Commentary on John 1 part 1/94

'The Lord shall give a word with great power to those who preach the gospel' — most excellently indeed does the sweet singer proclaim it.

And I think that those who set out upon this task ought not to be merely anyone at random, but those who have been illumined by the grace that is from above;

since indeed 'All wisdom is from the Lord,' as it is written, and 'Every good gift and every perfect present is from above, coming down from the Father of lights.' For a perilous thing, and one not without harm to the multitude, is the discourse that concerns the Essence highest above all and the mysteries that pertain to it;

whereas silence upon such matters is something free from dangers.

Yet the God who is over all removes us from this silence — even though we suppose it altogether fitting to keep still — when He says to one of the saints, 'Speak, and be not silent';

and the ordinance of the Law no less, signifying spiritual things as it were in a grosser figure,

commands those called to the divine priesthood to signify to the people, by the blasts of trumpets, concerning whatever they need to learn.

For God, I think, when He willed to lay down the fairest laws, did not reckon that the leaders of the peoples ought to put a hand upon the mouth, as it is written, and out of hesitation — lest they should seem to venture rashly upon things too high for the human mind — to decline a discourse so necessary for those being trained toward reverence and the knowledge of God, and to choose that hurtful silence for those who come to be taught.

But again the disciple of Christ troubles us, saying, 'Be not many teachers';

and still further to this, the most wise Preacher too, showing in enigmatic fashion the peril of teaching such things:

'For he that cleaveth wood,' he says, 'shall be endangered thereby, if the iron fall off, and he himself hath troubled his face, and he shall strengthen his powers.' For by the iron he likens the sharpness of the mind, inasmuch as it is by nature able to penetrate and to sink into the innermost things, even if it be somehow hindered by the density and compactness of the matter;

and again, more figuratively, he calls 'wood' the contemplations that lie in the God-inspired Scripture, which fashion a kind of spiritual paradise in the books wherein they are set, and moreover travail to bring forth the fruit of the Holy Spirit.

The spiritual woods, then — that is, the divine and mystical contemplations of the God-inspired Scripture — as one endeavours to unfold them by searching and by the most exact application and keenness of mind, he will then above all be endangered, he says, when the iron falls off: that is, when the mind, not borne along toward the true sense of the things written, comes to be outside the right apprehension, and, as it were letting go the straight way, is carried aside along some other path of interpretation that has been turned away from what is fitting.

Which very thing, when a man has suffered it, he will set the proper face of his soul — that is, his heart — in turmoil, and will strengthen against himself the wicked and adverse powers, which by bitter and perverse arguments outwit the mind of those who go astray, not permitting it to look up toward the beauty of the truth, but variously distorting it and persuading it to depart into monstrous conceptions;

for 'no one saith Anathema to Jesus except in Beelzeboul.'

And let no one, deceived himself, suppose that we are making a deceived interpretation of these things, or otherwise fashioning one out of false reasoning;

for it is at times the custom of the divine Scripture to name 'woods,' as we have already said, the contemplations in the God-inspired Scriptures.

'When thou shalt war against it to take it, thou shalt not utterly destroy the trees thereof by putting iron upon them, but thou shalt eat of it, and shalt not cut it down;

is the tree of the field a man, that it should enter before thy face into the bulwark? But the tree which thou knowest to be not fruit-bearing, that thou shalt utterly destroy and cut down.' Now, that the God of all would not have deigned to lay down such laws for us, if what is said were understood of the trees that come from the earth, I suppose is quite clear to everyone;

yet I say that one ought nevertheless to demonstrate the point also from another commandment, sparing none of such matters and making no account of them.

For what indeed does He again command to be done concerning the falsely named gods? 'Ye shall pull down their altars,' He says, 'and break in pieces their pillars, and cut down their groves.' But beside His own altar He does not at all permit wood to be cultivated;

for 'Thou shalt not plant for thyself any grove beside the altar of the Lord thy God,' and He plainly proclaims it.

And if one must add anything to these, I will say with the most wise Paul, 'Is it for the woods that God careth? Or saith He it altogether for our sakes?' — leading us by grosser examples up to the contemplations of spiritual things.

