Yohanes 5:1-9
Konteks5:1 After this 1 there was a Jewish feast, 2 and Jesus went up to Jerusalem. 3 5:2 Now there is 4 in Jerusalem by the Sheep Gate 5 a pool called Bethzatha 6 in Aramaic, 7 which has five covered walkways. 8 5:3 A great number of sick, blind, lame, and paralyzed people were lying in these walkways. 5:4 [[EMPTY]] 9 5:5 Now a man was there who had been disabled for thirty-eight years. 10 5:6 When Jesus saw him lying there and when he realized 11 that the man 12 had been disabled a long time already, he said to him, “Do you want to become well?” 5:7 The sick man answered him, “Sir, 13 I have no one to put me into the pool when the water is stirred up. While I am trying to get into the water, 14 someone else 15 goes down there 16 before me.” 5:8 Jesus said to him, “Stand up! Pick up your mat 17 and walk.” 5:9 Immediately the man was healed, 18 and he picked up his mat 19 and started walking. (Now that day was a Sabbath.) 20
Yohanes 7:23
Konteks7:23 But if a male child 21 is circumcised 22 on the Sabbath so that the law of Moses is not broken, 23 why are you angry with me because I made a man completely well 24 on the Sabbath?
Yohanes 9:1-7
Konteks9:1 Now as Jesus was passing by, 25 he saw a man who had been blind from birth. 9:2 His disciples asked him, 26 “Rabbi, who committed the sin that caused him to be born blind, this man 27 or his parents?” 28 9:3 Jesus answered, “Neither this man 29 nor his parents sinned, but he was born blind so that 30 the acts 31 of God may be revealed 32 through what happens to him. 33 9:4 We must perform the deeds 34 of the one who sent me 35 as long as 36 it is daytime. Night is coming when no one can work. 9:5 As long as I am in the world, I am the light of the world.” 37 9:6 Having said this, 38 he spat on the ground and made some mud 39 with the saliva. He 40 smeared the mud on the blind man’s 41 eyes 9:7 and said to him, “Go wash in the pool of Siloam” 42 (which is translated “sent”). 43 So the blind man 44 went away and washed, and came back seeing.
Yohanes 9:14
Konteks9:14 (Now the day on which Jesus made the mud 45 and caused him to see 46 was a Sabbath.) 47
[5:1] 1 sn The temporal indicator After this is not specific, so it is uncertain how long after the incidents at Cana this occurred.
[5:1] 2 tc The textual variants ἑορτή or ἡ ἑορτή (Jeorth or Jh Jeorth, “a feast” or “the feast”) may not appear significant at first, but to read ἑορτή with the article would almost certainly demand a reference to the Jewish Passover. The article is found in א C L Δ Ψ Ë1 33 892 1424 pm, but is lacking in {Ì66,75 A B D T Ws Θ Ë13 565 579 700 1241 pm}. Overall, the shorter reading has somewhat better support. Internally, the known proclivity of scribes to make the text more explicit argues compellingly for the shorter reading. Thus, the verse refers to a feast other than the Passover. The incidental note in 5:3, that the sick were lying outside in the porticoes of the pool, makes Passover an unlikely time because it fell toward the end of winter and the weather would not have been warm. L. Morris (John [NICNT], 299, n. 6) thinks it impossible to identify the feast with certainty.
[5:1] sn A Jewish feast. Jews were obligated to go up to Jerusalem for 3 major annual feasts: Passover, Pentecost, and Tabernacles. If the first is probably ruled out because of the time of year, the last is not as likely because it forms the central setting for chap. 7 (where there are many indications in the context that Tabernacles is the feast in view.) This leaves the feast of Pentecost, which at some point prior to this time in Jewish tradition (as reflected in Jewish intertestamental literature and later post-Christian rabbinic writings) became identified with the giving of the law to Moses on Mount Sinai. Such an association might explain Jesus’ reference to Moses in 5:45-46. This is uncertain, however. The only really important fact for the author is that the healing was done on a Sabbath. This is what provoked the controversy with the Jewish authorities recorded in 5:16-47.
