約翰福音註釋 第 1 章 第 71/94 段

For otherwise the things that rise to comparison with one another would in no respect differ from each other.

For how could a man at all be thought and called less than a man, or having what is greater, inasmuch as they are men? Therefore, in equal measure to all things of the same species belong the natural properties;

but the things belonging to them appear different, and lie within them according to the principle of the accident that is imposed from without.

Therefore, since according to his own proposition, or utterance —

only things of the same kind will more properly admit comparison with one another — let him first confess that the Son is of the same kind as the Father, that is, consubstantial;

for thus will you understand 'of the same kind,' for he judged that a man must be compared with a man, and also a horse with a horse;

and let him then teach the cause on account of which the Son, being compared with God the Father as of the same kind with him, has some inferiority at least in some respect; but where shall we find the 'less,' when to things of the same kind one definition of the essence would be fitting? For of each essence the definition concerning it appears not perfect in some and imperfect in another, but one and equal in all.

But we say that each of the accidents — or of the things that have accrued in whatever manner — has other causes.

And again, for the sake of clarity of what has been said, I shall bring forward that same example from the beginning.

A man will differ from a man in no way at all, inasmuch as they happen to be men;

but one is pious, another ill-minded, and one is weak and maimed in body, while another is sound and vigorous, and one is malicious, another good;

but whenever someone carefully examines the causes of these, he will not lay the blame on the definition of the essence, but rather attributes the causes to bodily or psychical affections.

Therefore, since one definition of the Godhead is both conceived and exists in respect of the Father and the Son — or however one might put it so as not to depart from what is fitting —

for they are compared as being of the same kind (and I shall, on account of the necessity of the subject under consideration, make use of his own words as well) — let those wretches teach what then they suppose has arranged for the Son to be in things inferior to God the Father. Is it passion, or sloth, and all such things as are wont to befall those who have a created nature? Then who would so rave and be so unreasonably disposed as even merely to endure, or even to receive into his ear, the blasphemy? Since therefore, being of the same kind with the God who is by nature, he is clearly himself also God by nature;

for he is compared with the Father;

and nothing will hinder his being in the same manner as the One who begot him;

how is he less? But since, going through matters both most ignorantly and most irrationally in what lies before us, the enemy of the truth did not shrink from saying that the Father is greater than the Godhead of the Son —

come, let us for a little wrap up the account of the economy with flesh and, for the sake of the refutation, separate it from the notion of the matters before us, and compare the Godhead of the Son with that of the Father, at least according to their argument, having first demanded that the one who dared to say this should say this: whether he supposes that God, being God by nature, exists, or something else besides this, honored, however, with the appellation of Godhead — just as indeed there are said to be many gods and lords in heaven, and many also upon the earth.

For if he affirms that the Son has been glorified merely by the title of Godhead, and does not truly exist by nature that very thing which he both is and is said to be, we shall meet him thinking what is reasonable, crying aloud plainly: O sir, if he is not God by nature, then we are still worshipping a creature alongside the Creator — and not only we who have this earthly region,

but also the very multitude of the holy angels; namely, so that we may know the true God, and are in his true Son Jesus Christ. This is the true God and eternal life. But if, standing in awe before the whole God-inspired Scripture together, he shall call him truly God and be disposed to grant that he so exists, yet supposes that he is in this way somehow deprived, at least in some respect, of the Father —

has he not then introduced to us another God, wholly severed from the natural relation to the Father, and conceived as in some individual hypostasis, yet not indwelling in the essence of God the Father? But I think the matter is plain to all.

For if there is nothing greater or less than himself, but he is conceived as greater than something less and less than something greater, is it not then altogether necessary to confess two gods by nature and true, so that the one may be conceived greater, and the other less than him? Therefore already, according to those men, the faith of the Church is gone and overturned;

and there is no longer one God over us, but henceforth two.

Of whom, then, have we been declared temples, according to the Scriptures? Or is it plain that we are temples of the One who has settled his own Spirit within our souls? When therefore we find from the sacred writings that the Spirit is called not the Father's only but also the Son's, what shall we reckon? And what is it fitting to think? Which of the two, thrusting aside, shall we say that the other is God? If then we admit two gods, the lesser and the greater, and shall say that both take up their abode in our souls through their own spirits, we shall be caught as having already become temples of gods;

and two spirits dwell in us, a greater and a less, in proportion to the nature of those who gave them.

