約翰福音註釋 第 1 章 第 20/94 段

By these words he signifies the time of the resurrection of all, when—as the inspired Paul wrote to us—'the Lord himself, with a command, with the voice of an archangel, and with the trumpet of God, shall descend from heaven' to judge the world in righteousness, and to render to each according to his works;

...he will be revealed as the Judge of the [inhabited world].

And usefully setting over against the resurrection of the dead the healing of the one who was sick, he shows the energy that looses death and destroys the corruption of all to be greater and more worthy of account; and fittingly and necessarily, as though the paradox lay in the lesser matter, he says: 'Do not marvel at this.'

And by no means at all shall we suppose that by these words he is disparaging the splendour of his own works, or commanding the hearers not to count worthy of wonder the things at which they might reasonably marvel; rather, he wills those who are struck with amazement at that miracle to know and to believe that for him to be marvelled at merely up to this point is a small thing.

For he raises up, by a word and by God-befitting energy, not merely those languishing from small infirmities, but even those already immersed in death itself and overcome by unmixed corruption;

and for this reason he says, bringing in the greater thing: 'That an hour is coming in which all who are in the tombs shall hear his voice.'

For he who by a word once brought the things that were not into being, how should he not be able to persuade that which has already been made to run back again into coming-to-be? For thus both would be of the same energy, and the admirable result in both cases would be of one and the same authority.

And he usefully adds that they shall come forth from the tombs—some, having been caught in shameful things and having lived their life in wickedness, to undergo unending punishment; but others, distinguished in virtues, to receive back as the reward of their fair conduct eternal life;

at once, as we have already said, bringing in himself through these words also as the Distributor of the things befitting each, and at the same time persuading them either, by the fear of suffering dreadful things, to shun what is base and to be somehow driven together into now willing to live more soberly, or, being pricked in a certain way with longing for eternal life, to be diligent in making their eagerness for good things more intense.

That the Son is in nothing inferior to God the Father, but is equal in might according to the energy that is over all things, as God from God.

'I can of myself do nothing;

as I hear, I judge, and my judgment is just, because I seek not my own will, but the will of the Father who sent me.'

Attend once again more carefully to the things said, and receive the force of the contemplation as in deep reflection.

The Jews, not knowing the deep mystery of the economy with flesh, nor yet recognizing the God the Word who dwelt in the temple that was from the Virgin, were often kindled—by a zeal that was misguided, and not one according to knowledge, as Paul says—into savage manners and untamed fits of wrath;

and indeed they even attempted to stone him, because, being a man, he made himself God, and again, because he called God his own Father, making himself equal to God. But since they were thus dull of understanding, not enduring God-befitting words at all, but both thinking and saying petty things concerning him, the Saviour by way of economy plays the child along with them; yet nonetheless he made his exposition of a blended kind, neither wholly declining the words befitting God, nor yet lapsing entirely into human utterances;

and having said something worthy of the divine authority, he straightway chastens the untutored temper of the hearers by adding something human also; and again, having said something human on account of the economy, he does not permit the things concerning himself to be seen in small matters alone, but shows himself to be God by nature through his more-than-human strength, or often through his words also.

Some such art as this you will find even now in the passages just now set before us;

for what did he say just before? 'For as the Father raises the dead and gives them life, so also the Son gives life to whom he wills'; then again, 'That an hour is coming in which all who are in the tombs shall hear his voice'; and besides these, that 'they shall also come forth to be judged, and shall receive their recompense in proportion to whatever they may have been as workers.'

But he who says that he is able to give life to whomever he wills, and that in the same manner as the Father—

was he not with justice bound to throw into confusion those who still supposed him to be a mere man? For it was in all likelihood that they, being Hebrews and reared upon the sacred writings, were not altogether ignorant that God will be the Judge of the world, since among them too it was often sung: 'Arise, O God, judge the earth'; and again, 'For God is Judge.' Since, then, he knew that the foolish peoples of the Jews were vexed at these things, he removes them from their wonted wrath by saying, in a more human fashion: 'I can of myself do nothing; as I hear, I judge.'

Now, so far as it is possible to take the words at their surface and speak, he mocks the understanding of the Jews;

for the form of the saying fashions a supposition of a certain weakness and of an authority not altogether free; yet it is not so in truth, since the Son, being in all things equal to the Father, has by nature the same energy and authority over all things.

But he says that he can do nothing of himself, and that he judges thus, just as he might hear;

in yet another manner showing himself to be of like mind and of equal might with God the Father.

