John 3:4 - Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible

By the answer of Nicodemus, it should seem that he was an old man; which is also probable, because he was one of the rulers: he puts the case as to himself; I am, saith he, an old man, how should I be born? Can a man enter the second time into his mother's womb, and be born? How true is that of the apostle, 1 Corinthians 2:14, The natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God! What a gross conception doth Nicodemus (though doubtless a learned as well as a great man) discover of regeneration, as if it could not be without a man's mother travailing in birth with him a second time! Nicodemus's question discovers a great deal of ignorance and weakness, but yet a great deal of simplicity and plainness in him; that he did not come, as the Pharisees generally were wont to come to Christ, to catch him by captious questions, but brought discendi pietatem, a pious desire to learn from him, and to be instructed by him. The Pharisees had been used to study the traditions of the elders, and spent their time about unprofitable niceties, as to the meaning of the law; so were not at all versed in the great things which concerned the kingdom of God. The like instance hath been in later ages, the popish divines spending their time generally about nice school questions, showing themselves much ignorant of spiritual things, and the great mysteries of the kingdom of God.