John 7

John 7:1–9 ESV

After this Jesus went about in Galilee. He would not go about in Judea, because the Jews were seeking to kill him. Now the Jews’ Feast of Booths was at hand. So his brothers said to him, “Leave here and go to Judea, that your disciples also may see the works you are doing. For no one works in secret if he seeks to be known openly. If you do these things, show yourself to the world.” For not even his brothers believed in him. Jesus said to them, “My time has not yet come, but your time is always here. The world cannot hate you, but it hates me because I testify about it that its works are evil. You go up to the feast. I am not going up to this feast, for my time has not yet fully come.” After saying this, he remained in Galilee.

John 7:1–9 (ESV)

John 1:7. After this Jesus went about in Galilee. He would not go about in Judea, because the Jews were seeking to kill him.

7:1. In Jesus’ day, Galilee and Judea were under separate jurisdictions (that of Antipas and the Roman prefect, respectively), so that someone in trouble in one part of the country would be safer to remain in the other part. In John’s day, regional religious differences seem to have been increasing, with Christians being concentrated in Galilee and the rabbinic movement gaining more allies in Judea.

John 7:2. Now the Jews’ Feast of Booths was at hand.

New Testament 7:1–9—The Unbelief of Jesus’ Brothers

7:2. The Feast of Tabernacles was one of the three most important festivals of the Jewish year and was celebrated for eight days in Jerusalem. Jewish pilgrims from throughout the Roman and Parthian world would gather. The men would live in booths constructed on rooftops or elsewhere, commemorating God’s faithfulness to his people when they lived in booths in the wilderness (women and children were not required to live in the booths). This feast was known for its joyous celebration.

John 7:3-4. So his brothers said to him, “Leave here and go to Judea, that your disciples also may see the works you are doing. For no one works in secret if he seeks to be known openly. If you do these things, show yourself to the world.”

New Testament 7:1–9—The Unbelief of Jesus’ Brothers

7:3–4. From the standpoint of general ancient political theory, the advice of Jesus’ brothers is correct; they may not know the specific matter of the Jerusalem authorities’ opposition. Most teachers taught in public places. Frank or open speech (v. 4) was considered virtuous, secret acts deceitful.

John 7:5. For not even his brothers believed in him.

7:5. But Jesus’ brothers lack the proper faith to understand his mission; their unbelief could encourage John’s readers in their own struggles with unbelieving families.

John 7:6-9. Jesus said to them, “My time has not yet come, but your time is always here. The world cannot hate you, but it hates me because I testify about it that its works are evil. You go up to the feast. I am not going up to this feast, for my time has not yet fully come.” After saying this, he remained in Galilee.

New Testament 7:1–9—The Unbelief of Jesus’ Brothers

7:6–9. Pious Jewish men who lived as near as Galilee were supposed to go to the feast. It would be normal for Jesus to travel with his extended family (Josephus spoke of whole towns going). The issue is not that he will not go, but that he will only go “secretly” at first, so as not to hasten the appropriate time of his execution (cf. 7:6 with 2:4).

John 7:10–13 (ESV)

10 But after his brothers had gone up to the feast, then he also went up, not publicly but in private. 11 The Jews were looking for him at the feast, and saying, “Where is he?” 12 And there was much muttering about him among the people. While some said, “He is a good man,” others said, “No, he is leading the people astray.” 13 Yet for fear of the Jews no one spoke openly of him.

John 7:10–13 (ESV)

John 7:10. But after his brothers had gone up to the feast, then he also went up, not publicly but in private.

7:10. Greco-Roman biographers often liked to describe their subjects’ appearances, flattering or not. That none of the Gospels does so suggests that Jesus’ appearance may have been average enough to allow him to pass unnoticed in a crowd: probably curly black hair, brown skin, perhaps a little over five feet in height—unlike the Aryan pictures of him that circulate in some Western churches. (The Shroud of Turin, which is purported to be Jesus’ burial cloth, makes him taller, in the epic Hebrew tradition—1 Sam 9:2. But its authority is disputed.) Although Diaspora Jewish men, like Greek and Roman men, were normally clean-shaven, coins portray Palestinian Jews in this period with full beards and hair down to their shoulders.

John 7:11-12. The Jews were looking for him at the feast, and saying, “Where is he?” And there was much muttering about him among the people. While some said, “He is a good man,” others said, “No, he is leading the people astray.”

7:11–12. “One who leads astray the multitude” (cf. NASB) or “one who deceives the people” (cf. NIV, NRSV) was a serious charge, applied to those who led other Jews to idolatry or apostasy. Deuteronomy 13 prescribes death as the penalty, and some rabbis even felt that such persons should be given no chance to repent, lest they be able to secure forgiveness though their followers had perished. Some Jewish sources as early as the second century charged Jesus with this crime.

John 7:13. Yet for fear of the Jews no one spoke openly of him.

7:13. The “Jews” here are clearly the Jerusalem authorities, who correspond in John’s day to the leaders repressing not only the Jewish Christians but also any other views within Judaism that they saw as competing with their own position.