For neither would the Father be conceived as active in regard to any of the things that are, alone and by himself apart from the Son, since he has the Son as his very strength and power.

Wherefore indeed all things came to be through him, and without him not even one thing came to be. Nor again, on the other hand, will the Son accomplish anything by himself, without the Father being present with him.

For it is precisely on this account that he also says, 'Of myself I do nothing.'

'But the Father who abides in me, he himself does the works.' And surely we shall not be so disposed as to suppose that the Son is empowered by the Father as though out of weakness, and that in turn authority over all things is bestowed upon him.

For otherwise he would no longer be God by nature, possessing the beauty of Godhead as something imported from outside.

But neither would the Father himself any longer abide in the unmixed pre-eminence of good things, if he who has the Word as the very character of his own nature were in need of power and authority derived from another.

For by analogy with the image and the archetype, the bestower of the things spoken of will be sought after; and thus henceforth the argument will slip away from us into an endless inquiry, and will run off into a deep sea of blasphemies.

But since the Son, subsisting out of the Father's substance, bears in himself by nature all the properties of the one who begot him, and essentially ascends to one Godhead with him by reason of the invariability of nature, he is indeed himself in the Father, and again he has the Father in himself.

For this reason, then, he often and blamelessly and truly ascribes to the Father the power of his own works, not placing himself outside the ability to act, but assigning all things to the operation of the one Godhead.

And the Godhead is one, in the Father and in the Son and in the Holy Spirit.

That the Son is not less than the Father, either in power or in operation with respect to any things, but is like him in all respects and of equal strength, has been demonstrated by us also through other passages, when the text before us was, 'The Son can do nothing of himself, except what he sees the Father doing; for whatever things that one does, these the Son likewise does.' And since I reckon it both just and fitting that the most desirable zeal in divine doctrines should show itself superior to all sloth,

come then, once more, doing something similar to sailors at sea, let us like a rope draw up again the whole discourse of the chapter from the beginning.

For it is thus possible to see that the Son, by the very act of saying that he can do nothing of himself, is not making an accusation against his own nature, but rather is convicting the folly of the Jews, and is plainly demonstrating that they had trampled upon the law given through Moses.

For the fact that immediately upon 'I can do nothing of myself' there is introduced 'as I hear, I judge,' frees the Son from all reproach concerning his supposed inability to do anything out of his own power.

Rather it clearly shows him to be one who loves the Father and who wills together with the one who begot him in all things.

By judging in the very way that he would also hear, he would henceforth be plainly shown as one who has set 'cannot' not on account of any weakness in operation with respect to certain things, but on account of its being impossible for him to transgress in any respect at all the will of the Father.

For since one Godhead is conceived in the Father and the Son, there will assuredly also be one and the same will; and the divine nature will never be conceived as standing in faction against itself, neither in the Father, nor indeed in the Son, nor even in the Holy Spirit; but whatever might perhaps seem good to the Father, this is the will of all the Godhead.

Necessarily, therefore, the Son presents himself as one who, so to speak, consents together with and assents together with the Father toward whatever decision might seem good, explaining that he cannot do anything which is not altogether according to the mind of the Father.

For this is what 'of myself' signifies to us.

Just as, if one were to say that he cannot commit sin, it would not seem right to anyone that he should incur a charge of weakness, but rather that he is explaining some admirable and God-befitting property of his own nature;

for he gives us to understand that he is unchangeable and unalterable.

So too, when he confesses that he cannot do anything of himself, we shall rather be astonished at seeing immutability as the fruit of an immutable nature, than inopportunely reckon the 'cannot' as significative of weakness.

But let these things again be said by us in proportion to our own measures.

Let the one who loves learning search out the better things.

We shall not, however, hesitate to interpret the saying in yet another way, lowering the discourse a little below the bounds of the Godhead and the pre-eminence of the Only-begotten.

And since the Son truly became and was designated man, we shall, transferring the force of these considerations to the dispensation in the flesh, show that the things which follow are also akin to and connected with what has already been set forth.

Accordingly, he plainly testified that all who are in the tombs shall also hear his voice, and that they shall come forth to be judged.

And since he has once entered upon the discourse concerning his judging the world, he asserts that not only at that time, at which he says the resurrection of the dead shall be, will he be a righteous judge, but that even now he judges rightly and justly the affairs of this present life.

But what was the matter in question, or concerning what was the discourse at all — hear now what follows.

He was begotten for our sakes of a woman.

For as Paul says, 'He does not take hold of angels, but of the seed of Abraham;'

whence he was obliged in all things to be made like his brethren. And since he became man and was in the form of the servant, the Lawgiver, as God and Lord, also became under the law.

