John 10:32-36

John 10:32-36. Jesus answered, Many good works have I showed you from my Father That is, in confirmation of my mission from my Father I have wrought many miracles, all of a beneficent kind, and most becoming the perfections of my Father, who sent me. I have fed the hungry, I have healed the lame, I have cured the sick, I have given sight to the blind, I have cast out devils, and I have raised the dead: for which of all these are you going to stone me? The Jews answered, For a good work we stone thee not We are going to punish thee with death, not for a good work, but for blasphemy; for, though thou art a man, weak and mortal as we ourselves are, thou arrogantly assumest to thyself the power and majesty of God; and by laying claim to the incommunicable attributes of the Deity, makest thyself God. This they took to be the plain meaning of his assertion, that he and the Father were one. Jesus Not judging it proper, at that time, to bring the sublime doctrine of his Deity into further debate; answered them, Is it not written in your law Or, in those sacred books which you own to be of divine original, (see Psalms 82:6,) where it is plain the persons that are spoken of are princes and magistrates; I said, Ye are gods? “The Jewish magistrates were God’s deputies in an especial manner, because the people whom they governed were his peculiar people, and because, in many instances, they were expressly called by him to undertake the fatigues of government, and had an afflatus, or inspiration of the Spirit, for that end. Thus the high-priests derived their dignity from God, and were possessed of the Urim and Thummim, by which they inquired of the Lord. When Moses chose the seventy elders to assist him in the distribution of justice, God put his Spirit upon them, and they prophesied, Numbers 11:17. Joshua, who succeeded Moses by divine appointment, is said to have been a man in whom was the Spirit, Numbers 27:18. Many of the judges were raised up by God, and had his Spirit. When Saul was anointed, the Spirit of God came upon him, and he prophesied, 1 Samuel 10:6; 1 Samuel 10:10.” Macknight. If he (God) called them gods, to whom the word of God came That is, to whom God was then speaking; and the Scripture cannot be broken That is, nothing that is written therein can be censured or rejected. Dr. Campbell translates this clause, And if the language of Scripture is unexceptionable; observing, “Our Lord defends what he had said from the charge of blasphemy, by showing its conformity to the style of Scripture in less urgent cases; insomuch, that if the propriety of Scripture language were admitted, the propriety of his must be admitted also.” “This,” adds he, “is one of those instances wherein, though it is very easy for the translator to discover the meaning, it is very difficult to express it in words which shall appear to correspond to those of his author.” Say ye of him whom the Father hath sanctified Hath set apart for the great work of redeeming and saving the human race; and sent into the world For that purpose; Thou blasphemest, because I said, I am the Son of God? If the Scripture, which cannot err, gives the title of gods to mortal and sinful men, why should you reckon guilty of blasphemy, me, whom the Father hath sanctified, and sent into the world on so grand a design, because I assume to myself a title which so justly belongs to me, namely, that of the Son of God? Some set the argument in another light, thus: If they, to whom the word of God, and the revelation of his will came, are called gods in Scripture, how dare you say to the Word of God himself, by whom all the various revelations of the divine will have been made to men; how dare you say to such a person, on such an occasion, Thou blasphemest! Jesus, it must be observed, was charged here by the Jews with ascribing divinity to his human nature; and in reply to this he shows, that, calling himself the Son of God, did not imply that, and that his works proved such a union of the human nature with the divine as he had before asserted, than which no answer could have been more wise and pertinent.