CAF Bible Study - The Gospel of John

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Is there some way to get it on the “Sticky” section? That is one of the nice features of this discussion on John’s gospel - one can always find the thread, even if no one has posted on it for a week. (With a study, sometimes it takes me a week to ponder, read commentaries, etc. before I’m ready to post. 😊 )

Nita
I agree.
 
Is there some way to get it on the “Sticky” section? That is one of the nice features of this discussion on John’s gospel - one can always find the thread, even if no one has posted on it for a week. (With a study, sometimes it takes me a week to ponder, read commentaries, etc. before I’m ready to post. 😊 )

Nita
Maybe I can get the Table of Contents on their?

I’m going to PM Michael Francis and see if he can get this done.
 
Please remain on the topic of the passage of the Gospel of John in question.

Note that I am working with NotWorthy on the parables thread concept. For those who wish to have each parable studied in a separate thread, please be aware that all you need do is click on the the OP’s name in a post and then “Find all threads started by …” to easily locate them. It is impractical to sticky several threads on the parable study as envisioned thus far. Please give us a few days to figure out a system and we’ll get that rolling.

Also, all one needs to do to catch up on a thread is click on your own name and then “Find all posts by …” click on your last post on that thread and you will enter the thread at that point and can begin reading and responding from there.
God bless!
MF
 
Please remain on the topic of the passage of the Gospel of John in question.

Note that I am working with NotWorthy on the parables thread concept. For those who wish to have each parable studied in a separate thread, please be aware that all you need do is click on the the OP’s name in a post and then “Find all threads started by …” to easily locate them. It is impractical to sticky several threads on the parable study as envisioned thus far. Please give us a few days to figure out a system and we’ll get that rolling.

Also, all one needs to do to catch up on a thread is click on your own name and then “Find all posts by …” click on your last post on that thread and you will enter the thread at that point and can begin reading and responding from there.
God bless!
MF
I am new here so this may be directed at me…although I don’t know if I posted incorrectly or not. ? Thanks! Kathie
 
For those interested in a little historical info:

The following footnote to 18:13 in the Ignatius Study Bible, regarding both Annas and Caiphas being referred to as high priest, peaked my interest (since I knew in OT there was only one who was high priest).

Annas: The high priest of Israel from Ad 6 to 15. Because the Romans deposed and replaced him with another priest contrary to the regulations of the Torah, many Jews still revered him as the rightful head of Israel even after he was relieved of his duties…

So, did a little more searching.
www.newadvent.org/cathen/12407b.htm
They were in the beginning chosen for life, but later removed at will by the secular power (Jos., “Ant.”, XV, iii, 1; XX, x),
bible.org/page.php?page_id=3999
The priesthood traced its lineage from Aaron through his son Eleazar to Zadok; the other son was Ithamar. The line of the High Priests was in the Zadokite family until the time of Antiochus IV Epiphanes, when Onias III had to flee for his life. Until that time, the office had a life-long tenure; but afterward the high priests were appointed and deposed at the will of the ruler, whether Seleucid, Roman, or Herodian.
Nita
 
For those interested in a little historical info:

The following footnote to 18:13 in the Ignatius Study Bible, regarding both Annas and Caiphas being referred to as high priest, peaked my interest (since I knew in OT there was only one who was high priest).

Annas: The high priest of Israel from Ad 6 to 15. Because the Romans deposed and replaced him with another priest contrary to the regulations of the Torah, many Jews still revered him as the rightful head of Israel even after he was relieved of his duties…

So, did a little more searching.

Nita
Very good! Wasn’t Annas Caiphas’ uncle or father-in-law?

Also, was Annas responsible for the execution of James, Bishop of Jerusalem. Of course, that would have made him ancient by that time (50’s AD). Whoever was the high priest, I believe he was deposed by the Roman Authorities as well. As a matter of fact, both Christians and Jews in Jerusalem were disturbed with James’ execution. That says something about the kind of man he was, able to walking the tightrope between the Jewish religion and this flegling religion that was destined to replace (or fulfill) it.
 
