Works (City of God, On the Trinity, etc.) 24 part 3/3

'But of that day and hour no one knoweth, neither the angels in heaven, nor the Son, but the Father.' For this he knows not, in that he makes others not to know it — that is, in that he did not so know it as to make it known to the disciples at that time; just as it was said to Abraham, 'Now I know that thou fearest God,' that is, 'now I have made thee to know it,' because Abraham himself, proved in that temptation, also became known to himself. For he was indeed going to tell that very thing to the disciples at a fitting time, of which future thing, speaking as of a past thing, he says: 'I will not now call you servants, but friends. For the servant knoweth not the will of his lord; but I have called you friends, because all things whatsoever I have heard of my Father I have made known to you' — which he had not yet done, but because he was certainly going to do it he spoke as if he had already done it. For to those very men he says:

'I have yet many things to say to you, but you cannot bear them now.' Among which is understood also, 'Of that day and hour.' For the Apostle too says: 'For I judged not myself to know anything among you but Jesus Christ, and him crucified.' For he was speaking to those who could not receive the higher things concerning Christ's deity; to whom also a little after he says: 'I could not speak to you as to spiritual, but as to carnal.' This therefore he did not know among them, which through him they could not know. And this alone he said he knew, which through him it behoved them to know. In short, he knew among the perfect what among the little ones he knew not; for there he says: 'We speak wisdom among the perfect.'

For it is by that manner of speech that anyone is said not to know what he conceals, in the way that a pit is called 'blind' which is hidden. For the Scriptures do not speak in any manner of speech that is not found in human usage, since they surely speak to men. According to the form of God it is said: 'Before all the hills he begot me,' that is, before all the heights of creatures; and, 'Before the morning star I begot thee,' that is, before all times and temporal things. But according to the form of a servant it is said: 'The Lord created me in the beginning of his ways.' Because according to the form of God he said, 'I am the truth,' and according to the form of a servant, 'I am the way.'

For because he himself is the firstborn from the dead, he made a way for his Church to the kingdom of God, to eternal life, of which he is the head as to the immortality even of the body; therefore he was created in the beginning of the ways of God for his works. For according to the form of God he is the Beginning who also speaks to us, in which Beginning God made heaven and earth; but according to the form of a servant he is 'a bridegroom coming forth from his chamber.' According to the form of God, 'the firstborn of every creature, and he is before all, and all things consist in him'; according to the form of a servant, 'he is the head of the body, the Church.' According to the form of God, the Lord of glory. Whence it is manifest that he himself glorifies his saints. For whom he predestined, them he also called;

and whom he called, them he also justified; and whom he justified, them he also glorified. For of him it is said that he justifies the ungodly; of him it is said that he is 'just, and justifying.' If therefore whom he justified, them he also glorified, he who justifies himself also glorifies, who is, as I said, the Lord of glory. Yet according to the form of a servant, to the disciples eagerly concerned about his glorification he answered: 'To sit at my right hand or at my left is not mine to give to you, but to those for whom it is prepared by my Father.' But what is prepared by his Father is prepared also by the Son himself, because he and the Father are one.

For we have already shown that in this Trinity, through many modes of the divine utterances, even that which belongs to all is said of individual persons, on account of the inseparable working of the one and the same substance. As also he says of the Holy Spirit: 'When I shall have gone, I will send him to you.' He did not say, 'We will send,' but as though only the Son were about to send him, and not the Father also; whereas in another place he says: 'These things I have spoken to you, abiding with you; but that Advocate, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, he shall declare to you all things.' Here again it is said as though not the Son also were about to send him, but only the Father. As therefore these sayings, so also that which he said, 'but to those for whom it is prepared by my Father';

he wished himself to be understood, together with the Father, as preparing seats of glory for whom he would. But someone says: 'There, when he was speaking of the Holy Spirit, he said that he himself would send him, so as not to deny that the Father would send him, and in another place spoke thus of the Father so as not to deny that he himself would send him; but here he openly says, It is not mine to give, and thus went on to say that these things were prepared by the Father.' But this is what we have laid down beforehand, that it was said according to the form of a servant, so that we should understand: 'It is not mine to give to you,' as if it were said, 'It is not of human power to give this,' so that through it may be understood that he gives this through that whereby he is God and equal to the Father. 'It is not mine,' he says, 'to give,' that is, 'not by human power do I give these things, but to those for whom it is prepared by my Father';

