Homilies on John, Homily 64

“Jesus lifted up His eyes and said, Father, I thank You that You have heard Me; and I knew that You always hear Me, but I said it because of the people standing nearby.” And what follows. [1.] I will now repeat what I have often said: Christ is concerned less with His own honor than with our salvation; less with saying something exalted than with saying something that can draw us to Him. That is why His exalted and mighty sayings are few, and even those are veiled, while humble and lowly sayings are many and fill His discourses. Since these were more effective in winning people over, He continues to use them. Yet He does not use them exclusively, so that those who come afterward will not be harmed, nor does He entirely withhold the exalted sayings, so that the people of that time will not take offense. Those who have moved from a low understanding to perfection can discern the whole from even a single exalted teaching. But those whose understanding remained low would never have come to Him at all unless they had often heard these lowly sayings. In fact, even after so many such sayings, they do not remain steadfast, but even stone and persecute Him, try to kill Him, and call Him a blasphemer. When He makes Himself equal with God, they say, “This man blasphemes” ( Matt. ix. 3 ); and when He says, “Your sins are forgiven” ( c. x. 20 ), they also call Him demon-possessed. So when He says that the person who hears His words is stronger than death, or, “I am in the Father and the Father in Me” ( c. viii. 51 ), they leave Him; and again, they take offense when He says that He came down from heaven. ( c. vi. 33, 60.) Now, if they could not bear these sayings even when He rarely spoke them, would they really have listened to Him if His discourse had always been exalted, always of this kind? But when He says, “As the Father commanded Me, so I speak” ( c. xiv. 31 ); and, “I have not come on My own” ( c. vii. 28 ), then they believe. That they believed then is clear from the Evangelist’s further statement: “As He spoke these words, many believed in Him.” ( c. viii. 30.) If lowly speech drew people to faith and exalted speech frightened them away, isn't it utter foolishness not to recognize at once the sole reason for those lowly sayings: that they were spoken for the sake of His hearers? In another place, when He wanted to say something exalted, He held back and gave this reason: “So that we do not offend them, cast a hook into the sea.” ( Matt. xvii. 27.) He does the same here. After saying, “I know that You always hear Me,” He adds, “but I said it because of the crowd standing around, so that they might believe.” Are these our words? Is this a human conjecture? When someone refuses to be persuaded by what is written that they took offense at exalted things, how can he, after hearing Christ say that He spoke humbly so they would not take offense, still suspect that the lowly sayings belong to His nature rather than to His condescension? So in another place, when a voice came down from heaven, He said, “This voice came for your sake, not Mine.” ( c. xii. 30.) Someone who is exalted may speak humbly about himself, but someone who is lowly has no right to say anything grand or exalted about himself. The former comes from condescension, prompted by the weakness of the hearers—or rather, (it is prompted by) His leading them to humility, His being clothed in flesh, His teaching His hearers to say nothing great about themselves, His being considered an enemy of God, their refusal to believe that He came from God, their suspicion that He broke the Law, and the fact that His hearers regarded Him with malice and were hostile toward Him because He said He was equal to God. But for a lowly man to say something great about Himself has no explanation, reasonable or unreasonable; it can only be foolishness, shamelessness, and inexcusable boldness. Why, then, does Christ speak humbly, when He is of that great Substance beyond all description? For the reasons already mentioned, and so that He would not be considered unbegotten. Paul seems to have feared something like this, which is why he says, “Except Him who put all things under Him.” ( 1 Cor. xv. 27.) It is impious even to entertain this thought. For if He were less than Him who begot Him and of a different Substance, yet was considered equal, would He not have done everything possible to prevent that belief? But instead He does the opposite, saying, “If I do not do the works of Him who sent Me, do not believe Me.” ( c. x. 37.) Indeed, His statement, “I am in the Father and the Father in Me” ( c. xiv. 10 ), conveys His equality to us. If He were inferior, He should have vigorously refuted this opinion and never said, “I am in the Father and the Father in Me” ( c. x. 30 ), or, “We are One,” or, “Whoever has seen Me has seen the Father.” ( c. xiv. 9.) Likewise, when He spoke about power, He said, “I and the Father are One”; and when He spoke about authority, He said again, “For as the Father raises the dead and gives them life, so the Son gives life to whomever He wills” ( c. v. 21 ). He could not do this if He were of a different substance. Even granting that He could, He still should not have said it, so that they would not suspect that the substance was one and the same. For if He often says things unsuited to Him to keep them from supposing He is an enemy of God, He should have done so all the more in that case. But as it is, His statements, “That they should honor the Son just as they honor the Father” ( c. v. 23 ); “The works He does, I also do” ( c. v. 19 ); and that He is “the Resurrection, and the Life, and the Light of the world” ( c. xi. 25; c. viii. 12 ), are the words of One making Himself equal to Him who begot Him and confirming the suspicion they held. Do you see how He makes this statement and defense to show that He did not break the Law, and how He confirms, rather than dispels, their belief in His equality with the Father? Likewise, when they said, “You blaspheme, because You make Yourself God” ( c. x. 33 ), He established this equality through the equality of His works. [2.] And why do I say that the Son did this, when the Father, who did not take on flesh, does the same thing? He too allowed many lowly things to be said about Him for the salvation of His hearers. For if someone were to collect such sayings as “Adam, where are you?” ( Gen. iii. 9 ); “That I may know whether they have acted entirely according to the outcry against it” ( Gen. xviii. 