Dictating the twentieth book on the Gospel according to John, most God-loving and most studious Ambrose, in the Lord. We pray that from the fullness of the Son of God, in whom the fullness was pleased to dwell, we may receive thoughts that are full and, so to speak, solid and containing nothing empty, so that the Gospel may be revealed to us according to what we examine; and that we may neither omit anything of what needs to be examined and set forth in commentary form, nor add more than is proper, nor misapprehend the mind of our Savior Jesus. May God, then, send to us the Word himself, manifesting himself, so that, the Father granting it, we may become beholders of his depth. 'I know that you are Abraham's seed; but you seek to kill me, because my word finds no room in you.'
For those who do not understand what is signified by the term 'seed' and the term 'children,' it will seem to contain a conflict between 'I know that you are Abraham's seed' and what is immediately going to be brought forward and said to the same people: 'If you are children of Abraham, do the works of Abraham.'
So that these things may be examined, let us first look at the bodily difference between 'seed' and 'child.' And this much is clear: that a seed possesses within itself the principles of the one who sowed it, still at rest and stored up; whereas the child comes into being when the seed has changed and worked upon the matter surrounding it, drawn from the woman and from the nourishment gathered to it, having been shaped and made ready for birth. And whatever, strictly speaking, is properly the child of someone, so far as bodily matters are concerned, has come to be from seed; but whatever is seed does not by any means become a child.
Now that these distinctions have been made beforehand by us, if 'I know that you are Abraham's seed' had to be understood bodily, it would have seemed altogether to follow that those to whom the statement is addressed were also children of Abraham—granting that a child is still 'seed,' a usage not given with precision.
But since the children of Abraham are judged by character and works, perhaps we must characterize those who are 'seed of Abraham' on the basis of certain seminal principles that have been cast down together, as I suppose, into certain souls. And if, just as not all human beings are, bodily, seed of Abraham, so too, according to what is set forth about who are 'seed of Abraham,' it is clear that not all human beings have come to dwell in the life of men with all the same seminal principles sown together into their souls.
But the cause of this, discerned according to great and hard-to-explain judgments, contemplated by those who have received the mind of Christ, so that they may see what has been granted to them by God, it is possible for only a few to grasp—those who have examined with greater care the matters before birth and in birth concerning each person; and since such things might trouble someone who has understood them but not with precision, we shall be exposing ourselves to danger by speaking concerning such matters, where speaking and unfolding such things is perilous, even if it is spoken truthfully.
And it is perilous also because it is necessary for the steward of the mysteries of God to seek the right occasion for the introduction of such doctrines, so as not to harm the hearer, and to observe carefully the measure of what is deficient or excessive—even if the occasion is observed—a fault occurring contrary to right reason—and to examine more carefully whether those to whom such things are handed down are fellow-servants, or slaves of someone other than the Lord of those who rule.
That the steward of the mysteries of God must examine all these things is established by the text that says: 'Who then is the faithful and prudent steward, whom the lord will set over his household, to give the ration of grain in due season to his fellow servants?' Not all human beings, then, are seed of Abraham; for they do not have the principles sown into their souls that are capable, if cultivated, of making them children of Abraham.
And one might raise the question in reply to these things, saying that he who has become seed of Abraham can indeed be blameworthy, if he does not also become his child; but how could someone reasonably be blamed for not doing the works of Abraham, who does not even have, to begin with, the being seed of Abraham, from which comes the becoming children to Abraham?
We shall reply to these things, using history as a kind of stepping-stone and seeking in the writings the traces of the truth pertaining to the topic, that if someone who was not a child of Abraham were the seed of no righteous person, then a certain one of the sinners would in fact be blameless, having no occasion whatsoever from seeds of the good; but as things stand, just as in the case of bodies one person is the seed of more righteous ancestors, another of fewer—as will be clear from the comparison of what will be said—so also, in the case of the elevated sense, it will be possible to speak analogously.
Abraham was born the twentieth from the first-formed man; for there are ten generations from Adam to Noah, and ten from Noah to Abraham. And Abraham had as brothers Nahor and Haran; for the three were sons of Terah. Now Nahor and Haran were not seed of Abraham; but neither was Abraham himself seed of Abraham.
The three were seed of righteous men—since it is still in question with regard to Adam's descendants among whom he was—namely, seed of Seth, whom God raised up in place of Abel; and of Enosh, who hoped to call upon the name of the Lord God; and of Enoch, who pleased God, after he had begotten Methuselah, for two hundred years; and of Noah, of whom it is said that he was righteous, perfect in his generation—Noah pleased God; and of Shem, of whom the Lord God appears for the first time in Genesis to be designated 'God,' which is clear from 'Blessed be the Lord God of Shem.'