Let us then say already, that the writings of the impious heretics may be understood as cities, and — not without some artifice, perhaps — towered up by the wisdom of the world and by the intricate deceits of their notions;

and there comes one to besiege them, and in a manner encircling them settles round about — taking up the shield of faith and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God — every one who contends for the sacred doctrines of the Church, and with all his might sets himself against their false tales, having practised, as Paul says, to cast down reasonings, and every high thing that exalteth itself against the knowledge of God, and to bring into captivity every thought unto the obedience of Christ. Whenever, then, such a soldier of Christ, he says, ranges over the bitter writings of the heresies as over some foreign land, and lights upon trees most tame — that is, if he finds words drawn from the God-inspired Scripture, or plainly the sayings of the prophets dragged over to their aim, or testimonies from the New Covenant — let him not bring the keenness of his mind, like a kind of iron, to bear upon them for their destruction and cutting off.

For it is not because it was taken up by those who know not how to interpret aright that on this account the thing which is through the mouth of God shall be altogether cast away;

but rather, since it is fruit-bearing, it shall be to thee for help and nourishment.

For that which is at times foolishly taken up by those men, when we turn it back to the right reasoning of the faith, so far from being weakened and being taken, we shall rather be nerved for the arguments against the heresy.

And he straightway adds a reasoning that in some way persuades the hearers that it behoves us to make our impulses of advocacy not rather for the overthrow of the divine oracles, but for the destruction of the things not rightly spoken by those on the opposing side;

for 'Is the tree of the field a man,' he says, 'that it should enter before thy face into the bulwark?' For dost thou ever imagine, he says, that the saying from the sacred writings will rise up against thee for battle of its own accord, like one of the heresiarchs, and not rather that it is being overreached through the folly of those men? Do not, then, cut it off, he says, but let it be to thee even for nourishment;

but the tree which thou knowest to be not fruit-bearing, that thou shalt utterly destroy and cut down. For uneatable, to those who are willing to understand aright, is the fruit of the writings of those men;

against those men let every iron come;

there let the power of the spiritual woodcutters be manifest; upon those men let the axe of vigour in advocacy be burnished.

For I think one ought to run back to that consideration: exceedingly difficult indeed is the exposition concerning the divine mysteries, and perhaps silence is better;

but since a strong argument persuades us, O most industrious brother, to offer up this writing as a kind of fruit of the lips and a spiritual sacrifice, I will not shrink from doing this also, taking courage in the God who makes wise the blind, who seeks from us not at all what is beyond us, but receives, like those very things, even the offerings of the poor.

For the lawgiver, having commanded him who wishes to bring a gift for a whole burnt offering to the Lord — as it stands at the beginning of Leviticus — to sacrifice an ox, and having thereby defined the measure of the honour in figure, again lowers it, saying that those who are not able for that must slaughter a sheep;

but He knew full well that even for this, perhaps, gloomy and unadmonishable poverty would persuade some to be too weak;

and therefore He says, 'he shall bring his gift from the turtledoves or from the pigeons'; and him who is yet lowlier even than these, and comes with the meanest things, He honours.

For 'his gift shall be fine flour,' He says — easy to procure, I suppose, for everyone — defining that even utmost poverty should by no means be excluded from bringing an offering.

So we will begin the writing of John, undertaking indeed a very great matter, yet not weakening because of our faith.

And that we shall both say and understand less than we ought, must without dispute be confessed;

but that we shall ask a just pardon for this, the great difficulty of the composition will persuade — or rather, what is truer, the weakness of the understanding that is in us.

And everywhere turning the discourse toward a more doctrinal exposition, we shall set it, as far as possible, against the false opinions of those who teach otherwise, not extending it to the length that was possible, but both freeing it from superfluities and being earnest to render it not lacking in what is fitting.

And the list of chapter-headings appended below will make clear the points on which our discourse has in some way been extended, to which we have also affixed numbers, so that what is sought may be found very readily by those who will read.

That the Only-begotten is eternal and before the ages;

the text set forth being, 'In the beginning was the Word.'

That the Son also, being God consubstantial with the Father, is in His own hypostasis, and likewise also the Father;

the text set forth being, 'And the Word was with God.'

That the Son also, being God by nature, is in no way either less than or unlike the Father; the text set forth being, 'And the Word was God.'

Against those who dare to say that the immanent and natural Word in God and the Father is one, and the Son spoken of in the divine Scriptures is another;

and such is the false opinion of those about Eunomius;

the text set forth being, 'The same was in the beginning with God.'

That the Son is by nature Creator together with the Father, as being from His essence, and not taken up as a subordinate helper;

the text set forth being, 'All things were made through Him.'

That the Son is Life by nature, and therefore is not created, but is from the essence of God the Father;

the text set forth being, 'That which was made in Him was life.'