Therefore he speaks at one time as under the law, and at another time again as above the law, and in both cases has authority that is beyond reproach.

But he is now conversing with Jews, as a guardian of the law and as a man, as one who does not know how to transgress the commandments ordained from above, nor who out of his own private judgment endures to do anything which does not seem good together with the divine law.

For this reason he says, 'I can do nothing of myself; as I hear, I judge.'

And by testifying of himself that he cannot do anything of himself which is not altogether also willed by the law, and that he thus judges and passes sentence upon matters just as he would hear — the law, that is, plainly declaring it — he convicts the disobediences of the Jews, and lays bare the unbridledness of their ways.

For indeed this too is what the well-placed saying 'I can do nothing of myself' obliquely intimates, as though to say: 'You, heedlessly transgressing the commandments given to you, have taken courage to do all things of yourselves as though henceforth free from danger, and you are eager to render your judgments on each of these matters not in conformity with the things ordained by God.'

'For you teach as doctrines the commandments of men, and you have made your own will into a law.'

What, then, is the manner of the arrangement in this passage, or how he introduces himself as judging justly, but them as by no means doing so, shall again be told.

He had healed the paralytic on the Sabbath; he had shown mercy to a man who had worn away long years in sickness, plainly bringing forth upon his case a right and good judgment.

In no way did he, out of reverence for the Sabbath, practise a most vain scrupulousness that would withhold mercy.

And just as on the Sabbath the Father too is active in regard to the governance of created things — and altogether through the Son — so also is he himself.

For he did not judge that the one in need of mercy on the Sabbath ought to be deprived of it because of the Sabbath, since he knew the Son of Man to be Lord of the Sabbath.

For neither did man come into being for the Sabbath, but the Sabbath for man.

Therefore the judgment of the Saviour in these matters was right and good, since he did not, on account of the Sabbath, prevent the loving-kindness shown toward the one lying sick, but rather did what he knows how to do as God.

For the divine nature is a fountain of goodness.

This he did even on the Sabbath.

But the judgment of the Jews, who were grieved at him because of the Sabbath, and on this account thirsted for the blood of the one who had done no wrong — how is it not exceedingly discordant with the divine laws?

For what does the law will? 'You shall not respect a person in judgment, for the judgment is God's.' 'Why then,' he says, 'are you angry with me because I made a whole man well on the Sabbath, while you do not condemn Moses, who ordained that even on the Sabbath the infants must be circumcised? Do not judge according to appearance, but judge the righteous judgment.'

'If a man receives circumcision on the Sabbath, so that the law of Moses may not be broken, are you so inconsiderately vexed at beholding a whole man healed on the Sabbath?'

'Therefore I indeed have judged justly, but you no longer do so, for you do all things of yourselves.'

'But I can do nothing of myself; as I hear, I judge; and my judgment is just, because I do not seek my own will, as you do, but the will of the Father who sent me.'

But what is the manner of the sending, and the meaning of his having been sent, we have already spoken of before through many words, and so we shall pass over saying anything further concerning these matters.

Only this must be usefully observed, that he says the law to be the will of God and the Father.

'If I bear witness concerning myself, my witness is not true;

there is another who bears witness concerning me, and I know that the witness which he bears concerning me is true.'

And such a statement would, quite reasonably, be disbelieved.

For we are so constituted that, drawn as by certain natural and necessary tugs of self-love, we are eagerly summoned to ascribe to ourselves nothing base, but always to array around ourselves — and not at all speaking truly — those things by which one might think himself to be seen as orderly and good.

Since, then, our Lord Jesus Christ ascribed to himself the judging of just things, having said outright that he can do nothing of himself, but that he makes the will of the Father, as it were, a rule in all things that must be done — and saying this, he has entered as a witness on his own behalf, even though he was truthful — necessarily, taking thought also for the sophistry of the Pharisees, for what they were about to say in their ignorance,

for they did not somehow know him to be God by nature.

Not departing from the folly befitting Jews, they say: 'You bear witness concerning yourself;

your witness is not true.' 'But to this, again, you shall hear in reply,' he says: 'I bear with those who still speak evil; I am by no means greatly vexed at the words which they belch forth out of the ignorance most dear to you.'

'I grant, for the sake of argument, that this too has been well said by you;

so be it: you reject my voice — there is another who bears witness concerning me.'