As for the other unrighteous men besides these, these three were seed of Terah rather. Now what we have said concerning the seed of Abraham must be understood concerning the seed of Shem and Noah and the more remote righteous men, whose properties Abraham and Nahor and Haran seem, in a seminal way, to have jointly received when they came into being; but Abraham cultivated the seminal principles he had in himself from all the righteous men before him, and added to these a holy quality of his own, according to his own particular seed, of which those called after him 'seed of Abraham' were able to partake; while Haran made the least care for himself and for the paternal seeds within himself, whence he was only able to bring forth Lot, breathing forth some small amount of salvation; and Nahor turned out inferior to both of the brothers.
It is possible, then, for one who is not seed of Abraham—since all those subsequent to Noah have altogether come to be from Noah, according to the history of the flood—to be seed of Noah; and if this, then also seed of Enoch, and altogether also seed of Enosh and Seth; but it is unclear to us, among the many descended below Noah, who is seed of Shem, and who of Ham, and who of Japheth, and of those below them; nevertheless, there is no one who has no share whatsoever in the seed of the righteous.
But I raise the point that perhaps it is possible for one who is not seed of Abraham, through the same starting-points that Abraham had from the earlier seeds, to become such that, although he is not from Abraham, he becomes assimilated to Abraham.
For just as Abraham, not being from the seed of Abraham but of those aforementioned, became Abraham, so it is possible for someone, by cultivating the better of the seeds sown within him, to become another Abraham—not by any means from the seed of Abraham, but himself also capable of sowing as Abraham did.
Let us hear all of this by referring what is said not to bodies and human beings, but to certain intelligible realities and rational principles, more or fewer, in which those who descend into birth, or enter it, and perhaps in some way also those who ascend, differently partake.
You will observe whether, with reference to such seeds, already named individually for those who take them to themselves, it is possible to apply the text, 'Going, they went and wept, bearing their seeds'; for if anyone is able, let him understand a journey, with weeping, of certain souls coming into birth, bearing the seeds of either more righteous ancestors or fewer, and likewise of unrighteous ones.
And let him consider, observing them as it were like farmers anxious about the seeds they have, wondering how they might cultivate these better ones—I mean the superior seeds—and not sow those others, lest they come into life with worse seeds.
And there is indeed a good hope in those who go and weep, bearing the seeds; for these, as they come for the most part, will arrive in exultation, carrying their sheaves.
Yet perhaps others have come, of whom one might say: 'Going, they went, bearing their seeds'—but for them this shall follow instead: 'Coming, they shall come in weeping, bearing their own,' like grass that withered before it could be plucked up, of which the reaper did not fill his hand, nor the gatherer of sheaves his bosom.
And those passing by did not say, 'The blessing of the Lord be upon you.' And see whether, in accordance with this, it can also be said in a more mystical sense by our Savior: 'Blessed are those who weep now, for they shall laugh.'
And 'Woe to those who laugh now, for you shall mourn and weep.' Yet the more one is seed of more recent righteous men, the more he bears the greater number of principles of righteousness—so that it is for this reason written, 'O seed of Abraham, his servants, sons of Jacob, his chosen ones,' and it is for this reason, in some way, also that what is said concerning John holds true: 'Among those born of women there is none greater than John the Baptist.'
Now, having come to these topics, take heed whether it does not make sense that certain of the seeds are made to disappear by God, lest there be more evils upon the earth, if those lacking the starting-points from better ancestors for cultivating what comes from superior seeds should be sown; for it is for this reason that the flood occurs, so that the seed of Cain might be utterly destroyed, since those descended from him would not have been able to have anything to cultivate, except only what came from Adam.
That the flood came about for the sake of the seed of Cain being made to disappear is established by the book inscribed 'Wisdom of Solomon,' through these words: 'But the unrighteous man, having departed from her (namely, from wisdom) in his wrath, perished together with his fratricidal passions, on whose account, when the earth was being flooded, wisdom saved it again, piloting the righteous man by means of a paltry piece of wood.'
The same thing seems to me to be established also by the disappearance of the people of Sodom and of their land, of whose wickedness a smoking wasteland still stands as a testimony, along with plants bearing fruit at unfinished seasons.
