John 5:17

Ver. 17. “ Jesus answered them: My Father worketh until now, and I work. ”

The aorist middle ἀπεκρίνατο is found only here and in John 5:19; perhaps also John 12:23. Its use may be occasioned by the personal, apologetic character of the following discourse. This utterance, like that of John 2:19 (comp. Luke 2:49), is like a flash of light breaking forth from the inmost depths of the consciousness of Jesus, from the point of mysterious union where He inwardly receives the Father's impulse. These sudden and immeasurably profound outbreakings of thought distinguish the language of Jesus from all other language.

These words are ordinarily explained in this sense: “My Father works continually (that is without allowing Himself to stop on the Sabbath), and, for myself, I work in the same way, without being bound by the legal statute;” either in that this declaration is applied to the work of God in the preservation of the universe, when once the creation is finished, (Reuss), or in that it is referred to the work of the salvation of humanity, which admits of no interruption (Meyer). In both cases, Jesus would affirm that He is no more subjected, as a man, to the obligation of the Sabbatic rest, than is God Himself. But if this were, indeed, His thought, He would not have said: until this very hour (ἔως ἄρτι), but always, continually (ἀεί). This objection is the more serious, because, according to the position of the words, this adverb of time, and not the verb, has the emphasis. Then, in the second member of the sentence, Jesus could not have refrained from either repeating the adverb or substituting for it the word ὁμοίως, in the same way; “And I also work continually, or likewise.”

Besides, it would have been very easy to answer to this argument that the position of a man with regard to the Sabbatic commandment is not the same with that of God. Finally the declaration of Jesus, thus understood, would contradict the attitude of submission to the law which He constantly observed during His life. Born a Jew, He lived as a faithful Jew. He emancipated Himself, undoubtedly, from the yoke of human commandments and Pharisaic traditions, but never from that of the law itself. It is impossible to prove in the life of Jesus a single contravention of a truly legal prescription. Death alone freed Him from this yoke. Such is the impression which He left, that St. Paul says of Him (Galatians 4:4): “ born under the law,” and characterizes His whole life by the expression (Romans 15:8): “ minister of the circumcision. ” Luthardt has fully perceived the special sense which the adverb ἔως ἄρτι, until this hour, must have. He has had the idea of contrasting it, not with the Sabbatic institution, but with the final Sabbath yet to come: “Since up to this time the work of salvation has not been consummated, as it will be in the future Sabbath, and consequently my Father works still, I also work.” This sense is certainly much nearer to the thought of Jesus; only the antithesis between the present Sabbath and the Sabbath to come is not indicated by anything in the text.

To apprehend thoroughly the meaning of this utterance, let us for a moment set aside the words ἕως ἄρτι, until this hour. Jesus says: “My Father works, and I also work.” The relation between these two propositions is obvious. We easily understand that it is necessary to combine logically what is grammatically in juxtaposition, and that it is as if it were: “ Since my Father works, I also work.” The Son cannot remain idle when the Father is working. We find again here that paratactic construction which is conformed to the genius of the Hebrew language, and which expresses by the simple copula, and, one of the numerous logical relations which the genius of the Greek states with precision by means of some other conjunction; comp. John 1:10; John 2:9, etc. Nothing is changed in this relation by the addition of the adverb ἐως ἄρτι, until this hour. The meaning becomes the following: “Since my Father works up to this moment, I also work.” Passow, in his Dictionary, remarks that in Greek, especially in the later writers, ἄρτι following καί, as is the case here, serves to indicate the immediate and rapid succession of two states; thus in this sentence: ἄρτι ἀπείργαστο τὸ ἆσμα καὶ ἀπῆλθεν (the song was no sooner finished than he departed).

This is precisely the relation of immediate succession which Jesus affirms here as the law of His activity, as the true relation between His Father's work and His own, from which He draws the justification of the miracle which had been made the subject of incrimination. Westcott, Weiss and Keil are unwilling to see here an idea of subordination; they claim that the work of the Son is much rather co-ordinated with that of the Father. But this alleged co-ordination would not justify Jesus; for, as we have already said, the position of a man cannot be compared to that of God. We must reach the point of dependence in order that the argument may avail. And this relation of dependence it is, indeed, which appears from the relation between the two propositions: “Since my Father works until this moment, I also work.” In order to grasp the meaning of this word, at once simple and profound, it is sufficient to imagine Jesus working with Joseph in the carpenter's shop at Nazareth. Can we not readily understand the reply which He would have addressed to the one who wished to turn Him aside from the work: “My Father works until now, and I also [consequently] cannot cease to work.” Jesus finds Himself now with His Heavenly Father in a vaster workshop; He sees God at work in the theocracy and in the whole world, occupied with working for the salvation of mankind, and He suits His own local and personal working to this immense work. This is what He has just done in healing the impotent man; this modest healing is a link in the great chain suspended from His Father's hand, a real factor in the work which God is accomplishing here on earth. The development of this thought will follow in John 5:19-20.

The meaning, therefore, is not: “I, as truly as God, have the right to work on the Sabbath;” but: “I have done nothing but obey the signal which God gave me at the moment...” Jesus sets forth, not the continuity of His working, but his filial and devoted adaptation to the work of the Father. And if objection is made that this amounts to the same thing, since God might direct Him to work even on the Sabbath, the answer is easy. God will not direct him to do anything which is contrary to the position of Jew, which He has imposed upon Him for the time of His earthly life. And He has done this none the more in this case, since neither the way in which Jesus healed the impotent man, nor the return of the latter to His dwelling, carrying his bed, really fell under the prohibition of the Mosaic law, as rightly understood. Hilgenfeld has gone even so far as to see in this saying of the Gospel an intentional contradiction of the idea of the rest of God in Genesis.

But the rest in Genesis refers to the work of God in the sphere of nature, while the question here is of the divine work for the salvation of the human race. Is there here, as is affirmed, pretentious metaphysics? No. It is the deepest foundation of the peculiar filial life of Jesus, which all at once appears in this marvelously concise saying. The life of Socrates presents a phenomenon which has some analogy to that of which we have just had a glimpse. His genius arrested him when he was on the point of acting contrary to the will of the gods. But what a distance between this purely negative action and the positive divine impulse to which Jesus attaches His whole work! And what an appropriateness in this saying, what an imposing apology! It was to say to His adversaries: In accusing me, it is the Father whom you accuse. It is the legislator Himself whom you reproach with the transgression of the law; for I only act on a signal received from Him. We can understand, however, how this saying, instead of pacifying the adversaries, was only like the drop of oil thrown upon the fire, and caused their rage to overflow.