John Baptist and the Deputation
[The Saviour of the World] [Volume I] [Book II]
[Following Poem VIII] Poem IX [Poem I]
John Baptist of Jesus and of himself. The Lamb of God.
(The Gospel History, from Sections 18 and 19)
John beareth witness of him, and crieth, saying, This was he of whom I said, He that cometh after me is become before me: for he was before me. For of his fulness we all received, and grace for grace. For the law was given by Moses; grace and truth came by Jesus Christ. No man hath seen God at any time; the only-begotten Son, which is in the bosom of the Father, he hath declared him.
And this is the witness of John, when the Jews sent unto him from Jerusalem priests and Levites to ask him, Who art thou? And he confessed, and denied not; and he confessed, I am not the Christ. And they asked him, What then? Art thou Elijah? And he saith, I am not. Art thou the prophet? And he answered, No. They said therefore unto him, Who art thou? that we may give an answer to them that sent us. What sayest thou of thyself? He said, I am the voice of one crying in the wilderness, Make straight the way of the Lord, as said Isaiah the prophet. And they had been sent from the Pharisees. And they asked him, and said unto him, Why then baptizest thou, if thou art not the Christ, neither Elijah, neither the prophet? John answered them, saying, I baptize with water: in the midst of you standeth one whom ye know not, even he that cometh after me, the latchet of whose shoe I am not worthy to unloose. These things were done in Bethany beyond Jordan, where John was baptizing.
On the morrow he seeth Jesus coming unto him, and saith, Behold, the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world! This is he of whom I said, After me cometh a man which is become before me: for he was before me. And I knew him not; but that he should be made manifest to Israel, for this cause came I baptizing with water. And John bare witness, saying, I have beheld the Spirit descending as a dove out of heaven; and it abode upon him. And I knew him not: but he that sent me to baptize with water, he said unto me, Upon whomsoever thou shalt see the Spirit descending, and abiding upon him, the same is he that baptizeth with the Holy Spirit. And I have seen, and have borne witness that this is the Son of God.
Again on the morrow John was standing, and two of his disciples; and he looked upon Jesus as he walked, and saith, Behold, the Lamb of God! And the two disciples heard him speak, and they followed Jesus.
John Baptist and the Deputation
(The Saviour of the World, Vol I Book II Poem IX)
John, who had seen the sign of the Anointing,
Bare witness to the people, cried aloud,—
“He is come, that One of whom I said to you,
That He who cometh after is before
Preferred, for He before me was; or e’er
God made the worlds, then was He beside Him.
He is become before me” (well for John Baptist!)
“In all the acts and choosings of my days:
How could I please myself, He, there to please?”
His fulness filleth all things, filleth us;
Grace upon grace He showereth on our days:
The touch of God’s continual kindnesses,
The little tender things He doth for each,
With scarce a pause to thank Him in: all these
Are of Him, who but late stood in our midst!
The law was given by Moses: all men know
That labour up the ladder of perfection,
Step gained to-day, and three steps lost to-morrow:
But grace and truth, these by Christ Jesus came;—
Recurrence always of God’s loving-kindness;
Insight, the power to see Him as He is,
And, in the strength of truth, to put Him first,
For He is before us—in all, preferred.
No man at any time hath seen High God:
The Son who lay in His bosom hath declared Him,
And this His witness— “full of grace and truth.”
Now the rulers of the people heard of John:
The Church at Jerusalem judged that it behoved
To make inquiry, Was he the Coming One?
Credentials of a prophet carried he—
A message, working in the people’s hearts;
His dress, his hermit-life, these all, a prophet’s:
Nay, might he be in truth the very Christ?
“Anyway, we of the temple should search this thing.”
So they sent a deputation to the spot
Where John all day baptized in Jordan, Priests
And Levites from Jerusalem, Pharisees.
As men charged with a mission, straight to the point,
They went: “Who art thou?” John, reading their thought,
Denied not, but confessed, “I am not the Christ.”
Still might he prophecy fulfil; they ask,
“Art thou Elias?” remembering how the books
Of the prophets closed with, Behold, I will send
Elijah, the prophet, to you before the coming
Of the great and dreadful day of the Lord. “I am not,”
Said John; for teachers sent from God are slow
To recognise their own significance;
How believe that they were thought of from of old?
One query more from these astute inquirers:—
“Art thou that prophet?”—the prophet like to him,
Who should, like him, lead and command the people,
That Moses spake of. “No,” again said John,
Nor paused to ponder if indeed he were
Thus honoured by God’s purpose long before.
The baffled questioners become displeased:
What right had he, without or call or sanction,
To preach to the people with authority?
“Who art thou, then? What sayest thou of thyself?
That we may answer take to them who sent us!”
