Jesus went unto the mount of Olives.
The genuineness of this narrative-including the last verse of the foregoing chapter-will be best considered after the exposition.
Jesus [It should be, 'But Jesus' Ieesous (G2424 ) de (G1161 )] went unto the mount of Olives. This verse should have formed the last verse of John 7:1-53. The information given will then be, that while "every man went unto his own house," Jesus, who had no home of His own to go to, "went unto the mount of Olives." Since "the mount of Olives" nowhere else occurs in this Gospel, and Jesus' spending the night there seems to belong only to the time of His final visit to Jerusalem; this has been thought adverse to the genuineness of the whole section. The following is Stier's explanation of this, with which, however, we are but indifferently satisfied. 'The return of the people to the inert quiet and security of their dwellings (John 7:53), at the close of the feast, is designedly contrasted with our Lord's homeless way, so to speak, of spending the short night, who is early in the morning on the scene again. One cannot well see why what is recorded in Luke 21:37-38, may not even thus early have taken place: it might have been the Lord's ordinary custom from the beginning to leave the brilliant misery of the city every night, that so He might compose His sorrowful and interceding heart, and collect His energies for new labours of love; preferring for His resting-place Bethany, and the Mount of Olives, the scene thus consecrated by many preparatory prayers for His final humiliation and exaltation.' But see the discussion of this question below.