Homily 10
1 John 5:1-3
"Whoever believes that Jesus is the Christ is born of God: and every
one who loves Him that begat Him, loves Him also that is begotten of
Him. By this we know that we love the children of God, because we
love God, and do His commandments. For this is the love of God, that
we keep His commandments."
1. I Suppose you remember, those of you who were present yesterday,
to what place in the course of this epistle our exposition has reached:
namely, "He who loves not his brother whom he sees, how can he love
God whom he sees not? And this commandment have we from Him,
That he who loves God, love his brother also." Thus far we discoursed.
Let us see then what comes next in order. "Whoever believes that
Jesus is the Christ is born of God." Who is he that believes not that
Jesus is the Christ? He who does not so live as Christ commanded. For
many say, "I believe:" but faith without works saves not. Now the work
of faith is Love, as Paul the apostle says, "And faith which works by
love." Your past works indeed, before you did believe, were either
none, or if they seemed good, were nothing worth. For if they were
none, you were as a man without feet, or with sore feet unable to
walk: but if they seemed good, before you believed, you ran indeed,
but by running aside from the way you went astray instead of coming
to the goal. It is for us, then, both to run, and to run in the way. He who
runs aside from the way, runs to no purpose, or rather runs but to toil.
He goes the more astray, the more he runs aside from the way. What is
the way by which we run? Christ has told us, "I am the Way." What the
home to which we run? "I am the Truth." By Him you run, to Him you
run, in Him you run. But, that we might run by Him, He reached even
to us: for we were afar off, foreigners in a far country. Not enough that
we were in a far country, we were feeble also that we could not stir. A
Physician, He came to the sick: a Way, He extended Himself to those
who were in a far country. Let us be saved by Him, let us walk in Him.
This it is to "believe that Jesus is the Christ," as Christians believe, who
are not Christians only in name, but in deeds and in life, not as the
devils believe. For "the devils also believe and tremble," as the
Scripture tells us. What more could the devils believe, than that they
should say, "We know who you are, the Son of God?" What the devils
said, the same said Peter also. When the Lord asked them who He was,
and whom did men say that He was, the disciples made answer to
Him, "Some say that you are John the Baptist; some, Elias; and others,
Jeremias, or one of the prophets. He says to them, But whom say you
that I am? And Peter answered and said, You are the Christ, the Son of
the Living God." And this he heard from the Lord: "Blessed are you,
Simon Barjona; for flesh and blood has not revealed it to you, but my
Father which is in heaven." See what praises follow this faith. " You are
Peter, and upon this rock I will build my Church." What means, "Upon
this rock I will build my Church"? Upon this faith; upon this that has
been said, " You are the Christ, the Son of the Living God. Upon this
rock," says He, "I will build my Church." Mighty praise! So then, Peter
says, " You are the Christ, the Son of the Living God:" the devils also
say, "We know who you are, the Son of God, the Holy One of God." This
Peter said, this also the devils: the words the same, the mind not the
same. And how is it clear that Peter said this with love? Because a
Christian's faith is with love, but a devil's without love. How without
love? Peter said this, that he might embrace Christ; the devils said it,
that Christ might depart from them. For before they said, "We know
who you are, the Son of God," they said, "What have we to do with
you? Why are you come to destroy us before the time?" It is one thing
then to confess Christ that you may hold Christ, another thing to
confess Christ that you may drive Christ from you. So then you see,
that in the sense in which he here says, "Whoso believes," it is a faith
of one's own, not as one has a faith in common with many. Therefore,
brethren, let none of the heretics say to you, "We also believe." For to
this end have I given you an instance from the case of devils, that you
may not rejoice in the words of believing, but search well the deeds of
the life.
2. Let us see then what it is to believe in Christ; what to believe that
Jesus, He is the Christ. He proceeds: "Whoever believes that Jesus is
the Christ, is born of God." But what is it to believe that? "And every
one who loves Him that begat Him, loves Him also that is begotten of
Him." To faith he has straightway joined love, because faith without
love is nothing worth. With love, the faith of a Christian; without love,
the faith of a devil: but those who believe not, are worse than devils,
more stupid than devils. Some man will not believe in Christ: so far, he
is not even upon a par with devils. A person does now believe in
Christ, but hates Christ: he has the confession of faith in the fear of
punishment, not in love of the crown: thus the devils also feared to be
punished. Add to this faith love, that it may become a faith such as the
Apostle Paul speaks of, a "faith which works by love:" you have found a
Christian, found a citizen of Jerusalem, found a fellow-citizen of the
angels, found a pilgrim sighing in the way: join yourself to him, he is
your fellow-traveller, run with him, if indeed you also are this. "Every
one who loves Him that begat Him, loves Him also that is begotten of
Him." Who "begat"? The Father. Who "is begotten"? The Son. What
says he then? "Every one who loves the Father, loves the Son."
