Commentary on the Gospel of John 13 part 5/6

But someone else will say that all the legal and prophetic matters, understood accurately by Moses and the prophets according to the spiritual sense, and written down, as was fitting, in a covered and veiled manner, are the things that were sown; and since 'if a word of wisdom is heard by a man of understanding, he will praise it and add to it,' it is clear that the apostles, making use as seeds of things more secret and deeper than what had been understood by Moses and the prophets, advanced to attain manifold visions, Jesus lifting up their eyes and illumining their minds; and the manifold things were the harvest of the many fields. It is not that the prophets and Moses, as though inferior, failed from the beginning to see as much as the apostles saw at the coming of Jesus, but rather that they were awaiting the fullness of time, in which it was necessary — together with the extraordinary coming of Jesus Christ — that things extraordinary, beyond whatever had ever been spoken or written in the world, should be revealed by him who did not consider being equal to God a thing to be grasped, but emptied himself and took the form of a servant. For in this the saying is true, that one is the sower and another is the reaper.

Whether we understand the passage according to the example taken from the arts and sciences, it is clear how the saying is true that one is the sower and another the reaper; or whether according to the fact that Moses and the prophets sowed, while those who lifted up their eyes according to the instructions of our savior Jesus beheld the fields, once they had become white, so as to see how the fields were now already white for harvest — either way it is thus clear how one is the sower and another is the reaper.

But consider whether 'one and another' can also be understood on the ground that those [former] are justified by such a conduct of life, while these [latter] by another different from that one — so that one might say 'one is the man under the law, another is the man of the gospel.' Yet they rejoice together, since one end, from one God, through one Christ, in one Holy Spirit, is laid up for both.

But Heracleon interpreted 'that the sower may rejoice together and the reaper' as follows: 'the sower,' he says, 'rejoices because he sows, and because already some of his seeds are being gathered, having the same hope also concerning the rest; and the reaper likewise [rejoices] because he too reaps; but the one was first to begin sowing, while the other was later to begin reaping.'

For both could not begin at the same time; for it was necessary first to be sown, and only afterward to be reaped. Yet when the sower has ceased sowing, the reaper will still be reaping; but for the present, both, each performing his own work, rejoice together, regarding the perfecting of the seeds as a shared joy.

And further, on the passage 'In this the saying is true, that one is the sower and another the reaper,' he says: 'For the son of man above this place sows; but the savior, being himself also son of man, reaps, and sends as reapers those understood, through the disciples, as angels, each to his own soul.' But he did not set forth very clearly who the two sons of man are, of whom the one sows and the other reaps. — 'I sent you to reap that on which you have not labored; others have labored, and you have entered into their labor.'

It is not difficult, from what has already been said, to see how Jesus sent the disciples to reap this, for which they themselves had not labored, but those before them; for since Moses and the prophets had toiled, that they might be able to make room to understand the mysteries, whose traces they have left for us in their own writings, the apostles have entered into the labor of Moses and the prophets, reaping — with Jesus as their initiating guide — and gathering into the storehouses of their own soul the mind [contained] in those [writings].

And the teaching always genuinely makes the labors of the earlier ones clearer to those being discipled, without the toil like that of the sowers. But concerning all the matters relating to what is sown by some and reaped by others, this too must be considered: whether, since angels are appointed over the sowing of mankind, the apostles, as fellow-workers in the perfecting of what has been sown, enter into the labor of others, reaping and finding fruits among those who have been benefited — fruits which the coming of Jesus made ready for harvest even before the four months that were expected.

But if this is so, it is worth considering whether the ministry of the angels toward the sowing-in of souls into bodies is toilsome, as they bring together two things by nature opposite into a single blend, and, at the appointed time, both begin to carry out the arrangement concerning each [soul], and bring forward to completion the one already formed beforehand.

But someone will say that it is contrary to these things that God himself is said to form/mold, both in the text 'Your hands have made me and fashioned me,' and in 'Before I formed you in the womb, I knew you, and before you came out of the womb, I sanctified you.' To this the following must be said.

That, just as the law was ordained through angels, and the word spoken through angels was [nonetheless] considered valid because spoken by God, so it is also possible to say that God forms [a person] in the womb through the angels appointed over generation/birth.

