Tractates on the Gospel of John 122.1–122.9

After narrating the event in which the disciple Thomas, when the places of the wounds in Christ's flesh were offered him to touch, saw what he had been unwilling to believe and believed, John the evangelist inserts this and says: "Jesus did many other signs too in the presence of his disciples, which are not written in this book. But these are written that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that believing you may have life in his name." This paragraph indicates, as it were, the end of this book; but there is narrated after it how the Lord manifested himself at the sea of Tiberias, and in the catch of fish commended the mystery of the Church, such as it will be at the last resurrection of the dead. I think it serves to commend this, that what was inserted as though it were the end of the book should also be a kind of preface to the narrative that was to follow, to give it in a way a more prominent place. That narrative begins thus: "After this Jesus manifested himself again at the sea of Tiberias; and he manifested himself in this way. There were together Simon Peter, and Thomas who is called Didymus, and Nathanael, who was from Cana of Galilee, and the sons of Zebedee, and two others of his disciples. Simon Peter said to them, I am going fishing. They said to him, We are coming with you too."

People usually ask about this fishing of the disciples why Peter and the sons of Zebedee went back to what they had been before they were called by the Lord; for they were fishermen when he said to them, "Come after me, and I will make you fishers of men." For then they followed him so as to cling to his teaching, leaving everything; so much so that when that rich man went away sad from him, to whom he had said, "Go, sell what you have and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; and come, follow me", Peter said to him, "See, we have left everything and followed you." What, then, does it mean that now, as though their apostleship had been abandoned, they become what they had been and take up again what they had left, as though forgetting what they had heard: "No one who puts his hand to the plough and looks back is fit for the kingdom of heaven"? Suppose they had done this when Jesus was dead, before he rose from the dead. This indeed they could not do, since the day on which he was crucified kept them all intent until his burial, which took place before evening; and the following day was the sabbath, when, keeping the custom of their fathers, they were certainly not allowed to work; and on the third day the Lord rose again and called them back to the hope which they had already begun to lose concerning him. Yet if they had done it then, we would think they had done it from the despair which had taken hold of their minds. But now, after he had been given back to them alive from the tomb; after the most evident reality of his living flesh had been offered to their eyes and hands, not only to be seen but also to be touched and handled; after the places of the wounds had been inspected, to the point of the confession of the apostle Thomas, who had declared that he would not believe otherwise; after they had received the Holy Spirit by his breathing on them; after the words spoken by his mouth into their ears, "As the Father has sent me, so I send you; whose sins you forgive, they are forgiven them; and whose sins you retain, they are retained"; suddenly they become what they had been, fishers not of men but of fish.

To those who are troubled by this it must be answered that they were not forbidden to seek their necessary livelihood by their own trade, which was of course lawful and permitted, while keeping their apostleship intact, if at any time they had nothing else to live on. Unless perhaps someone will dare to think or say that the apostle Paul did not attain the perfection of those who left everything and followed Christ, because, so as not to be a burden to any of those to whom he preached the Gospel, he earned his living with his own hands. In this, rather, was fulfilled what he says, "I laboured more than all of them"; and he added, "yet not I, but the grace of God with me"; so that this too may be seen to be ascribed to the grace of God, that he could labour in mind and body so much more than all of them that he neither ceased from preaching the Gospel nor yet, like them, sustained this life from the Gospel; while he sowed the Gospel much more widely and fruitfully through so many nations in which the name of Christ had not been proclaimed. In this he shows that living from the Gospel, that is, having one's living from it, was not a necessity imposed on the apostles but a right given to them. This right the same apostle mentions when he says: "If we have sown spiritual things among you, is it a great thing if we reap your material things? If others share this right over you, do not we still more? But we have not made use of this right." And a little later: "Those who serve at the altar share in the altar; so too the Lord has ordained that those who proclaim the Gospel should live from the Gospel. But I have made use of none of these." It is clear enough, then, that it was not commanded but put within the apostles' right that they should live from nothing else but the Gospel, and that from those among whom they were sowing spiritual things by preaching the Gospel they should reap material things, that is, receive the support of this flesh, and, as soldiers of Christ, receive the pay due to them, as from the provinces of Christ. That is why the same excellent soldier had said a little earlier on this matter, "Who ever serves as a soldier at his own expense?" Yet he himself did this, because he laboured more than all of them. If, then, blessed Paul, so as not to use, as the others did, the right which he certainly had with the other preachers of the Gospel, but to serve at his own expense, lest his teaching should offend as though it were for sale the nations wholly strangers to the name of Christ, learned a trade which he had not known, having been brought up otherwise, so that while the teacher was supported by his own hands no hearer should be burdened; how much more did blessed Peter, who had already been a fisherman, do what he knew, if for that present time he found nothing else to live on?

