John 9:28 - Coke's Commentary on the Holy Bible

But we are Moses' disciples, &c.— Hereby they craftily but most maliciously and falsely insinuated, that there was such an opposition between Moses and Jesus, that it was impossible for the same person to be the disciple of both. We know that God spake unto Moses, say they; but how did they know this?—Was it from the tradition which they had received concerning him?—Was it from the intrinsic proofs that might be drawn from his writings? Or was it from the miracles that he wrought in confirmation of his mission? Consider all these proofs with respect to Jesus: they all looked upon John as a person of integrity, and some indeed honoured him with the title of a prophet; but John testified that Jesus was the Lamb of God, the beloved Son of the Father, and that he had heard God himself declare as much, when Christ was baptized by him. The doctrines of Jesus were equally worthy of a divine messenger with those of Moses; they were more spiritual, and consequently more highly suitable to the nature of God, who is a Spirit. They were intended not for one particular nation, and therefore particularly suitable to the character of God, considered as the Father of mankind. The religion that he established was not local or temporal, like that of the Jews, nor, on that account, confined to a particular spot, or to be practised under particular circumstances; but to be professed every where, and to be extended throughout the habitable world. What still more confirms our Saviour's divine mission is, that he was predicted in every link of the great chain of prophesies which runs through the Old Testament; and even Moses himself speaks of him as a lawgiver,who should supersede his constitution, and ought to be heard by the latter Jews, as he himself had been by their fathers; yet notwithstanding they say, they knew that God spake to Moses, but had received no credentials to convince them of the divine mission of Jesus. Again, if they believed the mission of Moses on the evidence of miracles, credibly attested indeed, but performed two thousand years before they were born, it was much more reasonable, on their own principles, to believe the mission of Jesus, on at least equal miracles, wrought daily among them, when they might, in many instances, have been eye-witnesses to the facts; and one of which, notwithstanding all their malice, they werehere compelled to own, or, at least, found themselves utterly unable to disprove. Their partiality herein was inexcusable; nor was the inconsistency of this perverse people less glaring: for, at one time, they make their knowing whence Jesus was, an objection to his being the Messiah; and here theyobject to his being the Messiah, from their not knowing whence he was. But it is the nature of malice and of error always to confute and contradict themselves. See ch. John 7:27-28.