division among the people

John 7:37-44

In the last day, that great day of the feast, Jesus stood and cried, saying, If any man thirst, let him come unto me, and drink.  He that believeth on me, as the scripture hath said, out of his belly shall flow rivers of living water.  (But this spake he of the Spirit, which they that believe on him should receive: for the Holy Ghost was not yet given; because that Jesus was not yet glorified.)

Many of the people therefore, when they heard this saying, said, Of a truth this is the Prophet.  Others said, This is the Christ. But some said, Shall Christ come out of Galilee?  Hath not the scripture said, That Christ cometh of the seed of David, and out of the town of Bethlehem, where David was?  So there was a division among the people because of him.  And some of them would have taken him; but no man laid hands on him.

The difference and division was between two basic groups of people.

There were those who were asking questions to try and get to the truth, to find out if Jesus was the Prophet or the Messiah as prophesied in scripture.

The other group were those looking for excuses not to believe.  They lit on the the "fact" that Jesus was from Galilee.  If they were truly pursuing the truth they would have taken the time to ask if Jesus was a descendant of David or if He had always lived in Galilee, etc...   They didn't really want to know the truth because they were suppressing the truth in unrighteousness.

We should always pursue truth to its end, not stop when we reach an answer that we want to hear.