John 5:17

Persecute Jesus. Jesus was haled before the Sanhedrin and charged with Sabbathbreaking (see DA 204), and to this charge was added that of blasphemy (v. 18). The leaders of the nation sought to counteract Jesus’ undeniably great influence over the people (see on ch. 2:23). Also, they set spies to watch Him, apparently to build up a case, so that they could condemn Him to death (see DA 213).

By their action in publicly censuring Jesus in the spring of A.D. 29 the Jewish leaders sought to undermine His authority and influence with the people (DA 213). They made a public proclamation warning the nation against Him and set spies to follow Him in an endeavor to find cause for legal action against Him. In the full knowledge that their opposition to Him was without excuse they became even more bitter toward Him from now on, and began laying plans how they might take His life. This design they succeeded in carrying out two years later, at the Passover of A.D. 31.

By the spring of A.D. 29 they had ample evidence of his Messiahship — they knew of the vision of Zacharias (Luke 1:5-20), of the announcement to the shepherds (Luke 2:8-12), of the coming of the wise men (Matt. 2:1, 2), of the visit of Jesus to the Temple at the age of 12 (Luke 2:42-50), of the witness of John the Baptist to Christ as the Messiah (John 1:19-34). More recently they had had the additional evidence of the perfection evident in Jesus’ character, of the soundness of His teachings, and of the divine character of His miracles. Added to all of this they had the prophecies. These, the Jews must have been impressed were being fulfilled in events then taking place.

On the sabbath day. The Jews seem not to have punished the man for carrying his bed on the Sabbath, beyond censuring him publicly. But Jesus, the author of the miracle, they sought to slay, probably both because He had healed the man and because He had commanded him to carry his bed on the Sabbath (see on chs. 7:22-24; 9:6, 14). While it was allowed by Jewish law to treat a man who was acutely sick, the treating of a chronic case such as this was forbidden. Thus an ancient Jewish commentary, written many centuries after Jesus’ time, but which undoubtedly reflects the situation in His day, declares: “Is a person allowed to heal on the Sabbath? Our masters have taught: Mortal danger overrides the Sabbath; but if it is doubtful whether he [a sick man] will regain health or not, one should not override the Sabbath [on his account]” (Tanchuma B, cited in Strack and Billerbeck, Kommentar zum Neuen Testament vol. 1, p. 624). Jesus’ choice in the present instance of a man who had been ill for 38 years seems to have been made purposely to demonstrate the fallacy of such Jewish legal restrictions.

Worketh hitherto. Literally, “is working until now.” By these words Jesus assured His hearers that God, who had created the world, was still actively working in their midst, even on the Sabbath day (see EGW Supplementary Material on Acts 17:28). This was a contradiction of the deistic view in some circles of Judaism that tended to make God so distant from the world that He had little contact with it. Even more than this, Jesus’ words were an assertion that His own works as revealed in the miracle of healing He had just performed were indeed a work of God. The thought here expressed is basic to Jesus’ discourse in John 5:19-47.

And I. Or, “I also.” The emphatic use of the pronoun with the coordinate conjunction implies Jesus’ equality with God.