Ep. 70: At Chanukah
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LUKE 13:22, JOHN 10:22-42
It had been about two months since Jesus had left Jerusalem after the Feast of Tabernacles. He returns for a brief stay during the Feast of the dedication of the Temple (Chanukah). This festival was not of Biblical origin but had been instituted by Judas Maccabaeus in 164BC, when the Temple, which had been desecrated by Antiochus Epiphanes, was once more purified and re-dedicated to the Service of God. During the Feast, the series of Psalms known as the Hallel was chanted in the Temple, the people responding as at the Feast of Tabernacles.
The practice of illuminating the Temple and private houses was popular during the eight days of the festival. Tradition had it, that, when the Temple services were restored by Judas Maccabaeus, the oil was found to have been desecrated. Only one flagon was discovered of that which was pure, sealed with the very signet ring of the High Priest. The supply proved just sufficient for the sacred lampstand for one day, but by a miracle, the flagon was continually replenished for eight days until a fresh supply could be brought from Thekoah. In memory of this, it was ordered the following year, that the Temple be illuminated for eight days on the anniversary of its ‘Dedication.’
It is winter and Jesus is walking in the covered porch in front of the ‘Beautiful Gate,’ which formed the principal entrance into the ‘Court of the Women.’ As he walks up and down, the people are literally barring his way. From the circumstances, we cannot doubt that the question which they put, ‘How long will you hold us in suspense?’, was an accusation rather than a general enquiry!
The more we realise this, the more wonderful is his answer. Briefly. He puts aside their hypocrisy. Does he still need to go over old ground? he had told them before and they disbelieved him then! This was because they were not his sheep. As he had said to them before, it was characteristic of his sheep to hear, recognise and listen to His Voice and follow him. He reminds his hearers that his Work is really the Father’s Work, given to him to do and no one could snatch them out of the Father’s Hand.
They understood this but rejected it when they again took up stones intending to stone him - no doubt, because he expressed, in yet more plain terms, what they regarded as his blasphemy. Edersheim explains:
‘Once more the Lord appealed from his Words, which were doubted, to His Works, which were indubitable. And so he does to all time. His Divine Mission is evidence of his Divinity. And if his Divine Mission be doubted. He appeals to the ‘many excellent works’ which he hath ‘showed from the Father,’ any one of which might, and, in the case of not a few, had, served as evidence of his Mission. And when the Jews ignored, as so many in our days, this line of evidence, and insisted that he had been guilty of blasphemy, since, being a man. He had made himself God, the Lord replied in a manner that calls for our special attention.’
He claimed to be One with the Father. Let us see whether the claim was strange. In Psalm 82:6 the titles ‘God’ and ‘Sons of the Highest’ had been given to human judges, wielding his delegated authority, since his Word of authorisation had come to them. But now authority was not transmitted by ‘the word,’ but by a personal and direct Mission on the part of God.
The comparison made was not with prophets, because they only told the word and message from God, but with judges, who, as such, did the very acts of God. If these were ‘gods,’ the very representatives of God, could it be blasphemy when he claimed to be the Son of God, who had received authority, not through a word transmitted through long centuries, but a direct personal command to do the Father’s Work? he had been directly and personally consecrated to it by the Father and directly and personally sent by him, not to say, but to do the work of the Father.
The test was whether Jesus really did the works of the Father and if he did the works of his Father, then let them believe, if not the words yet the works, and then would they arrive at the knowledge that ‘in Me is the Father, and I in the Father.’ In other words, recognizing the Work as that of the Father, they would come to understand that the Father worked in him and that the root of his Work was in the Father.
The stones that had been taken up were not thrown, for his words were not deserving of such a punishment, according to Rabbinic law. But ‘they sought again to seize him,’ so as to drag him before their tribunal. His time, however, had not yet come ‘and he went forth out of their hand’. How he did this, we know not, but it serves to show his total control over the proceedings and narrative. He was totally in charge … if they only knew it!
This is an extract from the book, Jesus : Life and Times, available for £10 here (Finalist for Academic Book of the year at 2023 CRT awards)