And by this he signifies the God and Father who is in the heavens, who in many ways already has borne witness to the genuineness of the substance of his own offspring, whose witness he says also to know that it is true, thereby showing his own verdict too to be most worthy of credence indeed and true.

For lest, by accepting as it were that he speaks falsely concerning himself about himself, he should afford some ground of ill intent and an inroad against himself to those accustomed to hold heterodox opinions, he necessarily yields to what is fitting and to custom the point that the one who praises and approves himself ought by no means to be believed as truthful; and then he ascends again, as God, to the dignity owed to himself, and says that he knows the witness of the Father to be true — all but teaching this: that 'being true God, I know myself, and the Father will say nothing merely to gratify concerning me;'

'for I am by nature such, just as he too, being himself truthful, would decree.'

Accordingly, in that former case there was, as it were, a certain condescending assent, and the statement was hypothetical rather than true;

but in saying that he knows the witness of the Father to be true, there is a demonstration of the trustworthiness befitting God.

And it must again be noted that, according to his own hypostasis, the Father is other than the Son, and is not, as it seemed to some of the untaught heretics, introduced as a Son-Father.

You have sent unto John, and he has borne witness to the truth.

Just as we affirmed a moment ago that it is shameful, and not without a share of the utmost foolishness, for a man to be seen marveling at his own advantages—even if, through great virtue, he would refuse to speak falsely—so too a kindred and neighboring absurdity to that one is this: that certain men, though not summoned to give testimony in a matter, should go of their own accord and present themselves as deserters to the judges, that is, to those who wish to conduct the examination.

For such a man might well seem—and not beside the mark—not altogether earnest to speak the truth, but rather, by his exceeding eagerness to testify, to be declaring not what the very nature of the matter contains, but only what seems good to himself.

Most skillfully, therefore, does our Lord Jesus Christ—or rather, as God—overturn beforehand the charge the Pharisees might bring on these matters, saying: You have sent unto John.

It was not unbidden, He says, that the Baptist came to give his verdict concerning Me; he shall stand outside the writ that governs such a case; he made his testimony freely given.

You, asking, sent unto John, and he has borne witness to the truth.

For when he was asked by those who had been sent to him, whether he himself were the Christ, He confessed, and denied not.

He confessed: I am not the Christ, but I am sent before Him. Therefore he has borne witness to the truth; for the truth is Christ.

But I receive not the witness from man; yet these things I say that ye might be saved.

He does not dismiss the voice of John as useless, nor does He declare the witness of the truth to be idle;

for otherwise He would justly have seemed to be doing something amiss against Himself, if He sent forth against reason—as one who ought to be believed—the very man He Himself had sent to cry aloud, Prepare the way of the Lord, make straight the paths of our God. But rather, contending against the immeasurable deafness of the Jews, He advances to greater and weightier matters, saying that He does not of necessity receive the witness concerning Himself from the voice of a man, but rather makes His demonstration more brilliant, drawing it from the authority befitting Him who is by nature God, and from His preeminence in divine signs.

For a man's voice one might at times reject as not speaking truth, even if perchance he were one numbered among the saints;

Speak, crying aloud, and declare unto us another deception. And besides these, there were also certain who had fled from Jerusalem, that is, from the land of the Jews, into the country of the Egyptians;

and Azarias the son of Hosaiah, and Johanan the son of Kareah, and all the proud men, as it is written, openly disobeying the prophecies of Jeremiah, said: Thou speakest falsely; the Lord hath not sent thee unto us to say, Enter not into Egypt. But the demonstration through wonders—what contradiction could it admit? And to be attested by the very excellences of God the Father—what manner of contentiousness will this yet leave to those who love to lay charges through their perversity? And indeed Nicodemus—

and this man was one of the teachers among them, and ranked among those who had been allotted the office of ruling—

made his testimony from the wonders irrefutable, saying: Rabbi, we know that Thou art come a teacher from God;

for no man can do these signs that Thou doest, except God be with him. Since, then, the malice of the Jews does not go so far as that even the holy Baptist himself should be disbelieved when he brings forward, so far as words go, his testimony, again as though in character He says: The blessed Baptist has indeed borne witness to the truth, even though asked by you; but since nothing is beyond your attempting, and you have made it a habit to rush recklessly into every reviling, you have likely thrust aside his voice as well.

But since this too seems right to you—so be it, I am perhaps persuaded, I concede along with you, and for your sakes I will withdraw from the voice of John as well, and together with you I will strike out his testimony;

I have the Father who bears witness from above.

And teaching again that His word is pregnant with a hypothetical concession, He usefully added: These things I say that ye might be saved—as though to say: I addressed such words to you, not because the truth is so, but hypothetically, that you might by every means be saved.

