Chapter XXIII.—More Passages from the Same Gospel in Proof of the Same Portion of the Catholic Faith. Praxeas’ Taunt of Worshipping Two Gods Repudiated.

Again, when Martha in a later passage acknowledged Him to be the Son of God,303    John xi. 27. she no more made a mistake than Peter304    Matt. xvi. 16. and Nathanæl305    John i. 49. had; and yet, even if she had made a mistake, she would at once have learnt the truth: for, behold, when about to raise her brother from the dead, the Lord looked up to heaven, and, addressing the Father, said—as the Son, of course:  “Father, I thank Thee that Thou always hearest me; it is because of these crowds that are standing by that I have spoken to Thee, that they may believe that Thou hast sent me.”306    John xi. 41, 42. But in the trouble of His soul, (on a later occasion,) He said: “What shall I say? Father, save me from this hour: but for this cause is it that I am come to this hour; only, O Father, do Thou glorify Thy name”307    John xii. 27, 28.—in which He spake as the Son. (At another time) He said: “I am come in my Father’s name.”308    John v. 43. Accordingly, the Son’s voice was indeed alone sufficient, (when addressed) to the Father.  But, behold, with an abundance (of evidence)309    Or, “by way of excess.” the Father from heaven replies, for the purpose of testifying to the Son: “This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased; hear ye Him.”310    Matt. xvii. 5. So, again, in that asseveration, “I have both glorified, and will glorify again,”311    John xii. 28. how many Persons do you discover, obstinate Praxeas? Are there not as many as there are voices? You have the Son on earth, you have the Father in heaven. Now this is not a separation; it is nothing but the divine dispensation. We know, however, that God is in the bottomless depths, and exists everywhere; but then it is by power and authority. We are also sure that the Son, being indivisible from Him, is everywhere with Him.  Nevertheless, in the Economy or Dispensation itself, the Father willed that the Son should be regarded312    Or, held (haberi). as on earth, and Himself in heaven; whither the Son also Himself looked up, and prayed, and made supplication of the Father; whither also He taught us to raise ourselves, and pray, “Our Father which art in heaven,” etc.,313    Matt. vi. 9.—although, indeed, He is everywhere present. This heaven the Father willed to be His own throne; while He made the Son to be “a little lower than the angels,”314    Ps. viii. 5. by sending Him down to the earth, but meaning at the same time to “crown Him with glory and honour,”315    Same ver. even by taking Him back to heaven. This He now made good to Him when He said: “I have both glorified Thee, and will glorify Thee again.” The Son offers His request from earth, the Father gives His promise from heaven.  Why, then, do you make liars of both the Father and the Son? If either the Father spake from heaven to the Son when He Himself was the Son on earth, or the Son prayed to the Father when He was Himself the Son in heaven, how happens it that the Son made a request of His own very self, by asking it of the Father, since the Son was the Father? Or, on the other hand, how is it that the Father made a promise to Himself, by making it to the Son, since the Father was the Son? Were we even to maintain that they are two separate gods, as you are so fond of throwing out against us, it would be a more tolerable assertion than the maintenance of so versatile and changeful a God as yours!  Therefore it was that in the passage before us the Lord declared to the people present: “Not on my own account has this voice addressed me, but for your sakes,”316    John xii. 30. that these likewise may believe both in the Father and in the Son, severally, in their own names and persons and positions.  “Then again, Jesus exclaims, and says, He that believeth on me, believeth not on me, but on Him that sent me;”317    John xii. 44. because it is through the Son that men believe in the Father, while the Father also is the authority whence springs belief in the Son. “And he that seeth me, seeth Him that sent me.”318    Ver. 45. How so?  Even because, (as He afterwards declares,) “I have not spoken from myself, but the Father which sent me: He hath given me a commandment what I should say, and what I should speak.”319    John xii. 49. For “the Lord God hath given me the tongue of the learned, that I should know when I ought to speak”320    Isa. l. 4. the word which I actually speak. “Even as the Father hath said unto me, so do I speak.”321    John xii. 50. Now, in what way these things were said to Him, the evangelist and beloved disciple John knew better than Praxeas; and therefore he adds concerning his own meaning:  “Now before the feast of the passover, Jesus knew that the Father had given all things into His hands, and that He had come from God, and was going to God.”322    John xiii. 1, 3. Praxeas, however, would have it that it was the Father who proceeded forth from Himself, and had returned to Himself; so that what the devil put into the heart of Judas was the betrayal, not of the Son, but of the Father Himself. But for the matter of that, things have not turned out well either for the devil or the heretic; because, even in the Son’s case, the treason which the devil wrought against Him contributed nothing to his advantage. It was, then, the Son of God, who was in the Son of man, that was betrayed, as the Scripture says afterwards: “Now is the Son of man glorified, and God is glorified in Him.”323    Ver. 31. Who is here meant by “God?” Certainly not the Father, but the Word of the Father, who was in the Son of man—that is in the flesh, in which Jesus had been already glorified by the divine power and word. “And God,” says He, “shall also glorify Him in Himself;”324    Ver. 32. that is to say, the Father shall glorify the Son, because He has Him within Himself; and even though prostrated to the earth, and put to death, He would soon glorify Him by His resurrection, and making Him conqueror over death.

