Origen of Alexandria — Commentary on Scripture

John 18:39

But ye have a custom, that I should release unto you one at the passover: will ye therefore that I release unto you the King of the Jews?

Do not wonder that the Roman government, holding sway over the Jews who had recently become their subjects, thought it was appropriate to grant them something acceptable at the feast of the Passover. They allowed them to ask for anyone they wanted [to be freed] even though he might appear guilty of many murders. For in this way nations sometimes grant favors to those whom they have conquered, until their rule is established. Yet this custom of releasing a prisoner existed at one time among the Jews also. … Let us inquire whether anything like this may take place also in God’s judgment where the whole church may ask for any sinner to be released from the condemnation of sin especially if, while having other evil works, he is eager to do good for the church.

John 18:40 · 2 passages

Then cried they all again, saying, Not this man, but Barabbas. Now Barabbas was a robber.

Celsus’s comparison of Christ to a robber or murderer … is anticipated in the Gospels since God was numbered with the transgressors by wicked people who wanted a murderer (one who had been cast into prison for sedition and murder) to be released to them and wanted Jesus to be crucified. And they crucified him between two robbers. Jesus, indeed, is always being crucified with robbers among his genuine disciples and witnesses to the truth, and he suffers the same condemnation they do among people—if indeed we grant that those people have any resemblance to robbers who because of their godly lives suffer all kinds of injury and death so that they may keep their lives clean and pure.… But neither Jesus … nor they were … put to death according to any form of justice, and so it is his persecutors who are the ones who should incur the charge.

There is a likeness between the names of Barabbas and Jesus that is nothing short of a true mystery. Barabbas is appointed for making sedition and wars and murders in the souls of people, but Jesus is appointed for all good things as the Son of God and Peace and Word and Wisdom. These two therefore are bound in both human things and bodies. Here the people [of the Jews] asked for Barabbas to be released to them. Therefore, that nation [i.e., Israel] does not cease from having seditions and murders and robberies, as regards some of their own race in outward things but also as regards all the Jews who do not believe in Jesus who have also struggles within their own souls. For where Jesus is not, there are seditions and quarrels and battles. But where Jesus is … all good things, and innumerable spiritual riches, along with peace, rest in their hands. For he is our peace who made both one. And if anyone sees the opposite take place, he will recognize in them all that notable prisoner, Barabbas, whose release is craved not only then by sinful Israel according to the flesh but also by all…

There is a likeness between the names of Barabbas and Jesus that is nothing short of a true mystery. Barabbas is appointed for making sedition and wars and murders in the souls of people, but Jesus is appointed for all good things as the Son of God and Peace and Word and Wisdom. These two therefore are bound in both human things and bodies. Here the people [of the Jews] asked for Barabbas to be released to them. Therefore, that nation [i.e., Israel] does not cease from having seditions and murders and robberies, as regards some of their own race in outward things but also as regards all the Jews who do not believe in Jesus who have also struggles within their own souls. For where Jesus is not, there are seditions and quarrels and battles. But where Jesus is … all good things, and innumerable spiritual riches, along with peace, rest in their hands. For he is our peace who made both one. And if anyone sees the opposite take place, he will recognize in them all that notable prisoner, Barabbas, whose release is craved not only then by sinful Israel according to the flesh but also by all like them in either doctrine or life. Whoever, therefore, does evil things in his body frees Barabbas and binds Christ. But whoever does good things frees Christ and binds Barabbas.

John 19:2

And the soldiers platted a crown of thorns, and put it on his head, and they put on him a purple robe,

There are those who still have thorns with which they crown and dishonor Jesus, those, namely, who are choked by the cares and riches and pleasures of life and, though they have received the word of God, do not bring it to perfection. We must beware, therefore, lest we also, as crowning Jesus with thorns of our own, should be entered in the Gospel … and read how he is dishonored and mocked and beaten [by us].

John 19:9

And went again into the judgment hall, and saith unto Jesus, Whence art thou? But Jesus gave him no answer.

Since he willed to suffer on behalf of the world, he is silent when examined and beaten by Pilate. For if he had spoken, he would not have been crucified from weakness, since there is no weakness in the words that the Word speaks.

John 19:11

Jesus answered, Thou couldest have no power at all against me, except it were given thee from above: therefore he that delivered me unto thee hath the greater sin.

