Tractates on the Gospel of John 20.1–20.13

The words of our Lord Jesus Christ, especially those that John the evangelist records—who not without reason reclined on the Lord's breast, that he might drink in the secrets of his higher wisdom and pour out in preaching the gospel what he had drunk in by loving—are so secret and so deep in meaning that they trouble all who are perverse of heart and exercise all who are upright of heart. Therefore let your Charity attend to these few words that have been read. Let us see, if we can in any way, by the gift and help of him who willed his words to be read out to us—words heard then and written down so that they might be read now—what he means by what you have just heard him say: “Amen, amen, I say to you, the Son can do nothing of himself, but what he sees the Father doing; for whatever the Father does, these same things the Son also does likewise.”

Now you must be reminded where this discourse arose, because of the earlier part of the reading, where the Lord had cured a certain man among those who lay in the five porches of that pool of Solomon, to whom he had said, “Take up your bed and go to your house.” But he had done this on the sabbath; and so the Jews, being disturbed, falsely accused him as a destroyer and transgressor of the law. Then he had said to them, “My Father is working until now, and I am working.” For they, taking the observance of the sabbath carnally, thought that God, after the labor of making the world, was as it were sleeping until this day, and had therefore sanctified the day from which he began to rest, as it were, from his labors. Now the sacrament of the sabbath was commanded to our ancient fathers, and we Christians observe it spiritually, by abstaining from all servile work, that is, from all sin (for the Lord says, “Everyone who commits sin is the slave of sin”), and by having rest in our heart, that is, spiritual tranquillity. And although we strive for this in this world, we shall not reach that perfect rest until we have departed from this life. But God is said to have rested because he no longer made any creature after all things had been completed. And Scripture called it rest in order to remind us that we shall rest after good works. For so we have it written in Genesis: “And God made all things very good, and God rested on the seventh day”: so that you, man, when you consider that God himself rested after good works, should not hope for rest for yourself until you have done good works; and just as God, after he made man in his own image and likeness on the sixth day and on it completed all his very good works, rested on the seventh day, so you too should not hope for rest until you have returned to the likeness in which you were made, which you lost by sinning. For God should not be said to have labored, who “spoke, and they were made.” Who is there that, after such ease of working, would want to rest as if after labor? If he commanded and someone resisted him, if he commanded and it was not done, and he labored to get it done, then he might rightly be said to have rested after labor. But since we read in that same book of Genesis, “God said, Let there be light; and there was light. God said, Let there be a firmament; and the firmament was made,” and the rest made at once by his word; to which the psalm also bears witness, saying, “He spoke, and they were made; he commanded, and they were created”: how could he, who never labored in commanding, have sought rest after the world was made, as if to cease from work? Those things, then, are mystical, and set down in this way so that we may hope for rest after this life, but only if we have done good works. Therefore the Lord, beating back the impudence and error of the Jews and showing that they did not think rightly about God, said to those who were scandalized because he was working the healing of men on the sabbath, “My Father is working until now, and I am working”: do not, then, think that my Father so rested on the sabbath that from then on he does not work; but as he is working now, so I also work. But as the Father works without labor, so too the Son works without labor. God spoke, and they were made; Christ said to the sick man, “Take up your bed and go to your house,” and it was done.

