Bible Commentary

John 5:13

John 5:13

The Pulpit Commentary · Joseph S. Exell and contributors · Public Domain

Now he that was healed—in this place ὁ ἰαθεὶς takes the place of τεθεραπευμένος of . £ The fundamental idea in the verb θεραπεύω to render kindly and useful, even noble, service to another—to do the work and act the part of a θεράπων.

The ministry rendered may be that of a δοῦλος or ὑπηρέτης, a θάλπων or ἰατρὸς. The "service" successfully rendered by a physician is more often expressed by ἰάομαι, which has no other meaning than restoration to health, and its use here may imply this positive fact (see the use of both words in , )—knew not who it was (was at that time and for a while ignorant of the person of his Healer): for Jesus withdrew—after the healing.

ἐκνεύω is "to nod or bend the head and avoid a blow," but comes to mean "withdraw" or "retire." Some have supposed that, like ἐκνέω,, to "escape by swimming from a danger," ἐξένευσε means here "stealthily escaped"—a sense that it has in Eur.

, 'Hipp.,' 470, and elsewhere; but (as Grimm says) Jesus did not withdraw to avoid a danger which had not yet proclaimed itself, but to evade the acclamation of the multitude (see also Lange)—a crowd being in the place where the miracle had been wrought.

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