3. "In this we know that we love the sons of God." What is this,
brethren? Just now he was speaking of the Son of God, not of sons of
God: lo, here one Christ was set before us to contemplate, and we were
told, "Whoever believes that Jesus is the Christ is born of God: and
every one who loves Him that begat," i.e. the Father, "loves Him also
that is begotten of Him," i.e. the Son, our Lord Jesus Christ. And he
goes on: "In this we know that we love the sons of God;" as if he had
been about to say, "In this we know that we love the Son of God." He
has said, "the sons of God," whereas he was speaking just before of the
Son of God - because the sons of God are the Body of the Only Son of
God, and when He is the Head, we the members, it is one Son of God.
Therefore, he who loves the sons of God, loves the Son of God, and he
who loves the Son of God, loves the Father; nor can any love the Father
except he love the Son, and he who loves the sons, loves also the Son
of God. What sons of God? The members of the Son of God. And by
loving he becomes himself a member, and comes through love to be in
the frame of the body of Christ, so there shall be one Christ, loving
Himself. For when the members love one another, the body loves itself.
"And whether one member suffer, all the members suffer with it; or
one member be honoured, all the members rejoice with it." And then
he goes on to say, "Now you are the body of Christ, and members."
John was speaking just before of brotherly love, and said, "He who
loves not his brother whom he sees, how can he love God whom he
sees not?" But if you love your brother, haply you love your brother
and love not Christ? How should that be, when you love members of
Christ? When therefore you love members of Christ, you love Christ;
when you love Christ, you love the Son of God; when you love the Son
of God, you love also the Father. The love therefore cannot be
separated into parts. Choose what you will love; the rest follow you.
Suppose you say, I love God alone, God the Father. You lie: if you love,
you love Him not alone; but if you love the Father, you love also the
Son. Behold, say you, I love the Father, and I love the Son: but this only,
the Father God and the Son God, our Lord Jesus Christ, who ascended
into heaven, and sits at the right hand of the Father, that Word by
which all things were made, and "the Word was made flesh, and dwelt
in us:" this alone I love. You lie; for if you love the Head, you love also
the members; but if you love not the members, neither love you the
Head. Dost you not quake at the voice uttered by the Head from
Heaven on behalf of His members, "Saul, Saul, why do you persecute
ME?" The persecutor of His members He called His persecutor: His
lover, the lover of His members. Now what are His members, you
know, brethren: none other than the Church of God. "In this we know
that we love the sons of God, in that we love God." And how? Are not
the sons of God one thing, God Himself another? But he who loves
God, loves His precepts. And what are the precepts of God? "A new
commandment give I to you, that you love one another." Let none
excuse himself by another love, for another love; so and so only is it
with this love: as the love itself is compacted in one, so all that hang by
it does it make one, and as fire melts them down into one. It is gold:
the lump is molten and becomes some one thing. But unless the
fervour of charity be applied, of many there can be no melting down
into one. "That we love God," by this "we know that we love the sons of
God."
4. And by what do we know that we love the sons of God? By this, "that
we love God, and do His commandments." We sigh here, by reason of
the hardness of doing the commandments of God. Hear what follows.
O man, at what toil you in loving? In loving avarice. With toil is that
loved which you love: there is no toil in loving God. Avarice will enjoin
you labours, perils, sore hardships and tribulations; and you will do
its bidding. To what end? That you may have that with which you shall
fill your chest, and lose your peace of mind. You did feel yourself
haply more secure before you had it, than since you did begin to have.
