John 8:33

John 8:33. They answered him, We be Abraham's seed, and have never yet been slaves to any one: how sayest thou, Ye shall become free? The promise ‘shall make you free' cannot but imply that now they have no freedom, but are slaves. This thought they indignantly repel, for they are Abraham's seed! What is the true meaning of the next words is a question much disputed. It is hardly possible that they refer directly to national freedom, for the first words of the Decalogue speak of their deliverance from the house of bondage, and this history had often been repeated. Nor can we think that the Jews are simply appealing to the law which made it impossible for an Israelite to be kept in (continued) bondage. The former supposition involves too bold a falsehood; the latter, too prosaic and strained an interpretation in a context which contains no hint of civil rights. And yet there is truth in both. To be of Abraham's seed and to be a slave were discordant ideas. To Abraham was given the promise that he should be ‘heir of the world' (Romans 4:13): the Divine nobility of his descendants was only brought out more clearly by their frequent adverse fortune. Theirs was a religious pre-eminence above all nations of the world, a freedom which no external circumstances could affect National independence was natural (though not always enjoyed), because of this Divinely-given honour: in the same gift of God lay the principle of the Israelite's civil freedom. Least of all (they thought) could they, whose boast was that the truth was theirs, be held in a slavery from which the truth should free them.