Tractates on the Gospel of John 28–54

Tractate 34

TRACTATE 34 OnJohn 8.12 DO NOT doubt that we all tried also to understand what we havejust now heard and attentively received when the Holy Gospel was read; and each of us took what he could according to his own capacity from so great a matter which has been read. And when the bread of the word has been served, there is no one who complains that he has tasted nothing. But again I do not doubt that there is rarely anyone who has understood the whole. Nevertheless, even if there is someone who understands well all the words of our LordJesus Christjust recited from the Gospel, let him endure our ministry, until, if we can, with his help, we enable, by our discussion, all or many to understand what the few are delighted to have understood. 2. I think that what the Lord said, "I am the Light of the world," is clear to those who have eyes with which they may become partakers of this Light. But they who do not have eyes except in the flesh alone wonder at what was said by the Lord Jesus Christ: "I am the Light of the world." And perhaps there may even be present someone who would say to himself, Is the Lord Christ perhaps this sun which brings to pass a day by its rising and setting? For there have actually been heretics who have held these opinions. (2) The Manichees thought that Christ the Lord was this sun, visible to the eyes of the flesh, open and public not only to men but also to brute animals to see.I But the orthodox faith 1. In the complex syncretic religion founded by Mani, A.D. 216-<:. 277, Jesus held a special and unique position. As a particular emanation of the Divine Light, Jesus the Brilliant came as the Third Messenger to bring the knowledge of salvation to Adam. He is variously syncretized with the histori60 TRACTATE 34 61 of the Catholic Church condemns such a fabrication and recognizes that it is a diabolical doctrine; not only does it recognize it by believing, but also by reasoning it out, it refutes it in the case of those for whom it can. And so let us repudiate an error of this kind which the holy Church has made anathema from the beginning. Let us not think that the Lord Jesus Christ is this sun which we see rising from the east, setting in the west, whose passing night follows, whose rays are darkened by a cloud, whichjourneys by fixed motion from place to place. The Lord Christ is not this thing. The Lord Christ is not the sun [which was] made, but it is he through whom the sun was made. For "all things were made through him and without him was made nothing."2 3. Therefore, there is a Light which made this light [that we see]. Let us love this Light, let us desire to understand this Light. Let us thirst for it that under its guidance, we may sometime come to it itself and may so live in it that we may cal Jesus who is human in appearance only; sometimes, Jesus Patibi!is, the historicalJesus, is rejected as a false representation of the Darkness, a work of the devil, though sometimes, and particularly in North Africa, he is a lower element ofJesus the Brilliant, crucified in the realm of matter and mingled in the corporeal world, an individual moment in the cosmic drama of passion and redemption. Jesus the Brilliant "dwells in" the sun. Since God, the Divine Light, is to the Manichees a substance, not a person, he is the Light, he is what he dwells in; hence Jesus is the sun. Both the mythical Jesus and the sun are particular emanations of the one Divine Light. Augustine, of course, points out that Christ is light not in the physical sense, not the light of nature, but the light of Divine Wisdom; Augustine frequently mentions the Manichaean identification ofJesus with the sun, as, e.g., En in Ps 25.2.3 and 93.5; Sermo 4·5, 12.11-12, and 50.7 (PI 38'36, 105-106, and 329); Contra Faustum 16.10, 20.2 and 5-8, and 21.4 (PL 42.320-21,369,371-74, and 391); and De Genesi contra Manichaeos 1.6 and 2.38 (PL 34.176 and 216-17). See F. Dolgen, "Konstantin der Grosse und der Manichaismus, Sonne und Christus in Manichaismus ," AC 2 (1930) 301-14; F. Burkitt, The Religion of the Manichees (Cambridge 1925) esp. 37-43, 49-52, 92--93; G. Widengren, Mani and Manichaeism (London 1961); G. Bardy, "Manicheisme," Dictionnaire de theologie catholique (Paris 1927) 9.2.1841--95; J. Ries, "Manichaeism," NCE 9.153--60; A. Moon, The De Natura Boni of Saint Augustine, esp. 141,202-204,224-28; Augustine, De Haeresibus 46 (CCL 46.312-20). However, F. Decret, Aspects du Manicheisme dans l'Afrique romaine (Paris 1970) 229-31, questions Augustine's accuracy on this point. 