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| In What Manner the Son is Said Not to Know the Day and the Hour Which the Father Knows. Some Things Said of Christ According to the Form of God, Other Things According to the Form of a Servant. In What Way It is of Christ to Give the Kingdom, in What Not of Christ. Christ Will Both Judge and Not Judge.
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Chapter 12.—In What Manner the Son is Said Not to Know
the Day and the Hour Which the Father Knows. Some Things Said of
Christ According to the Form of God, Other Things According to the
Form of a Servant. In What Way It is of Christ to Give the Kingdom,
in What Not of Christ. Christ Will Both Judge and Not
Judge.
Again, “Of that day and that hour
knoweth no man, no, not the angels which are in heaven; neither the
Son, but the Father.”136
For He is ignorant of this, as
making others ignorant; that is, in that He did not so know as
at that time to show His disciples:137
| 137 [The more common explanation of
this text in modern exegesis makes the ignorance to be literal, and
referable solely to the human nature of our Lord, not to his person
as a whole. Augustin’s explanation, which Bengel, on Mark xiii. 32, is inclined
to favor, escapes the difficulty that arises from a seeming
division of the one theanthopic person into two portions, one of
which knows, and the other does not. Yet this same difficulty
besets the fact of a growth in knowledge, which is plainly
taught in Luke i. 80. In this
case, the increase in wisdom must relate to the humanity
alone.—W.G.T.S.] | as it was said to Abraham, “Now I
know that thou fearest God,”138
that is, now I have caused thee to
know it; because he himself, being tried in that temptation, became
known to himself. For He was certainly going to tell this same
thing to His disciples at the fitting time; speaking of which yet
future as if past, He says, “Henceforth I call you not servants,
but friends; for the servant knoweth not what his Lord doeth: but I
have called you friends; for all things that I have heard of my
Father I have made known unto you;”139
which He had not yet done, but
spoke as though He had already done it, because He certainly would
do it. For He says to the disciples themselves, “I have yet many
things to say unto you; but ye cannot bear them now.”140
Among which
is to be understood also, “Of the day and hour.” For the
apostle also says, “I determined not to know anything among you,
save Jesus Christ, and Him crucified;”141
because he was speaking to those
who were not able to receive higher things concerning the Godhead
of Christ. To whom also a little while after he says, “I could
not speak unto you as unto spiritual, but as unto carnal.”142
He was
“ignorant,” therefore, among them of that which they were not
able to know from him. And that only he said that he knew, which it
was fitting that they should know from him. In short, he knew among
the perfect what he knew not among babes; for he there says: “We
speak wisdom among them that are perfect.”143
For a man is said not to know
what he hides, after that kind of speech, after which a ditch is
called blind which is hidden. For the Scriptures do not use any
other kind of speech than may be found in use among men, because
they speak to men.
24. According to the form of God,
it is said “Before all the hills He begat me,”144
that is,
before all the loftinesses of things created and, “Before the
dawn I begat Thee,”145
that is, before all times and
temporal things: but according to the form of a servant, it is
said, “The Lord created me in the beginning of His ways.”146
Because,
according to the form of God, He said, “I am the truth;” and
according to the form of a servant, “I am the way.”147
For, because
He Himself, being the first-begotten of the dead,148
made a passage to the kingdom of
God to life eternal for His Church, to which He is so the Head as
to make the body also immortal, therefore He was “created in the
beginning of the ways” of God in His work. For, according to the
form of God, He is the beginning,149
that also speaketh unto us, in
which “beginning” God created the heaven and the earth;150
but
according to the form of a servant, “He is a bridegroom coming
out of His chamber.”151
According to the form of God, “He
is the first-born of every creature, and He is before all things
and by him all things consist;” according to the form of a
servant, “He is the head of the body, the Church.”152
According to
the form of God, “He is the Lord of glory.”153
From which it is evident that He
Himself glorifies His saints: for, “Whom He did predestinate,
them He also called; and whom He called, them He also justified;
and whom He justified, them He also glorified.”154
Of Him accordingly it is said, that
He justifieth the ungodly;155
of Him it is said, that He is just
and a justifier.156
If,
therefore, He has also glorified those whom He has justified, He
who justifies, Himself also glorifies; who is, as I have said, the
Lord of glory. Yet, according to the form of a servant, He replied
to His disciples, when inquiring about their own glorification:
“To sit on my right hand and on my left is not mine to give, but
[it shall be given to them] for whom it is prepared by my
Father.”157
25. But that which is prepared by
His Father is prepared also by the Son Himself, because He and the
Father are one.158
For we have
already shown, by many modes of speech in the divine Scriptures,
that, in this Trinity, what is said of each is also said of all, on
account of the indivisible working of the one and same substance.
As He also says of the Holy Spirit, “If I depart, I will send Him
unto you.”159
He did not
say, We will send; but in such way as if the Son only should
send Him, and not the Father; while yet He says in another place,
“These things have I spoken unto you, being yet present with you;
but the Comforter, which is the Holy Ghost, whom the Father will
send in my name, He shall teach you all things.”160
Here again
it is so said as if the Son also would not send Him, but the Father
only. As therefore in these texts, so also where He says, “But
for them for whom it is prepared by my Father,” He meant it to be
understood that He Himself, with the Father, prepares seats of
glory for those for whom He will. But some one may say: There, when
He spoke of the Holy Spirit, He so says that He Himself will send
Him, as not to deny that the Father will send Him; and in the other
place, He so says that the Father will send Him, as not to deny
that He will do so Himself; but here He expressly says, “It is
not mine to give,” and so goes on to say that these things are
prepared by the Father. But this is the very thing which we have
already laid down to be said according to the form of a servant:
viz., that we are so to understand “It is not mine to
give,” as if it were said, This is not in the power of man to
give; that so He may be understood to give it through that wherein
He is God equal to the Father. “It is not mine,” He says, “to
give;” that is, I do not give these things by human power, but
“to those for whom it is prepared by my Father;” but then take
care you understand also, that if “all things which the Father
hath are mine,”161
then this
certainly is mine also, and I with the Father have prepared these
things.
