they are not different in nature, but the selfsame is both Father and Son. What means the self-same? God is one. Thou hast heard, " Because I am not alone, but I and the Father that sent me: '* hear how thou mayest believe Father and Son; hear the Son Himself, " I and the Father are one." ' He said not, I am the Father; or, I and the Father is one person; but when He says, " I and the Father are one," hear both, both the one, imiim, and the are, sumus, and thou shalt be delivered both from Charybdis and from Scylla. In these two words, in that He said one. He delivers thee from Arius; in that He said are. He delivers thee from Sabellius. If one, therefore not diverse; if are, therefore both Father and Son. For He would not say are of one person; but, on the other hand, He would not say one of diverse. Hence the reason why He says, " my judgment is true," is, that thou mayest hear it briefly, because I am the Son of God. But I would have thee in such wise believe that I am the Son of God, that thou mayest understand that the Father is with me: I am not Son in such ' John X. 30.
manner as to have left Him; I am not in such manner here that I should not be with Him; nor is He in such manner there as not to be with me: I have taken to me the form of a servant, yet have I not lost the form of God; therefore He saith, " I am not alone, but I and the Father that sent me."
10. Tie had spoken of judgment; He means to speak of testimony. " In your law,'' saith He, "it is written that the testimony of two men is true. I am one that bear witness of myself, and the Father that sent me beareth witness ofme. " He expounded the law to them also, if they were not unthankful. For it is a great question, my brethren, and to me it certainly appears to have been ordained in a mystery, where God said, " In the mouth of two or three witnesses every word shall stand." ^ Is truth sought by two witnesses? Clearly it is; so is the custom of mankind: but yet it may be that even two witnesses lie. The chaste Susanna was pressed by two false witnesses: were they not therefore false because they were two? Do we speak of two or of three? A whole people lied against Christ. 3 If, then, a people, consisting of a great multitude of men, was found a false witness, how is it to be understood that "in the mouth of two or three witnesses every word shall stand," unless it be that in this manner the Trinity is mysteriously set forth to us, in which is perpetual stability of truth? Dost thou wish to have a good cause? Have two or three witnesses, — the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost. In short, when Susanna, the chaste woman and faithful wife, was pressed by two false witnesses, the Trinity supported her in her conscience and in secret: that Trinity raised up from secrecy one witness, Daniel, and convicted the two,'* Therefore, because it is written in your law that the witness of two men is true, receive our witness, lest ye feel our judgment. " For I," saith He, " judge not any man; but I bear witness of myself: '' I defer judgrrient, I defer not the witness.
11. Let us, brethren, choose for ourselves God as our judge, God as our witness, against the tongues of men, against the weak suspicions of mankind. For He who is the judge disdains not to be witness, nor is He advanced in honor when He becomes judge; since He who is witness will also Himself be judge. In what way is He witness? Because He asks not another to learn from Him who thou art. In what way is He judge? Because He has the power of killing and making alive, of condemning and acquitting, of casting down ^ Deut. xix. 15; Matt, xviii. 16. 3 Luke xxiii. i.
4 Dan. xiii. 36-62 (apocryphal addition).
Tractate XXXVII.]
into hell and of raising up into heaven, of joining to the devil and of crowning with the angels. Since, therefore, He has this power, He is judge. Now, because He requires not another witness that He may know thee; and that He who will hereafter judge thee is now seeing thee, there is no means whereby thou canst deceive Him when He begins to judge. For there is no furnishing thyself with false witnesses who can circumvent that judge when He shall begin to judge thee. This is what God says to thee: When thou despisedst, I did see it; and when thou believedst not, I did not frustrate my sentence. I delayed it, not removed it. Thou would st not hear what I enjoined, thou shalt feel what I foretold. But if thou hearest what I enjoined, thou shalt not feel the evils which I have foretold, but thou shalt enjoy the good things which I have promised.
12. Let it not by any means surprise any one that He says, " Aly judgment is true; because I am not alone, but I and the Father that sent me; " whilst He has said in another place, "The Father judgeth not any man, but all judgment hath He given to the Son." We have already discoursed on these same words of the evangelist, and we remind you now that this was not said because the Father will not be with the Son when He comes to judge, but because the Son alone will be apparent to the good and the bad in the judgment, in that form in which He suffered, and rose again, and ascended into heaven. For at that moment, indeed, as they were beholding Him ascending, the angelic voice sounded in the ears of His disciples, " So shall He come in like manner as ye have seen Him going into heaven; " ' that is, in the form of man in which He was judged, will He judge, in order that also that prophetic utterance may be fulfilled, ■' They shall look upon Him whom they pierced." = But when the righteous go into eternal life, we shall see Him as He is; that will not be the judgment of the living and the dead, but only the reward of the living.
