The paralytic at the pool of Bethzatha
1 After this there was a feast of the Jews and Je sus went up to Jerusalem.
2 Now, by the Sheep Gate in Je rusalem, there is a pool (called Beth zatha in Hebrew) surrounded by five galleries.
3 In these galleries lay a multitude of sick people – blind, lame and paralyzed.
3 ( 4 All were waiting for the water to move, for at times an angel of the Lord would descend into the pool and stir up the water; and the first person to enter after this movement of the water would be healed of whatever disease that person had.)
5 There was a man who had been sick for thirty-eight years.
6 Jesus saw him, and since he knew how long this man had been lying there, he said to him, “Do you want to be healed?”
7 And the sick man an swered, “Sir, I have no one to put me into the pool when the water is dis turbed; so while I am still on my way, another steps down before me.”
8 Jesus then said to him, “Stand up, take your mat and walk.”
9 And at once the man was healed, and he took up his mat and walked.
Now that day happened to be the Sabbath.
10 So the Jews said to the man who had just been healed, “It is the Sabbath and the Law doesn’t allow you to carry your mat.”
11 He answered them, “The one who healed me said to me: Take up your mat and walk.”
12 They asked him, “Who is the one who said to you: Take up your mat and walk?”
13 But the sick man had no idea who it was who had cured him, for Jesus had slipped away among the crowd that filled the place.
14 Afterwards Jesus met him in the Temple court and told him, ”Now you are well; don’t sin again, lest something worse happen to you.”
15 And the man went back and told the Jews that it was Jesus who had healed him.
16 So the Jews persecuted Jesus because he per formed healings like that on the Sabbath.
17 Jesus replied, “My Father goes on working and so do I.”
18 And the Jews tried all the harder to kill him, for Jesus not only broke the Sabbath observance, but also made himself equal with God, calling him his own Father.
The work of the Son is to give life
19 Jesus said to them, “Truly, I assure you, the Son cannot do anything by himself, but only what he sees the Father do. And whatever he does, the Son also does.
20 The Father loves the Son and shows him everything he does; and he will show him even greater things than these, so that you will be amazed.
21 As the Father raises the dead and gives them life, so the Son gives life to whom he wills.
22 In the same way the Father judges no one, for he has en trusted all judgment to the Son,
23 and he wants all to honor the Son as they honor the Father. Who ever ignores the Son, ignores as well the Father who sent him.
24 Truly, I say to you, anyone who hears my word and believes him who sent me, has eternal life; and there is no judgment for him because he has passed from death to life.
25 Truly, the hour is coming and has indeed come, when the dead will hear the voice of the Son of God and, on hearing it, will live.
26 For the Father has life in himself and he has given to the Son also to have life in himself.
27 And he has empowered him as well to carry out Judgment, for he is a son of man.
28 Do not be surprised at this: the hour is coming when all those lying in tombs will hear my voice
29 and come out; those who have done good shall rise to live, and those who have done evil will rise to be con demn ed.
30 I can do nothing of myself, and I need to hear Another One to judge; and my judgment is just, be cause I seek not my own will, but the will of him who sent me.
31 If I bore witness to myself, my testimony would be worthless.
32 But Another One is bearing witness to me and I know that his testimony is true when he bears witness to me.
33 John also bore witness to the truth when you sent messengers to him,
34 but I do not seek such human testimony; I recall this for you, so that you may be saved.
35 John was a burning and shining lamp, and for a while you were willing to enjoy his light.
36 But I have greater evidence than that of John – the works which the Father entrusted to me to carry out. The very works I do bear witness: the Father has sent me.
37 Thus he who bears witness to me is the Father who sent me. You have never heard his voice and have never seen his likeness;
38 then, as long as you do not believe his messenger, his word is not in you.
39 You search in the Scriptures thinking that in them you will find life; yet Scripture bears witness to me.
40 But you refuse to come to me, that you may live.
41 I am not seeking human praise;
42 but I have known that love of God is not within you,
43 for I have come in my Father’s name and you do not accept me. If another comes in his own name, you will accept him.
44 As long as you seek praise from one another in stead of seeking the glory coming from the only God, how can you believe?
45 Do not think that I shall accuse you to the Father. Moses himself in whom you placed your hope, ac cuses you.
46 If you believed Moses, you would believe me, for he wrote of me.
47 But if you do not believe what he wrote, how will you believe what I say?
7 [Bol] 19 Moses gave you the Law, didn’t he? But none of you keep the Law. Why, then, do you want to kill me?”
20 The people replied, “You have a demon; who wants to kill you?”
21 Jesus said to them, “I performed just one deed, and you are all astounded by it.
22 But remember the circumcision ordered by Moses – actually it was not Moses but the ancestors who began this practice. You circumcise a man even on the Sabbath,
23 and you would break the Law if you refused to do so because of the Sabbath. How is it, then, that you are indignant with me because I healed the whole person on the Sabbath?
24 Do not judge by appearances, but according to what is right.”
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Comments John, Chapter 5
• 5.1 Why did Jesus go to the Pool of Bethzatha? It is known that the said pool was a pagan place dedicated to Aesculapius, the god of health. Rumors abounded that, from time to time, the sick were healed there. The pious Jews, scandalized that healings should occur in a pagan place, main tained that people were healed not by Aesculapius but by an angel of the Lord. Unscrupulous Jews went there to seek a cure even from pagan idols. Jesus, too, went there, but in search of the sinner he wished to save.