As with Job … it is not by accidental attacks that we are assailed, whenever we are visited with any such loss of property. It is not by chance when one of us is taken prisoner or when those who are dear to us are crushed to death in their houses that fall in ruins. For in each one of these circumstances every believer ought to say, “You could have no power at all against me, except it were given you from above.” For observe that the house of Job did not fall on his children until the devil had first received power against them. Nor would the horsemen have made a raid in three bands to carry away his camels and oxen and cattle unless they had been instigated by that spirit to whom they had delivered themselves up as servants of his will.

John 19:17 · 2 passages

And he bearing his cross went forth into a place called the place of a skull, which is called in the Hebrew Golgotha:

The place of the skull is said to have some special appropriateness for the death of him who was to die for humankind. A Hebraic tradition has come down to us that says that the body of Adam the first man was buried just where Christ was crucified. And so, as in Adam all die, so in Christ all should be made alive. In the place that is called the place of the skull or head, the head of the human race should find resurrection along with the whole people through the resurrection of the Lord and Savior who suffered there and rose again. For it was unfitting that when many born from him received remission of sins and attained the blessing of resurrection, the very father of all people should not also attain this grace.

But it was fitting not only that the Savior should take his own cross but that we also should bear it, fulfilling our being pressed into service in the cause of salvation. But yet again, we do not profit from taking his cross as much as we do when Jesus himself takes his cross and bears it.

John 19:19

And Pilate wrote a title, and put it on the cross. And the writing was, JESUS OF NAZARETH THE KING OF THE JEWS.

Whether in pretence or in truth, Christ is proclaimed king, and every letter bears witness of his reign, whether of Greeks, or Romans, or Hebrews. And for a crown above his head was written, “This is Jesus the King of the Jews.” And since no other cause is found for his death (for there was none), this alone is put forward, “He was king of the Jews.” … And the high priest according to the letter of the law used to carry on his head the form of the sign and the sanctification of the Lord written on the plate. But the true high priest and king, Jesus, on the cross has it written, “This is the King of the Jews.” But ascending to the Father and receiving the Father into himself, he has for letters and for a name what he [God] is named and has him [the Father] as a crown.

John 19:26

When Jesus therefore saw his mother, and the disciple standing by, whom he loved, he saith unto his mother, Woman, behold thy son!

The Gospels are the firstfruits of all the Scriptures. But the firstfruits of the Gospels is the Gospel according to John whose meaning no one can understand who has not leaned on Jesus’ breast or received Mary from Jesus to be his mother also. But whoever wants to become another “John” must also become such as John was. In other words, he must be shown to be Jesus, so to speak. For Mary had no son except Jesus (in accordance with those who hold a sound opinion of her). But Jesus says to his mother, “Behold your son,” and not, “Behold, this man also is your son.” If this is so, then Jesus has in effect said, “Behold, this is Jesus whom you bore” [when he presents John to her]. For indeed, everyone who has been perfected “no longer lives, but Christ lives in him.” And, since “Christ lives” in him [i.e., John], it is said of him to Mary, “Behold your son,” the Christ.

John 19:31

The Jews therefore, because it was the preparation, that the bodies should not remain upon the cross on the sabbath day, (for that sabbath day was an high day,) besought Pilate that their legs might be broken, and that they might be taken away.

What do they [i.e., the Jews] take it to mean when it says, “For six consecutive days you shall gather. On the sixth day, however, you shall gather double”? It appears that that day that is placed before the sabbath is called the sixth day, which we call the Day of Preparation.

John 19:34 · 3 passages

But one of the soldiers with a spear pierced his side, and forthwith came there out blood and water.

Celsus asks whether the blood in the body of the crucified Jesus was the same as that which flows in the bodies of the immortal gods. He asks in jest, but we shall show that it was no mythic or Homeric blood that flowed from the body of Jesus.… With other dead bodies the blood congeals and pure water does not flow. But in the case of Jesus’ dead body, the miraculous feature was that both blood and water flowed forth from his side.