And thus far our second book shall come to a stand.

An exact inquiry: why the blessed Baptist is called by Christ not merely a lamp, but one burning and shining—the text set forth being: He was the lamp that burned.

That the Son is the image of God the Father, wherein also lies a refutation against the Jews, as not understanding the things spoken through Moses rather enigmatically—the text set forth being: Ye have neither heard His voice at any time, and what follows.

That Moses signified the coming of the Saviour, saying: A prophet shall the Lord your God raise up unto you like unto me.

That often the departures of Christ from Jerusalem signify that grace was to be transferred to the nations; and at the same time also the discourse concerning the five barley loaves and the two fishes—the text set forth being: And after these things Jesus departed to the other side of the sea of Tiberias.

That the Only-begotten is the impress of the hypostasis of God the Father, and there is no other impress besides Him, whether it exists or is conceived—the text set forth being: Which the Son of man shall give unto you, and what follows.

Concerning the manna, that it was a type of the coming of Christ and of the spiritual gifts of grace through Him—the text set forth being: Jesus therefore said unto them, Verily, verily, I say unto you, Moses gave you not the bread from heaven.

An exact inquiry: why the blessed Baptist is called by Christ not merely a lamp, but one burning and shining.

Now that we have but just and hardly laid down the pen upon the second book, and have swum across the broad and deep sea of divine contemplations, and thought thus to make land, as though our voyage had reached its harbor, and had all but fastened our vessel to the mainland, we behold the beginning of another sea, namely the course that lies before us in what follows. That we ought to accomplish this too with all diligence, the very aim of the matter constrains us; and no less does that saying of a certain one persuade us: For glorious is the fruit of good labors. Come then, ascending once more to a bold resolve, let us entrust the steering of our affairs to the good and man-loving God;

for spreading wide, like a sail, the breadth of our understanding, and taking into our bosom the grace of the Spirit as a favorable breeze from the stern, let us run out into a deep inquiry.

For Christ it is who gives a way in the sea and a path in the waters. Now then, our second book came to its close at the words: But I receive not the witness from man; yet these things I say that ye might be saved. Let us begin the third, joining on in order the things that follow, wherein Christ speaks concerning the holy Baptist:

He was the lamp that burned and shone, and ye were willing for a season to rejoice in his light.

He likens the holy Baptist to a lamp, inasmuch as, according to the measure that naturally belongs to man, he shone forth before His coming, yet not using a light of his own;

for in a lamp the light is not its own, but comes from without, brought in and added;

and thus you may see also in the saints the illumination that comes from Christ in the Spirit;

wherefore also, thinking and acting most gratefully and prudently, they themselves confess by their own voice: Of His fullness have we all received. For the Only-begotten is by nature light, inasmuch as He also shone forth from light—I mean, from the essence of the Father;

but the creation partakes of Him, and everything that brings with it the power of reasoning and understanding is, as it were, a vessel fashioned most excellently by God, the most excellent Craftsman of all, so as to be capable of being filled with the divine light.

A lamp, therefore, is the blessed Baptist, according to the account already given before.

And in saying this the Saviour, by way of dispensation, calls the senseless Pharisees to remembrance of the voice of God the Father, who says somewhere concerning him: I have prepared a lamp for my Christ. And very usefully and necessarily Christ adds now such things to what has already been said.

For since, shutting off from the Jews every occasion of disbelief, and driving them from every side toward the need of believing in Him, He seemed somehow to concede to their not receiving the witness that came from him, when He said: But I receive not the witness from man—lest they should suppose that the Lord was really and truly so disposed toward the forerunner as the form of the discourse implies, He usefully, for the present purpose, brings him forward proclaimed not by saying anything Himself concerning him, but through the voice of the Father;

for He thought it needful, chiefly out of reverence toward God the Father, to put to shame the one who resisted, that is, to show him now as more openly warring against God, inasmuch as he was setting himself against the very words of God the Father without restraint.

He was, then, He says, that lamp, and ye were willing for a season to rejoice in his light.

For it was needful to show the Pharisees not only as easily departing from what is fitting, and as thrust out from the willingness to believe through the great unholiness of their ways, but also to convict them as fickle, and as in no wise accustomed to persevere in the longing for good things, but scarcely tasting of them, and having praised only in words, and only so far as words go, those who might seem to be venerable, then quickly, without shame, passing over to the contrary disposition;

for this, I think, is what is signified by their being willing for a season to rejoice in his light.