See what avarice has enjoined you. You have filled your house, and are
in dread of robbers; have gotten gold, lost your sleep. See what avarice
has enjoined you. Do, and you did. What does God enjoin you! Love
me. You love gold, you will seek gold, and perchance not find it:
whoever seeks me, I am with him. You will love honour, and
perchance not attain to it: who ever loved me, and did not attain? God
says to you, you would make you a patron, or a powerful friend: you
seek a way to his favour by means of another inferior. Love me, says
God to you: favour with me is not had by making interest with some
other: your love itself makes me present to you. What sweeter than
this love, brethren? It is not without reason that you heard just now in
the Psalm, "The unrighteous told me of delights, but not as is Your law,
O Lord." What is the Law of God? The commandment of God. What is
the commandment of God? That "new commandment," which is called
new because it makes new: "A new commandment give I to you, that
you love one another." Hear because this is the law of God. The apostle
says, "Bear one another's burdens, and so shall you fulfil the law of
Christ." This, even this, is the consummation of all our works; Love. In
it is the end: for this we run: to it we run; when we are come to it, we
shall rest.
5. You have heard in the Psalm, "I have seen the end of all perfection."
He has said, I have seen the end of all perfection: what had he seen?
Think we, had he ascended to the peak of some very high and pointed
mountain, and looked out thence and seen the compass of the earth,
and the circles of the round world, and therefore said, "I have seen the
end of all perfection"? If this be a thing to be praised, let us ask of the
Lord eyes of the flesh so sharp-sighted, that we shall but require some
exceeding high mountain on earth, that from its summit we may see
the end of all perfection. Go not far: lo, I say to you, it is here; ascend
the mountain, and see the end. Christ is the Mountain; come to Christ:
you see thence the end of all perfection. What is this end? Ask Paul:
"But the end of the commandment is charity, from a pure heart, and a
good conscience, and faith unfeigned:" and in another place, "Charity
is the fullness," or fulfilment, "of the law." What so finished and
terminated as "fullness"? For, brethren, the apostle here uses end in a
way of praise. Think not of consumption, but of consummation. For it
is in one sense that one says, I have finished my bread, in another, I
have finished my coat. I have finished the bread, by eating it: the coat,
by making it. In both places the word is "end," "finish:" but the bread
is finished by its being consumed, the coat is finished by being made:
the bread, so as to be no more; the coat, so as to be complete.
Therefore in this sense take you also this word, end, when the Psalm is
read and you hear it said, "On the end, a Psalm of David." You are for
ever hearing this in the Psalms, and you should know what you hear.
What means, "On the end"? - "For Christ is the end of the law to every
one who believes." And what means, "Christ is the end"? Because
Christ is God, and "the end of the commandment is charity," and
"Charity is God:" because Father and Son and Holy Ghost are One.
There is He the End to you; elsewhere He is the Way. Do not stick fast
in the way, and so never come to the end. Whatever else you come to,
pass beyond it, until you come to the end. What is the end? It is good
for me to "hold fast in God." Have you laid fast hold on God? you have
finished the way: you shall abide in your own country. Mark well!
Some man seeks money: let not it be the end to you: pass on, as a
traveller in a strange land. But if you love it, you are entangled by
avarice; avarice will be shackles to your feet: you can make no more
progress. Pass therefore this also: seek the end. You seek health of the
body: still do not stop there. For what is it, this health of the body,
which death makes an end of, which sickness debilitates, a feeble,
mortal, fleeting thing? Seek that, indeed, lest haply ill-health hinder
your good works: but for that very reason, the end is not there, for it is
sought in order to something else. Whatever is sought in order to
something else, the end is not there: whatever is loved for its own
sake, and freely, the end is there. You seek honours; perchance seek
them in order to do something, that you may accomplish something,
and so please God: love not the honour itself, lest you stop there. You
seek praise? If you seek God's, you do well; if you seek your own, you
do ill; you stop short in the way. But behold, you are loved, are praised:
think it not joy when in yourself you are praised; be praised in the
Lord, that you may sing, "In the Lord shall my soul be praised." You
deliver some good discourse, and your discourse is praised. Let it not
be praised as yours, the end is not there. If you set the end there, there
is an end of you: but an end, not that you be perfected, but that you be
consumed. Then let not your discourse be praised as coming from
you, as being thine. But how praised? As the Psalm says, "In God will I
praise the discourse, in God will I praise the word." Hereby shall that
which there follows come to pass in you: "In God have I hoped, I will
not fear what man can do to me." For when all things that are your are
praised in God, no fear lest your praise be lost, since God fails not.
Pass therefore this also.
6. See, brethren, how many things we pass, in which is not the end.
These we use as by the way; we take as it were our refreshment at the
halting places on our journey, and pass on. Where then is the end?
