Homilies on the Gospel of John 80

A little while, and you do not behold Me;

and again a little while, and you shall see Me, because I go to the Father.

Then some of His disciples said one to another:

What is this that He says, 'A little while'? and the rest.

Nothing is so wont to cast down a soul that is in anguish and held fast by great despondency, as words that give birth to grief, turned over continually in the mind.

Why, then, having said 'I go away,' and 'No longer shall I speak with you,' does Christ continually repeat the same things, saying:

A little while, and you no longer behold Me;

and, 'Because I go to Him that sent Me'? For when He had revived them by the words concerning the Spirit, then again He casts down their spirits.

For what reason, then, does He do this? He tries their understanding, and renders it more approved, and trains them well to bear His departure nobly amid the hearing of grievous things.

For those who had practised this in words were likely thereafter to bear it easily also in the actual events.

And if one should examine it closely, this very thing is a consolation—the saying that 'I depart to the Father.'

For by this He made plain that He would not perish, but that His death is a kind of translation.

And He instilled in them yet another consolation.

For He did not say merely, 'A little while, and you no longer behold Me';

but, 'A little while, and you shall see Me,' making plain that He would return, that the separation would be but for a short time, and that His fellowship with them would be perpetual.

Whence one might reasonably marvel how, though they had often heard these things, they were in such doubt as though they had heard nothing.

Why then did they not understand? Either because of their grief, as I for my part suppose (for this cast the sayings out of their mind), or because of the obscurity of what was said.

Wherefore also it seemed to them that He was setting down two contrary things, which were not contrary.

For 'if we shall see Thee,' say they, 'whither goest Thou? and if Thou goest away, how shall we see Thee?' For this reason they say, 'We know not what He saith.'

For that He was about to depart, they knew;

but they were ignorant that after a little while He would come to them again.

For this very reason He rebukes them, that they did not perceive what was said.

For wishing to fix firmly in them the doctrine concerning His death, what does He say? 'Verily, verily, I say unto you, that you shall weep and lament';

which pertained to His death and the cross;

for since, on account of their unwillingness, they hastened to believe that He would not die, and then, hearing that He would die, were in doubt, not knowing what the 'A little while' could mean;

'but your grief shall be turned into joy.'

Then, showing that after the grief comes joy, and that grief gives birth to the joy, and that the former is brief while the pleasure is unending, He proceeded to a worldly example;

and what does He say? 'A woman when she is in travail has grief.'

And He employs a comparison which the prophets also used, constantly likening despondencies to the exceeding pains of childbirth.

but the pang of childbirth becomes the cause of joy;

at the same time confirming the doctrine concerning the resurrection, and showing that to depart hence is like departing from the womb into brilliant light;

'Marvel not that through such grief I lead you to what is profitable;

for the mother also comes thus, through grief, to become a mother.'

And here He also hints at something mystical:

namely, that He Himself loosed the pangs of death, and caused a new man to be brought forth.

And He said not merely that the affliction would pass away, but that she does not even remember it;

so great is the joy that succeeds it.

So also shall it be for the saints.

And indeed the woman does not rejoice for this reason, that a man has come into the world, but because a child has been born to her.

Since, if she rejoiced on this account, nothing would hinder even those who are not bearing children from rejoicing over another woman who is giving birth.

Wherefore then did He speak thus? Because He took up the illustration for this one purpose only, to show that grief is temporary but joy perpetual;

and that it is a translation into life, and that the gain from the pangs is great.

And He said not, 'A child was born,' but, 'A man.'

For here, to my mind, He hints at His own resurrection, and that He was to be born not into that death which was in travail, but into the kingdom.

For this reason He said not, 'A child was born to her,' but, 'A man was born into the world.'

'And you therefore now indeed shall be grieved;

but I will see you again, and your grief shall be turned into joy.'

Then, making plain that He would no longer die, He says:

'And no one takes it from you.'

'In that day you shall ask Me nothing.'

Again by these words He establishes nothing else than that He is from God.

'For then you shall know all things henceforth.'

But what is, 'You shall ask Me nothing'? You shall have no need of a mediator, but it will suffice, upon merely naming Me, to receive all things.

'Verily, verily, I say unto you, that whatsoever you shall ask the Father in My name.'

He shows the power of the name, seeing that, though neither seen nor entreated, but merely named, it works wonders even before the Father.

Now where has this taken place? There, where they say:

'Look upon their threatenings, and grant to Thy servants that with all boldness they may speak Thy word, and do signs in Thy name.'

'And the place was shaken where they were.'

'Hitherto you have asked nothing.'

namely, that it is profitable for Him again to depart, seeing that until then they had asked nothing, but then they would receive all things whatsoever they should ask.