So, where does Caiaphas come in? I’m getting lost in the family tree, etc.:confused:
 
So, where does Caiaphas come in? I’m getting lost in the family tree, etc.:confused:
I hope I’m remembering this right.

Caiphas was Annas’ son-in-law (maybe nephew, but I think S-I-L). Annas still had some influence on Caiphas. But Caiphas was the high priest for an extended period of time. I’ll see if I can get to the facts.
 
Please do, and let us know. I’m finding this fascinating, and confirms the facts in the Bible.
 
Here’s some info from Agape Bible Study:
Annas was High Priest from 6-15AD, succeeded by his sons Eleazar and Simon and in 18AD by his son-in-law was Caiaphas who was High Priest until 36AD, but Annas was the real power.
Again, I’m not sure if this is the same Annas, for this is many years later, roughly 56AD:
James, Bishop of Jerusalem was murdered at the command of the high priest Annas, to name a few and there were many more.
Ahhhh, and here it is:
Annas, son of Annas, was high priest from 62-70AD.
 
As I have pondered Chapter 18 the last several days, one of the things I’ve done is to imagine being the various people involved (I’ve done it before, so this is not the first time.). For some reason, this time it was the soldier who had his ear cut off that captured my attention. As I contemplated the horror of having my ear cut off, and then the absolute mystery and awesomeness of having it healed instantly; the tender touch of Jesus’ finger; love conveyed;… Like being lifted out of time, and engulfed temporarily in a state of other-worldliness.

How could anyone be unchanged. It encourages me to hope and trust that the soldier was one of the early converts.

The other person who captured my attention was Pilate and his - “What is truth?” I take it to be an expression of doubt that there is such a thing as truth; and even if there is, that there is no way one can discover and know for certain if it’s true. So, I tried to imagine that as one of the foundational stones in my mind and heart. How absolutely bleak and meaningless life would seem. Like, why bother - about anything; nothing firm anywhere to count on. How thankful it made me for the gift of faith in Our Lord and for the great grace to have been born into our Catholic faith.

Would love to hear any meditative thoughts others have had regarding Chapter 18.

Nita
 
The other person who captured my attention was Pilate and his - “What is truth?” I take it to be an expression of doubt that there is such a thing as truth; and even if there is, that there is no way one can discover and know for certain if it’s true. So, I tried to imagine that as one of the foundational stones in my mind and heart. How absolutely bleak and meaningless life would seem. Like, why bother - about anything; nothing firm anywhere to count on. How thankful it made me for the gift of faith in Our Lord and for the great grace to have been born into our Catholic faith.
Anytime I come across this verse, I have a “Jesus Christ Superstar” flashback.

The words of Pilate are:

So what IS Truth? Is Truth unchanging Law?
We both have truths. Are mine the same as yours
?”

These verses always strike me, maybe because it’s one of the issues between Catholics and other Christian faiths.
 
