The importance of verses 16–18 cannot be missed. For the first timewe learn of Jewish hostility toward Jesus and the plan to kill him (5:18). The judicial theme comes out in 5:16 in the word “persecute” (diōkō), the grammar of which indicates a protracted period of persecution. God and Jesus form the substance of the following discourse. Jesus justifies working on the Sabbath because of his special relation with God (5:17): if God can work, so can Jesus. Th…