Homilies on the Gospel of John 69

'We have heard out of the law that the Christ abideth for ever; and how sayest thou that the Son of man must be lifted up? Who is this Son of man?'

'We have heard out of the law that the Christ abideth for ever; and how sayest thou that the Son of man must be lifted up? Who is this Son of man?' [Section] 1.

Error is easily detected and feeble, even though from without it be daubed over with countless colors.

And just as those who whitewash rotten walls are unable by the plastering to set them right;

so also those who lie are easily convicted;

which is exactly what the Jews here experienced.

For when Christ had said to them:

'When I am lifted up from the earth, I will draw all men unto Myself,'

'We have heard,' they say, 'out of the law that the Christ abideth for ever;

and how sayest thou that the Son of man must be lifted up? Who is this Son of man?' So then they knew that the Christ is something immortal, and has a life which has no end.

Therefore they too knew what He was saying.

For indeed in many places of the Scriptures the passion and the resurrection are set down together.

For Isaiah too sets these things together, saying, 'As a sheep He was led to the slaughter,' and all that follows.

And David in the second psalm, and in many other places, joins these two together.

And the patriarch too, having said, 'He couched, he lay down as a lion,' added:

'And as a lion's whelp, who shall rouse him up?' He indicates at once both the passion and the resurrection.

But these men, thinking to stop His mouth and to show from this that He was not the Christ, confess that the Christ abideth for ever.

For they did not say, 'We have heard that the Christ suffers nothing, nor is crucified,' but 'That He abideth for ever';

and yet not even this saying was contrary.

For His passion proved no obstacle to His immortality.

From this it is possible to see that they understood many of the ambiguous sayings, and yet did evil willingly.

For since He had already spoken earlier concerning His death, when they heard here of His being lifted up, they suspected this.

'Who is this Son of Man?' And this too was said maliciously.

'Do not suppose,' he means, 'that we say this about you, so that you might say we oppose you out of hatred.'

'For behold, we do not even know of whom you are speaking, and yet we render our verdict.'

What then does Christ do? Stopping their mouths, and showing that His passion was no obstacle to His abiding forever, He says, 'Yet a little while is the light with you.'

Making clear that His death is a departure.

For the light of the sun is not destroyed, but after withdrawing for a little while it appears again.

'Walk while you have the light.'

What time does He mean here? Is it the whole of the present life, or the time before the cross? For my part I think both.

For on account of His unspeakable love for mankind, many believed even after the cross.

He says these things to press them urgently toward faith, which He had also done earlier, saying thus: 'Yet a little while I am with you.'

'He who walks in the darkness does not know where he is going.'

How many things, at any rate, the Jews are now doing, and they do not know what they are doing!

But walking as in darkness, they think indeed that they are travelling the straight road, yet they walk the contrary one—keeping sabbaths, and observing the law, and their scruples about foods.

And they do not know where they are walking.

'Walk in the light, that you may become sons of light.'

And yet in the prologue the evangelist says that 'they were born not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, but of God'—that is, of the Father.

But here He Himself is said to beget these—that you may learn that the working of the Father and of the Son is one.

'When Jesus had said these things, He departed from them and was hidden.'

Now why does He hide Himself? For they had neither taken up stones against Him, nor blasphemed anything of the sort they had before.

For what reason, then, did He hide Himself? Searching their hearts, He knew that their wrath was raging savagely against them, even though they uttered nothing.

He knew it seething and murderous, and He did not wait for it to break out into action, but hid Himself, thus assuaging their envy.

Observe, at any rate, how the evangelist hinted at this.

'Though He had done so many signs before them, they did not believe in Him.'

What sort of 'so many'? As many as the evangelist passed over.

And from what follows this is also clear.

For having withdrawn and yielded, and then returning again, He converses with them in a lowered tone, speaking thus:

'He who believes in Me does not believe in Me, but in Him who sent Me.'

He begins from humble and modest words, and takes refuge in the Father.

Then again He raises His discourse.

And whenever He sees them growing savage, He withdraws, and again presents Himself, and once more begins with humble words.

And where did He do this? Rather, where did He not do it? Observe, at any rate, what He says in the beginning:

then more loftily: 'For as the Father raises the dead and gives them life, so also the Son gives life to whom He will';

again, 'I do not judge you; there is another who judges';

then, having come to Galilee: 'Labour,' He says, 'not for the food that perishes.'

And having said great things concerning Himself—that He came down from heaven, that He gives eternal life—again He withdraws.

And having come again at the Feast of Tabernacles, He does this very same thing.

And one may see Him continually varying His teaching in this way—by presence, by absence, by humble words, by lofty ones.

'Though He had done so many signs before them,' he says, 'they did not believe in Him, that the word of Isaiah might be fulfilled which he spoke:'

'Lord, who has believed our report? and to whom has the arm of the Lord been revealed?' And again: 'They could not believe,' he says, 'because Isaiah said:'

'Hearing you shall hear, and shall not understand.'

'These things Isaiah said when he saw His glory and spoke of Him.'

Behold again the 'that' and the 'he said'—not of cause, but of result.

For it was not because Isaiah said it that they did not believe;

but because they were not going to believe, therefore Isaiah said it.