John Chapter 19
[1] Then Pilate took Jesus and scourged him.
[2] And the soldiers plaited a crown of thorns, and put it on his head, and arrayed him in a purple robe;
[3] they came up to him, saying, “Hail, King of the Jews!” and struck him with their hands.
[4] Pilate went out again, and said to them, “See, I am bringing him out to you, that you may know that I find no crime in him.”
[5] So Jesus came out, wearing the crown of thorns and the purple robe. Pilate said to them, “Behold the man!”
[6] When the chief priests and the officers saw him, they cried out, “Crucify him, crucify him!” Pilate said to them, “Take him yourselves and crucify him, for I find no crime in him.”
[7] The Jews answered him, “We have a law, and by that law he ought to die, because he has made himself the Son of God.”
[8] When Pilate heard these words, he was the more afraid;
[9] he entered the praetorium again and said to Jesus, “Where are you from?” But Jesus gave no answer.
[10] Pilate therefore said to him, “You will not speak to me? Do you not know that I have power to release you, and power to crucify you?”
[11] Jesus answered him, “You would have no power over me unless it had been given you from above; therefore he who delivered me to you has the greater sin.”
[12] Upon this Pilate sought to release him, but the Jews cried out, “If you release this man, you are not Caesar’s friend; every one who makes himself a king sets himself against Caesar.”
[13] When Pilate heard these words, he brought Jesus out and sat down on the judgment seat at a place called The Pavement, and in Hebrew, Gab’batha.
[14] Now it was the day of Preparation of the Passover; it was about the sixth hour. He said to the Jews, “Behold your King!”
[15] They cried out, “Away with him, away with him, crucify him!” Pilate said to them, “Shall I crucify your King?” The chief priests answered, “We have no king but Caesar.”
[16] Then he handed him over to them to be crucified.
[17] So they took Jesus, and he went out, bearing his own cross, to the place called the place of a skull, which is called in Hebrew Gol’gotha.
[18] There they crucified him, and with him two others, one on either side, and Jesus between them.
[19] Pilate also wrote a title and put it on the cross; it read, “Jesus of Nazareth, the King of the Jews.”
[20] Many of the Jews read this title, for the place where Jesus was crucified was near the city; and it was written in Hebrew, in Latin, and in Greek.
[21] The chief priests of the Jews then said to Pilate, “Do not write, The King of the Jews,' but, This man said, I am King of the Jews.’”
[22] Pilate answered, “What I have written I have written.”
[23] When the soldiers had crucified Jesus they took his garments and made four parts, one for each soldier; also his tunic. But the tunic was without seam, woven from top to bottom;
[24] so they said to one another, “Let us not tear it, but cast lots for it to see whose it shall be.” This was to fulfil the scripture, “They parted my garments among them,
and for my clothing they cast lots.”
[25] So the soldiers did this. But standing by the cross of Jesus were his mother, and his mother’s sister, Mary the wife of Clopas, and Mary Mag’dalene.
[26] When Jesus saw his mother, and the disciple whom he loved standing near, he said to his mother, “Woman, behold, your son!”
[27] Then he said to the disciple, “Behold, your mother!” And from that hour the disciple took her to his own home.
[28] After this Jesus, knowing that all was now finished, said (to fulfil the scripture), “I thirst.”
[29] A bowl full of vinegar stood there; so they put a sponge full of the vinegar on hyssop and held it to his mouth.
[30] When Jesus had received the vinegar, he said, “It is finished”; and he bowed his head and gave up his spirit.
[31] Since it was the day of Preparation, in order to prevent the bodies from remaining on the cross on the sabbath (for that sabbath was a high day), the Jews asked Pilate that their legs might be broken, and that they might be taken away.
[32] So the soldiers came and broke the legs of the first, and of the other who had been crucified with him;
[33] but when they came to Jesus and saw that he was already dead, they did not break his legs.
[34] But one of the soldiers pierced his side with a spear, and at once there came out blood and water.
[35] He who saw it has borne witness – his testimony is true, and he knows that he tells the truth – that you also may believe.
[36] For these things took place that the scripture might be fulfilled, “Not a bone of him shall be broken.”
[37] And again another scripture says, “They shall look on him whom they have pierced.”
[38] After this Joseph of Arimathe’a, who was a disciple of Jesus, but secretly, for fear of the Jews, asked Pilate that he might take away the body of Jesus, and Pilate gave him leave. So he came and took away his body.
[39] Nicode’mus also, who had at first come to him by night, came bringing a mixture of myrrh and aloes, about a hundred pounds’ weight.
[40] They took the body of Jesus, and bound it in linen cloths with the spices, as is the burial custom of the Jews.
[41] Now in the place where he was crucified there was a garden, and in the garden a new tomb where no one had ever been laid.
[42] So because of the Jewish day of Preparation, as the tomb was close at hand, they laid Jesus there.
 
