I am NOT or NOT YET going up to this feast

[tonychanyt]

John 7:

1 After this Jesus went about in Galilee. He would not go about in Judea, because the Jews were seeking to kill him. 2 Now the Jews’ Feast of Booths was at hand.

The chapter began with a dilemma: Jesus was avoiding Judea but the Feast of Booths was coming up. He had to go to Judea to celebrate the feast according to Moses' law. This is one of the three annual festivals when all Israelite men are required to visit the Jerusalem temple. Keep in mind that this wasn't optional.

3 So his brothers said to him, “Leave here and go to Judea, that your disciples also may see the works you are doing. 4 For no one works in secret if he seeks to be known openly. If you do these things, show yourself to the world.” 5 For not even his brothers believed in him.

Jesus' brothers did not believe him. They provoked him: If you are so great, then go now to Jerusalem; show your power to the world.

6 Jesus said to them, “My time has not yet [G3768 οὔπω] come, but your time is always here.

You go on ahead. I will not be going with you. My time is οὔπω (not yet).

7 The world cannot hate you, but it hates me because I testify about it that its works are evil. 8 You go up to the feast. I am not [G3756 οὐκ] going up to this feast,

Some manuscripts have not yet [G3768 οὔπω]. Either way, Jesus meant that he was not yet going because:

for my time has not yet [G3768 οὔπω] fully come.”

Jesus waited for God's timing.

The Greek adverb οὔπω (not yet) appeared either 2 or 3 times in 2 verses. Either way, Jesus' meanings in all 3 times meant "not yet".

9 After saying this, he remained in Galilee.
10 But after his brothers had gone up to the feast, then he also went up,

Now, his time had come. Jesus did not want to go with his brothers.

Did Jesus intentionally deceive his brothers by telling them, "I am not going up to this feast"?

They might think so, but only because of their unbelief. Jesus did not deceive them. Not going would have been a sin. They should know better than Jesus would sin by not going.

On the point of manuscript variants, Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges commented:

I go not up yet] ‘Yet,’ though very ancient, is possibly no part of the original text: it may have been inserted to avoid the charge of the heathen critic Porphyry, that Jesus here shews fickleness or deceit, and therefore cannot be Divine. But the sense is the same, whether ‘yet’ is inserted or not. He means ‘I am not going now; not going publicly in the general caravan of pilgrims; not going with you, who do not believe on Me.’ He does not say ‘I shall not go.’

I am NOT or NOT YET going up to this feast?

Even if the autograph manuscripts had only the word 'not', the implication was 'not yet'. Jesus didn't lie to his brothers. He just didn't want to go with them.