Who then will tolerate such vomitings? And who will not perceive the ignorant and most ridiculous argument found among those men, once he has examined the notion of the things just now stated by us? But perhaps, being compelled to confess two gods by nature, if indeed the one is greater and the other less, he will resort to that which is customary and worn out with him — I mean, to say that the Son has some individual nature of his own, if he is neither wholly separated from the created nature, nor yet wholly falls away from that of God the Father.

For those who do not plainly refuse to call him a creature and a thing made take refuge in the elegant turns of such phrases, devising as it were a more polished form of ill-speaking.

Whenever, then, we say that the Son is so disposed as neither wholly to exist as God by nature, nor yet wholly to be numbered among creatures, but to be some middle thing, so as both to be left behind from the dignity of God the Father, and to leap over the glory of the creatures —

first we shall say that no argument has permitted them to legislate and speak what they wish.

For either let them assure us from the sacred and divine writings, or, having their own argument attested from nowhere, let them be ashamed of defining things concerning the faith out of their own opinion.

But since this too has occurred to them to say out of an indiscriminate derangement of mind, I shall go to their proposition, and now I shall speak again: For if only things of the same species could properly admit comparison with one another, and the Son judged that he ought properly to be compared with God the Father, saying most plainly, 'The Father is greater than I' —

how is it not necessary that the Father too be conceived to be of such a sort as the Son might be said by you to be? And what follows from this? He overturns your whole theorem into nothing.

For so long as the Father is said by you to be greater than the Son, and the creation is less, the nature of the Only-begotten was, according to you, some middle thing.

...it troubles the heart of those so disposed. Why then, having abandoned the straight word of the truth, do you drive on into such absurdity of reasonings? Grant then, grant to the One of the same kind, according to yourselves, that he lies in equality with God the Father.

For thus there will be one God, worshipped and glorified in the holy and consubstantial Trinity, both by us ourselves already and by the holy angels.

'And now I have told you before it comes to pass, that when it does come to pass, you may believe.'

A sure pledge of the things expected to be is seen to be the prediction concerning them;

Christ therefore confirms the heart of the disciples and persuades them to think firmly that he truly ascends to the Father and God in the heavens, to reign together with him and to sit in council with him as God, and as having been begotten of him by nature as God.

For do not, he says, reckon my departure — the fleshly and visible one —

for I shall be with you as God through all things —

reckon it as equal to that of the holy prophets.

For they, inasmuch as they too came into being from earth and paid the debt due to their own nature, were both drawn together and gave place, going into the law befitting men;

but I, being God by nature, shall not lie in equal measure with those who came into being through myself, awaiting the season of the resurrection;

for I live always, being Life by nature;

and I shall send the Paraclete, and I shall bestow upon you also my peace, and I shall not prove false; but in order that, having obtained the promise and been made resplendent by the grace of the Holy Spirit, you may set your seal upon the truth of my words, coming to remembrance, as I said, after the trial, and that you may believe firmly that I am with the Father and reign together with him, I have discoursed of these things beforehand and have spoken to you.

The fulfilment of the promise, then, will guarantee the truth in the things that have been said.

For if I am not Life, he says, if I do not sit in council with God the Father, how could I myself bestow the divine and spiritual gifts? Yet I shall distribute them, just as I have promised, and I shall supply both the Spirit and peace.

Then how is it not beyond dispute that I am Life and reign together with the Father? For it is not the work of one who is not, or who has no power at all, to make resplendent with the divine gifts those who love him, but of one who both is and is able and reigns for ever.

That, then, he did not make in vain the prediction concerning the things that would be, Christ taught through these words.

For in order that they might have a more secure faith in him, coming, after the experience of the gifts, to the thought and remembrance of the things promised beforehand, he says that he made his discourse.

That, then, he did not make in vain the prediction concerning the things that would be — through these words Christ taught it.

For in order that they might hold a more secure faith in him, coming, after the trial of the gifts, into the thought and memory of the things foretold, he says that he made the discourse.

'I will no longer speak much with you;'

'for the ruler of this world is coming, and in Me he has nothing; but that the world may know that I love the Father, even as the Father has given Me commandment, so I do.'

Since the unholy Jews would soon be at hand, together with the cohort they were bringing and its commander, who had also promised to betray Him, and since they would presently seize Him and were about to carry Him off, before long, into the sufferings that pertain to the cross and precede the cross, He declared that He would now bring to a close His discourse to them.

For He says that the time had been shortened and reduced almost to nothing.

'For since the murderous rage of the Jews has grown greatly bold against Me, and is now seen already within the very doors, the time is at hand no longer for words spoken to you, but for the very act of suffering.'

