John 7:35

Then said the Jews The Jews therefore said, i.e. in consequence of what Christ had said, shewing that it is to the official representatives of the nation that His words are addressed.

Whither will he go, &c. Better, Where does this fellow intend to go, seeing that we shall not find Him? Does He intend to go unto the dispersion among the Gentiles, &c.

the dispersed Or, the dispersion, meaning those Jews who were dispersed among the heathen outside Palestine; the abstract for the concrete, like -the circumcision" for the Jews generally. The word for -dispersion" (diaspora), occurs James 1:1 and 1 Peter 1:1 (see notes there), and nowhere else in N.T. There were three chief colonies of these -dispersed" or -scattered" Jews, in Babylonia, Egypt, and Syria, whence they spread over the whole world. -Moses of old time hath in every city them that preach him," Acts 15:21. These opponents of Christ, therefore, suggest that He means to go to the Jews scattered among the Gentiles in order to reach the Gentiles and teach them the very mode of proceeding afterwards adopted by the Apostles. But here it is spoken in sarcasm. Christ's utter disregard of Jewish exclusiveness and apparent non-observance of the ceremonial law gave a handle to the sneer; which would be pointless if the word translated -Gentiles" (margin -Greeks") were rendered -Hellenists," i.e. Grecised Jews. Hellenes, or -Greeks," in N.T. alwaysmeans Gentiles or heathen. See on John 12:20.