Every house that is to be built as firmly as possible is built in fair weather and calm, so that it may not be hindered from receiving the necessary solidity, in order that it may become such as to withstand the onrush of a flood and the battering of a river, and whatever things are wont to happen when a storm occurs -- things that expose the unsound parts of buildings, but show forth those constructions that have attained their proper excellence.
But especially the rational building -- receptive of the contemplations of truth, as it exists in exposition and in writing -- is then above all well built, when God builds together with the one who has set out to accomplish this most excellent work, whenever the soul is at rest, enjoying the peace that surpasses all understanding, estranged from all disturbance and in no way tossed by waves.
It is because they have, as it seems to me, precisely understood these things that the servants of the prophetic spirit and the ministers of the evangelical proclamation have received themselves as worthy to receive the peace that is in secret, from him who always gives it to the worthy -- from him who has said: 'Peace I leave with you, my peace I give to you; not as the world gives do I give peace.'
Consider whether the account concerning David and Solomon regarding the temple hints at some such thing as this. For David, while waging the wars of the Lord and standing against many enemies of himself and of Israel, wished to build a temple for God, but was prevented by God through Nathan, who said to him: 'You shall not build me a house, because you are a man of blood.'
But Solomon, having seen God in a dream and having received wisdom in a dream (for the waking reality was reserved for him who says: 'Behold, something greater than Solomon is here'), came to be in the deepest peace, so that at that time each man rested under his own vine and under his own fig tree; and being, by the peace of his times, named accordingly (for 'Solomon' is interpreted 'peaceable'), on account of that peace he had leisure to build the celebrated temple for God. And likewise in the days of Ezra, when truth prevails over wine and over the hostile king and over women, the temple is rebuilt for God.
These things have been said by us in our defense to you, holy Ambrose, since, wishing to build the evangelical tower in writing according to your holy exhortation, we sat down and reckoned the cost, whether we had the means for its completion, lest we be mocked by those who observe us, being condemned as men who lay a foundation but are unable to finish the work.
But upon reckoning, we found that the means ready at hand for us for the completion of the building were not sufficient; yet we have trusted in God, who enriches in all speech and all knowledge, that as we strive to keep the spiritual laws ourselves, he will enrich us, and that, advancing in the building from the supplies furnished by him, we shall reach even the parapet of the building -- which prevents him who has gone up onto the roof of the word from falling -- since it is only those deprived of the parapet who fall, those who fall on account of the incompleteness of the buildings, this incompleteness becoming the cause of deaths and of falls for those who happen to be upon it.
And up to the fifth tome, even though the storm in Alexandria seemed to be working against us, we dictated what was given, as Jesus rebuked the winds and the waves of the sea; and having also advanced some way into the sixth, we were dragged out of the land of Egypt, God having rescued us -- he who led his people out of it.
Then, since the enemy had campaigned most bitterly against us through his new writings -- writings that are truly hostile to the gospel -- and had stirred up against us all the winds of wickedness in Egypt, the Word rather called upon me to stand firm for the contest and to guard my governing faculty, lest wicked reasonings should gain the upper hand and bring a storm into my soul, rather than, out of season, before my mind had received calm, to connect together the sequel of the writing; and my usual shorthand-writers, not being present, also hindered me from keeping to my dictations.
But now, since God, quenching many, has blunted the many fiery darts aimed against us, and our soul, having become accustomed to what has befallen it, forces itself, for the sake of the heavenly word, to bear the plots that have arisen against it more easily -- as though we had laid hold of a certain measure of calm weather, we no longer put it off, but wish to dictate what follows, praying that God, our teacher, resounding within, may be present in the innermost sanctuary of our soul, so that the building of the exposition of the Gospel according to John may reach its completion.
May God be attentive to our prayer, so that the body of the discourse may be able to be joined together, no circumstance any longer intervening that is able to work any interruption whatsoever of the writing. And know that it is out of much eagerness that I make this a second beginning of the sixth tome, because -- I know not how -- what was dictated to us earlier in Alexandria has not been brought to me.
For I thought it better, so that this present time too should not pass by unproductively for me as regards this work, to begin already on what remains, rather than, waiting with no certainty whether what was earlier dictated to us would be found, to lose no small amount of the intervening days. Let this suffice as a sufficient preface; let us now hold fast to the text itself: 'And this is the testimony of John.'
This is the second recorded testimony of John the Baptist concerning Christ, the former one having begun from 'This was he who said, He who comes after me...' and ending at 'the only-begotten God, who is in the bosom of the Father, he has declared him.' But Heracleon does not soundly suppose that 'No one has ever seen God,' and what follows, was spoken -- not by the Baptist, but by the disciple.
