These residents knew what the visiting crowd did not. Gill says they were "inhabitants of Jerusalem, and so are distinguished from the people" of John 7:20, and that living in the city they "knew more of the temper and disposition, the designs and attempts, of the chief priests, Scribes, and elders." Their question confirms what Jesus had said (John 7:19). What puzzled them was that the man the rulers wanted dead was speaking freely, and "they say nothing unto him" (John 7:26). Matthew Henry reads their words with suspicion: they "slyly and maliciously insinuate" things that would stir the rulers against Christ.

They keep reasoning among themselves. "But, lo, he speaketh boldly, and they say nothing unto him. Do the rulers know indeed that this is the very Christ?" (John 7:26). Then they dismiss the idea: "Howbeit we know this man whence he is: but when Christ cometh, no man knoweth whence he is" (John 7:27). Jesus cries out in the temple, "Ye both know me, and ye know whence I am: and I am not come of myself, but he that sent me is true, whom ye know not" (John 7:28). They seek to take Him, "but no man laid hands on him, because his hour was not yet come" (John 7:30).

"Them of Jerusalem" means residents of the city, as opposed to pilgrims who had come up for the feast. Gill notes that a rabbi in the Pirke Abot (a collection of Jewish sayings) is called "a man of Jerusalem" in the same sense.

The word "boldly" in John 7:26 is parresia, openly or publicly. It is the same word used in John 7:13, where "no man spake openly of him for fear of the Jews." The people were afraid to speak of Jesus openly, while Jesus Himself spoke openly. Gill says the rulers had been plotting against Jesus' life ever since the miracle at the pool (John 5).

This question shows that the rulers' plot was no secret in the city, yet it could not touch Jesus. His enemies wanted Him dead, and still He taught in the open, in the temple, at the feast. John gives the reason: "his hour was not yet come" (John 7:30). The timing of Jesus' life was in the Father's hands, not in the hands of those who hated Him; Gill says the time was fixed "in the council and covenant of God." When that hour came, Jesus Himself would say so (John 12:23).

The question also shows the danger of thinking we know Jesus. The people said, "we know this man whence he is" (John 7:27). Jesus answered that they knew His earthly home but not the One who sent Him (John 7:28-29).