Now the Catholic faith holds that the works of the Father and of the Son are not separable. This is what I wish, if I can, to say to your Charity; but according to those words of the Lord, “He who can receive it, let him receive it.” But he who cannot receive it, let him not ascribe this to me, but to his own slowness; and let him turn to him who opens the heart, that he may pour in what he gives. Lastly, if anyone does not understand because it was not said by me as it should have been said, let him pardon human frailty and make supplication to divine goodness. For we have Christ as our teacher within. Whatever you cannot grasp through your ear and my mouth, turn in your heart to him who both teaches me what I say and distributes to you as he deigns. He who knows what to give and to whom to give it will be present to the one who asks and will open to the one who knocks. And if perhaps he does not give, let no one call himself forsaken. For perhaps he delays giving something, but he leaves no one hungry. For if he does not give at the moment, he is exercising the seeker, not despising the asker. Look, then, and attend to what I wish to say, even if perhaps I cannot. The Catholic faith, confirmed by the Spirit of God in his saints against all heretical perversity, holds this: that the works of the Father and of the Son are inseparable. What is it that I have said? Just as the Father and the Son themselves are inseparable, so also the works of the Father and of the Son are inseparable. How are the Father and the Son inseparable? Because he himself said, “I and the Father are one.” Because the Father and the Son are not two gods but one God, the Word and he whose Word he is, one and only, one God, Father and Son embraced in love; and the Spirit of love of the two of them is one, so that there is the Trinity, Father and Son and Holy Spirit. Therefore not only of the Father and the Son, but also of the Holy Spirit: as there is equality and inseparability of persons, so also the works are inseparable. Let me say still more plainly what “the works are inseparable” means. The Catholic faith does not say that God the Father made something and the Son made something else; but what the Father made, this the Son also made, this the Holy Spirit also made. For all things were made through the Word: when he spoke and they were made, they were made through the Word, they were made through Christ. For “in the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God; all things were made through him.” If all things were made through him, then when God said, “Let there be light,” and there was light, he made it in the Word, he made it through the Word.

See, then, we have now heard the Gospel, where he answered the Jews who were indignant because he not only broke the sabbath but also called God his Father, making himself equal to God; for so it is written in the preceding passage. When, then, the Son of God and the Truth answered their mistaken indignation, he said, “Amen, amen, I say to you, the Son can do nothing of himself, but what he sees the Father doing.” As though he said: Why are you scandalized because I called God my Father and because I make myself equal to God? I am equal in such a way that he begot me; I am equal in such a way that he is not from me, but I am from him. For this is what is understood in these words: “The Son can do nothing of himself, but what he sees the Father doing.” That is, whatever the Son has by way of doing, he has from the Father that he does it. Why does he have from the Father that he does it? Because he has from the Father that he is the Son. Why does he have from the Father that he is the Son? Because he has from the Father that he is able, since he has from the Father that he is. For to the Son, to be is the same as to be able. It is not so with man. From the comparison with human weakness, which lies far below, lift up your hearts as best you can; and if perhaps one of us reaches the secret and, as if shuddering at the flash of a great light, grasps something, so as not to remain without understanding, let him nonetheless not think that he grasps the whole, lest he grow proud and lose what he has grasped. In man, what he is is one thing, what he is able to do is another. For sometimes a man exists and cannot do what he wills; but sometimes a man exists in such a way that he can do what he wills; so his being is one thing, his being able another. For if his being were the same as his being able, he would be able whenever he willed. But God, who does not have one substance by which he is and another power by which he is able, but to whom whatever is his, and whatever he is, is consubstantial, because he is God, does not exist in one way and is able in another; but he has being and being able together, because he has willing and doing together. Since, then, the power of the Son is from the Father, therefore the substance of the Son is also from the Father; and since the substance of the Son is from the Father, therefore the power of the Son is from the Father. There is not one power in the Son and another substance; but the power is the very same as the substance: substance that he may be, power that he may be able. So because the Son is from the Father, he said, “The Son can do nothing of himself.” Because the Son is not from himself, he is therefore not able from himself.

For he seems to have made himself, as it were, lesser when he said, “The Son can do nothing of himself, but what he sees the Father doing.” Here heretical vanity lifts its neck—that of those who say that the Son is less than the Father, of lesser power, majesty, and capacity—not understanding the mystery of Christ's words. But let your Charity attend, and see how in their carnal understanding they are now thrown into confusion by these very words of Christ. This is what I said a little earlier: that the Word of God troubles all perverse hearts, just as it exercises devout hearts, especially what is said through John the evangelist. For deep things are said through him, not ordinary things, not things easily understood. See now, the heretic, if perhaps he hears these words, draws himself up and says to us, “See, the Son is less than the Father; listen to the words of the Son, who says, ‘The Son can do nothing of himself, but what he sees the Father doing.’” Wait, as it is written: “Be gentle in hearing the word, that you may understand.” For suppose that I am disturbed by these words, since I say that the power and majesty of the Father and the Son are equal, when I hear, “The Son can do nothing of himself, but what he sees the Father doing.” Disturbed by these words, I ask you, who think you have already understood: We know from the Gospel that the Son walked on the sea; where did he see the Father walk on the sea? Here now he is disturbed. Set aside, then, what you had understood, and let us inquire together. What, then, do we do? We have heard the words of the Lord: “The Son can do nothing of himself, but what he sees the Father doing.” He himself walked on the sea; the Father never walked on the sea. Yet certainly the Son does nothing but what he sees the Father doing.