"Beloved, we are sons of God, and it has not yet appeared what we
shall be;" here is this said, in this epistle. As yet then, we are on the
way; as yet, wherever we come, we must pass on, until we attain to
some end. "We know that when He shall appear, we shall be like Him,
for we shall see Him as He is. That is the end; there perpetual praising,
there Alleluia always without fail. This, then is the end he has spoken
of in the Psalm: "I have seen the end of all perfection:" and as though it
were said to him, What is the end you have seen? "Your
commandment, exceeding broad." This is the end: the breadth of the
commandment. The breadth of the commandment is charity, because
where charity is, there are no straits. In this breadth, this wide room,
was the apostle when he said, "Our mouth is open to you, O you
Corinthians, our heart is enlarged: you are not straitened in us." In
this, then, is "Your commandment exceeding broad." What is the broad
commandment? "A new commandment give I to you, that you love one
another." Charity, then, is not straitened. Would you not be straitened
here on earth? Dwell in the broad room. For whatever man may do to
you, he shall not straiten you; because you love that which man cannot
hurt: love God, love the brotherhood, love the law of God, love the
Church of God: it shall be for ever. You labour here on earth, but you
shall come to the promised enjoyment. Who can take from you that
which you love? If no man can take from you that which you love,
secure you sleep: or rather secure you watch, lest by sleeping you lose
that which you love. For not without reason is it said, "Enlighten my
eyes, lest at any time I sleep in death." Those who shut their eyes
against charity, fall asleep in the lusts of carnal delights. Be wakeful,
therefore. For then are the delights, to eat, to drink, to wanton in
luxury, to play, to hunt; these vain pomps all evils follow. Are we
ignorant that they are delights? who can deny that they delight? But
more beloved is the law of God. Cry against such persuaders: "The
unrighteous have told me of delights: but not so as is your law, O
Lord." This delight remains. Not only remains as the goal to which you
may come, but also calls you back when you stray.
7. "For this is the love of God, that we keep His commandments."
Already you have heard, "On these two commandments hang all the
law and the prophets." See how He would not have you divide yourself
over a multitude of pages: "On these two commandments hang all the
law and the prophets." On what two commandments? " You shall love
the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with
all your mind. And, you shall love your neighbour as yourself. On these
two commandments hang all the law and the prophets." See here of
what commandments this whole epistle talks. Therefore hold fast
love, and set your minds at rest. Why do you fear lest you do evil to
some man? Who does evil to the man he loves? Love: it is impossible
to do this without doing good. Kindness does it, not fierceness. For
discipline you do this; because your kindness of love will not let you
leave him undisciplined. And indeed there come somehow these
different and contrary results, that sometimes hatred uses winning
ways, and charity shows itself fierce. A person hates his enemy, and
feigns friendship for him: he sees him doing some evil, he praises him:
he wishes him to go headlong, wishes him to go blind over the
precipice of his lusts, haply never to return; he praises him, "For the
sinner is praised in the desires of his soul;" he applies to him the
unction of adulation; behold, he hates, and praises. Another sees his
friend doing something of the same sort; he calls him back; if he will
not hear, he uses words even of castigation, he scolds, he quarrels:
there are times when it comes to this, that one must even quarrel!
Behold, hatred shows itself winningly gentle, and charity quarrels!
Stay not your regard upon the words of seeming kindness, or the
seeming cruelty of the rebuke; look into the vein they come from; seek
the root whence they proceed. The one is gentle and bland that he
may deceive, the other quarrels that he may correct. Well then, it is
not for us, brethren, to enlarge your heart: obtain from God the gift to
love one another. Love all men, even your enemies, not because they
are your brethren, but that they may be your brethren; that you may
be at all times on fire with brotherly love, whether toward him that is
become your brother, or towards your enemy, so that, by being
beloved, he may become your brother. Wherever you love a brother,
you love a friend. Now is he with you, now is he knit to you in unity,
yea catholic unity. If you are living aright, you love a brother made out
of an enemy. But you love some man who has not yet believed Christ,
or, if he has believed, believes as the devils: you rebuke his vanity.
Love, with a brotherly love: he is not yet a brother, but you love to the
end he may be a brother. Well then, all our love is a brotherly love,
towards Christians, towards all His members. The discipline of charity,
my brethren, its strength, flowers, fruit, beauty, pleasantness, food,
drink, meat, embracing, has in it no satiety. If it so delight us while in a
strange land, in our own country how shall we rejoice!
