All that came before me £ are thieves and robbers. Great difficulty has been felt by commentators in understanding "before me." The words clearly gave the early Gnostic heretics a text on which they established their dualistic rejection of the old dispensation.
Their absence from certain texts led Augustine and others to emphasize the word "came." "All who came," i.e. in their own strength or wisdom, when not "sent" or authorized by God. Other endeavors have been made (see Meyer and Lunge) to give it a non-temporal meaning, such as χωρίς, "independently of me."
Wolf and Olshausen make πρὸ equivalent to ὐπὲρ, "in the place" or "in the stead of me" (so Lunge, Lampe, Schleusner). De Wette and others accept the temporal meaning, "before," i.e. in point of time, and include under it the entire corpus of Old Testament saints and teachers, and therefore regard the saying as inconsistent with the gentleness of Christ.
But with John 5:39, John 5:45-47, and many other passages in this Gospel, it is certain the words could not mean to denounce all who came as teachers or shepherds before him in mere point of time as "thieves and robbers," whom the sheep did not hear.
Therefore the πρὸ must be to some extent modified in meaning. We agree with Westcott and Godet in limiting πρὸ ἐμού, by throwing the emphasis on the "came," and by adding, moreover, to it the essential point, "came making themselves doors of the sheep"—claiming to have the "key of knowledge," professing vainly to open or shut the door of heaven.
That is, no other has ever had the right or claim to be such "a door." The Baptist, the prophets, one by one, Abraham and Moses, in their day made no such profession. The dignity belongs to Christ alone.
The language may receive accentuation from the pressing urgency of false Christs, as well as the hopeless system of Pharisaic pride. Theme sees here the mere dressing out of St. Paul's language, condemnatory of false prophets and ravening wolves who would not spare the flock of Christ (Acts 20:29), and Christ's own words in the synoptists (Matthew 7:15; Matthew 23:1-39.
13, etc.). Special reference is made to the ceremonial superstitions, to "the hedge about the Law," to the cruel slavery of modern Pharisaism, which had done what neither prophets nor priests of old had attempted.
Archdeacon Watkins emphasizes the present tense, "are thieves," etc., making Christ's reference obvious to the lawyers and scribes of his own day, who were closing the door, and plundering those whom they kept out of the kingdom.
But the sheep did not hear them. The true sheep have not been seduced by them. The teaching of these Pharisees has not prevailed over susceptible souls.