Come back with me, then, to what I was saying, in case it should be understood in such a way that we both get out of the question. For I, according to the Catholic faith, see how I may get out without stumbling, without offense; but you, shut in on all sides, are looking for a way out. See where you came in. Perhaps you did not understand this either, when I said, “See where you came in.” Hear him saying, “I am the door.” Not without reason, then, are you looking for a way out and not finding one, except that you did not come in through the door, but fell in over the wall. So, as best you can, pick yourself up from your fall and enter through the door, that you may go in without stumbling and go out without error. Come through Christ; do not bring out of your own heart what you are to say, but speak what he shows. See how the Catholic faith gets out of this proposition. The Son walked on the sea; he set feet of flesh on the waves; the flesh walked, and the divinity governed. When, then, the flesh walked and the divinity governed, was the Father absent? If he was absent, how does the Son himself say, “But the Father who abides in me, he does his works”? If, then, the Father, abiding in the Son, does his works, that walking of the flesh on the sea was done by the Father, done through the Son. So that walking is an inseparable work of the Father and the Son. I see both working there: the Father did not desert the Son, nor did the Son depart from the Father. So whatever the Son does, he does not do without the Father, because whatever the Father does, he does not do without the Son.

We have got out of this. See that we rightly say that the works of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit are inseparable. For take it as you understand it: see, God made light, and the Son saw the Father making light—according to your carnal understanding, you who want to understand the Son as lesser because he said, “The Son can do nothing of himself, but what he sees the Father doing.” God the Father made light; what other light did the Son make? God the Father made the firmament, the heaven between waters and waters; the Son saw him, according to your slow and gross understanding. Since the Son saw the Father making the firmament, and said, “The Son can do nothing of himself, but what he sees the Father doing,” give me the other firmament. Or have you lost the foundation? But those who are “built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Christ Jesus himself being the chief cornerstone,” are at peace in Christ; they do not quarrel and wander in heresy. We understand, then, that light was made by God the Father, but through the Son; the firmament made by God the Father, but through the Son. “For all things were made through him, and without him nothing was made.” Shake out your understanding—which should not be called understanding, but plainly folly. God the Father made the world: what other world did the Son make? Give me the Son's world. This world in which we are—whose is it? Tell us, by whom was it made? If you say, “By the Son, not by the Father,” you have strayed from the Father; if you say, “By the Father, not by the Son,” the Gospel answers you, “And the world was made through him, and the world did not know him.” Acknowledge, then, him through whom the world was made, and do not be among those who did not know the one who made the world.

The works of the Father and the Son, then, are inseparable. But “The Son can do nothing of himself” means what it would mean if he said, “The Son is not from himself.” For if he is the Son, he was born; if he was born, he is from him of whom he was born. Yet he begot him equal to himself. For nothing was lacking to the one who begot: he did not seek time in order to beget, who begot one coeternal; nor did he seek a mother in order to beget, who brought forth the Word from himself; nor had the Father, in begetting, preceded the Son in age, so as to beget a younger Son. And perhaps someone says that after many ages God received a Son in his old age. As the Father is without old age, so the Son is without growth: neither did the one grow old nor did the other grow up; but equal begot equal, eternal begot eternal. How, someone says, eternal begot eternal? As a temporal flame generates a temporal light. For the generating flame is coeval with the light that it generates, and the generating flame does not precede the generated light in time; but from the moment the flame begins, from that moment the light begins. Give me a flame without light, and I give you God the Father without the Son. This, then, is the meaning of “The Son can do nothing of himself, but what he sees the Father doing”: that for the Son to see is to be born of the Father. His seeing is not one thing and his substance another; nor is his power one thing and his substance another. All that he is, is from the Father; all that he is able to do, is from the Father; for what he is able to do and what he is are one, and wholly from the Father.