CAPUT XXIII.

Post haec autem Martha Filium Dei eum confessa, non magis erravit, quam Petrus (Matth. XVI, 16) et Nathanael; quanquam etsi errasset, statim didicisset. Ecce enim, ad suscitandum fratrem ejus a mortuis, ad coelum et ad Patrem Dominus suspiciens: Pater, inquit (Joan. XI, 42) [utique Filius], gratias ago tibi, quod me semper exaudias. Propter istas turbas circumstantes dixi, ut credant quod tu me miseris. Sed et in conturbatione animae: Et quid dicam? Pater, salvum me fac de ista hora. Atquin propter hoc veni in istam horam. Verum, Pater, glorifica nomen 0184C tuum (Joan. XII, 27). In quo erat et Filius. Ego, inquit, (Joan. V, 43), veni in Patris nomine. Inde scilicet suffecerat Filii ad Patrem vox. Ecce ex abundantia respondet de coelo Pater, Filio contestatur (Matth. XVII, 5): Hic est Filius meus dilectus, in quo bene sensi, audite illum. Ita et in isto, Glorificavi, et glorificabo rursus , quot personae tibi videntur, perversissime Praxea, nisi quot et voces? habes Filium in terris, habes Patrem in coelis. Non est separatio ista, sed dispositio divina. Caeterum, scimus Deum etiam intra abyssos esse, et ubique consistere, sed vi et potestate. Filium quoque, ut individuum, cum ipso ubique. Tamen in ipsa oeconomia, Pater voluit Filium in terris haberi, se vero in coelis; quo et ipse Filius suspiciens, et orabat et postulabat a Patre, 0184D quo et nos erectos docebat orare: Pater noster qui es in coelis (Matth. VI, 19), et cum sit et ubique, hanc sedem suam voluit Pater; minoravit 0185A Filium modico citra angelos (Ps. VIII, 6), ad terram demittendo; gloria tamen et honore coronaturus illum, in coelos resumendo. Haec jam praestabat illi, dicens, Et glorificavi, et glorificabo. Postulat Filius de terris, Pater promittit a coelis. Quid mendacem facis et Patrem et Filium, si aut Pater de coelis loquebatur ad Filium, cum ipse esset Filius apud terras; aut Filius ad Patrem precabatur, cum ipse esset Pater apud coelos? Quale est ut Filius item postularet a semetipso, postulando a Patre, si Filius erat Pater; aut iterum Pater sibi ipsi promitteret, promittendo Filio, si Pater erat? ut sic duos divisos diceremus, quomodo jactitatis, tolerabilius erat duos divisos, quam unum Deum versipellem praedicare. Itaque ad istos tunc Dominus pronuntiavit 0185B (Joan. XII, 30): Non propter me ista vox venit, sed propter vos; ut credant hi, et Patrem et Filium, in suis quemque nominibus, et personis, et locis. Sed adhuc exclamat Jesus et dicit: Qui credit in me, non in me credit; sed in eum credit qui me misit (quia per Filium in Patrem creditur, et auctoritas credendi Filio, Pater est); et qui conspicit me , conspicit eum qui me misit. Quomodo? Quoniam scilicet a memetipso non sum locutus; sed qui me misit Pater, ipse mihi mandatum dedit quid dicam, et quid loquar, Dominus enim dat mihi linguam disciplinae, ad cognoscendum quando oporteat dicere sermonem quem ego loquor (Is. IV, 4). Sicut mihi Pater dixit, ita et loquor (Joan. XII, 50). Haec quomodo dicta sint, Evangelizator et utique tam clarus discipulus Joannes 0185C magis, quam Praxeas, noverat ; ideoque ipse de suo sensu: Ante autem solemnitatem Paschae , inquit (Joan. XIII, 1), sciens Jesus omnia sibi tradita a Patre esse, et se ex Deo exiisse , ad Deum vadere. Sed Praxeas ipsum vult Patrem de semetipso exiisse, et ad semetipsum abiisse, ut diabolus in cor Judae, non Filii traditionem, sed Patris ipsius immiserit. Nec diabolo bene, nec haeretico; quia nec in Filio bono suo diabolus operatus est traditionem. Filius enim traditus est Dei, qui erat in filio hominis, sicut Scriptura subjungit: Nunc glorificatus est filius hominis, et Deus glorificatus est in illo. Quid 0186A Deus? utique non Pater, sed Sermo Patris, qui erat in filio hominis, id est in carne, in qua et glorificatus jam; virtute vero et sermone, et ante Jesum : Et Deus, inquit, glorificavit illum in semetipso, id est, Pater Filium in semetipso habens, etsi porrectum ad terram, mox per resurrectionem glorificavit , morte devicta.