(2) Others thus: But though the Father has testified of Me, “neither have you heard His voice ... abiding in you;” i.e., you have been excluded from familiarity with Him, and from belief in His testimony, because you refuse to believe in Me. (Hengstenberg.)
(3) Others take the words to refer to the covenant entered into by God with the Jews (Deut. xviii. 15-19), that He should terrify them no more by His awful presence, as when He gave the law on Sinai (Exod. xx. 19-21), but should speak to them through a prophet. Hence Christ's words signify: The Father has borne testimony of Me, nor has He broken His word to you, that you should hear and see no more the terrifying sounds and sights of Sinai; and yet you refuse to keep your part of the compact (“you have not His word abiding in you”), inasmuch as you refuse to believe in Me, the Prophet whom He promised. (Tolet., Beel.)
(4) Others again thus: The Father has borne unquestionable testimony of Me, though not, I admit, in such a manner as that He could be seen, or His voice heard by you. But that testimony you accept not (you have not His word abiding in you), as is plain from the fact that you refuse to believe in Me. See the note to A Lap., in Migne's Ed., which agrees with Kuinoel.
Whatever view be adopted, [pg 105] we understand the testimony referred to in verse 37, to be that which is explicitly mentioned in verse 39; viz., the testimony of God given through the Scriptures in the writings of Moses and the prophets.[53]
| 39. Scrutamini scripturas, quia vos putatis in ipsis vitam aeternam habere: et illae sunt, quae testimonium perhibent de me: | 39. Search the scriptures, for you think in them to have life everlasting; and the same are they that give testimony of me: |
39. Here our Lord distinctly mentions the testimony to which He had already alluded (verse 37). Search the Scriptures, or rather, Ye search the Scriptures. In both the Greek and Latin texts the form of the verb leaves it doubtful whether it is to be understood as an indicative or an imperative. But the context, in which all the verbs are in the indicative, and the course of the argument, render it much more probable that the form is to be understood as an indicative. So, too, all the best modern commentators, even among the Protestants; e.g., Kuin., Alf., Bloomf., Westc., and the Revised Version, which renders: “Ye search the Scriptures.”
It is unnecessary then to delay long in refuting the argument which used to be drawn by Protestants from this text in favour of the indiscriminate reading of the Bible by all the faithful. A few words will suffice. (1) It is much more probable that the words do not contain a precept, but merely state a fact. (2) Even if they did contain a precept, they are addressed very probably only to the Jewish teachers (see verse [44]). (3) Even if we admitted that the words contain a precept, and are addressed to all the Jews, still it would not follow that all the faithful now are bound to read the Bible, nor that the Church may not sometimes, for grave reasons restrict the liberty to read it. For we must bear in mind that our Lord is here referring to the Sacred Scriptures in connection with one particular point, namely, the fulfilment of prophecy in Himself. Even if the Jews were authorized or commanded to read the Sacred Scriptures in regard to a particular question, it by no means follows that Protestants are commanded or even authorized to read them in order to form by the aid of private judgment an opinion on [pg 106] all questions of faith and morals.
The Catholic Church freely admits, of course, and insists that the reading of the Bible is in itself good and useful; but since the Bible contains “certain things hard to be understood, which the unlearned and unstable wrest ... to their own destruction” (2 Pet. iii. 16), hence she knows it is possible that, like all God's best gifts, the Bible may in certain circumstances be abused.
| 40. Et non vultis venire ad me ut vitam habeatis. | 40. And you will not come to me that you may have life. |
40. And is equivalent to “and yet.”