But someone will answer: And why did he not find it, since the Lord promised, saying, "Seek first the kingdom and the righteousness of God, and all these things will be added to you"? Even so the Lord fulfilled entirely what he promised. For who else added the fish that were to be caught? He must be believed to have brought on them the want which drove them to go fishing for no other reason than that he wished to show a miracle he had planned; so that he might at the same time feed the preachers of his Gospel and enrich the Gospel itself with so great a mystery, which he was going to commend through the number of the fish. Of this we too must now say what he himself adds.

"Simon Peter said, I am going fishing. Those who were with him said to him, We are coming with you too. And they went out and got into the boat; and that night they caught nothing. But when morning had come, Jesus stood on the shore; yet the disciples did not know that it was Jesus. Jesus said to them, Children, do you have anything to eat? They answered him, No. He said to them, Cast the net on the right side of the boat, and you will find. So they cast it, and now they were not able to haul it in because of the great number of fish. So that disciple whom Jesus loved said to Peter, It is the Lord. When Simon Peter heard that it was the Lord, he girded his tunic about him, for he was naked, and threw himself into the sea. But the other disciples came in the boat (for they were not far from land, but about two hundred cubits off), dragging the net full of fish. When they got out on land, they saw a charcoal fire laid, and fish laid on it, and bread. Jesus said to them, Bring some of the fish that you have now caught. Simon Peter went aboard and hauled the net to land, full of large fish, a hundred and fifty-three. And although there were so many, the net was not torn."

This is a great mystery in the great Gospel of John; and, that it might be commended more forcibly, it was written in the last place. That there were seven disciples in this fishing, Peter, and Thomas, and Nathanael, and the two sons of Zebedee, and two others whose names are not given, signifies by their number seven the end of time. For all time revolves in seven days. To this belongs the fact that when morning had come Jesus stood on the shore; because the shore too is the end of the sea, and so it signifies the end of the age. That Peter drew the net onto the land, that is, onto the shore, also shows the same end of the age. The Lord himself made this plain where, in another place, he gave a parable about a net cast into the sea: "And they draw it," he says, "to the shore." And explaining what the shore was, he says: "So it will be at the end of the age."

