himself, the beloved disciple.38 They had heard what their teacher had, on the previous
day, said of Jesus. But then He seemed to them but as a passing Figure. To hear more of
Him, as well as in deepest sympathy, these two had gathered to their Teacher on that
Sabbath morning, while the other disciples of John were probably engaged with that, and
with those, which formed the surroundings of an ordinary Jewish Sabbath. 39 And now
that Figure once more appeared in view. None with the Baptist but these two. He is not
teaching now, but learning, as the intensity and penetration of his gaze 40 calls from him
the now worshipful repetition of what, on the previous day, he had explained and
enforced. There was no leave-taking on the part of these two - perhaps they meant not to
leave John. Only an irresistible impulse, a heavenly instinct, bade them follow His steps.
It needed no direction of John, no call from Jesus. But as they went in modest silence, in
the dawn of their rising faith, scarce conscious of the what and the why, He turned Him. It
was not because He discerned it not, but just because He knew the real goal of their yet
unconscious search, and would bring them to know what they sought, that He put to them
the question, 'What seek ye?' which elicited a reply so simple, so real, as to carry its own
evidence. He is still to them the Rabbi - the most honoured title they can find - yet
marking still the strictly Jewish view, as we ll as their own standpoint of 'What seek ye?'
They wish, yet scarcely dare, to say what was their object, and only put it in a form most
modest, suggestive rather than expressive. There is strict correspondence to their view in
the words of Jesus. Their very Hebraism of 'Rabbi' is met by the equally Hebraic 'Come
and see;'41 their unspoken, but half-conscious longing by what the invitation implied
(according to the most probable reading, 'Come and ye shall see'42
38. This reticence seems another undesigned evidence of Johannine authorship.
39. The Greek has it: 'John was standing, and from among his disciples two.'
40. The word implies earnest, penetrating gaze.
41. The precise date of the origin of this designation is not quite clear. We find it in
threefold development: Rab, Rabbi, and Rabban - 'amplitudo,' 'amplitudo mea,'
'amplitudo nostra,' which mark successive stages. As the last of these titles was borne by
the grandson of Hillel (a.d. 30 -50), it is only reasonable to suppose that the two preceding
ones were current a generation and more before that. Again, we have to distinguish the
original and earlier use of the title when it only applied to teachers, and the later usage
when, like the word 'Doctor,' it was given indiscriminately to men of suppos ed learning.
When Jesus is so addressed it is in the sense of 'my Teacher.' Nor can there be any
reasonable doubt, that thus it was generally current in and before the time noted in the
Gospels. A still higher title than any of these three seems to have been Beribbi , or
Berabbi, by which Rabban Gamaliel is designated in Shabb. 115 a. It literally means
'belonging to the house of a Rabbi' - as we would say, a Rabbi of Rabbis. On the other
hand, the expression 'Come and see' is among the most common Rabbinic formulas,
although generally connected with the acquisition of special and important information.
42. Comp. Canon Westcott's note.
It was but early morning - ten o'clock.43 What passed on that long Sabbath-day we know
not save from what happened in its course. From it issued the two, not learners now but
teachers, bearing what they had found to those nearest and dearest. The form of the