John 7-8

Tree of Life Version

Anticipating Hostility at Sukkot

7 After these events, Yeshua was walking about in the Galilee. He did not want to walk in Judea, because the Judean leaders wanted to kill Him. ² Now the Jewish Feast of Tabernacles^[a] was near. ³ Therefore His brothers said to Him, “Leave here and go to Judea, so Your disciples also may see the works You are doing. ⁴ No one who wants to be well known does everything in secret. If You are doing these things, show Yourself to the world!” ⁵ For not even His brothers were trusting in Him.

⁶ Therefore Yeshua said to them, “My time has not yet come, but your time is always at hand. ⁷ The world cannot hate you, but it hates Me because I testify that its works are evil. ⁸ You go on up to the Feast. I’m not going to this feast, because My time hasn’t yet fully come.” ⁹ After saying these things, He stayed in the Galilee.

¹⁰ But after His brothers went to the Feast, He also went, not openly but secretly. ¹¹ Then the Judean leaders were searching for Him at the Feast and kept asking, “Where is that fellow?” ¹² There was a lot of murmuring about Him in the crowds. Some were saying, “He is good.” But others were saying, “Not so! He leads the people astray.” ¹³ Yet no one spoke openly about Him for fear of the Judean leaders.

Teaching at the Temple

¹⁴ About halfway through the Feast, Yeshua went up to the Temple and began teaching. ¹⁵ Then the Judean leaders were amazed, saying, “How does this man know so much, having never been taught?”^[b]

¹⁶ Yeshua answered, “My teaching is not from Me, but from Him who sent Me. ¹⁷ If anyone wants to do His will, he will know whether My teaching comes from God or it is Myself speaking. ¹⁸ Whoever speaks from himself seeks his own glory; but He who seeks the glory of the One who sent Him, He is true and there is no unrighteousness in Him. ¹⁹ Hasn’t Moses given you the Torah? Yet none of you keeps it. Why are you trying to kill Me?”

²⁰ The crowd answered, “You have a demon! Who’s trying to kill you?”

²¹ Yeshua answered, “I did one good work, and all of you are amazed. ²² Because Moses has given you circumcision (though it is not from Moses, but from the patriarchs), you circumcise a man on Shabbat. ²³ If a man receives circumcision on Shabbat so that the Torah of Moses may not be broken, why are you angry that I healed a man’s whole body on Shabbat? ²⁴ Do not judge by appearance, but judge righteously.”

²⁵ Then some of the people from Jerusalem were saying, “Isn’t this the person they’re trying to kill? ²⁶ Look, He speaks openly and they’re saying nothing to Him. Can it be that the leaders know He is the Messiah? ²⁷ But we know where this person is from. But the Messiah, whenever He may come, no one knows where He is from.”

²⁸ Then, while teaching in the Temple courts, Yeshua cried out, “You know both who I am and where I am from! I have not come on My own, but the One who sent Me is true. You do not know Him, ²⁹ but I know Him because I am from Him and He sent Me.”

³⁰ Then they were trying to seize Him; but no one laid a hand on Him, because His hour had not yet come. ³¹ Yet many from the crowd believed in Him and were saying, “When the Messiah comes, He won’t perform more signs than this person has, will He?” ³² The Pharisees heard people in the crowd murmuring these things about Him, and the ruling kohanim and Pharisees sent guards to arrest Him.

³³ Yeshua said, “I am with you only a little while longer, and then I am going to the One who sent Me. ³⁴ You will look for Me but will not find Me. Where I am, you cannot come.”

³⁵ The Judean leaders then said among themselves, “Where is this person about to go that we shall not find Him? He’s not going to the Diaspora to teach the Greeks, is He? ³⁶ What did He mean by saying, ‘You will look for Me but will not find Me. Where I am, you cannot come’?”

