John 8:51

Whenever our Lord said any thing of lofty meaning, the Jews in their insensibility set it down madness: Then answered the Jews and said to Him, Say we not well that you are a Samaritan, and have a devil?

But how, we may ask, when the Samaritans denied a future life, and the immortality of the soul, could they dare to call our Savior, Who had preached so much on the resurrection and the judgment, a Samaritan? Perhaps they only mean a general rebuke to Him for teaching, what they did not approve of.

The Samaritans were hated by the Jews; they lived in the land that formerly belonged to the ten tribes, who had been carried away.

It is not unlikely too, some may have thought that He held the Samaritan opinion of there being no future state really, and only put forth the doctrine of a resurrection and eternal life, in order gain to the favor of the Jews. They said that He had a devil, because His discourses were above human capacity, those, viz. in which He asserted that God was His Father, and that He had come down from heaven, and others of a like kind: or perhaps from a suspicion, which many had, that He cast out devils by Beelzebub, the prince of the devils.

Or they called Him a Samaritan because He transgressed the Hebrew ordinances, as that of the sabbath: the Samaritans not being correct observers of the law. And they suspected Him of having a devil, because He could disclose what was in their thoughts. When it was that they called Him a Samaritan, the Evangelist no where says: a proof that the Evangelists left out many things.

See; when God suffers a wrong, He does not reply reproachfully: Jesus answered, I have not a devil. An intimation this to us, that when reproached by our neighbors falsely, we should not retort upon them by bringing forward their evil deeds, however true such charges might be; lest the vehicle of a just rebuke turn into a weapon of rage.

And observe, when He had to teach them, and pull down their pride, He used roughness; but now that He has to suffer rebuke, He treats them with the utmost mildness: a lesson to us to be severe in what concerns God, but careless of ourselves.

And to imitate His patience first, if we would attain to His power. But though being reviled, He reviled not again, it was incumbent on Him to deny the charge. Two charges had been made against Him: You are a Samaritan, and have a devil. In reply He does not say, I am not a Samaritan: for Samaritan means keeper; and He knew He was a keeper: He could not redeem us, without at the same time preserving us. Lastly, He is the Samaritan, who went up to the wounded, and had compassion on him.

Our Lord, even more than Paul, wished to become all things to all men, that He might gain some and therefore He did not deny being a Samaritan. I have not a devil, is what Jesus alone can say; as He alone can say, The prince of this world comes, and has nothing in Me. None of us are quite free from having a devil. For; even lesser faults come from him.

Then after being so reviled, all that He says to vindicate His glory, is, But I honor My Father: as if to say, That you may not think Me arrogant, I tell you, I have One, Whom I honor.

He honored the Father, by revenging Him, and not suffering murderers or liars to call themselves the true sons of God.

Christ alone honored the Father perfectly. No one, who honors any thing which is not honored by God, honors God.

As all who have zeal toward God are liable to meet with dishonor from wicked men, our Lord has Himself set us an example of patience under this trial; And you do dishonor Me.

As if to say, I do my duty: you do not do yours.

And this was not addressed to them only, but to all who by unrighteous deeds inflict injury upon Christ, who is righteousness; or by scoffing at wisdom wrong Him who is wisdom: and the like.

How we are to take injuries, He shows us by His own example, when He adds, I seek not Mine own glory, there is one that seeks and judges.

As if to say, I have told you this on account of the honor which I have for My Father; and for this you dishonor Me. But I concern not myself for your reviling: you are accountable to Him, for whose sake I undergo it.

God seeks Christ’s s glory, in every one of those who receive Him: which glory He finds in those who cultivate the seeds of virtue implanted in them. And those in whom He finds not His Son’s glory, He punishes: There is one that seeks and judges.

Meaning of course the Father. But is it then that He says in another place, The Father judges no man, but has committed all judgment to the Son. Judgment is sometimes put for condemnation, whereas here it only stands for trial: as if to say, There is one, even My Father, who distinguishes My glory from yours; you glory after this world, I not after this world. The Father distinguishes the glory of the Son, from that of all men: for that He has been made man, does not bring us to a comparison with Him. We men have sin: He was without sin, even when He was in the form of a servant; for, as the Word which was in the beginning, who can speak worthily of Him?

Or thus; If that is true which our Savior says below, All men are yours, it is manifest that the judgment itself of the Son, is the Father’s.

As the perversity of the wicked increases, preaching so far from giving way, ought even to become more active. Thus our Lord, after He had been accused of having a devil, imparts the treasures of preaching in a still larger degree: Verily, verily, I say to you, If a man keep My saying, he shall never see death.

See is put for experience. But since, about to die Himself, He spoke with those about to die, what means this, If a man keep My saying, he shall never see death? What, but that He saw another death from which He came to free us, death eternal, the death of the damned, which is shared with the devil and his angels! That is the true death: the other is a passage only.

We must understand Him, as it were, to say, If a man keep My light, he shall not see darkness forever; forever being taken as common to both clauses, as if the sentence were, If a man keep My saying for ever, He shall not see death for ever: meaning that a man does not see death, so long as he keeps Christ’s word. But when a man, by becoming sluggish in the observance of His words, and negligent in the keeping of his own heart, ceases to keep them, he then sees death; he brings it upon himself. Thus taught then by our Savior, to the prophet who asks, What man is he that lives, and shall not see death? we are able to answer, He who keeps Christ’s word.

He says, keep, i.e. not by faith, but by purity of life. And at the same time too He means it as a tacit intimation that they can do nothing to Him. For if whoever keeps His word, shall never die, much less is it possible that He Himself should die.

If Christ is only man, how is it that He says, “Though I bear record of myself, yet my record is true: because I know whence I came, and whither I go; ye know not whence I came, and whither I go. Ye judge after the flesh?” Behold, also He says, that He shall return thither whence He bears witness that He came before, as being sent, to wit, from heaven. He came down therefore from whence He came, in the same manner as He goes thither from whence He descended. Whence if Christ were only man, He would not have come thence, and therefore would not depart thither, because He would not have come thence. Moreover, by coming thence, whence as man He could not have come, He shows Himself to have come as God. …

How could one say that Christ is saved, when the Lord Himself says, “I am the life;” and, “I am come that they might have life;” and, “He that believeth on me shall not see death, but he shall behold the life eternal?”

He calleth Himself, ( ver. 48 ,) “the bread of life,” because He maintaineth our life both which is and which is to be, and saith, “Whosoever shall eat of this bread shall live for ever.” By “bread” He meaneth here either His saving doctrines and the faith which is in Him, or His own Body; for both nerve the soul. Yet in another place He said, “If a man hear My saying, he shall never taste of death.” ( c. viii. 51 .) And they were offended; here they had no such feeling perhaps, because they yet respected Him on account of the loaves which had been made.

Ver. 51 . “Verily, verily, I say unto you, If a man keep My saying, he shall never see death.”

[1.] What I have often said, I will now say, that Christ looketh not so much to His own honor as to our salvation; not how He may utter some sublime saying, but how something able to draw us to Him. On which account His sublime and mighty sayings are few, and those also hidden, but the humble and lowly are many, and abound through His discourses. For since by these men were the rather brought over, in these He continueth; and He doth not on the one hand utter these universally, lest the men that should come after should receive damage, nor, on the other hand, doth He entirely withhold those, lest the men of that time should be offended. Since they who have passed from lowmindedness unto perfection, will be able from even a single sublime doctrine to discern the whole, but those who were ever lowminded, unless they had often heard these lowly sayings, would not have come to Him at all. …