John 8:17-18. After the first reason in answer to the Pharisaic rejection of His self-witness (namely, that He gave it in the consciousness of His divine mission, John 8:14), and after administering a reproof to His antagonists, in connection therewith, for their judging (John 8:15-16), there follows a second reason, namely, that His witness to Himself is no violation of the Jewish law, but has more than the amount of truth thereby required.

καὶ … δέ] atque etiam, as above in John 8:16.

τῷ ὑμετ.] emphatically, from the point of view of His opponents (comp. John 10:34, John 15:25), who took their stand thereon, and regarded Jesus as a παράνομον, and even in John 8:13 had had in view a well-known prescription of the law. The words of Christ are therefore no doubt anti-Judaic, but not in themselves antinomian (Schweizer, Baur, Reuss), or belonging to a later Christian point of view (De Wette, B. Crusius, Tholuck); nor must they be taken to mean: for Christ and believers the law exists no longer (Messner, Lehre der Apostel. p. 345); though, no doubt, they expressed His consciousness of being exalted above the Jewish law as it then was, and in the strange and hostile form in which it met Him. Accordingly, Keim[12] is mistaken in saying: “In this way neither could Jesus speak nor John write—not even Paul.” See John 5:45-47, John 7:19; John 7:22 f., John 5:39, John 10:35, John 19:36.

The passage itself from the law is quoted with considerable freedom (Deuteronomy 17:6; Deuteronomy 19:15), ἀνθρώπων being uttered with intentional emphasis, as Jesus draws a conclusion a minori ad majus. If the law demands two human witnesses, in my witness there is still more; for the witnesses whose declaration is contained therein are (1) my own individuality; and (2) the Father who has sent me; as His representative and interpreter, therefore, I testify, so that my witness is also His. That which took place, as to substance, in the living and inseparable unity of the divine-human consciousness, to wit, His witnessing, and God’s witnessing, Jesus discriminates here only formally, for the sake of being able to apply the passage of the law in question, from which He argues κατʼ ἄνθρωπον; but not incorrectly (Schenkel): hence, also, there is no need for supplying in thought to ἘΓΏ: “As a human knower of myself, as an honest man” (Paulus), and the like; or even, “as the Son of God” (Olshausen, who also brings in the Holy Ghost).

[12] See his Geschichtlich. Christ. p. 14, ed. 3. Note, on the contrary, that it is John himself who stands higher than Paul. But not even the Johannean Jesus has broken with the law, or treated it as antiquated. See especially vv. 45–47. His relation to the law is also that of πλήρωσις.

John 8:17. καὶ ἐν τῷ νόμῳ … πατήρ. He returns from “judging” to “witnessing,” and He maintains that His witness (John 8:18) satisfies the Mosaic law (Deuteronomy 17:6; Deuteronomy 19:15) because what He witnesses of Himself is confirmed by the Father that sent Him. The nature of this witness was given fully at John 5:37-47.—ἐγώ εἰμι ὁ μαρτυρῶν … Field maintains the A.V[63] “I am one that beareth witness,” against the R.V[64] “I am He that beareth witness”; ἐγώ εἰμι being equivalent to “There is I” or “It is I”. Misled perhaps by the Lord’s use of ἀνθρώπων (John 8:17), the Pharisees ask (John 8:19): Ποῦ ἐστὶν ὁ πατήρ σου; “Patrem Christi carnaliter acceperunt” (Augustine), therefore they ask where He is that they may ascertain what He has to say regarding Jesus; as if they said: “It is all very well alleging that you have a second witness in your Father; but where is He?” The idea of Cyril that it was a coarse allusion to His birth is out of the question, and Cyril himself does not press it. Jesus replies: Οὔτε … ᾔδειτε ἄν [or ἂν ᾔδειτε]. They ought to have known who He meant by His Father and where He was; and their hopeless ignorance Jesus can only deplore. They professed to know Jesus, but had they known Him they would necessarily have known the Father in whom He lived and whom He represented. Their ignorance of the Father proves their ignorance of Jesus.—Ταῦτα … ἱερῷ. On γαζοφ., see John 8:12. Euthymius, as usual, hits the nail on the head: “Ταῦτα” τὰ παῤῥησιαστικά. ἐπεσημήνατο γὰρ τὸν τόπον, δεικνύων τὴν παῤῥησίαν τοῦ διδασκάλου. “But no one apprehended Him, because not yet was His hour come.” His immunity was all the more remarkable on account of the proximity to the chamber where the Sanhedrim held its sittings, in the southeast corner of the Court of the Priests. See Edersheim’s Life of Christ, ii. 165, note.