Satisfying Spiritual Thirst

³⁷ On the last and greatest day of the Feast, Yeshua stood up and cried out loudly, “If anyone is thirsty, let him come to Me and drink. ³⁸ Whoever believes in Me, as the Scripture says, ‘out of his innermost being will flow rivers of living water.’” ^{[c] 39} Now He said this about the Ruach, whom those who trusted in Him were going to receive; for the Ruach^[d] was not yet given, since Yeshua was not yet glorified.

⁴⁰ When they heard these words, some of the crowd said, “This man really is the Prophet.” ⁴¹ Others were saying, “This is the Messiah.” Still others were saying, “The Messiah doesn’t come from the Galilee, does He? ⁴² Didn’t the Scripture say that the Messiah comes from the seed of David and from Bethlehem, David’s town?” ^{[e] 43} So a division arose in the crowd because of Yeshua. ⁴⁴ Some wanted to capture Him, but no one laid hands on Him.

Religious Adversaries

⁴⁵ Then the guards returned to the ruling kohanim and Pharisees, who asked them, “Why didn’t you bring Him?”

⁴⁶ “Never has anyone spoken like this man,” the guards answered.

⁴⁷ The Pharisees responded, “You haven’t been led astray also, have you? ⁴⁸ Have any of the rulers or Pharisees believed in Him? ⁴⁹ No, but this mob that doesn’t know the Torah—they are cursed!”

⁵⁰ Nicodemus, the one who had come to Yeshua before and was one of them, said to them, ⁵¹ “Our Torah doesn’t judge a man unless it first hears from him and knows what he’s doing, does it?”

⁵² They answered him, “You aren’t from the Galilee too, are you? Search, and see that no prophet comes out of the Galilee!”^[f]

⁵³ Then everyone went to his own house.

Mercy for a Sinful Woman

8 But Yeshua went to the Mount of Olives. ² At dawn, He came again into the Temple. All the people were coming to Him, and He sat down and began to teach them.

³ The Torah scholars and Pharisees bring in a woman who had been caught in adultery. After putting her in the middle, ⁴ they say to Yeshua, “Teacher, this woman has been caught in the act of committing adultery. ⁵ In the Torah, Moses commanded us to stone such women. So what do You say?” ⁶ Now they were saying this to trap Him, so that they would have grounds to accuse Him.

But Yeshua knelt down and started writing in the dirt with His finger. ⁷ When they kept asking Him, He stood up and said, “The sinless one among you, let him be the first to throw a stone at her.” ⁸ Then He knelt down again and continued writing on the ground.

⁹ Now when they heard, they began to leave, one by one, the oldest ones first, until Yeshua was left alone with the woman in the middle. ¹⁰ Straightening up, Yeshua said to her, “Woman, where are they? Did no one condemn you?”

¹¹ “No one, Sir,” she said.

“Then neither do I condemn you,” Yeshua said. “Go, and sin no more.”

The Light of the World

¹² Yeshua spoke to them again, saying, “I am the light of the world. The one who follows Me will no longer walk in darkness, but will have the light of life.”

¹³ Then the Pharisees said to Him, “You are testifying about Yourself, so Your testimony is not valid.”

¹⁴ Yeshua answered them, “Even if I testify about Myself, My testimony is valid. For I know where I came from and where I am going. But you don’t know where I come from or where I am going. ¹⁵ You judge according to the flesh, but I do not judge anyone. ¹⁶ Yet even if I do judge, My judgment is true, because it is not I alone but I with the Father who sent Me. ¹⁷ Even in your Torah it is written that the testimony of two men is true. ^{[g] 18} I am one witness for Myself, and the Father who sent Me bears witness for Me.”

¹⁹ Then they said to Him, “Where is your Father?”

Yeshua answered, “You know neither Me nor My Father. If you knew Me, you would also know My Father.” ²⁰ He spoke these words in the treasury while teaching in the Temple, but no one arrested Him because His hour had not yet come.

²¹ Then again Yeshua spoke to them, “I am going away. You will look for Me and die in your sin. Where I am going, you cannot come.”

²² “He won’t kill Himself, will He?” the Judeans asked. “Is that why He says, ‘Where I am going, you cannot come’?”