I do not know whether there is room to say something of this sort as well, concerning the difficulty: that Job and David, who said 'Your hands have made me and fashioned me,' were, as belonging to the portion of God, fashioned by him; and Jeremiah, hearing 'Before I formed you in the womb, I knew you,' has been formed by him as one who was to belong to the portion of God; while those who belong to the portion of others are formed by those who have been allotted them.

And this argument will interpret, in a yet more curious way, 'Let us make man according to our image and likeness' — God saying this concerning all mankind and originally undertaking the work, which work is later [carried out] also by the rest, to whom this statement is addressed according to each one's proper portion, God saying to them, 'Let us make man' — to whom he also says, at the confusion of the languages: 'Come, let us go down and confuse their tongue there.'

We say these things, however, not asserting them dogmatically; for matters of such magnitude require much testing, so that it may be found whether it is so or otherwise. Yet this interpretation, too, is not to be despised: each of mankind is the portion of someone, according to 'When the Most High divided the nations, when he scattered the sons of Adam, he set the boundaries of the nations according to the number of the angels of God; and the Lord's portion became his people Jacob, Israel the line/measure of his inheritance.'

But if indeed each person is altogether the portion of someone, since God scattered the sons of Adam, then each of the angels toils about his own portion, administering the affairs pertaining to it; but at the coming of the savior, [people] from the portion of all are taken, being led captive into obedience to Christ, through the apostles, evangelists, and teachers who serve the gospel under Christ, and are brought forward so that the nations become the inheritance of Christ.

Perhaps, then, for this reason it can be said to the apostles, who would shortly hear 'Go, make disciples of all nations,' the words 'Others have labored, and you have entered into their labor.'

But if it is holy angels who have received by lot the remaining portions apart from the chosen one, and who are appointed over the dispersal of souls, it is nothing absurd for the sower to rejoice together also with the reaper after the harvest.

But Heracleon says that these seeds were sown neither by them nor from them, he says (that is, he says this of the apostles); rather, those who have labored are the angels of the administration, through whom, as mediators, it was sown and raised up. As for 'You have entered into their labor,' he set forth the following: for the labor of sowers and of reapers is not the same; for the ones, digging the earth in cold and toil, sow, and throughout the whole winter tend it, hoeing and picking out the weeds/undergrowth; while the others, entering upon fruit already prepared, reap rejoicing in the summer harvest-time.

It will be possible for the reader, comparing what has been said by us with what has been said by Heracleon, to see which of the two interpretations can be judged to have hit the mark. — 'Now from that city many of the Samaritans believed because of the word of the woman, who testified, He told me all that I ever did.'

While the Samaritan woman had left her water jar and gone away into the city to proclaim the good news concerning the savior, and those who believed the woman's word were coming to the Lord, in the meantime the savior, meeting with the disciples, made the aforementioned statements/discourse, while the disciples were asking him to eat.

After what had been examined to the best of our ability was spoken to the disciples, Scripture resumes the account concerning those who had come from the city to him and had believed because of the testimony of the woman, who said, 'He told me all that I ever did.'

Now if we hold fast to what has been said above concerning Samaria and the Samaritan woman and Jacob's well, it is not difficult to see in what manner those who have been previously seized by strange teachings, on obtaining a sound word, leave, as it were, the city of [false] doctrines, and, having gone out of it, believe in a sound manner — a certain one [woman] having gone before them at Jacob's well and received the saving teaching, and having left the aforementioned water jar, in order to summon others also to be benefited in like manner.

But Heracleon took 'from the city' as meaning 'from the world'; and 'because of the word of the woman' as meaning, that is, 'through the spiritual church'; and he further remarks on 'many,' as though there were many psychic [souls], while he calls the one [woman] the incorruptible, single-formed, and unified nature of the election. We have taken a stand above, as far as was possible, in response to these things. — 'So when the Samaritans came to him, they asked him to stay with them; and he stayed there two days; and many more believed because of his word.'

Not implausibly might someone set the text 'Do not go into the way of the Gentiles, and do not enter any city of the Samaritans' against this saying here. For the savior, having been asked to stay among the Samaritans, stayed there two days — he who had said, 'Do not enter any city of the Samaritans.'

It is clear, then, that his disciples also had entered in together with him. To this it must be said that to go into the way of the Gentiles is to take up some Gentile doctrine foreign to the Israel of God, and to walk according to it; while to enter a city of the Samaritans is to come to be in some falsely-named knowledge belonging to those who claim to attend to legal, or prophetic, or evangelical, or apostolic words/sayings.

