Then said they unto him, Where is thy Father? — The words seem to be asked in scorn. “You speak of two witnesses. We accept you as one. Where is the other? He should be present before us if his evidence is to be accepted.” They must have known well from the earlier discourse that He claimed God as His Father, and the recurring phrase, “the Father that sent Me,” must have now made this clear. We are not to read in these words, then, any reference to a father in the flesh, though this interpretation is that of many ancient and modern expositors. The question, moreover, is not, “Who is Thy Father?” but “Where is Thy Father?” The question is asked in another spirit in John 14:8.
It may be that to their scorn is added the desire to draw from Him express words on which to base an accusation. They perhaps expect an answer such as “My Father who is in heaven.” (Comp. the direct question in John 10:24, and the adjuration of the high priest, Matthew 27:64.) But the time has not yet come. His answer contains no words which they could lay hold of as a technical ground for blasphemy.
Ye neither know me, nor my Father. — He traces their ignorance of the Father to its true cause, i.e., to their neglect of the only means by which God could be known. This thought has met us already in John 1:18 (see Note there), and will meet us again in John 14:9; John 16:3. Here the Pharisees think they know Him, and ask “Where is Thy Father?” The answer is. that if they really knew the witness of one, they would know the witness of both.