John answered by an image, drawn from the East,
Familiar to his hearers, used by the prophets.
When Eastern monarch would on journey go,
His heralds go before, and cry, “Make ready!”
And he, who reaps, or sows, or tills the soil,
Must leave his work, go, labour on the road
The king will travel—filling up the ruts,
Lowering hillocks, making straight the crooked:—
The Baptist tells his mission: not the Christ,—
“I am the voice,” saith he, “of one who cries
In wilderness, Make straight the Lord’s highway,
As saith Esaias, the prophet.”
Each of us
In some sort is a voice, each speaks a name;
By faithful work, true word, we utter—God;
Our own poor name, in slipshod work, vain speech.
But otherwise the Baptist! No person, he,
With ends of his own to attain, only a voice
Whose single purpose is to speak one message!
Not lost upon these learnèd, his allusion,
But, petulant, they ask him, “Why baptize,
If neither Christ, nor Elias, nor yet that prophet?”
John answered them, “I but baptize with water,
As any Rabbi might his following:
But while ye question me, there standeth One,
The King I come to herald, in your midst.”
(Had John that instant seen the gracious Presence,
Returned to Bethabara after many days?)
“Ye know Him not; eyes have ye and see not;
But He it is who cometh after me
And is preferred before me, whose shoe’s latchet
I am not worthy to stoop down and loose.”
No more of that day know we:—what report
They carried back to the great Sanhedrin,
Or had John speech with Jesus at the Pool.
Had John fulfilled his debt to God and the world
When he proclaimed their King to the waiting Jews?
The morrow found him standing by the Pool,
That baptistery of his, with multitude
Hanging, as always, on his word. Behold,
Drawing majestic towards them, that meek Man,
Form luminous to him, blank to the rest;
And, as a searchlight thrown on ship at night
Shows up crew, cordage, every separate plank,—
A flash of the Spirit lit up all the past
And all the future for the prophet’s eye!
“Behold the Lamb of God!” he cried, and the word
Expounded all the history of the Jews
Since that black night when out of Egypt came they;
Fulfilled the hope of the nation—deliverance
By sacrifice,—and here, the Paschal Lamb!
Did John indeed interpret his own word,
Momentous, awful, fraught with pain and bliss?
But, more, he saw in this his hour of Vision
A larger hope than Jewish mind yet held—
“That taketh away the sins of all the world!”
“Taketh,” with a continual act of taking,
Till all the sin in me, the sin in you,
The black sin in the world that hope dismays,
Shall all be taken away, and “There shall be
No more sin.” All this saw John as he beheld
A Man standing in the midst. Yet once again,
Must John declare the precedence of Christ,
That law of every court—the King goes first:
“First in regard of me,” first thought of all
Thoughts harbouring in my mind, for whom have I
In heaven but thee? in earth, who shall compare?
Another law of the spirit’s subtle life
Was given John to declare—“He must increase
And I must decrease”—hope of Christian hearts,
That evermore shall Christ be more and more,
And I, unworthy I, be less and less!
In expansion of great moment, John tells how,—
“I knew Him not, but that He should be known
To Israel came I, baptizing with water.”
Was it another witnessing, or that same?—
“I beheld the Spirit descend as a dove
From heaven, and it abode on Him: I knew
Him not; but He that sent me to baptize
With water gave this sign to me: ‘Even He
On whom thou seest the Spirit descend
And abide on Him, is He that shall baptize
With the Holy Spirit.’ This thing I have seen,
So bear I witness, This the Son of God”!
The Sign of the Dove! What might it mean to John?
He knew the sign of the sun, traversing heaven,
The signs of the former and the latter rains,
Knew every leaf inscribed with the name of God;
That all things bore the meanings of the Almighty
For him who knew to discern the seasons’ signs.
The dove that returned to Noah, spake it not
The homing instinct of the human soul
That finds no place but in God? The tenderness
Of cooing mate to mate—that mystery
Of the Bridegroom and His Bride—Christ and His Church,
Ineffable in married tenderness?
Abiding love, unruffled gentleness
And quietness and confidence and peace,
And constancy of one who sticketh close,—
These things John saw, for all men see as much.
By the sign of the dove, John knew the Christ:
Even so may we; where Christ is, there the Spirit
Broodeth content, constant in holy glee;—
For, “He baptizeth with the Holy Ghost.”
Again, upon the morrow, was John standing,
While two of his disciples talked with him,
At that old tryst of the Pool. He raised his eyes,
And looking upon Jesus as He walked
Toward the place of cleansing, cried aloud,
“Behold the Lamb of God!” And they who heard
That living word believed, and followed Him.
Nor envy nor desertion’s bitter pang
Troubled the prophet’s soul, able to see,
“He must, indeed, increase, and I grow less!”