²³ Yeshua said, “You are from below; I am from above. You are of this world; I am not of this world. ²⁴ Therefore I told you that you will die in your sins. If you don’t believe that I am, you will die in your sins.”

²⁵ So they asked Him, “Who are you?”

Yeshua replied, “What have I been telling you from the beginning? ²⁶ I have much to say and judge about you. But the One who sent Me is true, and I tell the world what I heard from Him.” ²⁷ They didn’t understand that He was talking to them about the Father.

²⁸ So Yeshua said, “When you have lifted up the Son of Man, then you will know who I am. I do nothing by Myself, but speak just what the Father has taught Me. ²⁹ The One who sent Me is with Me. He has not left Me alone, because I always do what is pleasing to Him.”

³⁰ As He was speaking these things, many people put their trust in Him.

³¹ Then Yeshua said to the Judeans who had trusted Him, “If you abide in My word, then you are truly My disciples. ³² You will know the truth, and the truth will set you free!”

³³ They answered Him, “We are Abraham’s children and have never been slaves to anyone! How can you say, ‘You will become free’?”

³⁴ Yeshua answered them, “Amen, amen I tell you, everyone who sins is a slave to sin. ³⁵ Now the slave does not remain in the household forever; the son abides forever. ³⁶ So if the Son sets you free, you will be free indeed! ³⁷ I know you are Abraham’s children; yet you are trying to kill Me, because My word has no place in you. ³⁸ I tell of what I have seen with the Father; so also you do what you heard from the Father.”^[h]

³⁹ “Abraham is our father,” they replied to Him.

Yeshua said to them, “If you are Abraham’s children, do the deeds of Abraham. ⁴⁰ But now you are seeking to kill Me—a Man who has told you the truth, which I heard from God. This Abraham did not do! ⁴¹ You are doing the deeds of your father.”

They said to Him, “We were not born as illegitimate children—we have one Father, God Himself!”

⁴² Yeshua said to them, “If God were your Father, you would love Me, for from God I came and now I am here. For I have not come on My own, but He sent Me. ⁴³ Why don’t you understand My speech? Because you’re not able to hear My word! ⁴⁴ You are of your father the devil, and you want to do the desires of your father. He was a murderer from the beginning and does not stand in the truth, because there is no truth in him. Whenever he speaks lies he is just being himself—for he is a liar and the father of lies.

⁴⁵ “But because I speak the truth, you do not believe Me. ⁴⁶ Which one of you convicts Me of sinning? If I am telling the truth, why don’t you believe Me? ⁴⁷ He who belongs to God hears the words of God. The reason you don’t hear^[i] is because you do not belong to God.”

⁴⁸ The Judean leaders responded, “Aren’t we right to say you are a Samaritan and have a demon?”

⁴⁹ Yeshua answered, “I do not have a demon! I honor My Father, yet you dishonor Me. ⁵⁰ But I do not seek My own glory; there is One who is seeking and judging. ⁵¹ Amen, amen I tell you, if anyone keeps My word, he will never see death.”

⁵² “Now we know You have a demon!” the Judean leaders said to Him. “Abraham and the prophets died. Yet You say, ‘If anyone keeps My word, he will never taste death.’ ⁵³ You are not greater than our father Abraham who died, are You? The prophets also died! Who do You make Yourself out to be?”

⁵⁴ Yeshua answered, “If I glorify Myself, My glory is nothing. It is My Father who gives Me glory—the One of whom you say, ‘He is our God.’ ^{[j] 55} Yet you do not know Him, but I know Him. If I say I do not know Him, I will be a liar like you. Yet I do know Him and keep His Word. ⁵⁶ Your father Abraham rejoiced to see My day; he saw it and was thrilled.”

⁵⁷ Then the Judeans said to Him, “You’re not even fifty years old and you’ve seen Abraham?”^[k]

⁵⁸ Yeshua answered, “Amen, amen I tell you, before Abraham was, I am!”

⁵⁹ Then they picked up stones to throw at Him, but Yeshua hid Himself and went out from the Temple.^[l]