'For do not, because I shall no longer be with you, suppose that you are forsaken;

My name shall give you greater boldness.'

Since then the things spoken were veiled in shadow, He says:

'These things I have spoken to you in proverbs; but an hour comes when I shall no longer speak to you in proverbs.'

'There shall be a time when you all shall know clearly.'

And He means the time of the resurrection.

'Then I shall announce to you plainly concerning the Father.'

For indeed for forty days He was with them and conversed with them, being assembled together with them, and speaking the things concerning the kingdom of God.

'For now, being in fear, you give no heed to what is said;

but then, having seen Me risen, and being together with Me, you shall be able to learn all things with boldness; for the Father Himself will love you, when your faith in Me has become firm.'

'And I will not ask the Father.'

'Your love toward Me suffices to plead for you.'

'For you have loved Me, and have believed that I came forth from God.'

'I came forth from the Father, and am come into the world;

and I go to the Father.'

For since the word concerning the resurrection consoled them not in an ordinary way, and along with these things also the hearing that 'I came forth from God and thither I go,' He continually turns these matters over.

For the one thing pledged that they rightly believed in Him;

and the other, that they were to be in safety.

When therefore He said, 'A little while, and you behold Me not;

and again a little while, and you shall see Me,' they were naturally ignorant;

But what is, 'You shall ask Me nothing'? You shall not say, 'Show us Thy Father,' and, 'Whither goest Thou?'; because you shall possess all knowledge, and the Father shall be disposed toward you even as I am.

This above all gave them relief: to learn that they would be friends of the Father.

'Now we know that thou knowest all things.'

He answered to that which was lurking in their mind. 'And thou needest not that any man should ask thee'—

that is, Before ever thou hearest, thou knowest the things that offend us, and thou hast given us rest, since thou saidst, 'The Father loveth you, because ye have loved me.'

After so many and so great things, then at last they say, 'Now we know.'

Seest thou how imperfect was their state? Then, since they say 'Now we know' as though conferring some favour upon him, he says—

Ye have need of many other things, in order that ye may come to perfection;

nothing as yet has been rightly accomplished in you.

For now ye shall betray me to my enemies, and so great a fear shall seize you that ye shall not even be able to withdraw together with one another.

But I shall suffer nothing terrible from these things.

Seest thou how again the discourse is condescending? This very thing indeed he charges them with, that they continually stand in need of his condescension.

For since they said, 'Lo, now speakest thou plainly, and speakest no proverb, and by this we believe thee'—

he shows that now, when they believe, they do not yet believe, and that he does not accept their words.

This he says, deferring them to another season.

And the words, 'The Father is with me,' he has again set down for their sake;

for this was what he wished them to learn, up and down.

Then, showing that he was not by these words delivering to them perfect knowledge, but rather that their reasoning might not be shaken (for it was likely they would reason certain human things, and that they would enjoy no help from him), he says—

'These things have I spoken unto you, that in me ye might have peace;'

that is, That ye cast me not out of your mind, but receive me.

Let no one then drag the words into a doctrine;

for they were spoken for our comfort and love.

For not even up to this point, he says, do they suffer such things;

the tide of terrors shall not stand still for you;

but so long as ye are in the world, ye shall have tribulation—not now only, when I am betrayed, but also after these things.

But rouse yourselves in your reasoning;

for ye shall suffer nothing terrible.

For when the Master has prevailed over the enemies, the disciples ought not to be distressed.

And how hast thou conquered the world, tell me? I have already said that I have cast down its ruler;

but ye shall know it also hereafter, when all things yield and give place to you.

And it is possible for us also to conquer, if we will, by looking unto the Author of our faith, and treading this road which he himself has cut for us;

so that not even death shall prevail over us.

What then? shall we not die? one says. For from this it is plain that it will not prevail.

And indeed the combatant is then illustrious, not when he does not grapple with the enemy, but when, having grappled, he is not held fast.

We are therefore not mortal because of the grappling, but immortal because of the victory.

For then should we have been mortal, if we had remained with it continually.

As therefore I would not call the longest-lived of animals immortal, though they remain a long time outside of death;

so neither is he mortal, because he is dissolved by death, who is destined to rise again after death.

For tell me, if a man should blush for a little while, shall we so call him perpetually red? By no means;

for the thing is not a permanent state.

If a man should become pale, shall we call him jaundiced? By no means.

Neither then wilt thou call mortal him who is in death for a short time;

since we should thus speak even of those who sleep;

for they too are dead, so to speak, and are without activity.

But does it corrupt the bodies? And what of that? for it is not that they may remain in corruption, but that they may become better.

Let us then conquer the world, let us run toward immortality, let us follow the King, let us set up a trophy for him, let us despise its pleasures.

Let us transfer the soul to heaven, and the whole world is conquered.

