Commentary on John 1 part 53/94

and He points also to the Word who dwells in the flesh, through again saying and adding 'And He that speaks with you, He it is.'

You see, then, how great is the union which the Word possesses;

for He did not set down a distinction, but says that He Himself is both the One who falls under the eyes of the body, and the One who is known from the speech.

It is therefore uninstructed and utterly impious for some to say inconsiderately, 'The man of Christ';

for being God, He became man, indivisible as to His being God and Son even with the flesh; for in these things is the most perfect confession and knowledge of the faith in Him.

Quick to the confession that is upon the faith, I say, and fervent unto godliness, was the man who had once been blind.

For when he knew that the truly Only-begotten Son was present and seen, he worshipped Him as God, and this though he saw Him in the flesh, not having the glory that is truly befitting God; but being enlightened in heart from the power and authority that were in Him, he leaps up proportionately to wise and good conceptions, and beholds as in a mirror the beauty of His divine and unspeakable nature;

for he would not have worshipped Him as God, had he not believed Him to be God, being led on to think thus from the miracle that had been wrought upon him and marvellously accomplished.

And since we have transferred the whole treatment concerning him to the person of the Gentiles, come now, let us speak again concerning this.

For behold with me how, through the worship in spirit, he fulfils the type of the service, into which the Gentiles were led by the hand through faith.

For with sacrifices of oxen and with frankincense and with the offerings of the other animals it was the custom for Israel to serve the Lord of all according to the legal command;

but those from among the Gentiles who have believed do not know this way of service, but have turned to the other, that is, the spiritual, which God indeed says is especially dear and more pleasing to Him.

'For I will not eat the flesh of bulls,' He says, 'nor will I drink the blood of goats. But rather He enjoins us to offer the sacrifice of praise, that is, worship accompanied by song; and beholding that the Gentiles would assuredly ascend to this through faith in the Holy Spirit, the sweet singer says, as to our Lord and Saviour: 'Let all the earth worship You and sing to You; let them sing to Your name.' But moreover the Lord Himself, our Jesus the Christ, showing that the spiritual worship is among things better than the legal service, says to the woman from Samaria: 'Believe Me, woman, that the hour is coming when neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem will you worship the Father.'

'But the hour comes, and now is, when the true worshippers shall worship the Father in spirit and in truth;

for the Father also seeks such to worship Him.

God is spirit, and those who worship Him must worship in spirit and in truth.' And, thinking rightly, we reason that the holy angels also excel in this manner, and that they offer to God worship as a kind of spiritual bodyguard.

Having added what is fitting to what has been said, we shall for the present refrain from the further citation of the texts.

But that again we may recall, that the man who had once been blind fittingly fulfilled the type of the Gentiles' service, setting worship as a neighbour to the confession of the faith.

'And Jesus said: For judgment I have come into this world, that those who do not see may see, and those who see may become blind.'

Explaining to us the cause of His manifestation—I mean the one in this world—Christ says through the voice of Isaiah: 'The Spirit of the Lord is upon Me, because of which He has anointed Me; He has sent Me to preach good tidings to the poor, to proclaim release to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind.' But also somewhere else He says: 'You deaf, hear; and you blind, look up to see.' Since, then, He says that He has been appointed by God the Father for this cause, that He might proclaim recovery of sight to the blind, how does He here say: 'For judgment I have come into this world, that those who do not see may see, and those who see may become blind'? Will anyone then say: Is Christ a minister of sin, according to the voice of Paul? God forbid. For He came to accomplish the aim that was set forth out of His gentleness toward us, that is, to illumine all men with the torch-light of the Spirit.

But the Jews, being obstinate unto unbelief, did not receive the grace that would have made them radiant, calling down upon themselves, as it were self-invited, the darkness.

And indeed it is written concerning them in the prophetic declarations: 'When they waited, the light became darkness to them; while they looked for brightness, they walked in gloom.' For so far as concerned the preaching of the Law, the Jews were awaiting the brightness and the light, that is, Christ.

For they both accepted that He would come and were expecting Him; yet those who by this seemed to be pious walked in gloom, that is, in deep darkness—no other cause having befallen them for suffering this blindness, but that by their own acts of unbelief they held within themselves a self-inflicted disease.

'I have come,' He says, 'to grant sight to the blind through faith'; but the unyielding mind of those who refuse to be led and will not submit, looking rather toward unbelief, made the coming of the Enlightener turn out to their condemnation.