'Nevertheless,' He says, 'the ruler of this world is come, and in Me he has nothing.'

'But I shall die, and that most gladly, and shall undergo death for the life of all, having of My own will entered even upon that which is against My natural inclination, out of reverence toward My Begetter and love toward Him, that I might fulfill His will.'

The aim of the passage before us, then, may be made abundantly clear in these words.

But unfolding what is contained in it more minutely, we say this: Adam, the first father of our race, sank under the death that came from the divine curse, through his loosing of the commandment that had been given, being accused both by himself and by the devil.

And he clearly appears to have suffered this for just causes.

For punishment follows not unjustly upon those who have sinned through slothfulness, and it is fitting that they be chastised.

For 'He did no sin, neither was guile found in His mouth'; yet He underwent the suffering on our behalf, being for His own part wholly free from blame, and offering Himself by His suffering as a ransom for the life of all.

For He loves the Father, who thirsted for the salvation of the world.

And it altogether belonged to Him who loves the Father, that whatever seemed good to the Father and was reckoned among necessary things, He should by no means count as of no account, but should hasten to bring it to its accomplishment.

And what was this? He willed that His own Son—although He possessed Him as of one form with Himself and pre-eminent in equality in every respect—should descend to so great a lowliness as even to become man for our sake, and not to blush at death for the life of all.

This the Son did, loving His Begetter, who is said to have given the commandment, that by His own power He might, through the suffering of the flesh, put death to death, and abolish the dominion of corruption, and make alive those who had been corrupted, and once more renew for them their ancient glory.

For this reason He says that the time for words is now narrow.

'For the suffering is already pressing on, and the audacity plotted against Me by the Jews has been kindled.'

'For I shall suffer of My own will, since it was for this that I have come.'

'Nevertheless the ruler of this world comes, and in Me he has nothing';

that is, 'I shall not be convicted of having committed any transgression, nor will there be for the Jews any reasonable pretext for their drunken violence against Me.'

The devil has nothing of his own in Me.

For evil things are, as it were, his own, and the origin of sin knows him for its beginning.

That the word of the Saviour is true, one may see most especially even from the sequence itself of the matter.

For how did He sin who knew no sin, who is by nature and in truth God, who is wholly incapable of any change toward that which is not right? And not least shall we see this also through the very things recorded by the holy evangelists.

For the most wise John has brought in Pilate saying, 'I find no fault in Him'; and again, after the placing of the crown of thorns, proclaiming and saying, 'Behold, I bring Him forth to you, that you may know that I find no fault in Him.' And Matthew says that Pilate came to such abhorrence of the wickedness that he even washed his hands before the Jews and said, 'I am innocent of the blood of this righteous man.' And presenting Him to us as brought before the very chief priests, he thus speaks: 'And the chief priests and the whole council sought false witness against Christ, that they might put Him to death, and found none, though many false witnesses came forward.' For even though His case was pursued through men, yet the devil used them as instruments and servants of the perversity that was in him, and it was he, rather than any other, who sought to find some offense in Him.

It is therefore true that the devil had nothing of his own in Him—Him whom He also named for the present 'the ruler of this world,' not as being in truth a lord, but as one of the accursed barbarians, who by the law of covetousness has seized upon what in no way belongs to him.

For through sin he made man subject to himself, and having driven him away from God like some unshepherded flock, he held sway over what was not his own.

Therefore he has been justly cast out from the dominion thus procured.

For Christ has come to reign over us; wherefore He says, 'Now shall the ruler of this world be cast out; and I, if I be lifted up from the earth, will draw all men unto Myself. Arise, let us go hence.'

The common and well-worn interpretation of the passage before us, held by most, gives us to understand this: that since the time had now driven in for the madness of the Jews, and all but showed the precious cross of the Saviour already fixed in place, He was hastening, together with the holy disciples, to hurry off to those places in which the band of servants, coming upon Him, seized Him.

Yet it is likely that He wished to hint at something else as well, namely something spiritual and hidden.

Wishing to signify what was to come to pass for us all, He cries out, 'Arise, let us go hence';

so that we might come to understand some such thing as truly meant: that from death to life, and from corruption to incorruption, through Him and with Him—as I said just now—we pass over, as it were, from one place into another.

Rightly then, indeed, does He say, 'Arise, let us go hence.'

Or you may take what is said in yet another way, as applying to ourselves.