But it is possible, when the Samaritans have left their own city and come to Jesus at Jacob's well, that Jesus, having welcomed the resolve of those who believed, remains with those who asked him.

I think that John, with careful observation, did not write that the Samaritans asked him to enter Samaria, or to enter the city, but rather to remain with them; for it is not the same thing to remain with the one who believes and to enter into his city. And likewise, in what follows he does not say, "and he remained in that city two days," or "he remained in Samaria," but "he remained there," that is, with those who had asked him.

For Jesus remains with those who ask him, and especially when those who ask him go out from their city and come to Jesus, as if imitating Abraham, who obeyed God when he said: "Go out from your land and from your kindred and from your father's house."

He remains two days with those who asked him; for they were not yet able to receive even his third day, since they were not capable of receiving some marvel, such as those in Cana of Galilee, who on the third day dined together with Jesus at the wedding.

Now the beginning of the many who believed from Samaria was the word of the woman testifying, "He told me all that I did"; but the increase and multiplication of the many who believed was no longer because of the woman's word, but because of the Word himself. For the Word is not beheld in the same way when he is seen from himself, illuminating the one who receives him, as when, spoken of through another, he is merely attested to.

But Heracleon, on these passages, says the following: "he remained with them" and not "in them," and "two days" — either the present age and the age to come, the one signified in the marriage, or the time before his passion and the time after the passion — which, having spent with them, and having converted many more to faith through his own word, he departed from them.

But it must be said, against his seeming precise observation that it is written "with them" and not "in them," that similar to "with them" is the saying, "Behold, I am with you all the days"; for he did not say, "I am in you."

Moreover, in saying that the two days are either this age and the age to come, or the time before the passion and after the passion, he has understood neither the ages to come after the age to come, concerning which the apostle says, "That he might show in the ages that are coming," nor does he see that Jesus is present with those who come to him not only before the passion and after the passion, and thereafter departs; for he is always with his disciples, never at any time abandoning them, so that they too say, "I live, yet no longer I, but Christ lives in me." But to the woman they said, "No longer because of your word do we believe; for we ourselves have heard, and know that this is truly the Savior of the world."

They renounce the faith that came through the woman's speech, having found something better than it: to have heard the Savior himself, and so to know that this is truly the Savior of the world. And it is indeed better to become an eyewitness of the Word and to hear him teaching without any intermediary and impressing his image upon the mind — the ruling faculty discovering the very forms of truth most clearly, not through human teachers — than, without seeing him and without being illumined by his power, to hear the account concerning him through servants who had seen him.

For it is impossible for one who is taught by someone who has seen and reports what he saw to experience the same affection concerning the ruling faculty as happens to the one who has actually seen; and it is indeed better to walk by sight than by faith.

For this reason those who, as it were, walk by sight would be said to possess the foremost gifts — the word of wisdom through the Spirit of God, and the word of knowledge according to the same Spirit; while those who walk by faith, even though faith too is a gift, according to "to another, faith, by the same Spirit," are, in rank, later than the former.

But it must be examined when and how Paul says, "For we walk by faith, not by sight." For how, as most understand it, does he walk by faith and not by sight who says with such great earnestness, "Am I not free? Am I not an apostle? Have I not seen Jesus our Lord?"

"Are you not my work in the Lord?" Let us then see how the saying "For we walk by faith, not by sight" must be understood, taking it up from the preceding words, which read thus: "Now he who has prepared us for this very thing is God, who has given us the pledge of the Spirit."

"Being confident then always, and knowing that while we are at home in the body we are away from the Lord — for we walk by faith, not by sight" (it is clear that we are at home in the body precisely when we are away from the Lord) — "being confident, we are rather well pleased to be away from the body and to be at home with the Lord."

These things having been thus said, in order to understand what it is to be at home in the body and away from the Lord, and what it is to be away from the body and at home with the Lord, let us ask ourselves what we shall say concerning the apostle: whether, being at home in the body, he was away from the Lord, or whether, being away from the body, he was at home with the Lord.

