Cornelius a Lapide
Table of Contents
Synopsis of the Chapter
First, Christ, departing from the earth, consoles His disciples, saying that He is going to prepare a place for them in the Father's house. Secondly, in v. 6, to Thomas asking: Where are You going? and by what way? Christ answers: I am the way, the truth, and the life; and to Philip, desiring that the Father be shown to him: Philip, He says, he who sees Me sees also My Father. Thirdly, in v. 16, He promises that He will send His own another Paraclete from heaven. Fourthly, answering Jude Thaddaeus, He says that he who keeps His commandments loves Him. Fifthly, in v. 27, He gives them His peace.
Vulgate Text: John 14:1-31
1. Let not your heart be troubled. You believe in God; believe also in Me. 2. In My Father's house there are many mansions; if it were not so, I would have told you: because I go to prepare a place for you. 3. And if I shall go and shall have prepared a place for you, I come again and will take you to Myself, that where I am, you also may be. 4. And where I go you know, and the way you know. 5. Thomas said to Him: Lord, we know not where You go: and how can we know the way? 6. Jesus said to him: I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No man comes to the Father, but by Me. 7. If you had known Me, you would undoubtedly have known My Father also: and from henceforth you shall know Him, and you have seen Him. 8. Philip said to Him: Lord, show us the Father, and it is enough for us. 9. Jesus said to him: Have I been so long a time with you, and have you not known Me? Philip, he who sees Me sees the Father also. How do you say: Show us the Father? 10. Do you not believe that I am in the Father, and the Father in Me? The words that I speak to you, I speak not of Myself. But the Father who abides in Me, He does the works. 11. Do you not believe that I am in the Father, and the Father in Me? 12. Otherwise believe for the very works' sake. Amen, amen, I say to you, he who believes in Me, the works that I do, he also shall do; and greater than these shall he do; because I go to the Father. 13. And whatsoever you shall ask the Father in My name, that I will do: that the Father may be glorified in the Son. 14. If you shall ask Me anything in My name, that I will do. 15. If you love Me, keep My commandments. 16. And I will ask the Father, and He shall give you another Paraclete, that He may abide with you forever, 17. The Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it sees Him not, nor knows Him: but you shall know Him, because He shall abide with you, and shall be in you. 18. I will not leave you orphans: I will come to you. 19. Yet a little while, and the world sees Me no more. But you see Me: because I live, and you shall live. 20. In that day you shall know, that I am in My Father, and you in Me, and I in you. 21. He who has My commandments, and keeps them, he it is who loves Me. And he who loves Me, shall be loved by My Father: and I will love him, and will manifest Myself to him. 22. Judas said to Him, not the Iscariot: Lord, how is it that You will manifest Yourself to us, and not to the world? 23. Jesus answered, and said to him: If any one love Me, he will keep My word, and My Father will love him, and We will come to him, and will make Our abode with him. 24. He who loves Me not, keeps not My words. And the word which you have heard, is not Mine; but the Father's who sent Me. 25. These things have I spoken to you, abiding with you. 26. But the Paraclete, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in My name, He will teach you all things, and bring all things to your mind, whatsoever I shall have said to you. 27. Peace I leave with you, My peace I give to you: not as the world gives, do I give to you. Let not your heart be troubled, nor let it be afraid. 28. You have heard that I said to you: I go away, and I come unto you. If you loved Me, you would indeed be glad, because I go to the Father: for the Father is greater than I. 29. And now I have told you before it comes to pass: that when it shall come to pass, you may believe. 30. I will not now speak many things with you. For the prince of this world comes, and in Me he has not any thing. 31. But that the world may know, that I love the Father: and as the Father has given Me commandment, so do I. Arise, let us go hence.
Verse 1: Let Not Your Heart Be Troubled. You Believe in God, Believe Also in Me
1. LET NOT YOUR HEART BE TROUBLED. YOU BELIEVE IN GOD, BELIEVE ALSO IN ME. — Christ saw the minds of the disciples troubled — that is, sorrowful, fearful, anxious, and dismayed — because He had foretold to them that His departure and passion were at hand through the betrayal of Judas and the scandal of Peter about to deny Him three times. For they feared that they too, overcome by fear of the Jews, might deny Christ. For if Peter, who seemed strong as a rock, was about to deny Him, what were the others, weaker and more timid, going to do? Christ heals this disturbance by saying: "You believe in God, believe also in Me."
For "you believe," the Greek is πιστεύετε, which is both imperative and indicative mood. Hence the Syriac and Arabic translate: Believe in God, and believe in Me. The meaning is, as if to say: If you believe in God, as I know you do, believe also in Me and consequently hope. For I am God, consubstantial with God the Father, so that by this faith and confidence you may overcome all trouble and fear and become partakers of My promises. For this will come to pass, if you fix the gaze of your mind through faith and hope on Me alone, and cast all your fear, anxiety, and worry upon Me, as your God and Lord. For though I depart from you in body, yet in spirit, care, and governance I will always be present with you.
Hear St. Chrysostom: He displays the power of His divinity by uncovering what they had in their minds, as if to say: You fear the adversities that threaten Me and you: lay aside your fear, because faith in Me and in the Father is stronger than whatever shall come upon you, and nothing can prevail against it. And St. Augustine: "Lest they should fear Christ's death as men do, and therefore be troubled, He consoles them, testifying that He is God, as if to say: You fear death for this form of a servant; let not your heart be troubled, the form of God will raise it up." Moreover, Christ here does, says Ribera, what farmers are accustomed to do, who join the vine, as weak, to the elm, that it may receive strength from it for climbing and growing, even if winds and rains rage against it: so the Lord joins the Apostles to Himself through faith, as to a most firm wall, that that of Psalm 26 may be fulfilled: "The Lord is my light and my salvation: whom shall I fear?" Hear Cyril also: "Who shall overcome those wholly armored with divine arms? And the weapon and broad shield which cannot be broken by the weapons of enemies is faith." Let the Christian think the same is said to him by Christ, when he is beset by temptation, trouble, or grave fear. You believe in God, believe also in your Christ; He will be present with you, He will give you strength, He will open a way of escape, He will make you a victor.
Verse 2: In My Father's House There Are Many Mansions; If Not, I Would Have Told You: Because I Go to Prepare a Place for You
2. IN MY FATHER'S HOUSE THERE ARE MANY MANSIONS. — Christ had said that He was going to the Father, and that Peter would follow Him afterward to the same place, but He had been silent about the other disciples: they therefore feared lest they be excluded from the Father's house and heaven. Christ removes this fear from them, as if to say: Fear not: although I am not taking you as companions with Me now into My Father's kingdom, yet I will make it so that you follow Me in due time, nor think that Peter alone is to follow Me there, as though there were no place except for Me and Peter; I assure you that there will be no lack of place for you there, because in My Father's house there are many mansions: therefore you have no reason to fear that they will all be occupied by Me and Peter or others, so that no place would remain for you in heaven. For the empyrean heaven is most vast, and has very many mansions, which will suffice to receive absolutely all men. Hear St. Augustine: "He adds this because the disciples feared for themselves, when it was said to Peter: The cock shall not crow, so that they might be refreshed from their trouble, trusting that even after the dangers of temptations they would abide with Christ with God." And Chrysostom: "Because the Lord had said to Peter: You shall follow afterward; lest they think this promise was given to him alone, He shows that they too are to be received into that region."
Moreover the word "many" suggests that there will be various degrees and orders of beatitude and glory in heaven, as if to say: Each Saint will have his own place in heaven, his own beatitude, his own glory, but unequal according to merits. The Fathers spoke against Jovinian, who, just as he held that the virtues are equal, so also held that their rewards in heaven would be equal. Hence the Interlinear Gloss: "Many mansions," that is, he says, diverse rewards of merits.
Hear St. Augustine: "Each one will receive a mansion according to his merit. There is indeed an equal denarius, that is, eternal life, which pertains to eternity, but there are diverse dignities of merits. It comes to pass through charity that what individuals have is common to all: for each one even has that in himself, when he loves in another, what he himself does not have. The error of those must be rejected who think that the mansions are said to be many because there will be something outside the kingdom of heaven, where the blessed little ones who depart from this life without baptism may abide: for far be it that any of those who reign should be outside the kingdom; nor did the Lord say, in blessedness, but in My Father's house."
Again St. Gregory, Morals book IV, chapter 40: "In the many mansions," he says, "there will be a concordant diversity of rewards: because so great a force of love unites us in that peace, that what each one has not received in himself, he rejoices to have received in another. Hence also those not laboring equally in the vineyard all equally receive the denarius. And indeed with the Father there are many mansions; and yet unequal laborers receive the same denarius, because there will be one beatitude of joy for all, although the sublimity of life will not be one for all." These many mansions, full of great light, the same St. Gregory, book IV of the Dialogues, chapter 36, narrates were shown to a certain Stephen. Therefore Christ with these words, and this display of the heavenly reward, encourages the Apostles not to dread the temptations and persecutions threatening them, but to desire them, inasmuch as through them they will obtain this reward.
IF NOT, I WOULD HAVE TOLD YOU: BECAUSE I GO TO PREPARE A PLACE FOR YOU. — "If not," that is, if it were otherwise, if the matter were otherwise, if namely there were not many mansions in the Father's house, "I would have told you that I go to prepare a place for you," as if to say: I would have said that I depart from you and go to prepare a place for you in heaven, unless many mansions were already prepared there; but because they are already prepared, for that reason I did not say to you: I will go to prepare them. Secondly, from the Greek and Syriac, which lack the word "because," Arias Montanus and Ribera expound it simply thus, as if to say: There are many mansions in My Father's house: if it were not so, I would plainly tell you; nor would I deceive you with vain hope, since I go to prepare a place for you, as if to say: Since I love you so much that I depart from you for the sake of preparing a place for you, how could I fail to say this, or in so great a matter suffer to be deceived those whom I love so greatly? And to prepare a place is to come into the possession of heaven, which until that time had been closed to men, as if to say: When I ascend, heaven will be opened to you, according to that: "Lift up, O you princes, your gates, and the King of glory shall enter in." And Micah 2: "For He will ascend, opening the way before them."
You will say: If the mansions were already prepared for the Apostles in heaven, how then does Christ go to prepare a place for them? I answer: Both are true. For first, these mansions had been prepared by God for the Apostles and the other elect from eternity, from God's predestination, as it were in first act. Secondly, nevertheless Christ goes to prepare them as it were in second act, namely that He may actually bring the Apostles into them: both because Christ opened, paved, and made level the way into heaven, previously closed and impassable, by His ascension into it; and because He, by His own blood and death on the cross, paid God the price of these heavenly mansions, and with that price purchased them for us: so St. Cyril; and most properly, because Christ from heaven sent the Holy Spirit, who by His grace, virtues, and heroic merits would make the Apostles and the other elect worthy of heaven.
So St. Augustine: "How," he says, "does He prepare, if they already are many? they are not yet if they must be prepared: the very ones which He prepared by predestining, He prepares by working. Therefore they already exist in predestination; otherwise He would have said: I will go and predestine; but because they do not yet exist in operation, He says: If I shall go and prepare, etc. He prepares mansions now by preparing the dwellers: for the house of God, of which the Apostle speaks, 'the holy temple of God, which you are,' is still being built, is still being prepared; He is said to depart that He may prepare, because the just man lives by faith: but if you see, it is not faith; lest it be seen, it is hidden that it may be believed: then a place is prepared, if we live by faith, if what is believed is desired, that what is desired may be had: He goes by hiding, comes by appearing, but unless He remain by governing, that we may advance by living well, the place will not be prepared where we can remain in enjoyment." And the Gloss: "The merit of believing is gathered, the reward is given to him who goes, the desire of love is the preparation of the mansion."
