John 19:37

They shall look All present, especially the Jews. The whole world was represented there.

pierced See on John 19:34. The word here used occurs nowhere else in N.T. excepting Revelation 1:7, and forms a connexion worth noting between the Gospel and the Apocalypse (see on John 11:44; John 15:20, and John 20:16); all the more so because S. John here agrees with the present Masoretic Hebrew text and in every word differs from the Greek of the LXX. The Greek softens down -pierced through" (which seemed a strange expression to use of men's treatment of Jehovah) into -insulted." See on John 6:45; John 12:13; John 12:15, where there is further evidence of the Evangelist having independent knowledge of Hebrew, and therefore being a Jew of Palestine.