John 7:52 - The Pharisee's unknowing self-fulfilment of Scripture

John 7:47-52

47 Then the Pharisees answered them, “Are you also deceived? 48 Have any of the rulers or the Pharisees believed in Him? 49 But this crowd that does not know the law is accursed.” 50 Nicodemus (he who came to Jesus by night, being one of them) said to them,51 “Does our law judge a man before it hears him and knows what he is doing?” 52 They answered and said to him, “Are you also from Galilee? Search and look, for no prophet has arisen out of Galilee.”

The Pharisees were constantly testing Jesus against the Scriptures to try and find fault in Him. Of course they were never able to find any faults and usually their 'testing' resulted in their own shortcomings being brought to light and the Scriptures being fulfilled by the Lord's teaching. 

In John 7:52 the Pharisees are dismissive of Christ's teachings by remarking that "no prophet has arisen out of Galilee.” 

Preachers often say that the reason the Pharisees said this was because Galilee was a poor region and nobody of any worth would ever be expected to come from there. This is incorrect and to give this verse no more consideration than that is to miss out on the intricacies of the Word of God. 

Even in this small remark, the workings of God's plan for salvation can be seen. The Pharisees have stumbled in their knowledge of Scripture and shown that Jesus is the Lord spoken of in the Old Testament. Everything in God's word links coherently. This off-the-cuff remark made by the Pharisees is no exception. Perhaps the Pharisees gave this remark no more thought than a simple smear of Jesus' reputation, however its meaning goes much deeper than that. 

The statement made takes us back to Jonah. Jonah’s hometown is Gath Hepher, a border town of Galilee near to Nazareth within the inheritance of the tribe of Zebulun (Joshua 9:13); the very place were Jesus was from and carried out the majority of His ministry. Jonah the prophet was from Galilee.

The statement made by the Pharisees is blatantly incorrect on their part and raises questions over its meaning. It cannot be concluded and would seem highly doubtful that the Pharisees would not have been aware that another prophet had come from Galilee. In fact the prophet Hosea also came from that same region therefore the people of the day and especially the Pharisees must have known that there were prophets from Galilee. 

It could be argued that the Pharisees are sarcastically mocking Jesus by making this statement, however this argument does not hold up considering that the prophet Jonah is considered so highly by the Jewish people. Every year the book of Jonah is read in its entirety during the Yom Kippur service. If this statement was made sarcastically it would not make sense because that would mean that the Pharisees are actually implying that prophets do come from Galilee which would have then given credibility to the claims of the day that Jesus was a prophet.  

Arguably, the answer is that it shows the Pharisees shortcomings and downright ignorance concerning the spiritual things of God. The Pharisees saw themselves as pious and knowledgable in the religious texts, however they were spiritually blind. They were proud and naturally minded. Throughout the Gospels, we see that despite their knowledge of scripture they could not begin to recognise the fulfilment of the Old Testament prophecies taking place right in front of their eyes. Therefore it is possible that through this statement made by the Pharisees the prophecy of Isaiah was fulfilled in the ministry of Jesus: Isaiah 44:18 they do not know nor understand; for he has shut their eyes, so that they cannot see, and their hearts so they cannot understand.

This was explained by Jesus in Matthew 13:10-17: 

And the disciples came and said to Him, “Why do You speak to them in parables?”11 He answered and said to them, “Because it has been given to you to know the mysteries of the kingdom of heaven, but to them it has not been given. 12 For whoever has, to him more will be given, and he will have abundance; but whoever does not have, even what he has will be taken away from him. 13 Therefore I speak to them in parables, because seeing they do not see, and hearing they do not hear, nor do they understand. 14 And in them the prophecy of Isaiah is fulfilled, which says: ‘Hearing you will hear and shall not understand, And seeing you will see and not perceive; 15 For the hearts of this people have grown dull. Their ears are hard of hearing, And their eyes they have closed, Lest they should see with their eyes and hear with their ears, Lest they should understand with their hearts and turn, So that I should heal them.’ 16 But blessed are your eyes for they see, and your ears for they hear; 17 for assuredly, I say to you that many prophets and righteous men desired to see what you see, and did not see it, and to hear what you hear, and did not hear it.

The mysteries of the Gospel have been revealed spiritually through the Lord Jesus to those who accept Him in faith, however to those people who do not have faith, they remain spiritually blind and unable to see just like the Pharisees were throughout. 

1 Corinthians 2:14 tells us that the natural man cannot discern spiritual things: "But the natural man does not receive the things of the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him; nor can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned."

2 Corinthians 4:3-4 states "But even if our gospel is veiled, it is veiled to those who are perishing, 4 whose minds the god of this age has blinded, who do not believe, lest the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God, should shine on them." 