If thou desire it not, it is conquered;

if thou laugh it to scorn, it is defeated.

We are strangers and sojourners;

let us therefore grieve at none of the things that give pain.

For if, being of an illustrious country and of famous forefathers, thou hadst gone away into some far land, known to no one, having neither children nor wealth, and then some one had insulted thee, thou wouldst not have grieved as though thou hadst suffered these things at home.

For the clear knowledge that thou art in a foreign and alien land persuaded thee to bear all things easily—both being despised, and hungering and thirsting, and suffering whatsoever it might be.

Reckon this also now, that thou art a stranger and a sojourner, and let nothing of the things in this foreign land trouble thee;

for thou hast a city whose artificer and maker is God;

and this sojourning here is for a brief and little while.

Let him that will strike, let him insult, let him revile.

We are in a foreign land, and we live meanly.

For the terrible thing is to suffer this in one's own country, among one's fellow-citizens;

then is the greatest disgrace and loss.

But if a man be in a place where he has no acquaintance, he endures all things easily.

For the insult becomes harder to bear according to the estimation of those who offer it.

For instance, if a man knowing the prefect to be prefect should insult him, then the insult is bitter;

but if he insult him supposing him to be a private person, he cannot even touch the one who suffers it.

So then let us also reason.

For those who insult us know not what we are—namely, that we are citizens of the heavens, and are enrolled in the country above, and are fellow-choristers with the Cherubim.

Let us then not grieve, nor account the insult an insult.

If they had known us, they would not have insulted us.

But they account us poor and mean? Let us then not, on our part either, account this an insult.

For tell me, if a man on a journey, having outstripped his children, were to sit down for a short space in an inn, waiting for them;

and then the innkeeper, or one of the travellers, not knowing who he might be, were to be vexed with him and to revile him—

Will he not laugh at that man's ignorance? Will not the mistake rather delight him? Will he not take amusement in it, as though some other person were being insulted? Let us too act in this same way.

For indeed we sit in an inn, awaiting our own people who are travelling along this same road.

When we all come together in one place, then they will know whom they were insulting.

These men then will hang their heads; then they will say:

This is the one whom we, in our folly, held up to ridicule.

Let us therefore console ourselves with these two things: that we are not the ones being insulted (for they do not know who we are), and that, even should we wish to exact justice, they will afterwards pay a most grievous penalty.

But may it never come to pass that anyone should have a soul so cruel and inhuman!

What then, if we are insulted by those of our own kindred? For this indeed is what is hard to bear.

On the contrary, this is precisely what is light to bear.

How so? Because we do not bear the insults of those we love in the same way as those of people we do not know.

These at any rate are the words we often speak when we console those who have been insulted:

He who insulted you is your brother; bear it nobly.

But if the name of brother and father moves you to forbearance, much more will what I am about to name—something nearer and more intimate than these.

For we are not merely brothers to one another, but also members and one body.

And if the name of brother moves you to forbearance, much more does that of a member.

Have you not heard the saying of those outside the Church, that one must accept one's friends together with their faults? Have you not heard Paul saying, 'Bear one another's burdens'? Do you not see those who are in love? For I am compelled—since we cannot draw an example from you—to lead my discourse to that subject.

And Paul himself does this very thing when he says:

Furthermore we have had fathers of our flesh who chastened us, and we gave them reverence.

But rather it is more fitting, he says, to cite that other passage, the one he wrote to the Romans:

Just as, he says, you presented your members as slaves to uncleanness and to lawlessness unto lawlessness,

so now present your members as slaves to righteousness.

For this reason we too, taking courage, follow the example.

Do you not then see those who are in love—how many dreadful things they suffer, inflamed with passion for harlot women: struck, beaten, mocked, enduring the harlot's coyness as she turns away and heaps countless insults upon them? Yet nevertheless, if but once they catch sight of something sweet and gentle from her, all is prosperity for them, all their former troubles are gone, and everything is borne along as by a fair wind—be it poverty, be it sickness, be it any other such thing.

For they reckon their own life to be either wretched or blessed according to whether they have their beloved disposed favourably toward them.

And they know nothing of human glory, nor of dishonour;

but even if someone insults them, on account of the great pleasure and the favour they receive from her they bear all things easily;

and even if she reviles them, even if she spits in their face, they count themselves, in suffering these things, as though they were being pelted with roses.

And what wonder is it if they are so disposed toward her? For they even reckon her house to be more splendid than all others, though it be of mud, though it be falling down.

...the walls? For even the very places where they pass their evenings, they leap up with delight when they behold them.

But here now permit me at last to speak that apostolic word.

Just as you presented your members as slaves to uncleanness, so now present your members to righteousness;

in the same manner I too say:

as those men loved these women, let us love one another, and we shall count it no dreadful thing to suffer.

so let us love God.