That the Son is [Light] by nature, and therefore is not created, but is from the essence of God the Father, as true Light from true Light; the text set forth being, 'And the life was the light of men.'

That the Son of God alone is true Light, but the creation is not, being a partaker of light as created; the text set forth being, 'It was the true Light.'

the text set forth being, 'It was the true Light.'

That the soul of man does not pre-exist the body, nor is embodiment on account of former sins, according to certain persons;

the text set forth being, 'It was the true Light, which lighteth every man that cometh into the world.'

That the Son alone is by nature the Only-begotten from the Father, as from Him and in Him;

the text set forth being, 'No one hath ever seen God.'

Truly exact and taught of God is the understanding of the holy evangelists, which, as it were from some hill and lookout — that of being able to behold the majesty — gathers from every side what is useful for the hearers, and with intense earnestness hunts after whatever it thinks would be profitable to those who thirst for the true word of the divine doctrines, and who with good purpose search out the meaning hidden within the divine Scriptures.

For it is not to those who examine too curiously, and take pleasure rather in the intricate deceits of reasonings than rejoice in the truth, that the Spirit reveals itself, since it neither enters into a soul contriving evil, nor otherwise permits the precious pearls to be rolled beneath the feet of swine;

but most gladly it converses with the simpler minds, inasmuch as they have their movement more free from craft, and decline to be over-subtle in superfluous things — with which too there certainly follows the experience of being amazed, and, by declining excessively to the right, of falling outside the straight and royal road.

For 'he that walketh simply walketh confidently,' according to the voice of Solomon.

And the holy evangelists having a very wondrous exactness in their writing —

for it is not they that speak, according to the voice of the Saviour, but the Spirit of the Father that is in them — one might with all reason grant that the writing of John has been dedicated beyond wonder, looking both to the surpassing height of its contemplations, and to the keenness of his mind, and to the continuous and successive influx of the thoughts.

for they run together with one another in the exposition of the divine doctrines, and, as it were let loose from the starting-line, they race toward one single goal.

The fashion of their discourse is woven in a somewhat various manner, and they seem to me to resemble certain men who have indeed agreed to gather into one city, yet do not altogether concur in walking by one and the same highway.

For it is possible to see the other Evangelists composing with much exactness the account of the genealogy of our Saviour according to the flesh, and tracing it down in order from Abraham to Joseph, or again mounting up from Joseph to Adam;

but the blessed John, not being greatly concerned with this labour, made use of a most warm and fiery movement of mind, so as to lay hold of the very things that are beyond the human intellect, and to dare to expound the ineffable and unutterable begetting of God the Word.

so that the course of the simpler folk may be opened wide, no utterance of the saints—who were both eyewitnesses and ministers of the word—being hindered by the malice of those men, he comes on keenly to the very chief of the divine doctrines, crying: In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God;

this was in the beginning with God. But I think that those who occupy themselves with the sacred writings ought to admit the words from all men, whatever may be noble and good, and bearing no harm;

for thus, gathering together to the same point what has been variously observed by the many, and bringing it into one aim and mind, they will ascend to a noble measure of knowledge, and, imitating the busy and wise bee, they will compact together the sweet honeycombs of the Spirit.

Now certain of the most diligent say that after the cross of our Saviour and his ascent into the heavens, certain false shepherds and false teachers, like untamed beasts, fell upon the flocks of the Saviour and threw them into no small confusion, speaking from their own heart, as it is written, and not from the mouth of the Lord—or rather, not from their own heart alone, but from the teachings of their own father, that is to say, the devil.

For if no one can say 'Jesus is anathema' except in Beelzebul, how shall our discourse concerning these things not be found true? What then are the things which those men belched forth against their own head? They ignorantly and impiously insisted that the Only-begotten Word of God, the eternal Light, in whom indeed we all both move and have our being, was then first called into existence, when he was born as man through the holy Virgin, and taking this common form was seen upon earth, as it is written, and consorted with men. Against those, then, who are so disposed, and who dared to slander the ineffable and pre-eternal begetting of the Son, the prophetic word lays its charge, saying thus: But draw near hither, ye lawless sons, seed of adulterers and of a harlot;

in whom did ye take your delight, and against whom did ye open your mouth, and against whom did ye let loose your tongue? Manifestly not one that casts forth good things out of a good heart, but one that spits up the venom of the murderous dragon, concerning whom the sweet singer says, as unto the one and Most High God over all: Thou didst crush the heads of the dragon upon the water. And since the tumult concerning these things among the believers was no small one, and the harm arising from the scandal was feeding, like a plague, upon the souls of the simpler folk;

