Tag: John

Greek commentary on John’s gospel dated 1190-1200 (Bodleian Library)

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Cruising the gospel – John 20:19-31

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Brief note:

In the previous installment, I used the Aramaic names for people rather than the modern English equivalents. I’ve done the same again this time because it’s what we normally do with foreign names.

We would not call Jacques Chirac ‘Jack’ and we don’t use an English name in place of Volodymyr Zelenskyy, so why do we call Yohanan ‘John’ and Cephas ‘Peter’? Using the original names reminds us that these people were part of a different culture than our own. From now on I shall continue to take this approach.

An amazing day

20:19-31 – In the first 18 verses of John 20 we saw how Maryam Magdalitha (Mary Magdalene) saw and believed; here in the rest of the same chapter we read about Te’oma (Thomas) and how he came to believe. Te’oma (Aramaic) and Didymus (Greek) both mean ‘twin’; John was writing in Greek so he gives both versions for clarity.

For Maryam, hearing Yahshua’s (Jesus’) voice was enough. but Te’oma needed a clearer hint. Notice the gentleness and understanding of Jesus here. There’s no tone of judgement or disappointment in Jesus’ words or in the way he gives Te’oma time to process things and finally what he needs to spark belief. It’s not at all surprising that someone might struggle to believe that after crucifixion and burial, someone might be alive again. In similar circumstances I might have struggled to believe, and so might you. Things were happening at breath-taking speed; this is the evening of the same day Maryam saw Yahshua outside the tomb at dawn.

Notice how the disciples are afraid of the Jews and therefore had the doors closed, perhaps even bolted. They are Jews themseleves, of course, but the Jews they’re afraid of are the leaders who had Jesus crucified and want to stamp out any hint of people still following him. They are surely right to be afraid of these powerful men.

Yet Yahshua, coming and standing there amongst them says ‘Shalom alechem’, ‘Peace be with you’. It’s the everyday greeting you’d hear on the streets in any Jewish town at that time, but here amongst these frightened men it has a much wider and deeper meaning. It’s not just a wish for physical peace and safety, it means peace and safety in the presence of Yahweh, the almighty Father who will protect them. And Yahshua shows them his hands and the wound in his side. And their fear and anxiety turn to rejoicing. We, too, can rejoice in his presence as he stands amongst us when we meet.

Jesus repeats the warm greeting, it’s also a promise, ‘Shalom alechem’ – ‘Peace be with you’. As the Father sent me, so I’m also sending you. They’re not just being given peace, but also a mission! It’s a message to us, today, as well. ‘Peace be with you and I’m sending you’. We can’t take only the peace, we must accept the being sent as well.

He breathed on them and said, ‘Receive the Holy Spirit’. He breaths on us too and tells us to receive the Holy Spirit. Do we receive him? And do we realise we have the power to forgive sins, or not to forgive? I’m not sure that we are quite so convinced about that! Why did Jesus breathe on them? the word for Spirit is ‘Ruach’ and it it also means ‘breath’. When Jesus fills us with his spirit he is also filling us with his breath. We can see the link in English with words like ‘inspiration’ and ‘respiration’ – both spirit and breath. As followers of Jesus, just as life-giving air flows in and out as we breath, so the eternal life-giving Holy Spirit flows in and out, active and equally life-giving (or even more so!).

But just like you and me, poor old Te’oma wasn’t there when Jesus appeared and said these things. When he does turn up and hears what had happened, he tells the others, ‘I can’t possibly believe that nonsense. I won’t believe such a thing unless I can see his hands and put my finger on the holes where the nails were, and put my hand in the hole in his side. We can’t judge Te’oma for not believing what they had told him. I’m pretty sure we’d be just the same, though possibly less open and honest about it!

But when Jesus does come by again, more than a week later, there’s double proof. Jesus already knows what Te’oma had said, and tells him, ‘Come on then, take a proper look, here are the nail holes and here’s the wound in my side. Put your finger here and take a good look at my hands, and put your hand here in my side and believe! Te’oma said, probably rather tremblingly, ‘My Master and my God’. Notice that this is far more than just believing Jesus died and returned to life. Te’oma knows who Yahshua really is, God himself in a different and unexpected form. I think at this stage Cephas (Peter), Johanan (John) and Maryam Magdalitha understood this, also Yahshua’s mother would have known. But Te’oma fully understands quite early too.

We sometimes think of him as ‘doubting Thomas’, but as soon as he had the evidence there was no room left for doubt!

And Yahshua’s comment right at the end of this gospel is very telling too. You saw and believed, how blessed are those who don’t see yet nevertheless believe. We don’t really need physical evidence, believing happens when something changes in our hearts. This is available to everyone!

See also:

• Doubting Thomas – Wikipedia

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John 20:1-18 – Cruising the Gospel

Greek commentary on John’s gospel dated 1190-1200 (Bodleian Library)

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Cruising the gospel – John 20:1-18

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An amazing day

20:1-10 – It’s now the day after the Sabbath, and the normal work of the week could begin. But this was not a normal week. Jesus’ disciples, family and friends would have been subdued, grieving, and wondering how things could have gone so wrong, so suddenly. But there were still practicalities to be dealt with and today was the first day when those tasks could be done.

Early, well before sunrise (Sabbath had ended at sunset the day before) Maryam Magdalitha (Mary or Miriam Magdalene) walked to the grave where they had laid Yahshua’s (Jesus’) body, wrapped in strips of cloth with a separate piece of linen for his head. The first thing Maryam noticed, probably from some distance away, was that the heavy stone that closed the grave had been rolled away to one side. Panicking, she didn’t go any closer but must have been horrified; turning round she ran back to Shimon Kepha (Simon Peter) and Johanan (John) and told them the conclusion she must have jumped to, that someone had removed the body and she didn’t know where they’d taken him.