Why then does the evangelist not put it thus, but says that the unbelief comes from the prophecy, and not the prophecy from the unbelief?

And proceeding further, he sets down this very point more forcibly, speaking thus:

'For this cause they could not believe, because Isaiah said'? From this he wishes to establish through many proofs the truthfulness of Scripture;

and that the things which He foretold came to pass not otherwise, but just as He said.

And for what reason did Christ come? Did He not know that they were not going to give heed to Him? And he brings in the prophets as knowing this too.

Yet He came, so that they might have no excuse concerning their sin.

For what the prophet foretold, he foretold as things that would assuredly come to pass.

For if it were not going to come to pass at all, he would not have foretold it;

but it was assuredly going to come to pass, since those men were in an incurable state.

But if the phrase 'they could not' is set down, it is set down in the sense of 'they would not.'

For indeed elsewhere too He says:

'He who is able to receive it, let him receive it.'

Thus He knows in many places to call the will 'power.'

'The world cannot hate you.'

And one may see this observed also in common usage:

'I cannot love so-and-so'—

calling the vehemence of the will 'power.'

'So-and-so cannot become good.'

And what does the prophet also say? 'If the Ethiopian can change his skin, and the leopard his spots, then this people also, having learned evil, will be able to do good.'

He does not mean this—that the practice of virtue is impossible for them;

but that because they do not will it, therefore they cannot.

And what the evangelist says means this—that it was impossible for the prophet to lie.

Not, however, that for this reason it was impossible for them to believe.

For it was possible, even had they believed, that this should remain true (unfalsified).

For He would not have foretold these things, had they been about to believe.

Why then, one asks, did He not put it thus: that Scripture has certain such idioms, and that one must yield to its own laws?

But these things he said when he saw His glory.

How then does John speak concerning the Son, but Paul concerning the Spirit? Not as

confounding the hypostases, but declaring that there is one dignity, he says.

For the things of the Father belong to the Son, and the things of the Son belong to the Father.

And indeed He spoke many things through angels, yet no one says, 'As the angel said'.

For the things spoken by God through angels would be God's; but the things of God are not therefore also the angels'.

The things of God are no longer also the angels' own.

But here he says that the words are the Spirit's.

What did he speak? 'I saw the Lord seated upon a throne, high and lifted up,' and what follows.

By 'glory,' then, he here means that vision, the smoke, the hearing of ineffable mysteries, the seeing of the Seraphim, the lightning that leaped forth from the throne, upon which even those powers could not gaze.

What did he speak? That he heard a voice saying,

'Whom shall I send, and who will go?' And I said,

'Behold, here am I; send me.'

'By hearing you shall hear, and shall not understand; and seeing you shall see, and shall not perceive.'

'For He hath blinded their eyes, and hardened their heart, lest they should see with their eyes, and understand with their heart.'

Behold again another question;

but there is none, if we attend rightly.

For just as the sun strikes the eyes of the weak-sighted, not by reason of its own nature, so too it comes to pass with those who do not attend to the words of God.

So too it is said that He hardened Pharaoh's heart, and so it comes to pass with those who are contentious against the words of God.

And this too is an idiom of Scripture, as also the phrase, 'He gave them over to a reprobate mind,' and, 'He apportioned them to the nations,' that is to say, 'He permitted, He let be.'

For he does not here introduce Him as acting, but shows these things as coming to pass out of the wickedness of others.

For when we are abandoned by God, we are handed over to the devil;

and having been handed over to the devil, we suffer countless dreadful things.

Therefore, to strike fear into the hearer, he says, 'He hardened,' and, 'He gave over.'

For that He not only does not hand us over, but does not even abandon us, unless we so will it, hear what he says:

'Are not your sins that which make a separation between me and you?' And again:

'They that remove themselves far from Thee shall perish.'

'Thou hast forgotten the law of thy God, I also will forget thee.'

And He Himself in the Gospels:

'How often would I have gathered your children, and ye would not!'

'I came, and there was no man;

I called, and there was none to hearken.'

These things He says, to show that we are the ones who begin the abandonment, and become the cause of our own destruction.

For God not only does not will to abandon or to punish, but even when He punishes, He does it unwillingly.

'For I desire not the death of the sinner,' He says, 'so much as that he should turn and live.'

And Christ even weeps over the destruction of Jerusalem;

which we also do over our friends.

Knowing these things, then, let us do all things so as not to depart from God, but let us hold fast to care for the soul and to love for one another, and let us not tear our own members (for this belongs to madmen and to those beside themselves);

but the more we see men ill-disposed, let us the rather tend them.

For indeed, even in bodies we often see many having intractable and incurable diseases, yet we do not cease to apply remedies.

For what is worse than gout of the foot? What than gout of the hand? Do we then cut off the limbs? By no means;

but we do everything so as to obtain some alleviation, since we cannot dissolve the evil.

Let us do this also in the case of our brethren;

and, if they are incurably sick, let us continue tending them, and let us bear one another's burdens.

For thus shall we both fulfil the law of Christ, and obtain the promised good things, by the grace and lovingkindness of our Lord Jesus Christ, with whom to the Father, together with the Holy Spirit, be glory, unto the ages of ages.