(1) The ministry and baptism of Jesus in Judaea. Verse 22. - With this verse a new departure is taken, and circumstances are described which indirectly, rather than explicitly, indicate the manner of our Lord's ministry for the larger part of a year; and they furnish opportunity for recording the last great public utterance of John the Baptist, with all its special difficulties of chronology and doctrine. After these things, related in the previous paragraphs; after, that is, the scene in the temple, and the demand for a sign, and the typical discourse of the Lord with a ruler of the Jews, from reasons not difficult to deduce from the narrative, Jesus (came) and his disciples [came] into the land (γῆν, not χὼραν, as in Mark 1:5) of Judaea. Surrounded or accompanied by some of his disciples (John being one of them), Jesus left the metropolis and betook himself to the countryside. His Messianic claims were not accepted by the authorities. He did not entrust himself to the half-believers. He altered or deviated from the course hitherto adopted, and addressed himself to the less-prejudiced inhabitants of the country places in the province of Judaea. His hour was not yet come. Jerusalem and Judah were thus compared or contrasted in Ezra 2:1; Ezra 7:14; 2 Chronicles 20:18. The precise locality is not stated, though it is probable it was not far from the new scene chosen by John for the continuance of his ministry. The identification of the site of Aenon, near Saleim, does not finally determine the scene of our Lord's abode or baptismal ministry. We are expressly told, both here and in John 4:3, that it was in Judaea, not Samaria, that Jesus there tarried with them, and was baptizing. The words imply a lengthened abode, and a method of ministry which, from that time, he laid aside. The statement that he administered the rite personally is in John 4:2 explicitly corrected. The baptism by the disciples was done, however, with the sanction and under the direction of Jesus. As the trial ministry of the twelve apostles (mentioned in Matthew 10.), occurring during our Lord's earthly life, corresponded with the first preaching of John rather than with that which followed the glorification of Jesus and the Pentecostal effusion, so this ordinance closely resembled the water baptism of John; it was a preparatory symbol, an educational rite, one that allied this early ministry to that of his great forerunner. The water baptism of Jesus corresponded in significance with the water baptism of John. They were one and the same ordinance, predictive, symbolic, anticipatory of the baptism of the Spirit. "Jesus adopted John's baptism ere its waters forever ceased to flow, and thus he blessed and consecrated them. He took up the work of his forerunner and completed it" (Edersheim, 1:393). Weiss (with consent of Renan) admits that these reminiscences reveal their own historicity, and none more so than the return of Jesus for a time to the scenes of the activity of the Baptist. Apparently such an act conflicts with the exalted ideas the author of the Fourth Gospel entertains with reference to his Master. Thoma thinks he sees in Pauhne writings indication of Christ's baptismal ministry, and suggests that the "Johannist" therefore finds a place for such "a washing in water by the Word" in the active word of Jesus! When our Lord, after his resurrection, referred to the baptism with the Spirit, he contrasted it with the baptism of John, and made no reference to his own temporary adoption of the same rite. All water baptism is thus placed in its true relation to the baptism of the Spirit - not as the necessary preliminary of the latter, nor its indispensable seal or guarantee, but as the impressive symbol of the need of heavenly cleansing, and of the direct impact upon the soul of the power of the eternal Spirit. The length of our Lord's residence in Judaea cannot be positively determined; but one hint may be gathered item John 4:35. The "four months before the harvest" indicate the arrival of the month of December, and therefore the lapse of some eight months between the cleansing of the temple and the return to Galilee. This last event, in Matthew's Gospel (Matthew 4:12-17 with parallels), is associated with the imprisonment of John. The Fourth Gospel, by obvious reference to the current synoptic chronology of the commencement of the Galilaean ministry (one which made this imprisonment a note of time), shows that the period described in this Gospel, and the baptismal energy of Jesus in Judaea, and the profoundly interesting events mentioned in ch. 3. and 4, were not incompatible with admitted facts. It also suggests that the character of our Lord's ministry in the neighbourhood of the metropolis was closely allied with that which the synoptists described as obtaining in his early Galilaean efforts. We are impressed by the solemn silence which has fallen over these eight months. It may be accounted for on the general principle of the evangelist, which was to fasten upon and preserve the memory of a few solemn moments which especially impressed his own mind, and which had been overlooked or unknown by Matthew and the other evangelists. Moreover, it is more than probable that the author of this Gospel was not with the Master during the whole of this period. There are, however, hints that the rumours of the spiritual might and gathering power of Jesus had produced a great effect upon John the Baptist, and qualified the tone of his last testimony.

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