John 7

Some Questions to Ponder

• Does familiarity breed contempt?
• Is it possible to take the evidence of God’s existence for granted?
• How do we keep our faith in God fresh and vibrant?
• Can we be inoculated against faith?

What is the "Feast of Tabernacles?"

• Leviticus 23:26—To remember the wandering in the desert.
• Thanksgiving for the growing season.
• Zechariah 14:17—Prayer for future rain and harvest.
• Anticipation of the prophecy in Zechariah 14:8: "On that day living waters shall flow out from Jerusalem, half of them to the eastern sea and half of them to the western sea; it shall continue in summer as in winter."

John 7:1-9

• 7:4—John uses krupto (Greek, “secret”).
  a. His brothers are challenging Jesus to show how powerful He really is and to stop being a secret.
  b. 7:6—Jesus is running on a different timetable. His calendar is a spiritual one.
  c. 7:8—The revelation of who Jesus really is will come at a different time (cf. 2:4).

John 7:10-18

• This passage is central to Kierkegaard’s “hidden revealer” theory.
• 7:12—There was a great deal of complaining and murmuring (goggusmos) about Jesus among the crowd (Morris, p. 356-357).
  a. This is intentionally symbolic of the Exodus narrative.
  b. This crowd is divided because of Jesus and will later be divided over His words.
  c. Yet the people were not speaking openly because they were afraid of the Jewish religious leadership.
• 7:15—The idea behind this phrase is literally “to know letters,” meaning to study under a rabbi (Brown, 1966, p. 312).
• 7:16—Jesus says that His teaching comes from God:
  a. Wisdom of Solomon 7:12—Anyone who wants to know God’s wisdom will find it.
  b. John 5:44—Those who want to receive their own glory will receive it, but this glory is imperfect and not from God.
• Three Aspects of Jesus’ Teaching (Shawn Daggett, Harding University):
  1. 7:15—It was not academic (‘faking it”).
  2. 7:16—It was inspired by God (“feeling it”).
  3. 7:18—It was not self-serving (“frauding it”).

John 7:19-30

• 7:19—Is this a general statement or is Jesus being specific about the Law of Moses?
• 7:22—Sabbath is a reminder that God wants His world to flourish and heal itself with a day of rest.
• 7:24—Only those whose feet are grounded in reality can judge truthfully.
  a. 7:27—One cannot judge on appearances alone. The people think they know from where the Messiah will come.
  b. 7:28—We do not have any specific examples of Jesus’ teachings in John’s Gospel, only spin-offs controversies.
  c. 7:28-29—They know who Jesus is in human form, but His true identity as God’s emissary has been hidden from them.
  d. 1:15 and 19-23—It appears that John the Baptizer’s ministry was to evoke “the hidden revealer,” but he did not know exactly who it would be.
  e. 7:30—Jesus is mysteriously protected from being arrested prematurely.

John 7:31-39

• Is there a spiritual battle occurring here?
• 7:31—These people are not operating out of the world of light.
  a. They merely see the signs but do not grasp the meaning behind the signs. This is not a true faith but one based on a quantity of works (“sign faith”).
  b. 7:32—The crowd is being redefined and repositioned because of the Word and Light. They are taking a new stance towards Jesus.
  c. Proverbs 1:28—Wisdom would be searched for but not found because Man was not searching correctly. This is now being applied by Jesus to Himself.
  d. John 7:35-36—The Jewish leaders do not have a clue about what Jesus is saying.
  i. Jesus is not talking about going to the Gentiles, yet that is exactly what will happen during the time of the Early Church.
  ii. But then again, this could have been a derogatory comment regarding Jesus’ apparent lack of success with the Jews.
• 7:37—Jesus promises living water.
  a. Isaiah 12:3—On the last day of the festival, a priestly procession would bring water from the Pool of Siloam, chanting this passage as they marched.
  b. John 7:37-38—Jesus pops up and proclaims that He will replace earthly water with living water. He appropriates the symbol of the festival to Himself (“replacement motif”; Carson, p. 253-256).
  i. See Talbert, p. 154-155.
  ii. The practice of drawing water from Siloam began ca. 200 BC, and continued until AD 70.
  iii. Water would be drawn for 7 days, however only prayer was offered on the eighth day.

John 7:40-52

• 7:40—There is an expectation for the Messiah, yet it has been unclear what that expectation really is.
• 7:43—The crowd is torn (schisma) because of what Jesus has said.
• 7:47-49—The Pharisees are the shepherds of the Jewish crowds, yet they are neglecting their pastoral role.
• 7:52—The irony is that the Pharisees challenge Nicodemus to search the Scriptures, when, in fact, Nicodemus has started to come into the light because he has searched the Scriptures.

References

Raymond Brown, The Gospel According to John I-XII, Anchor Bible 29 (Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1966).

D. A. Carson and H. G. M. Williamson, ed., It is Written: Scripture Citing Scripture: Essays in Honor of Barnabas Lindars (Cambridge/New York: Cambridge University Press, 1988).

Leon Morris, The Gospel According to John, rev. ed., New International Commentary on the New Testament 4 (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1995).

Charles H. Talbert, Reading John: A Literary and Theological Commentary on the Fourth Gospel and the Johannine Epistles, rev. ed., Reading the New Testament (Macon, GA: Smyth and Helwys, 2005).