2. Jn 1.3· 62 ST. AUGUSTINE never at all die. For it is this Light about which long ago prophecy set forth and sang in the psalm as follows: "You will save men and beasts, 0 Lord, as your mercy has been multiplied , 0 God."3 These are the words of the holy psalm; notice what the ancient utterance of the holy men of God has announced in advance about such a Light. It said, "You will save men and beasts, 0 Lord, as your mercy has been multiplied, 0 God." For, because you are God and have multiple mercy, the same multiplicity of your mercy has come not only to men, whom you created in your image, but also to brute animals, which you have made subject to men. For the well-being4 of the brute animal is also from that one from whom is the wellbeing of man.5 You would not blush to think this about the Lord, your God; nay, rather you would take it for granted and count on it, and take care that you not think otherwise. The very one who saves you also saves your horse, your ewe-and let us come to the absolutely least of things-your hen. "Salvation is the Lord's."6 And God saves these things. It disturbs you; you ask. I wonder why you doubt. Will he who deigned to create disdain to save? Salvation of angels, of men, of brute animals is the Lord's; "Salvation is the Lord's." As no one is of himself, so no one is saved of himself. Accordingly, most truly and excellently did the psalm say, "You will save men and beasts, 0 Lord." Why? "As Your mercy has been multiplied, 0 God." For you are God, you created, you save; you have given that one exists, you give that one is well. 4. Therefore if, as God's mercy has been multiplied, men and beasts are saved by him, do not men have something else which God the creator may present to them which he does not present to the beasts? Is there no distinction between the animal made in the image ofGod and the animal subjected to the image of God? Certainly there isl Besides this salvation com3 · Ps 35 (36).7-8. 4. Throughout this passage there is a double connotation of the Latin words salus and salvus, health or salvation and healthy or saved, which cannot be adequately reflected in the translation. See Tractates 7'9. note 55; 17.12. note 37; 30.4. note 12. 5· Cf. Tractate 30 .3. 6. Ps 3.9. TRACTATE 34 63 mon to us and the dumb animals there is something which God may present to us but does not present to them. What is this? Continue in the same psalm, "But the children of men will hope under the covering of your wings."7 Having now salvation in common with their brute animals, "the children of men will hope under the covering of your wings." They have one salvation in present reality, another in hope. The salvation in the present is common to both men and beasts, but the other is that for which men hope. And they who hope receive it; they who despair do not. For it says, "the sons of men will hope under the covering of your wings." But they who hope perseveringly are protected by you that they be not downcast from their hope by the devil: "they will hope under the covering of your wings." Therefore, if they will hope, for what will they hope, except what the brute animals will not have? "They will be inebriated by the richness of your house, and you will give them to drink of the torrent of your pleasure."8 What kind of wine is it from which it is praiseworthy to be inebriated ? What kind of wine is it which does not confuse, but guides the mind? What kind of wine is it which makes a man forever sane and does not by inebriation make him insane? "They will be inebriated." By what? "By the richness of your house, and you will give them to drink of the torrent of your pleasure." Why? "Because with you is the fountain of life."g The very Fountain of life himself walked upon the earth. He said, "Let him who thirsts come to me."IO Behold, the Fountain . (2) But we had begun to speak about light, and we were dealing with a problem proposed from the Gospel about light. In the words of the Lord it was read to us, "I am the light of the world." From this arose the problem that no one, thinking in carnal terms, should suppose that he be understood as this sun; from there we came to the psalm in the consideration of which we again found the Lord as the Fountain of life. Drink and live. "With you," it says, "is the fountain of life." And so 7· Ps 35 (36).8. 9· Ps 35 (36).10. 8. Ps 35 (36).9. 