Yohanes 7:12

7:12 There was ¹  a lot of grumbling ²  about him among the crowds. ³  Some were saying, “He is a good man,” but others, “He deceives the common people.” ⁴ 

Yohanes 7:40-41

Differing Opinions About Jesus

7:40 When they heard these words, some of the crowd ⁵  began to say, “This really ⁶  is the Prophet!” ⁷  7:41 Others said, “This is the Christ!” ⁸  But still others said, “No, ⁹  for the Christ doesn’t come from Galilee, does he? ¹⁰ 

Yohanes 9:17

9:17 So again they asked the man who used to be blind, ¹¹  “What do you say about him, since he caused you to see?” ¹²  “He is a prophet,” the man replied. ¹³ 

[7:12]  ¹ tn Grk “And there was.”

[7:12]  ² tn Or “complaining.”

[7:12]  ³ tn Or “among the common people” (as opposed to the religious authorities mentioned in the previous verse).

[7:12]  ⁴ tn Or “the crowd.”

[7:40]  ⁵ tn Or “The common people” (as opposed to the religious authorities like the chief priests and Pharisees).

[7:40]  ⁶ tn Or “truly.”

[7:40]  ⁷ sn The Prophet is a reference to the “prophet like Moses” of Deut 18:15, by this time an eschatological figure in popular belief.

[7:41]  ⁸ tn Or “the Messiah” (Both Greek “Christ” and Hebrew and Aramaic “Messiah” mean “one who has been anointed”).

[7:41]  sn See the note on Christ in 1:20.

[7:41]  ⁹ tn An initial negative reply (“No”) is suggested by the causal or explanatory γάρ (gar) which begins the clause.

[7:41]  ¹⁰ tn Questions prefaced with μή (mh) in Greek anticipate a negative answer. This can sometimes be indicated by using a “tag” at the end in English (here the tag is “does he?”).

[9:17]  ¹¹ tn Grk “the blind man.”

[9:17]  ¹² tn Grk “since he opened your eyes” (an idiom referring to restoration of sight).

[9:17]  ¹³ tn Grk “And he said, ‘He is a prophet.’”

[9:17]  sn At this point the man, pressed by the Pharisees, admitted there was something special about Jesus. But here, since prophet is anarthrous (is not accompanied by the Greek article) and since in his initial reply in 9:11-12 the man showed no particular insight into the true identity of Jesus, this probably does not refer to the prophet of Deut 18:15, but merely to an unusual person who is capable of working miracles. The Pharisees had put this man on the spot, and he felt compelled to say something about Jesus, but he still didn’t have a clear conception of who Jesus was, so he labeled him a “prophet.”