Behold, now, washed with water, with Holy Ghost
Anointed, tempered in temptation’s forge,
Proclaimed by herald King before the people,
Witnessed by prophet, very Lamb of God,
Acknowledged of the Father, His own Son
Begotten, in whom fully pleased is He;—
With all these signs now see we Christ go forth,
For Redemption of mankind to energise,
Strivings of sinners against Himself to bear,
To Labours, Passion, Death upon the Cross!
St. John i. 15–28.
“Behold the Lamb of God.”—St. John i. 29–37.
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Commentary by J. R. Dummelow
Jn 1:15. Another parenthesis, introducing further testimony of the Baptist, which the evangelist indicates as of permanent importance.
He that cometh after me] i.e. He who begins his work later than myself. Is become before me] viz. in honour. For he was before me] i.e. He existed before my birth, and even before His own birth, as the eternal Son of God. The Baptist learnt that Christ was God’s Son by a special revelation, and by the voice of the Father at Christ’s baptism: see vv. 32–34.
Jn 1:16–18. The preface concluded. The ‘we’ of v. 16 shows that these vv. are not words of the Baptist, but that they express the spiritual experience of Christ’s disciples, in whose name the evangelist speaks. 16. Of his fulness] ‘Fulness’ (pleroma) was a word much used (and abused) by the Gnostics against whom St. John contended. Here it means, (1) the fulness of the divine attributes which dwelt in Christ (Eph 1:23 Col 1:19 2:9), and (2) the fulness of the human virtues which He displayed. Both these ‘fulnesses’ Christ imparts in some measure to true believers, as the evangelist testifies from personal experience. Grace for grace] i.e. grace succeeding grace, one act of love after another, ever increasing in proportion as we deserve it or require it. 17. Moses set before us mere commands, without changing our nature, or giving us the power to obey them. Jesus Christ came to change our nature. He offers us ‘grace,’ whereby we are born again as children of God, and become heirs of everlasting life; also ‘truth,’ i.e. Christian holiness, which becomes possible to those who abide in Christ: cp. Ro 5:21. By Moses … by Jesus] lit. ‘through’ Moses, ‘through’ Jesus.
Jn 1:18. God the Father never reveals Himself to men directly, but always by and through His only-begotten Son. This was the case even before the Incarnation. It was God the Son who manifested Himself to the patriarchs, gave the Law to Moses, inspired the prophets, and enlightened the sages of the Gentiles. But now by His Incarnation He has revealed God more perfectly. So completely does ‘the Word made flesh’ represent the invisible Father, that ‘he that hath seen me hath seen the Father’ (14:9): cp. 5:37 6:46 Ex 33:20 Col 1:15 1 Tim 6:16 1 Jn 4:12, 20. The only begotten Son] Many very ancient authorities read, ‘(the) only begotten God,’ a striking statement of our Lord’s Deity. In the bosom] i.e. in eternal, intimate, loving union with the Father: cp. the expression ‘in Abraham’s bosom’ (Lk 16:22), and Jn 13:23. This v. explains how it is that God is love, not only since the creation, when He created objects for His love, but from eternity: cp. 17:24.
Jn 1:1:19–4:42. Preliminary ministry of our Lord. All the events recorded by St. John from 1:19 to 4:42 (the testimony of the Baptist; the preliminary call of John, Andrew, Peter, Philip, and Nathanael; the marriage at Cana; the visit to Capernaum; the first cleansing of the Temple; the interview with Nicodemus; the interview with the Samaritan woman) may be regarded as a preliminary ministry, for they took place before the Baptist was cast into prison (see Mt 4:12). The ministry proper begins with the imprisonment of the Baptist, upon news of which Jesus withdrew into Galilee (Mt 4:12 Jn 4:43, 46).
Jn 1:19–28. Public testimony of the Baptist to Jesus in reply to a deputation from the Sanhedrin. The independence and fulness of the account of the Baptist in this Gospel renders it highly probable that the evangelist had once been the Baptist’s disciple. He knows, for example, the exact places where John baptised (1:28 3:23); the exact day and even hour when certain things were said (1:29, 35, 39); the contemporary disputes with the Jews about purifying (3:25); the relations, not always friendly, between the disciples of John and those of Christ (3:26); the exact time when John was cast into prison (3:24). His account of the Baptist’s testimony agrees with that of the Synoptists, but he adds to it important particulars. He mentions, for instance, that John actually saw the dove descending upon Jesus, and was thus enabled to recognise Him (1:32), that he applied to Him the titles Lamb of God (1:29, 36) and Son of God (1:34 3:36), the latter clearly in a superhuman sense, for he declares His preëxistence (1:15, 30), and says that to believe in Him is to have eternal life (3:36). For the historical difficulties, see on these passages and on Mt 11:2. The Synoptists record the Baptist’s testimony before our Lord’s baptism, and St. John his testimony afterwards, when the descent of the Spirit upon Jesus, and the voice of the Father, had convinced the Baptist that Jesus was truly the Son of God.