10. In 7·37· 64 ST. AUGUSTINE the children of men hope under the bower of your wings, seeking to be inebriated by this Fountain. But we were speaking of light. Continue therefore; for when the prophet had said, "with you is the fountain of life," he continued and added , "In your light we shall see light"ll-God from God, Light from Light. Through this Light, the light of the sun was made; and the Light which made the sun, under which he also made us, was made under the sun for our sakes. The Light which made the sun, I say, was made for our sakes under the sun. Do not despise the cloud of the flesh; he is covered with a cloud not that he may be darkened, but that [his brightness] may be rendered endurable. 5. Speaking, therefore, through the cloud of the flesh, the unfailing Light, the Light of Wisdom, said to men: "I am the Light of the world. He who follows me will not walk in darkness but will have the light of life." How did he withdraw you from the eyes of the flesh and recall you to the eyes of the heart? It was not enough to say, "He who follows me will not walk in darkness but will have the light"; he added, "oflife," as it was said there.12 "Because with you is the fountain of life." See, therefore, my brothers, how the words of the Lord concur with the truth of that psalm; there, light was placed with the fountain of life, and by the Lord "light of life" was said. But in these physical experiences light is one thing, a fountain is another. Mouths seek a fountain; eyes, light. When we thirst, we seek a fountain; when we are in darkness, we seek a light. And if perchance we should be thirsty at night, we kindle a light so that we may come to the fountain. Not so with God; light is the same thing as fountain; he who shines for you that you may see also himself flows for you that you may drink.13 6. Therefore, you see, my brothers, you see, if you see 11. Ps 35 (36).10. The psalm uses the Latin word lumen for light, whereas In 8.12 has lux. In association with the fountain lfons) as a source one might expect the Latin lux as a source of light (see Tractate 21.4, note 15); but Augustine here makes no distinction between lumen and lux. 12. I.e., in Ps 35 (36).10. 13. Cf. Tractate 13.5. TRACTATE 34 65 within, what kind of light this is about which the Lord says, "He who follows me will not walk in darkness." Follow this sun; let us see if you will not walk in darkness. Look, by rising, it comes out for you. That [sun] in its passage goes to the west. You are, perhaps, setting out for the east. Unless you were to go in the opposite direction and not where it is heading, by following it you will really make a mistake and you will reach the west instead of the east. If you follow it on land, you will make a mistake; if a sailor follows it at sea, he will make a mistake. Finally, it seems to you that the sun must be followed and you yourself are going west where it, too, is heading. Let us see when it has set, if you will not walk in darkness. See how, even if you do not wish to desert it, it will desert you, completing the day by the necessity of its servitude. But in the meantime our Lord Jesus Christ, even when he was not appearing to all through the cloud of the flesh, was controlling all things through the power of his wisdom. Your God, the whole [of him], is everywhere; if you should not fall from him he never sets on you. 7. Therefore, he said, "He who follows me will not walk in darkness, but will have the light oflife." What he promised, he put in a verb ofthe future tense; he did not say, He has, but he said, "he will have the light of life." Yet neither did he say, Who will follow me, but "who follows me." That which we ought to do, he has put in the present tense; but what he promised to those who do it he has signified by a verb of the future tense. "He who follows will have." Now he follows, later he will have, now he follows by faith, later he will have by sight. For the Apostle says, "while we are in the body, we are absent from the Lord, for we walk by faith and not by sight."14 At what time by sight? When we shall have had the light oflife, when we shall have come to that vision, when this night will have passed. In fact, about that day which will rise, it has been said, "In the morning I shall stand before you, and I shall see."15 What does "in the morning" mean? When the night of 14. 2 Cor 5.6-7. 