And it was indeed the work of a good God to make the land of Sodom disappear, and to dry up from it whatever moisture remained, so that there might no longer be a vine of Sodom, nor a shoot of Gomorrah, nor a grape of gall, nor a cluster of bitterness, nor wine that is the incurable fury of dragons and the fury of asps.
You will say the same thing also concerning the Egyptians, of whom it is said: 'He killed their vine with hail, and their sycamores with frost'; for it belongs to a good God to kill the vines of the Egyptians and the sycamores of the impious.
These things have been said by us as preliminary to the examination of the discourse concerning the seeds of Abraham or of some one of the righteous, for the sake of making clear how and in what manner it was said by the Savior to the same people, 'I know that you are Abraham's seed,' and 'If you are children of Abraham, do the works of Abraham.'
But concerning the children of Abraham who do the works of Abraham, God granting it, we shall speak at a more opportune time, when we come to the examination of that particular text.
It is possible, then, for one who happens to be seed of Abraham to also become, through diligence, his child; but it is also possible, through negligence and lack of cultivation, to lose even the being his seed. These people, then, to whom the discourse is addressed, were still within the realm of hopes, since Jesus knew that they were still seed of Abraham, and observed that they had not yet lost the capacity to become children of Abraham; for as though it were possible for them to become children of Abraham, in addition to being his seed, he says to them: 'If you are children of Abraham, do the works of Abraham.'
But just as there are some who are seed of Abraham, so there are others who are, as Daniel says, 'seed of Canaan and not of Judah,' and others still who are, as Wisdom says, 'seed accursed from the beginning.'
And to these things we shall also say that, just as in bodily matters, from many seeds it sometimes happens that one of the seeds proves able to be more effective, so it is possible to see the same also in the case of spiritual seeds.
What I mean will be clear from what will be said; for since the one who sows has within himself both ancestral and kindred principles, at times his own principle prevails, and what is born comes forth resembling the one who sowed; but at other times the principle of the sower's brother prevails, or of the sower's father, or of the sower's uncle, and sometimes even of the sower's grandfather; on account of which those born come to resemble this one or that one.
And it is also possible to see the principle of the wife prevail, or of the wife's father, or of her brother, or of her grandfather, according to the ferments occurring in the mixture, all the principles being shaken together at once, until one of the seminal principles prevails.
Let all this, then, be transferred to the soul that is filled with intelligible seeds, which have come from certain of its named fathers; and, owing to the manifold mobility or ready mobility of the ruling faculty and its attentiveness to this or that mental impression, let there emerge, as it were, certain seminal principles of the fathers; and as these are cultivated, someone will become a child—this one of Abraham (clearly being also, at the same time, of Noah), another of Noah (though not so as to be also of Abraham), and another of Canaan, and another of some one of the righteous or of the unrighteous.
Nevertheless, we have not all come with like and the same seeds, but neither has anyone come devoid of saving and holy seeds; unless, indeed, someone should abash us into thinking otherwise, adducing at the same time, in this connection, the help from God that does not despair even of the most wicked, who have entered into life without the best seeds—abashing us with the text: 'God is able, from these stones, to raise up children for Abraham.'
All that has been said concerning the seed of Abraham, and those who stand in an analogous relation to it, we might reasonably accept, provided that we have accepted that it was not said in a bodily sense: 'I was not sent except to the lost sheep of the house of Israel,' and 'Not even in Israel have I found such great faith,' and whatever else has been said in a similar manner to these.
These people, then, to whom the discourse is addressed, seem not to have room for the Word, the Word not being able, on account of the surpassing greatness peculiar to it, to make room for itself within them, which is above them, since they were still only seed of Abraham.
But if, in addition to being seed of Abraham, they had cultivated it, and the seed of Abraham had grown to greatness and increase, then, in the greatness and increase of the seed of Abraham, the word of Jesus would have found room.
And up to this point you will say that the word does not find room in those who have not progressed from being seed of Abraham, nor come to become his children.
And it is always possible to observe that those who have no room for the Word, because they are lesser vessels, wish to kill the unity of the Word's greatness, thinking that they would be able, after his destruction and his being crushed, to make room for his members.
Those in whom the word comes to be in such a way that they will, as it were, kill it, will utter the [verse]: "All my bones were scattered" — if, then, any one of us is seed of Abraham, and the word of God still has no room in him, let him not seek to kill the word, but, changing from being seed of Abraham into becoming a child of Abraham, he will be able to make room for the word of God which up to now he did not make room for. "What I have seen with the Father I speak; you, then, do what you have heard from the Father."