We were now about to be removed from loving to set our minds on the things that are in the world, to choosing to be willing to do what seems good to God; and further still, to ascend from bondage to the dignity of adoption, from earth to the city above, from sin to righteousness—that is, the righteousness through faith in Christ—from human uncleanness to the sanctification that is through the Spirit, from dishonor to glory, from ignorance to understanding, and from cowardice and unmanliness to a good courage in that which is good.

Setting 'here,' then, as it were, in the place of our transgressions upon earth, He says, 'Arise, let us go hence';

for even though, so far as the form of the expression goes, He appears to bind Himself together with us, yet this will in no way whatever wrong us, since it is His custom to do so.

And indeed, in other places too He will be found saying to His own disciples, 'We must work the works of Him that sent us, while it is day;

the night comes, when no man can work.' Do you hear how He weaves Himself together with us as one who must work, although in respect of the obligation to work He does not fall under the same case as we? But this form of expression is habitual with us, and we shall find it no less among ourselves.

And indeed the divinely-inspired Paul, when rebuking the Corinthians, ventured this, writing thus: 'These things, brethren, I have in a figure transferred to myself and Apollos, that in us you might learn not to think beyond what is written.' And that, even though He was not co-liable with their weaknesses, yet as leader of the way to all good things and of the turning from the old passions to that which is better—not an ambassador, not an angel, but the very Lord of all Himself—we have had Him, this is in no way doubtful.

For we have been redeemed, not through ourselves, nor yet through any other of created beings, but rather through Christ our Saviour Himself.

Therefore, when He says, as though with us and among us, having run through the worthlessness that is in the world, 'Arise, let us go hence,' He will say this not as co-liable, or as held fast by human passions, but as the author and protector and guide of the entrance into incorruption and into the life that is in sanctification and love of God.

That the Son is of one substance with God the Father, and is not of a different nature nor alien, as certain of the perverse hold.

'I am the true vine, and My Father is the husbandman.'

Wishing to show that it befits love to depend upon love for Him, and how much profit we shall gain from cleaving to Him—showing the benefit—He says that He Himself is the vine, as in the manner of an illustration, and that the branches are those who have been united to Him and, in a manner, fitted and rooted into Him, and have already become partakers of His own nature through their sharing in the Holy Spirit;

for the Holy Spirit that has united us to Christ the Saviour is His own.

For the cleaving to the vine on the part of those who come to it is by their own choice, whereas its relation toward us is a natural connection proceeding from itself.

For it is out of good choice that we have drawn near through faith, but we have become His kindred, receiving from Him the dignity of adoption.

For indeed, according to the holy Paul, 'He that is joined to the Lord is one spirit.' Just as, therefore, in other places He has been named a base and foundation through the voice of the prophet;

for upon Him we are built up, we too having become as stones, living and spiritual, unto a holy priesthood, unto a habitation of God in the Spirit; and in no other manner are we able to be built up unto this, unless Christ has become our foundation;

as a mother and nurse of the branches.

For we have been born anew out of Him and in Him, in the Spirit, unto the bearing of the fruit of life—not the ancient and old life, but that which is in the newness of faith and of the love toward Him.

And we are preserved so as to retain our being, being grafted as it were into Him and holding fast with all our might to the holy commandment that has been delivered to us, and through hastening to preserve the good that comes from our noble birth—that is, through not enduring to grieve in any way at all the Holy Spirit that has taken up its dwelling in us, through whom God is understood to dwell in us.

For in what manner we are in Christ and He in us, the wise John himself will show us, saying: 'Hereby we know that we are in Him and He in us, by the Spirit which He has given us'; and again, 'Hereby we know that we are in Him:

he that says he abides in Him ought himself also so to walk, even as He walked.' And making this yet clearer to His hearers, he again speaks thus: 'He that keeps His commandments abides in Him, and He in him.' For if the keeping of the commandments works love toward Him, and we cleave to Him through love, how is not what has been said shown to be true in these things? For just as the stock of the vine ministers and distributes to the branches the enjoyment of its own quality that is natural and inherent in it, so the Only-begotten Word of God implants in the saints, as it were, the kinship both of the nature of God the Father and of His own, giving them the Spirit, inasmuch as they have been united to Him both through faith and through holiness in every respect;

and He nourishes them unto godliness, and works in them the knowledge of every virtue and of good works.

And He says the Father is the husbandman—for what cause, then, is this also? For neither is the Father idle or inactive toward us, the Son nourishing and holding us together unto well-being in the Holy Spirit; rather, the setting-right of our condition is the work of the whole holy and consubstantial Trinity, and through the entire divine nature there proceeds the will and power that is over all things done by it.