21 ); “Now I know that you fear God” ( Gen. xxii. 12 ); “If they will listen” ( Ezek. iii. 11 ); “If they will understand” ( Deut. v. 29 ); “Who will give this people a heart like this?”; and the expression, “There is no one like You among the gods, O Lord” ( Ps. lxxxvi. 8 ), along with many similar sentences in the Old Testament, he would find them unworthy of God's dignity. In Ahab's case, it says, “Who will entice Ahab for Me?” ( 2 Chron. xviii. 19.) And His continual comparisons in which He places Himself above the gods of the pagans—all these things are unworthy of God. Yet in another sense they become worthy of Him, because He is so kind that, for our salvation, He does not insist on expressions that suit His dignity. Indeed, becoming man, taking the form of a servant, speaking humble words, and being clothed in humble (garments) are unworthy of Him if we consider His dignity, but worthy if we consider the unspeakable riches of His lovingkindness. There is also another reason for the humility of His words. What is it? They knew and acknowledged the Father, but they did not know Him. That is why He continually appeals to the Father, whom they acknowledged, because He Himself was not yet considered worthy of belief. This was because of His hearers' foolishness and weakness, not any inferiority of His own. That is why He prays and says, “Father, I thank You that You have heard Me.” For if He gives life to whomever He wills, and gives life just as the Father does, why does He call on Him? But now it is time to go through the passage from the beginning. “Then they took away the stone where the dead man lay. And Jesus lifted up His eyes and said, Father, I thank You that You have heard Me. And I knew that You always hear Me, but I said it because of the people standing nearby, so that they might believe that You sent Me.” Let us then ask the heretic: Did He receive a boost of power from the prayer and so raise the dead man? How, then, did He perform other miracles without prayer, saying, “You evil spirit, I command you, come out of him” ( Mark ix. 25 ); “I will; be clean” ( Mark i. 41 ); “Get up, pick up your bed” ( c. v. 8 ); “Your sins are forgiven” ( Matt. ix. 2 ); and to the sea, “Peace, be still”? ( Mark iv. 39.) In short, what advantage does He have over the Apostles if He too works through prayer? Or rather, I should say that they did not do everything through prayer either, but often worked without prayer, calling on the Name of Jesus. Now, if His Name had such great power, how could He have needed prayer? If He had needed prayer, His Name would have had no power. When He made man in his entirety, what kind of prayer did He need? Was there not great equality of honor then? “Let Us make,” it says, “man.” ( Gen. i. 26 .) What greater sign of weakness could there be than needing prayer? But let us see what the prayer was: “I thank You that You have heard Me.” Who ever prayed this way? Before offering any prayer, He says, “I thank You,” showing that He did not need prayer. “And I knew that You always hear Me.” He said this to show that His will and the Father's are one, not because He Himself was powerless. But why did He adopt the form of prayer? Listen to Him, not me, as He says, “For the sake of the people standing nearby, so that they may believe that You sent Me.” He did not say, “So that they may believe that I am inferior, that I need a boost of power from above, that without prayer I can do nothing”; instead He said, “That You sent Me.” For the prayer implies all these things if we take it at face value. He did not say, “You sent Me weak, acknowledging servitude and doing nothing on My own.” Instead, setting all these things aside so that you would have no such suspicions, He states the real reason for the prayer: “So that they may not consider Me an enemy of God; so that they may not say, He is not from God; so that I may show them that the work has been done according to Your will.” He is virtually saying, “If I were an enemy of God, what has been done would not have succeeded.” But “You heard Me” is said between friends and equals. “And I knew that You always hear Me” means, “I need no prayer for My will to be done, except to persuade people that You and I have one will.” “Why, then, do You pray?” For the sake of the weak and those with a coarser understanding. Ver. 43. “And when He had said this, He cried out in a loud voice.” Why did He not say, “In the name of My Father, come out”? Or why did He not say, “Father, raise him up”? Why did He leave out all these expressions and, after taking the posture of someone praying, show His independent authority through His actions? Because this too was part of His wisdom: to show condescension through words, but power through His deeds. Since they had no other charge against Him except that He was not from God, and since they deceived many in this way, He proves this very