But that is a parable in words, not in a deed done; whereas by a deed done, just as in this place he signified how the Church will be at the end of the age, so by another fishing the Lord signified the Church as it is now. And that he did the one at the beginning of his preaching, but this one after his resurrection, shows that that catch of fish signifies the good and the bad whom the Church has now, but this one only the good, whom it will have for ever, when the resurrection of the dead is completed at the end of this age. Moreover, there Jesus was not standing on the shore, as here, when he ordered the fish to be caught; but getting into one of the boats, which was Simon's, he asked him to put out a little from the land, and sitting in it he taught the crowds. And when he had finished speaking, he said to Simon, "Put out into the deep, and let down your nets for a catch." And there, what was caught of fish was in the boats; they did not, as here, drag the net to land. By these signs, and any others that can be found, there the Church in this age is figured, but here the Church at the end of the age; that is why the one was done before and this one after the Lord's resurrection, because there Christ signified us as called, here as raised. There the nets are not cast to the right, lest they signify the good only, nor to the left, lest they signify the bad only; but without distinction: "Let down your nets," he says, "for a catch", so that we may understand the good and the bad mixed together. But here he says, "Cast the net on the right side of the boat", to signify those who stand at the right hand, the good only. There the net was breaking, to signify schisms; but here, since in that supreme peace of the saints there will then be no schisms, it was fitting for the evangelist to say, "And although there were so many", that is, so large, "the net was not torn"; as though he were looking back to that time when it was torn, and commending this good by comparison with that evil. There such a great number of fish was caught that the two boats were filled and began to sink, that is, were pressed down toward sinking; for they did not sink, but were in danger. For where do the great evils that we groan over in the Church come from, unless from the fact that so great a multitude cannot be resisted, which comes in with its ways wholly foreign to the path of the saints, almost to the point of sinking discipline? But here "they cast the net on the right side, and now they were not able to haul it in because of the great number of fish." What does "now they were not able to haul it in" mean, unless that those who belong to the resurrection of life, that is, to the right hand, and who end their lives within the nets of the Christian name, will appear only on the shore, that is, at the end of the age, when they have risen? That is why they were not able to haul in the nets so as to pour out into the boat the fish they had caught, as was done with all those for whom the net broke and the boats were weighed down. But the Church holds these right-hand ones after the end of this life in the sleep of peace, lying hidden as it were in the deep, until the net comes to the shore, toward which it was being dragged from about two hundred cubits. And what was figured there by two boats, because of the circumcision and the uncircumcision, I think is figured in this place by the two hundred cubits, because of the elect of both kinds, of the circumcision and of the uncircumcision, as a hundred and a hundred; because in reckoning, the number one hundred passes over to the right hand. Finally, in that fishing the number of fish is not stated, as though what was foretold through the prophet were fulfilled there: "I have announced and spoken; they are multiplied beyond number"; but here there are none beyond number, but the number is fixed, a hundred and fifty-three; and the reason for this number must be given, with the Lord's help.

For if we set up a number to signify the law, what will it be but ten? For we know most certainly that the Decalogue of the law, that is, those ten well-known commandments, was first written by the finger of God on two tablets of stone. But the law, when grace does not help, makes transgressors, and is only in the letter; for that is above all why the apostle says, "The letter kills, but the Spirit gives life." Let the Spirit, then, be joined to the letter, lest the letter kill the one whom the Spirit does not make alive; but so that we may fulfil the commandments of the law, not by our own strength but by the gift of the Saviour. And when grace is joined to the law, that is, the Spirit to the letter, in a way the number seven is added to the number ten. For that the Holy Spirit is signified by this number, that is, seven, the evidence of the sacred writings, when attended to, testifies. For holiness or sanctification belongs properly to the Holy Spirit; hence, although the Father is spirit and the Son is spirit, since God is spirit, and the Father is holy and the Son is holy, yet the Spirit of both is called by a proper name the Holy Spirit. Where, then, did sanctification first sound in the law but on the seventh day? For God did not sanctify the first day, on which he made light; or the second, on which he made the firmament; or the third, on which he separated the sea from the land and the land brought forth plants and trees; or the fourth, on which the stars were created; or the fifth, on which he made the animals that live in the waters and fly in the air; or the sixth, on which he made the living creature of the earth and man himself; but he sanctified the seventh day, on which he rested from his works. Fittingly, then, the Holy Spirit is signified by the number seven. The prophet Isaiah too says, "The Spirit of God will rest upon him"; and then, commending him by his sevenfold working or gift, he says, "the spirit of wisdom and understanding, the spirit of counsel and might, the spirit of knowledge and godliness, and the spirit of the fear of God will fill him." What of the Apocalypse? Are not seven spirits of God spoken of there, though there is one and the same Spirit, distributing to each as he wills? But the sevenfold working of the one Spirit was so named by the same Spirit, who was present to the writer, that they were called seven spirits. So when the Holy Spirit, through the number seven, is added to the ten of the law, it makes seventeen; and this number, when all the numbers from one up to itself are added together, grows to a hundred and fifty-three. For if you add two to one, it makes three; if you add three and four to these, they make ten in all; then if you add all the numbers that follow up to seventeen, the total is brought to the number mentioned. That is, if to ten, which you reached from one to four, you add five, it makes fifteen; add six to these, and it makes twenty-one; add seven to these, and it makes twenty-eight; add eight and nine and ten to these, and it makes fifty-five; add eleven and twelve and thirteen to these, and it makes ninety-one; add again fourteen and fifteen and sixteen, and it makes a hundred and thirty-six; to this number add the one that remains, the one we are dealing with, namely seventeen, and that number of fish will be complete. So it is not only a hundred and fifty-three saints that are signified as rising to eternal life, but thousands of saints who belong to the grace of the Spirit; by which grace agreement is made with the law of God, as with an adversary, so that, as the Spirit gives life, the letter does not kill, but what is commanded through the letter is fulfilled with the Spirit's help, and if anything falls short, it is forgiven. All, then, who belong to this grace are figured by this number, that is, signified in a figure. This number also contains three times the number fifty, and three more besides, because of the mystery of the Trinity; and fifty is made by multiplying seven by seven and adding one; for seven times seven makes forty-nine. And one is added to signify that he is one who is shown through seven because of his sevenfold working; and we know that the Holy Spirit was sent on the fiftieth day after the Lord's ascension, the Spirit whom the disciples had been commanded to await as promised.