Did you shudder to hear that I demand toward God as great a measure of love as we have displayed toward the harlot? But I shudder, because we do not display even so much.

And, if you will, let us pursue the argument, even though what is said be exceedingly hard to bear.

The beloved harlot promises her lovers nothing good, but only dishonour, and shame, and outrage.

For this is what dancing attendance on a harlot woman makes a man to be: ridiculous, shameful, dishonoured.

But God promises heaven and the good things that are in the heavens; He has made us sons, and brothers of the Only-begotten; while you live He has bestowed upon you countless gifts, and at your death a resurrection; and He promises to give such good things as it is not even possible to conceive, and He makes us honoured and reverend.

And again, she compels her lover to squander all his substance into a pit and into destruction;

but God bids us sow toward heaven, and He gives back a hundredfold, and eternal life.

Again, she treats her lover as a slave, laying commands on him harsher than any tyrant;

but God says, 'No longer do I call you slaves, but friends.'

Do you see the surpassing measure both of the evils here and of the good things from thence? What then of the things that follow after these? For the sake of this woman many men even keep vigil, and whatever she commands they obey with eagerness; they forsake house, and father, and mother, and friends, and money, and standing, and all their affairs are left in want and desolation;

yet for God's sake—or rather for our own sake—we often are not willing to spend even a third part of our possessions, but seeing the hungry we look away, and we pass by the naked, and we do not so much as impart a word.

But as for her, even should the lovers see a maidservant of hers, and a barbarian one at that, they stand in the midst of the marketplace and, as though preening and exulting, converse with her, unwinding long, doubled courses of speech;

and for her sake they reckon the whole of life to be nothing—not rulers, not a kingdom (and all who have had experience of the malady know this well);

and they are more grateful to her when she gives them orders than they would be if they were serving others.

Is not hell then justly deserved? Are not countless torments justly deserved? Let us therefore come to our senses, and render to the service of God at least this much, at least the half of what others render to the harlot, at least the third.

Perhaps you shudder again? For indeed so do I myself.

But I could wish that you shuddered not merely at the words, but also at the deeds.

Yet now, here in church our heart is contracted with fear, but once we have gone out we cast everything aside.

What then is the gain? For if in that other case money must be spent, no one bewails his poverty, but many, even having borrowed, have often given when caught in her snare;

but here, if we make mention of almsgiving, they throw up to us children, and wives, and household, and standing, and countless excuses.

'But there is great pleasure there,' one says.

This indeed is the very thing over which I lament and mourn.

What then, if I should show that the pleasure here is greater? For there, no small portion of the pleasure is cut short by shame, and by the outrage, and by the expense; and in the second place by the war and the enmity;

but here there is nothing of the sort.

For what, tell me, is equal to this pleasure—to sit awaiting heaven and the kingdom there, and the radiance of the saints, and the life that has no end? 'But these things are in expectation,' one says, 'while those are in actual experience.'

What experience? Do you wish that I speak of things in actual experience here too? Consider how great a freedom you enjoy, and how you fear no one nor tremble while living in virtue—no enemy, no plotter, no slanderer, no rival, no fellow-lover, no jealous man, no poverty, no sickness, nor any other of the ills that beset mankind;

but there, even if countless things fall out according to your wish, and wealth flows in as though from fountains, the war of the rival lovers, and the

plots, and the ambushes will make the life of him who lives with those women more wretched than that of any man.

For while that despicable woman lives daintily and luxuriously, war must needs be kindled up to please her whims.

This then is harder than countless deaths and more unbearable than any punishment.

But here there is nothing of the sort.

For the fruit of the Spirit, he says, is love, joy, peace.

Nowhere is there war, nor untimely spending of money, nor reproaches accompanying the outlay;

even if you give but an obol, even if a loaf, even if a cup of cold water, He will hold great gratitude toward you, and He does nothing to sting or grieve you, but does all things so as to make you glorious and to free you from all shame.

What defence then shall we have, what pardon, when we let go of these things and give ourselves over to their opposites, and of our own accord cast ourselves into the burning furnace of fire? Wherefore I exhort those who are sick with such maladies to recover themselves, and to be led back to health, and not to allow themselves to fall into despair.

For that son too suffered things far more grievous than these;

But when he had returned to his father's house, and was restored to his former honour, he appeared more illustrious than one who had enjoyed good repute all along.

Let us then be zealous to imitate this man; and returning to the Father, let us at length at last withdraw from that captivity, and transfer ourselves to freedom, that we may also enjoy the kingdom of heaven, by the grace and loving-kindness of our Lord Jesus Christ, with whom to the Father be glory, together with the Holy Spirit, unto the ages of ages.