but now understand thou that, if all things which the Father hath are mine, this too is surely mine, and together with the Father I have prepared these things. For I ask also how this was said: 'If anyone hear not my words, I will not judge him.' For perhaps he said this, 'I will not judge him,' in the same way as there, 'It is not mine to give.' But what follows here? 'For I came not,' he says, 'to judge the world, but to save the world.' Then he adds and says: 'He that despiseth me and receiveth not my words hath one that judgeth him.' Here we should now understand the Father, did he not add and say: 'The word that I have spoken, that shall judge him in the last day.' What then? Shall not even the Son judge, because he said:

'I will not judge him' — neither the Father, but the word which the Son has spoken? Nay, hear yet further what follows: 'For I,' he says, 'have not spoken of myself, but the Father who sent me, he gave me commandment what I should say and what I should speak; and I know that his commandment is life everlasting. The things therefore that I speak, even as the Father said to me, so do I speak.' If therefore the Son does not judge, but the word which the Son has spoken, and the word which the Son has spoken judges for this reason, that the Son has not spoken of himself, but the Father who sent him gave him commandment what he should say and what he should speak — the Father assuredly judges, whose word is that which the Son has spoken, and that very word of the Father is the same Son himself.

For the Father's commandment is not one thing and the Father's word another; for He called it both a word and a commandment. Let us then consider whether perhaps, when He said, 'I have not spoken of myself,' He wished this to be understood: 'I was not born of myself.' For if He speaks the Father's word, He speaks His very self, since He is Himself the Father's Word. Very often He says, 'The Father has given to me,' by which He wishes it to be understood that the Father has begotten Him; so that He did not give something to one already existing and not possessing it, but His very giving that He might have was His begetting that He might be. For the Son of God is not, like a creature, before the incarnation and before the creature He assumed—the Only-begotten through whom all things were made—one thing while having another; rather He is that very thing which He has.

This is said more plainly in that passage, if anyone be fit to grasp it, where He says: 'As the Father has life in Himself, so has He given to the Son to have life in Himself.' For He did not give to one already existing and not possessing life that he should have life in himself, since by that very fact that He is life He is life. This, then, is the meaning of 'He gave to the Son to have life in Himself': He begot the Son to be immutable life, which is life eternal. Since therefore the Word of God is the Son of God, and the Son of God is true God and life eternal, as John says in his epistle, here too what else do we recognize when the Lord says: 'The word which I have spoken, that shall judge him in the last day'?

And He says that the Father's own word is a word and the Father's commandment, and that this commandment is life eternal. 'And I know,' He says, 'that His commandment is life eternal.' I therefore ask how we are to understand: 'I will not judge, but the word which I have spoken shall judge'—which from what follows plainly appears to be said as if He were saying: 'I will not judge, but the Father's word shall judge.' Now the Father's word is the Son of God Himself. Is it then to be understood thus: 'I will not judge, but I will judge'? How can this be true unless in this way:

namely, 'I will not judge by human power, because I am the Son of Man, but I will judge by the power of the Word, since I am the Son of God.' Or, if 'I will not judge, but I will judge' seem contrary and mutually opposed, what shall we say of that place where He says: 'My doctrine is not mine'? How is it His, how is it not His? For He did not say, 'This doctrine is not mine,' but 'My doctrine is not mine'; the same which He called His He called not His. How is this true unless He called it His in one respect and not His in another—His according to the form of God, not His according to the form of a servant? For when He says, 'It is not mine, but His who sent me,' He makes us have recourse to the Word Himself.

