Hi everyone. Welcome back to daily gospel. Exegesis. As always, we're going to dive into the text from The Gospel. Reading that you will hear it today's mass and our goal is to help you understand the literal sense. That's what this podcast is all about. We don't look at politics going on in the church today. Just every day we do the same thing which is help, you understand, the literal sense of scripture, which is what we should be doing as Catholics.
That's where we should start. If we want to understand the Bible. So if you go to mass today, you would hear from John chapter, 1 verses 35 to 42. This is a reading, that's not particularly well-known. So let's get into the text as John stood with two of his disciples Jesus passed and John stared hard at him and said look Look, there is the Lamb of God. Hearing this, the two disciples, who followed Jesus, Jesus turned around and saw them following
and said, what do you want? They answered Rabbi, which means teacher, where do you live? Come and see, he replied. So they went and saw where he lived and stayed with them. The rest of that day, it was about the tenth hour. One of these two who became followers of Jesus after hearing. What John had said was Andrew, the brother of Simon Peter. Early next morning, Andrew met his brother and said to him, we have found the Messiah, which means the Christ and he took Simon to Jesus.
And Jesus looked hard at him and said, you are Simon. Son of John, you are to be called cephas, meaning Rock. So an interesting reading here and we'll see, as we go along that this lectionary translation that we have here. It's not great in a lot of ways, they've added some things in and change some of the words around, which make it a little more confusing. So, let's start by thinking about the context. So just prior to this in John chapter 1 John, the Baptist has been preaching.
And he identified for the crowd who the Messiah was. He looked at? Jesus and said there is the Messiah. And then, in the previous Passage, John the Baptist apparently that's where he baptizes Jesus and he sees this Spirit descending Upon Jesus. So all of that is has happened. The scene of course is the River. Jordan in the region of perea. And what we're going to see here, it's kind of like the origin story for two of the disciples.
It's an interesting backstory that you don't get to hear in the other gospels. Remember, this is quite early in Jesus ministry, this is before he even begins his Galilean Ministry, this is before he's gone into the desert to be tempted. He's still in the region of perea, just after his baptized now verse 35, if you look at most Bibles, there's a phrase in here which is actually really
important. But the lectionary has taken it out because it may not make sense if we just started with this phrase, but there is a phrase in there and it's this the next day. So that tells us that what we're about to see occurs on the day following what we've just heard. Now, what happened on the previous day, that's when Jesus approached. John the Baptist at the River,
Jordan to be baptized. So on that day, the John the Baptist told the crowds that Jesus is the Messiah and he did a big speech about it. Now I apparently it's the next day and Jesus is still hanging around and at the River Jordan, he didn't just get baptized and then go away. He's staying in that region. So if you added up chronologically, if you study, John chapter 1 carefully. We're now on the third day at the River, Jordan And the text he says as John stood with two of his disciples.
Now we're talking here about John the Baptist, not the Apostle, John so John the Baptist is there with two of his disciples so John the Baptist has disciples and we later learned that one of these disciples is Andrew. Who is the second disciple? The gospel text doesn't tell us. And so for that reason, many scholars believe. Now we can't prove this but it's an interesting Theory.
Many scholars, believe the second disciple, a disciple of John, the Baptist who is not named it's actually John himself. The author. The Apostle John is the second disciple that would make sense actually, because we know that the Apostle John never named himself in his own Gospel, he typically calls himself the Beloved disciple Now, if that's correct, if this second disciple, here is the Apostle John. That would mean, he is a disciple of John, the Baptist
and that would explain a lot. That would explain how, the Apostle, John knows. So many things that John, the Baptist said early on because he is one of John, the Baptist's our own disciples. So what does it mean to say that? John the Baptist had disciples, we sometimes think of him as a bit of a loner out in the desert, he actually has followers that follow him around and help him baptized people. It was common at that time for
Jewish people. To follow particular, rabbis that they were drawn to many Jews, voluntarily chose to follow rabbis, and if they did that, they would spend as much time with the rabbi as possible when they weren't working. John the Baptist was a very popular preacher. At this time, he had a lot of disciples.
Many people were flocking to him out in the wilderness and Andrew, and this other unnamed disciple, possibly, the Apostle, John, they are both disciples their followers of John the Baptist, which means that they spend time with him in their spare time when they're not working. They want to learn from him, verse 36, Jesus passed, and John
stared hard at him. A better translation of this would be. He looked at Jesus as he a walk to. So, we can imagine here, John the Baptist in the river preaching and then he sees John, the Baptist pass by again, and he looks at Jesus just as he does on the previous day. And he says, look, there is the Lamb of God or Behold the Lamb of God. And we talked about the Lamb of God, in the previous days, leading up to this one. It's a very significant phrase.
He's the final Lamb of God, the one whose sacrifice is going to atone for everyone's sins. So, again, John the Baptist points out to the crowd that this is the I'm of God, he's the one who's going to bring his salvation? He is the Messiah. That's what John the Baptist says, here verse 37 hearing this, the two Disciples of following Jesus, so these two disciples Andrew, and the other disciple. They hear.
