At that time, the Jews sent from Jerusalem priests and Levites to John, that they might ask him: 'Who art thou?' And he confessed, and did not deny; and he confessed: 'I am not the Christ.' And they asked him: 'What then? Art thou Elias?' And he said: 'I am not.' 'Art thou the prophet?' And he answered: 'No.' They said therefore to him: 'Who art thou, that we may give an answer to them that sent us? What sayest thou of thyself?' He said: 'I am the voice of one crying in the wilderness: Make straight the way of the Lord, as said the prophet Isaias.' And they that were sent were of the Pharisees. And they asked him and said to him: 'Why then dost thou baptize, if thou be not Christ, nor Elias, nor the prophet?' John answered them, saying: 'I baptize in water;
but there hath stood one in the midst of you, whom you know not. The same is He that shall come after me, who is preferred before me, the latchet of whose shoe I am not worthy to loose.' These things were done in Bethany beyond the Jordan, where John was baptizing. From the words of this reading, dearest brethren, the humility of John is commended, who, though he was of such great virtue that he might have been believed to be Christ, chose to subsist firmly in himself, lest by human opinion he should be caught up emptily above himself. For he confessed, and denied not, and confessed: 'I am not the Christ.' But because he said 'I am not,' he plainly denied that which he was not.
but he did not deny that which he was, so that, speaking the truth, he might become a member of Him whose name he did not falsely usurp for himself. Since therefore he was unwilling to lay claim to the name of Christ, he became a member of Christ, because while he strove humbly to acknowledge his own infirmity, he merited truly to obtain His loftiness. But when, from another reading, a saying of our Redeemer is recalled to mind, from the words of this reading a very intricate question is generated for us. For in another place the Lord, being asked by the disciples about the coming of Elias, answered: 'Elias is already come, and they knew him not, but did unto him whatsoever they had a mind. And if you will know, John himself is Elias' (Matt. 17:12). But John, being asked, says: 'I am not Elias.'
What is this, dearest brethren, that what the Truth affirms, the prophet of Truth denies? For 'He is' and 'I am not' are very much at variance with one another. How then is he a prophet of Truth, if he is not in accord with the words of that same Truth? But if the truth itself be subtly examined, that which sounded contradictory between them is found to be in no way contradictory. For to Zacharias the angel says concerning John: 'He shall go before Him in the spirit and power of Elias' (Luke 1:17). He is therefore said to be about to come in the spirit and power of Elias, because, just as Elias will forerun the second coming of the Lord, so John foreran the first. Just as the former is to come as the forerunner of the Judge, so the latter was made the forerunner of the Redeemer.
John, therefore, was Elijah in spirit, but he was not Elijah in person. What the Lord affirms concerning the spirit, John denies concerning the person; for it was fitting that the Lord should utter to His disciples a spiritual judgment about John, while John himself should answer the carnal crowds not concerning his spirit but concerning his body. What John declared therefore seems contrary to the truth, yet he did not depart from the path of truth. When he also denies that he is a prophet — since he could not only proclaim the Redeemer but also point Him out — he at once expresses who he is, for he adds: 'I am the voice of one crying in the wilderness.'
You know, dearly beloved brethren, that the only-begotten Son is called the Word of the Father, as John testifies, saying: 'In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God' (John 1:1). And from your very own manner of speaking you recognize that the voice sounds first, so that the word may afterward be heard. John, therefore, asserts that he is the voice, because the Word precedes. Running before the Lord's coming, he is called the voice, because through his ministry the Word of the Father is heard by men. He also cries in the wilderness, because he announces to forsaken and abandoned Judea the consolation of the Redeemer. What he cries out he makes plain when he adds: 'Make straight the way of the Lord, as Isaiah the prophet said' (Isaiah 40:3).
The Lord's way is made straight unto the heart when the word of truth is humbly heard. The Lord's way is made straight unto the heart when life is prepared according to the precept. Whence it is written: 'If anyone loves me, he will keep my word, and my Father will love him, and we will come to him and make our dwelling with him' (John 14:23). Whoever, therefore, lifts up his mind in pride, whoever pants with the burning heats of avarice, whoever defiles himself with the pollutions of lust, closes the door of his heart against the truth; and lest the Lord come to him, he bars the gates of his soul with the bolts of vice. But still those who were sent inquire: 'Why then do you baptize, if you are not the Christ, nor Elijah, nor the prophet?'
That this was said not out of zeal to know the truth but out of malice to exercise rivalry, the Evangelist quietly made known when he adds, saying: 'And those who had been sent were of the Pharisees.' As if he plainly said: They question John about his deeds who know not how to seek doctrine but only to envy. Yet every holy man, even when he is questioned with a perverse mind, is not turned away from his zeal for goodness. Whence John too answered the words of envy with the teachings of life. For he at once adds: 'I baptize in water; but there has stood one in the midst of you whom you do not know.' John baptizes not with the Spirit but with water, because, being unable to loose sins, he washes the bodies of the baptized with water, yet does not wash the mind by pardon.