Just as we might say that certain men from the beginning became eyewitnesses of the word — concerning whom Luke says: "Even as those who from the beginning were eyewitnesses and became servants of the word delivered them to us" — so we shall say that the Savior is an eyewitness of the things that are with the Father, and that it is on this account that it is said, "No one has known the Father except the Son," since those to whom the Son reveals him are no longer non-eyewitnesses.
That the Savior is an eyewitness of the things that pertain to the Father is clearly shown by the passage before us, in the words "What I have seen with the Father I speak." One might ask whether there will ever be a time when the angels themselves will see the things that are with the Father, no longer beholding them through a mediator and servant. Now, when one has seen the Son as the Father who sent him, one sees the Father in the Son; but when someone sees the Father as the Son sees him, and shall see the things that are with the Father, that person, in a manner similar to the Son, will be an eyewitness of the Father and of the things of the Father, no longer conceiving what pertains to him of whom it is the image by means of the image.
The Savior, then, speaks having seen the things that are with the Father, but the Jews who had believed in him have not seen the things that are with the Father, but have heard from the Father, in order that they might do what they heard; hence the Lord says to them: "You then, do what you have heard from the Father."
One might ask when the Jews who had believed the Lord heard from the Father. To this, someone, understanding the words "What you have heard from the Father, do" in a simpler sense, will say that they heard from the Father in that the Father had spoken through Moses and the prophets the things that must be done as written in the Law and the Prophets — and whoever uses this saying against those of heterodox opinion clearly establishes that the Father of Christ is none other than the God who gave the Law and the Prophets.
But another, also making use of the saying "Everyone who has heard from the Father and learned comes to me — not that anyone has seen the Father except he who is from with the Father"...
"This one has seen the Father" — he will say that there are certain souls, among those becoming embodied, who before coming into birth had been made disciples with the Father and had heard him, and these come to the Savior; from among these were also the Jews now under examination who had believed in him, to whom he was saying: "You then, do what you have heard from the Father"; and he will say that these are the ones also called the seed of Abraham.
But to this someone might object, saying that "Everyone who has heard from the Father and learned comes to me" certainly implies that whoever hears from the Father and has learned from him altogether comes to the Savior; whereas "You then, do what you have heard from the Father," spoken to the Jews who were seeking to kill the Son of God — to whom, as not yet being children of Abraham, it is said, "If you are children of Abraham, do the works of Abraham" — shows that these do not yet have the fruits of having come to the Savior. To one who objects in this way, someone will reply, asserting that "Everyone who has heard from the Father and learned" is not the same as "You then, do what you have heard from the Father": for the one who, besides hearing from the Father, has learned, altogether comes to the Savior; but those who have heard, yet not altogether learned as well, are not yet children of Abraham.
We would inquire of those who introduce [fixed] natures, and who, in interpreting "Because my word has no room in you," explain, following Heracleon, that it has no room because the hearers are unfit either by essence or by disposition — how could those who are unfit by essence have heard from the Father?
But moreover, were these ever sheep of Christ, or were they strangers to him? If they were strangers, how did they hear from the Father, given that it is clearly said, as they suppose, to strangers: "For this reason you do not hear, because you are not of my sheep"?
Unless, then, being hard-pressed, they wrap themselves in another absurdity, saying that the strangers had heard from the Father, but that these same ones did not hear from the Savior. But if they belonged to the Savior and to the blessed nature, how were they seeking to kill him? And how did the Savior's word have no room in them? "They answered and said to him: Our father is Abraham."
These people would seem to have made their answer, taking the question of who was their father in a much more lowly sense than that in which the Lord spoke.
For Jesus, referring to God, was saying "You then, do what you have heard from the Father"; but they, more lowly, acknowledge the father of their nation as their own father, saying: "Our father is Abraham."
But one who wished to defend them, as having answered well, might say that, being modest and not granting themselves the claim of being sons of God, when Jesus said, "What you have heard from the Father, do," referring to God, they said: "Our father is Abraham."
But it is clear that the Savior corrects even this, as having been falsely said, by means of the words: "If you are children of Abraham, do the works of Abraham."
Not unreasonably, one might also raise a question about this: How is it consistent, on the Savior's part — since he does not agree that they are children of Abraham — for him to say to them, "You then, do what you have heard from the Father," when "from the Father" is referred to God?
