“After this there was a feast of the Jews; and Jesus went up to Jerusalem.”
Some time later, Jesus went up to Jerusalem for one of the Jewish festivals. — the vague temporal marker (some time later) allows narrative flexibility. Jesus' journey to Jerusalem for a festival introduces the city of conflict and rejection. Jewish festivals (while not named) represent the calendar of temple worship that Jesus will challenge.
Church Fathers on John 5:1
After this there was a feast of the Jews, and Jesus went up to Jerusalem.
The feast of Pentecost. Jesus always went up to Jerusalem at the time of the feasts, that it might be seen that He was not an enemy to, but an observer of, the Law. And it gave Him the opportunity of impressing the simple multitude by miracles and teaching: as great numbers used then to collect from the neighboring towns.
The pool by the sheep-market, is the place where the priest washed the animals that were going to be sacrificed.
Read all 19 entries in the readerCatena Aurea · St. Thomas Aquinas, tr. J. H. Newman · public domain
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