For some in truth supposed, being dragged away from the true doctrines by the babblings of those men, that the Word was then at last called into the beginning of being, when he became man;

having come together and gathered to the same place, those of the believers who were the more intelligent came to the disciple of the Saviour—I mean John himself, of course—and reported the disease that had assailed the brethren, and uncovered the babblings of those who taught otherwise, and vehemently besought him to succour both themselves through the illuminations of the Spirit, and those already ensnared and fallen within the diabolical nets, by stretching out a saving hand.

The disciple, therefore, grieving over those who were perishing and corrupted in mind, and thinking it likewise most absurd to make no provision for those who should come after them in succession, runs to the composition of his book;

and the things which it was more human to tell—to genealogize the matters concerning the legal and natural descent according to the flesh—he conceded to the other Evangelists to expound more amply;

but he himself, very warmly and exceedingly with youthful vigour, leaps upon the babblings of those who introduced those doctrines, saying:

That the Only-begotten is eternal and before the ages.

How then is he not recent, if he was begotten in later times? And how did he not lie when he said to the Jews: Verily I say unto you, before Abraham was, I am? For it is surely plain and confessed by all that Christ was born through the holy Virgin at times far later, after the blessed Abraham.

And where at all shall the 'was in the beginning' be preserved and hold good, if the Only-begotten came into being at the end of the ages? For consider with me also through what follows, how great an absurdity it involves to curtail the eternal existence of the Son, and to suppose that he came into being in later times.

And this very thing, again, will be set before us for a finer examination, that which the blessed Evangelist said:

Than the beginning nothing is older, if indeed the definition of 'beginning' is to be preserved in itself;

for there could never be a beginning of a beginning;

or else it will altogether cease to be in truth a beginning, if some other be conceived before it and arise prior to it;

and besides, if it be admitted that anything pre-exists the true beginning, our discourse concerning it will go off to infinity, another ever rising up before it and declaring second the very one about which our inquiry might be made.

There will not, then, be a beginning of a beginning, according to the exact and true reasoning; but our discourse concerning it will depart into something unwound and incomprehensible.

And since this flight ever backward has no end, and ascends beyond the measure of the ages, the Son will be found not to have come into being in time, but rather to exist eternally with the Father.

But if he was in the beginning, what mind, tell me, will be able to fly up above the power of the 'was'? And when at all will the 'was' stand still as at an end, ever running forward before the pursuing reason, and leaping up beyond the thought that follows it? At this indeed the prophet Isaiah, being astounded, says: Who shall declare his generation? for his life is taken away from the earth. For truly the discourse concerning the generation of the Only-begotten is taken away from the earth—that is, it is above all the understanding of the things upon the earth, and above all speech, so as to be henceforth inexpoundable.

But if he is above the mind and the words that are in us, how could he be a thing made, since the understanding within us does not grow weary in circumscribing things made by both time and word? — Otherwise, to the same effect, it must be considered: In the beginning was the Word.

It is altogether impossible to take, in the case of the Only-begotten, a beginning conceived in time, since he is before all time, and has his existence pre-eternally; and moreover, in addition to these things, the divine nature refuses to terminate in an end;

for it will remain ever in like manner, according to that which is sung in the Psalms: But thou art the same, and thy years shall not fail. From what beginning, then, measured in time and quantity, shall the Son go forth for us, seeing that he does not endure to run to an end, inasmuch as he is by nature God, and for this cause cries: I am the life? For a beginning could never at all be conceived to exist by itself apart from looking to its own end, since it is named a beginning as in relation to an end, and an end again as in relation to a beginning;

and again, by 'beginning' in these matters we signify that which is according to time or quantity.

Therefore, since the Son is older than the very ages, he will escape having come into being in time;

and he was also through all in the Father as in a fountain, according to that which was said by him: I came forth from the Father and am come. Since, therefore, the Father is conceived as a fountain, the Word was in him, being his wisdom and power and impress and radiance and image.

And if there was no time when the Father was without the Word and wisdom and impress and radiance, it is necessary to confess together that the Son exists eternally, who is these things to the eternal Father.