For this reason He is glorified by us both wholly and in one person.

For we call God our Saviour, not rendering the thanksgiving for the mercies we have received partly to the Father, partly to the Son Himself, or to the Holy Spirit, but truly declaring our salvation to be the achievement of the one Godhead.

And even if something of what has been done for us, or of what is wrought concerning creation, seems to be apportioned to each person, yet we no less believe that all things are from the Father through the Son in the Spirit.

You will understand, then, and that quite rightly, that the Father nourishes us unto godliness through the Son in the Spirit;

and again He tills us—that is, He watches over and visits us and deems us worthy of the care that sets us right—through the Son in the Spirit.

For we shall reason thus more rightly than in any other way, at least according to our understanding;

for if we shall grant to each person severally to work some part of what concerns us, which we say belongs perhaps to neither of the others, how is it not beyond dispute that—since the Son has now been named the vine, and the Father the husbandman—we are nourished in a special way, and are held together unto well-being, by the Son alone;

while from the Father we have merely the visitation? For to the vine belongs the nourishing of its own branches, but to the tiller belongs the visiting.

But if we think rightly, we shall assuredly hold in every way that neither could the one accomplish the whole apart from the Father, nor yet the other apart from the Son or the Holy Spirit;

for all things are from the Father through the Son in the Spirit, as we have said.

And it was very much by way of dispensation that the Saviour has now also named the Father husbandman; and what was the occasion of this, it is in no way difficult to state.

For lest anyone suppose that the care for us belongs to the Only-begotten alone, He has, as it were, brought in the Father and God as a fellow-worker, calling Himself the vine which supplies to its own branches life and the power to bear fruit, and calling the one who begot Him the vinedresser.

For we needed, indeed we needed, to learn that God—conceived in the holy and consubstantial Trinity—has not only made us partakers of His own nature,

but also exercises over our affairs a most exact and careful oversight—an oversight here taken up under the figure of husbandry, both fittingly and exceedingly well.

For since the vine and the branches from it have already been named, how is the mention of the vinedresser not most fitting in these things, bringing in the overseer and caretaker of all, that is, God? And if we have believed that the Son is naturally and truly in His own Father, and has in His own nature the one who begot Him, and that all things are accomplished through both in the Spirit as from one Godhead, then neither will the Father lie outside the nourishing of us, nor would the Son be reckoned a stranger to the husbandry concerning us—and rightly so.

For where identity of nature is seen in terms that admit no variation, there the operation is undivided, even should it perhaps be conceived by someone as being worked in various and different ways.

And since there is one essence—that is, the true and natural Godhead conceived in three hypostases, I mean in the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit—how is it not exceedingly clear and beyond all doubt that whatever operation may be said to be of any one is the accomplishment of the whole and single Godhead, at least according to the principle of natural power? And indeed our Lord Jesus Christ, admitting the Father as fellow-worker in all things, once addressed the impious Jews, saying: 'Many good works have I shown you from My Father; for which of them do you stone Me?' And again, concerning the working on the Sabbath: 'My Father,' He says, 'works until now, and I work.' And I do not think anyone would suppose Him to be saying that the Father works some part of the things concerning creation by turns, and the Son again another part.

But since the Father does all things through the Son, and would never work anything otherwise—for the Son is His wisdom and His power—

for this reason He again named the Father the worker of His own works, saying: 'Of Myself I do nothing, but the Father who abides in Me, He does the works.' I think, then, that it befits us to understand it in no other way than this: that Christ stands in the rank of the vine, while we hang after the manner of branches, being fattened as it were by grace and drinking in the power through the Spirit unto spiritual fruit-bearing.

But since again, when we have chosen to walk uprightly, the bitter argument of the adversaries claps against us and tries to persuade what it is not lawful to conceive, we will set clearly before our hearers, gathering it into brief words, the things which one of them has composed in long lines. For he says: 'Well indeed has the Only-begotten refuted and shown to be ridiculous those who suppose Him to be consubstantial with God and the Father.'

'For behold, He plainly names Himself a vine, and the Father a vinedresser.'

'As, therefore,' he says, 'the vine and the vinedresser are not the same in essence—

for the one is wood, and the other is a man,

and these are altogether of different kind and of another race—

so the Son is not consubstantial with the Father, but stands far apart, and an essential principle separates them, seeing that the one is a vinedresser and the other a vine.'

For it is not doubtful that some will attempt, without good reason, to carry over such things to the account of the economy in the flesh.

For he says that it is not His own flesh that is the vine, but rather the Godhead.