For because they do not believe, they are condemned.

And this the Saviour has stated more plainly for you through other words also: 'Verily, verily, I say unto you, he that believeth in the Son is not judged, but he that obeyeth not the Son hath already been judged, because he hath not believed in the name of the Son of God.' Gracefully, therefore, He discourses from the matter close at hand and in His very keeping, and He makes the marvel wrought so wondrously upon the man once blind to be, as it were, the root of His discourse.

For He affirms that the man recovered sight not only in body but also as regards the mind, because he received the faith; while the Pharisees suffered the contrary.

For they did not behold His glory, though it shone forth most brilliantly, and in a miracle both very great and fresh.

'Those of the Pharisees who were with Him heard these things, and said unto Him, Are we also blind?' The Pharisees keep close and press to walk together with Christ the Saviour, though they have a bitter dart in their heart and are consumed with grief and envy because of His glory.

Yet they walk together with Him nonetheless, gathering fuel for their hatred and concocting manifold slanders against His miracles, and thereby loosening from the more docile the guilelessness of their understanding.

But since, when Christ said these things, they inquired further, they were once more cut to the quick; for it was not likely that they should be ignorant that the aim of His discourse was turned against them.

And since it had been said by Him still in an unrestricted and undefined way—'That they which see may become blind'—not yet having occasion reasonably to accuse Him as insulted, they craftily inquire, drawing the force of what was said to their own persons, and demanding as it were that He speak more plainly whether He is calling them too blind, so that again they might condemn Him as one who had transgressed a commandment of the Law.

'Thou shalt not speak evil of a ruler of thy people.' Either, then, expecting to be insulted, they say such things, that they might seem reasonably to fasten upon Him and be indignant, and thus render blameless their plot against Christ; or else, truly harbouring in mind something more bitter, they were labouring to bring forth the kind of slander that suited them.

For nothing puts to shame the ungrateful man.

'Jesus said unto them, If ye were blind, ye would not have sin;'

'but now ye say, We see;'

The Saviour again consumes them, having with art tempered His reproof.

For He departs from all reviling, yet puts them to shame by setting before them the power of truth;

and He shows them to have sight to no useful purpose, or rather to have fallen into a worse state than one who sees not at all.

For the blind man, He says, in that he beheld none of the things wondrously accomplished, stands outside of sin and is in some way blameless;

but those who were eye-witnesses and beholders of the miracles, and who through great folly and ill-will did not accept the faith arising from them, have a sin hard to wash away, and truly a condemnation hard to escape thereupon.

To understand it thus, then, with regard to bodily blindness and recovery of sight, is not unpersuasive;

but passing over analogously to the spiritual sense, and drawing thence the like force for the discourse, we shall say again that the man without understanding might most reasonably ask pardon before the Judge, while the man keen in understanding and perceiving what is profitable, who then sells the inclination of his mind for baser things and grants the victory to pleasures rather than to what is beneficial, will shamelessly ask for mercy, and will have no plea to help him against being punished from any quarter; and he will perish, and very justly, having kept upon himself a sin without advocate.

And indeed our Lord Jesus Christ, marking this very thing, says in the Gospels: 'He that knoweth his lord's will and doeth it not shall be beaten with many stripes.' For the charges against him who does not know are those of ignorance, but against him who has understood, yet is thrust into acting inconsiderately, they are of the utmost contempt.

And observe again how even in this the word of the Saviour has been made secure;

for He does not say declaratively 'Because ye see,' but 'Ye,' He says, 'say that we see.'

For it would indeed have been most absurd to bear witness to understanding in men who wear a mind so blind and extinguished as to dare to say concerning Him, 'We know that this man is a sinner.' Self-condemned, therefore, are the Jews, who affirm that they themselves see, yet do nothing at all of what they ought to do, and that most vehemently; and who, though they know the Lord's will, so despise it as even to set themselves against the noblest miracles.

'Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that entereth not by the door into the fold of the sheep, but climbeth up some other way, the same is a thief and a robber;

but he that entereth in by the door is the shepherd of the sheep;

to him the doorkeeper openeth, and the sheep hear his voice, and he calleth his own sheep by name and leadeth them out;

and a stranger will they in no wise follow, but will flee from him, because they know not the voice of strangers.'

For while discoursing about blindness and recovery of sight, He straightway makes His words concern sheep, and a fold, and a door.

