Verse 22
22. Had agreed already Doubtless this agreement was published by authority, or these parents could not have known it. To these Jews, therefore, there are chargeable two crimes against truth. They predetermined that no evidence of the divinity of Jesus should be admitted as valid, and thus they rejected truth by positive will. They decreed that all acknowledgments of his Messiahship, on whatever evidence, should be suppressed by force; and this was persecution. They ignored truth, and they persecuted what they feared to be truth.
He was Christ They might have acknowledged Jesus to be a prophet, or a worker of miracles, without confessing him to be Christ or Messiah. But then, so varying was the notion in regard to Christ, that they might fear that any acknowledgment of his supernatural claims might incur the penalty. The tyranny that can pass a persecuting decree can stretch it to any shape that suits its own malice.
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