[5:1] 3 map For location see Map5 B1; Map6 F3; Map7 E2; Map8 F2; Map10 B3; JP1 F4; JP2 F4; JP3 F4; JP4 F4.
[5:2] 4 tn Regarding the use of the present tense ἐστιν (estin) and its implications for the dating of the Gospel of John, see the article by D. B. Wallace, “John 5,2 and the Date of the Fourth Gospel,” Bib 71 (1990): 177-205.
[5:2] 5 tn The site of the miracle is also something of a problem: προβατικῇ (probatikh) is usually taken as a reference to the Sheep Gate near the temple. Some (R. E. Brown and others) would place the word κολυμβήθρα (kolumbhqra) with προβατικῇ to read “in Jerusalem, by the Sheep Pool, there is (another pool) with the Hebrew name.” This would imply that there is reference to two pools in the context rather than only one. This does not seem necessary (although it is a grammatical possibility). The gender of the words does not help since both are feminine (as is the participle ἐπιλεγομένη [epilegomenh]). Note however that Brown’s suggestion would require a feminine word to be supplied (for the participle ἐπιλεγομένη to modify). The traditional understanding of the phrase as a reference to the Sheep Gate near the temple appears more probably correct.
[5:2] 6 tc Some
[5:2] sn On the location of the pool called Bethzatha, the double-pool of St. Anne is the probable site, and has been excavated; the pools were trapezoidal in shape, 165 ft (49.5 m) wide at one end, 220 ft (66 m) wide at the other, and 315 ft (94.5 m) long, divided by a central partition. There were colonnades (rows of columns) on all 4 sides and on the partition, thus forming the five covered walkways mentioned in John 5:2. Stairways at the corners permitted descent to the pool.
[5:2] 8 tn Or “porticoes,” or “colonnades”; Grk “stoas.”
[5:2] sn The pool had five porticoes. These were covered walkways formed by rows of columns supporting a roof and open on the side facing the pool. People could stand, sit, or walk on these colonnaded porches, protected from the weather and the heat of the sun.
[5:4] 9 tc The majority of later
[5:5] 10 tn Grk “who had had thirty-eight years in his disability.”
[5:6] 12 tn Grk “he.” The referent (the man) has been specified in the translation for clarity.
[5:7] 13 tn Or “Lord.” The Greek κύριος (kurios) means both “Sir” and “Lord.” In this passage the paralytic who was healed by Jesus never acknowledges Jesus as Lord – he rather reports Jesus to the authorities.
[5:7] 14 tn Grk “while I am going.”
[5:7] 16 tn The word “there” is not in the Greek text but is implied.
[5:8] 17 tn Or “pallet,” “mattress,” “cot,” or “stretcher.” Some of these items, however, are rather substantial (e.g., “mattress”) and would probably give the modern English reader a false impression.
[5:9] 18 tn Grk “became well.”
[5:9] 19 tn Or “pallet,” “mattress,” “cot,” or “stretcher.” See the note on “mat” in the previous verse.
[5:9] 20 tn Grk “Now it was Sabbath on that day.”
[5:9] sn This is a parenthetical note by the author.
[7:23] 21 tn Grk “a man.” See the note on “male child” in the previous verse.
[7:23] 22 tn Grk “receives circumcision.”
[7:23] 23 sn If a male child is circumcised on the Sabbath so that the law of Moses is not broken. The Rabbis counted 248 parts to a man’s body. In the Talmud (b. Yoma 85b) R. Eleazar ben Azariah (ca.
[7:23] 24 tn Or “made an entire man well.”
[9:1] 25 tn Or “going along.” The opening words of chap. 9, καὶ παράγων (kai paragwn), convey only the vaguest indication of the circumstances.