Shimon and Johanan set out running to the tomb and Maryam was right behind them. Johanan ran fastest and bent over and looked in through the low opening and saw the linen strips inside, but didn’t go in. Then Kepha arrived and just went straight into the tomb; he saw the linen strips as well, and also the head cloth. Then Johanan went inside the tomb, saw the same things, and believed.

What’s the significance of this? The author, very likely Johanan himself, explains in verse 9 that they didn’t understand from the Bible that Yashua had to rise again from death. This is not surprising. The Bible mentioned here is what we call ‘The Old Testament’. It was the Hebrew Bible or a Greek translation of it, and the passages that suggested the Son would die and rise again are scattered around in the books of various prophets, the Psalms and elsewhere and are always straightforward (though more so in hindsight). The opportunity for hindsight was only now beginning to open. Yahshua had explained some of this to them. Johanan, who was a close friend of Yahshua and a deep thinker had seen him die and now made the mental leap to understanding that for Yahshua death was a temporary affair. He’d said he’d return from death, and he wasn’t here in the grave anymore, somehow he was alive again! Johanan got it immediately. Kepha, a more down-to-earth and practical person did not, at least, not just yet. The two of them didn’t seem to worry about Maryam in her distress, but no doubt deeply distracted themselves, turned back to the city and the place where they were staying.

10:11-18 – Maryam, still crying in grief, now finally looked inside the tomb herself and saw two people, one sitting where Yahshua’s head had rested and the other at his feet. Seeing the tears rolling down Maryam’s cheeks they asked her why she was crying. The use of the word ‘woman’ here seems to us rather strange, perhaps unkind, perhaps distant and rather aloof. But it was a normal way to address a woman at that time, much as we might still say to a man, ‘What’s the matter, man?’, ‘What’s up, chap?’ or ‘You OK, mate?’ or just ‘What’s the problem? So let’s translate this the way we might say it today. Think in terms of these two angels saying, ‘Why are you crying?’ or ‘Why are you crying, Lady?’ And she tells them, through her sobs, ‘They’ve taken the Master away and I have no idea where they’ve put him.’

Turning round, she saw a figure standing outside the tomb. We know the tomb entrance is low so she’s unlikely to see the person’s face until she is outside, and with tears in her eyes she may not be seeing anything very clearly.

In fact, it’s Yahshua, and he also asks, ‘Why are you crying? Who are you looking for?’ She assumes it’s the gardener who perhaps looks after the nearby olive trees and asks him, ‘If you’ve moved him – tell me where he is and I’ll go and get him’.

Yahshua, seeing how confused she is, says only one word. He appreciates how blurred her vision is so he simply speaks her name.

‘Maryam’.

No gardener would know her name, and in that moment she recognises his voice. She cries out ‘Rabboni!’ (‘Teacher!’) and reaches to grab him, perhaps just an arm, more likely a full hug. Her misery and grief fall away immediately, replaced by astonishment and joy. But Yahshua says, ‘Don’t hang onto me because I have not yet gone up to the Father. Instead, go now to my brothers and tell them that I’m going up to my Father and your Father, to my Elohim (Gods) and your Elohim’. And right away, off she went to tell them.

Why did I write ‘Gods’ in the previous paragraph, not ‘God’? Because ‘Elohim’ is a plural form in Hebrew, the singular is ‘El’ or ‘Eloah’. Plurals are sometimes used to stress importance and power, Queen Victoria used ‘we’ rather than ‘I’ – ‘We are not amused’ instead of ‘I’m not amused’ In the Hebrew Bible ‘Elohim’ is a plural noun but when referring to the Almighty it takes singular verbs, As if Queen Victoria had said, ‘We am not amused’. In Aramaic it is ‘Elah’ or ‘Alaha’ allied to the Arabic ‘Allah’. We shouldn’t miss the significance of this, there’s a hint of threeness here. The Father and the Spirit are ‘up there somewhere’ while Yahshua is still ‘down here’. He plans to return to be with them, and later he will send the Spirit to come to live in and among his followers. Two thousand years later, the Spirit is still here in and among Yahshua’s followers. The Spirit is entirely capable of being ‘up there’ and ‘down here’ simultaneously.

And why did he tell Maryam not to cling to him? Perhaps he’s simply saying that the most urgent thing for him now is to get back to be fully in his Father’s presence because only then can he send the Spirit, someone they need in them as soon as possible. In a hostile and confusing world any delay in the coming of the Spirit will leave the disciples vulnerable and without direction. Maryam can help by taking the news that Yahshua is alive back to them right away. Clinging to Jesus is natural but only benefits one person while leaving the many feeling lost, distressed and confused. I think Maryam understood this right away because she headed back to the city immediately without another word.

It’s also significant that Yahshua appeared to a woman before he appeared to any of the men he’d been teaching for three years. In Jewish tradition scribes taught village boys to read and memorise the Old Testament Law. Girls were not taught these things. And Rabbis (Teachers) would take men as disciples, but not women. Yahshua broke tradition by teaching both men and women, and he now chooses to appear to a woman first. This is a lesson that church understood at the beginning, but forgot for 1900 years and has begun to relearn very slowly over the last seventy or eighty years.

See also:

• Elohim – Wikipedia
• Mary Magdalene – Wikipedia

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Useful? Interesting?

If you enjoyed this or found it useful, please like, comment, and share below. (If you don’t see those links, click the article’s title above the main photo and they will appear.) Send a link to friends who might enjoy the article or benefit from it – Thanks! My material is free to reuse (see conditions), but a coffee is always welcome and encourages me to write more often!

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Matthew 27:32-66 – Cruising the Gospel