8. Let us run then, my brethren, let us run, and love Christ. What
Christ? Jesus Christ. Who is He? The Word of God. And how came He
to the sick? "The Word was made flesh, and dwelt in us." It is complete
then, which the Scripture foretold, "Christ must suffer, and rise again
the third day from the dead." His body, where is it? His members,
where toil they? Where must you be, that you may be under your
Head? "And that repentance and remission of sins be preached in His
name through all nations, beginning at Jerusalem." There let your
charity be spread abroad. Christ says, and the Psalm, i.e. the Spirit of
God, "Your commandment is exceeding broad:" and forsooth some
man will have charity to be confined to Africa! Extend your charity
over the whole earth if you will love Christ, for Christ's members are
over all the earth. If you love but a part, you are divided: if you are
divided, you are not in the body; if you are not in the body, you are not
under the Head. What profits it you that you believe and are broken!!
You adore Him in the Head, blaspheme Him in the Body. He loves His
Body. If you have cut yourself off from His Body, the Head has not cut
itself off from its Body. To no purpose do you honour me, cries your
Head to you from on high, to no purpose do you honour me. It is all
one as if a man would kiss your head and tread upon your feet:
perchance with nailed boots he would crush your feet, while he will
clasp your head and kiss it: would you not cry out in the midst of the
words with which he honours you, and say, What are you doing, man?
you tread on me. You would not mean, You tread on my head; for the
head he honoured; but more would the head cry out for the members
trodden upon, than for itself because it was honoured. Does not the
head itself cry out, I will none of your honour; do not tread on me?
Now say if you can, How have I trodden upon you? say that to the
head: I wanted to kiss you, I wanted to embrace you. But see you not,
O fool, that what you would embrace does in virtue of a certain unity,
which knits the whole frame together, reach to that which you tread
upon? Above you honour me, beneath you tread upon me. That on
which you tread pains more than that which you honour rejoices. In
what sort does the tongue cry out? "It hurts me." It says not, "It hurts
my foot," but, "It hurts me," says it. O tongue, who has touched you?
who has struck? who has goaded? who has pricked? No man, but I am
knit together with the parts that are trodden upon. How would you
have me not be pained, when I am not separate?
9. Our Lord Jesus Christ, then, ascending into heaven on the fortieth
day, did for this reason commend to us His Body where it would
continue to lie, because He saw that many would honour Him for that
He is ascended into heaven: and saw that their honouring Him is
useless if they trample upon His members here on earth. And lest any
one should err, and, while he adored the Head in heaven should
trample upon the feet on earth, He told us where would be His
members. For being about to ascend, He spake His last words on
earth: after those same words He spake no more on earth. The Head
about to ascend into heaven commended to us His members on earth
and departed. Thenceforth you find not Christ speaking on earth; you
find Him speaking, but from heaven. And even from heaven, why?
Because His members on earth were trodden upon. For to the
persecutor Saul He said from on high, "Saul, Saul, why persecute you
me?" I am ascended into heaven, but still I lie on earth: here I sit at the
right hand of the Father, but there I yet hunger, thirst, and am a
stranger. In what manner then did He commend to us His Body, when
about to ascend into heaven? When the disciples asked Him, saying,
"Lord, will you at this time present yourself, and when shall be the
kingdom of Israel?" He made answer, now at the point to depart, "It is
not for you to know the time which the Father has put in His own
power: but you shall receive strength of the Holy Ghost coming upon
you, and you shall be witnesses to me." See where His Body is spread
abroad, see where He will not be trodden upon: "You shall be
witnesses to me, to Jerusalem, and to Judea, and even to all the earth."
Lo, where I lie that am ascending! For I ascend, because I am the Head:
my Body lies yet beneath. Where lies? Throughout the whole earth.
Beware you strike not, beware you hurt not, beware you trample not:
these be the last words of Christ about to go into heaven. Look at a
sick man languishing on his bed, lying in his house, and worn out with
sickness, at death's door, his soul as it were even now between his
teeth: who, anxious, it may be, about something that is dear to him,
which he greatly loves, and it comes into his mind, calls his heirs, and
says to them, I pray you, do this. He, as it were, detains his soul by a
violent effort, that it may not depart ere those words be made sure.
