John 7:39 — meaning, Hebrew and Greek word study, commentary
John 7:39
(But this spake he of the Spirit, which they that believe on him should receive: for the Holy Ghost was not yet given; because that Jesus was not yet glorified.)
Jesus (i.e. Jehoshua) · noun — nominative singular masculine, a proper name
was
ἐδοξάσθη.¶edoxasthē
G1392
to render (or esteem) glorious (in a wide application) · verb — aorist passive indicative, 3rd person singular
yet
οὐδέπωoudepō
G3764
not even yet · adverb — negative
glorified
δοξάζωdoxázō
G1392
to render (or esteem) glorious (in a wide application)
Strong's Exhaustive Concordance (James Strong, 1890/1894), public domain; digitized by Open Scriptures (CC BY-SA). KJV word tagging: eBible.org (public domain). Original-language text, parsing and brief lexicon: STEPBible.org data from Tyndale House, Cambridge (CC BY 4.0).
Cross-references
Acts 2:17 And it shall come to pass in the last days, saith God, I will pour out of my Spirit upon all flesh: and your sons and your daughters shall p…
Joel 2:28 And it shall come to pass afterward, that I will pour out my spirit upon all flesh; and your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, your ol…
John 14:16-17 And I will pray the Father, and he shall give you another Comforter, that he may abide with you for ever;
Isaiah 32:15 Until the spirit be poured upon us from on high, and the wilderness be a fruitful field, and the fruitful field be counted for a forest.
John 16:7 Nevertheless I tell you the truth; It is expedient for you that I go away: for if I go not away, the Comforter will not come unto you; but i…
Acts 2:33 Therefore being by the right hand of God exalted, and having received of the Father the promise of the Holy Ghost, he hath shed forth this,…
Isaiah 44:3 For I will pour water upon him that is thirsty, and floods upon the dry ground: I will pour my spirit upon thy seed, and my blessing upon th…
John 12:16 These things understood not his disciples at the first: but when Jesus was glorified, then remembered they that these things were written of…
Cross-references from OpenBible.info (CC BY), in the lineage of the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge (public domain).
Commentary
Matthew Henry on John 7:37-44
In these verses we have,
I. Christ's discourse, with the explication of it, Joh 7:37-39. It is probable that these are only short hints of what he enlarged upon, but they have in them the substance of the whole gospel; here is a gospel invitation to come to Christ, and a gospel promise of comfort and happiness in him. Now observe,
1. When he gave this invitation: On the last day of the feast of tabernacles, that great day. The eighth day, which concluded that solemnity, was to be a holy convocation, Lev 23:36. Now on this day Christ published this gospel-call, because (1.) Much people were gathered together, and, if the invitation were given to many, it might be hoped that some would accept…
this spake he of the Spirit--who, by His direct personal agency, opens up this spring of living waters in the human spirit (Joh 3:6), and by His indwelling in the renewed soul ensures their unfailing flow.
they that believe, &c.--As the Holy Ghost is, in the redemption of man, entirely at the service of Christ, as His Agent, so it is only in believing connection with Christ that any one "receives" the Spirit.
for the Holy Ghost was not yet given--Beyond all doubt the word "given," or some similar word, is the right supplement. In Joh 16:7 the Holy Ghost is represented not only as the gift of Christ, but a gift the communication of which was dependent upon His own departure to the Father.…
Was not yet given - Δεδομενον, given is added by the Codex Vaticanus, (B.) the Syriac, all the Persic, later Syriac with an asterisk, three copies of the Slavonic, Vulgate, and all the Itala but three; and several of the primitive fathers. The word seems necessary to the completion of the sense.
Certain measures of the Holy Spirit had been vouchsafed from the beginning of the world to believers and unbelievers: but that abundant effusion of his graces spoken of by Joel, Joe 2:28, which peculiarly characterized the Gospel times, was not granted till after the ascension of Christ:
1. Because this Spirit in its plenitude was to come in consequence of his atonement; and therefore could not come…
The Church Fathers
He promised the Holy Spirit to the Apostles before the Ascension; He gave it to them in fiery tongues, after the Ascension. The Evangelist's words, Which they that believe on Him should receive, refer to this.
Accordingly, in the Acts of the Apostles, we find that men who had "John's baptism" had not received the Holy Spirit, whom they knew not even by hearing. That, then, was no celestial thing which furnished no celestial (endowments): whereas the very thing which was celestial in John-the Spirit of prophecy-so completely failed, after the transfer of the whole Spirit to the Lord, that he presently sent to inquire whether He whom he had himself preached, whom he had pointed out when coming to him, were "HE.
But I will recur again to what was before us. The Spirit came to be in the Prophets for the need's sake of prophesying, He indwelleth now through Christ in believers, having begun in Him first when He was made Man. For as God He has unceasingly the Spirit Who is Essentially of His Nature and His own. He is anointed for our sakes and said to receive the Spirit as Man, not for Himself bringing in the participation of the Divine good things, but for the nature of man as we have already taught. When then the Divine Evangelist says to us, For the Spirit was not yet because that Jesus was not yet glorified, let us understand him to mean the full and complete habitation in men of the Holy Ghost.
The Church Fathers: public-domain translations (Ante-Nicene and Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers), verse-indexed by SermonIndex (CC BY 4.0).
Dictionary and topics
Emblems Of The Holy Spirit, The · Water — Water
Feast Of Tabernacles, The · Customs observed at: Drawing water from the pool of Siloam — Customs observed at: Drawing water from the pool of Siloam
Fountains And Springs · Illustrative: Of the Holy Spirit — Illustrative: Of the Holy Spirit
Gift Of The Holy Spirit, The · Given: Upon the exaltation — Given: Upon the exaltation
Rivers · Illustrative: Of the gifts and graces of the Holy Spirit — Illustrative: Of the gifts and graces of the Holy Spirit
Trinity · THE HOLY — THE HOLY
Water · .Water of life — .Water of life
Dictionary: Easton's (1897) and Smith's (1863), public domain. Topics: Nave's Topical Bible (1896) and Torrey's Topical Textbook (1897), public domain. Both as parsed by NEUU (CC BY 4.0).
But this spake he of the Spirit,.... These are the words of the evangelist, explaining the figurative expressions of Christ; showing, that by rivers of living water, he meant the Spirit in his gifts and graces; and which is the plain sense of the passages referred to by him, particularly Isaiah 44:3, and which, as before observed, the Jews supposed were intimated by their drawing and pouring water at the feast of tabernacles.
Which they that believe on him should receive; the apostles, and others, that had believed in Christ, and had received the Spirit, as a spirit of regeneration and sanctification; as a spirit of illumination and conversion; as a spirit of faith and adoption; but on the…
John 7:37-39
37. Now on the last day, which was the greatest day of the feast, Jesus stood, and exclaimed, saying, If any man thirst, let him come to me, and drink. 38. He who believeth in me, as the Scripture saith, out of his belly shall flow rivers of living water. 39 But this he spoke of the Spirit which they who believed in him were to receive. For the Holy Spirit was not yet given, because Jesus was not yet glorified.
37. On the last day. The first thing that ought to be observed here is, that no plots or intrigues of enemies terrified Christ, so as to cause him to desist from his duty; but, on the contrary, his courage rose with dangers, so that he persevered with greater firmness.…
