Homilies on John 54.1–54.2

“So Jesus said to the Jews who had believed in him, ‘If you abide in my word, you are truly my disciples, and you will know the truth, and the truth [will set you free].’” Our affairs need much endurance, beloved; and endurance comes when doctrines are rooted deep. For as no wind that falls on an oak which sends its roots down into the depths below and is gripped tight can tear it up, so no one will be able to overturn the soul that is nailed fast by the fear of God. For to be nailed is more than to be rooted. This at any rate is what the prophet prays for, saying, “Nail my flesh with the fear of you.” So you too, nail yourself and fasten yourself, as though fixed through with a nail. For as these are hard to capture, so their opposites are easily captured and are thrown down easily; which is what happened to the Jews then. For having heard and believed, they turned aside again. So Christ, wishing to deepen their faith so that it might not be superficial, digs into the soul with sharper words. For it belonged to those who believed to bear even rebukes; but they at once grew savage. And how does he do this? First he charges them: “If you abide in my word, you are truly my disciples, and the truth will set you free,” all but saying, “I am about to make a deep cut, but do not be shaken.” Or rather, by these very words he also checked the pride of their minds. Set free from what, tell me? From sins. What then do those boasters say? “We are the seed of Abraham, and have never been enslaved to anyone.” At once their mind fell; and this happened because they were excited about worldly things. “If you abide in my word” belonged to one who was showing what was in their hearts, and who knew that they had believed but had not abided. And he promises something great: that they would become his disciples. For since some had gone away earlier, he hints at them when he says, “If you abide”; for they too had heard and believed and gone away, because they did not abide. “For many of his disciples went back and no longer walked with him.” “You will know the truth,” that is, me; for I am the truth. Everything Jewish was a type; but you will know the truth from me, and it will set you free from your sins. For as he said to those others, “You will die in your sins,” so he said to these, “It will set you free.” And he did not say, “I will free you from slavery,” but left them to perceive this. What then do they say? “We are the seed of Abraham, and have never been enslaved to anyone.” And yet, if they had to be indignant, it should have been at the former words, saying, “What then? Do we not know the truth now? Is the law then a lie? And our knowledge too?” But they cared about none of these things; they are pained about worldly affairs, and that because they suspected that slavery was meant. For there are, there are even now, many who are ashamed of indifferent things and of this slavery, but no longer of the slavery of sin; and they would choose to be called slaves ten thousand times with the slavery of sin rather than once with the other. Such were these men too, and they knew no other slavery; and they say, “Have you called slaves those of the race of Abraham, the well-born, who for this reason ought not to be called slaves? For we have never been enslaved,” they say. For such are the boasts of the Jews: “We are the seed of Abraham, we are Israelites”; nowhere do they mention their own good deeds. That is why John cried out to them, saying, “Do not presume to say, ‘We have Abraham as our father.’” And why did Christ not refute them? For they had often been enslaved, to the Egyptians and the Babylonians and many others. Because his words were not for display, but for salvation and benefit, and he was pressing toward this. Otherwise he could have spoken of the four hundred years; he could have spoken of the seventy; he could have spoken of the times under the judges, at one time twenty years, at another two, at another seven; he could have said that they never ceased being enslaved. But he was not eager to show this, that they had become slaves of men, but of sin, which is the harshest slavery, from which God alone can set free. For to forgive sins belongs to no one else; and this they themselves admitted. Since, then, they admitted that this was the work of God, he leads them to it and says, “Everyone who commits sin is a slave of sin,” showing that he speaks of this freedom, freedom from this slavery. “The slave does not remain in the house forever; the son remains forever.” Gently here too he casts down the things of the law, hinting at the former times. For so that they might not run back and say, “We have sacrifices which Moses commanded; they can set us free,” for this reason he added these words. Otherwise, what consistency would the saying have had? “For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, being justified freely by his grace”; and the priests themselves too. That is why Paul too says of the priest that “he must offer for himself as well as for the people, since he too is beset with weakness.” And this is shown by saying, “The slave does not remain in the house.” Here he also shows his equality of honor with the Father, and the difference between slave and free; for the parable means this: that is, the slave has no authority; for this is the meaning of “does not remain.”

