John 10:39 — Community Reflections

JOHN 10:39 — KING JAMES VERSION 0

“Therefore they sought again to take him: but he escaped out of their hand,”

Again they tried to seize him, but he escaped their grasp — the second attempt to apprehend Jesus (following the stoning attempt) shows escalating hostility and Jesus' freedom from their grasp, suggesting divine protection and the timing of His hour (which has not yet come according to John's narrative). His escape demonstrates that no one can arrest Him before the appointed time.

Church Fathers on John 10:39

The Jews still persist in their madness; Therefore they sought again to take Him.
Bede · 8th century

To lay hold of Him, not by faith and the understanding, but with blood thirsty violence. Do you so lay hold of Him, that you may have sure hold; they would fain have laid hold on Him, but they could not: for it follows, But He escaped out of their hand. They did lay hold of Him with the hand of faith. It was no great matter for the Word to rescue His flesh from the hands of flesh.
Augustine · 4th century

Christ, after discoursing on some high truth, commonly retires immediately, to give time to the fury of people to abate, during His absence. Thus He did now: He went away again beyond Jordan, into the place where John at first baptized. He went there that He might recall to people’s minds, what had gone on there; John’s preaching and testimony to Himself.
Chrysostom · 4th century

Read all 8 entries in the readerCatena Aurea · St. Thomas Aquinas, tr. J. H. Newman · public domain

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