¹ sn If it was obvious to the soldiers that the victim was already dead it is difficult to see why one of them would try to inflict a wound. The Greek verb pierced (νύσσω, nussō) can indicate anything from a slight prod to a mortal wound. Probably one of the soldiers gave an exploratory stab to see if the body would jerk. If not, he was really dead. This thrust was hard enough to penetrate the side, since the author states that blood and water flowed out immediately.

³ sn Look, here is the man! Pilate may have meant no more than something like “Here is the accused!” or in a contemptuous way, “Here is your king!” Others have taken Pilate’s statement as intended to evoke pity from Jesus’ accusers: “Look at this poor fellow!” (Jesus would certainly not have looked very impressive after the scourging). For the author, however, Pilate’s words constituted an unconscious allusion to Zech 6:12, “Look, here is the man whose name is the Branch.” In this case Pilate (unknowingly and ironically) presented Jesus to the nation under a messianic title.

³ sn The crown of thorns was a crown plaited of some thorny material, intended as a mockery of Jesus’ “kingship.” Traditionally it has been regarded as an additional instrument of torture, but it seems more probable the purpose of the thorns was not necessarily to inflict more physical suffering but to imitate the spikes of the “radiant corona,” a type of crown portrayed on ruler’s heads on many coins of the period; the spikes on this type of crown represented rays of light pointing outward (the best contemporary illustration is the crown on the head of the Statue of Liberty in New York harbor).

¹ sn The kingdom (of God) is a major theme of Jesus’ teaching. The nature of the kingdom of God in the NT and in Jesus’ teaching has long been debated by interpreters and scholars, with discussion primarily centering around the nature of the kingdom (earthly, heavenly, or both) and the kingdom’s arrival (present, future, or both). An additional major issue concerns the relationship between the kingdom of God and the person and work of Jesus himself, as here where Jesus refers to My kingdom.

² sn This is a parenthetical note by the author. Before he states the response to Jesus’ identification of himself, the author inserts a parenthetical note that Judas, again identified as the one who betrayed him (cf. 18:2), was standing with the group of soldiers and officers of the chief priests. Many commentators have considered this to be an awkward insertion, but in fact it heightens considerably the dramatic effect of the response to Jesus’ self-identification in the following verse, and has the added effect of informing the reader that along with the others the betrayer himself ironically falls down at Jesus’ feet (18:6).

² tn The phrase “officers of the chief priests and Pharisees” is a comprehensive name for the groups represented in the ruling council (the Sanhedrin) as in John 7:32, 45; 18:3, 12, 18, 22; 19:6. They are different from the Levites who served as “temple police” according to K. H. Rengstorf (TDNT 8:540). In John 7:32ff. these officers had made an unsuccessful attempt to arrest Jesus, and perhaps this is part of the reason why their leaders had made sure they were accompanied by Roman soldiers this time. No more mistakes were to be tolerated.

⁶ sn A possible allusion to Ps 41:9 or Prov 24:22 LXX. The exact passage is not specified here, but in John 13:18, Ps 41:9 is explicitly quoted by Jesus with reference to the traitor, suggesting that this is the passage to which Jesus refers here. The previous mention of Ps 41:9 in John 13:18 probably explains why the author felt no need for an explanatory parenthetical note here. It is also possible that the passage referred to here is Prov 24:22 LXX, where in the Greek text the phrase “son of destruction” appears.

¹ tc A number of early mss (א¹ B C* D L co) read πατρός (patros, “Father”) here instead of θεοῦ (theou, “God”; found in P⁵ א*^,2 A C³ W Θ Ψ 33 ƒ^1,13 M). Although externally πατρός has relatively strong support, it is evidently an assimilation to “I came from the Father” at the beginning of v. 28, or more generally to the consistent mention of God as Father throughout this chapter (πατήρ [patēr, “Father”] occurs eleven times in this chapter, while θεός [theos, “God”] occurs only two other times [16:2, 30]).

¹ tn Or “that.” It is very difficult to determine whether ὅτι (hoti; 3 times in 16:9, 10, 11) should be understood as causal or appositional/explanatory: Brown and Bultmann favor appositional or explanatory, while Barrett and Morris prefer a causal sense. A causal idea is preferable here, since it also fits the parallel statements in vv. 10-11 better than an appositional or explanatory use would. In this case Jesus is stating in each instance the reason why the world is proven guilty or wrong by the Spirit-Paraclete.

³ tn Or “he now loved them completely,” or “he now loved them to the uttermost” (see John 19:30). All of John 13:1 is a single sentence in Greek, although in English this would be unacceptably awkward. At the end of the verse the idiom εἰς τέλος (eis telos) was translated literally as “to the end” and the modern equivalents given in the note above because there is an important lexical link between this passage and John 19:30, τετέλεσται (tetelestai, “It is ended”).