For he who is not a child of Abraham … [text lost in the manuscript] … then, of those after Abraham, if being blameworthy, as these to whom the discourse is addressed — much more will he not be a child of God.
But observe whether, in reply to this too, we can say that it is not said "you then, do what you have heard from your father," nor "from our father," but "from the Father" — a father who is not necessarily the father of those who are not children of Abraham, nor of those who have not been shaped from the seed of Abraham into the children of Abraham; or, that "What you have heard from the Father" is said indefinitely and can be taken as equivalent to "from the Father" [in the sense of source] — and this is clear from "What I have seen with the Father I speak," which has the same force as "with my Father."
And in what follows we are also taught of whom God is the Father, through the words in which the Savior also says: "If God were your father, you would love me."
But it is clear that those who were seeking to kill the Son did not love him; and not loving him, they could not properly be called sons of God. Hence it is plain that "You then, do what you have heard from the Father" does not carry the same force as "from the Father" [understood as their own father]. "Jesus says to them: If you are children of Abraham, do the works of Abraham."
X. Those who select one particular item among the works of Abraham — namely, "And Abraham believed God, and it was reckoned to him for righteousness" — and suppose that this is what "Do the works of Abraham" refers to, so that it might also be granted to them that faith is a work, [a claim] which would not be granted by those who accept "Faith without works is dead," nor by those who hear that being justified by faith differs from being justified by works of the Law — let them explain why it is not said, "If you are children of Abraham, do the work of Abraham," in the singular, but in the plural: "Do the works of Abraham," which, as I think, amounts to "Do all the works of Abraham."
But if "Do all the works of Abraham" is equivalent to this, and it is necessary that one who has a wife should not, in bodily terms, approach another, nor, after the death of the woman he had married, take another wife in old age — if such a one wishes, according to the Savior's instruction, to be shown to be a child of Abraham by doing the works of Abraham — then clearly we also learn from this that everyone must, allegorizing the whole narrative concerning Abraham, do spiritually each of the things done by him, beginning from "Go out from your land and from your kindred and from your father's house, into the land which I will show you" — a saying spoken not to Abraham alone, but also to every one who is to become his child.
For each of us also has a certain land, and a kindred that was not good before the divine oracle came, and a house of our father before the word of God reached us — because of all these things it will be necessary for us, according to the word of God, to go forth, if indeed we hear the Savior saying: "If you are children of Abraham, do the works of Abraham." For thus we shall arrive, as those who have left our own land, at the land which God will show us — the land that is truly good and indeed vast — which it is fitting should be given by the Lord God to those who have done what was commanded in "Go out from your land."
And, having left a kindred that was not good, we shall become a nation great and greater than is normal for human beings; and, having despised a father's house not worthy of praise, we shall be blessed, our name being magnified, becoming blessed to such a degree that those who bless us are blessed by God, while those who curse us shall be under a curse, and every tribe of the earth shall be blessed in us (at which time the account might also be said of us: "He journeyed" — concerning Abraham: "And Abraham journeyed, just as the Lord had spoken to him"; and I think that at the beginning, and to a certain extent, Lot will follow us, of whom the symbol was "And Lot went with him") — and, having returned to the land of Canaan, we shall pass through the land as far as the place of Shechem, thus advancing by the ascent of the mind until we come to the lofty oak.
It belongs to the one who has understood "Do the works of Abraham" also to build an altar to the Lord who appeared to us at the place of the lofty oak, and after this to depart from the place of the lofty oak, as it were toward the mountain — the mountain to the east of Bethel, which is interpreted "House" — where he will pitch his own tent, with Bethel toward the sea and Ai toward the east; and Ai is interpreted "Festivals."
And as such a one continues to advance, he will afterward build an altar to the Lord, being now also able to call upon the name of the Lord. And next, departing from there too, he who is to become a child of Abraham, having become in some way more skilled in strategy and understanding against how many enemies he must prepare himself, will encamp in the
wilderness. After this he will experience a trial of famine that is upon the land, and will go down into Egypt to sojourn there, lest the famine that has grown strong upon the land should also overpower him. And he will go down into Egypt with his fair-faced wife, making certain agreements with her, so that it may go well with him on her account, and there may come to be for him in Egypt sheep and calves and donkeys and menservants and maidservants and mules and camels.
Concerning each of these things, it would be the task of some wise man, one capable of skillfully reaching the depths of Scripture, to speak — one who, in short, examines the whole narrative concerning Abraham and all the things written about him, which are allegorized; these we shall attempt to explain as spiritual persons.