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Nicodemus

Came at night with a compliment, and came back in daylight with a hundred pounds of burial spices.

He is a Pharisee and a ruler of the Jews, which puts him on the council that will eventually vote. He arrives after dark, which John notes three separate times, and opens with courtesy: we know that you are a teacher come from God. The answer cuts across the compliment entirely. Except a man be born again he cannot see the kingdom of God, and the conversation that follows is a learned man asking how a grown person gets back inside his mother.

Where he appearsJohn 3 · John 7 · John 19

John
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Nicodemus

The movements, in the order the text gives them.

The Account of Nicodemus

  1. 01

    John 3:1-4

    The same came to Jesus by night

    He opens with what we know and is answered with what he cannot see. His question about entering a second time into the womb is not mockery, it is a man taking the words seriously.

    Nicodemus arrives with an assessment of Jesus and receives an assessment of what a person needs. The compliment is substantial: a ruler and Pharisee acknowledges divine backing for the signs. Jesus does not spend the conversation enjoying it. He moves directly from recognizing a teacher to being able to see God's kingdom. Those are not the same achievement.

    The chapter break can hide the connection. John 2 ends with people believing because of signs and Jesus knowing what is in man. John 3 immediately introduces a man whose opening argument rests on signs. Nicodemus is therefore not an unrelated visitor placed after a completed discussion. He brings the previous paragraph into the room.

    The difficulty then turns on birth. Nicodemus translates the requirement into another physical beginning, complete with the impossibility of returning to a mother's womb. The response about water and Spirit that follows makes clear that repetition of ordinary birth is not the point. His education has brought him to a serious question, not supplied its answer. The night is stated; its motive is not. John gives enough darkness for the setting without requiring an invented confession of fear.

    Verse by verse

    1. 3:1

      Pharisee identifies Nicodemus's religious affiliation; ruler identifies his standing. John 7:50 places him among the leaders who are discussing Jesus.

    2. 3:2

      The Gospel says that he came by night but does not state why. Secrecy, opportunity for conversation, and symbolic darkness should not be confused with an explicitly supplied motive.

    3. 3:3-4

      The Greek wording permits the interplay between a new birth and birth from above. The following verses identify the Spirit as essential to that birth.

    John 3:1-4

    King James Version · 4 verses

    3:1There was a man of the Pharisees, named Nicodemus, a ruler of the Jews:

    3:2The same came to Jesus by night, and said unto him, Rabbi, we know that thou art a teacher come from God: for no man can do these miracles that thou doest, except God be with him.

    3:3Jesus answered and said unto him, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God.

    3:4Nicodemus saith unto him, How can a man be born when he is old? can he enter the second time into his mother’s womb, and be born?

    John 3:1-4: The same came to Jesus by night
  2. 02

    John 3:9-16

    How can these things be

    He is told that the wind blows where it lists, reminded that he is a master of Israel, and handed the sentence about the serpent in the wilderness and the Son given.

    The teacher of Israel is being taken back to the wilderness. Jesus does not answer Nicodemus with a private spiritual technique available only to the well informed. He reaches into a public episode from Israel's Scriptures: people dying from serpent bites, and the provision God instructed Moses to raise before them. Nicodemus's professional territory becomes the place where his understanding is tested.

    The comparison has an exact center. As the serpent was lifted up, so the Son of man must be lifted up. The passage does not say that Jesus resembles a serpent in every possible respect, or turn each detail in Numbers into a code. It joins God's appointed means of deliverance, the act of looking in the wilderness, and believing in the Son here. Life is received through the provision God gives.

    Then the scale widens. The teacher is of Israel; the love named in verse 16 reaches the world. The repeated whosoever keeps that widening from remaining an impressive generality. The passage moves from one learned man's difficulty to the giving of the only begotten Son, and from perishing to everlasting life. Nicodemus's question opens onto considerably more than a clarification of terms.

    Verse by verse

    1. 3:10

      The Greek describes Nicodemus as the teacher of Israel. The rebuke concerns the gap between his acknowledged teaching role and his understanding, not a statement that all learning is worthless.

    2. 3:14

      Numbers 21:8-9 supplies the comparison's source: the bitten person looked at the raised brass serpent and lived.

    3. 3:15-16

      Both verses join believing with life rather than perishing. Verse 16 identifies God's love and the gift of the only begotten Son as the setting of that promise.

    John 3:9-16

    King James Version · 8 verses

    3:9Nicodemus answered and said unto him, How can these things be?

    3:10Jesus answered and said unto him, Art thou a master of Israel, and knowest not these things?

    3:11Verily, verily, I say unto thee, We speak that we do know, and testify that we have seen; and ye receive not our witness.

    3:12If I have told you earthly things, and ye believe not, how shall ye believe, if I tell you of heavenly things?

