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| More Passages from the Same Gospel in Proof of the Same Portion of the Catholic Faith. Praxeas' Taunt of Worshipping Two Gods Repudiated.
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Chapter XXIII.—More
Passages from the Same Gospel in Proof of the Same Portion of the
Catholic Faith. Praxeas’ Taunt of Worshipping Two Gods
Repudiated.
Again, when Martha in a later passage acknowledged
Him to be the Son of God,8070
she no more made a
mistake than Peter8071
and
Nathanæl8072
had; and yet, even
if she had made a mistake, she would at once have learnt the truth:
for, behold, when about to raise her brother from the dead, the Lord
looked up to heaven, and, addressing the Father, said—as the Son,
of course: “Father, I thank Thee that Thou always hearest
me; it is because of these crowds that are standing by that I have
spoken to Thee, that they may believe that Thou hast sent
me.”8073
But in the trouble
of His soul, (on a later occasion,) He said: “What shall I say?
Father, save me from this hour: but for this cause is it that I am come
to this hour; only, O Father, do Thou glorify Thy name”8074
—in which He spake as the Son. (At another time) He
said: “I am come in my Father’s name.”8075
Accordingly, the Son’s voice was
indeed alone sufficient, (when addressed) to the Father. But,
behold, with an abundance (of evidence)8076
| 8076 Or, “by way of
excess.” |
the Father from heaven replies, for the purpose of testifying to the
Son: “This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased; hear ye
Him.”8077
So, again, in that
asseveration, “I have both glorified, and will glorify
again,”8078
how many Persons do
you discover, obstinate Praxeas? Are there not as many as there are
voices? You have the Son on earth, you have the Father in heaven. Now
this is not a separation; it is nothing but the divine dispensation. We
know, however, that God is in the bottomless depths, and exists
everywhere; but then it is by power and authority. We are also sure
that the Son, being indivisible from Him, is everywhere with Him.
Nevertheless, in the Economy or Dispensation itself, the Father
willed that the Son should be regarded8079
as
on earth, and Himself in heaven; whither the Son also Himself looked
up, and prayed, and made supplication of the Father; whither also He
taught us to raise ourselves, and pray, “Our Father which art in
heaven,” etc.,8080
—although,
indeed, He is everywhere present. This heaven the Father willed
to be His own throne; while He made the Son to be “a little lower
than the angels,”8081
by sending Him down
to the earth, but meaning at the same time to “crown Him with
glory and honour,”8082
even by taking Him
back to heaven. This He now made good to Him when He said: “I
have both glorified Thee, and will glorify Thee
again.” The Son offers His request from earth, the Father
gives His promise from heaven. Why, then, do you make liars of
both the Father and the Son? If either the Father spake from heaven to
the Son when He Himself was the Son on earth, or the Son prayed to the
Father when He was Himself the Son in heaven, how happens it that the
Son made a request of His own very self, by asking it of the Father,
since the Son was the Father? Or, on the other hand, how is it that the
Father made a promise to Himself, by making it to the Son, since the
Father was the Son? Were we even to maintain that they are two separate
gods, as you are so fond of throwing out against us, it would be a more
tolerable assertion than the maintenance of so versatile and changeful
a God as yours! Therefore it was that in the passage before us
the Lord declared to the people present: “Not on my own account
has this voice addressed me, but for your sakes,”8083
that these likewise may believe both in the
Father and in the Son, severally, in their own names and persons and
positions. “Then again, Jesus exclaims, and says, He that
believeth on me, believeth not on me, but on Him that sent
me;”8084
because it is
through the Son that men believe in the Father, while the Father also
is the authority whence springs belief in the Son. “And he that
seeth me, seeth Him that sent me.”8085
How so? Even because, (as He afterwards declares,) “I have
not spoken from myself, but the Father which sent me: He hath given me
a commandment what I should say, and what I should
speak.”8086
For “the Lord
God hath given me the tongue of the learned, that I should know when I
ought to speak”8087
the word which I
actually speak. “Even as the Father hath said unto me, so do I
speak.”8088
Now, in what way
these things were said to Him, the evangelist and beloved disciple John
knew better than Praxeas; and therefore he adds concerning his own
meaning: “Now before the feast of the passover, Jesus knew
that the Father had given all things into His hands, and that He had
come from God, and was going to God.”8089
Praxeas, however, would have it that it was the Father who proceeded
forth from Himself, and had returned to Himself; so that what the devil
put into the heart of Judas was the betrayal, not of the Son, but of
the Father Himself. But for the matter of that, things have not turned
out well either for the devil or the heretic; because, even in the
Son’s case, the treason which the devil wrought against Him
contributed nothing to his advantage. It was, then, the Son of God, who
was in the Son of man, that was betrayed, as the Scripture says
afterwards: “Now is the Son of man glorified, and God is
glorified in Him.”8090
Who is here meant
by “God?” Certainly not the Father, but the Word of the
Father, who was in the Son of man—that is in the flesh, in which
Jesus had been already glorified by the divine power and word.
“And God,” says He, “shall also glorify Him in
Himself;”8091
that is to say, the
Father shall glorify the Son, because He has Him within Himself; and
even though prostrated to the earth, and put to death, He would soon glorify
Him by His resurrection, and making Him conqueror over
death.E.C.F. INDEX & SEARCH
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