15· Ps 5·5 (NAB 5·4)· 66 ST. AUGUSTINE this age has passed, when the terrors of temptations have been traversed, when that lion has been overcome which "goes about at night, roaring, seeking someone to devour."16 "In the morning I shall stand before you, and I shall see." (2) But now what do we think, brothers, is suited to this time except what is said again in a psalm: "Every night I shall wash my bed; I shall water my couch with my tears."17 Every night, it says, I shall weep; I shall burn with desire for the light. The Lord sees my desire; for another psalm says to him, "Before you is all my desire, and my groaning has not been hidden from yoU."IB Do you desire gold? You can be seen; for in seeking gold, you will be apparent to men. Do you desire grain? You ask who has it and to him also you announce your desire to attain that for which you long. Do you desire God? Who sees it except God? From whom do you seek God, as you seek bread, water, gold, silver, grain? From whom do you seek God except from God? He himselfis sought from himself who promises himself. Let your soul expand its desire, and with a bosom capable of holding more, let it seek to grasp what eye has not seen, nor ear heard, nor has it entered into the heart of man.19 For that, one can desire, one can long, one can sigh; but one cannot worthily reflect upon it and explain it in words. 8. Therefore, my brothers, because the Lord said briefly, "I am the light of the world. He who follows me will not walk in darkness but will have the light of life," and in these words what he commanded is different from what he promised, let us do what he commanded that we may not desire what he promised with shameless face. Let him not say to us in his judgment: Have you done in fact what I commanded, that you may seek after what I promised? What, then, did you command , 0 Lord our God? He says to you, That you should follow me. You sought the counsel of life. Of what life except that about which it was said, "With you is the fountain of life"?20 A certain man heard, "Go, sell all that you have, and give to the poor, and you shall have treasure in heaven; and 16. 1 Pt 5.8. 17. Ps 6.7. 18. Ps 37 (38).10. 19· Cf. 1 Cor 2.9, quoting Is 64.4 (NAB 64.3). 20. Ps 35 (36).10. TRACTATE 34 67 come, follow me." "He went away sad,"21 he did not follow. He sought a good master, he questioned a teacher, and scorned him when he was teaching. "He went away sad," bound up in his desires. "He went away sad," carrying a huge pack ofgreed upon his shoulders. He labored; he felt anxiety;22 and he who wanted to put his pack away from him was considered one who was not to be followed, but deserted. But after the Lord cried out through the Gospel, "Come to me, all you who labor and are burdened, and I will refresh you. Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me, for I am meek and humble of heart,"23 how many, when they heard the Gospel did what the rich man, when he heard it from the Lord's own mouth, did not do? Therefore, let us now do it, let us follow the Lord. Let us loose the shackles by which we are prevented from following . And who is suited to loose such knots, if that one should not help to whom it was said, "You have broken my bonds"?24 And about him another psalm says, "The Lord releases those that were fettered, the Lord raises up those that were bowed down."25 g. And what do those released and raised up follow except the Light from whom they hear, "I am the light of the world. He who follows me will not walk in darkness"? For the Lord enlightens the blind.26 Therefore we are now enlightened, brothers, having the eye-salve of faith. For his saliva together with earth, with which he who was blind from birth was smeared,27 came first.28 And we were born blind from Adam, and we have need of him who enlightens. He mixed saliva with earth: "The Word was made flesh and dwelt among US."29 He mixed saliva with earth; and so it was predicted: "Truth has sprung out of the earth."30 But he himself said, "I am the way, the truth, and the life."31 21. Mt 19.21-22, Cf. Mk 10.21-22, Lk 18.22-23. 22. Or simply, as Browne translates, he was hot. 23. Mt 11.28-29. 24. Ps "5 (1l6).16. 25· Ps 145 (146).7-8. 26. Cf. Ps 145 (146).8. 27· Cf. In 9.6. 28. I.e., before faith. As usual, all the elements in the miraculous event are taken in a figurative sense. 29· In 1.14· 30. Ps 84 (85)·12. 31. In 14.6. 