But clearly, since those who are in the flesh cannot please God, and the saints are not in the flesh but in the Spirit, if indeed the Spirit of God dwells in them, Paul was not in the flesh nor in the body; for he speaks truly when he says, "And I too think that I have the Spirit of God," not being at home in the flesh and body — since it is the one who is at home in the body who walks by faith, not by sight.

And see whether it may belong to apostolic precision not to affirm that "being in the flesh" and "being at home in the body" are the same thing. For those who are in the flesh cannot please God; but those who are at home in the body are indeed away from the Lord, yet they walk by faith, even if they do not yet receive things by sight.

And I think that those who wage war according to the flesh are in the flesh; while those who do not understand the spiritual things of Scripture, being wholly devoted to it and to the body, are at home in the body and away from the Lord. For how does he not depart from the Lord — if the Lord is the Spirit — who does not yet contain the life-giving and spiritual element of Scripture? Yet such a one walks by faith; whereas he who compares spiritual things with spiritual and becomes spiritual — he who judges all things, yet is himself judged by no one — departs from the body and is at home with the Lord.

Now these things, even though they may seem to us to have been said with a digression into the apostolic sayings, are nevertheless most necessary for the distinction concerning the account of the Samaritans, who no longer believe because of the woman's speech, but because they have heard and know that this is the Savior of the world. It is, however, nothing to wonder at, that concerning some it is said that they walk by faith and not by sight, while concerning others it is said that they walk by sight, which is greater than walking by faith.

But Heracleon, taking more simplistically the phrase "No longer because of your speech do we believe," says that the word "only" is to be supplied. Furthermore, concerning the words "For we ourselves have heard, and know that this is the Savior of the world," he says: for men at first, being guided by other men, believe in the Savior, but when they encounter his own words, these men no longer believe because of human testimony alone, but because of the truth itself. "And after the two days he departed from there into Galilee; for Jesus himself testified that a prophet has no honor in his own homeland."

The saying appears altogether inconsistent. For what does "For Jesus himself testified that a prophet has no honor in his own homeland" have in common with his having departed after two days from the Samaritans, with whom he had stayed, and going away into Galilee?

For if Samaria had been his homeland, and he had been dishonored there, so that he had departed for this reason without staying more than two days, then it would have been consistently said, "For Jesus himself testified that a prophet has no honor in his own homeland."

But even if it had been written, "And after the two days he departed into Galilee, but did not go into his own homeland; for Jesus himself testified that a prophet has no honor in his own homeland" — even so, what is said would have made sense.

And perhaps this is indeed the intended meaning of the saying, but John, being unskilled in expression, has expressed with difficulty what he understood. For it is not stated into what place of Galilee they received him, they having seen all that he had done in Jerusalem at the feast; but after this he also recorded that he came to Cana of Galilee. The evangelist is consistent with himself and is not at a loss regarding the matter at hand.

Having then first told in what manner the Lord leaves Judea and goes away into Galilee, and having recounted — since he had to pass through Samaria — the things said near the plot of land which Jacob gave to Joseph, by Jacob's well, and how he remained two days with the Samaritans, he then renders his arrival in Galilee, even though not a few things had been said in between.

But since above we had said beforehand that Judea, lying somewhere above, is a symbol of something better, and Galilee of something lesser — and since, in accordance with this, the God who loves mankind does not despise even the lesser things, which have need of oversight — for this reason he also left the Samaritans rather quickly, in order to be present to the Galileans, who were eagerly to receive him, and to heal the son of the royal official.

Having done these things in Galilee, when the feast of the Jews was at hand, he goes up to Jerusalem, making the feast better and more joyful by his own presence.

Let us now see also what "For Jesus himself testified that a prophet has no honor in his own homeland" means, and it is fitting that, since it is Jesus who testifies, we should seek the sense of the saying in a manner worthy of him.

Now the homeland of the prophets was indeed in Judea, and it is evident that they did not have honor among the Jews: they were stoned, sawn in two, tried, died by the slaughter of the sword, and, on account of being dishonored, went about in sheepskins and goatskins, destitute, afflicted, ill-treated.

And indeed the Jews are reproached by him who says to them, "Which of the prophets did your fathers not persecute? And they killed those who announced beforehand the coming of the Righteous One" — they who, at the very end, having also dishonored the Prophet who is over all, through whom the prophets themselves became prophets, said, "Away with him, away with him, crucify him!"