Verse 3: And If I Shall Go and Shall Have Prepared a Place for You: I Will Come Again, and Will Take You to Myself, That Where I Am, You Also May Be
3. And if I shall go, and shall prepare a place for you: I WILL COME AGAIN, AND WILL TAKE YOU TO MYSELF, THAT WHERE I AM, YOU ALSO MAY BE. — "If," that is "when," as if to say: When I have departed to heaven, and there have prepared a place for you and your successors — that is, for all the elect — by giving them successively through each age until the end of the world the Holy Spirit and His grace and merits, by which they may prepare themselves for heavenly glory and make themselves worthy of it: which being done, I will come again on the day of judgment, that I may take you all to Myself, that I may crown you in the heavens with worthy reward. For Christ often foretold in the Gospels that He would return at the last judgment, that He might receive to Himself and glorify the faithful and the Apostles, who labored for Him and suffered many things.
Verse 4: And Where I Go You Know, and the Way You Know
4. AND WHERE I GO YOU KNOW, AND THE WAY YOU KNOW. — "You know," that is, you can and ought to know easily, because you have often heard from Me that I go to the Father in heaven, and that the way to heaven is My faith, doctrine, life, passion, and cross. And the Apostles knew that Christ had said these things; but they did not yet understand them, whence they did not even remember them. Hence Augustine: "They knew indeed," he says, "but they did not know that they knew"; they knew by habit, they did not know in act: they knew confusedly and obscurely; they did not know distinctly and in particular — namely, how Christ is the way, and the Father is the goal and terminus of the way. So Ribera, Toletus, Maldonatus, and others.
Verse 5: Thomas Said to Him: Lord, We Know Not Where You Are Going, and How Can We Know the Way?
5. THOMAS SAID TO HIM: LORD, WE KNOW NOT WHERE YOU ARE GOING, AND HOW CAN WE KNOW THE WAY? — as if to say: Since we do not know where You are going, how can we know the way which tends to where You are going? For he who does not know the terminus must also not know the way to the terminus. We have indeed heard You say that You go into Your Father's house, where there are many mansions, to prepare a place for us; but where is this house of the Father? where are those many mansions? If this house is heaven, as we suspect, tell us this more clearly and explicitly, explain these mansions more fully: where and in what region are they situated? For great, and as it were immense, is the vastness of heaven — indeed of the many heavens. So Thomas. "But Christ," says Cyril, "answered nothing to such curiosity: for He does not expound the whole matter; but leaving those things for an opportune time, He explains what is presently necessary." Whence follows:
Verse 6: Jesus Said to Him: I Am the Way, and the Truth, and the Life. No One Comes to the Father but by Me
6. JESUS SAID TO HIM: I AM THE WAY, AND THE TRUTH, AND THE LIFE. — Briefly the true sense is, as if to say: You ask two things, O Thomas, namely My way and its terminus — where I am going and by what way? I answer: I am the way which you seek; a way, I say, not deceptive, but true, which leads to true life, namely to God the Father in the heavens, where is My Father's house, in which I said there are many mansions; whence, explaining this, He adds: "No one comes to the Father but by Me." The Father therefore is the terminus; I am the way. It is a hendiadys: "Way and truth," that is, the true way. Again, "truth and life" is true life. For the word "truth," when placed between "way" and "life," can be referred to both. Now: "I am the way" — this is, My faith, doctrine, grace, and life is the way that leads to heaven. For often in Scripture "Christ" is put for things joined to Christ, such as Christ's faith, grace, doctrine. Or "I am the way," that is, I am the teacher, the pointer, and the leader of the true way, which directly leads to eternal and blessed life, as if to say: "I am the way," because I point out and teach the true faith and holy conversation, which is the true way to eternal life. He alludes to that in Isaiah 30: "And your eyes shall see your teacher, and your ears shall hear the word of one behind you admonishing: this is the way, walk in it."
But because some ways are true and right, and others are false and erroneous, according to that: "There is a way which seems right to a man, and its last ends lead to death," Proverbs 16, hence Christ is called "the way and the truth," that is, the true and right way, according to that of Isaiah 35: "And this shall be for you a straight way, so that fools shall not err through it," as if to say: The Jews, Gentiles, and philosophers said and taught many things about beatitude and the blessed life, and about the virtues which, as it were, lead as a way to it, but they fell into many errors, and therefore led men not to life but to destruction and hell: because just as they placed not a true, but a painted and false beatitude and blessed life in riches, honors, pleasures, and vain sciences; so they entered and taught others not a true, but a painted and false way to the blessed life. But I teach the true faith, piety, charity, and the other virtues, by which as a right way one comes to the true eternal life, which is with the Father and consequently with Me. For I and the Father are one. Therefore as the Father is the blessed life both formally and causally — because He communicates the same to us — and objectively, because God is the object of the beatific vision, so also I am that very same truth and life. I am therefore He who shows you the right way to heaven; I am He who, as the truth, frees you from every error of mind; I am He who leads you to true life. Wherefore be not troubled at My death which is at hand and yours which is to follow; but believe and hope in Me. For I will raise both Myself and you from death to the blessed and glorious life; for I am the way, the truth, and the life.
Hence it is clear that Christ is the way. First, because He Himself, through the merit of His passion, opened the way to heaven for us. So Jansen and Maldonatus. Second, because by His doctrine He showed us the same way. Third, because He inspires in us faith, grace, and holy works and merits, by which as ways we tend toward eternal life. Fourth, because He Himself went before us on this way to heaven by His holy life and passion, and was the first to tread it, so that we, following and imitating Him in the same, might come to the heaven to which He ascended and came.
This is the true sense of this passage. But because this is a golden saying of Christ, hear the various and elegant senses and opinions of the Fathers on it.
First then, St. Leo, Sermon 2 On the Resurrection: Christ, he says, is the way of holy conversation, the truth of divine doctrine, the life of eternal beatitude.
Secondly, St. Cyril, book IX, chapter 33: Christ, he says, is for us the way through the action of life, the truth through the rectitude of faith, the life through the fount of sanctification. And he adds: "Three things are necessary, he says, that we may obtain the heavenly mansions: the working of virtue, right faith, and the hope of life"; and for this reason the Lord says: "I am the way," because He gave us the law, and by word and example taught us to despise the world and act holily. He is the truth, because He Himself is the most upright rule of our faith, and taught us divine truths. He is the life, because the life we hope for, no one can bestow upon us but He Himself. So the sense will be, as if to say: No one comes to the Father (who is very true life and beatitude) unless by charity he walks in Me, who am the way; and by faith believes in Me, who am the truth; and by hope trusts in Me, who am the eternal life.
Thirdly, St. Bernard, Sermon 2 On the Ascension: "Let us follow You, O Lord, through You, to You, because You are the way, the truth, and the life: the way in example, the truth in promise, the life in reward." The same Bernard, Sermon 7 on the Lord's Supper: "I," he says, "am the way by which one must go; and the truth to which one must come; and the life in which one must remain. I am the way without error, the truth without falsity, the life without death. I am the way in example, the truth in promise, the life in reward. I am the way accessible, the truth irrevocable, the life unending. I am the way broad and spacious, the truth powerful and abundant, the life delightful and glorious." Thus far St. Bernard, or whoever is the author; for the style argues another author.
Fourthly, St. Augustine: Christ, he says, is the way according to humanity, by which He came to us and returned to the Father; He is the same, truth and life, according to divinity. Hear him, Sermon 55 On the Words of the Lord according to John: "By what way do you wish to go? I am the way; where do you wish to go? I am the truth; where do you wish to remain? I am the life. Every man desires truth and life; even the Philosophers saw that God is a certain life and truth, but not every one found the way. Therefore the Word of God, which with the Father is truth and life, by assuming humanity was made the way: walk through the man and you shall arrive at God; it is better to limp on the way than to walk strongly off the way." The same Augustine here, tract 69: "Through the form of a servant," he says, "the Lord came to us and returned to Himself, bringing flesh back from death to life: God had come through the flesh to men, truth to liars: but God is truthful, while every man is a liar; yet He did not leave Himself when He came to us: for he who speaks, in a certain way proceeds to his hearers, nor does he leave himself; but when he is silent, as it were he returns to himself, and remains with them if they hold what they have heard. The Lord Himself, through Himself and to Himself, and to the Father — and we through Him and to Him and to the Father — we go."
Fifthly, St. Hilary, book VII On the Trinity: "He does not seduce us," he says, "who is the way; nor does He entice by falsehoods, who is the truth; nor does He leave us in the horror of death, who is the life." The same, in the book On the Essence of the Father and the Son: "He does not lead," he says, "through wandering paths, because He is the way; nor does He delude through falsehoods, because He is the truth; nor does He leave us in the horror of death, because He is the life: if He is the way, you do not need another guide; if He is the truth, I do not speak falsely; if He is the life, even when dying you shall come to Me."
Sixthly, St. Chrysostom, homily 72: "I am the way," he says, "because through Me you shall come; I am the truth, because without doubt these things which I have said shall be; I am the life, because not even death itself shall be able to prevent you from coming to Me." To this is added Toletus, who explains thus: "I am the way," because through Me one must pass from sin to justice, from this world to eternal beatitude. "I am the truth," because the justice and beatitude which I promise, Christ becomes the way for you; but truth, when you persevere in contemplation; and life is added, because action and contemplation must be referred to God.
St. Basil notes that Christ is called the way, to signify that Christians must daily walk and advance on the way of virtue, according to that passage of the Psalmist: "They shall go from strength to strength; the God of gods shall be seen in Sion." "Hearing the word 'way,'" he says, "we understand the sequence and order through works of justice, and through the illumination of knowledge leading to legitimate progress, always hastening to what lies ahead, and stretching ourselves to what remains, until we arrive at the blessed end, which is the knowledge of God, which the Lord will bestow through Himself on those who believe in Him. For truly He is a good way, ignorant of deviation and error, our Lord Jesus, leading to the Father who is truly good. No one, He says, comes to the Father except through Me. Such is our return to God through the Son." Thus far St. Basil, in his book On the Holy Spirit, chapter VIII, who says that Christ is the way, not only through faith but also through the working of virtues.
Seventh, St. Ambrose, in the book On the Good of Death, chapter XII: "Christ says: I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through Me. Let us enter upon this way, let us hold fast to the truth, let us follow life. The way leads us on, the truth confirms, the life is bestowed on those who persevere." And a little later: "We follow You, Lord Jesus, but let us follow when called, for without You no one ascends. For You are the way, the truth, and the life, because in the way there is possibility, in the truth there is faith, in the life there is reward. Receive us as the way, confirm us as the truth, vivify us as the life."
Symbolically: Christ is the way of beginners, cleansing them through hatred of sin and detestation of their former life; the same is the truth of those making progress, enlightening them through examples of virtues and zeal for a new and holy way of life; the same is the life of the perfect, uniting them to God through the affection of pure love. Hear St. Bernard, sermon 7 on the Marriage at Cana, piling up many things: "I am the way of beginners, the truth of those advancing, the life of those arriving; I am the bright and serene way, the living truth without pain, the happy and pleasant life; I am the way on the gibbet, the truth in hell, the life in the joy of the resurrection; I am the way in which there is no thorn or thistle; the truth in which there is no sting of falsehood; the life in which the dead lives again; I am the straight way, the perfect truth, the life that shall remain without end; I am the way of reconciliation, the truth of retribution, the life of eternal blessedness. No one comes to the Father except through Me," as if to say: No one comes to Me, the truth and the life, except through Me, the way.
