Expositor's Greek Testament (Nicoll)

John 16:31

To this enthusiastic confession Jesus makes the sobering and pathetic reply: Ἄρτι πιστεύετε; Do ye now believe that I am God's Representative? Is this your present attitude? ἰδοὺ, ἔρχεται ὥρα καὶ νῦν ἐλήλυθεν, “Behold, the hour is coming and is come,” so imminent is it that the perfect may be used. ἵνα σκορπισθῆτε … ἀφῆτε. Cf. 1Ma 6:54. ἐσκορπίσθησαν ἔκαστος εἰς τὸν τόπον αὐτοῦ. In John 10:12 the wolf σκορπίζει τὰ πρόβατα. Cf. especially Mark 14:27. εἰς τὰ ἴδια frequently of one's own house, cf. John 19:27; Acts 21:6; Esther 5:10; Esther 6:12. Here perhaps it is somewhat less definite, “to his own” is better than “to his own house”. It includes “to his own interests,” or “pursuits,” or “familiar surroundings,” or “private affairs,” or all these together. Those whom He had gathered round Him and who believed in Him were yet destined to fail Him in the critical hour, and were to scatter each to his own, for the time abandoning the cause and Person who had held them together, leaving their loved Master (John 16:27) alone. καὶ οὐκ εἰμὶ μόνος … ἐστι, “and (yet) I am not alone, because the Father is with me”. This presence supplies the lack of all other company. He was destined to lose for a time the consciousness even of this presence, Matthew 27:46.

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Expositor's Greek Testament (Nicoll)

John 16:31

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