Commentary on John 1 part 29/94

for it was not likely that they would set themselves against the voices of the holy prophets — that God and the Father would sound into the worthy the mystery concerning Him, and would reveal His own Son, speaking to each one ineffably, and in a manner befitting God implanting the understanding of these things.

But higher up, in saying 'No one can come to Me except the Father who sent Me draw him,' He shows the drawing to be neither compulsory nor most violent, by adding:

'Everyone who has heard from My Father and learned comes to Me.'

For where there is hearing and learning and the good that comes from instruction, faith is clearly through persuasion and not by compulsion;

and the understanding that is toward Christ is bestowed by the Father upon the worthy rather as a matter of ready reception, out of love, than as something compulsory;

for the doctrinal teaching insists on preserving free will and self-determination in the soul of man, so that it may justly demand rewards for good things, but, when it errs from what is fitting and, out of slothfulness, departs from what seems good to the Lawgiver, it may carry off the most reasonable penalty for being punished.

But one must know that, even though the Father is said to instruct some in the mystery concerning Christ, yet He will not work in this alone, but will rather accomplish it through the Son as through His own Wisdom.

For it is consistent to understand that the revelation according to understanding in some will not be from the Father apart from Wisdom;

and the Wisdom of the Father is the Son;

therefore the Father will work the revelation in the worthy through the Wisdom of His own Offspring.

And to speak once for all, and truly indeed and altogether, and not otherwise, one would not err in saying that all whatsoever are the operations of God and the Father upon certain things, that is, His wills, belong to the whole Holy Trinity, and likewise also those of the Son Himself, and those of the Holy Spirit.

For on this account, as I think, when God and the Father is said to reveal His own Son and to call to Him those who are readier for believing, the Son Himself is also found doing this, and the Holy Spirit no less.

'... My Father who is in the heavens.' And He Himself is seen doing this in other places.

And indeed Paul very rightly extols himself concerning this, crying out about the mystery according to Christ: 'For neither did I receive it from man, nor was I taught it, but through the revelation of Jesus Christ.' And you may see that the Holy Spirit Himself no less reveals Christ to us.

The most wise John therefore writes: 'And as for you, the anointing which you received from Him abides in you, and you have no need that anyone teach you; but as His anointing teaches you concerning all things.' And the Saviour Himself somewhere says, concerning the Paraclete — that is, the Spirit: 'I have yet many things to say to you, but you cannot bear them now.'

But when He comes, that Spirit of truth, He will guide you into all the truth;

for He will not speak from Himself, but whatsoever He hears, that will He speak, and He will declare to you the things that are coming.

He will glorify Me, for He shall receive of what is Mine and will declare it to you. For being the Spirit of truth, He will illumine those in whom He may come to dwell, and will lead them by the hand to the apprehension of the truth.

And we say these things, not as though we were rending the Godhead into estrangement, nor as setting the Father wholly apart in division from the Son, or the Son from the Father, nor yet the Holy Spirit from the Father and the Son; but rather, seeing that there is truly one Godhead, and it is thus proclaimed as beheld in the holy and consubstantial Trinity, we determine that the things attributed to each and seeming to be assigned to Him distinctively belong to the counsels and operations of the whole Godhead.

For the divine and indivisible nature will work through itself unpartitioned, so far as concerns the one principle of the Godhead, even though each of those who are contemplated subsists in His own proper existence;

for the Father is that which He is, and likewise the Son, and likewise the Holy Spirit.

But in addition to what has been said, this too must be carefully considered:

those names which stand in a certain relation to one another are made known by both together, and one may discern the disclosure of the one within that of the other.

It follows therefore of absolute necessity that the Son is revealed through the Father, and again the Father through the Son;

for the one is altogether introduced together with the other; and if anyone should know God as Father by nature, he will assuredly conceive also of the Son who was begotten of Him—just as, without doubt, the reverse also holds.

For he who confesses the Son will not be ignorant of Him who begot Him.

Therefore, in so far as God is Father, and is thus conceived and proclaimed, He implants in His hearers the knowledge concerning His own Offspring;

and in so far as the Son is named of Him by nature and truly is, He proclaims the Father.

For this reason He says, as to Him: 'I have manifested Thy name to men.' For since the Son became known among those who believed, He says that the name of the One who begot Him has been made manifest.

And God the Father might be understood as implanting in us the knowledge of His own Offspring, not by a voice breaking forth from on high, nor by some thunder resounding about the world, but plainly by a divine illumination shining up within us for the understanding of the God-inspired Scripture.