Anagogically, St. Augustine, in the Sentences, n. 268: "The Lord says: I am the way, the truth, and the life — through Me one comes, to Me one arrives, in Me one remains. For when one arrives at Him, one also arrives at the Father, because He is known through the equal One to whom He is equal, with the Holy Spirit binding and joining us together, that we may remain in the highest and unchangeable good without end." Hence St. Bernard, when dying, appeared to a certain absent person saying that he was ascending upward, "because truth is on high": for on earth below there is nothing but vanity and falsehood, as Ecclesiastes teaches. "There is (said St. Bernard) no knowledge here, no recognition of truth; above is the fullness of knowledge, above is the true knowledge of truth." So his Life has it, book V, chapter III. And when St. Benedict was dying, this vision was shown concerning him to two of his monks. "For they saw," says St. Gregory, book II of the Dialogues, chapter 37, "that a road, strewn with garments and gleaming with innumerable lamps, stretched in a straight path toward the East from his cell up to heaven. A man of venerable bearing standing near from above asked whose road it was that they beheld. They confessed that they did not know. He said to them: This is the way by which Benedict, the beloved of the Lord, ascends to heaven."
"I am the life," who will make you rise from death, so that I may take you to Myself; for death will not be able to prevent you from coming to Me, because I am the cause of life.
FOR NO ONE COMES TO THE FATHER EXCEPT THROUGH ME. — For I am the way to the Father, who is the goal. For the Father is blessed life itself, beatifying all the Saints, as I have already said. "No one," namely of men. Suarez adds: "no one" also of the angels; for he holds and proves at length that all these have received all their grace and glory from Christ and His merits, in part III, question XIX, article 3, disputation XLII, section 1.
Verse 7: If You Had Known Me, You Would Certainly Have Known My Father Also; and From Now On You Know Him, and Have Seen Him
7. IF YOU HAD KNOWN ME, YOU WOULD CERTAINLY HAVE KNOWN MY FATHER ALSO. — Christ meets the objection. For the disciples could have objected: You, O Christ, assert that You are the way, but the Father is the goal toward which You go. But we do not know the Father, hence we do not know the goal to which we must go; therefore make us know the Father. Again, if the Father is the goal and You are the way, how then did You say: "I am the way, the truth, the life," that is, I am the way and the end of the way? Christ replies that both are true. For, He says, I have one essence with the Father, one and the same divinity. Therefore "if you had known Me" fully and perfectly, "you would certainly have known My Father also." The Apostles did indeed know and believe that Christ was the Son of God, but they did not yet believe that He was consubstantial with the Father and had the same essence and deity numerically with Him; but they came to know this afterwards, when they had received the Holy Spirit. Hence He adds:
AND FROM NOW ON YOU KNOW HIM, AND HAVE SEEN HIM. — Hilary reads "you shall know" in the future; as if to say: You will now know the Father at Pentecost through the illumination of the Holy Spirit, indeed you have already seen Him in Me: for "he who sees Me sees My Father also," as Christ adds. The Greek, Syriac, and Arabic have γινώσκετε, that is, you know, in the present; as if to say: You now know the Father, because you have seen Him in Me working so many virtues and miracles. For even if you have not seen Him nakedly in His essence and deity, you have nevertheless seen Him veiled in Me and in My humanity as in a cloud, through the signs and miracles which He hurls forth from it like lightning and thunder. Thus Cyril, Chrysostom, and others.
Verse 8: Philip Said to Him: Lord, Show Us the Father, and It Is Enough for Us
8. PHILIP SAYS TO HIM: LORD, SHOW US THE FATHER, AND IT IS ENOUGH FOR US. — Philip did not understand Christ's answer, namely how he who knows Christ also knows the Father; he therefore insists that Christ Himself show them the Father, as if to say: You say that the Father is in You, and is as it were hidden. Open Yourself, and show Him to us. For the Father is the principle, fountain, and origin of the divinity, as St. Dionysius says, chapter II On the Divine Names; St. Augustine, book V On the Trinity, chapters XIII and XIV; and the Sixth Council of Toledo, in its Confession of Faith.
AND IT IS ENOUGH FOR US. — First, St. Chrysostom, as if to say: We desire nothing else than that the Father be shown to us.
Second, St. Cyril: "it is enough for us," namely for beatitude, that we may be freed from all disturbance, sorrow, and fear, because since the Father is God, He Himself will beatify us.
Third, "it is enough for us," to confound the Jews who deny that You are the Son of God. So also Cyril.
Fourth, more simply: "it is enough for us," that we may believe You and give credence to the things You have already said and promised us about the many mansions in heaven, as if to say: Instead of all the reasons which You, O Christ, heap up to console us, grieving at Your death, we ask for one thing, that You show us the Father; for this one thing will be and suffice for us in place of all. So roughly St. Hilary, book VII On the Trinity.
Anagogically, the Interlinear Gloss: The Father will suffice us, because in Him there will be sufficiency for us. And the Gloss, as if to say: In whom is sufficiency, and not in You. Hear St. Augustine, book I On the Trinity, chapter VIII: "That joy, which will fill us with His countenance, requires nothing more; which Philip had well understood, so as to say: Lord, show us the Father, and it is enough for us; but he had not yet understood that he could say: Lord, show us Yourself, and it is enough for us; and in order that he might understand this, the reply was given him: So long a time I have been with you," etc.
Hence that saying of St. Augustine is true: "If you suffice for God, may your God suffice for you." For God is Shaddai, that is, sufficiency, plenty, abundance of all good things, as I showed on Genesis XVII, 1. For He alone is the satiety of the heart, the rest of the soul, the jubilation of minds. Hence the Psalmist: "We shall be satisfied when Thy glory shall appear," Psalm XVI, 15. And: "They shall be inebriated with the plenty of Thy house, and Thou shalt make them drink of the torrent of Thy pleasure," Psalm XXXV, 9. And: "For what have I in heaven, and what have I desired upon earth besides Thee? my flesh and my heart have failed. God of my heart, and God my portion forever," Psalm LXXII, 25.
The a priori reason is that God created man to His own image and likeness; therefore He gave him an infinite capacity and infinite desire, which cannot be filled and satisfied by many finite goods. Therefore it is necessary that God alone, who is the infinite good, fill and satisfy it, according to that saying of St. Augustine, book I of the Confessions, chapter 1: "You have made us, O Lord, for Yourself, and our heart is restless until it rests in You." Hence the same St. Augustine, on Psalm CII: "For cattle," he says, "it is good to fill the belly, to sleep, to taste, to live, to be in health, to beget. Is that the kind of good you seek? Heir of Christ, why do you rejoice that you are a companion of cattle? Lift up your hope to the good of all goods; He Himself will be the good, by whom you have been made good in your kind, and all things in their kind have been made good: who satisfies your desire with good things." The same, on Psalm LXII: "If you love riches," he says, "God Himself will be your riches; do you love a good fountain? What is more splendid than that Wisdom? what more luminous? Whatever can here be loved, He who made all things will be for you in place of all. As with marrow and fatness may my soul be filled."
Verse 9: Jesus Said to Him: So Long a Time Have I Been With You, and You Have Not Known Me? Philip, He Who Sees Me Sees the Father Also
9. JESUS SAYS TO HIM: SO LONG A TIME HAVE I BEEN WITH YOU (for three years conversing I have taught you who I am), AND YOU HAVE NOT KNOWN (the Greek, Chrysostom, and Cyril read, "you have not known" in the singular) ME, namely that I am not only a man, but also the Son of God, not diverse from Him in essence and existence, but ὁμοούσιος and consubstantial with God the Father Himself. For this reason, having seen Me, you desire to see the Father, because you think that the Father is plainly diverse from Me and has a different nature, as if to say: I have seen Jesus the Son of God, it remains for me to see His Father, distinct from Him, as happens among men. This is the root of your error; therefore cutting it off, I affirm to you and say: Philip, he who sees Me sees the Father also. — as if to say: Since I and the Father are plainly one and the same — namely, one divine essence, one, I say, not only in species, but one in the individual — hence he who sees Me through the humanity which I assumed, in the same way that he sees Me, sees also My Father, because I and the Father are one. Note here: In Christ the humanity was seen in itself, but the divinity per accidens, because it was not seen in itself, but only through the humanity, just as the soul is seen through the body in which it moves and acts. Therefore he who with the bodily eye (about which Philip was chiefly asking, and Christ was answering; for with the eye of the mind, He says they did not know Him, namely fully and perfectly) was seeing this man in himself, namely Jesus, was indirectly and per accidens seeing His deity, because this man was truly God. Therefore since there is one and the same God, by the same reasoning by which he was seeing God the Son, by the same act he was seeing God the Father; I speak as regards the essence, which is the same and common to both, not as regards the person: for the person of the Son assumed humanity, but not the person of the Father. Therefore he who directly saw this man, directly saw the person of the Son of God hidden in the man, but not the person of the Father, except by concomitance, as I will say on verse 10. In like manner, he who with the eye of the mind saw, and from the miracles recognized this man, namely Jesus, to be the Son of God, also by the same means recognized God to be His Father, both because no one can beget God the Son except God the Father, and because there is only one divinity, which is consequently numerically the same in the Father and in the Son; therefore he who sees or knows the deity of the Son, knows also the deity of the Father, since it is one and the same. So St. Augustine, Cyril, Chrysostom, Hilary, and other Fathers everywhere against the Arians, who from this passage prove first, that Jesus was truly God, so that he who saw this man, saw God equally. Second, that the person of the Son of God is one, and that of God the Father another: which Sabellius denied; for these words mark this diversity of persons: "Me and My Father"; for the person of the Father is one, the person of the Son another, inasmuch as He is begotten from the Father. Third, that the Son is ὁμοούσιος with the Father; for unless He were ὁμοούσιος with the Father, the Son could be seen without the Father being seen, and vice versa the Father could be seen without the Son being seen, as happens in human affairs, where often children are known without their parents being known. Therefore you err, O Philip, in desiring, having seen Me, to see the Father, as though you were about to see another God and another deity, since there is but one and the same: "How then do you say: Show us the Father?" For I have already shown Him to you in Myself, as I said.
Finally Hilary, book VII On the Trinity, and Ribera hold that he who sees the Son sees also the Father; because the Son is the character and figure of the Father's substance, that is, the express and full image and likeness of the Father, just as in an image expressed in wax the very form of the seal by which it was impressed is seen. But Christ here is not so much treating of likeness as of the identity of the divine nature, as Toletus rightly notes.
This is the true sense, by which Christ directly answers the question and the mind of Philip; but because Christ, seizing the occasion of a question, is accustomed to rise higher and carry His hearers upward, and to teach more sublime things and to include them in the same discourse; hence, second, this passage can be taken of every proper knowledge of the Father and the Son, whether by faith or by vision, as if to say: He who sees Me according to My divinity, sees the Father also, because although He is distinct from Me, nevertheless I am in Him and He is in Me through the identity of nature; therefore he who sees, that is, believes, Me to be the Son of God, also sees, that is, believes, God to be My Father; and he who by the beatific vision sees Me intuitively, intuitively sees also the Father. So from St. Cyril, Augustine, Chrysostom, and Hilary, Maldonatus here, and Suarez, in the book On the Divine Attributes, chapter XXIII, n. 11, who hence teaches that the Blessed, when they see the divine essence, likewise see the three persons in it.
