John 7:40-44

Differing Opinions About Jesus

7:40 When they heard these words, some of the crowd ¹  began to say, “This really ²  is the Prophet!” ³  7:41 Others said, “This is the Christ!” ⁴  But still others said, “No, ⁵  for the Christ doesn’t come from Galilee, does he? ⁶  7:42 Don’t the scriptures say that the Christ is a descendant ⁷  of David ⁸  and comes from Bethlehem, ⁹  the village where David lived?” ¹⁰  7:43 So there was a division in the crowd ¹¹  because of Jesus. ¹²  7:44 Some of them were wanting to seize him, but no one laid a hand on him. ¹³ 

[7:40]  ¹ tn Or “The common people” (as opposed to the religious authorities like the chief priests and Pharisees).

[7:40]  ² tn Or “truly.”

[7:40]  ³ sn The Prophet is a reference to the “prophet like Moses” of Deut 18:15, by this time an eschatological figure in popular belief.

[7:41]  ⁴ tn Or “the Messiah” (Both Greek “Christ” and Hebrew and Aramaic “Messiah” mean “one who has been anointed”).

[7:41]  ⁵ tn An initial negative reply (“No”) is suggested by the causal or explanatory γάρ (gar) which begins the clause.

[7:41]  ⁶ tn Questions prefaced with μή (mh) in Greek anticipate a negative answer. This can sometimes be indicated by using a “tag” at the end in English (here the tag is “does he?”).

[7:42]  ⁷ tn Grk “is from the seed” (an idiom for human descent).

[7:42]  ⁸ sn An allusion to Ps 89:4.

[7:42]  ⁹ sn An allusion to Mic 5:2.

[7:42]  ¹⁰ tn Grk “the village where David was.”

[7:43]  ¹¹ tn Or “among the common people” (as opposed to the religious authorities like the chief priests and Pharisees).

[7:43]  ¹² tn Grk “him”; the referent (Jesus) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

[7:44]  ¹³ sn Compare John 7:30 regarding the attempt to seize Jesus.