And in regard to this too you will find the Son active in us;

for it is written somewhere concerning the holy disciples that 'Then He opened their understanding,' namely, that they might understand the holy Scriptures.

'Not that anyone has seen the Father, save He who is from God.'

Having foreseen again, as God, that they would by no means receive the revelation given through the Spirit, nor would they conceive the understanding that comes from above in illuminations, but through great perversity of purpose would demand the very necessity of beholding the Father, and, so to speak, of being instructed by a face-to-face vision—such as, they supposed, was once granted to their fathers when the glory of God descended upon Mount Sinai;

He again draws them back, and as with a bridle turns them about to the necessity of not holding a gross conception concerning God, nor of imagining that the invisible nature will ever be visible;

'for no one,' He says, 'has ever beheld the Father.'

And He seems again to be hinting also at the hierophant Moses himself,

as though, by entering into the thick darkness, he beheld the ineffable nature of God, and with the eyes of the body saw that which by nature is undefiled beauty.

But lest, by speaking too nakedly concerning the all-wise Moses, He should somehow rouse them to their wonted boldness, He speaks indefinitely and at once against all, as though about that one: 'Not that anyone has seen the Father.'

'Do not,' He says, 'demand the things that are above nature, nor be borne by unreasonable impulses toward that which is inaccessible to all that has come into being.'

For the divine and inconceivable nature has fled and escaped notice—not only the eyes that are in us alone, but even now those of all creation;

for in the word 'No one,' all things are fenced off; but by determining that He alone both is of God and has beheld the Father, He plainly places Himself outside all those against whom the 'No one' would be understood in its denying force.

And since He is outside all, and, no one seeing the Father, He alone fails not of the beholding, how then would He any longer be conceived as being among all things, as one of them, but rather outside all things, as above all? And if all things are said to be of God, and none sees the Father—

for all things are of God, according to the utterance of Paul;

He alone contemplates the Father, by reason of His being from God.

The phrase 'from God' we shall understand rightly, applying to Him and Him alone that which is from the essence of the Father.

For if it be not after this manner, for what reason, as we said before, when all things are said to be of God, does He alone ascend to the beholding of the One who begot Him, by reason of His being from God? Therefore it will indeed be said of created things, but in a more improper sense;

for all things are from God in a creative manner, because they were brought by Him into being;

but in the case of the Son, He will receive the phrase 'from God' in another and truer manner, as being of Him by nature.

Wherefore, not being numbered together with all, but being outside all and above all with the Father, He will not share in the weakness of all, inasmuch as He is exempt from community of nature with them; but as recurring to the nature of the One who begot Him, He will assuredly behold Him from whom He is.

But as to how, or in what manner, either He Himself shall behold the Father, or again shall be seen by the Father, it is not the task of our tongue to tell;

yet it must nevertheless be conceived in a manner befitting God.

'Verily, verily, I say unto you, he that believeth on Me hath everlasting life.'

Faith, therefore, is the door and the way unto life, and the running back from corruption unto incorruption.

Moreover, the hearers will have no less occasion to marvel at the divine economy displayed in these things as well.

For since He perceives that they comprehend nothing at all, and sees that they do not even think it fitting to be persuaded by the words that come from the prophets, He cuts short, by an oath sworn unto truth, all that was weak in them for faith, as arising from human reasonings.

And setting before those who believe the enviable prizes, as with certain hooks—namely, by the desires directed toward them—He all but constrains even the unwilling and persuades them to walk toward that which is proclaimed.

For what could be more to be preferred than eternal life, to those for whom death is bitter and the sufferings that come from corruption loom before them? And this too would befit a wise teacher: I mean, through the whole way that calls unto life, to re-instruct unto the better those who have chosen to think anything foolish.

And being Himself the eternal life, He promises to give Himself to those who believe—which is for Christ to dwell in our hearts through faith. CHAPTER II

That the holy body of Christ is life-giving, in the passages where He speaks of His own body as of bread.

'I am the bread of life.'

'Your fathers ate the manna in the wilderness, and died;

this is the bread that comes down from heaven, that one may eat of it and not die.'

Very clearly in these words one may behold that which was foreproclaimed through the prophet Isaiah: 'I became manifest to those who sought Me not; I was found by those who asked not after Me.'

'I said, Behold, here am I, to a nation that called not upon My name;'

'I stretched out My hands unto a disobedient and gainsaying people.' For having stripped off the whole husk of the discourse, and having removed, so to speak, every covering, He now openly and without veil manifests Himself to those of Israel, saying: 'I am the bread of life,' that they might learn that, if they have as their desire to be superior to corruption and to put off the very death that assailed them through transgression, they must walk toward partaking of Him who is mighty to give life, who does away with corruption and abolishes death;

for this is truly the proper and most fitting work of the life that is according to nature.

