Saturday in the Fourth Week of Lent, March 20, 2021

John 7:40-53

Some in the crowd who heard these words of Jesus said, “This is truly the Prophet.” Others said, “This is the Christ.” But others said, “The Christ will not come from Galilee, will he? Does not Scripture say that the Christ will be of David’s family and come from Bethlehem, the village where David lived?” So a division occurred in the crowd because of him. Some of them even wanted to arrest him, but no one laid hands on him. So the guards went to the chief priests and Pharisees, who asked them, “Why did you not bring him?” The guards answered, “Never before has anyone spoken like this man.” So the Pharisees answered them, “Have you also been deceived? Have any of the authorities or the Pharisees believed in him? But this crowd, which does not know the law, is accursed.” Nicodemus, one of their members who had come to him earlier, said to them, “Does our law condemn a man before it first hears him and finds out what he is doing?” They answered and said to him, “You are not from Galilee also, are you? Look and see that no prophet arises from Galilee.” Then each went to his own house.

St. John relates a debate which took place in Jerusalem concerning the identity of the Lord Jesus.  In fact, it is hard to look at a man and see more than a man.  It is hard for us even to look at an individual walking down the street or dining next to us and to know that this is a great musician or a learned scholar or even a highly regarded athlete.  It has been known to happen that wealthy owners of banks visit one of their branches while dressed casually, and the tellers who treat them discourteously, finding to their horror who this really is, are fired.  Many people who heard Jesus preach in the Temple area in Jerusalem or in places in Galilee never saw him perform a miracle and only heard about his miracles second- or third-hand.  The people here had just heard the Lord proclaim, “If any one thirst, let him come to me and drink.  He who believes in me, as the scripture has said, ‘Out of his heart shall flow rivers of living water.’ ” (John 7, 37-38).  They had heard him preach, but otherwise they seemed to know little about him.  Some question about the place of his birth arose.  Despite their incomplete knowledge, some folks proved ready at least to accept him as the long awaited Prophet of whom Moses spoke, or even as the Messiah, “the Christ”.  As this was only the second visit Jesus made to Jerusalem during his Public Life, during which he stayed only a few days, this is remarkable.  They did look at him and they listened to him and, perhaps influenced by news of his miracles, they believed at least this much.  These were people of good-will.  Even those who could not accept Jesus as the Messiah based their thinking on what little evidence they had before them.  The guards too, are shown to be of good-will and open minds.  They fail to arrest Jesus because they have heard him speak, and they reckoned that the words he uttered were not those of a criminal or a danger to the public good.

“Have you also been deceived? Have any of the authorities or the Pharisees believed in him? But this crowd, which does not know the law, is accursed.”  The Pharisees ask an interesting question here.  The very people who should have recognized him — the authorities and the Pharisees — did not recognize him because they were not of good will or open mind.  And they had heard him preach many times and seen him perform many incredible miracles.  They simply refused to believe.  They barred the door of their minds and hearts at the knock of faith, lest it enter in.  In addition. They convict themselves of failing to do the job they had set for themselves, for if the crowd did not know the Law, that was the fault of the Pharisees who purported to interpret it for them.  It is they, rather, who did not know the Law, for if they had, “they would never have crucified the Lord of glory” (1 Corinthians 2, 8).  

“Then each went to his own house.”  Those without faith do not go to God’s house.  They are not members of the Body of Christ.  They are alone, each of them, in solitude with their frustration, with their hopeless fight against the Truth.