Why then does he baptize who does not loose sins by baptism, except that, preserving the order of his precursorship — he who by being born had gone before the One to be born — he might also, by baptizing, go before the Lord who was to baptize; and he who by preaching was made the forerunner of Christ, might by baptizing also become His forerunner in the imitation of the sacrament? Announcing the mystery amid these things, he asserts that this One has both stood in the midst of men and yet is not known, because the Lord, appearing through the flesh, stood visible to him in body and invisible in majesty. Concerning whom he further says: 'He who comes after me was made before me.' For thus it is said, 'made before me,' as if it were said, 'set before me.' He comes therefore after me, because born afterward; but he was made before me, because preferred to me.
But saying this a little above, he also disclosed the reasons for His preferment when he added: 'because he was before me.' As if he plainly said: He surpasses me even though born after me, for the times of His nativity do not confine Him. For He who is born in time through a mother is begotten of the Father without time. And to Him how great a reverence of humility he owes he manifests by subjoining: 'whose sandal-strap I am not worthy to loose' (Mark 1:7). It was a custom among the ancients that if a man refused to take as wife her who by right fell to him, he who came as bridegroom to her by right of kinship would loose that man's sandal. What, then, did Christ appear among men to be, but the bridegroom of holy Church? Of whom the same John also says:
'He who has the bride is the bridegroom' (John 3:29). But because men supposed John to be the Christ — which the same John denies — he rightly declares himself unworthy to loose the strap of His sandal. As if he plainly said: I cannot bare the footprints of our Redeemer, because I do not wrongly usurp for myself the name of bridegroom. Yet this can also be understood in another way. For who does not know that sandals are made from dead animals? But the incarnate Lord, coming, appeared as it were shod, because in His divinity He assumed the dead flesh of our corruption. Whence also through the Prophet He says: 'Into Idumea will I stretch out my sandal' (Psalm 60:10).
For by Idumea the Gentile world is signified, and by the sandal the assumed mortality. Into Idumea, therefore, the Lord asserts that He stretches out His sandal, because, when He became known to the Gentiles through the flesh, His divinity came to us as it were shod. But the human eye does not suffice to penetrate the mystery of this incarnation. For it can in no way be searched out how the Word is made flesh, how the supreme and life-giving Spirit is quickened within a mother's womb, how He who has no beginning both exists and is conceived. The strap of the sandal, therefore, is the knot of the mystery.
And so John is not able to loose the strap of His sandal, because he himself does not suffice to search out the mystery of His incarnation, though he recognized it through the spirit of prophecy. What then does it mean to say: 'I am not worthy to loose the strap of His sandal,' except plainly and humbly to profess even his own ignorance? As if he openly said: What wonder is it if He is preferred to me, whom indeed I regard as born after me, yet the mystery of whose nativity I do not comprehend? Behold John, filled with the spirit of prophecy, shines with wondrous knowledge, and yet declares of himself that which he does not know.
In this matter we must ponder, dearly beloved brethren, and consider with our whole intent, how holy men, in order to guard within themselves the virtue of humility, when they know certain things marvelously, strive to recall before the eyes of their mind that which they do not know, so that while on one side they consider their own weakness, on that side where they are perfect their soul may not exalt itself. For knowledge is a virtue, and humility is likewise the guardian of virtue. It remains, therefore, that the mind humble itself in everything it knows, lest the wind of pride carry off what the virtue of knowledge gathers. When you are good, brethren, always recall to memory the evils you have done, so that while the fault is warily beheld, the mind may never incautiously rejoice over a good work.
Regard others as above you, especially those who are not committed to your charge, as your neighbors; because even those whom you see doing certain wrong things — you do not know what good may lie hidden in them. Let each one, therefore, strive to be great, yet in some way let him not know himself to be so, lest, while he arrogantly attributes greatness to himself, he lose it. For hence it is said through the prophet: 'Woe to you who are wise in your own eyes, and prudent in your own sight' (Isaiah 5:21). Hence Paul says: 'Be not wise in your own conceits' (Romans 12:16). Hence against the proud Saul it is said: 'When you were little in your own eyes, were you not made the head among the tribes of Israel?' (1 Samuel 15:17). As if it were plainly said:
When you regarded yourself as little, I made you great above the rest. But because you regard yourself as great, by me you are esteemed as small. On the contrary, when David despised the power of his own kingdom while dancing before the ark of the Lord's covenant, he said: 'I will play, and I will become more vile than I have been, and I will be humble in my own eyes' (2 Samuel 6:22). For whom would it not exalt to break the jaws of lions, to tear apart the arms of bears, to be chosen while his elder brothers were passed over, to be anointed to the helm of the kingdom while the king was reprobated, to lay low with a single stone Goliath who was feared by all, to carry back to the king, the foreigners being slain, the numerous foreskins that had been set as the price, to receive the kingdom by promise, and the whole people of Israel —
to possess the whole people thereafter without any contradiction? And yet in all things he despises himself, who confesses that he is humble in his own eyes. If, then, holy men, even when they do valiant deeds, think mean things of themselves, what shall they say in their own excuse who swell up without any work of virtue? But even if any good works are present, they are nothing unless they are seasoned with humility. For a wonderful deed, when joined with pride, does not lift up but weighs down. He who gathers virtues without humility carries dust into the wind; and whence he seems to bear something, thence he is the more grievously blinded. In all things, therefore, that you do, my brethren, hold fast humility as the root of good work;
and look not to those whom you are already above, but to those below whom you still are, so that while you set before yourselves the examples of your betters, you may through humility be able ever to ascend to greater things.