Do you recall the Gospel text from a few weeks ago, in which Jesus healed a man who had been blind from birth, leading to the man and his parents being dragged before the Pharisees and interrogated over Jesus having thereby broken the Sabbath? Well, that was pretty much the entirety of Chapter Nine of John’s Gospel. Thisweek’s text covers the opening verses of Chapter Ten. That means that Jesus’ teaching about himself as the Good Shepherd, follows immediately upon his teaching about the spiritual blindness of the Pharisees. The meaning of Jesus’ teaching in this chapter thereby becomes a little easier to understand:
Jesus is the Good Shepherd – good (kalos) in the sense of true and authentic.
The Pharisees are bad shepherds and reveal their inauthenticity through their inability to hear and recognize the voice of the true shepherd.
The Pharisees’ deafness is equivalent to their spiritual blindness in the previous chapter.
The Pharisees are bad shepherds because they do not know how to lead their flock to abundant life. (Middle Eastern shepherds, unlike Western ones, do not drive their sheep from behind, but instead know how to lead them by teaching them the sound of their voice, which they subsequently follow.)
Jesus is the gate or door to the sheepfold, and to the safety and protection (abundant and eternal life) that lies therein. This may be illustrated by the image of a shepherd who would lay down in the opening of the sheepfold, thereby serving as a quite literal “door.”
On the other hand, the Pharisees are likened to thieves and robbers, who take instead of give. These are the “all who came before me” of whom Jesus speaks (vs. 8) – which clearly does not literally mean “all,” for that would include the Patriarchs and the Prophets. Instead, Jesus is using a figure of speech – literally an ‘image field’ or ‘extended metaphor’ (paroimian) as verse 6 describes it.
It is in this context that Jesus includes two of seven egō eimi (I am) statements: I am the gate (vs. 7) and I am the good shepherd (vs. 9). Along with the other five – the bread of life (6:35), the resurrection and the life (11:25), the light of the world (9:5), the way, truth and life (14:6) – Jesus’ identity is revealed through this divine name which God shared with Moses in Exodus 3:14 (“I am who I am”).
Interestingly, scholars have pointed out that in the ancient Near East sheepfolds often contained the flocks of several families, who collectively could afford the cost of a gateman/doorman. The owners of the sheep would separate the sheep using only their voice, which each sheep would recognize and follow. This not only informs Jesus’ words concerning voice. It may also speak to the diversity of God’s flock, and the blessing each has of recognizing the voice of the good shepherds who care for them, and of the Good Shepherd that each ultimately serves.