For the Father's doctrine is the Father's Word, who is the only Son. And what does this also mean: 'He who believes in me does not believe in me'? How in Him, how not in Him? How can so contradictory and self-opposed a thing be understood—'He who believes in me,' He says, 'does not believe in me but in Him who sent me'—unless you understand it thus: 'He who believes in me does not believe in that which he sees,' lest our hope be in a creature, but rather in Him who took up the creature in which He might appear to human eyes, and so might, through faith, cleanse hearts to contemplate Him as equal to the Father? And therefore, referring the intention of believers to the Father and saying:

'He does not believe in me, but in Him who sent me,' He surely did not wish to be separated from the Father, that is, from Him who sent Him, but that men should so believe in Him as in the Father, to whom He is equal. This He plainly says in another place: 'Believe in God, and believe in me'—that is, as you believe in God, so also in me, because I and the Father are one God. Therefore, just as here He seemed as it were to take away the faith of men from Himself and transfer it to the Father by saying, 'He does not believe in me but in Him who sent me,' from whom nevertheless He surely did not separate Himself; so also when He says, 'It is not mine to give, but to those for whom it is prepared by my Father,' I think it is clear in what respect each is to be understood. For such also is that saying: 'I will not judge,' though He Himself is to judge the living and the dead;

but because it is not by human power, therefore, having recourse to His deity, He raises upward the hearts of men, for whose uplifting He descended. [XIII 28] Yet unless this same one, who is the Son of God on account of the form of God in which He is, were also the Son of Man on account of the form of a servant which He took, the apostle Paul would not have said of the princes of this world: 'For if they had known, they would never have crucified the Lord of glory.' For it was out of the form of a servant that He was crucified, and yet it was the Lord of glory who was crucified. For such was that taking-up which made God man and man God. Yet what is said on account of what, and what is said according to what, the prudent and diligent and devout reader, with the Lord's help, understands.

For behold, we have said that according to that which He is God He glorifies His own, that is, precisely according to that whereby He is the Lord of glory; and yet the Lord of glory was crucified, because rightly is God also said to have been crucified—not out of the power of divinity but out of the weakness of the flesh; just as we say that according to that which He is God He judges, that is, out of divine power, not human, and yet the man Himself is to judge, just as the Lord of glory was crucified. For thus He plainly says: 'When the Son of Man shall come in His glory, and all the angels with Him, then shall be gathered before Him all nations,' and the rest that is proclaimed concerning the future judgment down to the final sentence in that passage.

And the Jews indeed, who persevering in malice are to be punished in that judgment, as it is written elsewhere: 'They shall look on Him whom they pierced.' For since both the good and the evil are to see the judge of the living and the dead, without doubt the evil will not be able to see Him except according to the form in which He is the Son of Man, yet in the brightness in which He will judge, not in the lowliness in which He was judged. But that form of God in which He is equal to the Father, the ungodly will without doubt not see. For they are not pure in heart: 'Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God.' And that vision is face to face, which is promised as the highest reward to the righteous;

and it will come to pass when He shall deliver up the kingdom to God and the Father, in which He wishes the vision of His own form also to be understood, when the whole creation is made subject to God—even that creation in which the Son of God was made the Son of Man—since according to this the Son Himself will then be subject to Him who subjected all things to Him, that God may be all in all. Otherwise, if the Son of God as judge, in the form in which He is equal to the Father, will appear also to the ungodly when He is to judge, what is it that He promises as something great to His lover, saying: 'And I will love him, and will show myself to him'? Wherefore the Son of Man is to judge, yet not by human power but by that whereby He is the Son of God;

and again, the Son of God is to judge, yet not appearing in that form in which as God He is equal to the Father, but in that in which He is the Son of Man. Therefore both may be said: 'The Son of Man will judge,' and 'The Son of Man will not judge'; because the Son of Man will judge, so that what He says may be true—'When the Son of Man shall come, then shall be gathered before Him all nations'; and the Son of Man will not judge, so that what He says may be true—'I will not judge,' and 'I seek not my own glory; there is one who seeks and judges.' For inasmuch as in the judgment not the form of God but the form of the Son of Man will appear, not even the Father Himself will judge. For according to this it is said: 'The Father judges no man, but has committed all judgment to the Son.'