If there is anyone who, when he reads Moses, murmurs against him, and the Law which has been written according to the letter is displeasing to him because it seems incoherent in many things, Moses shows him the rock which is Christ and leads him to it that he may drink from it and quench his thirst. But this rock will not give water unless it has been struck, but when it has been struck it brings forth streams. For after Christ had been struck and crucified, he brought forth the streams of the New Testament. This is why it was said of him, “I will the strike the shepherd and the sheep will be scattered.” He had to be struck, therefore, for unless he had been struck and unless “water and blood had gone out from his side,” we all would suffer “thirst for the word of God.” This, therefore, is what the Apostle also understood when he said, “They all ate the same spiritual food and drank the same spiritual drink. For they drank of the spiritual rock which followed, but the rock was Christ.”

Pilate sought to gratify the whole people who had said, “Crucify, crucify him.” He also feared a riot among the people and so did not give orders (according to the usual practice of the Romans with those who are crucified) for Jesus to be stabbed under his armpits. This is sometimes done by those who condemn people guilty of greater crimes, because greater suffering is endured by those who are not stabbed after crucifixion who end up living in very great torment sometimes even the whole night and still the whole day after. Jesus therefore, since he had not been stabbed and was expected to hang a long time on the cross and endure greater torments, prayed to the Father and was heard. Immediately on crying to the Father, he was taken. Or, as one who had the power to lay down his life, he laid it down when he wanted to.

John 19:40

Then took they the body of Jesus, and wound it in linen clothes with the spices, as the manner of the Jews is to bury.

If you still live to sin, you cannot be buried with Jesus or laid in his new tomb because your old self still lives and cannot walk in newness of life. Therefore the Holy Spirit was careful to hand down through the Scriptures that it was a new sepulcher in which Jesus was buried and that he was wrapped in a clean linen cloth. He did this so that everyone who wants to be buried with Jesus by baptism might know that nothing of the old state should be brought to the new tomb, nothing of uncleanness to the clean linen cloth.

John 19:41

Now in the place where he was crucified there was a garden; and in the garden a new sepulchre, wherein was never man yet laid.

Observe whether the harmony of the three Evangelists here is not fitted to make an impression: for they have thought it right to describe the tomb as one that was “quarried or hewn out of the rock.” Whoever examines the words of the narrative will see something worthy of consideration, both in them and in the newness of the tomb—a point mentioned by Matthew and John—and in the statement of Luke and John, that no one had ever been interred there before. For it became him, who was unlike other dead people (but who even in death manifested signs of life in the water and the blood) and who was, so to speak, a new dead man, to be laid in a new and clean tomb, in order that, as his birth was purer than any other (because he was born not in the way of ordinary generation but of a virgin), his burial also might have the purity symbolically indicated in his body being deposited in a sepulcher that was new, not built of stones gathered from various quarters and having no natural unity, but quarried and hewn out of one rock, united together in all its parts.

John 19:42

There laid they Jesus therefore because of the Jews' preparation day; for the sepulchre was nigh at hand.

Surely if no one had as yet been laid there, men and women were afterward laid there. For this is the meaning for those who consider carefully.… He who said, “We have been buried with Christ through baptism and have risen with him,” has himself been after Christ buried together with Christ in a new and spiritual tomb hewn in the rock. It is the same for all who have been buried together with Christ in baptism so that they may rise with him from the new tomb of the Firstborn from the dead who holds the preeminence in all things.

John 20:17 · 2 passages

Jesus saith unto her, Touch me not; for I am not yet ascended to my Father: but go to my brethren, and say unto them, I ascend unto my Father, and your Father; and to my God, and your God.

But after he had destroyed his enemies through his passion, the Lord, who is mighty in battle and strong, required a purification that could be given to him by his Father alone. And this is why he forbids Mary to touch him.

It belongs to the resurrection that one should be on the first day in the paradise of God, and it belongs to the resurrection when Jesus appears and says, “Do not touch me. For I am not yet ascended to my Father,” but the perfection of the resurrection was when he came to the Father.

John 20:23

Whose soever sins ye remit, they are remitted unto them; and whose soever sins ye retain, they are retained.

Consider the person inspired by Jesus as the apostles were and who can be known by his fruits as someone who has received the Holy Spirit and become spiritual by being led by the Spirit as a son of God to do everything by reason. This person forgives whatever God forgives and retains sins that cannot be healed, serving God like the prophets by speaking not his own words but those of the divine will. So he, too, serves God, who alone has authority to forgive.