For if, according to him too, 'From his fullness we all received, and grace upon grace; because the Law was given through Moses, [but] grace and truth came through Jesus Christ' was spoken by the Baptist, how is it not consistent that the one who had received of the fullness of Christ, and who confessed a second grace in place of a first grace, and that the Law was given through Moses while grace and truth came to be through Jesus Christ, should -- from the things that had come to him out of the fullness -- have understood also how no one has ever seen God, and that the Only-begotten, being in the bosom of the Father, has handed down the explanation to him and to all who have received of the fullness?
For it is not now for the first time that he who is in the bosom of the Father has expounded, as though no one had previously become fit to receive the things which he narrated to the apostles; if indeed, being before Abraham came to be, he teaches us that Abraham exulted to see his day, and came to be in joy. And 'From his fullness we all received,' and 'grace upon grace,' as we have said in what precedes, shows also that the prophets had received the gift from the fullness of Christ, and that they too had received a second grace in place of a former one; for they too, being led by the hand of the Spirit, had already arrived, after what was given in the types, at the vision of the truth.
For this reason it is not all the prophets but many who desired to see what the apostles were seeing. For if there was a difference among the prophets, then those who were perfected and outstanding did not desire to see what the apostles saw -- for they had already beheld these things; but those who did not, like these, arrive at the height of the Word came to be in longing for the things known to the apostles through Christ. For we have understood 'to see' as not spoken bodily, and we have perceived 'to hear' as declared spiritually, only he who has acquired ears being prepared to hear the words of Jesus -- which does not happen all at once.
And further, concerning the fact that the holy ones before the bodily sojourn of Jesus had understood the mysteries of the divinity to a greater degree than most of those who believe [now] -- the Word of God teaching them even before he became flesh (for he was always at work, being an imitator of the Father, concerning whom he says: 'My Father works until now') -- it is possible to reason further also from the following words:
He says somewhere to the Sadducees, who disbelieved the doctrine concerning the resurrection: 'Have you not read what was spoken to you by God at the bush: I am the God of Abraham and the God of Isaac and the God of Jacob? Now he is not God of the dead but of the living.' If then God is not ashamed to be called the God of these men, and they are numbered by Christ among the living, and all who believe are sons of Abraham, since in faithful Abraham all the nations are blessed -- he having been established by God as the father of the nations -- do we hesitate to accept that the living [patriarchs] knew the lessons of the living, having been taught by Christ, who came to be before the Morning Star, before he became flesh?
And for this reason they were living, since they had a share in him who said, 'I am the life'; and, as heirs of such great promises, they had room to receive the manifestation not only of angels but also of God in Christ; and perhaps, seeing the image of the invisible God -- since he who has seen the Son has seen the Father -- they are recorded as having, in that they had come to know God and had heard the words of God in a manner befitting God, seen God and heard him.
But I think that those who are perfectly and genuinely sons of Abraham are sons of his deeds, spiritually understood, and of the knowledge that was manifested to him -- the things known and done by him coming to be present in those who are reckoned as sons of the patriarch, according to which he teaches those who have ears, saying: 'If you are children of Abraham, do the works of Abraham.'
And if 'the wise man will understand the things from his own mouth, and on his lips he will carry discernment,' it is necessary either rashly to declare, concerning the prophets, that they were not wise, if they did not understand the things from their own mouth, or, accepting the reverent and true position, that the prophets were wise, to confess that they themselves understood the things from their own mouth and carried discernment upon their lips.
And it is clear that Moses saw with his mind the truth of the law and the allegories, according to the anagogical sense, of the histories recorded by him; and Joshua understood the true inheritance that came to be after the destruction of the twenty-nine kings, being able, more than we, to discern of what true realities the things accomplished through him were but shadows.
And it is clear that Isaiah too saw the mystery of him who sits upon the throne, and of the two Seraphim and their wings, and of the altar and the tongs, and of the covering of the face and the feet that was done by the Seraphim; and Ezekiel saw the mystery of the Cherubim and their movement, and the firmament above them, and him who sits enthroned upon it. And what could be more glorious and more exalted than these?
And so that I may not, by speaking of each instance one by one, extend the discourse to great length in wishing to establish that those who were perfected in the former generations knew no less than the things revealed to the apostles by Christ, since it was he who revealed to them, who also taught the apostles the unspeakable mysteries of piety -- having added yet a few more things, I will leave it to those who read to judge and to consider concerning these matters what they wish.
