Critics of the New Testament are agreed that the writers did not commonly waste words. When we light upon a fact mentioned casually and of which, for the moment, nothing seems to come, we may suspect that the event caused considerable concern at the time, and that it had consequences which do not at once appear. In the above verse [JOHN 2:12] it is simply said that the family "went down to Capernaum"; but this was no holiday excursion, it would not have been mentioned if it were merely that; the household may not have been permanently removed at that time, but at any rate this seems to have been a trial visit intended to discover whether Capernaum would be a suitable abode. I have attributed this removal to the jealousy caused at Nazareth by our Lord's having worked His Signs not there but at Cana. There were very probably other reasons as well.
- from page 307, The Risen an Master