I used to think that Pilate was the ultimate turkey, fearing an immediate revolt. Consider the Jews’ rules of engagement: they could not enter his fort, could not kill any of his soldiers if they left, had to be home by dark (also had a lot of shopping and preparation to do before then) and couldn’t leave home the next day.

Then I came to see him as a man well and truly between a rock and a hard spot. Tradition holds that his wife, Claudia, was a Christian; Orthodox list her as a saint. A lot of his actions make sense in that light. He couldn’t condemn Jesus without also condemning Claudia, thus the many protests of His innocence. He couldn’t release Jesus without leaving his whole family open to charges of treason, thus the fear that he would be said to be “not Caesar’s friend”.

Then I came to see him as a man more like myself than I’d wish. Always wondered why Jesus said so little to him. Realized that he was so full of his own importance, and duty to family & country, and a hundred other things; that he was not able to hear much of what Jesus had to say.
 
the sick, the lonely, the crushed and the poor identify with this agony of Jesus, because he has CHOSEN to share in their pain. This scene convinces them that God now knows what they suffer because, in his Son, he experiences human suffering and humiliation. This God is no bystander in the face of human pain. this God is truly compassionate in that basic meaning of the word-one who suffers with.
Our suffering is overcome by Christ’s suffering. “He was wounded for our trangressions, he was bruised for our iniquities. Upon Him was the chastisement that made us whole. With his stripes we are healed” Our wounds are healed by Christ’s wounds, not necessarily through miraculous cures but by the gift of faith Jesus offers, a faith that involves pain in the goal of liberation from sin.
Hail King of the Jews, crowned with thorns. What a contrast between Sunday’s palms of Glory, and the palms of thorns woven into a crown. The soldiers knelt before the King of Glory mocking. How ironic that the heartless knelt before the “King of Hearts”…
 
vs. 14-16, Pilate hands off Jesus to be crucified
It was the sixth hour
It was noon
The priests of the temple had begun the sacrifice of the lambs.
John the baptist pointed to Jesus, at the beginning of this Gospel, and calls him God’s lamb. the sacrifice of the Passover lambs at the temple will be matched by the sacrifice of the Lamb of God who marches to the cross to save us from our sins.
I can still remember the feeling I got the first time this was pointed out to me, that the passover lambs were being slaughtered in the temple at the same time Jesus was being crucified. It was like someone hit me in the head with a 2x4.
 
RedWolf,

That bit on Claudia is interesting. Seems strange, though, for Claudia is quite a Roman sounding name – perhaps it was her Roman nickname? (eg: like Paul->Saul?). If she were not a Jew beforehand whom Pilate had married, then I wonder since Jesus did not come to preach to the Pagans but rather first to the Jews – what special event, do you think, had drawn her to see and believe in him before the dream…

Those churches which hold she was a Christinan, do you know on what they base the idea – is it some extrabiblical document or a tradition?
 
As far as Pilate goes from the Roman side, I am struck by how Jesus had phrased his comments to him and the compatibility of the theological statements.
To the Romans, the “gods” were often spoken of as having sex with women on earth whom they lustfully enjoyed – and the stories were rampant about the superhero strength and revenge wrought from the destruction of such characters by human forces at the hands of the gods. How revenge and reprise followed on these kind of decisions…

I also wonder, since Herod had desired to see Jesus before because of “these powers” that are at work in him, what Pilate had heard of Jesus. Did he know about the healing of Malchus and the drawn sword of Peter? Immediately before this Jesus is found saying “if I were a king on earth, my subjects would be fighting…”

But also, here in this passage, the author appears to bring up irrelevant or at least very obscure facts – and yet, they were obviously important to him. The crown of thorns, the royal purple that Herod sent Jesus back in, the dialogue of Herod with the Jews over the point of Caesar.