13. Likewise, let it not surprise you that He says, " Li your law it is written that the testimony of two men is true," that any man should hence suppose that this was not also the law of God, because it is not said, /// the law of God: let him know that, when it is said thus, In your law, it is just as if He said, " In the law which was given to you;" given by whom, except by God? Just as we say, " Our daily bread; '' and yet we say, " Give us this day."
I Acts i. II.
- Zech. xii. lo; John xix. 37.
TRACTATE XXXVII.
Chapter VHI. 19. 2c.
I. What in the holy Gospel is spoken briefly ought not briefly to be expounded, so that what is read may be understood. The words of the Lord are few, but great; to be valued not by number, but by weight: not to be despised because they are few, but to be sought i:)ecause they are great. You who were present yesterday have heard, as we discoursed according to our ability from that whicu the Lord said, " Ye judge after the flesii; I judge not any man. But yet if I judge, my judgment is true; because I am not alone, but I and the Father tliat sent me. It is written in your law, that the testimony of two men is true. I am one that bear witness of myself, and the Father that sent me beareth witness of me." Yesterday, as I have said, from these words a discourse was delivered to your ears and to your minds.
When the Lord had spoken these words, they who heard, " Ye judge after tlie llesh," manifested the truth of what they had heard. For they answered the Lord, as He spoke of God His Father, and said to Him, " Where is thy Father?" The Father of Christ they understood carnally, because they judged the words of Christ after the flesh. But He who spoke was openly flesh, but secretly the Word: man visible, God hidden. They saw the covering, and despised the wearer: they despised because they knew not; knew not, because they saw not; saw not, because they were blind; they were blind, because they believed not.
2. Let us see, then, what answer the Lord made to this. "Where," say they, "is thy Father?' ' For we have heard thee say, ' ' I am not alone, but I and the Father that sent inc: " we see thee alone, we do not see thy Father [Tractate XXXVII.
with thee; how sayest thou that thou art not alone, but that thou art with thy Father? Else show us that thy Father is with thee. And the Lord answered them: Do ye know me, that I should show you the Father? This is indeed what follows; this is what He answered in His own words, the exposition of which we have already premised. For see what He said, " Ye neither know me nor my Father: if ye knew me, ye would perhaps know my Father also." Ye say then, " Where is thy Father?" As if already ye knew me; as if what you see were all that I am. Therefore because ye know not me, I do not show you my Father. Ye suppose me, in fact, to be a man; hence ye seek a man for my father, because "ye judge after the flesh." But because, according to what you see, I am one thing, and another thing according to what you see not, and that I as hidden from you speak of my Father as hidden, it is requisite that you should first know me, and then ye know my Father also.
3. " For if ye knew me, ye would perhaps know my Father also." He who knows all things is not in doubt when He says perhaps, but rebuking. Now see how this very word perhaps, which seems to be a word of doubting, may be spoken chidingly. Yea, a word expressive of doubt it is when used by man, for man doubts because he knows not; but when a word of doubting is spoken by God, from whom surely nothing is hid, it is unbelief that is reproved by that doubting, not the Godhead merely expressing an opinion. For men sometimes chidingly express doubt concerning things which they hold certain; that is, use a word of doubting, while in their heart they doubt not: just as thou wouldst say to thy slave, if thou wert angry with him, " Thou despisest me; but consider, perhaps I am thy master/* Hence also the apostle, speaking to some who despised him, says: "And I think that I also have the Spirit of God. ' ' ' When he says, "I think," he seems to doubt; but he is rebuking, not doubting. And in another place the Lord Jesus Christ Flimself, rebuking the future unbelief of mankind, saith: " When the Son of man cometh, will He, thinkest thou, find faith on the earth? " ^ 4. You now, as I think, understand how the word perhaps is used here, in case any weigher of words and poiser of syllables, as if to show his knowledge of Latin, finds fault with a word which the Word of God spoke; and by blaming the Word of (jod, remain nut eloquent, but mute. For who is there that speaks as doth the Word which was in the beginning Cor.