But since, while firmly maintaining that the manna had been given to their fathers in the wilderness, they would not receive the true bread that came down from heaven—that is, the Son—He makes a necessary comparison of the type with the truth, that they might thus know that this was not the bread from heaven, but rather He whom the experience of the reality shows to be such by nature.

'For your fathers and forefathers,' He says, 'having eaten the manna, paid the debt owed to the nature of the body, having gained through it only a temporary life, and bringing to the flesh a food that lasted but a day; with difficulty they contrived only this—not to die on the spot.'

'And it would be the clearest proof,' He says, 'that this was not, in the truer sense, the bread from heaven—namely, that those who partook of it were in no way profited by it unto incorruption.'

And on the other hand, a sign likewise that the Son is properly and truly the bread of life is this: that those who once partook of Him, and were in a certain manner commingled with Him through communion, are shown to be superior even to the very bonds of death.

For that the manna is again taken as an image, rather than a shadow, of Christ, and dimly foreshadowed the bread of life, but was not itself the bread of life, has been said by us at length;

and the psalmist too somehow lends his aid, crying in the Spirit: 'He gave them bread of heaven; man ate the bread of angels.' For the saying seems in a manner to have been spoken by the Spirit-bearer concerning those of Israel, yet the truth is not so; rather, the aim of the words is directed more toward us.

For is it not utterly silly and senseless to suppose that the holy angels in heaven, though they have obtained an incorporeal nature, partake of grosser food, and need aids to be sustained unto life, such as this body from the earth might crave? Nay, I think there is no difficulty in conceiving that, since they are spirits, they would need such food also—spiritual, that is, and intelligible.

How then is the bread of angels said to have been supplied to the forefathers of the Jews, if the prophet cries the truth in such matters? But it is plain that, since the typical manna was for an image of Christ—who holds together and sustains all things in being, and nourishes angels while giving life to the things upon the earth—the prophet called that which was dimly foreshadowed in shadows by the name of the truth, inasmuch as the holy angels cannot partake of a more earthly food, of a gross conception, as it were—I mean that concerning the manna—and, drawing his hearers even against their will, he somehow leads them up to a spiritual meaning, namely that which concerns Christ Himself, who is also the bread of the holy angels themselves.

'Therefore those who ate the manna,' He says, 'have died,' as having plainly received from it no participation in any life;

for it was not in truth life-giving, but rather a help against fleshly hunger, and was taken up as in a type of the truer reality.

But those who take into themselves the bread of life shall have as their prize immortality; having utterly set at nought corruption and the evils that come from it, they shall ascend unto the unbroken and unending length of the life that is according to Christ.

And nothing at all will do violence to our words concerning these matters by the fact that those who have come to partake of Christ must also taste of fleshly death, because of that which befits our nature;

for even if, slipping into this common end, they should suffer that which is human, yet, as Paul says, they live unto God, being destined to live.

'The living bread that came down from heaven;

if anyone eat of this bread, he shall live for ever.'

'To say the same things to you is to me indeed not irksome, but for you it is safe,' the divinely-inspired Paul writes to certain ones, having, I think, learned this too from the very words of the Saviour.

For just as for wounds that grow savage there is need not of the application of one single remedy, but rather of a treatment of many kinds, and one not applied perhaps but once, but by the continuity of its application storming out the malady;

so, I think, for a most obdurate soul and a hardened mind, frequent helps from teachers must be made ready and must come one after another in close succession.

For it would tend to soften them, not by a single and first instruction, but rather by that which is again and afterward brought to bear upon them, even if it should come by means of the very same words.

Therefore the Saviour often, turning the same discourse round again for the Jews, sets it before them in varied forms: at one time enigmatic and cloaked in much obscurity, at another stripped of all duplicity, released and unconstrained, so that thereafter, having disobeyed, they might lack any further excuse against their condemnation, but being evil should perish evilly, themselves thrusting the sword of destruction against their own soul.

Therefore Christ, hiding nothing any longer, says: I am the living bread which came down from heaven.

That, He says, was a type, a shadow, and an image;

hear now plainly and no longer veiled: I am the living bread; if anyone eat of this bread, he shall live for ever.

They who ate of that manna died;

but he who eats this bread, that is, Me, or rather My flesh, shall live for ever.