When he has dictated those last words, he breathes out his soul, he is
borne a corpse to the sepulchre. His heirs, how do they remember the
last words of the dying man? How, if one should stand up and say to
them, Do it not: what would they say? "What? shall I not do that which
my father, in the act of breathing out his soul, commanded me with his
last breath, the last word of his that sounded in my ears when my
father was departing this life? Whatever other words of his I may not
regard, his last have a stronger hold upon me: since which I never saw
him more, never more heard speech of his." Brethren, think with
Christian hearts; if to the heirs of a man, his words spoken when
about to go to the tomb are so sweet, so grateful, so weighty, what
must we account of the last words of Christ, spoken not when about to
go back to the tomb, but to ascend into heaven! As for the man who
lived and is dead, his soul is hurried off to other places, his body is laid
in the earth, and whether these words of his be done or not, makes no
difference to him: he has now something else to do, or something else
to suffer: either in Abraham's bosom he rejoices, or in eternal fire he
longs for a drop of water, while his corpse lies there senseless in the
sepulchre; and yet the last words of the dying man are kept. What
have those to look for, who keep not the last words of Him that sits in
heaven, who sees from on high whether they be despised or not
despised? The words of Him, who said, "Saul, Saul, why persecute you
Me?" who keeps account, to the judgment, of all that He sees His
members suffer?
10. And what have we done, say they? We are the persecuted, not the
persecutors. You are the persecutors, O wretched men. In the first
place, in that you have divided the Church. Mightier the sword of the
tongue than the sword of steel. Agar, Sarah's maid, was proud, and she
was afflicted by her mistress for her pride. That was discipline, not
punishment. Accordingly, when she had gone away from her mistress,
what said the angel to her? "Return to your mistress." Then, O carnal
soul, like a proud bond-woman, suppose you have suffered any
trouble for discipline' sake, why do you rave? "Return to your
mistress," hold fast the peace of the Church. Lo, the gospels are
produced, we read where the Church is spread abroad: men dispute
against us, and say to us, "Betrayers!" Betrayers of what? Christ
commends to us His Church, and you believe not: shall I believe you,
when you revile my parents? Would you that I should believe you
about the "betrayers"? Do you first believe Christ. What is worth
believing? Christ is God, you are man: which ought to be believed
first? Christ has spread His Church abroad over all the earth: I say it -
despise me: the gospel speaks - beware. What says the gospel? "It was
necessary for Christ to suffer, and to rise again from the dead on the
third day, and that repentance and remission of sins should be
preached in His name." Where remission of sins, there the Church is.
How the Church? Why, to her it was said, "To you I will give the keys of
the kingdom of heaven, and whatever you shall loose on earth shall be
loosed in heaven, and whatever you shall bind on earth shall be bound
in heaven." Where is this remission of sins spread abroad? "Through
all nations, beginning at Jerusalem." Lo, believe Christ! But, because
you are well aware that if you shall believe Christ, you will not have
anything to say about "betrayers," you will needs have me to believe
you when you speak evil against my parents, rather than yourself
believe what Christ foretold!
[The remainder of the Homily is wanting in all the manuscripts. It
seems also that St. Augustin was hindered from completing the
exposition of the entire epistle, as he had undertaken to do: at least
Possidius specifies this work under the title, "In Epist. Joannis ad
Parthos Tractatus decem," and it is scarcely likely that the whole of the
fifth chapter was expounded in this tenth Homily. - Of the "Sermons,"
there are none upon the remaining part of this epistle: the following
extracts from other works of St. Augustin will supply what will be
most desiderated: namely, his exposition of the text on "the Three
Witnesses," of "the sin to death," and of the twentieth verse].
Contra Maximinum, lib. ii. c. 22 §. 3.
1 Joann. v. 7, 8. There are three witnesses, spirit, water and blood; and
the three are one.