But whoever has a wise mind dwelling within, and has been zealous to apply himself with more careful attention to what is contemplated, will perceive that here too the discourse proceeds as it were in a straight line, and has nowhere swerved from what is fitting.

But what I have often said I will say yet again, taking it up afresh.

It is the custom of Christ the Saviour not to answer only the words uttered by the voice, when any come to Him, but—since He sees both reins and hearts—to make His defence even to their thoughts alone;

for all things are naked and laid open unto Him, and there is no creature hidden before Him. Therefore also He says to one of the saints: 'Who is this that hideth counsel from Me, keeping words in his heart, and thinketh to hide them from Me?' Since, then, the unholy band of the Pharisees was maliciously inquiring, as we said just now, whether they too are blind—so that, if He should truly say that they are indeed blind, He might again be condemned as having reviled the rulers and spoken evil of those who had been allotted to rule peoples—

for they thought highly of themselves on this account, as of something great and extraordinary;

our Lord Jesus Christ of necessity, contending here again with this very reasoning of theirs, usefully introduces the parable, hinting somewhat more dimly and as though in riddles that they will not, out of covetousness, hold the leadership securely, nor will the dignity remain steadfast to them, since out of arrogance they insult God, the giver of it;

and He teaches that this shall belong only to those who are called by Him unto the leadership of peoples.

He says, therefore, that He Himself is a door, admitting by His own counsel unto the leadership of the rational flocks the man who is knowledgeable and God-loving.

But He calls a thief and a robber, and one that climbeth up some other way, the man who by force and tyranny supposes he can seize the honour not given to him—such as were those concerning whom, doubtless, He says through one of the prophets, 'They reigned, but not by Me; they ruled, but not through My Spirit.' And He intimates through these words that if it is according to their pleasure to lead the peoples, they must, having believed and received the divine preaching, run to this through Him, so that they may have their rule both unshaken and well established—which indeed came to pass in the holy apostles, and in the teachers of the holy churches after them, to whom also the doorkeeper opens; that is, either the angel appointed to preside over the churches and to work together with those allotted to the priesthood for the benefit of the peoples, or again the Saviour Himself, who is both door and Lord of the door.

And He most firmly affirms that the flock of sheep rightly obeys and yields to the voice of the shepherd, but declines, and that most earnestly, the voice of strangers—that you may understand a true matter, extending the force of the discourse to the more general.

For we teach in the churches, conveying the doctrines through the God-inspired Scripture, and setting before men, as a kind of spiritual nourishment, the evangelical and apostolic word.

And obedient to such things are those who believe in Christ and are distinguished by an undistorted faith; but they decline the voices of false shepherds, and turn away from them as from a deadly affliction.

What, then, is that which is here hinted at to the Pharisees? someone will ask. Summing it up briefly and in a compendious word, I will say again.

He shows Himself to be both Lord of the fold, and door, and doorkeeper, that they might learn accurately that they will not have the position of leadership firmly established, unless, coming to it through Him, they possess the God-given good.

They will in no way preside over those about to believe in Him; rather the sheep will depart from the teaching among them, and will attach themselves to the shepherds appointed through Him.

'This parable spake Jesus unto them;

but they understood not what things they were which He spake unto them.'

Simple is the speech of the saints, and free from the over-curiousness of the Greeks;

'For God chose the foolish things of the world,' according to the word of Paul, 'that He might put to shame the wise.' Accordingly, He used the term 'proverb';

for thus he calls the parable;

and perhaps because the character of such things is somehow always mingled, and through both, as through one, the thing signified is understood.

Yet this we say, that the inspired Evangelist greatly marvels at the want of understanding of the Jews.

For, as the very experience of the facts bears witness, they have a mind resembling rocks or iron, having practised receiving nothing at all of the profitable teachings.

And he utters this with no small emphasis.

For it is as if he plainly said: So far do the Pharisees stand apart from being able to understand any of the necessary things—although they hold themselves outrageously wise—that they did not understand this parable, so easily discerned and bright, in which there is nothing hard, nothing crooked to the understanding, nothing difficult to grasp.

And he fittingly laughs to scorn the Jewish ill-counsel, since to them Christ appeared to be nothing, although He was teaching things above the Law and making His instruction far more gracious than that of Moses.

'Jesus therefore said unto them, Verily I say unto you, I am the door of the sheep.'

He knew full well, being by nature God and beholding the things lying in the depths, that the Pharisee understood nothing of what was said by Him, although he was wont to think great things of himself as to knowledge of the Law, and was incomparably haughty in seeming to be wise.

