Did the Religious Leaders Know That Jesus Was the Christ?

Tom:

We are in the Gospel of John and currently we are in 7:25, “Then said some of them of Jerusalem, Is not this he, whom they seek to kill?  But lo, he speaketh boldly, and they say nothing unto him.  Do the rulers know indeed that this is the very Christ?  Howbeit we know this man whence he is:  but when Christ cometh, no man knoweth whence he is.”  Dave, they are wrestling with a few things here.

Dave:

Well, first of all, if you go back to verse 19, Jesus said, “Why go ye about to kill me?”  And they say, “You have a devil! Who goeth to kill thee? You’re dreaming this up.”  Well now, people are saying, “Is not this he whom they seek to kill?” And he is speaking boldly.  Well, we know that the rabbis, the leaders, the religious leaders, they are out to get him, they are out to arrest him, they are out to kill him but they are not doing anything, how come?  Well, because, as the scripture doesn’t say it here, but as it says in other places, his time had not yet come.  They couldn’t do it.  They sent, when we get to chapter 11, we will find that the Pharisees send officers to take him and when Jesus speaks they are just dumbfounded and they go back and the Pharisees say, “Why didn’t you take him?”  They said, “No man ever spake like that man.”  So, yes, they want to kill him but, on the other hand, they are vacillating and they don’t know exactly how to do it.  Sometimes they are afraid of the multitude because sometimes the multitude is in favor of Christ.  But they go on and argue, “Howbeit, we know this man, whence he is”—

Tom:

Let me back you up a little bit—but in verse 26 they say, “Do the rulers know indeed that this is the very Christ?”

Dave:

No, they don’t.

Tom:

Do these people know?  In other words, we’re finding them just keep flip flopping back and forth.

Dave:

Right.  I think maybe the rulers suspected it, but they did not want to acknowledge it.  They wanted to maintain their own position as you get again in chapter 11—“Isn’t it expedient that one man die and the nation survive and if you let this man go on, the Romans will take away our positions,” so this is what they are concerned about.  Then we come to verse 27 where it says, “We know this man, whence he is but when Christ cometh no man knoweth whence he is.”  Well, that wasn’t true.  Micah:5:2But thou, Bethlehem Ephratah, though thou be little among the thousands of Judah, yet out of thee shall he come forth unto me that is to be ruler in Israel; whose goings forth have been from of old, from everlasting.
See All... said he would be born in Bethlehem.  It indicated that he would be in Galilee. Galilee of the Gentiles would see great light. But as far as his origin, whence he is, that would refer to his birthplace and that had to be known and the scriptures said it would be Bethlehem.  Now, part of the problem, perhaps, was because Joseph, “being warned of God in a dream,” it says, when Herod was out to kill the babies, out to kill the Messiah.

Tom:

So, Herod had some understanding of when this king would come.

Dave:

The rabbis told him.  They said he would be born in Bethlehem.  So, Herod goes to Bethlehem and has all the babies killed, from two years old and younger, just to make sure because the wise men, whom he asked to come back when they found the babe and tell him where he was, they were warned of God to get out of there and so Herod feels betrayed by them.  He doesn’t know who this child is.  He is going to kill every child from under two years of age just for good measure, make sure he doesn’t miss anyone.  But they knew.And they knew that Christ had not been born in Nazareth.  When they came back they fled to Egypt to get away from this slaughter and then when they came back they settled down in Nazareth, but the scripture said he would be called a Nazarene, also.  Anyway, it simply isn’t true that no one would know whence Christ was.  In fact, the Old Testament prophets gave us so much insight, and gave so many prophesies so that you couldn’t possibly fail to recognize the Messiah when he came.  They had all of this but they were not willing.

Tom:

Dave, let me address something here.  People who read the Bible want things to be as simple as it can be, so they come up with the idea that well, the Bible says everything in it is true.  “Thy Word is truth,” it says, and other scriptures, “The entirety of thy Word is true,” the psalmist writes, and so on.  But we do have some things in here that are either misunderstandings, or just what Satan says is not true.  So, we have to be diligent in searching the Word and be familiar with it enough to recognize when somebody is slipping something in here.

Dave:

Know who is speaking—you can’t quote everything in the Bible as being true because sometimes others are speaking and not the servants of God, not the prophets but others, even sometimes they are critics and they are presenting ideas.  Let’s think, for example, of Job’s comforters.  Job’s comforters, so called, come and they say a lot.  Now, is all of everything they say inspired of God?  I don’t think so, but we have it recorded.  We have what the rabbis said in accusation against Jesus and so forth, an accusation against Paul.

Tom:

Dave, back to Job’s counselors though—wouldn’t it be that many things that they say, it sounds like it comes from other parts of scripture so it has its truth in the sense that there are principles, true principles, but the application was completely—they missed the mark with that big time.  They applied things to Job that did not apply, so they took a truth but they just missed the boat with it.

Dave:

Christ says, verse 28-30, “Then cried Jesus in the temple as he taught, saying, Ye both know me, and ye know whence I am:  and I am not come of myself, but he that sent me is true, whom ye know not.  “But I know him:  for I am from him, and he hath sent me.  Then they sought to take him; but no man laid hands on him, because his hour was not yet come.”  So, Christ is acknowledging you know where I come from, my home town, my mother’s husband was a carpenter there, apparently he is dead at this time, I’ve been there as a carpenter, and so forth, but I didn’t come here on my own but someone sent me.  In other words, his very birth into this earth was on a mission from the Father and they don’t like that.  They understand somewhat what he is saying and they are going to get him, they sought to take him it says.  It’s an interesting statement.  A number of times in the scripture it says he walked right through the mob that was trying to take him.  He could do that, but there came a time when he allowed the mob to take him and bind his hands.  Not that that could have held him, and take him to the chief priests and they took him to Pilate.  Pilate beats him, scourges him, and mocks him and so forth.  That time would come, but now his hour was not yet come and they cannot lay hands on him.  It goes on and says verse 31, “And many of the people believed on him, and said, When Christ cometh, will he do more miracles than these which this man hath done?  Well, the Pharisees heard that the people murmured such things concerning him; and the Pharisees and the chief priests sent officers to take him.”

Tom:

It’s obvious here somebody is moving in on their territory and they may be losing control of the people, which has been a problem, the institutional religion from the get go, from the smallest cult to the largest church organization.

Dave:

Tragically, that’s the case.Religion is an attempt to gain power over people’s lives.  You have the rules, you dispense the rules, they can only get to heaven through you, they have to follow what the church says, an institution, or the guru and so forth, and that gives them power as well as wealth.  Jesus deals with that in Matthew 23.  So that, again, is the situation here and the Pharisees are determined to get rid of him but at this point they are not able to do so because it was not time for him to be nailed to the cross. That was coming.