Not in vain, then, were these fish said to be both so many and so large, that is, both a hundred and fifty-three and large. For so it is written: "And he hauled the net to land, full of large fish, a hundred and fifty-three." For when the Lord had said, "I have not come to abolish the law but to fulfil it", being about to give, of course, the Spirit through whom the law could be fulfilled, as though about to add seven to ten, after a very few words in between he says, "Whoever, then, breaks one of the least of these commandments, and teaches men so, will be called least in the kingdom of heaven; but whoever does and teaches them will be called great in the kingdom of heaven." This one, then, can belong to the number of the large fish. But that least one, who breaks by his deeds what he teaches by his words, can be in a Church of the kind signified by that first catch of fish, which has good and bad, because it too is called the kingdom of heaven; which is why he says, "The kingdom of heaven is like a net cast into the sea and gathering of every kind." There he wants both good and bad to be understood, which he says are to be separated on the shore, that is, at the end of the age. Then, to show that these least ones are reprobate, who teach good things by speaking and break them by living badly, and that they will not be in eternal life as least ones, but will not be there at all, when he had said, "He will be called least in the kingdom of heaven", he at once added, "For I tell you, unless your righteousness exceeds that of the scribes and Pharisees, you will not enter the kingdom of heaven." These are certainly the scribes and Pharisees who sit on the seat of Moses, and of whom he says, "Do what they say, but do not do what they do; for they say and do not do": they teach by their words what they break by their conduct. It follows, then, that one who is least in the kingdom of heaven, such as the Church now is, will not enter the kingdom of heaven, such as the Church will then be; since by teaching what he breaks he will not belong to the company of those who do what they teach; and therefore he will not be in the number of the large fish, since "whoever does and teaches will be called great in the kingdom of heaven." And because he will be great here, therefore he will be there, where that least one will not be. For there they will be so great that he who is less there is greater than he than whom no one is greater here. But yet those who are great here, that is, who in the kingdom of heaven where the net gathers good and bad do the good things they teach, will themselves be greater in that eternity of the kingdom of heaven; and they are the ones whom these fish, belonging to the right hand and the resurrection of life, indicate. There follows the Lord's breakfast with these seven disciples, and what he said after the breakfast, and the end of the Gospel itself, which, as God grants, we shall discuss; but this is not to be crammed into this sermon.