and of satisfied heart-peace on theirs. As yet they were only followers, learners, not yet
called to be Apostles, with all of entire renunciation of home, family, and other calling
which this implied. This, in the course of proper development, remained for quite another
period. Alike their knowledge and their faith for the present needed, and could only bear,
the ca ll to personal attachment.51
51. The evidence for the great historic difference between this call to personal
attachment, and that to the Apostolate, is shown - I should think beyond the power of
cavil - by Godet, and especially by Canon Westcott. To these and other commentators the
reader must be referred on this and many points, which it would be out of place to discuss
at length in this book.
It was Sunday morning, the first of Christ's Mission-work, the first of His Preaching. He
was purposing to retur n to Galilee. It was fitting He should do so: for the sake of His new
disciples; for what He was to do in Galilee; for His own sake. The first Jerusalem-visit
must be prepared for by them all; and He would not go there till the right time - for the
Paschal Feast. It was probably a distance of about twenty miles from Bethabara to Cana.
By the way, two other disciples were to be gained - this time not brought, but called,
where, and in what precise circumstances, we know not. But the notice that Philip was a
fellow-townsman of Andrew and Peter, seems to imply some instrumentality on their
part. Similarly, we gather that, afterwards, Philip was somewhat in advance of the rest,
when he found his acquaintance Nathanael, and engaged in conversation with him just as
Jesus and the others came up. But here also we mark, as another characteristic trait of
John, that he, and his brother with him, seem to have clung close to the Person of Christ,
just as did Mary afterwards in the house of her brother. It was this intense exclusiveness
of fellowship with Jesus which traced on his mind that fullest picture of the God-Man,
which his narrative reflects.
The call to Philip from the lips of the Saviour met, we know not under what
circumstances, immediate responsive obedience. Yet, though no special obstacles had to
be overcome, and hence no special narrative was called for, it must have implied much of
learning, to judge from what he did, and from what he said to Nathanael. There is
something special about Nathanael's conquest by Christ - rather implied, perhaps, than
expressed - and of which the Lord's words gives significant hints. They seem to point to
what had passed in his mind just before Philip found him. Alike the expression 'an
Israelite in truth, in whom is no guile'52 - looking back on what changed the name of
Jacob into Israel - and the evident reference to the full realisation of Jacob's vision in
Bethel,53 may be an indication that this very vision had engaged his thoughts. As the
Synagogue understood the narrative, its application to the then state of Israel and the
Messianic hope would most readily suggest itself. Putting aside all extravagances, the
Synagogue thought, in connection with it, of the rising power of the Gentiles, but
concluded with the precious comfort of the assurance, in Jer. xxx. 11, of Israel's final
restoration.54 Nathanael (Theodore, 'the gift of God,') had, as we often read of Rabbis,55
rested for prayer, meditation, or study, in the shadow of that wide-spreading tree so
common in Palestine, the fig-tree.56 The approaching Passover-season, perhaps mingling
with thoughts of John's announcement by the banks of Jordan, would naturally suggest
the great deliverance of Israel in 'the age to come;' 57 all the more, perhaps, from the