The Pharisees were unable to see that Jesus was the Messiah because they were unwilling to and therefore they were blinded to all the evidence and fulfillments of Scripture taking place even to the point that they became wrong in their thinking. As stated by Jesus in Matthew 13:15 "their eyes have closed." Their hardness to Jesus closed their eyes even to facts that would have been common knowledge in those days, such as the fact that Jonah and Hosea were both from Galilee. This hardness to the gospel was in itself a fulfilment of prophecy and necessary to fulfil God’s plan for salvation. Romans 11:25 tells us “… that blindness in part has happened to Israel until the fullness of the Gentiles has come in”. 

We read in Romans 11:7-8 that it was God who chose to blind the Pharisees and Israel to the truth of Jesus: "Just as it is written:“What then? Israel has not obtained what it seeks; but the elect have obtained it, and the rest were blinded. … God has given them a spirit of stupor, Eyes that they should not see And ears that they should not hear, To this very day.” 

This statement in John 7:52 shows the Pharisees blindness, which must have been brought on by God in fulfillment of the prophecy. The Pharisees were so unwilling to believe in Jesus that they were blind to see simple things and clear evidence before them.  

It should be mentioned that whilst God brought blindness over the Pharisees in order to fulfil Scripture and His plan for salvation, they still would have had freewill and were free to reject or accept the spiritual things of God. Whilst it was God who blinded the Pharisees, this did not preclude them from believing or repenting. We know that there were individual believers amongst them. Nicodemus is mentioned in John 7:50 and we read in John 12:42 that there were believers amongst the rulers of Israel: "Nevertheless even among the rulers many believed in Him, but because of the Pharisees they did not confess Him, lest they should be put out of the synagogue."

This spiritual blinding was necessary to complete God’s plan for salvation, for it was through Israel’s rejection of Jesus that salvation has become available to all, both Jew and Gentile (Romans 11:11): and this brings us back to Jonah, a Jew tasked with a mission to go and preach a message of salvation to the Gentile city of Nineveh. 

If the Pharisee’s statement is a result of their spiritual blindness it is interesting that within this statement it is the prophet Jonah who is inadvertently rejected together with Jesus because in Matthew 12 Jesus compares Himself to Jonah and compares the account of Jonah with His own death and resurrection to come: "For as Jonah was three days and three nights in the belly of the great fish, so will the Son of Man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth. 41 The men of Nineveh will rise up in the judgment with this generation and condemn it, because they repented at the preaching of Jonah; and indeed a greater than Jonah is here."

The words “arisen out of Galilee” used by the Pharisees are also significant in this respect. The greek word used by the Pharisees in John 7:52 was egeiro which means "to arouse from the sleep of death, to recall the dead to life." This greek word was used throughout the gospels when referring to resurrection from the dead, Lazarus’ resurrection, Jesus’ resurrection and the raising of the Temple after three days which is representative of Jesus’ resurrection. 

Returning back to Jonah who we know was raised up out of the belly of the fish -

Jonah 2:2 Out of the belly of Sheol I cried, and you heard my voice.

Jonah 2:6 … You have brought up my life from the pit, O Lord, my God. 

The Hebrew word for ‘pit’ used in Jonah 2:6 is shachath which literally means “death” or “grave”. 

Now, not only is the Pharisee's statement factually incorrect on the basis that there had previously been prophets from Galilee, but also the statement is spiritually incorrect on the basis that the previous prophet from Galilee had been swallowed into the belly of Sheol and lifted up out of the grave by God which resulted in the Gentile city of Ninevah repenting of their sin; which is a direct picture of the death and resurrection of Jesus which has resulted in salvation becoming available to the Gentiles. By using egeiro the Pharisees have (and most certainly without intending to) referred to Jesus' resurrection before it had come to pass, rejected the picture of Jesus' death and resurrection painted by the prophet Jonah and rejected Jesus' resurrection to come. 

To focus on Hosea, the other prophet from Galilee, Hosea also points directly to the coming death and resurrection of Jesus: Hosea 6:2 states, "After two days He will revive us; On the third day He will raise us up, that we may live in His sight."

In this one small statement in John 7:52 that was made by the Pharisees to dismiss the authority of Jesus, the Pharisees have unknowingly managed to 

1. place Jesus side by side with Old Testament prophets, which is exactly the opposite of what they would have wanted to do; 
2. link Jonah, Hosea and Jesus together; 
3. refer directly to Jesus' resurrection which was to come; 
4. reject Jonah and Hosea as prophets; 
5. reject the account of Jonah which was considered highly and well respected and fail to consider Hosea 6:2, which are both in turn pointing directly towards Jesus’ resurrection to come; and 
6. reject Jesus’ resurrection.

-BACChristian