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JOHN 10:17 — KING JAMES VERSION 0
John 10:16John 10:18
“Therefore doth my Father love me, because I lay down my life, that I might take it again.”
The reason my Father loves me is that I lay down my life — only to take it up again — Jesus establishes that His voluntary death is the basis for the Father's love (specifically the giving of His life) and grounds His authority to resurrect Himself. The laying down and taking up of life demonstrate the Son's complete obedience and the Father's vindication of His sacrifice. This is not passive suffering but active obedience to the Father's mission, and the resurrection is inseparable from the sacrifice.

Church Fathers on John 10:17

Two evil persons have been mentioned, one that kills, and robs the sheep, another that does not hinder: the one standing for those movers of seditions; the other for the rulers of the Jews, who did not take care of the sheep committed to them. Christ distinguishes Himself from both; from the one who came to do hurt by saying, I am come that they might have life; from those who overlook the rapine of the wolves, by saying that He gives His life for the sheep. Wherefore He said…

Chrysostom · 4th century

As if He said, I love My sheep, and they love and follow Me. For he who loves not the truth, is as yet very far from knowing it.

Gregory the Great · 6th century

Hence the difference of the hireling and the Shepherd. The hireling does not know his sheep, because he sees them so little. The Shepherd knows His sheep, because He is so attractive to them.

Theophylact · 11th century
Read all 26 entries in the readerCatena Aurea · St. Thomas Aquinas, tr. J. H. Newman · public domain
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