For Paul says in the Epistle to the Romans: 'Now to him who is able to establish you according to my gospel, according to the revelation of the mystery kept silent for eternal ages, but now made manifest both through the prophetic writings and through the appearing of our Lord Jesus Christ.' For if, through the prophetic writings, the mystery that was formerly kept silent has been made manifest to the apostles, and the prophets understood the things from their own mouth, inasmuch as they were wise, then the prophets knew the things that have been made manifest to the apostles.
But since it was not revealed to the many, Paul says for this reason: 'To other generations it was not made known to the sons of men, as it has now been revealed to his holy apostles and prophets in the Spirit, that the Gentiles are fellow-heirs and fellow-members of the body.' Now observe (even if it is possible, in this way, that an objection may be raised in reply by those who do not accept this reasoning, to understand this word 'that which is being revealed' in that manner) whether perhaps it is possible to see 'being revealed' in two ways: in one way, when it is merely understood; in another way, if this is something being prophesied, so that it comes to pass and is fulfilled -- for then it is revealed, when it is accomplished in being fulfilled.
As for the fact, then, that the Gentiles are fellow-heirs and fellow-members and fellow-partakers of the promise in Christ: as far as concerns the knowledge that the Gentiles were to become fellow-heirs and fellow-members and fellow-partakers, and when they were to become so, and for what reason, and what sort of beings they were, and how, being strangers to the covenants and alien to the promise, they would afterward become fellow-members and fellow-partakers -- of this the prophets had knowledge, since it had been revealed to them.
But it is not revealed to those who understand, yet do not see the things prophesied being accomplished, in the same way as to those who behold with their eyes the outcome of these things -- which is what happened in the case of the apostles. For thus, as I think, they understood the matters no more than the fathers and prophets did; but this is true concerning them: that 'which was not revealed to other generations, as it has now [been revealed] to the apostles and prophets' -- namely, that the Gentiles are fellow-heirs and fellow-members and fellow-partakers of the promise in Christ -- is true in the sense that, in addition to their understanding the mysteries, they also perceived the clear evidence through the matter being accomplished.
Now the saying, 'Many prophets and righteous men desired to see what you see, and did not see it, and to hear what you hear, and did not hear it,' can also bear a similar account -- as though they too had desired to see the mystery of the incarnation of the Son of God being dispensed, and his descent, for the sake of the dispensation of salvation to the many, unto his passion. As an example, we may take also another such case: suppose one of the apostles, understanding the unspeakable words which it is not lawful for a man to utter, yet not going to see the second, glorious, bodily coming of Jesus proclaimed among believers, should desire to see it; and suppose another, who not only has not attained the same accuracy and understanding as the apostle, but who, clinging to the divine hope much less than he, comes to grasp something of the second coming of our Savior -- a coming which the apostle, following the example, may indeed have desired, but not yet have beheld.
Indeed we shall not speak falsely in saying that these two, whom the apostle - or even the apostles - desired to see, have seen [it]; and it is not at all necessary because of this to call them more understanding or more blessed than the apostles. Just so, neither must we say that the apostles were wiser than the fathers or than Moses and the prophets, and especially than those who were deemed worthy of still greater manifestations and divine appearances and revelations of great mysteries on account of their virtue.
But we have spent still more time examining these matters, because, under the illusion of glorifying the coming of Christ by claiming that the apostles were far wiser than the fathers and the prophets, some have even fabricated another, greater god, while others, not daring to go so far, insofar as their own reasoning allows, because of the untested character of their doctrines, defraud the fathers and prophets of the gift given to them by God through Christ, through whom all things came into being; and if all things, it is clear that also the good things revealed to them, and the deeds and holy symbols of the mysteries of piety, came through him.
But since the noble soldiers of Christ must fortify themselves on every side on behalf of the truth, nowhere allowing, as far as possible, an opening to be made for the plausibility that comes from falsehood, come, let us examine these matters too.
For perhaps they will say that the first testimony of John concerning Christ is: 'He who comes after me has come to be before me, because he was before me.' And that the words 'For from his fullness we have all received, and grace upon grace' and what follows were spoken from the person of the disciple [i.e. the Evangelist, not the Baptist].
But it is necessary also to refute this as a forced and inconsequential interpretation; for it is altogether violent to suppose that the discourse of the Baptist is suddenly and, as it were, untimely interrupted by the discourse of the disciple, and to anyone who knows how to attend even in some measure to the connection of what is said, the coherence of the wording is clear - that it was he who said: 'He who comes after me has come to be before me, because he was before me.'