Jn 1:19. The Jews] In this Gospel ‘the Jews’ has the following special senses: (1) the inhabitants of Judæa, (2) members of the Sanhedrin (the meaning here), and (3) the enemies of Jesus. Sent] One function of the Sanhedrin was to judge false prophets, hence they now desired to judge the claims of John.
Priests and Levites] the proper parties to enquire into a new religious movement. The priests performed the services of the Temple, offered the sacrifices, and burnt the incense. The Levites waited upon the priests in their ministry, and discharged subordinate duties.
Jn 1:20. Not the Christ] Some already believed that he was, Lk 3:15. 21. Elias] i.e. Elijah, whose personal return to prepare the way of the Messiah was expected by many (Mal 4:5 Mk 6:15; see especially on Mt 16:14 17:10). John denied that he was literally Elijah, though his coming fulfilled Malachi’s prophecy (Mt 11:14 17:12 Lk 1:17). The prophet] viz. the prophet mentioned Dt 18:15, and regarded by the deputation not as the Messiah, but as one of his forerunners. John, however, regarded the prophet of Dt 18:15 as actually the Messiah (cp. Ac 3:22), and therefore denied that he was ‘that prophet.’ 23. The words in Isaiah (Isa 40:3) refer to the preparation for the return from Babylon of the exiled Jews: the Baptist applies them to himself, as descriptive of his work: see on Mt 3:3.
Jn 1:25. Why baptizest thou?] Baptism was ordinarily administered only to proselytes. The meaning of the challenge seems, therefore, to be, ‘What right hast thou, who art neither the Messiah, nor his forerunner “that Prophet,” to treat Israelites as if they were proselytes?’ It is implied that the Messiah, who came to inaugurate an entirely new covenant, might possibly be expected to baptise even Jews. 26. With water] John’s baptism was outward, symbolising repentance and remission of sin: Christ’s was inward, conveying the gift of the Spirit, and the power to lead a new life. 28. Bethany] lit. ‘house of passing over,’ RM ‘Bethabarah,’ or ‘Betharabah’; probably the same as the Beth-barah of Jg 7:24. A ford on the Jordan, NE. of Bethshean, is still called ‘Abarah,’ lit. ‘passing over.’
Jn 1:29. The Lamb of God] The reference is perhaps not to the Paschal lamb, but to the Suffering Servant of Isa 53, who is ‘brought as a lamb to the slaughter,’ and whose death atones for sin. Contrast this description of the Messiah with the prevalent idea of a conqueror who would restore the kingdom to Israel. The Jews generally regarded the Messiah not as ‘the Lamb of God,’ but as ‘the Lion of the tribe of Judah.’ The sin of the world] The idea of atonement for the sins of Israel is found in Isa 53: the further idea that the Messiah will atone for the sins of the world, follows naturally from the numerous utterances of the OT. prophets which speak of the participation of the Gentiles in the Messianic kingdom (Ps 87, etc.).
Jn 1:30. See v. 15. 31. I knew him not] But in Mt 3:14 he seems to know Him, for he says, ‘I have need to be baptized of thee.’ The discrepancy, however, is only apparent. John is looking for the promised sign. Jesus presents Himself for Baptism. His majestic appearance strikes John with awe. Through prophetic insight (or perhaps as the result of a personal interview before the Baptism) he surmises that He is the true Messiah (‘I have need,’ etc.). The sign that follows makes the surmise a certainty. 34. The Son of God] The chief difficulty as to the use of this term by the Baptist is removed by the statement that he first learnt that Jesus was ‘the Son of God’ at the Baptism. In the OT. it was a title of the Davidic king, and of the Messiah (2 S 7:14 Ps 89:27, etc.), and did not necessarily imply (though see Ps 2, and cp. Ps 110) superhuman dignity.
Jn 1:35–51. Preliminary call of five Apostles, Andrew, John, Peter, Philip, and Bartholomew (peculiar to Jn). This account, so far from conflicting with the (later) call described Mt 4:18 Mk 1:15 (cp. Lk 5:1), really removes a difficulty, for it shows how the Apostles came to obey the final call to follow Jesus so readily. After their preliminary call, described here, the Apostles loosely attached themselves to Jesus as learners, but did not leave their homes and occupations. Afterwards when further intercourse had strengthened their hope that He was really the Messiah, they left all and followed Him.
Jn 1:35. Two] One was Andrew, the other (who characteristically suppresses his name) was John himself (see v. 40). The Baptist points out Jesus, thus suggesting that henceforth they should be His disciples.