[63] Authorised Version.

[64] Revised Version.

17. It is also written in your law] Literally, But in the law also, your law, it is written. ‘Your’ is very emphatic; ‘the Law about which you profess to be so jealous.’ Comp. ‘Thou art called a Jew, and restest on the Law’ (Romans 2:17).

the testimony of two men is true] Better, the witness of two, &c. Not so much a quotation as a reference to Deuteronomy 19:15; Deuteronomy 17:6. Note that the Law speaks of ‘two or three witnesses:’ here we have ‘two men.’ The change is not accidental, but introduces an argument à fortiori: if the testimony of two men is true, how much more the testimony of two Divine Witnesses. Comp. ‘If we receive the witness of men, the witness of God is greater; for this is the witness of God which He hath testified of His Son’ (1 John 5:9).

John 8:17. Καί) also.—ἐν τῷ νόαῳ τῷ ὑμετέρῳ) in your law, to which ye refer, John 8:5, “Now Moses in the law commanded us, that,” etc.—δύο ἀνθρώπων, of two men) how much more that of God and of the Son of God? Since these witnesses are said to be two, the argument [proof] is one of the same nature. See as regards these two, Zechariah 6:13, at the end, “He shall build the temple of the Lord; and He shall bear His glory, and shall sit and rule upon His throne; and He shall be a Priest upon His throne; and the counsel of peace shall be between them both.”—ἀληθής, true) irrefragable.

Verse 17. - Having laid down the principle on which he was justified in maintaining the truthfulness of the assumption which the Pharisees impugned, he proceeded to vindicate, for these Jewish legalists, its agreement with the very letter of the Law. He adopted here the identical ground which was taken by him when first of all he claimed this fellowship with the Father. Yea, and in your Law it has been written, that the witness of two men is true. Many have said that here Jesus puts himself on one side as in hostility to the Law; Baur and some others plead, from the very phrase "your Law," that Jesus could not have used such an expression, and that John could not have recorded it; and Reuss urges that this expression agrees with the "standpoint of the gospel,which aims at lowering and degrading the old dispensation." Nothing could be less in harmony with the facts (see Introduction, § VII. 2). Even Meyer says, "The words are anti-Judaic... though not antinomian." Surely our Lord was simply appealing to his bitter enemies to recognize the application of the principle found in their own Law, of which they were continually making a proud boast. He simply goes to common ground of argument, and is ready to show that even the letter of the Law sustains his claim for the sufficient reason that he is not alone, but the Father is manifestly with him. Just as he never said "our Father" when addressing his disciples, but either "my Father" or "your Father" (John 20:17), because God is not the Father of men in the full sense in which he was Father to the only begotten Son; so he could not say "our Law" or "Moses gave us the Law" without derogating from the unique relation he sustained to the Law (compare Paul's language, Romans 2:17, 21, 23). The quotation from Deuteronomy is not verbally exact; it even carries the statement of Scripture to a broader generalization, and is so worded that it applies to the case in point, by carrying the position to a legitimate consequence - "the witness of two men is true." By using the word "men," Christ suggests the contrast between two men on one side and the God-Man and the Father on the other. Lightfoot ('Horae Hebraicae') quotes 'Rosh-Shanah,' 1:2, 3, "that two persons well known must testify to the supreme court that they had seen the new moon! If these were unknown persons, they must bring proof that they were credible witnesses." Upon these common principles of jurisprudence the Lord was willing, in purely Jewish fashion, to rest his claim. John 8:17In your law (ἐν τῷ νόμῳ τῷ ὑμετέρῳ)

Literally, in the law, that which is yours. Yours has an emphatic force: of which you claim a monopoly. See John 7:49.

It is written (γέγραπται)

The perfect tense: it has been written, and stands written. The common form of citation elsewhere, but used by John of the Old Testament scriptures only here. His usual form is γεγραμμένον ἐστίν, the participle with the finite verb, literally, it is having been written.

The witness of two men

See Deuteronomy 19:15.

The Father - beareth witness of me

Thus there are two witnesses, and the letter of the law is fulfilled.

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