Note the sick man’s first response. In this miraculous place many hoped for a cure but few were healed. By ourselves alone – I have no one – we cannot be saved. We need a Savior.
Jesus disappears after the miracle. Some people might have said that he was at ease in a pagan temple, or think he healed the sick in the name of their gods. Jesus will make himself known in the Temple of the true God, his Father.
The Jews attacked Jesus because he “worked” on the Sabbath day. Let us examine Jesus’ reply more closely: My Father goes on working. It is well that people observe a day of rest to pay homage to God; yet God himself does not rest, nor is he absent from the world: he gives life to people. Being God-the-Son, Jesus should imitate God the Father instead of resting like people do. His enemies, on hearing him, were not mis taken about his claims: they wanted to kill him because he made himself equal with God (v. 18).
Don’t sin again… (v. 14). Jesus reminds the sick man of his lack of faith that led him to the pagan sanctuary where he waited in vain for 38 years, just as in former times the Israelites remained secluded 38 years in the oasis of Kadesh in the desert, without be ing able to enter the Promised Land. John noted this coincidence. He also understood that the cure in the pool represented baptism. Jesus’ remark to the healed person is addressed to those who have been converted and baptized: Do not sin again.
After this account the Christian faith is presented again. See commentary on John 3:11.
It should be mentioned that in these “discourses” John the Evangelist is fond of repeating key words of the discourses seven times. Here, for example, we find the words Sab bath, Jesus, and Moses seven times each; and the Father 14 times. John intends to contrast the Jew ish religion instituted by Moses, whose major precept was the Sabbath rest, with that of the new times which Jesus came to inaugurate, wherein he enables us to know the Father.
• 19. THE SON AND THE FATHER, THE RESURRECTION
Jesus’ opponents were surprised to see how he violated the law of the sacred rest; this, however, was only the first intervention of Jesus (7:21). Jesus intends to do much more than just reform religion: he has come to renew the whole of creation.
The books of the Old Testament spoke of God as only one. Now Jesus shows us a new face of God: he is Father and has sent his Son to complete his work. In all that he does, God endeavors to give us life, and the greatest of his works is the Resurrection.
This rising from the dead does not mean “to return to life” but to begin a new and transformed life. The dead will rise again, of course (v. 28), but we can also speak of the resurrection in the lives of those who become believers. A word of Jesus accepted in faith gives us life and later takes root in us and transforms us. Together, the Father and the Son raise us to new life. God’s love, which engenders life, reaches us through the voice of Christ (v. 25). Compare v. 25 with v. 28.
Jesus then is not only human like us. Though human, he is also divine and reveals to us another face of God. Jesus wants to replace in our minds any image of God as a jealous or paternalistic God. The Gospel shows the Father giving all his authority to a human, to Christ. This re sonates with modern psychology that teach es that a person is not fully adult until he liberates himself from parental authority. Our contemporary world rightly rejects a paternalistic God.
On numerous occasions, Jesus called himself the Son of Man (See the explanation in Mark 8:27). Here John says a son of man (v. 27); that is, a Jewish idiom which means a human being. By being human, Jesus saves humanity from within.
When Jesus claims to be the Son, he repeats these two affirmations in various ways:
– Everything that my Father does, I do; all that the Father has, I have.
– and: I cannot do anything by myself.
In this way, Jesus is a model for the sons and daughters of God. We also should commune with the Father, so that he may teach us his works: there is no Christian life without prayer, that is, without a personal relationship with God.
• 30. THE TESTIMONY
To gain a direction in life, we need some un der standing of the world and humankind. This understanding may come through reason and science, but more often we are influenced and guided by the testimony of others – by their words, attitudes and personal qualities.
It is thus that those in love discover one another, friends accept each other, a career is decided upon, a religious or political commitment is made. It is also thus that the Word of God is discovered. Therefore, Jesus speaks of the testimonies that accredit him:
– his works, that is, his miracles.
– John the Baptist’s testimony in pointing him out as the Savior.
– the words of the Bible that refer to him.
Some people say that since the Bible is the word of God they do not need anything more than that to guide them. Let them know that just as God spoke through events and through prophets, he con tinues speaking to us through actual events and through spokespersons of the Spirit in the Church. Jesus rebuked those who believed they possessed the truth just by having the Bible, but did not believe in him whom God was sending them (v. 38).
God instructs us in his way when we listen to what others teach us; in daily life and within the Church we meet people living according to the Spirit, whereas others only pretend to be religious and upright persons.
How then do we distinguish between what is true and what is false? How do we recognize those who speak of God’s ways from personal experience? Jesus says that those who love the truth recognize those who speak the truth. Everyone values the testimony of an equal. To recognize the messengers of God, we must be the peo ple who do not look for praise from one another, and thus are not enslaved by false values. Whoever seeks the truth and mercy will recognize a communication of the Glory of God in the words and actions of God’s more humble servants.
It pleases God when we recognize his witnesses. He desires everyone to honor the Son just as his Father does. By believing in his Son, we show ourselves worthy of his trust and thus become God’s children, open to his life.