I would not have you mistake that place in the epistle of John the
apostle where he says, "There are three witnesses: the Spirit, and the
water, and the blood: and the three are one." Lest haply you say that
the Spirit and the water and the blood are diverse substances, and yet
it is said, "the three are one:" for this cause I have admonished you,
that you mistake not the matter. For these are mystical expressions, in
which the point always to be considered is, not what the actual things
are, but what they denote as signs: since they are signs of things, and
what they are in their essence is one thing, what they are in their
signification another. If then we understand the things signified, we do
find these things to be of one substance. Thus, if we should say, the
rock and the water are one, meaning by the Rock, Christ; by the water,
the Holy Ghost: who doubts that rock and water are two different
substances? yet because Christ and the Holy Spirit are of one and the
same nature, therefore when one says, the rock and the water are one,
this can be rightly taken in this behalf, that these two things of which
the nature is diverse, are signs of other things of which the nature is
one. Three things then we know to have issued from the Body of the
Lord when He hung upon the tree: first, the spirit: of which it is
written, "And He bowed the head and gave up the spirit:" then, as His
side was pierced by the spear, "blood and water." Which three things if
we look at as they are in themselves, they are in substance several and
distinct, and therefore they are not one. But if we will inquire into the
things signified by these, there not unreasonably comes into our
thoughts the Trinity itself, which is the One, Only, True, Supreme God,
Father and Son and Holy Ghost, of whom it could most truly be said,
"There are Three Witnesses, and the Three are One:" so that by the
term Spirit we should understand God the Father to be signified; as
indeed it was concerning the worshipping of Him that the Lord was
speaking, when He said, "God is a Spirit:" by the term, blood, the Son;
because "the Word was made flesh:" and by the term water, the Holy
Ghost; as, when Jesus spake of the water which He would give to those
who thirst, the evangelist says, "But this said He of the Spirit which
those who believed on Him were to receive." Moreover, that the Father,
Son, and Holy Ghost are "Witnesses," who that believes the Gospel can
doubt, when the Son says, "I am one who bear witness of myself, and
the Father that sent me, He bears witness of me." Where, though the
Holy Ghost is not mentioned, yet He is not to be thought separated
from them. Howbeit neither concerning the Spirit has He kept silence
elsewhere, and that He too is a witness has been sufficiently and
openly shown. For in promising Him He said, "He shall bear witness of
me." These are the "Three Witnesses," and the Three are One, because
of one substance. But whereas, the signs by which they were signified
came forth from the Body of the Lord, herein they figured the Church
preaching the Trinity, that it has one and the same nature: since these
Three in threefold manner signified are One, and the Church that
preaches them is the Body of Christ. In this manner then the three
things by which they are signified came out from the Body of the Lord:
like as from the Body of the Lord sounded forth the command to
"baptise the nations in the Name of the Father and of the Son and of
the Holy Ghost." "In the name:" not, In the names: for "these Three are
One," and One God is these Three. And if in any other way this depth of
mystery which we read in John's epistle can be expounded and
understood agreeably with the Catholic faith, which neither confounds
nor divides the Trinity, neither believes the substances diverse nor
denies that the persons are three, it is on no account to be rejected.
For whenever in Holy Scriptures in order to exercise the minds of the
faithful any thing is put darkly, it is to be joyfully welcomed if it can be
in many ways but not unwisely expounded.
De Sermone Domini in Monte, lib. i. 22, § 73.
1 Joann. v. 16. If he knows a brother who sins a sin that is not to deat,
pray, and God will give life to him who sins not to death; there is a sin
to death; I do not say to pray for that.
But what presses harder upon the present question [in the Lord's
command of praying for enemies and persecutors] is that saying of the
apostle John, "If any man know that his brother sins a sin not to death, he shall ask, and the Lord will give life to that man who sins not to
death: but there is a sin to death: not for that do I say that he should
ask." For it manifestly shows that there are some "brethren" whom we
are not commanded to pray for, whereas the Lord bids us pray even
for our persecutors. Nor can this question be solved except we
acknowledge, that there are some sins in brethren that are worse than
the sin of enemies in persecuting. That "brethren" mean Christians,
may be proved by many texts of Holy Writ; the plainest, however, is
that of the apostle which he puts thus: "For the unbelieving husband is
sanctified in the wife, and the unbelieving wife is sanctified in the
brother." For he has not added our; but thought it plain enough, when
by the term brother he spake of the Christian that should have an
unbelieving wife. And accordingly he says just afterwards, "But if the
unbelieving depart, let her depart: but a brother or sister is not put
under servitude in a matter of this sort." The "sin," therefore, of a
brother, "to death," I suppose to be when, after the acknowledging of
God through the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, one fights against the
brotherhood, and is set on by the fire-brands of hatred against the
very grace through which he was reconciled to God. But "a sin not to
death" is when a person, not having alienated his love from his
brother, yet through some infirmity of mind may have failed to exhibit
the due offices of brotherhood. So, on the one hand, the Lord on the
cross said, "Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do,"
since they had not yet, by being made partakers of the grace of the
Holy Spirit, entered into the fellowship of holy brotherhood; and
blessed Stephen in the Acts of the Apostles prays for them who are
stoning him; because they had not yet believed Christ, and were not
fighting against that grace of communion. On the other hand, the
apostle Paul does not pray for Alexander, and the reason I suppose, is,
that this man was a brother, and had sinned "to death," i.e. by
opposing the brotherhood in a spirit of hatred. Whereas for such as
had not broken off the bonds of love, but had given way through fear,
he prays that they may be forgiven. For so he says: "Alexander the
coppersmith did me much evil: the Lord reward him according to his
works: of whom beware also; for he has greatly withstood our words."