Now whether this was said in that mode of speech which we mentioned above, where He says, 'Thus He gave to the Son to have life in Himself,' so as to signify that thus He begot the Son, or in that mode in which the apostle speaks, saying: 'Wherefore He raised Him up and gave Him a name which is above every name'—for this was said of the Son of Man, according to which the Son of God was raised from the dead. For He indeed in the form of God is equal to the Father, from which He emptied Himself, taking the form of a servant; in that very form of a servant He both acts and suffers and receives, which things the apostle consequently weaves together: 'He humbled Himself, becoming obedient unto death, even the death of the cross;'

'wherefore He exalted Him, and gave Him a name which is above every name, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of things in heaven and things in earth and things under the earth, and every tongue confess that the Lord Jesus is in the glory of God the Father.' Whether then it was said according to that mode of speech or according to this, 'He has given all judgment to the Son,' hence it sufficiently appears that if it were said according to that whereby it is said, 'He gave to the Son to have life in Himself,' it certainly would not be said, 'The Father judges no man.' For according to this—that the Father begot an equal Son—He judges together with Him. Therefore it was said according to this: that in the judgment not the form of God but the form of the Son of Man will appear.

Not that He who gave all judgment to the Son will not judge, since the Son says of Him, 'There is one who seeks and judges'; but it was said thus: 'The Father judges no man, but has committed all judgment to the Son,' as if it were said: 'No one will see the Father in the judgment of the living and the dead, but all will see the Son,' because He is also the Son of Man, that He may be seen even by the ungodly, since they too shall look on Him whom they pierced. And lest we seem rather to conjecture than to demonstrate openly, we bring forward a sure and manifest saying of the same Lord, by which we may show that this was the very reason He said:

'The Father judges no man, but has committed all judgment to the Son,' because the judge will appear in the form of the Son of Man—which form is not the Father's but the Son's, and not that form of the Son in which He is equal to the Father, but that in which He is less than the Father, so that in the judgment He may be visible to both the good and the evil. For a little afterward He says: 'Amen I say to you, that he who hears my word and believes Him who sent me has life eternal, and shall not come into judgment, but shall pass from death to life.' This life eternal is that vision which does not pertain to the wicked. Then follows: 'Amen, amen I say to you, that the hour comes, and now is, when the dead shall hear the voice of the Son of God, and they that hear shall live.'

And this is proper to the devout, who so hear of His incarnation as to believe that He is the Son of God—that is, so receive Him as made less than the Father for our sake in the form of a servant, that they believe He is equal to the Father in the form of God. And therefore it follows, and, commending this very thing, He says: 'For as the Father has life in Himself, so has He given to the Son also to have life in Himself.' Then He comes to the vision of His own brightness, in which He is to come to judgment, which vision will be common both to the ungodly and to the righteous. For it follows and He says: 'And He has given Him power to execute judgment also, because He is the Son of Man.' I think nothing is plainer.

For because He is the Son of God and equal to the Father, He does not receive this power of executing judgment, but has it with the Father in secret; but He receives it so that the good and the evil may see Him judging, because He is the Son of Man. For the vision of the Son of Man will be shown even to the evil; but the vision of the form of God only to the pure in heart, because they shall see God—that is, to the devout alone, to whose love He promises this very thing, that He will show Himself to them. And therefore see what follows: 'Marvel not at this,' He says.

What forbids us to marvel except that at which truly marvels everyone who does not understand why He said that the Father had given Him power to execute judgment because He is the Son of Man, when rather one might have expected Him to say, 'because He is the Son of God'? But because the unrighteous cannot see the Son of God according to that whereby in the form of God He is equal to the Father, and yet it is needful that when they are judged before Him, both the righteous and the unrighteous should see the judge of the living and the dead—'Marvel not,' He says, 'at this, for the hour is coming in which all who are in the graves shall hear His voice; and they shall come forth, they that have done good unto the resurrection of life, they that have done evil unto the resurrection of judgment.'

For this end, therefore, it was needful that He should receive that power because He is the Son of Man, so that all who rise again might see Him in the form in which He can be seen by all—but some to condemnation, others to life eternal. But what is life eternal except that vision which is not granted to the ungodly? 'That they may know Thee,' He says, 'the one true God, and Jesus Christ whom Thou hast sent.' How Jesus Christ Himself also, except as they know the one true God who will show Himself to them—not as He will also show Himself, to those who are to be punished, in the form of the Son of Man? According to that vision He is good, according to which vision God appears to the pure in heart, since: 'How good is the God of Israel to the upright in heart!'