    3:13And no man hath ascended up to heaven, but he that came down from heaven, even the Son of man which is in heaven.

    3:14And as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of man be lifted up:

    3:15That whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have eternal life.

    3:16For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.

    John 3:9-16: How can these things be
  3. 03

    John 7:50-52

    Does our law judge any man before it hear him

    He says the careful, procedural thing in a hostile room. The reply is not an argument but a sneer about geography.

    Nicodemus asks for a hearing and receives a question about his address. The exchange has teeth. The leaders have just dismissed the crowd as people who do not know the law. One of their own then raises a legal difficulty with their treatment of Jesus. Suddenly the relevant issue is whether Nicodemus might be Galilean too. The subject changes precisely where an answer is needed.

    His intervention is narrower than a declaration that Jesus is the Christ. He insists that judgment should follow a hearing and knowledge of a person's deeds. That restraint matters. The Gospel does not give him a speech he never made, but neither does it make the speech negligible. In this room, even the demand to hear Jesus is treated as suspicious.

    The parenthesis identifies him twice: the former night visitor, and one of them. He belongs to the body he is questioning. This is not an outsider lecturing a uniformly hostile people; it is an argument within Israel's leadership about whether its own law is being honored. Nicodemus has moved from asking Jesus for an explanation to asking his colleagues for one. The colleagues are noticeably less helpful.

    Verse by verse

    1. 7:50

      Being one of them places Nicodemus inside the leadership group. The reminder of his night visit explicitly connects this intervention with John 3.

    2. 7:51

      Nicodemus asks for hearing and examination, not an automatic verdict in Jesus' favor. His stated argument concerns how judgment is reached.

    3. 7:52

      The reply does not answer his procedural objection. It redirects attention to Galilee and challenges his association with Jesus.

    John 7:50-52

    King James Version · 3 verses

    7:50Nicodemus saith unto them, (he that came to Jesus by night, being one of them,)

    7:51Doth our law judge any man, before it hear him, and know what he doeth?

    7:52They answered and said unto him, Art thou also of Galilee? Search, and look: for out of Galilee ariseth no prophet.

    John 7:50-52: Does our law judge any man before it hear him
  4. 04

    John 19:39-40

    About a hundred pound weight

    He brings a quantity fit for a king and helps wind the body in linen with the spices. The man who came at night is now working in the afternoon with witnesses.

    The last appearance of Nicodemus is measured by weight. His first brought an argument about signs; this one brings myrrh and aloes. John again identifies him as the man who came by night, making the connection impossible to miss. The man once recorded in a private conversation is now involved in the physical care of an executed body.

    The quantity resists being treated as a polite token. About a hundred pounds is an enormous provision of burial spices, and the same Gospel has already made a single pound of Mary's ointment fill a house with fragrance. The substances are not identical, so their prices cannot simply be multiplied. The point is the scale of what Nicodemus brings, not an invented invoice.

    Joseph has obtained the body; Nicodemus joins him in wrapping it. The Gospel calls this Jewish burial practice, keeping the act firmly within the customs of Jesus and the men caring for him. It records no speech of confession, and no claim that Nicodemus now expects the resurrection. His action need not be given words the text withholds. At the end, the hands that once accompanied questions are occupied with linen, spices, and the body of Jesus.

    Verse by verse

    1. 19:39

      The reminder of the night visit links the burial directly to John 3:2. The text supplies the contrast in action without stating Nicodemus's complete inner development.

    2. 19:39

      The ancient unit is the Roman litra, not a modern English pound. The Gospel presents the quantity as approximate.

    3. 19:40

      The plural they includes Joseph and Nicodemus. John describes wrapping with spices according to Jewish burial practice, not an embalming operation described in detail.

    John 19:39-40

    King James Version · 2 verses

    19:39And there came also Nicodemus, which at the first came to Jesus by night, and brought a mixture of myrrh and aloes, about an hundred pound weight.

    19:40Then took they the body of Jesus, and wound it in linen clothes with the spices, as the manner of the Jews is to bury.

    John 19:39-40: About a hundred pound weight

Why it matters

John gives him three appearances and each one is a step taken in the open air a little further than the last. The night visit produces the most quoted verse in the New Testament. Years later, when the council wants an arrest, he asks whether their own law judges a man before hearing him and is asked in return whether he is from Galilee. Then at the end, with nothing left to gain, he brings myrrh and aloes about a hundred pound weight and helps bury a condemned man in public.

6 songs

The music

Every song in the catalogue whose passage falls inside these chapters.

  1. John 3:1-21

    Born Again

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  2. John 3:1-21

    Born of the Spirit

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  3. John 3:14-21

    God So Loved the World

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  4. John 3:22-36

    He Must Increase

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  5. John 7:1-53

    If Any Man Thirst

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  6. John 19:1-37

    It is Finished

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