Verse 10: Do You Not Believe That I Am in the Father, and the Father Is in Me? The Words That I Speak, I Do Not Speak of Myself; But the Father Who Abides in Me, He Does the Works
10. DO YOU NOT BELIEVE THAT I AM IN THE FATHER, AND THE FATHER IS IN ME? — Note first: Here again the distinction of the divine persons is signified; for one is not properly said to be in himself, but in another. Second, the identity of the divine nature is signified; for because the Father and the Son are and exist in one and the same divine nature, hence the Father is in the Son and the Son in the Father. Christ proves this from the effect, namely because He Himself had His doctrine and works from the Father and in common with the Father; therefore He also had the same nature in common with Him. So Cyril and Leontius. Hence consequently, third, by this saying is signified the perfect and intimate conjunction and indwelling of one divine person in another, and vice versa, by which it comes about that the Father is in the Son and the Holy Spirit, the Son in the Father and the Holy Spirit, the Holy Spirit in the Father and the Son; which Damascene, book I On the Faith, chapter XI, calls περιχώρησις, and from him the Scholastics call circumincession; about which mystery St. Augustine treats in book VI On the Trinity, final chapter; St. Hilary, book IV On the Trinity; St. Ambrose, on chapter XIII of the Second Epistle to the Corinthians. "Each," says St. Augustine, "are in each, and all in each, and each in all, and all in all, and all are one." Each divine person therefore exists in each of the others not only as regards essence, but also as regards relation and His own proper person, because all are most intimate and most closely joined to one another, as I have more fully shown from Suarez and others on Isaiah XLV, 14, at the words: "Surely God is in Thee." Whence it follows that he who fully knows and sees one person, e.g., the Son, as the Blessed see Him, not only sees the deity common to the Father and the Son, but also sees the very person of the Father, both because the person of the Father is intimate to the person of the Son, and because He includes essential relation and order to it; for the Father is essentially He who begets the Son; and this is what Christ says here: "Do you not believe that I am in the Father, and the Father is in Me?" St. Hilary adds that the Son is most like the Father, inasmuch as He is His character and living image.
THE WORDS THAT I SPEAK, I DO NOT SPEAK OF MYSELF. — as if to say: The words which I speak are not human, but divine; therefore they proceed not from My humanity, but from the divinity which I received from the Father, as from their proper cause: whence he who hears Me speaking, hears not so much Me, as God the Father speaking in Me and through Me. Note: The deity common to the Father and the Son was the efficient cause of the divine words which Christ uttered; yet the thing signified by the words was often the proper person of the Son, not the Father, as when He said: I am the Son of God, I am the Word, I assumed flesh, The things which I say and do, I have received from the Father. For these things He was saying of Himself, not of the Father, as is clear; for the Father did not become man, but the Son; the Father however, equally with the Son, was the efficient cause, both of the Incarnation and of the words uttered by the incarnate Word. For the works of the Holy Trinity ad extra, as the theologians say, are undivided and common to the three divine persons.
BUT THE FATHER WHO ABIDES IN ME, HE DOES THE WORKS. — "The Father," as the first principle, not only of creatures, but also of the other divine persons, namely the Son and the Holy Spirit. For when the Father by begetting communicated His deity to the Son, He also communicated to Him His omnipotence, power, and operation. Therefore if not the Son, but the Father Himself had assumed humanity, He would have spoken and done exactly the same things that the Son spoke and did, both because the Father spoke and acted in the Son, and because the deity and omnipotence of the Father and the Son is the same, which spoke and wrought all things in the Son through the humanity He assumed. Whence Christ leaves it to the Apostles to gather, as if to say: Therefore, when you see and hear Me, consider that My Father is seen and heard by you. And from these My sayings and deeds, says Ribera, you can understand how good My Father is, how gentle, how much He loves you; from My miracles you can recognize My omnipotence, that I know all things and have all good things in Me; from which you understand that the Father likewise has the same, and that in Him you will have the true abundance of all good things; and since these outward things lead you to the knowledge of such great goods, what do you think it will be, if you were to behold the essence of Me and of the Father without mirror and riddle? Therefore He is not speaking of essential knowledge, but of that which can be had on the way.
Verse 11: Do You Not Believe That I Am in the Father, and the Father Is in Me? Otherwise Believe on Account of the Very Works
11. Do you not believe that I am in the Father, and the Father is in Me? 12. OTHERWISE (Syriac: if not) BELIEVE ON ACCOUNT OF THE VERY WORKS. — For "you do not believe," the Greek has πιστεύετέ μοι, that is, "believe me"; and so read the Syriac, the Arabic, Euthymius, Cyril, and Hilary, book VII On the Trinity, but the meaning comes to the same thing, and one includes the other, as if to say: Do you not believe that I am in the Father and the Father in Me? Believe, because I assert this to you. Otherwise, if you do not believe Me when I simply assert it, believe at least because of the very works, because the Father, by working in Me and through Me so many and so great miracles, by the very works shows that He dwells in Me and works such great things through Me, just as the soul shows that it is in the body through motion, sight, hearing, touch, and the other vital operations which it performs through the body.
AMEN, AMEN I SAY TO YOU, HE WHO BELIEVES IN ME, THE WORKS THAT I DO, HE ALSO SHALL DO, AND GREATER THAN THESE SHALL HE DO. — Christ wishes to prove that the Father is in Him, and He in the Father; the force of the argument consists in this, as if to say: He who believes that the Father is in Me, will, by this faith, or by the force and power of this faith, perform miracles and divine works similar to those which I perform, indeed he will perform greater ones than I perform. Therefore that faith must be true, namely that which believes that the Father is in Me and operates. For the Father operates through true faith and bears witness to its truth through miraculous works, but not to false faith; otherwise He Himself, who is the first truth, would be witness and approver of falsehood and lying.
And greater than these shall he do, not every faithful person who believes in Me, but some of them, such as the Apostles and Apostolic men.
What were these greater things? First, Origen, homily 7 on Numbers, holds that these greater things are that fragile men conquer the flesh, the demon, and the world: for more, he says, is it that Christ conquers in us, than that He conquers in Himself.
Second, St. Chrysostom: The greater things, he says, are that St. Peter with his shadow healed any sick people whatsoever, Acts V, 15 — for Christ did not do this — and similar things.
Third and rather, St. Augustine, treatise 72, holds that these greater things are the conversion of all the nations of the whole world, made through the twelve Apostles. For Christ converted far fewer, namely only about five hundred, for so many are named, 1 Corinthians XV, 6. Hear St. Augustine, whose lengthy words I have compressed into a few: "What are these greater things — is it perhaps that the shadow healed the sick? For it is greater that a shadow should heal than a fringe; but when He said this, He was commending the deeds of His words; for when He said: The Father abiding in Me, He does the works — by works He meant the words which He spoke, whose fruit was their faith; and when the disciples were preaching the Gospel, not so few as those were, but also the Gentiles believed; the rich man departed sorrowful from the Lord's presence; yet afterwards what that one man did not do, many did, when He was speaking through the disciples; but He was not speaking only of the Apostles when He said: He who believes in Me, etc. For the very believing in Christ is a work of Christ, which He works in us, yet not without us; He makes us do, that is, out of impious we become just." He then adds a marvelous and paradoxical thing: "And I would say this is greater than creating heaven and earth; for these shall pass away, but the salvation and justification of the predestined shall remain. The angels also in heaven are works of Christ, even if it is of equal power to create them and to justify the impious; this is of greater mercy. Although there is no necessity to understand all the works of Christ when He says: Greater than these shall he do; for perhaps He spoke of those works which He was then doing; and He was doing the words of faith: but it is less to preach the words of justice, which He did for our sake, than to justify the impious, which He so does in us that we also do it." And the Gloss: "What He does in us, not without us, is greater than those things which He does without us, like heaven and earth. For in those there is only the work of God, in these the image of God."
You will ask: Why did Christ wish to work greater things through the Apostles than through Himself? I answer: First, because He wished faith in Himself to be gradually disseminated and to grow, lest if it grew suddenly it should be thought to be a phantasm, and Christ be thought a magician or impostor,
Verse 13: And Whatsoever You Shall Ask the Father in My Name
13. And whatsoever you shall ask the Father (so the Roman edition, St. Chrysostom, Cyril, and others, although the Greek, Arabic, and Syriac now do not have "the Father") in My name, this I will do: that the Father may be glorified in the Son. — These words refer to what preceded: "And greater works shall he do; because I go to the Father." For after faith, of which He said in the preceding verse: "He who believes in Me, greater works than these shall he do," here He appends the profession of faith in His name, the invocation of it, and the petition for these greater works, as if to say: I indeed depart from you, O Apostles, and go to the Father; but in place of My presence I leave and give to you the invocation of My name, that through it you may ask for these greater things and obtain them. Wherefore Christ here signifies His divinity and His authority equal to the Father's, as Cyril says; for it is the glory of the Son that through invocation of Him the Father grants to the Apostles things so great, indeed greater, than those the Son did while He lived. And thus the Father is glorified in the Son, and the Son in the Apostles.
In My Name — that is, invoking My name; or, as if to say: if you ask through My merits, through My power and faith, as the Church does, which concludes all her prayers saying: "Through our Lord Jesus Christ," etc.
This I Will Do. — I will bring it about that the Father grants it to you; indeed I Myself, being in the Father and with the Father, will do the same thing and will accomplish it for you, so that all the power, strength, and glory of these greater works which you shall perform may be ascribed to Me, not to you. For when the Father is prayed to, the Son is also prayed to, says Suarez, Book I On Prayer in general, chapter ix, at the end. Or else, as the same author adds in the same place, "Father" here is taken essentially for God and the whole Holy Trinity, as it is taken when we pray: "Our Father, who art in heaven"; and thus under the name of the Father is also understood the Son and the Holy Spirit. The former is more genuine, because Christ here throughout distinguishes the Father from Himself.
That the Father May Be Glorified in the Son. — Christ customarily, out of modesty, refers all His glory to the Father as to the first fount and origin. Again, learn from this that wondrous works and miracles are not to be sought except for the glory of God, or when the glory of God requires and demands that they be done.
Let prelates, princes, and superiors learn here from Christ to keep for themselves the smaller and humbler tasks and to leave the greater and more splendid ones to their subjects. For thus they will obtain the praise of humility, the gratitude of their subjects, and the glory of the people. For they will accomplish greater things through their subjects than through themselves: for what a subject does, the superior is reckoned to do through him. St. Ignatius, founder of our Society, once made General, publicly catechized, while to his fellow subjects he gave the ample pulpits of sermons. He also decreed that the Rectors of the Society, at the beginning of their Rectorship, should publicly exercise catechesis.
So that whatever they ask in His name — that is, through His merits — He Himself may do and bestow upon them. St. Augustine raises an objection: "Paul prayed that the angel of Satan might depart, yet did not receive it; but notice that it is said: In My name, which is Jesus. For what we ask against our salvation we do not ask in the name of the Savior; because He will not be Savior to him if He does what hinders his salvation. The physician knows what the sick man asks for his salvation and what against it, and therefore he does not do the will of one asking the contrary, in order to restore health; and sometimes even some things which we ask in His name He does not do at the moment we ask, yet He does do them: for they are deferred, not denied."
Verse 14: If You Ask Me Anything in My Name, This I Will Do
14. If you ask Me anything in My name, this I will do. — The Arabic has: "I will do for you whatever you wish." What Christ said in the preceding verse about the Father, here He says of Himself, to show that He is the same God with the Father, inasmuch as He hears those who pray and does all that the Father does. Whence Cyril asserts that Christ here signifies His own divinity. Some think that the very same thing is stated and confirmed here as He said in the preceding verse. Hence Chrysostom and Nonnus omit this verse, but the Syriac, Arabic, St. Augustine, St. Cyril, Theophylact, and Euthymius read it.
Better do Toletus and others judge that something different is said here. For that saying in the preceding verse, "And whatsoever you shall ask the Father in My name," pertains to the petition for greater works, of which He had said, "greater works than these shall he do"; but in this verse Christ says He will hear their particular prayers, so that, although He goes to the Father and is absent in body, He is nevertheless always present in spirit, and hears their prayers and succors their needs.
First, because what grows gradually gradually acquires faith in itself, and grows more and lasts longer; for what is done quickly perishes quickly.
Second, that Christ's equanimity and modesty, as well as His power and magnificence, might be more commended: for not only was He so powerful in Himself to work such things, but He also had the strength and efficacy to transfuse the same power into the Apostles, so that they did similar, indeed greater things. For the Apostles did these things not by their own power but by Christ's — namely, by the strength, authority, and power received from Christ. Wherefore Christ was greater than those through whom He worked these greater things.
Third, because it was fitting that Christ should first suffer and die, and through His Passion and death merit these wonderful works, which He afterward performed through the Apostles.
Fourth, because it was fitting that Christ should first rise, ascend into heaven, and from there send the Holy Spirit, who would work such wonders. For the conversion of the world was the effect, as well as the glory, ornament, and crown of Christ's resurrection, ascension, and sending of the Holy Spirit. This cause Christ adds, saying: "Because I go to the Father."
Because I Go to the Father. — As if to say: After death, when I have gained the victory, triumphing over sin, death, the devil, the world, and hell, I shall ascend gloriously to the throne of the Father, and therefore through you I shall perform greater works than I myself performed in this life while still struggling. The time of My humility and lowliness is fulfilled; I shall receive My glory. There is no reason for Me to hide My face in poverty and humility as I did, for I wished to give place to My Passion and the redemption of mankind; but once these are accomplished, I shall soon gloriously ascend to the Father, who will wish My name to be made known, celebrated, worshiped, and adored throughout the whole world by the preaching of the Apostles. Wherefore through them He will work greater things than He wrought through Me in life. So Cyril, Book IX, chap. XLI, Toletus, and others.
Verse 15: If You Love Me, Keep My Commandments
15. If you love Me, keep My commandments. — Christ here, bidding His disciples His last farewell, gives His final counsels, three of them, concerning the three principal Theological virtues, namely, faith, hope, and charity, to be preserved and exercised. Of faith, when He says in verse 1: "You believe in God, believe also in Me." Of hope, when He says in verse 13: "Whatever you ask the Father in My name, this I will do." For petition, or prayer, is an act of hope. Of charity, when He says here: "If you love Me, keep My commandments." And these three are connected with each other. For faith begets hope, and hope begets charity. The sense then is, as if to say: If you wish to obtain these My promises, and to impetrate what you ask in My name — that I may obtain them for you from the Father, indeed bestow them through Myself — love in return Him who so loves you; persevere and grow in My love. But this you will do if you observe My commandments which I have given you. As if to say: If you wish to please Me, and to obtain through Me all you ask, keep My commandments. So Ribera, Toletus, Maldonatus, and others. Christ therefore, departing, admonishes His own to persist in faith, hope, love, and observance of the commandments in Him. If they do this, He promises a great reward, saying:
Verse 16: And I Will Ask the Father, and He Shall Give You Another Paraclete
16. And I will ask the Father, and He shall give you another Paraclete. — As if to say: If you persevere in My love and in the keeping of My commandments, by My prayers I shall obtain for you the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will pour out upon you at Pentecost, who shall work great things, indeed greater, through you than I have done.
And I Will Ask — as man: for Christ as man prays for us, says St. Augustine.
And Another Paraclete. — "Another," that is, other than Myself. Hence it is clear that Christ also was the Paraclete of the Apostles and faithful — that is: first, advocate, intercessor, pleader, according to that word of Paul: "We have an Advocate with God the Father, Jesus Christ," says St. Augustine; second, exhorter, stirrer, impeller; third, consoler, as the Syriac translates; for these three things the Greek parakletos signifies. But departing, Christ sent another Paraclete, namely the Holy Spirit, who succeeded Christ in these three roles. For He is first the advocate and companion of the faithful, because "He intercedes for us with unspeakable groanings," Rom. viii, 26. He is likewise our exhorter and consoler; which two offices Christ here chiefly has in view, as if to say: Up to now I have taught, ruled, and consoled you, O My disciples, and therefore because of My imminent departure you are grieving; but lift up your minds and trust; for in My place I shall send you another Paraclete, who will not for a short time, as I, but your whole life long teach, encourage, console, and protect you. Whence Euthymius so expounds: He will give you another Paraclete, that is, another admonisher and teacher in the contests of virtue, comfort and support in afflictions. The Holy Spirit therefore is Paraclete, that is: first, exhorter, stirrer, impeller, because He stirred the Apostles to undertake arduous works of virtue for God's glory, and to evangelize freely throughout the whole world, not fearing tyrants, torturers, racks, fires, indeed courting the most atrocious death and martyrdom for Christ. Second, consoler, because in adversities, hardships, doubts, and temptations He consoled and strengthened them: for the Holy Spirit is as it were a shining and burning fire, and therefore dispels all the darkness, fear, and torpor of the soul. So St. Chrysostom; and, as St. Bernard says, Sermon 2 On Pentecost: "Those whom He fills, He makes fervent in spirit and to know in truth." And a little before: "The Paraclete bestows the pledge of salvation, the light of knowledge, and the strength of life, so that what is impossible by nature becomes possible — indeed easy — by His grace." See what I have said about the Holy Spirit at Acts II, 1 ff.; Isaiah XI, 1 ff., and elsewhere.
He Will Give to You — O Apostles, at the coming Pentecost. Hence St. Jerome, Question IX to Hedibia, refutes the heresy of Montanus, Priscilla, and Maximilla, whose follower was Tertullian, who said that long after the Apostles the Holy Spirit first descended upon the heresiarch Montanus in the year of the Lord 220, and therefore that Montanus was the Paraclete promised by Christ. See St. Epiphanius, Heresy 48; and St. Augustine, Heresies 26 and 86.
That He May Abide with You Forever. — From this promise of Christ it follows that the Holy Spirit always remains in the Church and assists the faithful as Paraclete — that is, as consoler in afflictions and impeller to any works of virtue, even heroic ones. St. Augustine raises an objection: "How shall we keep the commandments in order to receive Him whom, unless we have, we cannot keep the commandments? He replies: He who loves has the Holy Spirit, and by having merits to have more, and by having more loves more. So the disciples already had the Spirit, but He was to be given them more fully; they had Him hiddenly, they were about to receive Him manifestly." And St. Chrysostom: "After the disciples had been purified through the Passion, and sent into dangers and contests, it was fitting that the Holy Spirit be given in abundance."
Verse 17: The Spirit of Truth
17. The Spirit of Truth. — Why is the Holy Spirit called "the Spirit of truth"? Cyril answers first: because He is the Spirit of the Son, that is, proceeding by spiration from the Son, to whom wisdom and truth are appropriated, according to that word of verse 6: "I am the way, the truth, and the life."
Second, because the Holy Spirit made known to the world that Jesus is God and the Son of God, the Messiah and Savior. For this is what Christ was urging here when He said in verse 9: "Philip, he who sees Me sees also the Father, etc.; I am in the Father, and the Father is in Me." So St. Basil, Book II On the Holy Spirit, chap. XVIII.
Third, Euthymius says: The Holy Spirit is called "the Spirit of truth" — that is, most true and most excellent — and is set in opposition to angel, soul, and wind, which are spirits, but analogically and by participation, since the Holy Spirit by essence is the purest and most powerful Spirit.
Fourth, "of truth," because He is worthy of faith, says St. Chrysostom.
Fifth, others take "of truth" to mean "of the New Testament." For the Holy Spirit was reserved for the New Testament, as the Spirit of liberty and love, whereas in the Old He was the Spirit of servitude and fear.
Sixth, and most plainly, the Holy Spirit is "the Spirit of truth" because He is the author of all truth, and is alone the teacher and bestower of pure and complete truth, who teaches us all truths necessary for salvation and frees us from all errors. For Christ thus explains in chapter xvi: "When, however, that Spirit of truth shall come, He shall teach you all truth" (so in Isaiah XI, 2, the same Spirit is called the Spirit of wisdom, counsel, piety, fortitude, because He inspires in us wisdom, counsel, piety, fortitude): "all truth," I say, but especially the Gospel truth, which is threefold — namely: first, the very reality of Christ and His grace, prefigured and adumbrated by the shadows, ceremonies, and figures of the old law; second, the fulfillment of all God's promises (for Christ fulfilled them, and the Holy Spirit shows this to the Apostles); third, the knowledge of divine things, insofar as it is necessary for salvation.
"The Spirit of truth" therefore is opposed to the evil spirit of the world, which is lying, erring, and deceitful. Hence Christ adds: "Whom the world cannot receive." Whence St. Augustine, in the book On the Grace of the New Testament, teaches that the Holy Spirit is the soul of the Church: "The Holy Spirit," he says, "is the love and bond of the Father and Son; to Him belongs the society by which we are made one. The body of man consists of many members, and one soul enlivens all the members, causing the eye to see, the ear to hear, and so in the rest; so the Holy Spirit contains and enlivens the members of the body of Christ, which is the Church."
Whom the World Cannot Receive. — "The world," that is, worldly men, animal and carnal, who gape after earthly desires — vain wealth, honors, delights — are incapable of the Holy Spirit, because He is wholly heavenly, spiritual, divine, teaching us to despise all earthly things as vain and to love and embrace heavenly things as true and solid. For, as the Apostle says, Rom. viii: "The prudence of the flesh is enemy to God." Whence St. Basil, in the book On the Holy Spirit: "As," he says, "in an unclean mirror the images of things cannot be received or seen, so man cannot receive the illumination of the Holy Spirit unless he casts off sin and the affection of the flesh."
Because It Sees Him Not, Neither Knows Him — because it has the eyes of the mind earthly, filled and blinded by the desires of the flesh. Whence neither does it "know Him," that is, it does not know Him practically, in such a way as to love, desire, taste, and seek Him.
But You Shall Know Him (knowing His power, efficacy, doctrine, holiness, heavenly and divine life): For He Shall Abide with You and Shall Be in You. — For by His presence in you He will exert His power, grace, and divine operation, whereby it will come about that you know Him, love Him when known, and breathe Him forth to others when loved. Just as the power of pepper is felt when it is crushed; or the power of fire latent in wood, when through flame it breaks forth into a great blaze.
Shall Abide. — The Vulgate with St. Augustine and Nonnus reads menei ("will abide"); the Greek, Syriac, Theophylact, and Euthymius read with a different accent menei, that is, "abides" (present). Hear St. Bernard, Sermon 20 among the minor sermons: the Holy Spirit "proceeds, breathes, inhabits, fills, glorifies. He is said to proceed in two ways — whence and whither. Whence? from the Father and Son. Whither? to the creature. By proceeding He predestines; by breathing He calls those whom He has predestined; by inhabiting He justifies those whom He has called; by filling He heaps with merits those whom He has justified; by glorifying He enriches with rewards those whom He has heaped with merits."
Verse 18: I Will Not Leave You Orphans: I Will Come to You
18. I Will Not Leave You Orphans (bereaved and destitute of Me, your Father): I Will Come to You. — Because Christ in verse 13 called His disciples "little children," He rightly says: "I will not leave you orphans" — that is, without a Father — because although I am going away from you to the Father and about to send you another Paraclete in My place, yet I shall not on that account desert you and leave you orphans, but going I will return and "come to you." Christ did this, first and properly, when after the resurrection He appeared bodily to the Apostles and taught, comforted, and gladdened them. So St. Augustine and Euthymius. Second, He did it at Pentecost, when He visibly sent them the Holy Spirit in the likeness of fiery tongues. So Cyril, Jansenius, and others. Third, He did it invisibly, when from heaven He often spiritually visited them and imparted to them His heavenly gifts. So St. Chrysostom. Fourth, He will do it visibly on the day of judgment, when in the judgment He will make the Apostles His assessors and will lead them with Himself in triumph into heaven. These things Christ will explain more in what follows.
Verse 19: Yet a Little While, and the World Sees Me No More. But You See Me
19. Yet a little while, and the world sees Me no more. But you see Me. — So the Roman and Greek editions read; but the Syriac, St. Augustine, Chrysostom, Theophylact, Euthymius, and Toletus read "you shall see" (the Arabic renders "you have seen"), because the present is here, according to custom, used for a future that is already at hand and imminent. As if to say: A short time of life remains to Me, namely a few hours, after which I shall die on the cross and be withdrawn from this life and world. Wherefore worldly men will see Me no more, but you, O disciples, see Me — that is, you shall see Me — because on the third day I shall rise from death and show Myself to be seen by you. For literally He speaks of sensible vision. So St. Augustine, Toletus, and others.
Tropologically: as the world will not see Me with the eye of the body, so neither will it see Me with the eye of the mind, because it will not believe in Me nor know Me to be the Messiah, the Son of God; but you will know this very thing more clearly by the illumination of the Holy Spirit, whom you will receive at Pentecost. So Ribera.
Anagogically: after the day of judgment the world shall not see Me reigning gloriously in heaven; but you shall see Me then thus, because I shall make you partakers of My glory. So St. Cyril, Chrysostom, and others.
Because I Live, and You Shall Live. — As if to say: You shall see Me, because on the third day I shall rise from death and live again; you likewise shall live, so that you may see Me risen again, and so that you may be able to preach My death and resurrection to the whole world. As if to say, as Theophylact has it: When you see Me living again, you will rejoice and will, as it were, revive from death at My appearance, just as Jacob, hearing that Joseph — whom he thought dead — was alive, revived as though waking from a heavy sleep, Gen. XLV, 26. Again, "you shall live" — more fully on the day of judgment, when through My life and resurrection I shall raise you up to the same blessed and glorious life, that you may live blessedly with Me in all happiness and glory in heaven for all eternity. So St. Augustine, Cyril, Chrysostom, Euthymius. He says in the present, "I live," to signify that He is about to rise from death at once. Hear St. Augustine: "Of the present He said He lives, of the future that they would live; for His resurrection was soon to come, but theirs was to be deferred until the end of the world. Yet because He lives, we too shall live: for through a man came death, and through a man the resurrection of the dead."
Verse 20: In That Day You Shall Know That I Am in My Father, and You in Me, and I in You
20. In That Day You Shall Know That I Am in My Father, and You in Me, and I in You. — As if to say: After I shall have risen, and especially after I, ascending into heaven, shall have sent into you the Holy Spirit, by His illumination you shall know more clearly and surely these three things: first, that "I am in the Father" through the unity of the divine essence — that is, that I am true God and the Son of God the Father. Second, that you are in Me through love, care, and keeping — that is, that I love, care for, and guard you singularly. Cyril subtly adds: that you are in Me through union of substance. For when I assumed your flesh and substance, I united to Myself all of human nature, and as it were coupled all men to Myself. Third, that I am in you, by indwelling in you through My grace, illuminating and directing you to every good and to eternal life in heaven. Whence the Interlinear Gloss: You shall know, it says, that I am in the Father as a ray in the sun, one with it; and you in Me, as branches in the vine; and I in you, as the vine in the branch, ever instilling and pouring into you the sap and life of grace. St. Hilary adds, Book VIII On the Trinity, that Christ is in us as food in the stomach, through the communication of the Eucharist: "He," he says, "is in the Father by the nature of divinity; we are in Him by His bodily birth; and He in turn is in us through the mystery of the Sacrament; for He says: He who eats My flesh and drinks My blood remains in Me, and I in him."
Verse 21: He Who Has My Commandments and Keeps Them, He It Is Who Loves Me
21. He Who Has My Commandments and Keeps Them, He It Is Who Loves Me. — As the Gloss says: Not only you Apostles will live and will know, but whoever loves Me, and therefore keeps My commandments. Toletus takes this of the ordinary faithful, who in Christ's time, besides the Apostles, believed in Him; for these are here admonished by Him to persevere in their faith, love, and obedience. For thus it will come about that they are loved in return by Him and by the Father, and that He will manifest Himself to them after the resurrection, showing Himself to have risen from the dead alive and glorious, as He did by appearing to more than five hundred brethren, 1 Cor. XV, 6. This sense is true and fitting, but narrower; for Christ is speaking to all the faithful of every age and time. The sense therefore is, as if to say: He who has My commandments — that is, who holds the precepts which he has heard from Me in memory, mind, and affection — "and keeps them," so as to carry them out in work; "who has them in memory, and keeps them in life," says St. Augustine; "who has them in words, and keeps them in works; who has them by hearing, and keeps them by doing; who has them by doing, and keeps them by persevering — he it is who loves Me," because he does what is pleasing and acceptable to Me, what I love and desire, what I wish to be done by him, what I commanded him, and I command under pain of My offense, wrath, vengeance, and hell. By a similar phrase and sense He said, in chapter v, 38: "And His word you have not abiding in you." For, as St. Gregory says, Homily 30, the proof of love is the showing of work; the love of God is never idle: for it works great things if it exists; but if it refuses to work, it is not love.
But He Who Loves Me Shall Be Loved by My Father. — Because My commandments are the Father's commandments; for I received them from the Father. Wherefore he who keeps them reveres and loves the Father, and does a thing most acceptable to Him. Hence in turn he calls forth His love upon himself, so that, loving God the Father, he is loved in return by Him, and is raised to greater graces by Him, and receives greater benefits from Him; for love is the magnet of love. Note here: We do not first love God, but God first loves us, and therefore He breathes into us the grace by which we may love Him in return. If we accept this and begin to love Him, He in turn loves us more and pours into us a greater grace and charity.
And I Will Love Him — not only as God: for thus I shall love him with the same love as the Father; but also as man I shall continue to love him, and with greater graces and gifts I shall affect and fill him, both in this life and in the life to come. Whence St. Augustine says: "I will love him for this, that I may manifest Myself: for neither then did He not love; now He has loved us for this, that we may believe; then for this, that we may see; now we love by believing what we shall see, then we shall love by seeing what we have believed."
And I Will Manifest Myself to Him — both in this life, by a clearer knowledge from day to day of Me and of My mysteries and gifts — not only speculative but also practical and experiential, by which the saints taste and savor Christ and how sweet the Lord is, and therefore break forth into affections of gratitude, love, praise, and jubilation, such as Paul pours out, 1 Cor. II, and elsewhere: so Cyril — and also most clearly in heaven, where he shall see by vision Christ, God and man, whom here he believed by faith. So St. Augustine, tract 75.
Verse 22: Lord, What Has Happened, That You Will Manifest Yourself to Us, and Not to the World?
22. Jude said to Him, not the Iscariot (but Thaddaeus, brother of St. James the Less, author of the Canonical Epistle): Lord, what has happened (that is, what is the cause) it is (it is a Hebraism; for the Hebrews say me haia, that is, "what was," meaning "what is the cause"), that You will manifest Yourself to us and not to the world? — For You said: "The world no longer sees Me, but you see Me," that is, will see Me. Christ had spoken these words of His death, resurrection, and appearance to be made to the Apostles, not to the worldly and unbelieving Jews; but Judas did not understand, and therefore asks to have them explained. He asks the reason, says St. Augustine, why He will not manifest Himself to the world but to His own. The Lord answers: because these love, but the others do not love. Judas uses the word "manifest" because Christ had just used the same, saying: "I will manifest Myself to him." So this word stuck in the mind of Judas, though he is looking back at Christ's earlier statements.
Verse 23: If Anyone Loves Me, He Will Keep My Word, and My Father Will Love Him, and We Will Come to Him and Make Our Abode with Him
23. Jesus answered and said to him: If anyone loves Me, he will keep My word, and My Father will love him, and We will come to him and make Our abode with him. — As if to say: Do not think, O Jude, that I will appear after the resurrection to you alone and your fellow Apostles, as though the fruit of My life and Passion were restricted to you alone and the whole world excluded from it. For although I shall appear visibly only to you and a few others, I shall nevertheless appear invisibly to all in the world who, through you and the other Apostles, have received, loved, and kept My faith and doctrine to be preached. "For whoever loves Me will keep My word, and My Father will love him" — as He has loved you, in the sense and manner I explained in verse 21.
And We Will Come to Him — I and the Father, and consequently the Holy Spirit; for where there is one divine Person, there are the other two, as if to say: Although after the resurrection I shall come visibly only to you, yet invisibly through My grace I shall come to all the faithful who believe in Me and love and keep Me and My doctrine. And just as I shall come to them, so also will the Father and the Holy Spirit come, that We may abide and dwell in his soul as in Our house and temple.
Note: God, who is everywhere and therefore immovable, is said to come and abide not by change of place, but by a new operation which He exercises in this or that place. So here He is said to come to the faithful and the just by grace and a new operation, inasmuch as He preserves, promotes, and protects them in righteousness, and together with their free will assists and cooperates with them helping them: for He prevents their intellect by His illumination, and their will by His pious affection, by which He impels it to good works, although arduous, and with the concurrence of His grace collaborates to accomplish them. So St. Augustine, Chrysostom, Cyril, and others.
Hear St. Augustine: "Love distinguishes the saints from the world; love makes them dwell unanimous in the house in which the Father and Son make Their mansion, who also give the very love; to whom at the last They will give the manifestation of Themselves; They come to us when we come to Them; They come by succoring, enlightening, filling us; we come by obeying, contemplating, receiving."
Finally, piously St. Bernard, Sermon 3 On the Advent: "Blessed, he says, is he with whom You will make Your abode, Lord Jesus. Blessed is he in whom wisdom builds herself a house, hewing out seven pillars; blessed is the soul that is the seat of wisdom. Which is that soul? Clearly the soul of the just. Rightly so, because 'justice and judgment are the preparation of Your throne.' Who among you, brethren, desires to prepare in his soul a throne for Christ? Behold, what are those silks, those tapestries, what cushions are to be prepared? 'Justice and judgment,' he says, 'are the preparation of Your throne.' Justice is the virtue that renders to each his own. Render therefore to the three what is theirs. Render to the superior, render to the inferior, render to the equal — to each what you owe — and you will worthily celebrate the coming of Christ, preparing for Him a throne in justice."
Hence learn that God gives to the just not only His grace but also Himself, so that really God the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit dwell in the soul of the just as in Their temple, and adorn it with Their presence and heap upon it Their gifts, as I have shown at length on Hosea, 10, at the words: "It shall be said to them, Sons of the living God."
Tropologically: The Holy Trinity comes to the three powers of the soul, which He created to His own image, that He may dwell in them and in them reform, renew, and perfect His image which has been corrupted by concupiscences.
To the Father memory is appropriated, because He, conceiving all things out of His fruitful memory, brought forth the Word and begot the Son. To the Son intellect is appropriated, because He Himself was begotten by an act of intellection, as it were the word of the mind, the idea, image, and exemplar of all things. To the Holy Spirit will is appropriated, because He proceeds by an act of will, namely the love of the Father and Son, as the love and bond of Both. Therefore the Father reforms the memory, when from it He erases the species of vain, disgraceful, and illicit things, and introduces the species of divine things, so that it may remember nothing save God and His worship, love, piety, and the other virtues. The Son reforms the intellect, so that it may think of nothing save what pertains to salvation and holiness. The Holy Spirit reforms the will, so that it may love and seek these same things. Wherefore let the holy soul constantly think that she is the temple of the Holy Trinity, according to 2 Cor. vi: "You are the temple of the living God, as God says (Lev. xxvi, 12): Because I will dwell in them and walk among them, and I will be their God, and they shall be My people." Therefore let her walk worthily in the sight of such majesty, that she may serve Him always by faith, hope, and charity.
In the old temple there were three vessels: an altar for burning incense, a candlestick shining with seven lamps, and a table of the shewbread. Let there likewise be in the holy soul an altar of prayer, exhaling holy praises and pious desires to God; let there be a candlestick shining with the seven gifts of the Holy Spirit; and finally let there be a table of beneficence and charity. Then in her will be fulfilled that saying of Apoc. XXI, 3: "Behold, the tabernacle of God with men, and He will dwell with them, and they shall be His people, and God Himself with them shall be their God." See St. Bernard, Sermon 27 on the Canticle, where he teaches that the holy soul is a heaven, in which there shines the sun of charity, the moon of continence, and the stars of the other virtues.
Verse 24: He Who Does Not Love Me Does Not Keep My Words
24. He Who Does Not Love Me Does Not Keep My Words. — The reason, therefore, why one does not keep God's commandments is that he does not love God. For if he loved God, he would keep God's commands. Whence St. Gregory, Homily 30: "In so far," he says, "as one is separated from the higher love, so far is he delighted with the lower: therefore of the love of God let tongue, mind, and life be demanded."
And the Word (sermo — it is an antiptosis) which You Have Heard Is Not Mine, but the Father's Who Sent Me. — Hear St. Augustine: "He spoke in the singular, and He did not want Himself to be understood as His own, but the Father's, being the Word, image, and Son of the Father: rightly He attributes to the author what the equal does, from whom He has this very thing — that He is equal to Him." And Chrysostom: "He signifies that He speaks nothing apart from the Father, nor anything besides what seems good to Him."
Verse 25: These Things Have I Spoken to You, Abiding with You
25. These things have I spoken to you, abiding with you.
Verse 26: But the Paraclete, the Holy Spirit, Whom the Father Will Send in My Name, He Will Teach You All Things
26. But the Paraclete, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in My name, He will teach you all things, and will bring to your remembrance all things whatever I shall have said to you. — Thus must these words be punctuated, according to the Roman, Greek, Syriac, and Arabic editions. Wherefore less fittingly St. Chrysostom refers the phrase "abiding with you" (the Arabic, "standing with you") to "the Paraclete," as if to say: "I depart, but in My place the Holy Spirit will abide with you." For it must be referred to Christ, who preceded it, as if to say: These things which you have heard from My mouth up till now, I have spoken to you while I was abiding with you and teaching you; but I know that much of them is not grasped or understood by you, whether on account of your rudeness or on account of the novelty and loftiness of the things I have said. I will therefore bring it about that the Father sends you the Holy Spirit as Paraclete — that is, as instructor and consoler — who will recall and explain all these things that I have said to you, so that, enlightened by Him, you may easily understand all things; and He will console you, sorrowing over My departure, and in every persecution of the Jews and any other tribulation He will comfort and strengthen you, that you may overcome it. Finally, He will sanctify you, and so bring it about that you can sanctify many others in the same way. For He is called, and truly is, the Holy Spirit, because He Himself is by essence uncreated and perfect sanctity, from which all holiness of men and angels emanates and flows forth as a ray from the sun. That the Holy Spirit did this for the Apostles is clear from Acts 2 and following. Hear Chrysostom: "He frequently calls Him Paraclete on account of their sadness." And the Gloss: "Although consoling is the work of the Trinity, it nevertheless pertains to the Holy Spirit, because in Scripture He is designated by the name of the goodness through which God consoles us."
Whom the Father Will Send in My Name — that is, through Me, says Cyril, because the Holy Spirit proceeds from the Father and the Son; wherefore the Father with the Son, through the Son, just as He breathes the Holy Spirit, so also sends Him. Second, "in My name," that is, on account of Me and My merits. Third, "in My name," that is, in My stead, in My place, to carry on the work which I began, to transact My business — namely, to spread My faith, doctrine, and Church through the preaching of the Apostles among all peoples. So Maldonatus, Toletus, and others.
He Will Teach You All Things — namely, whatever pertains to the mysteries of My coming and incarnation; "all things," whatever is necessary for the instruction, foundation, and stability of the Church. Hear Didymus, book On the Holy Spirit: "He will teach those perfected in the faith of Christ all spiritual and intellectual mysteries; but He will teach them invisibly, infusing into the mind the knowledge of divine things." And Gregory, Homily 30: "Unless the Holy Spirit is present to the heart of the hearer, the word of the teacher is idle. Let no one therefore attribute to the teaching man what he understands from the teacher's mouth: unless He who teaches is within, the tongue of the teacher labors outside in vain." And Augustine: "The Son does not speak without the Holy Spirit, nor does the Holy Spirit teach without the Son, but the Trinity says and teaches all things. But unless these things were commended to us separately, human weakness could in no way grasp it."
And Shall Suggest. — In Greek hypomnesei, that is, will bring back to memory; so the Arabic, Cyril, Augustine, Euthymius. Whence from this passage S. Augustine notes that the external voice of the Apostle, or of the preacher, is not sufficient for the understanding of the thing preached, or for assent, but it is the work of the Holy Spirit, who inwardly illumines the mind to understand those things, and inclines the will to embrace the same, and strengthens the memory to retain the same. So teach all the orthodox doctors, and the Councils of Orange, Milevis, and Trent. Hear S. Augustine: "He shall suggest, that is, He shall remind you; for it pertains also to grace not to forget the most salutary admonitions." And Theophylact: "The Holy Spirit taught whatever Christ had not said, inasmuch as they were unable to bear it; but He brought to mind whatever the Lord had said, but because of its obscurity or because of their slowness of understanding they had been unable to commit to memory." Less accurately the Interlinear: "He shall teach," it says, that you may know; "He shall suggest" that you may will; for "He shall suggest" pertains to memory, that you may recall, and by recalling, understand.
Whatsoever I Shall Have Said unto You. — In Greek eipo, that is, "I have said": so the Arabic; the Syriac however renders, "I say."
Verse 27: Peace I Leave with You, My Peace I Give unto You
27. Peace I leave with you, My peace (Arabic: my own, which is so mine that it is proper to me) I give unto you: not as the world giveth, do I give unto you.
This is Christ's farewell: for the Hebrews, when they greet someone arriving or bid farewell to someone departing, say: "Peace be with you," where by the word peace they signify a greeting and a wish for all prosperous things, every good, every happiness — as though Christ were saying: I departing give to you, O Apostles, and to your posterity, and as by inheritance leave My blessing, by which I wish you every good from God — and that not a false, empty, and short-lived one, as the world does, but a true, solid, and eternal one; not by flattering with words, as worldly men do, but by really promising and giving help and grace, by which you may securely attain to the eternal goods, and lead many others to the same by your preaching, charity, prayer, and holiness. So Maldonatus.
Somewhat differently Jansenius and Toletus: This peace, they say, is that of which Paul, Philippians IV, says: "The peace of God, which surpasseth all understanding, keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus." Now this peace contains first, friendship with God; secondly, tranquillity of soul and serenity in temptations and persecutions; thirdly, mutual concord among themselves. This makes men strong in every danger, and supplies consolation in every trouble: this the Lord leaves to His own, not riches or temporal possessions; for peace excels all the riches of this age.
Hear S. Augustine On the Words of the Lord according to John: "He cannot come to the inheritance of the Lord who would not keep the testament of peace, nor can he have concord with Christ who wishes to be at discord with a Christian; peace and serenity of mind, simplicity of heart, the bond of love, the fellowship of charity."
Symbolically S. Augustine here: "He leaves peace, he says, in this age, in which while abiding we conquer the enemy; He will give peace in the future, when without an enemy we shall reign. Peace for you is He Himself, both when we believe that He is, and when we shall see Him as He is. It must be noted however that when He says, 'I will give,' He added, 'Mine,' wishing His peace to be understood, such as He Himself has, in whom nothing is in conflict, because He has no sin; but the peace which He left to us ought rather to be called ours than His: such peace we have now, in which we still say: 'Forgive us our debts.' There is also peace for us among ourselves, for we believe and love one another; but neither is that peace full, because we do not see one another's thoughts of heart. The Lord's words can also be taken in such a way that they may seem to be a repetition of the same thought."
Verse 28: Let Not Your Heart Be Troubled. If You Loved Me, You Would Indeed Rejoice, Because I Go to the Father
28. Let not your heart be troubled, nor let it be afraid. You have heard that I said to you: I go, and I come unto you.
Christ adds this, because He saw the Apostles sad on account of His departure, timid and fainthearted because of the hatred of the Jews and the battles threatening them, says Chrysostom — lest, when the shepherd is away, the wolf invade the sheep, says S. Augustine. He therefore consoles and raises them up, saying: Be not troubled, sorrowful, anxious or afraid at My departure, as though you were about to be sheep without a shepherd, sons without a father, disciples without a master, exposed to the injuries of the Jews. For, as I have said, I "go" indeed to death, but presently on the third day I shall rise again, and then "I come," that is, I shall come immediately and return to you.
If you loved Me, you would indeed rejoice, because I go to the Father (Arabic: you would rejoice indeed at My progress to the Father): because the Father is greater than I.
The Apostles loved Christ, and therefore were saddened at His departure: when therefore Christ says, "If you loved Me," He speaks in the common manner of men, and it is a way of speaking to and consoling friends who grieve over a friend's departure — as though to say: If, as true and sincere love requires, you were to show it to Me, O Apostles, you ought to rejoice, not grieve at My departure, since it is going to be very useful and advantageous to Me — indeed also to you. For I go to the Father, who is greater than I, that is, from the fellowship of men I go to God; from human misery and contempt I go to divine felicity, exaltation, honor, and glory, that I may prepare a place for you, and in its time may take you up and lead you to the same. So Cyril. Hear S. Augustine: "Human nature is to be congratulated, in that it has been so assumed by the Word that it is established immortal in heaven, and thus earth has become sublime, that it might sit at the right hand of the Father: who would not rejoice that his own nature is now immortal in Christ, and hope that this will be so for himself through Christ?"
Because the Father is Greater than I.
This was the Achilles of the Arians, by which they prove that the Son is not God, but the first creature of God. But S. Athanasius, Augustine, Basil, Nazianzen, and the other Fathers answer them best, that Christ here speaks of Himself, not as He is God, but as He was man; for thus He was less than the Father, indeed even less than the angels. That this is so is clear from the fact that Christ here gives the reason why He goes to the Father, "because," He says, "the Father is greater than I." But Christ goes to the Father as He is man, ascending into heaven; for as God, He is always in heaven with the Father. Whence S. Augustine: "Therefore," he says, "He both went, by that which was in one place, and remained, by that which was everywhere," that is, He went as to His humanity, He remained as to His deity. Therefore the Father was greater than He as to His humanity, not as to His deity. In a similar way the Son Himself, as He is God, is greater than Himself as He is man, equally as the Father is; for to the Father He Himself is homoousios and in all things equal. The sense then is, as though to say: You ought to rejoice, O Apostles, at My departure, because I go to the Father and ascend into heaven, to greater honor and dignity, that I may obtain from the Father greater rewards of My labor and suffering for Me and for you — namely for Me the session at the right hand of the Father and the dominion of the whole world, the adoration of all the angels, the conversion of all nations to My faith and worship; for you indeed the Holy Spirit and all His gifts, armed with which you may subject the whole world to Me and to yourselves, and lead it with yourselves to the heavenly glory. For these things, which are far greater than those you have hitherto seen and received, I, going to the Father, shall ask of Him and obtain.