We must therefore guard against, and at the same time reject, the hardening of ourselves against the words that lead to godliness, since Christ persuades us to change our mind not once only, but many times.

For it would be beyond dispute that they will assuredly be liable to most grievous charges who have swerved into utmost madness, and through excessive disobedience do not refrain from insolently affronting, as in drunken outrage, the Teacher of the noblest things.

For this reason He says concerning the Jews: If I had not come and spoken to them, they would not have had sin;

but now they have no excuse for their sin. For those who have in no way received into their heart through hearing the word of salvation may perhaps meet with a gentler Judge, pleading that they did not hear at all, even though they will most certainly give account for not having sought to learn;

but those who, though often trained by the same admonitions and words toward the pursuit of what is profitable, yet senselessly reckon that they ought to deprive themselves of the noblest goods, shall pay a most bitter penalty and shall fall, as it were, upon a grieved Judge, having no excuse to find that could move Him to pity for that same madness of theirs.

And the bread which I will give is My flesh, for the life of the world.

I die, He says, for all, that I may quicken all through Myself, and I have made My own flesh a ransom for the flesh of all.

For death shall die in My death, and the fallen nature of man shall rise again together with Me, He says.

For through this I have become like you, that is, man, and of the seed of Abraham, that in all things I might be made like unto My brethren.

And the blessed Paul also, having rightly understood this which Christ just now said to us, himself says: Since then the children have partaken of blood and flesh, He also in like manner shared in the same, that through death He might destroy him who had the power of death, that is, the devil. For it was not otherwise possible that he who had the power of death, and death itself, should ever be brought to nought, unless Christ had given Himself for us, one as a ransom for all.

For this reason too He says somewhere in the Psalms, offering Himself for us to God the Father as a spotless victim: Sacrifice and offering Thou didst not desire, but a body Thou hast prepared for Me;

in whole burnt offerings and offerings for sin Thou hadst no pleasure.

I willed it: for since the blood of bulls and goats and the ashes of a heifer did not suffice for the cleansing of sin, nor could the slaughter of irrational beasts ever have abolished the power of death, Christ Himself enters in, in a certain manner, to undergo the penalties on behalf of all.

For by His stripes we were healed, as the prophet says, and He Himself bore our sins in His body upon the tree; and He was crucified for all and on behalf of all, that, one having died for all, we all might live in Him.

For it was not possible that He should be held fast by death, nor could corruption ever have prevailed over the life that is His by nature.

And that Christ offered His own flesh for the life of the world we shall learn also from His own words;

for He says: Holy Father, keep them; and again: For their sakes I sanctify Myself. Now He says that He sanctifies Himself in these words, not as being of benefit unto sanctification for one who is in purity of soul, that is, of spirit, as is understood in our case, nor yet unto a participation in the Holy Spirit;

for the Spirit was in Him by nature;

and He was and is ever holy, and shall be so perpetually;

but the words I sanctify are used in these passages in the sense of I dedicate and I bring near, as a spotless victim, for a sweet-smelling savour.

For that which was brought to the divine altar was sanctified, or rather, according to the Law, was called holy.

For since the life-giving Word of God dwelt in the flesh, He transformed it into His own proper good, that is, into life, and being wholly united to it according to the ineffable manner of the union, He rendered it life-giving, even as He Himself is life-giving by nature.

For this reason the body of Christ gives life to those who partake of it;

for it drives out death when it comes to be in those who are dying, and it banishes corruption, bearing perfectly within itself the Word who does away with corruption.

But perhaps someone will say, fixing the eye of the mind upon the resurrection of those who have fallen asleep: Those who have not received the faith in Christ, and have not become partakers of Him, will not come back to life at the time of the resurrection.

What then? Will not all creation that has fallen into death run back to life? To this indeed we shall say: All flesh shall come back to life;

for the prophetic word foretells that the dead shall be raised.

For we shall reckon that the mystery accomplished through the resurrection of Christ extends over all humanity, and we believe that in Him and first of all in Him our nature has been wholly set free from corruption.

For all shall be raised, after the likeness of Him who was raised for our sakes and who has all within Himself, inasmuch as He was man.

And just as in the first-formed man we were laid down unto death, so again in the First-born, who was raised for our sakes from the dead, all shall come back to life;

but those who have done good things unto a resurrection of life, as it is written, and those who have done evil things unto a resurrection of judgement. And I for my part would grant, and that by no ordinary measure, that to rise again unto punishment is more bitter than death, and to come back to life only to receive torments.