Why, while speaking of sins, did he mention a house? To show that, as a master has authority over a house, so he himself has authority over all things. And “does not remain” means this: he has no authority to grant favors, since he is not master of the house; but the son is master of the house. For this is the meaning of “remains forever,” a metaphor taken from human affairs, so that they might not say, “Who are you?” “All things are mine; for I am the Son, and I remain in the house of the Father,” calling his authority a house. For elsewhere too he calls the Father’s rule a house: “In my Father’s house are many rooms.” For since the discourse was about freedom and slavery, he naturally uses this metaphor, saying that those others did not have authority to forgive. “So if the Son sets you free.” Do you see his oneness of essence with the Father, and how he shows that he has the same authority as he? “If the Son sets you free, no one will gainsay it any longer, but you have a secure freedom. For it is God who justifies; who is to condemn?” Here he shows that he himself is clean of sin, and he hints at the freedom that is freedom in name only; for this even men give, but that other God alone. And by this he persuades them not to be ashamed of this slavery, but of the slavery of sin. And wishing to show that, even if they were not slaves, by rejecting that freedom they had become slaves all the more, he added at once, “You will be free indeed.” And by the addition he also indicates that this other freedom is not true. Then, so that they might not say, “We have no sin” (for it was likely that they would say this), see how he brought this charge against them. Passing over the rest of their life without refuting it, he brings into the open the thing in hand, which they still wished to do, and says, “I know that you are the seed of Abraham; but you seek to kill me.” Gently and little by little he casts them out of that kinship, teaching them not to be proud of it. For as freedom and slavery come from works, so does kinship. And he did not say at once, “You are not Abraham’s, you murderers of the righteous one,” but for the present he goes along with them and says, “I know that you are the seed of Abraham; but this is not the question”; and then [he goes on] with this more vehement discourse. For one may observe for the most part that when he is about to do something great, after doing it he uses more boldness, since the testimony of his works stops their mouths. “But you seek to kill me.” “What then, if justly?” someone says. But not even that; and so he gives the reason: “Because my word finds no place in you.” How then does it say that they believed in him? But, as I said, they changed again. That is why he took hold of them sharply. “For if you boast of kinship with him, you must also show his way of life.” And he did not say, “You do not make room for my word,” but “My word finds no place in you,” showing the loftiness of his doctrines. Yet not even for this ought they to have killed him, but rather to have honored and attended to him, so as to learn. “What then,” someone says, “if you speak these things of yourself?” For this reason he added, “I speak what I have seen with my Father; and you do what you have heard from your father.” “As I,” he says, “show forth the Father both by my words and by the truth, so you too show yours by your deeds. For I have not only the same essence but also the same truth as the Father.” “They said to him, ‘We have Abraham as our father.’ Jesus said to them, ‘If you had Abraham as your father, you would do his works. But now you seek to kill me.’” Here he keeps turning to their murderous purpose, and mentions Abraham. He does this wishing to lead them away from that kinship, to take away their excessive boasting, and to persuade them no longer to rest their hopes of salvation on him, nor on kinship by nature, but on kinship by choice. For this was what kept them from coming to Christ: thinking that that kinship was enough for their salvation. And what truth does he mean? That he is equal to the Father. For this is why the Jews sought to kill him; and he says, “You seek to kill me, because I have told you the truth, which I heard from my Father.” To show that these things are not contrary to the Father, he again takes refuge in him. “They said to him, ‘We were not born of sexual immorality; we have one Father, God.’” What do you say? You have God as Father, and you accuse Christ for saying this? Do you see that he said in a special sense that God was his Father? Since, then, he had cast them out of kinship with Abraham, having nothing to say, they dare something greater, running up to God. But he casts them out of this honor too, saying, “If God were your Father, you would love me, for I came forth from God and am here; I have not come of myself, but he sent me. Why do you not understand my speech? Because you cannot hear my word. You are of your father the devil, and you wish to do your father’s desires. He was a murderer from the beginning, and has not stood in the truth. When he speaks a lie, he speaks from his own.” [Since he had cast] them out of kinship with Abraham, and since they dared greater things, he then delivers the blow, saying that not only are they not Abraham’s, but they are even the devil’s, giving a cut to match their shamelessness; and he does not leave it without proof, but establishes it by refutations. “For to murder,” he says, “belongs to his wickedness.” And he did not simply say “the works,” but “You do his desires,” showing that both he and they are vehemently bent on murder, and that envy was the cause. For having nothing to charge against Adam, but only envying him, he destroyed him. This, then, he hints at here too. “And he has not stood in the truth,” that is, in the right life. For since they kept accusing him of not being from God, he says that this too comes from there; for the devil first gave birth to the lie, saying, “On the day you eat, your eyes will be opened”; and he was the first to use it. Men use it not as their own but as something foreign; but he uses it as his own. “But because I speak the truth, you do not believe me.” What sort of connection is this? “Though you have nothing to charge me with, you wish to kill me. For since you are enemies of the truth, for this reason you persecute me. Otherwise, if not for this, state the