As you may know there is a verse removed in many translations of the Book of John. In the fifth chapter the fourth verse gives an explanation of why people are gathered at this pool. This verse may or may not be included in the body of your text, but if not there will be a footnote at the bottom or side of the page for you to find it in.
The Missing Verse
“Some manuscripts include here, wholly or in part, paralyzed—’and they waited for the moving of the waters. 4 From time to time an angel of the Lord would come down and stir up the waters. The first one into the pool after each such disturbance would be cured of whatever disease they had.'”
John 5:4
Context
Excluded
Here is the the passage with this verse missing (as found in most Bible translations):
“Some time later, Jesus went up to Jerusalem for one of the Jewish festivals. 2 Now there is in Jerusalem near the Sheep Gate a pool, which in Aramaic is called Bethesda and which is surrounded by five covered colonnades. 3 Here a great number of disabled people used to lie—the blind, the lame, the paralyzed. [4] 5 One who was there had been an invalid for thirty-eight years. 6 When Jesus saw him lying there and learned that he had been in this condition for a long time, he asked him, “Do you want to get well?”
John 5:1-6 with the fourth verse excluded
Included
Here it is with the verse included:
“Some time later, Jesus went up to Jerusalem for one of the Jewish festivals. 2 Now there is in Jerusalem near the Sheep Gate a pool, which in Aramaic is called Bethesda and which is surrounded by five covered colonnades. 3 Here a great number of disabled people used to lie—the blind, the lame, the paralyzed and they waited for the moving of the waters. 4 From time to time an angel of the Lord would come down and stir up the waters. The first one into the pool after each such disturbance would be cured of whatever disease they had. 5 One who was there had been an invalid for thirty-eight years. 6 When Jesus saw him lying there and learned that he had been in this condition for a long time, he asked him, “Do you want to get well?”
John 5:1-6
You Decide
Whether it should or shouldn’t be in the text doesn’t really matter to me that much for I accept a supernatural worldview regardless.
Personally how one parses this predicament is way more interesting to me.
I would wager a lot of the time most people wouldn’t even notice a verse missing and most pastors would gloss over this seemly nasty little fact of a discrepancy in the text (for the sake of helping God save face of coarse ).
Inspiration
I am being a little facetious here but the real issue at hand is a weak and elementary view of inspiration. In my experience I have notice a tendency among Christians to conflate inspiration with something of the likes to that of automatic writing.
Intended or not lots of peoples belief of inspiration turns into God “zapping” people to produce a certain texts that is perfectly preserved in “its original form” though we have no proof of such in existence. This may seem like a joke but people really do form a conclusion about the doctrine of inspiration that comes pretty close to this idea.
Sadly as well intended as one might be, this type of poor articulation when it come to inspiration sets people up to be confused at the very least, or at worst destroyed by critics who use discrepancies such as John 5:4.
This text only become a problem if you 1- don’t want to acknowledge the existence of a supernatural world view or 2- If you hold an unbiblical view of inspiration.
If you posses a healthy view on inspiration there is no problem. God’s spirit moved upon ordinary people, using their acquired skills (and most likely help through an amanuensis in some cases) to craft a work which told Gods story that He was please with.
Conclusion
If that is how God communicated with all people via inspiration then what’s the difference if there is a bit of extra info about a pool being stirred by angels or not?
Either way at some point someone felt there was confusion about this passage and was inspired to add a bit of information to give more context to this section of scripture.
I suppose for me, something like this would only cause a persons worldview to be in jeopardy, if your worldview wasn’t very solid to begin with.
Peace and Blessings
Biblical Doctrine Derives From the Biblical Text
The Unseen Realm Course
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