More properly, therefore, we must understand as life truly the life that is in Christ, that which is in sanctification and blessedness and in unfailing gladness;

since the wise John also knows well that this is truly the life, saying: He who believes in the Son has eternal life, but he who disobeys the Son shall not see life, but the wrath of God abides upon him. For behold, behold, he says that the one held fast in disobedience shall not see life;

and yet all creation is expected to run back to life and to be raised.

It is evident, therefore, that the Saviour with good reason called life that which has been prepared for the saints, that, I mean, which is in glory and in sanctification; and that those who go on to the participation of the life-giving flesh will need to pursue it, is to none who are right-minded a matter of doubt.

And He reminds us of the things laid down in the sacred Scriptures, in which of old also this was signified under the figure of bread.

It is written accordingly in Numbers: And the Lord spoke to Moses, saying: Speak to the children of Israel and say to them: When ye enter into the land into which I bring you there, it shall be that, when ye eat of the bread of the land, ye shall set apart a heave offering, a portion separated to the Lord;

the first-fruits of your dough, a cake, ye shall set apart as a heave offering; as ye separate a heave offering from the threshing-floor, so shall ye set it apart, the first-fruits of your dough, and ye shall give to the Lord a heave offering throughout your generations. Now the Law, having, as it were, a coarse veil derived from the letter, delineated such things in enigmatic fashion;

but it proclaimed beforehand again the truly true bread that comes down from heaven, that is, Christ, and gives life to the world.

For consider how, having become man like unto us through His likeness to us, He was dedicated to God the Father as a kind of first-fruits of our dough and as a portion set apart, according to that which is written, being shown forth as the first-born from the dead, and as the first-fruits of the resurrection of all, ascending into heaven itself;

for He was taken from us, He took hold of the seed of Abraham, as Paul says, and He was dedicated as from all and on behalf of all, that He might give life to all, and that, as a sheaf from the threshing-floor, the first-fruits might be offered to God the Father.

And just as, being in truth light, He conferred upon His own disciples the grace derived from that reality;

for He says, Ye are the light of the world; so also, being the living bread who quickens all things and holds them together in being, He again, after a likeness and through the shadow that is according to the Law, prefigured, as in twelve loaves, the sacred choir of the apostles.

For it says thus in Leviticus: And the Lord spoke to Moses, saying: Command the children of Israel, and let them take for thee pure beaten olive oil for light, to burn a lamp continually outside the veil in the tabernacle of witness. Then it says besides this: And ye shall take fine flour and make of it twelve loaves; of two tenth parts shall each loaf be;

and ye shall set them in two rows, six loaves in the one row, upon the pure table before the Lord, and ye shall put upon the row pure frankincense and salt, and it shall be for loaves as a memorial, set forth before the Lord. Now the lamp that is in the holy tabernacle and outside the veil, giving light, we have in what has preceded granted to be the blessed John, nourished with the purest oil, that is, with the illumination given through the Spirit;

and outside the veil, since his word is catechetical: for he says, Prepare ye the way of the Lord, make straight the paths of our God; but the things within the veil, that is, the hidden mystery concerning Christ, he does not greatly disclose.

For I, he says, baptize you in water unto repentance, but He who comes after me is mightier than I, whose sandals I am not worthy to bear; He shall baptize you in the Holy Spirit and fire. You see, then, how he himself gives light, calling to repentance as with a plainer word, yet entrusts the laying bare of the things within the veil to Him who baptizes through fire and the Spirit? And we have treated of these matters more at large, when a text was set before us at the beginning of the book: He was the lamp that burneth and shineth; but we have now touched upon them somewhat in passing, since it was necessary, after John's passing mention, to show that the proclamation of the holy apostles was near at hand and lay immediately adjacent.

For it says, Ye shall make twelve loaves;

receiving into these same ends, it goes and is extended toward whatever anyone might will.

He commands accordingly that each be of two tenth parts, that thou mayest see the perfection in the disciples, in an equal pair, I mean in the practical and in the contemplative virtue.

He commands, moreover, usefully, that they be set in two rows, all but pointing out that very posture which it was customary and fitting to adopt, ever receiving the Lord in their midst, and being accustomed, as it were, ever to encircle Him as a kind of teacher.

And that we may learn that, as Paul says, they have become a sweet savour of Christ unto God the Father, He commands frankincense to be placed upon the loaves and that they be sprinkled also with salt.

For it was said to them somewhere: Ye are the salt of the earth. But He also usefully commands that they be offered on the day of the sabbaths;

for they were shown forth in the last times of the age, and the last day of the week is the sabbath.

And not this only, but since at the time of the sojourn of our Saviour we kept sabbath spiritually;