Jamieson, Fausset & Brown

“He was in the world, &c.--The language here is nearly as wonderful as the thought. Observe its compact simplicity, its sonorousness--"the world" resounding in each of its three members--and the enigmatic form in which it is couched, startling the reader and se…”

“But as many--individuals, of the "disobedient and gainsaying people." gave he power--The word signifies both authority and ability, and both are certainly meant here. to become--Mark these words: Jesus is the Son of God;”

“By this elaborate threefold denial of the human source of this sonship, immense force is given to what follows, but of God--Right royal gift, and He who confers must be absolutely divine. For who would not worship Him who can bring him into the family, and ev…”

“(Anything lower than this His words cannot mean); that is, "My Successor is my Superior, for He was my Predecessor." This enigmatic play upon the different senses of the words "before" and "after" was doubtless employed by the Baptist to arrest attention, and …”

“For, &c.--The Law elicits the consciousness of sin and the need of redemption; it only typifies the reality. The Gospel, on the contrary, actually communicates reality and power from above (compare Ro 6:14). Hence Paul terms the Old Testament "shadow," while …”

“Elias--in His own proper person. that prophet--announced in De 18:15, &c., about whom they seem not to have been agreed whether he were the same with the Messiah or no.”

“Why baptizest thou, if not, &c.--Thinking he disclaimed any special connection with Messiah's kingdom, they demand his right to gather disciples by baptism.”

“Wherever there shall live a sinner throughout the wide world, sinking under that burden too heavy for him to bear, he shall find in this "Lamb of God," a shoulder equal to the weight. The right note was struck at the first--balm, doubtless, to Christ's own spi…”

“But the sign which he was told to expect was the visible descent of the Spirit upon Him as He emerged out of the baptismal water. Then, catching up the voice from heaven, "he saw and bare record that this is the Son of God."”

“What seek ye--gentle, winning question, remarkable as the Redeemer's first public utterance. (See on Mt 12:18-20.) where dwellest thou--that is, "That is a question we cannot answer in a moment; but had we Thy company for a calm hour in private, gladly shoul…”

“Come and see--His second utterance, more winning still. tenth hour--not ten A.M. (as some), according to Roman, but four P.M., according to Jewish reckoning, which John follows. The hour is mentioned to show why they stayed out the day with him--because littl…”

“His great sensitiveness is touchingly shown in his representation of this first contact with the Lord; the circumstances are present to him in the minutest details; he still remembers the very hour. But "he reports no particulars of those discourses of the Lor…”

“Whence knowest thou me--conscious that his very heart had been read, and at this critical moment more than ever before. Before Philip called thee--showing He knew all that passed between Philip and him at a distance. when . . . under the fig tree, &c.--where …”

“How much loftier this than anything Philip had said to him! But just as the earth's vital powers, the longer they are frost-bound, take the greater spring when at length set free, so souls, like Nathanael and Thomas (see on Joh 20:28), the outgoings of whose…”

“(2) As the miracle did not make bad good, but good better, so Christianity only redeems, sanctifies, and ennobles the beneficent but abused institution of marriage; and Christ's whole work only turns the water of earth into the wine of heaven. Thus "this begin…”

“What sign showest thou unto us, seeing that thou doest these things?--Though the act and the words of Christ, taken together, were sign enough, they were unconvinced: yet they were awed, and though at His very next appearance at Jerusalem they "sought to kill …”

“Nicodemus probably thought he had gone a long way, and expected, perhaps, to be complimented on his candor. Instead of this, he is virtually told that he has raised a question which he is not in a capacity to solve, and that before approaching it, his spiritua…”

“How, &c.--The figure of the new birth, if it had been meant only of Gentile proselytes to the Jewish religion, would have been intelligible enough to Nicodemus, being quite in keeping with the language of that day; but that Jews themselves should need a new bi…”

“Already had the symbol of water been embodied in an initiatory ordinance, in the baptism of the Jewish expectants of Messiah by the Baptist, not to speak of the baptism of Gentile proselytes before that; and in the Christian Church it was soon to become the gr…”

“That which is born, &c.--A great universal proposition; "That which is begotten carries within itself the nature of that which begat it" [OLSHAUSEN]. flesh--Not the mere material body, but all that comes into the world by birth, the entire man; yet not humani…”

“Ye must--"Ye, says Jesus, not we" [BENGEL]. After those universal propositions, about what "a man" must be, to "enter the kingdom of God" (Joh 3:5) --this is remarkable, showing that our Lord meant to hold Himself forth as "separate from sinners."”

“Nor is it merely as something that should be experienced under the Gospel that the Old Testament holds it forth--as many distinguished critics allege, denying that there was any such thing as regeneration before Christ.”

“The "we" and "our" are here used, though Himself only is intended, in emphatic contrast, probably, with the opening words of Nicodemus, "Rabbi, we know," &c. ye receive not, &c.--referring to the class to which Nicodemus belonged, but from which he was beginn…”

“Yet was the warrant in both cases to expect a cure equally rational and well grounded. As the serpent was God's ordinance for the cure of every bitten Israelite, so is Christ for the salvation of every perishing sinner--the one however a purely arbitrary ordin…”

“For God so loved, &c.--What proclamation of the Gospel has been so oft on the lips of missionaries and preachers in every age since it was first uttered? What has sent such thrilling sensations through millions of mankind? What has been honored to bring such m…”