He himself goes on in his words, and unsettles those who understand wrongly, in order to call the erring back to a right understanding. After he had said, “The Son can do nothing of himself, but what he sees the Father doing,” in case a carnal understanding should creep in and turn the mind aside, and a man should picture for himself two craftsmen, as it were, one a master, the other a pupil watching the master make, for example, a chest, so that as the master made his chest, the pupil might make another chest according to what he had seen in the master at work—so that the carnal understanding should not double any such thing in that simple divinity—he went on to say, “For whatever the Father does, these same things the Son also does likewise.” The Father does not do some things and the Son other similar things, but the same things likewise. For he did not say, “Whatever the Father does, the Son also does other similar things,” but, “Whatever the Father does,” he says, “these same things the Son also does likewise.” What he does, these the Son does too: the Father made the world, the Son made the world, the Holy Spirit made the world. If there are three gods, there are three worlds; if the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit are one God, one world was made by the Father through the Son in the Holy Spirit. So the Son does those things that the Father also does, and does not do them unlike: he both does these things and does them likewise.

He had already said, “these he does”; why did he add, “he does likewise”? So that another wrong understanding or error should not arise in the mind. For you see the work of a man: there is mind in a man and body; the mind commands the body, but there is a great difference between body and mind: the body is visible, the mind invisible; there is a great difference between the power and strength of the mind and that of any body, even a heavenly one. Yet the mind commands its body, and the body acts; and what the mind is seen to do, the body also does. The body, then, seems to do the same thing as the mind, but not likewise. How does it do the same thing, but not likewise? The mind makes a word within itself, commands the tongue, and the tongue utters the word the mind made: the mind made it, and the tongue made it; the master of the body made it, and the servant made it; but in order for the servant to make it, it received from the master what to make, and made it at the master's command. The same thing was made by both; but likewise? How not likewise, someone says? See, the word my mind made remains in me; what my tongue made, once the air was struck, has passed away and is not. When you have spoken a word in your mind, and it has sounded through your tongue, go back to your mind and see that the word you made is there. Did it remain in your tongue as it remained in your mind? What sounded through your tongue the tongue made by sounding, the mind made by thinking; but what the tongue sounded has passed away; what the mind thought remains. So the body made what the mind made, but not likewise. For the mind made what the mind may keep; but the tongue made what sounds and strikes the ear through the air. Do you chase the syllables and make them stay? Not so, then, the Father and the Son; but he does these same things, and does them likewise. If God made the heaven that remains, the Son made this heaven that remains. If God the Father made man who dies, the Son made the same man who dies. Whatever lasting things the Father made, these lasting things the Son also made, because he made them likewise; and whatever temporal things the Father made, these same temporal things the Son made, because he not only made the same things but also made them likewise. For the Father made through the Son, because the Father made all things through the Word.

Seek a separation in the Father and the Son: you will not find one. But only if you have risen up will you then not find one; only if you have touched something above your mind will you then not find one. For if you move among the things that the mind makes for itself in its wandering, you are talking with your own images, not with the Word of God: your images deceive you. Pass beyond the body too, and understand the mind; pass beyond the mind too, and understand God. You do not touch God unless you have passed beyond the mind as well: how much less do you touch him if you have stayed in the flesh? Those, then, whose understanding is of the flesh, how far are they from understanding what God is? For they would not be there even if they understood the mind. A man withdraws far from God when he understands carnally; and there is a great difference between flesh and mind, but a greater difference between mind and God. If you are in the mind, you are in the middle: if you look below, there is the body; if you look above, there is God. Lift yourself up from the body; pass beyond yourself too. For see what the psalm said, and you are reminded how God is to be understood: “My tears have been my bread day and night, while it is said to me every day, Where is your God?” As though the pagans were saying, “See, here are our gods; where is your God?” For they point to what is seen; we worship what is not seen. And to whom should we show it? To a man who has nothing to see with? For surely, if they see their gods with their eyes, we too have other eyes with which to see our God. Those very eyes must be cleansed by our God, that we may see our God: “For blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God.” So, when he had said he was troubled, when it was said to him every day, “Where is your God?”—“These things I remembered,” he says, because it is said to me every day, “Where is your God?” And as if wishing to lay hold of his God, “These things I remembered,” he says, “and poured out my soul above me.” So, in order to reach my God, of whom it was said to me, “Where is your God?”, I did not pour out my soul over my flesh, but above me: I passed beyond myself, in order to touch him. For he who made me is above me: no one reaches him except one who has passed beyond himself.

