Tuesday 4th November
Read John 13:1-5
“It was just before the Passover Festival. Jesus knew that the hour had come for him to leave this world and go to the Father. Having loved his own who were in the world, he loved them to the end. 2 The evening meal was in progress, and the devil had already prompted Judas, the son of Simon Iscariot, to betray Jesus. 3 Jesus knew that the Father had put all things under his power, and that he had come from God and was returning to God; 4 so he got up from the meal, took off his outer clothing, and wrapped a towel round his waist. 5 After that, he poured water into a basin and began to wash his disciples’ feet, drying them with the towel that was wrapped round him.” (NIVUK)
Augustine, the great North African church father of the 4th century, sometimes had novel ways of understanding passages of scripture. In his magisterial commentary on John his reflections on the passage before us focused on areas we would not normally consider. Yet, despite this, they are immensely illuminating.
Augustine focuses on John’s time marker for the events he is about to narrate. The Greek for Passover is similar to the Greek for ‘suffering’, and as such speaks volumes about what is about to occur. He then notes that the Hebrew, as expected, would mean ‘pass over’, drawing Christian readers back to ancient Egypt and the saving act of Yahweh in providing an escape from death and then salvation through the sea. Finally, the Latin word would be ‘transitus’, meaning to ‘pass through’, ‘transit’ or ‘cross’. An idea that John immediately draws attention to in the next sentence.
Together, the single word ‘Passover’ conveys that Jesus, through his suffering, would save people from death and pass through this world to return to the Father.
All of us will eventually ‘pass away’ but only some of us will ‘pass through’, with Him, into the new creation.