VII. 40.
- Luke xviii. 8.
with God? Do not consider these words as we use them, and from these wish to measure that Word which is God. Thou hearest the Word indeed, and despisest it; hear God and fear Him: " In the beginning was the Word." Thou referrest to the usage of thy conversation, and sayest within thyself. What is a word? What mighty thing is a word? It sounds and passes away; after beating the air, it strikes the ear and is no more. Hear further: "The Word was with God;" remained, did not by sounding pass away. Perhaps thou still despisest it: " The Word was God." With thyself, O man, a word in thy heart is a different thing from sound; but the word that is with thee, in order to pass to me, requires sound for a vehicle as it were. It takes to itself sound, mounts it as a vehicle, runs through the air, comes to me and yet does not leave thee. But the sound, in order to come to me, left thee and yet did not stay with me. Now has the word that was in thy heart also passed away with the passing sound? Thou didst speak thy thought; and, that the thought which was hid with thee might come to me, thou didst sound syllables; the sound of the syllables conveyed thy thought to my ear; through my ear thy thought descended into my heart, the intermediate sound flew away: but that word which took to itself sound was with thee before thou didst sound it, and is with me, because thou didst sound it, without quitting thee. Consider this, thou nice weigher of sounds, whoever thou be. Thou despisest the Word of God, thou who comprehendest not the word of man.
5. He, then, by whom all things were made knows all things, and yet He rebukes by doubting: " If ye knew me ye would perhaps know my Father also." He rebukes unbelievers. He spoke a like sentence to the disciples, but there is not a word of doubting in it, because there was no occasion to rebuke unbelief. For this, "If ye knew me, ye would perhaps know my F'ather also," which He said to the Jews, He said also to the disciples, when Philip asked, or rather, demanded of Him, saying, " Lord, show us the Father, and it sufficeth us: " just as if he said. We already know Thee even ourselves; Thou hast been apparent to us; we have seen Thee; Thou hast deigned to choose us; we have followed Thee, have seen Thy marvels, heard Thy words of salvation, have taken Thy precepts upon us, we hope in Thy promises: Thou hast deigned to confer much upon us by Thy very presence: but still, while we know Thee, and we do not yet know the Father, we are inflamed with desire to see Him whom we do not yet know; and thus, be- Tractate XXXVI I. J Tractate XXXVI I. J cause we know Thee, but it is not enough until we Icnow the Father, show us the Father, and it sufficeth us. And the Lord, that they might understand that they knew not what they thought they did already know, said, ''Am I so long time with you, and ye know me not, Philip? he who hath seen me hath seen the Father." ' Has this sentence a word of doubting in it? Did He say, He that hath seen me hath perhaps seen the Father? Why not? Because it was a believer that listened to Him, not a persecutor of the faith: hence did the Lord not rebuke, but teach. "Whoso hath seen me hath seen the Father also; " and here, " If ye knew me, ye would know my Father also,'' let us remove the word which indicates the unbelief of the hearers, and it is the same sentence.
6. Yesterday we commended it to your consideration, beloved, and said that the sentences of the Evangelist John, in which he narrates to us what he learned from the Lord, had not required to be discussed, were that possible, except the inventions of heretics had compelled us. Yesterday, then, we briefly intimated to you, beloved, that there are heretics who are called Patripassians, or Sabellians after their founder: these say that the same is the Father who is the Son; the names different, but the person one. When He wills, say they. He is Father; when He wills. He is Son: still He is one. There are likewise other heretics who are called Arians. They indeed confess that our Lord Jesus Christ is the only Son of the Father; the one, Father of the Son; the other. Son of the Father; that He who is Father is not Son, nor He who is Son is Father; they confess that the Son was begotten, but deny His equality. We, namely, the catholic faith, coming from the doctrine of the apostles planted in us, received by a line of succession, to be transmitted sound to posterity, — the catholic faith, I say, has, l)etween both those parties, that is, between both errors, hekl the truth. In the error of the Sabellians, He is only one; the Father and Son is the same person: in the error of the Arians, the Father and the Son are indeed different persons; but the Son is not only a different person, but different in nature. Thou midway between these, what sayest thou? Thou hast shut out the Sabellian, shut out the Arian also. The Father is I'ather, the Son is Son; another person, not another in nature; for, " I and the Father are one," which, so far as I could, I pressed on your thoughts yesterday. When he hears that word, we «/r, let the Sabellian go away > John xiv. 8.
confounded; when he hears the word one, let the Arian go away confounded. Let the catholic steer the bark of his faith between both, since in both he must be on his guard against shipwreck. Say thou, then, what the Gospel saith, "land the Father are one." Not different in nature, because one; not one person, because are.
7. A little before He said, " My judgment is true; because I am not alone, but I and the Father that sent me:" as if He said, The reason why my judgment is true is, because I am the Son of God, because I speak the truth, because I am truth itself. Those men, understanding Him carnally, said, "Where is thy Father? " Now hear, O Arian: "Ye neither know me, nor my Father;'' because, " If ye knew me, ye would know my Father also." What doth this mean, except "land the Father are one"? When thou seest some person like some other, — give heed, beloved, it is a common remark; let not that appear to you difficult which you see to be customary. — when, I say, thou seest some person like another, and thou knowest the person to whom he is like, thou sayest in wonder, "' How like this person is to that! " Thou wouldst not say this unless there were two. Here one who does not know the person to whom thou sayest the other is like remarks, "Is he so like him?'' And thou answerest him: What? dost thou not know that person? Saith he, ''No, I do not.'' Immediately thou, in order to make known to him the person whom he does not know by means of the person whom he observes before him, answerest, saying. Having seen this man, thou hast seen the other. Thou didst not, surely, assert that they are one person in saying this, or that they are not two; but made such answer because of the likeness: " If thou knowest the one, thou knowest the other; for they are very like, and there is no difference whatever between them.'' Hence also the Lord saith, " If ye knew me, ye would know my Father also;" not that tlie Son is the Father ()ut like the Father. Let the Arian blush. Thanks be to the Lord that even the Arian is separate from the Sabellian error, and is not a Patripassian: he does not affirm that the Father assumed flesh and came to men, that the Father suffered, rose again, and somehow ascended to Himself; this he does not affirm; he acknowledges with me the Father to be Father, the Son to be Son. But, O brother, thou hast escaped that shipwreck, why go to the other? Father is Father, Son is Son; why dost thou affirm that the Son is unlike, that He is different, another substance? If He were unlike, would He say to 2l6 [Tractate XXXVII.
His disciples, " He tliat hath seen me hath seen the Father"? Would He say to the Jews, "If ye knew me, ye would know my Father also "? How would this be true, unless that other was also true, " I and the Father are one "?
8. " These words spake Jesus in the treasury, speaking in the temple:" great boldness, without fear. For He could not suffer if He did not will it, since He were not born if He did not will it. What follows then? "And no man laid hold of Him, because His hour was not yet come." Some, again, when they hear this, believe that the Lord Christ was subject to fate, and say: Behold, Christ is held by fate! O, if thy heart were not fatuous, thou wouldst not believe in fate, \ifate, as some understand it, is derived ixovufando, that is from speaking, how can the Word of God be held by fate, whilst all things that are made are in the Word itself? For God has not ordained anything which He did not know beforehand; that which was made was in His Word. The world was made; both was made and was there. How both was made and was there? Because the house which the builder rears, was previously in his art; and there, a better house, without age, without decay: however, to show forth his art, he makes a house; and so, in a manner, a house comes forth from a house; and if the house should fall, the art remains. So were all things that are made with the Word of God; because God made all things in wisdom,' and all that He made were known to Him: for He did not learn because He made, but made because He knew. To us they are known, because they are made: to Him, if they had not been known, they would not have been made Therefore the Word went before. And what was before the Word? Nothing at all. For were there anything before it, it would not have been said, " In the beginning was the Word; " but. In the beginning was the Word made. In short, what says Moses concerning the world? " In the beginning God made the heavens and the earth." Made what was not: well, if He made what was not, what was there before? "In the beginning was the Word. " And whence came heaven and earth? "All things were made by Him." Dost thou then put Christ under fate? Where are the fates? In heaven, sayest thou, in the order and changes of the stars. How then can fate rule Him by whom the heavens and the stars were made; whilst thy own will, if thou thinkest rightly, transcends even the stars? Or, because thou knowest that Christ's flesh I Ps. civ. 24.
was under heaven, is that the reason why thou thinkest that Christ's power was put under the heavens?
9. Hear, thou fool: "His hour was not yet come; " not the hour in which He should be forced to die, but that in which He would deign to be put to death. For Himself knew when He should die: He considered all things thai were foretold of Him, and awaited all to be finished that was foretold to be before His suffering; that when all should be fulfilled, then should come His suffering in set order, not by fatal necessity. In short, hear that you may prove. Among the rest that was prophesied of Him, it is also written: " They gave me gall for meat, and in my thirst they gave me vinegar to drink." ^ How this happened, we know from the Gospel. First, they gave Him gall; He received it, tasted it, and spat it out. Thereafter, as He hung on the cross, that all that was foretold might be fulfilled, He said, "I thirst." They took a sponge filled with vinegar, bound it to a reed, and put it to His mouth; He received it, and said, " It is finished. " What did that mean? All things which were prophesied before my death are completed, then what do I here any longer? In a word, when He said " It is finished, He bowed His head, and gave up the ghost." Did the thieves, who were nailed beside Him, expire when they would? They were held by the bonds of flesh, for they were not the creators of the flesh; fixed by nails, they were a long time tormented, because they had not lordship over their weakness. The Lord, however, when He would, took flesh in a virgin's womb: came forth to men when He would; lived among men so long as He would; and when He would He quitted the flesh. This is the part of power, not of necessity. This hour, then, He awaited; not the fated, but the fitting and voluntary hour; that all might first be fulfilled which behoved to be fulfilled' before His decease. How could he have been under necessity of fate, when He said in another place, " I have power to lay down my life, and I have power to take it again: no man taketh it from me, but I lay it down of myself and take it again? " ^ He showed this power when the Jews sought Him. " Whom seek ye? " saith He. " Jesus," said they. And He answered," I am He." When they heard this voice, " they went back and fell to the ground." ■* 10. Says one. If he had this power, why, when the Jews insulted him on the cross and said, " If he be the Son of God let him come down from the cross,'' did he not comedown.
2 Ps. Ixix. 22.
3 John X. 18.
4 John xviii. 6.
Tractate XXXVIII.]
to show them his power by coming down? Because He was teaching us patience, therefore He deferred the demonstration of His power. For if He came down, moved as it were at their words, He would be thought to have been overcome by the sting of their insults. He did not come down; there He remained fixed, to depart when He would. For what great matter was it for Him to descend from the cross, when He could rise again from the sepulchre? Let us, then, to whom this is ministered, understand that the power of our Lord Jesus Christ, then concealed, will be made manifest in the judgment, of which it is said, "God will come manifest; our God, and He will not be silent." ' Why is it said, ''will come manifest"? Because He, our God,- — namely, Christ, — came hidden, will come manifest. "And will not l)e silent:" why this "will not be silent"? Because at first He did keep silence. When? When He was judged; that this, too, might be ful- I Ps. I.
I Ps. I.
filled which the prophet had foretold: "As a sheep He was led to the slaughter, and as a lamb before his shearer is dumb, so He opened not His mouth.'' =" He would not have suffered did He not will to suffer: did He not suffer, that blood had not been shed; if that blood were not shed, the world would not be redeemed. Therefore let us give thanks to the power of His divinity, and to the compassion of His infirmity; both concernini» the hidden power which the Jews did not recognize, whence it is now said to them, " Ye neither know me nor my Father," and also concerning the flesh assumed, which the Jews did not recognize, and yet knew His lineage: whence He said to them elsewhere, " Ye both know me, and ye know whence I am." Let us know both in Christ, both wherein He is equal to the Father and wherein the Father is greater than He. That is the Word, this is the flesh; that is God, this is man; but yet Christ is one, God and man.
2 Isa. liii. 7.
TRACTATE XXXVIII.
Chapter VIH. 21-25.
1, The lesson of the holy Gospel which preceded to-day's had concluded thus: that "the Lord spake, teaching in the treasury," what it pleased Him, and what you have heard; "and no one laid hands on Him, for His hour was not yet come." ' Accordingly, on the Lord's day we made our subject of discourse what He Himself thought fit to give us. We indicated to your Charity why it was said, " His hour was not yet come," lest any in their impiety should have the effrontery to suspect Christ as laid under some fatal necessity. For the hour was not yet come when by His own appointment, in accordance with what was predicted regarding Him, He should not be forced to die unwillingly, but be ready to be slain.
2. But of His own passion itself, which lay not in any necessity He was under, but in His own power, all that He said in His discourse to the Jews was, " I go away," For to Christ the Lord's death was His proceeding to the place whence He had come, and from which He had never departed. " I go away," • Chap. viii. 20.
• Chap. viii. 20.
said He, "and ye shall seek me," not from any longing for me, but in hatred. P'or after His removal from human sight. He was sought for both by those who hated Him and those who loved Him; by the former in a spirit of persecution, by the latter with the desire of having Him. In the Psalms the Lord Himself says by the pro[)het, "A place of refuge hath failed me, and there is none that seeketh after my life;"= and again He says in another place in the Psalms, " Let them be confounded and ashamed who seek after my life."^ He blamed the former for not seeking, He condemned the latter because they did. For it is wrong not to seek 'the life of Christ, that is, in the way the disciples sought it; and it is wrong to seek the life of Christ, that is, in the way the Jews sought it: for the former souglu to possess it, these latter to destroy it. Accordingly, iiecause these men sought it tlnis in a wrong way, with a perverted heart, what ne.xt did He add? " Ye shall seek me, and " — not to let you suppose that ye will seek me for good — " ye » Ps. cxlii. 4.
3 Ps. xl. 14.
2l8 [Tractate XXXVIII.