As I think about this, and how long afterward John wrote his Gospel – I am trying to understand why an old man writing his memoirs of the crucifixion chose these elements to focus on – what was in his audience, or perhaps what was ingraned in himself that these particular things were what he found so important to record.

I do notice small points, that the priests fear of entering the Praetorium because of the passover, and some other indications, mean that this passover was probably the backup one (there were two permitted every year) the later one for those who were ceremonially unclean at the first – or perhaps Rome had limited it to a single event whether unclean or not, I don’t know – but then what Jew could be in the Praetorium except those whom had already celebrated the early passover to know what events took place inside.

The Jews who resisted rule by Rome are found saying “We have no king but Caesar.” So they flattered Rome and spit in Herod’s family face at the same time. Yet why say such a thing to Pilate when surely he knew they despised Roman rule.
And I am thinking about how even John himself in the book of Revelation would allude to Nero the Roman emporer under the sign of the Beast, 666.
In theory, the Jews had no king except God – and ever since they demanded Saul so that they could be “like other nations”, they had been involved with earthly kings.

But if I take the meaning of the passage as purely Ironic, purely the fulfillment of scripture in unexpected ways – then I am struck by things which I do not fully understand.

I wonder at the nails in Jesus’ hands, and the refusal to break any bone – or have any imperfection at all in the sacrificial lamb. How then, does one nail him through the wrist without breaking a bone – I am sure that in some way it happened.

Jesus being pierced in the same fashion as a lamb makes sense, the use of “side” instead of heart in deference to the “sign” of Adam’s wife Eve coming forth from his rib makes sense – although I also tend to think of this in terms of the heart, – the blood and water which gushed forth are some kind of testimony in the eyes of John, and clearly in the eyes of the Catholic Church, and the devotion of divine mercy. Though their exact meaning, and any ironic reading of them is beyond me. They are the signs of Life and Death both – the water like baptism, is a plunging or drowning to death – the blood is the life, which is so ingraned into the meaning of the sacrificial lamb.

But also, what to make of Pilate saying he found no fault in him – in the earlier encounter, but then John phrasing it in sentence [12] that at this later time “Pilate sought to release him” – when in fact he seems to have been trying to release him the whole time.

I also am struck by the idea of paradise, mentioned in one of the other Gospels, I think, in conjunction with Garden. Although Eden in theory was a “paradise” in Greek – a Persian garden of sorts – the Garden of the Cross is much the same as the Earthly eden – a place of death and blood.
 
All I can say is that the first 18 lines of this Gospel, the Prologue, is packed with more Catholic Doctrine than any other 18 verses of the Bible. At least in my book they are!!! The Prologue used to confuse me, but now it makes much more sense!
After a very long absence from Catholic Answers All I can say is that John chapter 1 and 2 are the complete Father’s plan on salvation that will be explained by the Son’s Plan in chapter 3-12,26 and completed by the Holy Spirit’s plan that starts at 12,27. Jesus’ portion contains the two wonderful chapters (5+6) on the EUCHARIST.
Notworthy, I love your line on baptism…
God BLESS!!!
 
I wouldn’t get too side tracked on untraceable traditions. Suffice it to say that while tradition runs the gambit regarding Pilate, it is consistent regarding Claudia being a Christian (Claudia Procula, aka Prokla, Prokles, etc.). I mentioned it only because it seems to make sense of Pilate’s unusual behavior. As to how she may have become a Christian, who knows? But Pilate’s usual residence was relatively near the area Jesus operated in and some back and forth seems likely. A man goes around doing miracles, and people will tend to talk. Considering some of the crowds Jesus gathered, etc., I suspect that Pilate must have had intelligence on Jesus for some time, and that may also account for Pilate repeatedly declaring Jesus innocent. If, repeat if, there is truth to allegations of Claudia’s lineage, she may have had her own intelligence network. This is speculation, let’s get back to study.
 
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