But in my own homeland all the prophets have been honored, together with him who arose from God, according to what was said concerning him by Moses: "The Lord your God will raise up for you a prophet from among your brothers, like me; him you shall hear"; for his homeland is not among the Gentiles, who have received salvation through the trespass of Israel. And it is also written elsewhere: "No prophet is acceptable in the..."

"...homeland and in his own house." And it is indeed useful, having gathered the related saying from the Gospels, to see when and on what occasion this was said by the Savior.

One may marvel at the truth of the Savior's pronouncement, extending not only to the holy prophets who were dishonored by their own kin, and to our Lord himself, but also to those who spent their time in some kind of wisdom and were despised by their fellow citizens, so that some of them were even led away to death.

It is possible to gather such things from Greek history concerning those who practiced philosophy or astronomy, or excelled in whatever branches of learning. And these too are the voices of those who dishonored him: "Is this not the carpenter's son? Is not his mother called Mary? And are not his brothers with us? Whence then has this man all these things?"

And this most paradoxical thing has indeed happened in the case of the prophets: their fellow citizens did not honor them while living, but attend to them once dead, building and adorning their tombs.

And to build the tombs of the prophets and adorn them occurs when someone, having abandoned the life-giving spirit inherent in the intentions of their writings, attends to and adorns all around the letter that kills, supposing that the beauty of prophecy consists in the bare reception of the letter.

This is the work of the scribes and Pharisees who are called wretched by the Lord — the scribes being named after the bare letter alone, and the Pharisees being those who are divided and have lost the divine unity; for "Pharisees" is interpreted as "the divided ones." "When therefore he came into Galilee, the Galileans received him, having seen all that he did in Jerusalem at the feast; for they themselves also had gone to the feast."

It is worth examining the cause of the Galileans' acceptance — the acceptance with which they received the Savior when he came into Galilee — whether it was so great as to produce in them astonishment and admiration for the Savior sufficient to make them accept him; and further, to what it refers, as it were, when it speaks of the "many things" Jesus did in Jerusalem — namely the statement, "having seen all that he did in Jerusalem at the feast."

We find nothing said beforehand except that "He found in the temple those selling oxen and sheep and doves, and the money-changers sitting there; and having made a whip of cords, he drove them all out of the temple, both the sheep and the oxen, and poured out the coins of the money-changers and overturned their tables, and said to those selling the doves: Take these things away from here; do not make my Father's house a house of trade."

What then is so great in these things that the Galileans, moved by them, should receive the Lord — being attested to have received him for this reason, because, having come to the feast in Jerusalem, they had seen all that Jesus did there?

If we remember what has been said in that place, showing that no less power of the Savior was displayed in those deeds than the power that worked so that the blind might see again, the deaf hear, and the lame walk, then it must be said that perhaps the Galileans, reasoning rightly and not being deceived, and struck with amazement at the divinity of Jesus, received him when he came into Galilee, having seen all that he did in Jerusalem.

And all these things were: that with a whip of cords the sheep and oxen were driven out of the temple, and the coins of the money-changers were poured out and their tables overturned, and that it was said with authority to those selling the doves: "Take these things away from here; do not make my Father's house a house of trade."

But I think that he did not only these things at that time, but also other signs; for it is added after those: "Now when he was in Jerusalem at the Passover, at the feast, many believed in his name, beholding his signs which he did." Concerning which Nicodemus also says: "Rabbi, we know that you have come as a teacher from God; for no one can do these signs that you do, unless God is with him."

Nevertheless, it is possible for one who is a Galilean, being present at the feast in Jerusalem where the temple of God is, to observe all that Jesus did there — and especially the manner in which, with the whip of cords made by himself, he drove out all those selling oxen and sheep and doves, both the sheep and the oxen, and the rest.

For the feast in Jerusalem is, for the Galileans, the beginning of their receiving the Son of God when he came to them; for if they had not seen the things done at the feast, they would not have received him — or else he himself would not have journeyed to them so eagerly, leaving behind those who had asked him to remain with them, unless they had been prepared beforehand to receive him.

Now those who received Jesus received also him who sent him; for he says: "He who receives me receives him who sent me." First, then, one must see — that is, understand — all the works of Jesus in Jerusalem, the manner in which he purifies the temple, restoring it to be a house of the Father and no longer a house of trade, so that after beholding these things we may receive the Word who worked them.