For how at all is he an impress, and how an exact image, unless he is seen to be formed unto that beauty of which he is also the image? And it will do no harm at all to conceive of the Son as being in the Father as in a fountain;

for in these matters the name of 'fountain' signifies only the 'from which.'

perhaps his radiance, or as from fire its innate heat;

for in such examples it is possible to see one begotten of one, yet ever nevertheless co-existing and inseparably present, so that apart from the one the other cannot be by itself, and it preserves the true account of its own nature.

For how at all is there a sun not having radiance, or how radiance not being within the sun that shines it forth? And how, again, is there fire, if it has not the power to warm? And whence is the warm, if not from fire, or perchance from some other thing possessing the essential quality of fire that lies not far off? As, therefore, in these things the inhering of the things that come from them does not do away with their co-existence, but rather shows the begotten ever running together with the begetters, and having obtained one nature in relation to them;

for even though he is conceived and spoken of as in the Father and from the Father, he will not enter in to us as alien and strange, or as second after him, but as being in him, and ever co-existing, and having shone forth from him, according to the ineffable manner of the divine begetting.

And that God and Father is called by the saints a 'beginning' of the Son only in respect of the 'from which,' hear the Psalmist proclaiming beforehand through the Holy Spirit the second appearing of our Saviour, and saying, as unto the Son himself: With thee is the beginning in the day of thy power, in the splendour of thy saints. For the day of the Son's power is that in which he judges the whole world, and renders to each according to his works;

and even then he will come altogether as being himself in the Father, and having in himself the Father—the unoriginate as it were beginning of his own nature, only in respect of the 'from which,' because of his existing from the Father.

Into many and various conceptions is the discourse concerning the 'beginning' here signified diversified for us, being eager to hunt from every side the things tending to profit, and tracking, like a hound, the true apprehension of the divine doctrines and the exactness in the mysteries;

For 'Search the holy Scriptures,' says the Saviour, 'because in them ye think ye have eternal life;'

and these are they which testify concerning me. The blessed Evangelist, then, seems here to signify by 'beginning'—that is, the authority over all things—the Father, in order that the divine nature may be shown above all things, having under its feet everything that is made, and all but riding upon those who have been called into being through it.

In this beginning, therefore, which is over all and upon all, was the Word—not with all things under its feet, but outside of all things, being naturally in it, as a co-eternal fruit, having as it were for his place the most ancient of all things, the nature of him who begat him.

wherefore also, having sprung free from a free Father, he will possess together with him the rule over all.

What, then, may be the argument of the construction in this passage, it is fitting consequently to discern.

Recklessly did certain men, as we said in what precedes, insist that the Word of God was then first called into being, when, taking the temple from the holy Virgin, he became man for our sakes;

What then would remain, if the Son were thus in nature—either a thing made and fashioned, and of like nature with all the rest, whose coming into being is out of things not being, and for whom the name and reality of servitude are justly verified? For what among things made will without danger decline the servitude under God who rules over all? And what will not bow beneath the rule and authority and lordship over all, which Solomon himself also somewhere signifies, saying: For with righteousness is a throne of rule made ready. For the throne of rule—of that which is over all, that is—is ready and very exceedingly becoming unto righteousness.

And what the throne is concerning which the discourse now runs, hear God saying through one of the saints: Heaven is my throne. Therefore heaven is ready unto righteousness—that is, the holy spirits in the heavens.

to others, if according to those men he is late-born and one of the things made in time;

of necessity the blessed Evangelist leaps more keenly upon those who teach otherwise, and draws the Son out of all servitude;

and he shows him to have shone forth from the free substance that rules over all, and insists that he is naturally within it, saying: In the beginning was the Word.

And to the name of 'beginning' he usefully interweaves the 'was,' in order that he may be conceived not only as glorious, but also as pre-eternal;

for the 'was' is placed in these words as stretching out the thought of the beholder unto a certain deep and incomprehensible begetting, ineffable and beyond time.

For the 'was,' being uttered without limit, into what place will it terminate for us, seeing that it is by nature ever advancing forward beyond the pursuing mind, and making whatever cessation of it anyone may suppose it to have, the beginning of a course yet further beyond? The Word, therefore, was in the beginning—that is, as in the beginning which is over all things, and existing naturally from it, having the lordly dignity;

But if this is true, how is he still a thing made or fashioned? And where there is altogether the 'was,' in what manner shall the 'was not' enter in, or what place henceforth will it have against the Son? — CHAPTER II.

That the Son, being both God and of one substance with the Father, exists in his own hypostasis, and likewise also the Father.

And the Word was with God.