26. For I ask again, in what manner
this is said, “If any man hear not my words, I will not judge
him?”162
For perhaps
He has said here, “I will not judge him,” in the same sense as
there, “It is not mine to give.” But what follows here? “I
came not,” He says, “to judge the world, but to save the
world;” and then He adds, “He that rejecteth me, and receiveth
not my words, hath one that judgeth him.” Now here we should
understand the Father, unless He had added, “The word that I have
spoken, the same shall judge him in the last day.” Well, then,
will neither the Son judge, because He says, “I will not judge
him,” nor the Father, but the word which the Son hath spoken?
Nay, but hear what yet follows: “For I,” He says, “have
not spoken of myself; but the Father which sent me, He gave me a
commandment, what I should say, and what I should speak; and I know
that His commandment is life everlasting: whatsoever I speak
therefore, even as the Father said unto me, so I speak.” If
therefore the Son judges not, but “the word which the Son hath
spoken;” and the word which the Son hath spoken therefore judges,
because the Son “hath not spoken of Himself, but the Father who
sent Him gave Him a commandment what He should say, and what He
should speak:” then the Father assuredly judges, whose word it is
which the Son hath spoken; and the same Son Himself is the very
Word of the Father. For the commandment of the Father is not one
thing, and the word of the Father another; for He hath called it
both a word and a commandment. Let us see, therefore, whether
perchance, when He says, “I have not spoken of myself,” He
meant to be understood thus,—I am not born of myself. For if He
speaks the word of the Father, then He speaks Himself,163
because He
is Himself the Word of the Father. For ordinarily He says, “The
Father gave to me;” by which He means it to be understood that
the Father begat Him: not that He gave anything to Him, already
existing and not possessing it; but that the very meaning of, To
have given that He might have, is, To have begotten that He might
be. For it is not, as with the creature so with the Son of God
before the incarnation and before He took upon Him our flesh, the
Only-begotten by whom all things were made; that He is one
thing, and has another: but He is in such way as to
be what He has. And this is said more plainly, if any
one is fit to receive it, in that place where He says: “For as
the Father hath life in Himself, so hath He given to the Son to
have life in Himself.”164
For He did not give to Him, already
existing and not having life, that He should have life in Himself;
inasmuch as, in that He is, He is life. Therefore “He gave
to the Son to have life in Himself” means, He begat the Son to be
unchangeable life, which is life eternal. Since, therefore, the
Word of God is the Son of God, and the Son of God is “the true
God and eternal life,”165
as John says in his Epistle; so
here, what else are we to acknowledge when the Lord says, “The
word which I have spoken, the same shall judge him at the last
day,”166
and calls
that very word the word of the Father and the commandment of the
Father, and that very commandment everlasting life?” “And I
know,” He says, “that His commandment is life
everlasting.”
27. I ask, therefore, how we are to
understand, “I will not judge him; but the Word which I have
spoken shall judge him:” which appears from what follows to be so
said, as if He would say, I will not judge; but the Word of the
Father will judge. But the Word of the Father is the Son of God
Himself. Is it to be so understood: I will not judge, but I will
judge? How can this be true, unless in this way: viz., I
will not judge by human power, because I am the Son of man; but I
will judge by the power of the Word, because I am the Son of God?
Or if it still seems contradictory and inconsistent to say, I will
not judge, but I will judge; what shall we say of that place where
He says, “My doctrine is not mine?” How “mine,” when “not
mine?” For He did not say, This doctrine is not mine, but
“My doctrine is not mine:” that which He called His own,
the same He called not His own. How can this be true, unless He has
called it His own in one relation; not His own, in another?
According to the form of God, His own; according to the form of a
servant, not His own. For when He says, “It is not mine, but His
that sent me,”167
He makes us
recur to the Word itself. For the doctrine of the Father is the
Word of the Father, which is the Only Son. And what, too, does that
mean, “He that believeth on me, believeth not on me?”168
How believe
on Him, yet not believe on Him? How can so opposite and
inconsistent a thing be understood—“Whoso believeth on me,”
He says, “believeth not on me, but on Him that sent
me;”—unless you so understand it, Whoso believeth on me
believeth not on that which he sees, lest our hope should be in the
creature; but on Him who took the creature, whereby He might appear
to human eyes, and so might cleanse our hearts by faith, to
contemplate Himself as equal to the Father? So that in turning the
attention of believers to the Father, and saying, “Believeth not
on me, but on Him that sent me,” He certainly did not mean
Himself to be separated from the Father, that is, from Him that
sent Him; but that men might so believe on Himself, as they believe
on the Father, to whom He is equal. And this He says in express
terms in another place, “Ye believe in God, believe also in
me:”169
that is, in
the same way as you believe in God, so also believe in me; because
I and the Father are One God. As therefore, here, He has as it were
withdrawn the faith of men from Himself, and transferred it to the
Father, by saying, “Believeth not on me, but on Him that sent
me,” from whom nevertheless He certainly did not separate
Himself; so also, when He says, “It is not mine to give, but [it
shall be given to them] for whom it is prepared by my Father,” it
is I think plain in what relation both are to be taken. For that
other also is of the same kind, “I will not judge;” whereas He
Himself shall judge the quick and dead.170
But because He will not do so by
human power, therefore, reverting to the Godhead, He raises the
hearts of men upwards; which to lift up, He Himself came
down.E.C.F. INDEX & SEARCH
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