68 ST. AUGUSTINE (2) We shall fully enjoy the truth when we have seen him face to face, because this, too, is promised to us. For who could dare to hope for what God had not deigned either to promise or to give? We shall see him face to face. The Apostle says, "Now I know in part, now in a dark manner through a mirror, but then face to face."32 And John the Apostle says in his epistle, "Beloved, now we are the children of God, and it has not yet appeared what we shall be. We know that, when he shall appear, we shall be like to him, for we shall see him as he is."33 This is a great promise; if you love, follow. (3) I love, you say, but by what way do I follow? If the Lord your God had said to you, "I am the truth and the life," longing for truth, desiring life, you would immediately ask the way by which you could come to these things, and you would say to yourself, A great thing is truth, a great thing is life; if only there were some way by which my soul might come to these! Do you seek by what way? Hear him saying first, "I am the way." Before he said to you where, he gave the way by which: "I am," he said, "the way." The way where? "And the truth and the life." He first said by what way you were to come, then he said where you were to come. I am the way, I am the truth, I the life. Abiding with the Father, the truth and the life; clothing himself with flesh, he became the way. It is not said to you: Labor in seeking the way that yo.u might attain the truth and the life. This is not said to you. Lazy man, rise up! The way himself has come to you, and he has roused you who were sleeping from your sleep-if he has really roused you up: "Rise and walk."34 Perhaps you are trying to walk and cannot because your feet hurt. From what do your feet hurt? Is it that they have run through rough places at the bidding of greed? But the Word of God has healed even the lame. Look, you say, I have healthy feet, but I do not see the way. He has enlightened the blind, too. 10. All of this is through faith while we are exiled from the Lord and remain in body.35 But when we have walked throughout the way and come to the homeland itself, what will 32. I Cor 13.12. 34· In 5.8. 33· I In 3.2. 35. Cf. 2 Cor 5.6-7. TRACTATE 34 69 be more joyful to us? What will be more blessed for us? For there will be nothing more tranquil: for nothing will rebel against man. (2) But now, brothers, we are scarcely without quarrel. We have indeed been called to concord; we are commanded to have peace among ourselves. This must be attempted and striven for with all our strength, that one day we may come to the most perfect peace. But now very often we quarrel with those whose interests we want to look after. That man goes astray; you want to lead him to the way. He resists you; you quarrel. A pagan resists; you argue against the errors of idols and demons. A heretic resists; you argue against other doctrines of demons. An evil Catholic does not wish to live well; you reproach even your inner brother. He remains in the house with you, and he seeks profligate ways. You seethe as to how you may correct him that you may render a good accounting about him to the Lord of both ofyou. How great are the necessities for quarrels everywhere! Very often a man, feeling weariness, says to himself, What good does it do me to endure opponents, to endure those who return evil for good? I wish to work in their interests; they want to perish. I consume my life in quarreling; I have no peace. What's more, I make those my enemies whom I ought to have as friends, if they would observe the good will of one working in their interest. What good does it do me to suffer these things? Let me return to myself. I shall be with myself; I shall call upon my God. (3) Return to yourself; there you find a quarrel. If you have begun to follow God, there you find a quarrel. What quarrel, you say, do I find? "Flesh lusts against spirit, and spirit against fiesh."36 Look, you are yourself. Look, you are alone. Look, you are with yourself. Look, you suffer no other man. But you see another law in your members, fighting against the law of your mind, and imprisoning you in the law of sin which is in your members.37 Therefore, cry out, and from your inner quarrel shout to God, that he may pacify you for yourself: 36. Gal 5.17. 37· cr. Rom 7.23. 70 ST. AUGUSTINE "Unhappy man that 1 am, who will deliver me from the body of this death? The grace of God through Jesus Christ our Lord."38 For he said "He who follows me will not walk in darkness, but will have the light of life." (4) When all quarreling has been ended, immortality will follow, because "the enemy death will be destroyed last."39 And what kind of peace will there be? "This corruptible must put on incorruption, and this mortal must put on immortality ."40 That we may come there, because then it will be in reality, let us now follow in hope him who said, "I am the light ofthe world. He who follows me will not walk in darkness, but will have the light of life." 38. cr. Rom 7.24-25. 39. 1 Cor 15.26. 40. 1 Cor 15.53. ...