For this reason He makes His exposition most clear to them, and, having as it were reeled in what was a long discourse, He declares in very few words the aim of the proverb.

For being good by nature, He leads by the hand toward comprehension even those who are not worthy, in the hope that perchance some manner of benefit might dawn upon them.

And He plainly says that He Himself is the door of the sheep, teaching a matter that is acknowledged;

for only through faith in Him do we enter into intimacy as toward God; and He is Himself witness thereof, saying, 'No one cometh unto the Father, but by Me.' Either, then, He wishes to signify some such thing, or—what is more fitting to the matters set before us—He again makes it clear that through Him we come to leadership and to the guiding of the rational flocks, according to what was said through Paul, 'For no one taketh the honour unto himself, but he that is called by God.' And indeed no one of the holy prophets appointed himself, nor will the illustrious and great choir of the apostles be found to have called itself to this.

For they were appointed through the will of Christ, who called them unto apostleship by name and one by one, as He says in the proverb set before us.

For we know how in the Gospel according to Matthew the names of the apostles were set down in order, and then straightway there is added the manner of their proclamation;

for it says that the Saviour appointed these twelve, whom also He named apostles. Therefore, seeing the smitten Pharisee craving to rule, and no moderately inflamed toward the name and the reality of leadership, He usefully teaches that He Himself both is the one who supplies the leading of others and is able easily to bring men to this.

For being the door of the sacred and divine fold, He will admit the fit man, but will wall off the passage inward from him who is not such.

'All that came are thieves and robbers;

but the sheep did not hear them.'

Charming away the untamed mind of the Pharisees and transferring it to a sober reckoning, He attempts to show what a profitless and utterly perilous thing it is to dare to take the lead not by ordination from above, nor by the divine will, but out of human arrogance, supposing that they will prevail in office even though the very Giver of it is unwilling.

Having therefore expressly called Himself the Door, inasmuch as He alone brings in to leadership those who are fit, He at once sets alongside the undertakings of men of former times, so that, beholding as in a painted panel the sketched-out course of the matter to its end, they might now learn clearly that the power to rule and to lead flocks and peoples exists solely through the grace from above, and not through tyrannical enterprises.

Usefully, therefore, He here too says, calling to remembrance what was among the men of old, that all who came were thieves and robbers, but the sheep did not hear them.

For certain men came forward feigning the oversight of good shepherds; but since there was no one appointing them to leadership and persuading those whom they ought to have led to obey, the multitude of the sheep leapt away.

But we must by no means suppose that, because He said 'All,' the sending of the holy prophets is annulled by our Saviour Christ.

For the saying is not against those, but against others.

For since He was about to speak concerning false shepherds and those who climb up into the fold of the sheep by some other way, when those of whom the discourse treated had already necessarily been plainly indicated beforehand, He says 'All'; yet we shall by no means think that the person of the holy prophets is thereby set aside.

'I did not speak to them, yet they prophesied'; and to the blessed Jeremiah He says: 'The prophets prophesy lies in My name; I did not send them, nor speak to them, nor command them; for they prophesy to you the visions and divinations and prophecies of their own heart.'

'If they are prophets, and if the word of the Lord is in them, let them meet Me.'

What has the chaff to do with the wheat? For the word that is truly from God has the most nourishing power and strengthens the heart of man, according to what is written; but the word of the impious false prophets, or rather false teachers, being most easily crumbled and chaff-like, works no benefit at all in its hearers.

Whenever, then, He names as thieves and robbers those who rushed ahead of His coming, He is either intimating the lying and deceitful multitude of whom we have just now spoken, or you may apply the force of the saying also to those concerning whom it is written in the Acts of the Apostles.

'For before these days rose up Theudas, claiming to be someone great, to whom a number of men, about four hundred, joined themselves;'

'who was slain, and all who obeyed him were dispersed and came to nothing.'

'After him rose up Judas the Galilean in the days of the census, and drew away people after himself;'

'and he too perished, and all who obeyed him were scattered.' You see, then, in these instances, without doubt and clearly, that Christ says such things not concerning the holy prophets, but concerning those who hold the other rank—so that He may persuade even the unwilling Pharisees not, by their own arrogant folly, thoughtlessly to arrogate to themselves the power, even against God's will, to preside over peoples, but rather to yield all authority to the divine will, and to hasten to run in through the true Door, rather than, like plunderers, to attempt to climb up by another way into the fold of the sheep.

