“Some of the Pharisees said, ‘This man is not from God, for he does not keep the Sabbath (Joh 9:16).’”
How would you know if someone had been sent by God? The Pharisees thought that they knew. Recently I was wrestling with John 10:22-42. At first glance it appears that it should be connected to the Good Shepherd dialogue (Joh 10:1-21). And yet John 10:22 introduces the section as occurring during the Feast of Dedication. This is problematic because the Good Shepherd dialogue is believed to be associated with the Feast of Booths or Tabernacles. They are separated by three months.
When I discovered that the Feast of Dedication is only found here I thought surely the meaning of Jesus’ words must be associated with that feast. The Feast of Dedication was instituted by Judas Maccabaeus after his rebel forces regained Jerusalem and the Temple in their struggle against Antiochus Epiphanes (Vincent 1887, 195). It is an eight-day feast that commemorates the cleansing and rededication of the Temple required after Epiphanes profaned it by offering a pig on the alter years earlier (Vincent 1887, 195). It is celebrated on the 25th day of Chisleu, which is in the middle of December, and we know it today as the celebration of Hanukkah (Vincent 1887, 195).
Perhaps the key to Jesus’ words is in the fact that the Jews were celebrating a feast that had not been instituted in the Old Testament. God had told Moses to tell, “the people of Israel and say to them, ‘These are the appointed feasts of the LORD that you shall proclaim as holy convocations; they are my appointed feasts (Lev 23:1-2).’” The Feast of Dedication was not among God’s appointed feasts because Judas Maccabaeus had appointed it. Unfortunately, I couldn’t find any commentor that made any connection to this idea.
The next logical destination in my quest was in Jesus’ words immediately following His words about the sheep. Jesus had claimed that “I and the Father are one (Joh 10:30)” and in response the Jews were going to stone him for blasphemy. Jesus’ defense was to quote Psalm 82:6, “’Is it not written in your Law, ‘I said, you are gods’ (Joh 10:34)?”
Psalm 82 is a short eight verse Psalm in which God judges a counsel that he has gathered because they were not judging rightly. They were judging unjustly with neither knowledge or understanding and instead were judging with partiality and as a result they were going to die like men. Now there is some debate as to whether this counsel is a counsel of angels/demons or if this counsel is a counsel of Israeli judges and although it makes for some fun reading the answer isn’t necessary for Jesus’ allegation against the Jews in the Gospel of John. The argument Jesus makes is that according to how the Jews were judging blasphemy they would have to level the same judgment against God who called the members of His counsel gods (Psa 82:1 and 6). It doesn’t matter who makes the claim about men or angels to claim either of them are god or gods is the act of blasphemy that the Jews are alleging against Jesus.
Bottom line, what Jesus is explaining, from the Law as recognized by the Jews, was that the blasphemy they were accusing Jesus of did not rule Him out as the Messiah. In fact, I think Jesus is using a subtle word play when he asks, “do you say of him whom the Father consecrated and sent into the world, ‘You are blaspheming,’ because I said, ‘I am the Son of God’ (Joh 10:36)?” In the immediate context of their allegation Jesus is challenging their logic and reasoning but, in the allusion to Psalm 82, the one who is consecrated and sent is the very one who judges the counsel, “Arise, O God, judge the earth; for you shall inherit all the nations (Psa 82:8).” Jesus’ final work would be to receive God’s judgment on behalf of the earth. At this moment if the Jews answer Jesus rhetorical question ‘no’ then they are abandoning their allegation of blasphemy but if they answer ‘yes’ they are admitting to the very claim that Jesus is making.
Jesus makes one more move to put the onus back on the Pharisees. Essentially He tells them that if they cannot believe Him when He says that He is the Son of God then they need to evaluate His works and determine if they are the works of His father that they might know and understand (Joh 10:38).” It is no coincidence that the Jews confronted Jesus at the Feast of Dedication with the challenge “How long will you keep us in suspense? If you are the Christ, tell us plainly (Joh 10:24).”
One of the Messianic hopes of that time was that the Messiah would restore the Jewish Monarchy. That restoration hadn’t come during Ezra, Zerubbabel, or Nehemiah’s time. However, it had come through the Hasmonean line. “Although Aristobulus I was the first of the Maccabees actually to claim the title of king, several of his predecessors held the office in all ways save the name (Scott 1995, 164).” The commemoration of the purification of the Temple at the Feast of Dedication was a commemoration of the Maccabean monarchy. The Jews were asking Jesus, if He was the Messiah, when was he going to restore the monarchy. That was the sign that they were looking for. That was the sign that would make plain Jesus’ claim.
So where does this leave us today?
First, I wonder what sign you are waiting for. I once roomed with another soldier who had told me he had given up on Christianity because when he and his mother were going through hard times they prayed, and God did not deliver them. The help they sought, the sign they were looking for, was not proffered and so Jesus must not be the real messiah. How many of us have approached the truth of the gospel this way? The truth is the same signs that were given to the Jews of Jesus time have been given to us.
Second, if we have accepted Jesus as the Messiah, how often do we miss what He has done and what He is doing because He is not doing what we want or what we expect? Jesus died so that you and I could be with Him in eternity. That is the only truth that could allow a soldier to be called of God to a battlefield in which God knows that soldier will not return. That is the only truth that frees you and I to sacrifice up to our very lives in obedience to God’s plan of advancing that very truth. The Jews were expecting an earthly king and because they were they missed out on a heavenly kingdom.
Scott, J. Julius. Jewish Backgrounds Of The New Testament. Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 1995.
Vincent, Marvin Richardson. Word Studies in the New Testament. Vol. 2. New York, NY: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1887.