The Baptist teaches how Jesus came to be before him, namely by his being first in rank - since he is 'firstborn of all creation' - through the statement: 'For from his fullness we have all received.' 'For on this account,' he says, 'he has come to be before me, because he was first before me. And by this I understand him to be first before me and more honored with the Father, since from his fullness both I and the prophets before me have received the more divine and greater and prophetic grace, in place of the grace that was accepted from him according to our own choice.'
And for this reason too he has come to be before me, because he was first before me - since we have understood, having received from his fullness, that the Law was given through Moses, not by Moses, and that the truth through Jesus Christ was not only given but also came into being; for it was God, his Father, who gave the Law through Moses, [and who made grace and truth through Jesus Christ,] and who made grace and truth that reached mankind through Jesus Christ.
For if we hear more discerningly the saying that declares, 'Grace and truth came to be through Jesus Christ,' we shall not be troubled as though this statement stood in contradiction to that other utterance, 'I am the way and the truth and the life.' For if it is Jesus who says, 'I am the truth,' how does the truth come to be through Jesus Christ? For no one comes to be through himself.
But it must be understood that the self-subsisting Truth itself, essential and, so to speak, the archetype of the truth that is in rational souls - from which truth, as it were, images of that Truth have been impressed upon those who are minded toward the truth - did not come to be through Jesus Christ, nor at all through anyone, but was begotten by God; just as also the Word who was in the beginning with God came to be not through anyone, and the Wisdom, which God created as the beginning of his ways, came to be not through anyone - so also the Truth came to be not through anyone.
But the truth that is among men came to be through Jesus Christ; for instance, the truth in Paul and in the apostles came to be through Jesus Christ. And it is not to be wondered at that, though truth is one, we should speak of many truths as having flowed forth, as it were, from that one. At any rate the prophet David knows this, speaking of many truths: 'The Lord seeks out truths' - for the Father of truth does not seek out the one truth, but the many, through which those who possess them are saved.
We find something similar said concerning righteousness and righteousnesses to what was said concerning truth and truths. For the self-subsisting, essential Righteousness is Christ: 'who became for us wisdom from God, and righteousness and sanctification and redemption.' From that Righteousness the righteousness in each individual is imprinted, so that many righteousnesses come to be among those who are being saved; wherefore also it is written: 'For the Lord is righteous, and he has loved righteous deeds' - for so we have found it in the accurate copies, and in the other editions besides the Seventy, and in the Hebrew.
Consider whether the other things likewise, as many as are said to be Christ in the singular, can in the same proportion also be named in the plural when multiplied - for instance, Christ is our life, as the Savior himself says, 'I am the way and the truth and the life'; and the apostle says, 'When Christ, who is your life, is manifested, then you also will be manifested with him'; and again it is written in the Psalms: 'Your mercy is better than lives' - for on account of the Christ who is in each individual as life, the lives are multiplied.
Perhaps we must likewise inquire into the saying, 'Since you seek proof of the Christ who speaks in me?' For it is as though Christ is found in each individual saint, and through the one Christ there come to be many christs, who are imitators of him and are formed according to him, who is the image of God; whence God also says through the prophet: 'Touch not my christs.' What we thought we had passed over, then, while expounding 'Grace and truth came to be through Jesus Christ,' this we have now unfolded as it occurred to us; and at the same time we have shown that it is still the voice of John the Baptist that, even through these words, bears witness to the Son of God.
Let us now, then, examine the second testimony of John. Since the Baptist was of priestly lineage, the Jews from Jerusalem, as being his kinsmen, send priests and Levites to inquire who John might be. Now he, by saying 'I am not the Christ,' has by this very statement made a confession of the truth, and has not, as one might suppose, 'denied' by saying 'I am not the Christ'; for it is not a denial to speak for the glory of Christ by saying that one is not himself the Christ.
Once the priests and Levites sent from Jerusalem had heard that he was not the expected Christ, they inquire concerning the second honored name hoped for among them, Elijah, whether he might be that one. He says that he is not Elijah, again confessing the truth by 'I am not.'
But since, although many prophets arose in Israel, one particular prophet, the one prophesied by Moses, was especially expected, according to the saying that declares: 'The Lord your God will raise up for you a prophet from among your brothers, like me; him you shall hear. And every soul that does not hear that prophet shall be utterly destroyed from among his people' - they ask a third question, not whether he is a prophet, but whether he is THE prophet.
And since they did not apply this name to Christ, but supposed that he was someone other than the Christ, he - knowing that the one whose forerunner he is, is both the Christ and this prophet who was prophesied - says, 'No'; whereas perhaps he would have answered 'Yes,' had they asked without the article; for, being himself a prophet, he was not ignorant of this.