Moreover, some, in order to satisfy the Arians in all respects, answer more subtly but more intricately that the Father is greater than the Son, not only as man, but also as God — because the name of father among men by its nature seems more honorable than the name of son; for the father is the principle and cause of the son. Therefore the Father is greater than the Son, not in magnitude, not in time, not in power, not in dignity, not in worship, but by reason of a certain honor among men, that is, by reason of origin: because the Father is the origin of the Son, but the Son is not the origin of the Father. So S. Athanasius in his Sermon Against the Arians; S. Hilary, Book IX On the Trinity; S. Gregory Nazianzen, Oration 4 On Theology; Cyril, Book II of the Thesaurus, ch. III; Leontius, Chrysostom, Theophylact, Euthymius here. Although as a matter of fact in divine things filiation, by which He is called Son, is as excellent, as eminent, as honorable and to be honored as is paternity in the Father; indeed, just as the Son has from the Father that He is Son, so in turn the Father has from the Son that He is Father. For he is a father who has a son: wherefore here the passive origin which is in the Son is in itself as worthy and excellent as the active origin which is in the Father. For it is as great a thing to be begotten God as to beget God; and therefore it is as great a thing to be the Son as to be the Father. Finally, each has the same divine essence, exactly the same in individual, and therefore the same majesty, the same omnipotence, wisdom, holiness, etc.; wherefore one cannot be greater than the other. "He is greater," says S. Hilary, "as giving by the authority of the giver, but He is not less, to whom the one being is given." "Greater" — understand by the usage and estimation of men, not of God. Whence Maldonatus thinks that Hilary and the like conceded more than was fair to the Arians. Wherefore Damascene, Book I On the Faith, ch. IX, correcting this, says: "The Father is greater, not by nature, not by dignity, but only by origin." See Suarez, Book II On the Trinity, ch. IV; and I think S. Hilary meant nothing else.
Thirdly, S. Chrysostom, Leontius, Theophylact, Euthymius answer that the Father is greater than the Son, not in Himself, but in the opinion of men. For the Apostles thought the Son to be less than the Father. But this seems harsh; for Christ, the master of truth, ought to have spoken from truth, and to correct the error of the Apostles, as His disciples.
Furthermore, the analogy of divine generation with human, which deceived the Arians, is in many things unlike and different. For in human matters the father is greater than the son: first, because he is prior to and older than the son; secondly, because he is greater than him in stature and size, for an adult begets a small infant; thirdly, because he produces another slight nature, numerically different from his own, which he communicates to the son — wherefore he is greater than the son and his nature, being its author; fourthly, because he freely begets the son, for he could have not begotten. But in divine matters the reasoning is entirely different; for the Father is not greater than the Son in age or in stature, but coeval, equal, and the same; nor does He beget a deity other than His own, but communicates to the Son the same one He has: nor does He beget freely, but out of the natural fecundity of the divine nature produces this Son equal to Himself, and He cannot produce another. For this fecundity of the deity demands to be as much in the Son as in the Father, and thus demands to be in the three persons, and communicates and pours itself out wholly and equally to them. Finally, S. Cyril, in the Council of Ephesus, proves that the Father is greater than Christ as He is man, not as He is God, by this reasoning: "We acknowledge Him (namely the Son) just as the Father, as being unable to be converted or changed, in need of nothing, a perfect Son, like the Father, and differing from Him only in this, that He is unbegotten. For He is the accurate and express image of the Father; and it is established that an image ought fully to comprise all those things by which the exemplar itself, which is greater, is more perfectly expressed, as the Lord Himself taught: The Father is greater than I."
Verse 29: And Now I Have Told You Before It Come to Pass: That When It Shall Come to Pass, You May Believe
29. And now I have told you before it come to pass: that when it shall come to pass, you may believe.
As though to say: Now I foretell to you My departure and death, and from thence My resurrection and return to you, not that you may grieve with Me and look to yourselves; but that, when you see these very things accomplished in reality, you may believe that I foreknew and preordained all these things, and consequently that I underwent death not out of necessity, but of free will, for your salvation and the world's, and therefore that you may believe Me to be the Messiah, the Son of God, the Savior of the world. Hear S. Augustine: "This is the praise of faith, if what is believed is not seen, but from things which are seen there is acquired in us that those things are believed which are not seen; the disciples were about to see Him living after His death, and ascending to the Father, and thereby to believe Him to be the Son of God, who could do and foretell these things before He did them; and they would believe with a faith not new, but increased: or certainly one that had failed when He died, and was restored when He had risen."
Verse 30: I Will Not Now Speak Many Things with You: For the Prince of This World Cometh
30. I will not now speak many things with you: for the prince of this world cometh.
As though to say: Now is not the time for speaking more, but I end My discourse, because the prince of this world, the devil, to whom worldly men have subjected themselves by sinning of their own will, through his henchmen "cometh," that is, draws near, to seize and kill Me. For Christ said this when the henchmen were approaching with Judas, sent by the chief priests to apprehend Him.
And (but) he hath not any thing in Me.
As though to say: He comes indeed to seize Me, but in Me he has no right, because he will find no sin in Me, on account of which he made Adam and his descendants die: wherefore he would unjustly inflict death on Me, the innocent; and that I will suffer, so that by My unjust death I may despoil him of his right and rescue men from his power and tyranny. So Cyril and Chrysostom. Therefore the innocence of Christ, and the death of the Innocent One, has freed us all, the guilty, from harm. And this was the great consolation of Christ, which He here inculcates upon the Apostles.
Or, as Maldonatus, as though to say: The devil comes to seize and kill Me through the Jews, but "he hath not any thing in Me," that is, he will not be able to conquer or destroy Me, as he hopes: for although I am about to die, yet I shall do it not by his power and might, but by My own will and liberty, that I may satisfy the will of the Father. It is clear from what follows.
Moreover S. Ambrose, Book On the Flight from the World, ch. IV, and S. Hilary, Book IX On the Trinity, read: "in Me he finds nothing," namely that is his own, that is no sin. Again the same read thus: "In Me he does not find nothing," and thus explain it: in Me he does not find sin, which is nothing.
Verse 31: But That the World May Know That I Love the Father, and as the Father Hath Given Me Commandment, So Do I
31. But that the world may know that I love the Father, and as the Father hath given Me commandment, so do I.
As though to say: I shall die, not forced by the Jews, the ministers of the devil, but freely, that I may satisfy the love and obedience of the Father. For He Himself commanded Me to undertake this death for the redemption of men, wherefore I do thus; and I undertake it. So S. Chrysostom, Cyril, Euthymius, and others.
You will say: Christ received a commandment from the Father to suffer, to die, and to do the things He was doing. Therefore He could not will the contrary, nor was He free, because thus He would have sinned: but Christ is impeccable on a twofold ground — first, because of the hypostatic union with the Word; secondly, because of the light of glory, because He sees God. For Christ and the Blessed, because they clearly see God to be the immense good, are wholly rapt into love of Him, so that they can love or will nothing contrary or displeasing to Him. I answer: the hypostatic union with the Word made Christ impeccable, inasmuch as the office of the Word was to guard and preserve that humanity hypostatically united to Himself, so that it should admit no sin, lest the Word, or God, sustaining that humanity, should be said to have sinned. For actions belong to supposita, or persons. Now the Word kept the humanity from sinning, not by physically predetermining the human will of Christ to obey the Father's command, but only by His congruous grace continually preventing, gently directing, and impelling it — as, from the foreknowledge of future conditionals, He foreknew that it would consent to such a grace, and therefore would always freely submit itself to God's will, nor would even venially offend Him. Furthermore the light of glory indeed necessitated Christ inasmuch as He was blessed, that by the beatific act He should submit Himself to God's will and decree of death seen through this light; yet it did not necessitate Him inasmuch as He was a wayfarer, because as wayfarer He had infused knowledge, as we have faith, according to which He could freely elicit an act of love and obedience, or not elicit it at His choice, as we freely elicit similar acts. He therefore elicited a free act, by which, obeying the Father's command, He accepted the death of the cross, saying: "Behold, I come, that I may do, O God, Thy will," Psalm XXXIX, 7, and Hebrews X, 9; nor did the former act determine the latter, since they are altogether distinct and of a different order: for the former is the act of the blessed, the latter is the act of the wayfarer. See the Scholastics.
Arise, Let Us Go Hence.
These words depend on the preceding, and are connected with them, as though to say: That the world may know that I love the Father, and am carrying out His command about undertaking death of My own accord, arise, let us go hence to the garden of Gethsemane, where Judas and the Jews await Me, to seize and kill Me. So S. Augustine, Tract 70; Hilary, Book IX On the Trinity, Toletus, and others.
Less rightly therefore Chrysostom, Euthymius, and Ribera explain it, as though to say: Because I see you, O Apostles, to be timid and faint-hearted, on account of the Jews threatening and approaching Me, arise therefore, and let us go into a more secret and safer place, or into a more secret part of the house, where you may hear Me more securely and quietly as I continue with the rest.
Mystically: Cyril, Book X, ch. XII; S. Gregory Nazianzen, Oration On the Love of the Poor, and S. Ambrose, Book On the Good of Death, ch. V, expound it as though to say: "Arise," that is, lift up your mind from earth to heaven, that you may dwell in mind among heavenly things: for thus you will shut out all fear, nor will you fear death, but rather desire it, as though about to go straight to heaven by means of it.
You will ask whether Christ really rose from table and went out of the house toward the garden of Gethsemane, and went on speaking on the way the things which John narrates in the three following chapters, at the end of which He crossed the brook Cedron and entered the garden, in which, as He was praying, He was betrayed by Judas with a kiss and taken by the Jews, as John narrates, XVIII, 1 and following? Cyril, Augustine, Bede, and Toletus affirm it, and it is probable. More probably, however, Jansenius, Maldonatus, and others deny it, who think that Christ here did not leave the house or place — both because John does not narrate that it was done; and because, as He walked along the road, Christ could not conveniently have said what follows up to ch. XVIII, in such a way that all the Apostles, following Him in a great company, could hear and understand all those things; and because John asserts that Christ at last went out only after the whole discourse was finished, XVIII, 1; and finally, because Matthew, XXVI, 30, and Mark, XIV, 27, affirm that Christ, on going out of the house, did not preach, but sang a hymn. Therefore He says, "Arise," because Christ really rose from table and stood up on His feet, and commanded the Apostles to do the same, that they might depart with Him to the Mount of Olives, where He knew He was to be seized; but, as is customary with dear ones and friends bidding farewell, who grudgingly give a last farewell to those whom they most love and are unwillingly torn from them — resuming and prolonging the interrupted discourse — so Christ, standing, here took up a new and longer discourse, and extended it from ch. XV following up to ch. XVIII, verse 1, where, finishing the discourse, He went across the brook Cedron onto the Mount of Olives. For this is the custom of lovers, when they bid farewell to one another. So Ovid, about to go from his own people into exile, thus sings of himself as painfully bidding farewell, Book I of the Tristia, Elegy 3:
Thrice I touched the threshold, thrice I was called back, and I myself, / Yielding to my feelings, my foot was slow. / Often after saying farewell, again I said much, / And as though departing, I gave last kisses.
Tropologically: when a difficult thing decreed by God or commanded by a Superior is imminent — for example, a dangerous journey, death, martyrdom — let us offer ourselves generously and eagerly to God as a victim of charity and obedience, and for the love of God let us meet the danger of our own accord, saying with Christ: "Arise, let us go." For he who, by boldly meeting it, breaks the first assault of fear, he has conquered half the difficulty and will easily overcome the rest, as we daily experience, according to that saying:
He who has well begun has half done.