John the Baptist identify Jesus as the Messiah and they're intrigued, so they begin to follow Jesus. In particular, it seems these two disciples want to know who this Jesus guy is? Where does he come from? Where does he live? They're fascinated by him. In verse 38, Jesus turned around and saw them following him and he said, what do you want? Now, our translation makes that seem a bit abrupt what he actually says they're more literally. Is what do you seek?
So Jesus, Ask them. What do they want? What do they seek these two disciples that are following him now? Jesus probably already knows the answer to this but he wants to open up the dialogue. He wants to hear what they have to say for themselves. These are Jesus first words in the Gospel of John. Jesus has not said anything yet. Until now, in verse 38, his first words are, what do you seek? And there might be some, some theological significance there.
He is. Inviting people to consider what do they seek? Which, of course should be salvation. Which he Come to bring and the two disciples answered Rabbi and then John tells us, which means teacher. So the fact that John, the Apostle, John the author translates, this word, Rabbi for his readers indicates that he knows many of his readers are probably not Jewish. What does the red rabbi mean?
Well, it means teacher as John tells us and it's a title of respect in that culture, for those who taught about God and religious things, it's a title of respect that you will give someone who you believe is teaching the truth about God. So at this point, the two disciples are not willing to call him Messiah, they just call him Rabbi or teacher and this is what they asked. Jesus. Where do you live a better translation? There would be. Where are you?
Staying, they don't want to know where he lives permanently. They want to know where he's staying currently they want to know where they can find him. They want to follow him back to the place. He's staying at Jesus answer. In verse 39 he says come and see you probably heard this slogan used by lots of Ministries and maybe vocations organizations talking about this phrase as their slogan. You want to know what we're about come and see you probably
heard this used before. In the original literal context which is what we're concerned with come and see this is Jesus. Speaking to these two disciples to allow, he's inviting them to come and see where he lives. You can say it's both an invitation and a risk and a promise. You could. Imagine Jesus is saying come and
you will see. And in a sense, this does apply to all of us, Jesus is inviting all of us to come and investigate him and to investigate the things of Salvation. So he says to the two disciples has come and see, come and see where I live. And the two went and saw where he lived or they saw where he was staying. We don't know exactly where he was staying, John the author doesn't tell us but we can
logically work it out. John. The Baptist is baptizing in Bethany beyond the Jordan in the region of Korea. Now, that is nowhere near Nazareth or Capernaum. So wherever Jesus is staying has to be within walking distance of Bethany beyond the Jordan. So it has to be within a few hours walk. It's not. As a riff, it's not capernum. So possibly, he might have been staying in Jericho, if you look at a map of Israel in these times, the major city near Bethany beyond the Jordan is Jericho.
So, maybe that's where Jesus walked to possibly, that's where he's staying. And the two disciples they follow him. And our translation says, they stayed with him. The rest of the day, it was about the tenth hour. This is not a very helpful translation, I think a better translation. Might be something like this. They stayed with him that A today for it was about the tenth hour.
So when it says, they stayed with him, a basically means they stayed overnight with him for it was about the tenth hour. So they went to his house and by then it was about the tenth hour which is 4 p.m. and they realize it's getting too late for them to walk back to Bethany beyond the Jordan. So they decide to stay with Jesus overnight, these two disciples apparently get to stay with Jesus.
And it's possible that some conversations happened during that night, maybe Jesus stayed up with them and talk to them about things. That would be cool, but we're Sure what happened, but they apparently stayed with him wherever he staying, interestingly hear the word for state aid. It's elsewhere translated in the gospel as remain. Remember when Jesus says, remain in me or abide in me, it's the same word and that describes the sun's intimate Divine communion with the father.
If you look at Chapter, 14 verse 10 and 15:10, they both use that same Greek word, which is translated remain here. It's translated stayed but it's the same Greek word. So maybe the apostle John the author here is trying to connote that. The two disciples who were there with him. They abided with Jesus in a special theological way and it's certainly true that by the end of the night, the disciples are beginning to understand Jesus true identity, verse 40, the author.
John now tells us one of these two who became followers of Jesus after hearing. What John had said was Andrew the brother of Simon Peter. So here we introduced to the Apostle. Andrew the brother of Peter, Andrew is always described in reference to Peter, his famous for being Peters brother. Basically and Peter is the leader of the disciples. Everyone knew who Peter was.
So for the gospel authors to say, Andrew the brother of Peter that automatically gives him a special kind of prominence. Now, verse 41 here has another unhelpful phrase, which makes things a bit difficult to understand. So the phrase the lectionary has added into our translation is early next morning. That is not there in the original. If you look up a Bible and go to John 1:41 it does not say early next morning. And in fact, if you read on it, probably wasn't the next
morning. It doesn't make sense to say it was the next morning. So this is one place where the lectionary has not been particularly helpful. In the way the his have decided to render this particular verse they've added in a phrase which makes things more confusing. Normally this translation is actually quite good but here I think we can say as people who are studying the Bible that I think they've probably made this section a little more difficult to understand the what it needs to be.