[9:1] sn Since there is no break with chap. 8, Jesus is presumably still in Jerusalem, and presumably not still in the temple area. The events of chap. 9 fall somewhere between the feast of Tabernacles (John 7:2) and the feast of the Dedication (John 10:22). But in the author’s narrative the connection exists – the incident recorded in chap. 9 (along with the ensuing debates with the Pharisees) serves as a real-life illustration of the claim Jesus made in 8:12, I am the light of the world. This is in fact the probable theological motivation behind the juxtaposition of these two incidents in the narrative. The second serves as an illustration of the first, and as a concrete example of the victory of light over darkness. One other thing which should be pointed out about the miracle recorded in chap. 9 is its messianic significance. In the OT it is God himself who is associated with the giving of sight to the blind (Exod 4:11, Ps 146:8). In a number of passages in Isa (29:18, 35:5, 42:7) it is considered to be a messianic activity.
[9:2] 26 tn Grk “asked him, saying.”
[9:2] 28 tn Grk “in order that he should be born blind.”
[9:2] sn The disciples assumed that sin (regardless of who committed it) was the cause of the man’s blindness. This was a common belief in Judaism; the rabbis used Ezek 18:20 to prove there was no death without sin, and Ps 89:33 to prove there was no punishment without guilt (the Babylonian Talmud, b. Shabbat 55a, although later than the NT, illustrates this). Thus in this case the sin must have been on the part of the man’s parents, or during his own prenatal existence. Song Rabbah 1:41 (another later rabbinic work) stated that when a pregnant woman worshiped in a heathen temple the unborn child also committed idolatry. This is only one example of how, in rabbinic Jewish thought, an unborn child was capable of sinning.
[9:3] 30 tn Grk “but so that.” There is an ellipsis that must be supplied: “but [he was born blind] so that” or “but [it happened to him] so that.”
[9:3] 31 tn Or “deeds”; Grk “works.”
[9:3] 32 tn Or “manifested,” “brought to light.”
[9:4] 34 tn Grk “We must work the works.”
[9:4] 35 tn Or “of him who sent me” (God).
[9:5] 37 sn Jesus’ statement I am the light of the world connects the present account with 8:12. Here (seen more clearly than at 8:12) it is obvious what the author sees as the significance of Jesus’ statement. “Light” is not a metaphysical definition of the person of Jesus but a description of his effect on the world, forcing everyone in the world to ‘choose up sides’ for or against him (cf. 3:19-21).
[9:6] 38 tn Grk “said these things.”
[9:6] 39 tn Or “clay” (moistened earth of a clay-like consistency). The textual variant preserved in the Syriac text of Ephraem’s commentary on the Diatessaron (“he made eyes from his clay”) probably arose from the interpretation given by Irenaeus in Against Heresies: “that which the Artificer, the Word, had omitted to form in the womb, he then supplied in public.” This involves taking the clay as an allusion to Gen 2:7, which is very unlikely.
[9:6] 40 tn Because of the length and complexity of the Greek sentence, the conjunction καί (kai) was replaced by a third person pronoun and a new sentence started here in the translation.
[9:7] 42 tn The pool’s name in Hebrew is shiloah from the Hebrew verb “to send.” In Gen 49:10 the somewhat obscure shiloh was interpreted messianically by later Jewish tradition, and some have seen a lexical connection between the two names (although this is somewhat dubious). It is known, however, that it was from the pool of Siloam that the water which was poured out at the altar during the feast of Tabernacles was drawn.
[9:7] 43 sn This is a parenthetical note by the author. Why does he comment on the meaning of the name of the pool? Here, the significance is that the Father sent the Son, and the Son sent the man born blind. The name of the pool is applicable to the man, but also to Jesus himself, who was sent from heaven.
[9:7] 44 tn Grk “So he”; the referent (the blind man) is specified in the translation for clarity.
[9:14] 45 tn Or “clay” (moistened earth of a clay-like consistency).
[9:14] 46 tn Grk “and opened his eyes” (an idiom referring to restoration of sight).