But when the evil shall see the judge, He will not seem good to them, because they will not rejoice in Him with the heart, but then shall all the tribes of the earth mourn—all, that is, in the number of the wicked and unbelieving. For this reason also He answered that man who, calling Him good master and seeking counsel of Him for obtaining life eternal: 'Why do you ask me concerning the good? None is good but one, God'; whereas in another place the Lord Himself calls a man good: 'A good man,' He says, 'out of the good treasure of his heart brings forth good things, and an evil man out of the evil treasure of his heart brings forth evil things.'

But because that man was seeking life eternal, and life eternal is in that contemplation in which God is seen not unto punishment but unto everlasting joy, and he did not understand with whom he was speaking, since he supposed Him to be only the Son of Man: 'Why,' He says, 'do you ask me concerning the good?' That is: 'This form which you see, why do you ask concerning the good, and call me good master according to what you see? This is the form of the Son of Man; this is the form that was taken; this form will appear in the judgment not only to the righteous but also to the ungodly, and the vision of this form will not be for good to those who do evil.'

'But there is a vision of my form, in which, being therein, I did not consider it robbery to be equal to God, but that I might take this form, I emptied myself.' That one God, therefore—Father and Son and Holy Spirit—who will not appear except unto that joy which shall not be taken away from the righteous, for which future joy he sighs who says: 'One thing I have asked of the Lord, this will I seek, that I may dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of my life, that I may contemplate the delight of the Lord'—that one God, then, is Himself alone good in this respect, that no one sees Him unto grief and mourning, but only unto salvation and true gladness. 'If you understand me according to that form, I am good;

but if only according to this form, why do you ask me concerning the good, if you shall be among those who will look on Him whom they pierced, and that very vision will be evil to them because it will be penal?' That the Lord spoke from this sense—'Why do you ask me concerning the good? None is good but one, God'—is made probable by those testimonies which I have mentioned; because that vision of God, by which we shall contemplate the immutable substance of God, invisible to human eyes, which is promised to the saints alone—which the apostle Paul calls 'face to face'; and of which the apostle John says, 'We shall be like Him, for we shall see Him as He is'; and of which it is said, 'One thing I have asked of the Lord, that I may contemplate the delight of the Lord'; and of which the Lord Himself says:

'And I will love him and will show myself to him'; and for the sake of which alone we cleanse our hearts by faith, that we may be blessed as pure in heart, since they shall see God; and whatever other things are said of this vision, which are most abundantly scattered through all the Scriptures and found by whoever directs the eye of love to seeking it—this alone is our highest good, for the obtaining of which we are commanded to do whatever we rightly do. But that vision of the Son of Man which was foretold, when all nations shall be gathered before Him and to Him saying, 'Lord, when did we see Thee hungering and thirsting?' and the rest—that will neither be good for the ungodly who shall be sent into eternal fire, nor be the highest good for the righteous.

For He still calls them to the kingdom which is prepared for them from the foundation of the world. For as He will say to those: 'Go into eternal fire,' so to these: 'Come, blessed of my Father, possess the kingdom prepared for you.' And as those shall go into eternal burning, so the righteous into life eternal. But what is life eternal except that they may know Thee, He says, the one true God, and Jesus Christ whom Thou hast sent—but now in that brightness of which He says to the Father: 'which I had with Thee before the world was'? For then He shall deliver up the kingdom to God and the Father, that the good servant may enter into the joy of his Lord, and may hide those whom God possesses in the hiding-place of His countenance from the trouble of men—of those, that is, who shall then be troubled, hearing that sentence.

From that evil report the righteous man will not fear, if only he be protected in the tabernacle—that is, in the right faith of the catholic Church—from the contradiction of tongues, that is, from the slanders of heretics. But if there is another sense of the Lord's words in which He says, 'Why do you ask me concerning the good? None is good but one, God,' provided only that on that account it not be believed that the substance of the Father is of greater goodness than that of the Son—according to which He is the Word through whom all things were made—and provided it in no way shrinks from sound doctrine, let us securely use not one only but as many as can be found. For heretics are refuted the more forcibly the more outlets lie open for avoiding their snares. But those things which are still to be considered, let us now seek from another beginning.