point at great length through His words, in the way their weakness required. He had the power to show both His agreement with the Father and His own dignity at once by other means, but the crowd could not rise to that level of understanding. And He says, “Lazarus, come out.” [3.] This is what He spoke of when He said, “The hour is coming when the dead will hear the voice of the Son of God, and those who hear will live.” ( c. v. 25.) So that you would not think He received the power to act from someone else, He taught you this beforehand and proved it through His deeds. He did not say, “Get up,” but, “Come out,” speaking with the dead man as though he were alive. What can equal this authority? And if He does not do it by His own strength, what advantage does He have over the Apostles, who say, “Why do you stare at us as though we had made this man walk by our own power or holiness?” ( Acts iii. 12.) For if He were not working by His own power, yet failed to add what the Apostles said about themselves, they would in a sense be wiser than He, because they refused the glory. And in another place: “Why are you doing these things? We too are men with the same passions as you.” ( Acts xiv. 15.) Since the Apostles did nothing by themselves, they spoke this way to persuade people of that fact. But when a similar opinion was formed about Him, would He not have dispelled the suspicion if He really were not acting by His own authority? Who would claim otherwise? In fact, Christ does the opposite when He says, “I said it because of the people standing nearby, so that they might believe.” So if they had believed, there would have been no need for prayer. Now, if prayer were not beneath His dignity, why would He give them as the reason for His praying? Why did He not say, “I do it so that they may believe that I am not equal to You”? Their suspicion should have required Him to make that point. When He was suspected of breaking the Law, He used these very words, even though they had said nothing: “Do not think that I have come to destroy the Law” ( Matt. v. 17 ). But here He confirms their suspicion. Indeed, why was there any need to go such a roundabout way and use such obscure sayings? It would have been enough to say, “I am not equal,” and settle the matter. “But,” someone says, “did He not say, ‘I do not do My own will’?” Even this He said indirectly, in a way suited to their weakness, and for the same reason He offered the prayer. But what does “You have heard Me” mean? It means, “There is nothing on My part opposed to You.” Thus “You have heard Me” is not a statement that He lacked power in Himself. (If that were the case, it would mean ignorance as well as powerlessness if, before praying, He did not know that God would grant the prayer. And if He did not know, why did He say, “I am going to wake him,” instead of, “I am going to ask My Father to wake him”?) Just as this expression indicates identity of will rather than weakness, so does “You always hear Me.” We must either understand it this way or say that it addressed their suspicions. Now, if He was neither ignorant nor weak, He clearly speaks these lowly words so that their very extremity may persuade you and compel you to acknowledge that they arise from condescension and do not suit His dignity. What, then, do the enemies of truth say? “He did not say those words, ‘You have heard Me,’” someone says, “to accommodate His hearers' weakness, but to show the Father's superiority.” Yet this would not show superiority; it would humble Him greatly and show Him as having nothing more than a human being. For praying does not belong to God or to the One who shares the Throne. Do you see, then, that their unbelief was His only reason for resorting to this? Notice, at least, that the action testifies to His authority. “He called, and the dead man came out wrapped.” Then, so that the event would not seem to be an illusion (for his coming out bound seemed no less marvelous than his resurrection), Jesus commanded them to untie him, so that by touching him and coming near him they could see that it was really him. And He says, “Let him go.” Do you see His freedom from boasting? He does not take him along or tell him to accompany Him, so that no one will think He is putting him on display. He knew so well how to exercise restraint. When the sign had been performed, some marveled, while others went and reported it to the Pharisees. What did they do then? When they should have been astonished and admired Him, they plotted to kill the One who had raised the dead. What foolishness! They thought they could hand over to death the One who had overcome death in the bodies of others. Ver. 47. “And they said, What are we doing? For this man performs many miracles.” Even after receiving such proof of His divinity, they still call Him “man.” “What are we doing?” They should have believed, served Him, bowed down to Him, and no longer considered Him a man. Ver. 48. “If we leave him alone like this, the Romans will come and take away both our nation and city.” What are they proposing to do? They want to stir up the people, as though they themselves would be in danger of being suspected of establishing a kingdom. “For if,” one of them says, “the Romans learn that this Man is leading the crowds, they will suspect us and come and destroy our city.” Why, tell me? Did He teach rebellion? Did He not allow you to pay tribute to Caesar? Did you not want to make Him king, and did He not flee from you? Did He not lead a lowly, unassuming life, with neither a house nor anything else of the kind? So they said this out of malice, not because they expected anything of the sort. Yet things turned out contrary to their expectations: the Romans took their nation and city after they had killed Christ. For His actions gave no grounds for suspicion. One who healed the sick, taught the most excellent way of life, and commanded people to obey their rulers was dismantling tyranny rather than establishing it. “But,” someone says, “we infer this from earlier (impostors).” But they taught rebellion; He taught the opposite. Do you see that their words were only a pretext? What action of this kind did He ever display? Did He travel with an imposing guard? Did He have a procession of chariots? Did He not seek out deserted places? But to avoid seeming to speak out of their own resentment, they say that the whole city is in danger, that the public welfare is being plotted against, and that they must fear the worst. These things did not cause your captivity; their opposites did. This applies both to the latest captivity and to the Babylonian captivity and the one under Antiochus that followed it. You were handed over into slavery because there were people among you who acted unjustly and provoked God's anger, not because there were worshipers among you. But this is what envy does: once it has blinded the soul completely, it keeps people from seeing anything they ought to see. Did He not teach people to be meek? Did He not tell them to turn the other cheek when struck on the right? Did He not tell them to endure injury, to be more willing to suffer evil than others are to inflict it? Tell me, are these signs of someone establishing a tyranny, or rather of someone tearing one down? [4.] But as I said, malice is dreadful and full of hypocrisy. It has filled the world with ten thousand evils. This disease fills the courts; it produces the desire for fame and wealth, the love of power, and insolence. Because of it, wicked robbers infest the roads and pirates the sea. It produces murders throughout the world and tears our race apart. Whatever evil you see, you will find that it arises from this. It has even broken into the churches. It has caused ten thousand dreadful things from the beginning. It is the mother of greed. This disease has turned everything upside down and corrupted justice. For “gifts,” it says, “blind the eyes of the wise, and like a muzzle on the mouth turn aside rebukes.” ( Ecclus. xx. 29 , LXX. and marg. of E.V.) It makes slaves of free people. We talk about it every day, and no good comes of it. We become worse than wild beasts: we plunder orphans, strip widows, wrong the poor, and heap misery on misery. “Alas! The righteous have vanished from the earth!” ( Mic. vii. 1, 2.) It is now our turn to mourn too—or rather, we need to say this every day. Our prayers do no good, nor do our advice and exhortations; all that remains is to weep. Christ did this. After repeatedly exhorting the people of Jerusalem, when they gained nothing from it, He wept over their hardness. The Prophets do this too, and let us do it now. The time has come for mourning, tears, and wailing. Now is the time for us too to say, “Call for the mourning women, and send for the skilled women, so that they may cry aloud” ( Jer. ix. 17 ). Perhaps this way we can drive out the disease of those who build splendid houses and surround themselves with lands acquired through plunder. It is time to mourn. Join me in mourning, you who have been stripped and injured; draw out my tears with your own mourning. But as we mourn, let us mourn for them, not ourselves. They have not harmed you; they have destroyed themselves. You receive the Kingdom of heaven in return for the injustice done to you; they receive hell in return for their gain. That is why it is better to suffer injustice than to commit it. Let us weep for them with a lament taken from the Holy Scriptures, with which the Prophets also wailed, rather than one of human invention. With Isaiah let us wail bitterly and say, “Woe to those who add house to house, who join field to field, so that they may take something from their neighbor! Will you live alone on the earth? Great and beautiful houses, and there will be no inhabitants in them.” ( Isa. v. 8, 9.) Let us mourn with Nahum and say with him, “Woe to him who builds his house high up.” (Perhaps Jer. xxii. 13.) Or rather, let us mourn for them as Christ mourned for the people of old. “Woe to you who are rich, for you have received your comfort.” ( Luke vi. 24.) I beg you, let us not stop lamenting this way, and, if it is not improper, let us even beat our breasts over our brothers' carelessness. Let us not weep for someone already dead, but for the plunderer, those who grasp for more, those who crave possessions, those who can never get enough. Why should we mourn for the dead, for whom nothing more can be done? Let us mourn for these people who can still change. But perhaps they will laugh while we lament. That itself is reason enough to lament: they laugh when they should mourn. For if our sorrows had affected them at all, we should have stopped grieving because of the promise that they would change. But since they are unfeeling, let us keep weeping—not simply for the rich, but for those who love money, the greedy, the plunderers. Wealth is not evil (for we can use it rightly when we spend it on those in need), but greed is evil, and it prepares punishments that never end. Let us then weep for them; perhaps they will change. Or even if those who have fallen into it do not escape, at least others will avoid falling into the danger and guard against it. May they be freed from their disease, and may none of us ever fall into it, so that we may all together receive the promised good things, through the grace and lovingkindness of our Lord Jesus Christ, to whom be glory forever and ever. Amen.