John 7:14–24 ESV

About the middle of the feast Jesus went up into the temple and began teaching. The Jews therefore marveled, saying, “How is it that this man has learning, when he has never studied?” So Jesus answered them, “My teaching is not mine, but his who sent me. If anyone’s will is to do God’s will, he will know whether the teaching is from God or whether I am speaking on my own authority. The one who speaks on his own authority seeks his own glory; but the one who seeks the glory of him who sent him is true, and in him there is no falsehood. Has not Moses given you the law? Yet none of you keeps the law. Why do you seek to kill me?” The crowd answered, “You have a demon! Who is seeking to kill you?” Jesus answered them, “I did one work, and you all marvel at it. Moses gave you circumcision (not that it is from Moses, but from the fathers), and you circumcise a man on the Sabbath. If on the Sabbath a man receives circumcision, so that the law of Moses may not be broken, are you angry with me because on the Sabbath I made a man’s whole body well? Do not judge by appearances, but judge with right judgment.”

John 7:14–24 (ESV)

John 7:14. About the middle of the feast Jesus went up into the temple and began teaching.

7:14. Teaching was often done in public places, including in the temple courts. Some popular teachers drew large crowds there.

It is interesting that Jesus went up to Jerusalem in secret, yet goes to the heart of place of Jewish worship and begins to teach.

John 7:15. The Jews therefore marveled, saying, “How is it that this man has learning, when he has never studied?”

New Testament 7:10–36—Divided Opinions

7:15. Most children in the Greco-Roman world could not afford even a primary education. But Palestinian Jewish children, except perhaps from the poorest homes (which a carpenter’s family was not), would learn how to read and recite the Bible, whether or not they could write. The issue here is not that Jesus is illiterate (he is not), but that he has never formally studied Scripture with an advanced teacher, yet he expounds as well as any of the scholars without citing earlier scholars’ opinions.

John 7:16-17. So Jesus answered them, “My teaching is not mine, but his who sent me. If anyone’s will is to do God’s will, he will know whether the teaching is from God or whether I am speaking on my own authority.

New Testament 7:10–36—Divided Opinions

7:16–17. Learning by doing was a standard part of Jewish education, which included imitating one’s teacher.

John 7:18-19. The one who speaks on his own authority seeks his own glory; but the one who seeks the glory of him who sent him is true, and in him there is no falsehood. Has not Moses given you the law? Yet none of you keeps the law. Why do you seek to kill me?”

7:18–19. False prophets were technically to be executed; but the prophet like Moses was to be followed (Deut 18:9–22).

Deuteronomy 18:15–22 (ESV)

A New Prophet like Moses

15 “The Lord your God will raise up for you a prophet like me from among you, from your brothers—it is to him you shall listen— 16 just as you desired of the Lord your God at Horeb on the day of the assembly, when you said, ‘Let me not hear again the voice of the Lord my God or see this great fire any more, lest I die.’ 17 And the Lord said to me, ‘They are right in what they have spoken. 18 I will raise up for them a prophet like you from among their brothers. And I will put my words in his mouth, and he shall speak to them all that I command him. 19 And whoever will not listen to my words that he shall speak in my name, I myself will require it of him. 20 But the prophet who presumes to speak a word in my name that I have not commanded him to speak, or who speaks in the name of other gods, that same prophet shall die.’ 21 And if you say in your heart, ‘How may we know the word that the Lord has not spoken?’— 22 when a prophet speaks in the name of the Lord, if the word does not come to pass or come true, that is a word that the Lord has not spoken; the prophet has spoken it presumptuously. You need not be afraid of him.

John 7:20. The crowd answered, “You have a demon! Who is seeking to kill you?”

7:20. Demoniacs were often thought to act insanely; in this case the crowd thinks Jesus is paranoid. But even this charge could imply the suspicion that he is a false prophet (7:12): false prophets were also thought to channel spirits (indeed, many pagan magicians claimed such spirit-guides). The penalty for false prophets was death. Josephus tells of one true prophetic figure in this period (he does not quite label him a “prophet”) who was regarded as insane and demon possessed; the Gospels mention another (John the Baptist—Mt 11:18).

John 7:21-24. Jesus answered them, “I did one work, and you all marvel at it. Moses gave you circumcision (not that it is from Moses, but from the fathers), and you circumcise a man on the Sabbath. If on the Sabbath a man receives circumcision, so that the law of Moses may not be broken, are you angry with me because on the Sabbath I made a man’s whole body well? Do not judge by appearances, but judge with right judgment.”

New Testament 7:10–36—Divided Opinions

7:21–24. Jesus asks the crowd to reason consistently (sound and fair judgment was paramount in Jewish teaching): why is it wrong for him to heal supernaturally on the sabbath, when circumcision (which wounds) is permitted on the sabbath? A later first-century rabbi argued similarly: If circumcising on the eighth day takes precedence over the sabbath (and it does), saving a whole life also does (as was commonly agreed). Some practices at the festivals (such as killing the Passover lamb and waving the lulab, i.e., palm branch, at the Feast of Tabernacles) likewise took precedence over the sabbath.