'If anyone enters through Me, he shall be saved, and shall go in and go out, and shall find pasture.'

From what is wont to happen He fashions the form of the discourse, as it were out of a narrative, unto spiritual contemplation; and He makes, almost, of what is spread out before the eyes and has nothing difficult for comprehension, an image of the things more hidden.

'For the thieves and robbers,' He says, 'assailing the pens of the sheep without restraint, do not drive in through the door, but leaping down from some other side and vaulting over the wall of the fold, they run into danger.'

For surely it is very likely that one who thus robs, and has chosen to do evil heedlessly, will be caught; whereas those who go in through the very door make their entrance most free of danger, being of course not unmarked, nor yet unknown to the master of the sheep.

For they run in when he who is set over the doors opens to them.

'But such men,' He says, 'shall be together with the sheep in much boldness, having made their entrance in the most lawful manner, harmless as it were, and freed from all suspicion of robbery.'

This, then, is the pattern of the narrative;

but transferring what is thereby signified unto spiritual profit, we say this: that those who climb up to rule over peoples not by divine appointment and consent—as it were refusing to enter through the door—shall assuredly perish, He says, being crushed by the divine judgment for their presumptuous undertakings, according to the tenor of the saying.

But those who have obtained a God-given leadership, and walk toward it through Christ, shall rule over the most holy fold in much boldness and grace, being so far removed from the wrath appointed for those others that they may thence await honours, and may every moment expect the crowns coming from above—since their aim is by no means to harm the sheep in any way whatever, but rather to benefit them, and, doing what is pleasing to the Lord of the flock, ever to love to keep safe those who have been placed under Him.

And by these words the Lord greatly troubles the inflexible Pharisees, telling them that they shall by no means be saved, but shall utterly fall away from the office in which they stand—and that most justly, since they suppose that they will hold it securely not through God, but through their own ill-will.

But on this account too there comes over me to marvel at the incomparable love of the Saviour toward mankind.

For the Lord is truly compassionate and merciful, setting before all the way of salvation, and in manifold ways calling to it even that which is exceedingly deaf to hearing and hardened.

And again the demonstration of what has been said will come to me from the matter itself.

For since neither by miracles, nor indeed by the longing that looks toward the hope and glory to come, does He persuade the Pharisee to accept the word from Him, He proceeds swiftly to that thing whereby it was most likely they would be troubled, so that, as it were by an inescapable necessity, they might henceforth look to obedience.

...being present and even in their hands, unless, most speedily transferring themselves to a willingness to obey Him, they should enjoy His forbearance.

'The thief does not come except to steal and to kill and to destroy;'

'I came that they might have life, and might have it more abundantly.'

Since our Saviour Christ affirmed that He Himself is the Door, and taught that it rests with Him both to bring in whomsoever He might will, and to leave outside the man unsuited and utterly unskilled for shepherding, and moreover had shut out as robbers and thieves those who were deserters toward a grace not given them from above, the wretched Pharisees again reasoned among themselves who then this man might be, that he ascends to such great boldness—being himself perhaps also numbered among those whose coming he impugns;

for they supposed that he too was set forth as a false shepherd and false overseer out of his own private opinion, not that, being God, He became man according to the most ancient proclamation of the God-inspired Scripture.

And it is likely indeed that, having gathered the true knowledge concerning Him, they cast it off along with their disobediences as some grievous burden, and looked only to the things that lay according to their own pleasure and lay within their concern;

and these were to have the leadership of peoples and to be styled thereby.

Since, therefore, He knew that they were pondering these things, or even whispering them to one another, not waiting for a more open accusation from them, He makes His defence fittingly, and stoutly maintains that it must be tested from the very facts who is the shepherd and who is the thief—and He says that such a thing is by no means hard to distinguish, whenever one examines closely the aim and manner of each.

'For the thief,' He says, 'comes for the destruction of the flock, this being unquestionably the outcome of his desire to rob;'

'but the truly good shepherd will come into the fold of the sheep for none of the dreadful ends, but rather to accomplish for them what is profitable, and whatever might be conceived to be for their great benefit, this he will energetically bring to pass.'

Let the power of the discourse come, therefore, as from another image, unto what is more true, and let the Pharisee consider once more: what those false shepherds and false teachers then procured for those whom they deluded, and what Christ came to bestow, or unto what prosperity He would raise us up.