion. Observe how well He argues with them from the law. He wishes to prove that this work was not a violation of the law; and shows accordingly that there are many things more important than the law for the observance of the sabbath, by the observance of which that law is not broken but fulfilled. Moses therefore, He says, gave to you circumcision, not because it is of Moses, but of the fathers, and you on the sabbath day circumcise a man.

As if He said, you have done well to receive circumcision from Moses, not because it is of Moses, but of the fathers; for Abraham first received circumcision from the Lord. And you circumcise on the sabbath. Moses has convicted you: you received a law to circumcise on the eighth day; and you received a law to rest on the seventh day. If the eighth day after a child is born happen to be the sabbath, you circumcise the child; because circumcision appertains to, is a kind of sign of, salvation; and men ought not to rest from the work of salvation on the sabbath.

Circumcision was given for three reasons; first, as a sign of Abraham’s great faith; secondly, to distinguish the Jews from other nations; thirdly, that the receiving of it on the organ of virility, might admonish us to observe chastity both of body and mind. And circumcision then possessed the same virtue that baptism does now; only that the gate was not yet open. Our Lord concludes: If a man. on the sabbath day receive circumcision, that the law of Moses should not be broken; are you angry at Me because I have made a man every whit whole on the sabbath day?

Which is as much as to tell them, The breaking of the sabbath in circumcision is a keeping of the law; and in the same way I by healing on the sabbath have kept the law. You, who are not the legislators, enforce the law beyond its proper bounds; whereas Moses made the law give way to the observance of a commandment, which did not come from the law, but from the fathers. His saying, I have made a man every whit whole on the sabbath day, implies that circumcision was a partial recovering.

Circumcision also was perhaps s a type of our or Lord Himself. For what is circumcision but a robbing of the flesh, to signify the robbing the heart of its carnal lusts. And therefore it was not without reason that it was applied to that member by which the mortal creature is propagated: for by one man sin entered into the world. And therefore every one is born with the foreskin, because every one is born with the fault of his propagation. And God does not change us either from the corruption of our birth, or from that we have contracted ourselves by a bad life, except by Christ: and therefore they circumcised with knives of stone, to prefigure Christ who is the stone; and on the eighth day, because our Lord’s resurrection took place on the day after the seventh day; which resurrection circumcises us, i.e. destroys our carnal appetites. Regard this, said our Lord, as a type of My good work in making a man every whit whole on the sabbath day: for he was healed, that he might be whole in body, and he believed, that he might be whole in mind. You are forbidden indeed to do servile work on the sabbath; but is it a servile work to heal on the sabbath? You eat and drink on the sabbath, because it is necessary for your health: which shows that works of healing are by no means to be omitted on the sabbath.

He does not say, however, I have done a greater work than circumcision; but only states the matter of fact, and leaves the judgment to them, saying, Judge not according to the appearance, out judge righteous judgment: as if to say, Do not, because Moses has a greater name with you than I, decide by degree of personal eminence; but decide by the nature of the thing itself, for this is to judge righteously. No one however has blamed Moses for making the sabbath give place to the commandment of circumcision, which was not derived from the law, but from another source. Moses then commands the law to be broken to give effect to a commandment not of the law: and he is more worthy of credit than you.

What our Lord here tells us to avoid, in judging by the person, is very difficult in this world not to do. His admonition to the Jews is an admonition to us as well; for every sentence which our Lord uttered, was written for us, and is preserved to us, and is read for our profit. Our Lord is above; but our Lord, as the truth, is here as well. The body with which He rose can be only in one place, but His truth is diffused every where. Who then is he who judges not by the person? He who loves all alike. For it is not the paying men different degrees of honor according to their situation, that will make us chargeable with accepting persons. There may be a case to decide between father and son: we should not put the son on an equality with the father in point of honor; but, in respect of truth, if he have the better cause, we should give him the preference; and so give to each their due, that justice do not destroy desert.

[2.] O how great the wisdom of the woman! how meekly doth she receive the reproof! “How should she not,” saith some one? Tell me, why should she? Did He not often reprove the Jews also, and with greater reproofs than these? (for it is not the same to bring forward the hidden thoughts of the heart, as to make manifest a thing that was done in secret; the first are known to God alone, and none other knoweth them but he who hath them in his heart; the second, all who were sharers in it know;) but still when reproved did not bear it patiently. When He said, “Why seek ye to kill me?” ( c. vii. 19 ), they not only did not admire as the woman did but even mocked at and insulted Him; yet they had a demonstration from other miracles, she had only heard this speech. …

Ver. 19 . “Did not Moses give you the Law? and yet none of you keepeth the Law? Why go ye about to kill Me?”

Observe the marks of a robber; first, that he doth not enter openly; secondly, not according to the Scriptures, for this is the, “not by the door.” Here also He referreth to those who had been before, and to those who should be after Him, Antichrist and the false Christs, Judas and Theudas, and whatever others there have been of the same kind. And with good cause He calleth the Scriptures “a door,” for they bring us to God, and open to us the knowledge of God, they make the sheep, they guard them, and suffer not the wolves to come in after them. For Scripture, like some sure door, barreth the passage against the heretics, placing us in a state of safety as to all that we desire, and not allowing us to wander; and if we undo it not, we shall not easily be conquered by our foes. By it we can know all, both those who are, and those who are not, shepherds. …

And, in truth, had sought to do so before; for the Evangelist saith, “Therefore the Jews sought to kill Him” ( c. v. 18 ); and, “Why seek ye to kill Me?” ( c. vii. 19 .) But then they only sought, now they ratified their determination, and treated the action as their business.

33. Since God then beareth witness, and the Holy Ghost joins in the witness, and Christ says, Why do ye seek to kill me, a man who has told you the truth ? let the heretics be silenced who speak against His humanity, for they speak against Him, who saith, Handle me, and see; for a spirit hath not flesh and bones, as ye see me have . Adored be the Lord the Virgin-born, and let Virgins acknowledge the crown of their own state: let the order also of Solitaries acknowledge the glory of chastity for we men are not deprived of the dignity of chastity. In the Virgin’s womb the Saviour’s period of nine months was passed: but the Lord was for thirty and three years a man: so that if a virgin glories because of the nine months, much more we because of the many years.

The second declares His human nature, as, Now ye seek to kill Me, a man that hath told you the truth , and Even so must the Son of Man be lifted up , and the like.