Then he subjoins for whom he prays, saying, "At my first answer no
man stood with me, but all men forsook me: I pray God that it may not
be laid to their charge." This difference of sins it is that distinguishes Judas with his treason from Peter with his denial. Not that to him who
repents there is to be no forgiveness: lest we go against that sentence
of the Lord, in which He commands always to forgive the brother who
asks his brother's forgiveness: but that the mischief of that sin is, that
the man cannot submit to the humiliation of begging for pardon, even
when he is forced by his evil conscience both to acknowledge and to
publish his sin. For when Judas had said, "I have sinned, in that I have
betrayed the innocent blood," he went and hanged himself in
desperation, rather than pray for forgiveness in humiliation. So it
makes a great difference, what sort of repentance God forgives. For
many are much quicker than others to confess that they have sinned,
and are angry with themselves in such sort that they vehemently wish
they had not sinned, while yet they cannot lay down their pride, and
submit to have the heart humbled and broken so as to implore
pardon: a state of mind which one may well believe to be, for the
greatness of their sin, a part of their already begun damnation.
And this, perhaps, it is "to sin against the Holy Ghost:" i.e. through
malice and envy to fight against brotherly charity after receiving the
grace of the Holy Spirit: that sin which the Lord says has no
forgiveness, either here or in the world to come. .. . For the Lord in
saying to the Pharisees, "Whoever shall speak an evil word against the
Son of Man," &c., may have meant to warn them to come to the grace
of God, and having received it, not to sin as they have now sinned. For
now they have spoken an evil word against the Son of Man, and it may
be forgiven them, if they be converted and believe and receive the
Holy Spirit: which when they have received, if they will then have ill-
will against the brotherhood and oppose the grace they have received,
there is no forgiveness for them, either in this world or in the world to
come.
Contra Maximinum. lib. ii. c. 14, § 2, 3.
1 Joann. v. 20. "That we may be in His true Son Jesus Christ; he is the
true God, and eternal life."
When you read, "That we may be in His true Son Jesus Christ," think of the "true Son" of God. But this Son you in no wise think to be the true
Son of God, if you deny Him to be begotten of the substance of the
Father. For was He already Son of Man and by gift of God became Son
God, begotten indeed of God, but by grace, not by nature? Or, though
not Son of Man, yet was He some sort of creature which, by God's
changing it, was converted into Son of God? If you mean nothing of
this sort, then was He either begotten of nothing, or of some
substance. But you have relieved us from all fear of having to suppose
that you affirm the Son of God to be of nothing, for you have declared
that this is not your meaning. Therefore, He is of some substance. If
not of the substance of the Father, then of what? Tell me. But you
cannot find any other . . . Consequently, the Father and the Son are of
one and the same substance. This is the Homouusion . . . . In the
Scriptures both you and we read, "That we may be in His true Son
Jesus Christ; He is the true God and Eternal Life." Let both parties yield
to such weighty evidence. Tell us then, whether this "true Son" of God,
discriminated as He is by the property of this name from those who
are sons by grace, be of no substance or of some substance. You say, "I
do not say that He is of no substance, lest I should say that He is of
nothing." He is therefore of some substance: I ask, of what? If not of
the substance of the Father, seek another. If you find not another, as
indeed you can find none at all, then acknowledge it to be the
Father's, and confess the Son Homouusios, "of one substance with the
Father." Flesh is begotten of flesh, the Son of flesh is begotten of the
substance of the flesh. Set aside corruption, reject from the eye of the
mind all carnal passions, and behold "the invisible things of God
understood by the means of the things that are made." Believe that
the Creator who has given flesh power to beget flesh, who has given
parents power of the substance of the flesh to generate "true sons" of
flesh, much more had power to beget a "true Son" of His own
substance, and to have one substance with the true Son, the spiritual
incorruption remaining and carnal corruption being altogether alien
therefrom.