³ tn The words “Jesus to be the Christ” are not in the Greek text, but are implied (see 9:22). As is often the case in Greek, the direct object is omitted for the verb ὡμολόγουν (hōmologoun). Some translators supply an ambiguous “it,” or derive the implied direct object from the previous clause “believed in him” so that the rulers would not confess “their faith” or “their belief.” However, when one compares John 9:22, which has many verbal parallels to this verse, it seems clear that the content of the confession would have been “Jesus is the Christ (i.e., Messiah).”

² sn The phrase driven out must refer to Satan’s loss of authority over this world. This must be in principle rather than in immediate fact, since 1 John 5:19 states that the whole world (still) lies in the power of the evil one (a reference to Satan). In an absolute sense the reference is proleptic. The coming of Jesus’ hour (his crucifixion, death, resurrection, and exaltation to the Father) marks the end of Satan’s domain and brings about his defeat, even though that defeat has not been ultimately worked out in history yet and awaits the consummation of the age.

³ sn The statement I have other sheep that do not come from this sheepfold almost certainly refers to Gentiles. Jesus has sheep in the fold who are Jewish; there are other sheep which, while not of the same fold, belong to him also. This recalls the mission of the Son in 3:16-17, which was to save the world—not just the nation of Israel. Such an emphasis would be particularly appropriate to the author if he were writing to a non-Palestinian and primarily non-Jewish audience.

¹ tn Since the Greek phrase εἰσέρχομαι καὶ ἐξέρχομαι (eiserchomai kai exerchomai, “come in and go out”) is in some places an idiom for living or conducting oneself in relationship to some community (“to live with, to live among” [cf. Acts 1:21; see also Num 27:17; 2 Chr 1:10]), it may well be that Jesus’ words here look forward to the new covenant community of believers. Another significant NT text is Luke 9:4, where both these verbs occur in the context of the safety and security provided by a given household for the disciples. See also BDAG 294 s.v. εἰσέρχομαι 1.b.β.

¹ tn Or “the Jewish religious authorities”; Grk “the Jews.” In NT usage the term ᾿Ιουδαῖοι (Ioudaioi) may refer to the entire Jewish people, the residents of Jerusalem and surrounding territory, the authorities in Jerusalem, or merely those who were hostile to Jesus. (For further information see R. G. Bratcher, “‘The Jews’ in the Gospel of John,” BT 26 [1975]: 401-9.) Here the phrase refers mainly to the Pharisees, mentioned by name in John 9:13, 15, 16. References in this context to Pharisees and to the synagogue (v. 22) suggest an emphasis on the religious nature of the debate which is brought out by the translation “the Jewish religious leaders.”

⁵ tc Some significant mss (P⁶⁶ B* [700]) have the present imperative ποιεῖτε (poieite) here: “If you are Abraham’s children, then do,” while many others (א² C K L N Δ Ψ ƒ^1,13 33 565 579 892 pm) add the contingent particle ἄν (an) to ἐποιεῖτε (epoieite) making it a more proper second class condition by Attic standards. The simple ἐποιεῖτε without the ἄν is the hardest reading, and is found in some excellent witnesses (P⁷⁵ א* B² D W Γ Θ 070 0250 1424 pm).

² tn The expression οὖν πάλιν (oun palin) indicates some sort of break in the sequence of events, but it is not clear how long. The author does not mention the interval between 8:12-20 and this next recorded dialogue. The feast of Tabernacles is past, and the next reference to time is 10:22, where the feast of the Dedication is mentioned. The interval is two months, and these discussions could have taken place at any time within that interval, as long as one assumes something of a loose chronological framework. However, if the material in the Fourth Gospel is arranged theologically or thematically, such an assumption would not apply.

³ tn Or possibly “Jesus bent down and wrote an accusation on the ground with his finger.” The Greek verb καταγράφω (katagraphō) may indicate only the action of writing on the ground by Jesus, but in the overall context (Jesus’ response to the accusation against the woman) it can also be interpreted as implying that what Jesus wrote was a counteraccusation against the accusers (although there is no clue as to the actual content of what he wrote, some scribes added “the sins of each one of them” either here or at the end of v. 8 [U 264 700 al]).

¹ tc Most witnesses (א* L W^s M) read πρῶτος (prōtos) here instead of πρῶτον (prōton). The former reading would be a predicate adjective and suggest that Andrew “was the first” person to proselytize another regarding Jesus. The reading preferred, however, is the neuter πρῶτον, used as an adverb (BDAG 893 s.v. πρῶτος 1.a.β.), and it suggests that the first thing that Andrew did was to proselytize Peter. The evidence for this reading is early and weighty: P^66,75 א² A B Θ Ψ 083 ƒ^1,13 892 al lat.

⁶ sn The kingdom of God is a major theme of Jesus’ teaching. The nature of the kingdom of God in the NT and in Jesus’ teaching has long been debated by interpreters and scholars, with discussion primarily centering around the nature of the kingdom (earthly, heavenly, or both) and the kingdom’s arrival (present, future, or both). An additional major issue concerns the relationship between the kingdom of God and the person and work of Jesus himself. See Luke 6:20; 11:20; 17:20-21.