And in all these answers the second testimony of John is not yet complete, until, to those who were asking for an answer to report to those who sent them, he proclaimed it from the prophetic voice, that of Isaiah, which runs thus: 'A voice crying in the wilderness, make straight the way of the Lord.'
It is worth inquiring whether the second testimony is complete, and a third occurs directed to those sent from the Pharisees, who wish to learn why on earth he baptizes, since he is neither the Christ nor Elijah nor the prophet - namely in the words 'I baptize with water; but among you stands one whom you do not know, he who comes after me, of whom I am not worthy to loose the strap of his sandal' - or whether this too, the report given to the Pharisees, is still a part of the second testimony.
But as far as I am able to conjecture from the wording, I would say that the discourse to those sent from the Pharisees is a third testimony. It should be observed, however, that the first testimony sets forth the divine character of the Savior, the second removes the suspicion of those who doubted whether John might be the Christ, while the third proclaims that he who is invisibly present to men is one who will come very shortly.
But before examining the subsequent testimonies, according to which he is testified to by being pointed out, let us look at each expression of the second and third testimonies, first observing this - that two delegations come to the Baptist: one from Jerusalem, the Jews sending priests and Levites to ask him, 'Who are you?'; the other from the Pharisees sending men who raise further questions about the answer already given to the priests and Levites.
Observe, then, how, in keeping with the priestly and Levitical character, the questions are put with gentleness and a love of learning: 'Who are you?' and 'What then? Are you Elijah?' and 'Are you then the prophet?' and further, 'Who are you, that we may give an answer to those who sent us? What do you say about yourself?' For there is nothing arrogant or brash in their questioning, but everything befitting exact servants of God.
But those sent from the Pharisees, without troubling themselves at all over what had been said by the Levites and priests, address to the Baptist, as it were, insolent and rather foolish words in the question, 'Why then do you baptize, if you are not the Christ, nor Elijah, nor the prophet?' - practically not wishing to learn, as the aforementioned priests and Levites had sent to do, but rather wishing to prevent him from baptizing, perhaps supposing that baptizing was the work of no one other than the Christ or Elijah or the prophet.
And everywhere the one who would engage the Scripture accurately must exercise diligence, since it is necessary to observe by whom and when the things said are said, so that we may find that throughout the whole of the holy books the words have been fittingly assigned to the persons speaking them. - 'Then the Jews sent from Jerusalem priests and Levites, that they might ask him, Who are you? And he confessed and did not deny, and he confessed, I am not the Christ.'
And who ought the elders to have been who were sent to John by the Jews, and from where, other than those judged, according to the election of God, to be distinguished, from that place, Jerusalem, chosen out of all the so-called good land, where the temple of God was? They inquire of John, then, with so great an honor; but concerning Christ nothing of this sort is recorded as having been done by the Jews. Rather, what the Jews do toward John, this John does toward Christ, inquiring through his own disciples: 'Are you the one who is to come, or should we look for another?'
And John, having confessed to those who had come and not having denied, afterward declares, 'I am a voice crying in the wilderness'; but Christ makes his answer as one who has, in word and deed, a testimony greater than John's, saying: 'Go and report to John what you see and hear: the blind receive their sight, the lame walk, lepers are cleansed, the deaf hear, the poor have good news preached to them.' Concerning these things, God granting it, we shall treat more opportunely in their own proper places.
Perhaps, then, one might not unreasonably raise the question why, when the priests and Levites inquired of John not whether he himself was the Christ, but 'Who are you?', the Baptist answers not what would have been fitting to the question 'Who are you?' - namely 'I am a voice crying in the wilderness' - but rather what would properly have been said had they asked, 'Are you the Christ?' For 'I am not the Christ' would have suited the question 'Are you the Christ?', while 'I am a voice crying in the wilderness' would have suited the question 'Who are you?'
It must be said, in reply to this, that, as is likely, he perceived from their inquiry the reverence of the priests and Levites, who were suggesting a suspicion, an opinion, that perhaps the one baptizing might be the Christ, but were on guard against naming this too openly, so as not to seem presumptuous. Hence, reasonably, in order that every false suspicion of theirs about himself might first be removed, and then the truth might in this way be set forth, he declares first of all, before anything else, that he is not the Christ.
That they had suspected something of this sort is shown by the second question and further by the third. For since they supposed him to be Elijah, who was hoped for as second in honor and esteemed by them next after the Christ, once John had declared that he was not the Christ, they asked: