' I Cor. xi.
27.
= Luke xxii. 3, 4.
3 Luke xxii. 19-21.
the dipping of a thing does not always imply its washing; but some things are dipped in order to be dyed. But if a good meaning is to be here attached to the dipping, his ingratitude for that good was deservedly followed by damnation.
4. But still, possessed as Judas now was, not by the Lord, but by the devil, and now that the bread had entered the belly, and an enemy the soul of this man of ingratitude: still, I say, there was this enormous wickedness, already conceived in his heart, waiting to be wrought out to its full issue, for which the damnable desire had always preceded. Accordingly, when the Lord, the living Bread, had given this bread to the dead, and in giving it had revealed the betrayer of the Bread, He said, "What thou doest, do quickly." He did not command the crime, but foretold evil to Judas, and good to us. For what could be worse for Judas, or what could be better for us, than the delivering up of Christ, — a deed done by him to his own destruction, but done, apart from him, in our behalf? "What thou doest, do quickly." Oh that word of One whose wish was to be ready rather than to be angry! That word! expressing not so much the punishment of the traitor as the reward awaiting the Redeemer! For He said, " What thou doest, do quickly," not as wrathfully looking to the destruction of the trust-betrayer, but in His own haste to accomplish the salvation of the faithful; for He was delivered for our offences,* and He loved the Church, and gave Himself for it.s And as the apostle also says of himself: "Who loved me, and gave Himself forme."® Had not, then, Christ given Himself, no one could have given Him up. What is there in Judas' conduct but sin? For in delivering up Christ he had no thought of our salvation, for which Christ was really delivered, but thought only of his money gain, and found the loss of his soul. He got the wages he wished, but had also given him, against his wish, the wages he merited. Judas delivered up Christ, Christ delivered Himself up: the former transacted the business of his own selling of his Master, the latter the business of our redemption. " What tliou doest, do quickly,'' not because thou hast the power in thyself, but because He wills it who has all the power.
5. " Now no one of those at the table knew for what intent He spake this unto him. For some of them thought, because Judas liad the money-bag, that Jesus said unto him, Buy those things whicli we have nticd of against 4 Rom. iv, 25.
SKph. V. 25.
6 GaL ii. 20.
[Tractate LXIIL the feast; or, that he should give something to the poor." The Lord, therefore, had also a money-box, where He kept the offerings of believers, and distributed to the necessities of His own, and to others who were in need. It was then that the custom of having churchmoney was first introduced, so that thereby we might understand that His precept about taking no thought for the morrow ' was not a command that no money should be kept by His saints, but that God should not be served for any such end, and that the doing of what is right should not be held in abeyance through the fear of want. For the apostle also has this foresight for the future, when he says: " If any believer hath widows, let him give them enough, that the church may not be burdened, that it may have enough for them that are widows indeed." - I Matt. vi. 34.
I Tim. V. 16.
6. " He then, having received the morsel of bread, went immediately out: and it was night." And he that went out was himself the night. "Therefore when" the night "was gone out, Jesus said. Now is the Son of man glorified." The day therefore uttered speech unto the day, that is, Christ did so to His faithful disciples, that they might hear and love Him as His followers; and the night showed knowledge unto the night, ^ that is, Judas did so to the unbelieving Jews, that they might come as His persecutors, and make Him their prisoner. But now, in considering these words of the Lord, which were addressed to the godly, before His arrest by the ungodly, spetial attention on the part of the hearer is required; and therefore it will be more becoming in the preacher, instead of hurriedly considering them now, to defer them till a future occasion.
3 Ps. xix. 2, TRACTATE LXIII Chapter XIII. 31, 32 I. Let us give our mind's best attention, and, with the Lord's help, seek after God. The language of the divine hymn is: "Seek God and your soul shall live."' Let us search for that which needs to be discovered, and into that which has been discovered. He whom we need to discover is concealed, in order to be sought after; and when found, is infinite, in order still to be the object of our search. Hence it is elsewhere said, "Seek His face evermore."^ For He satisfies the seeker to the utmost of his capacity; and makes J;he finder still more capable, that he may seek to be filled anew, according to the growth of his ability to receive. Therefore it was not said, "Seek His face evermore," in the same sense as of certain others, who are " always learning, and never coming to a knowledge of the truth; "^ but rather as the preacher saith, "When a man hath finished, then he beginneth; "■* till we reach that life where we shall be so filled, that our natures shall attain their utmost capacity, because we shall have arrived at perfection, and no longer be aiming at more. For then all that can satisfy us will be revealed to our eyes. But here let us always be seeking, and let our re- 2 Ps. cv. 4.
4 Ecclus. xviii. 7.
ward in finding put no enu to our searching. For we do not say that it will not be so always, because it ij only so here; but that here we must always be seeking, lest at any time we should imagine that here we can ever cease from seeking. For those of whom it is said that they are " always learning, and never coming to a knowledge of the truth," are here indeed always learning; but when they depart this life they will no longer be learning, but receiving the reward of their error. For the words, "always learning, and never coming to a knowledge of the /ruth," mean, as it were, always walking, and never getting into the road. Let us. on the other hand, be walking always in the way, till we reach the end to vvhich it leads; let us nowhere tarry in it till we reach the proper place of abode: and so we shall both persevere in our seeking, and be making some attainments in our finding, and, thus seeking and finding, be passing on to that which remains, till the very end of all seeking shall be reached in that world where perfection shall admit of no further effort at advancement. Let these prefatory remarks, dearly beloved, make your Charity attentive to this disqourse of our Lord's, which He addressed to the disciples before His passion: for it is profound in it- Tractate LXIII.]
o^y self; and where, in particular, the preacher purposes to expend much labor, the hearer ought not to be remiss in attention.
2. What is it, then, that the Lord says, after that Judas went out, to do quickly what he purposed doing, namely, betraying the Lord? What says the day when the night had gone out? What says the Redeemer when the seller had departed? "Now," He says, " is the Son of man glorified." Why " mra "? It was not, was it, merely that His betrayer was gone out, and that those were at hand who were to seize and slay Him? Is it thus that He " is now glorified," to wit, that His deeper humiliation is approaching; that over Him are impending both bonds, and judgment, and condemnation, and mocking, and crucifixion, and death? Is this glorification, or rather humiliation? Even when He was working miracles, does not this very John say of Him, " The Spirit was not yet given, because that Jesus was not yet glorified "? ' Even then, therefore, when He was raising the dead, He was not yet glorified; and is He o-lorified now, when drawincj near in His own person unto death? He was not yet glorified when acting as God, and is He glorified in going to suffer as man? It would be strange if it were this that God, the great Master, signified and taught in such words. We must ascend higher to unveil the words of the Highest, who reveals Himself somewhat that we may find Him, and anon hides Himself that we may seek Him, and so press on step by step, as it were, from discoveries alread}'^ made to those that still await us. I get here a sight of something that prefigures a great reality.
Judas went out, and Jesus is glorified; the son of perdition went out, and the Son of man is glorified. He it was that had gone out, on whose account it had been said to them all, "And ye are clean, but not all'' (ver. lo). When, therefore, the unclean one departed, all that remained were clean, and continued with their Cleanser. Something like this will it be when this world shall have been conquered by Christ, and shall have passed away, and there shall be no one that is unclean remaining among His people; when, the tares having been separated from the wheat, the righteous shall shine forth as the sun in the kingdom of their Father. ^^ Tlie Lord, foreseeing such a future as this, and in testimony that such was signified now in the separation of the tares, as it were, by the departure of Judas, and the remaining bchintl of the wheat in the persons of the holy apostles, said, "Now is the Son of man glorified:" as ' Chap. vii. 39.
3 Matt. xiii. 43.
if He had said. See, so will it be in that day of my glorification yet to come, when none of the wicked shall be present, and none of the good shall be wanting. His words, however, are not expressed in this way: Now is //vyfo-. ured the glorification of the Son of man; but expressly, " Now is the Son of man glorified: " just as it was not said, The Rock signified Christ; but, " That Rock was Christ." ^ Nor is it said. The good seed signified the children of the kingdom, or. The tares signified the children of the wicked one; but what is said is, "The good seed, these are the children of the kingdom; and the tares, tlie children of the wicked one."-* According, then, to the usage of Scripture language,, which speaks of the signs as if they were the things signified, the Lord makes use of the words, " Now is the Son of man glorified; " indicating that in the completed separation of that arch sinner from their company, and in the remaining around Him of His saints, we have the foreshadowing of His glorification, when the wicked shall be finally separated, and He shall dwell with His saints through eternity.
3. But after saying, " Now is the Son of man glorified," He added, " and God is glorified in Him." For this is itself the glorifving of the Son of man, that God should be glorified in Him. For if He is not glorified in Himself, but God in Him, then it is He whom God glorifies in Himself. And just as if to give them this explanation. He furthers adds: " If God is glorified in Him, God shall also glorify Him in Himself." That is, " If God is glorified in Him," because He came not to do His own will, but the will of Him that sent Him; "and God shall glorify Him in Himself," in such wise that the human nature, in which He is the Son of man, and which was so assumed by the eternal Word, should also be endowed with an eternal immortality. "And," He says, "He shall straightway glorify Him; " predicting, to wit, by such an asseveration, His own resurrection in the immediate future, and not, as it were, ours in the end of the world. For it is this very glorification of whicli the evangelist had previously said, as I mentioned a little ago, that on this account the Spirit was not yet in their case given in that new way, in which He was yet to be given after the resurrection to those who believed, because that Jesus was not yet glorified: tlint is, mortality was not yet clothed witli immortality, antl temporal weakness transformed into eternal strength. This glorification may also be indicatetl in tlie 1 1 ( '>r. X. 4.
4 Mntt. xiii. 38.
i6 [Tractate LXIV.
words, "Now is the Son of man glorified; " so that the word " now " may be supposed to refer, not to His impending passion, but to His closely succeeding resurrection, as if what was now so near at hand had actually been accomplished. Let this sufifice your affection to-day; we shall take up, when the Lord permits us, the words that follow.
TRACTATE LXIV.
Chapter XHL 33.
"i. It becomes us, dearly beloved, to keep in view the orderly connection of our Lord's words. For after having previously said, but subsequently to Judas' departure, and his separation from even the outward communion of the saints, " Now is the Son of man glorified, and God is glorified in Him; " — whether He said so as pointing to His future kingdom, when the wicked shall be separated from the good, or that His resurrection was then to take place, that is, was not to be delayed, like ours, till the end of the world; — and having then added, " If God is glorified in Him, God shall also glorify Him in Himself, and shall straightway glorify Him," whereby without any ambiguity He testified to the immediate fulfillment of His own resurrection; He proceeded to say, " Little children, yet a little while I am with you." To keep them, therefore, from thinking that God was to glorify Him in such a way that He would never again be joined with them in earthly intercourse, He said, " Yet a little while I am with you: '' as if He had said, Straightway indeed I shall be glorified in my resurrection; and yet I am not straightway to ascend into heaven, but "yet a little while I am with you." For, as we find it written in the Acts of the Apostles, He spent forty days with them after His resurrection, going in and out, and eating and drinking: ' not indeed that He had any experience of hunger and thirst, but even by such evidences confirmed the reality of His flesh, which no longer needed, but still possessed the power, to eat and to drink. Was it, then, these forty days He had in view when He said, "Yet a little while I am with you," or something else? For it may also be understood in this way: "Yet a little while I am with you;" still, like you, I also am in this state of fleshly infirmity, that is, till He should die and rise again: for after He rose again He was with them, as has been said, for forty days in the full manifestation of His bodily I Acts i. 3.
presence; but He was no longer with them in the fellowship of human infirmity.
2. There is also another form of His divine presence unknown to mortal senses, of which He likewise says, " Lo, I am with you alway, even to the end of the world. ""= This, at least, is not the same as " yet a little while I am with you; " for it is not a little while until the end of the world. Or if even this is so (for time flies, and a thousand years are in God's sight as one day, or as a watch in the night,) 3 yet we cannot believe that He intended any such meaning on this occasion, especially as He went on to say, " Ye shall seek me, and as I said unto the Jews, Whither I go, ye cannot come." That is to say, after this little while that 1 am with you, " ye shall seek me, and whither I go, ye cannot come,*' Is it after the end of the world that, whither He goes, they will not be able to come? And where, then, is the place of which He is going to say a little after in this same discourse, " Father, I will that they also be with me where I am"?'^ It was not then of that presence of His with His own which He is maintaining with them till the end of the world that He now spake, when He said, "Yet a little while I am with you;" but either of that state of mortal infirmity in which He dwelt with them till His passion, or of that bodily presence which He was to maintain with them up till Flis ascension. Whichever of these any one prefers, he can do so without being at variance with the faith.
3. That no one, however, may deem that sense inconsistent with the true one, in which we say that the Lord may have meant the communion of mortal flesh which He held with the disciples till His passion, when He said, " Yet a little while I am with you; " let those words also of His after His resurrection, as found in another evangelist, be taken into consideration, when He said, " These are the words which I spake unto you, while I ' Matt, xxviii. 20.
3 Ps. xc. 4.
4 Chap. xvii. 24.
Tractate LXV.]
2>^7 was yet with you:"' as if then He was no longer with them, even at the very time that they were standing by, seeing, touching, and talking with Him. What does He mean, then, by saying, " while I was yet with you,^' but, while I was yet in that state of mortal flesh wherein ye still remain? For then, indeed, He had been raised again in the same flesh; but He was no longer associated with them in the same mortality. And accordingl)'-, as on that occasion, when now clothed in fleshly immortality, He said with truth, " while I was yet with you," to which we can attach no other meaning than, while I was yet with you in fleshly mortality; so here also, without any absurdity, we may understand His words, '' Yet a little while I am with you," as if He had said, Yet a little while I am mortal like yourselves. Let us look, then, at the words that follow.
4. "Ye shall seek me: and as I said unto the Jews, Whither I go, ye cannot come; so say I to you now." That is, ye cannot come now. But when He said so to the Jews, He did not add the " now." - The former, therefore, were not able at that time to come where He was going, but they were so afterwards; because He says so a little afterwards in the plainest terms to the Apostle Peter. For, on the latter inquiring, " Lord, whither goest Thou?" He replied to him, "Whither I go thou canst not follow me now; but thou shalt follow me afterwards" (ver. 36). But what it means is not to be carelessly passed over.
' Luke xxiv. 44.
- Scarcely an admissible use of the '" now " (apri), which manifestly refers to the time of Jesus saying so to the disciples, and not to the period of their inability to come. — Tr.
For whither was it that the disciples could not then follow the Lord, but were able afterwards? If we say, to death, what time can be discovered when any one of the sons of men will find it impossible to die; since such, in this perishable body, is the lot of man, that therein life is not a whit easier than death? They were not, therefore, at that time less able to follow the Lord to death, but they were less able to follow Him to the life which is deathless. For thither it was the Lord was going, that, rising from the dead. He should die no more, and death should no more have dominion over Him.^ For as the Lord was about to die for righteousness' sake, how could they have followed Him now, who were as yet unripe for the ordeal of martyrdom? Or, with the Lord about to enter the fleshly immortality, how could they have followed Him now, when, even though ready to die, they would have no resurrection till the end of the world? Or, on the point of going, as the Lord was, to the bosom of the Father, and that without any forsaking of them, just as He had never quitted that bosom in coming to them, how could they have followed Him now, since no one can enter on that state of felicity but he that is made perfect in love? And to show them, therefore, how it is that they may attain the fitness to proceed, where He was going before them, He says, "A new commandment I give unto you, that ye love one another " (ver. 34). These are the steps whereby Christ must be followed; but any fuller discourse thereon must be put off till another opportunity.
3 Rom. vi. 9.
TRACTATE LXV.
I. The Lord Jesus declares that He is giving His disciples a new commandment, that they should love one another. "A new commandment," He says, " I give unto you, that ye love one another." But was not this already commanded in the ancient law of God, where it is written, " Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself"?' Why, then, is it called a new one by the Lord, when it is proved to be so old? Is it on this account a Lev. xix. 18 new commandment, because He hath divested us of the okl, and clothed us with the new man? For it is not indeed every kind of love that renews him that listens to it, or rather yields it obedience, but that love regarding which the Lord, in order to distinguish it from all carnal affection, added, "as I have loved you." l-'or husbnnds and wives love one another, and parents and chiklreii, and all other human relationships that bind men together: to say nothing of the blameworthy and damnable love which is mutually 3i8 [Tractate LXV.
felt by adulterers and adulteresses, by fornicators and prostitutes, and all others who are knit together by no human relationship, but by the mischievous depravity of human life. Christ, therefore, hath given us a new commandment, that we should love one another, as He also hath loved us. This is the love that renews us, making us new men, heirs of the New Testament, singers of the new song. It was this love, brethren beloved, that renewed also those of olden time, who were then the righteous, the patriarchs and prophets, as it did afterwards the blessed apostles: it is it, too, that is now renewing the nations, and from among the universal race of man, which overspreads the whole world, is making and gathering together a new people, the body of the newly-married spouse of the only-begotten Son of God, of whom it is said in the Song of Songs, " Who is she that ascendeth, made white?"' Made white indeed, because renewed; and how, but by the new commandment? Because of this, the members thereof have a mutual interest in one another; and if one member suffer, all the members suffer with it; and one member be honored, all the members rejoice with it.^ For this they hear and observe, "A new commandment I give unto you, that ye love one another: '' not as those love one another who are corrupters, nor as men love one another in a human way; but they love one another as those who are God's, and all of them sons of the Highest, and brethren, therefore, of His only Son, with that mutual love wherewith He loved them, when about to lead them on to the goal were all sufficiency should be theirs, and where their every desire should be satisfied with good things.^ For then there will be nothing wanting they can desire, when God will be all in all.'' An end like that has no end. No one dieth there, where no one arriveth save he that dieth to this world, not that universal kind of death whereby the body is bereft of the soul; but the death of the elect, through which, even while still remaining in this mortal flesh, the heart is set on the things which are above. Of such a death it is that the apostle said, " For ye are dead, and your life is hid with Christ in God."^ And perhaps to this, also, do the words refer.
I Song of Sol. viii. 5, where Augustin, in dealbata, follows the Septuagint in their misreading and alteration of the original T5l^'j"|^' "y''"'" ^he ■zui/cierness'''' (as in chap. lii. 6), into n222n^, n|17l2n)p, or some such participle. The Vulgate differs from Augustin, and reads correctly, de descrto, but interposes between this and the next clause another participial expression, deliciis afflziens, abounding in delights. Our English version follows the original. — Tr.
3 Ps. ciii. 5. 5 Col. iii. 3.
"Love is strong as death."* For by this love it is brought about, that, while still held in the present corruptible body, we die to this world, and our life is hid with Christ in God; yea, that love itself is our death to the world, and our life with God. For if that is death when the soul quits the body, how can it be other than death when our love quits the world? Such love, therefore, is strong as death. And what is stronger than that which bindeth the world?
2. Think not then, my brethren, that when the Lord says, "A new commandment I give unto you, that ye love one another," there is any overlooking of that greater commandment, which requires us to love the Lord our God with all our heart, and with all our soul, and with all our mind; for along with this seeming oversight, the words "that ye love one another" appear also as if they had no reference to that second commandment, which says, ' ' Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself." For "on these two commandments," He says, " hang all the law and the prophets."^ But both commandments may be found in each of these by those who have good understanding. For, on the one hand, he that loveth God cannot despise His commandment to love his neighbor; and on the other, he who in a holy and spiritual way loveth his neighbor, what doth he love in him but God? That is the love, distinguished from all mundane love, which the Lord specially characterized, when He added, " as I have loved you." For what was it but God that He loved in us? Not because we had Him, 'but in order that we might have Him; and that He may lead us on, as I said a little ago, where God is all in all. It is in this way, also, that the physician is properly said to love the sick; and what is it he loves in them but their health, which at all events he desires to recall; not their sickness, which he comes to remove? Let us, then, also so love one another, that, as far as possible, we may by the solicitude of our love be winning one another to have God within us. And this love is bestowed on us by Him ^yho said, "As I have loved you, that ye also love one another." For this very end, therefore, did He love us, that we also should love one another; bestowing this on us by His own love to us, that we should be bound to one another in mutual love, and, united together as members by so pleasant a bond, should be the body of so mighty a Head.
3. "By this," He adds, "shall all men know that ye are my disciples, if ye have love * Song of Sol. viii. 6.
7 Matt. xxii. 37-40.
Tractate LXVI.J one to another: '* as if He said, Other gifts of mine are possessed in common with you by those who are not mine, — not only nature, life, perception, reason, and that safety which is equally the privilege of men and beasts; but also languages, sacraments, prophecy, knowledge, faith, the bestowing of their goods upon the poor, and the giving of their body to the flames: but because destitute of charity, they only tinkle like cymbals; they are nothing, and by nothing are they profited/ It is not, then, by such gifts of mine, however good, which may be alike possessed by those who are not my disciples, but " by this it is that all men shall know that ye are my disciples, that ye have love one to another." O thou spouse of Christ, fair amongst women! O thou who ascendest in whiteness, leaning upon thy Beloved! for by His light thou art made dazzling to whiteness, by His assistance thou art preserved from falling. How well becoming thee are the I I Cor. xiii. 1-3.
I I Cor. xiii. 1-3.
words in that Song of Songs, which is, as it were, thy bridal chant, " That there is love in thy delights"!- This it is that suffers not thy soul to perish with the ungodly: it is this that judges thy cause, and is strong as death, and is present in thy delights. How wonderful is the character of that death, which was all but swallowed up in penal sufferings, had it not been over and above absorbed in delights! But here this discourse must now be closed; for we must make a new commencement in dealing with the words that follow.
^ Song of Sol. vii. 6, according to the Septuagint. It is very doubtful, however, whether the LXX. themselves held the meaning drawn from their version by Augustin. It seems all to depend on where they inserted the point of interrogation (;); and the mss. vary. The Vatican, that in common use, places it rt/Vcr d-yan-Tj (love), which could hardly have been Augustin's reading. Other MSS. place it at the end of the verse, making the whole a single sentence, as in our English version. Augustin must have found the point immediately after ijSvvOri^ (" thou art pleasant "), thus disjoining dyairr) from what precedes, and making it, with ev Tpii</)aw aov, a clause by itself. The Masoretic punctuation of the Hebrew gives some grounds for Augustin's reading: for there is a larger disjunctive accent over n?2j7j (" thou art pleasant "'), indicating the central pause of the verse; while the minor disjunctive under riD~N may only be intended to make up by emphasis for the abruptness of the language, — Tr.
TRACTATE LXVI.
Chapter XHI. 36-38.
I, While the Lord Jesus was commending to the disciples that holy love wherewith they should love one another, "Simon Peter saith unto Him, Lord, whither goest Thou?'' So, at all events, said the disciple to his Master, the servant to his Lord, as one who was prepared to follow. Just as for the same reason the Lord, who read in his mind the purpose of such a (juestion, made him tliis reply: " Whither I go, thou canst not follow me now; " as if He said. In reference to the object of thy asking, thou canst not now. He does not say, Thou canst not; but "Thou canst not now." He intimated delay, without depriving of hope; and that same hope, which He took not -away, but rather bestowed, in His next words He confirmed, by proceeding to say, "Thou shalt follow me afterwards." Why such haste, Peter? The Rock {petrd) has not yet solidified thee by His Spirit. Be not lifted up with presumption, " Thou canst not now; " be not cast now into despair, "Thou shalt fcjllow afterwards." But what does he say to this? " Why cannot I follow Thee now? I will lay down my life for Thy sake." He saw what was the