Think of the body: it is mortal, it is earthly, it is frail, it is corruptible: cast it away. But perhaps the flesh is temporal. Think of other bodies, think of the heavenly bodies; they are greater, better, splendid: look at them too; they revolve from east to west, they do not stand still; they are seen with the eyes, not only by man but also by beasts: pass beyond them too. “And how,” you will say, “do I pass beyond the heavenly bodies, when I walk on the earth?” You pass beyond them not with the flesh but with the mind. Cast them away too: though they shine, they are bodies; though they gleam from the sky, they are bodies. Come, since perhaps you think you have nowhere to go when you consider all these. “And beyond the heavenly bodies,” you say, “where am I to go, and what am I to pass beyond with the mind?” Have you considered all these? “I have considered them,” you say. With what have you considered them? Let the considerer himself appear. For the considerer of all these, the one who discerns, distinguishes, and in a manner weighs them in the balance of wisdom, is the mind. Without doubt the mind with which you have thought of all these is better than all these that you have thought of. This mind, then, is spirit, not body: pass beyond it too. Compare the mind itself first, that you may see where you are to pass beyond: compare it with the flesh. Far be it! Do not deign to compare them. Compare it with the brightness of the sun, the moon, the stars: the brightness of the mind is greater. First look at the swiftness of the mind itself. See whether the spark of the thinking mind is not more vehement than the splendor of the shining sun. With your mind you see the sun rising: how slow is its motion compared with your mind! Swiftly you were able to think what the sun is going to do. It is going to come from the east to the west, and tomorrow it rises again from the other side. When your thought has done this, the sun is still slow, and you have traversed everything. A great thing, then, is the mind. But how do I say “is”? Pass beyond it too; for the mind itself is changeable, though it is better than every body. Now it knows, now it does not know; now it forgets, now it remembers; now it wills, now it does not will; now it sins, now it is just. Pass, then, beyond all changeableness: not only beyond all that is seen, but also beyond all that changes. For you have passed beyond the flesh, which is seen; you have passed beyond the heaven, the sun, the moon, and the stars, which are seen; pass beyond all that changes too. For when you had finished with these, you had come to your mind, but there too you found the changeableness of your mind. Is God changeable? Pass beyond your mind too, then. Pour out your soul above you, that you may reach God, of whom it is said to you, “Where is your God?”

Do not think that you will be doing something that a man cannot do. John the evangelist himself did this. He passed beyond the flesh, passed beyond the earth he trod, passed beyond the seas he saw, passed beyond the air where the birds fly, passed beyond the sun, passed beyond the moon, passed beyond the stars, passed beyond all the spirits that are not seen, passed beyond his own mind by the very reason of his soul. Passing beyond all these, pouring out his soul above himself, where did he arrive? What did he see? “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God.” If, then, you see no separation in the light, why do you seek separation in the work? See God; see his Word clinging to the Word-speaker: for he who speaks does not speak in syllables, but to shine with the splendor of wisdom—this is his speaking. What has been said of his Wisdom? “It is the radiance of eternal light.” Look at the radiance of the sun. The sun is in the sky, and it spreads its radiance over all lands, over all seas; and yet it is a bodily light. If you can separate the radiance of the sun from the sun, separate the Word from the Father. I am speaking of the sun. One slender little flame of a lamp, which can be put out with one breath, spreads its light over everything that lies near it. You see the light spread out, generated by the little flame; you see emission, you do not see separation. Understand, then, dearest brothers, that the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit cleave to one another inseparably, that this Trinity is one God, and that all the works of the one God are the works of the Father, the works of the Son, the works of the Holy Spirit. As for the rest that follows, belonging to the discourse of our Lord Jesus Christ himself in the Gospel, since a sermon is owed to you tomorrow as well, be present to hear it.