charge.” For this is why he added, “Which of you convicts me of sin?” Then they say, “We were not born of sexual immorality.” And yet many of them were born of sexual immorality, for they made unfitting unions; but he does not refute even this, but stands against that other point. For since he had shown from all these things that they were not from God but from the devil (for to murder is devilish, and to lie is devilish, and you do both), he shows that to love is the sign of being from God. “Why do you not understand my speech?” For since they were always at a loss, saying, “What is this, ‘Where I am going, you cannot come’?”, for this reason he says, “You do not understand my speech, because you do not have the word of God. And this happens to you because of the lowliness of your mind, and because my things are far greater.” “What then, if they could not perceive it?” Here “cannot” means “will not”: “because you have trained yourselves to be lowly, because you imagine nothing great.” For since they said that they persecuted him out of zeal for God, he therefore tries everywhere to show that to persecute him belongs to those who [hate] God, and on the contrary to love him belongs to those who know God. “We have one Father, God,” they say. They pride themselves on this, on honor, not on [righteous deeds]. “So your not believing is not proof that I am a stranger [to God]; but your unbelief is a sign that you do not know God. And the cause is that you wish to lie and to do the devil’s works.” And this is caused by meanness of soul, as the apostle says: “For where there is strife and jealousy among you, are you not carnal?” And why can you not? “Because you wish to do your father’s desires,” you are eager [to do them]. Do you see that by “you cannot” he means “you will not”? Because Abraham did not do this. But what are his works? Gentleness, forbearance, obedience. But you are set in the opposite direction, being harsh and cruel. And how did it occur to them to take refuge in God? He had shown them unworthy of Abraham; so, wishing to escape this, they went up to the greater claim. For since he had reproached them with murder, they say this as though making a kind of defense, that they were avenging God. So he shows that this very thing belongs to those who oppose God. And “I came forth” shows that he is from there; he says “I came forth” hinting at his coming to us. And since they were likely to say, “You say strange and novel things,” he says that he has come from God. “So naturally you do not listen to them,” he says, “being of the deceiver. For why do you kill me? What have you to charge me with? If it is not this, why do you not believe me?” So, having shown from their lying and murder that they are of the devil, he showed also that they are strangers to Abraham and to God, both from their hating one who had done no wrong and from their not hearing his word. And he shows again and again that he was not opposed to God, and that it was not for this that they did not believe, but because they were strangers to God. For one who had committed no sin, who said that he had come from God and been sent from there, who spoke the truth, and spoke it in such a way as to invite all to refute him, and then was not believed, was clearly not believed because they were carnal. For sins know how to make the soul lowly. That is why he says, “Since you have become dull of hearing.” For when one cannot despise the things on earth, how will he ever practise wisdom about the things in heaven? So, I beg you, let us do everything so that our life may be set right, so that our mind may be cleansed, so that nothing filthy may become a hindrance to us. “Light for yourselves the light of knowledge, and do not sow on thorns.” For one who does not know that greed is evil, when will he know the greater things? One who does not abstain from these things, when will he lay hold of those? It is good to seize, but not perishable things: the kingdom of heaven. “For the violent,” it says, “seize it.” So it is not possible to attain it with slackness, but with earnestness. What is “the violent”? There is need of much force (for the way is narrow), and of a youthful and noble soul. Those who seize wish to get ahead of everyone; they look to nothing, not to condemnation, not to accusation, not to punishment, but they are intent on one thing only, to take what they wish to seize, and they outrun all who are ahead of them. Let us then seize the kingdom of heaven. For here seizing is not blamed but praised; what is blamed is not seizing. Here our wealth does not come from another’s loss. Let us then be eager to seize it; even if anger troubles us, even if desire troubles us, let us do violence to nature; let us become gentler; let us toil a little, so that we may rest forever. Do not seize gold, but seize the wealth that shows gold to be mud. For tell me, if lead and gold lay before you, which would you seize? Is it not clear that it would be the gold? Then where the one who seizes is punished, you prize the greater; but where the one who seizes is honored, do you give up the greater? For if there were punishment on both sides, would you not rather have gone for this? But here there is nothing of the kind; on the contrary, [there is even a reward]. “And how can one seize it?” someone says. Throw away what you have in your hands; for as long as you hold onto them, you will not be able to seize those. For consider a man who has his hands full of silver: will he be able, as long as he holds it, to seize gold, unless he throws it away and becomes unencumbered? For one who seizes must be lightly girded, so as not to be held back. And indeed even now there are hostile powers running at us to take things from us. But let us flee them, let us flee; let us cut the ropes, let us strip ourselves of worldly things. What need is there of silken garments? How long shall we keep unrolling this farce? How long shall we bury gold? I wished to stop always saying these things; but you do not let me, always giving me occasions and subjects. But now at least let us leave off, so that, having taught others too through our life, we may attain the promised good things, by the grace and love for humankind of our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom and with whom be glory to the Father, together with the Holy Spirit, now and always and to the ages of ages. Amen.