Keeping in mind of course that the lectionary translation is not primarily for Bible study, it's actually more for preaching in the context of the liturgy. So what happens here in verse 41, it says Andrew met his brother. So Andrew who has just encountered Jesus and has been at his house who now believes Jesus is the Messiah Andrew now goes and finds his brother Simon.
Now, Simon is probably fishing in Galilee, Simon Works in Galilee. If you look at a map Galilee and perea are not near each other, it's probably about a five-day walk for Andrew to going, see Simon.
So that probably means it wasn't the Day that Andrew went and saw Peter. Unless, of course, Peter happens to be staying in the area as well, but I think it's most illogical to assume that Peter is staying in his usual spot in Galilee. So, Andrew would have had to walk about 94 kilometers to get back to Simon in Galilee. So a four or five day walk for him to go and get his brother when he finally gets to his brother. He says, we have found the Messiah which means the Christ.
So again here, the Apostle John adds in a phrase to To clarify for his readers. What the word Messiah means? It means the Christ. So Christ is not Jesus. Last name, when we say, Jesus Christ. We mean Jesus Messiah. So, if we ever use that phrase, Jesus Christ, what we are actually saying is Jesus, is the Messiah now. Andrew and Simon are both faithful Jews and they've been waiting for the Messiah. They believe the Messiah is coming here.
The Apostle, John tells us that Andrew says to Peter. We have found the Messiah. This would be incredibly joyful. Joyful news during this stay at Jesus house, Andrew has become convinced that Jesus is the Messiah and he wants to share that with his brother naturally. And he can't just ring his brother up and tell him because there is no phones in this day. He has to go and see him personally to tell him we have found the Messiah and he takes, Simon back to Jesus.
So now Andrew takes Simon to Jesus. That's probably another 5 day, walk back down to Bethany. So this whole time period, here is probably about ten days long. That means Jesus stayed in the region of perea for quite a while. It would have taken a while for Peter to get down and see Jesus here. So Simon now gets to Jesus and verse 42. Jesus looked hard at him, so Jesus is focusing on Peter.
He's really looking at Peter. He's seeing his future and he's seeing his heart and Jesus says to him, you are Simon son of John. So that's Simon. His birth name, Simon, son of John, but now Jesus says, you are to be called cephas. Now what he's saying here is that one day in the future, you will be called cephas one day. You'll be called cephas. It's not here that Jesus gives him the official title and says, from now on, you will be called
cephas or Peter here. All he says, is one day you will be called Peter. So it's the very first chronological encounter between Jesus and Peter. It's quite significant and he says, you are to be called cephas meaning Rock. So, cephas is an Aramaic word, which means in English, Walk and the Greek version of this would say, face basically gets translated to Peter or Petros. So cephas Petros Peter. They're all the same word. Why? Jesus chooses to call him cephas? Or says, one day you'll be
called cephas. That's not explained here. But it is explained later in Matthew chapter 16 and we talked about that in the podcast, when we get there, it's a very significant passage. But here, this is very early on this is, well, before Matthew 16. Jesus already knows the very first time he encounters Peter here. He knows. The Peter will be the leader of his shoe of his church, after he's gone. He sees all that in advance.
So what we've seen here is the origin story of Andrew and Peter. And possibly also the Apostle, John, if you assume that the other unnamed disciple here is the Apostle. John. This is not their official call to Ministry that happens. Later, this is purely a first meeting. It's the first in Counter between these disciples and Jesus but it's not their official call as Apostles when
Jesus does later. Call Peter and Andrew to follow him, which he does in Galilee while they're fishing in Galilee, they are ready to come, they drop, their net straight away and that's easy to explain when you keep in mind that they've already met him once before they've met him here so that when he does call them later by the Sea of Galilee they're ready to follow him. So that's the end of our text for today. There's still more disciples that Jesus is going to call in John chapter one.
So you can hear that next section of text every year on January 5th, it's red. Let's now turn to the catechism to see what it has to say about this passage. So we could just have one reference here paragraph. 608 of the catechism is about this concept of Jesus being the Lamb of God. It says after agreeing to baptize him along with the Sinners, John the Baptist, he looked at Jesus and pointed him out as the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the World by doing.
So he reveals. The Cheese's is at the same time, the suffering servant, who silently allows himself. To be led to the slaughter and who Bears, the sin of the multitudes and also the Paschal Lamb, the symbol of Israel's Redemption at the first Passover, Christ's whole life, expresses his mission to serve and to give his life as a ransom
for many. So we have here, this concept of Jesus being the Lamb of God, which is what John the Baptist calls him repeatedly in John chapter one that's being unpacked here for us. I hope you learned something. New from today's episode, the whole John chapter one is quite fascinating the way it sets up the rest of Jesus Ministry. Thanks once again for tuning in. Please tell other people about this podcast, you can send in your questions.
Anytime a logical Bible study at gmail.com, I'd love to answer your questions in an upcoming episode or if you have any feedback, tell us what you've been learning. Tell us how you first found the podcast. I'd love to hear from you. So all the information about how to contact us at the ministry is in the show. Notes will continue to move through the gospels in the coming days.