St John Chapter iv : Verses 44-54
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| Jesus saith to him: Go thy way; thy son liveth. J-J Tissot. Brooklyn Museum. |
45 And when he was come into Galilee, the Galileans received him, having seen all the things he had done at Jerusalem on the festival day; for they also went to the festival day.
46 He came again therefore into Cana of Galilee, where he made the water wine. And there was a certain ruler, whose son was sick at Capharnaum.
47 He having heard that Jesus was come from Judea into Galilee, went to him, and prayed him to come down, and heal his son; for he was at the point of death.
48 Jesus therefore said to him: Unless you see signs and wonders, you believe not.
49 The ruler saith to him: Lord, come down before that my son die.
50 Jesus saith to him: Go thy way; thy son liveth. The man believed the word which Jesus said to him, and went his way.
51 And as he was going down, his servants met him; and they brought word, saying, that his son lived.
52 He asked therefore of them the hour wherein he grew better. And they said to him: Yesterday, at the seventh hour, the fever left him.
53 The father therefore knew, that it was at the same hour that Jesus said to him, Thy son liveth; and himself believed, and his whole house.
54 This is again the second miracle that Jesus did, when he was come out of Judea into Galilee.
44 αὐτὸς ⸀γὰρ Ἰησοῦς ἐμαρτύρησεν ὅτι προφήτης ἐν τῇ ἰδίᾳ πατρίδι τιμὴν οὐκ ἔχει.
44 Ipse enim Jesus testimonium perhibuit, quia propheta in sua patria honorem non habet.
45 ὅτε οὖν ἦλθεν εἰς τὴν Γαλιλαίαν, ἐδέξαντο αὐτὸν οἱ Γαλιλαῖοι, πάντα ἑωρακότες ⸀ὅσα ἐποίησεν ἐν Ἱεροσολύμοις ἐν τῇ ἑορτῇ, καὶ αὐτοὶ γὰρ ἦλθον εἰς τὴν ἑορτήν.
45 Cum ergo venisset in Galilaeam, exceperunt eum Galilaei, cum omnia vidissent quae fecerat Jerosolymis in die festo : et ipsi enim venerant ad diem festum.
46 Ἦλθεν οὖν ⸀πάλιν εἰς τὴν Κανὰ τῆς Γαλιλαίας, ὅπου ἐποίησεν τὸ ὕδωρ οἶνον. καὶ ἦν τις βασιλικὸς οὗ ὁ υἱὸς ἠσθένει ἐν Καφαρναούμ.
46 Venit ergo iterum in Cana Galilaeae, ubi fecit aquam vinum. Et erat quidam regulus, cujus filius infirmabatur Capharnaum.
47 οὗτος ἀκούσας ὅτι Ἰησοῦς ἥκει ἐκ τῆς Ἰουδαίας εἰς τὴν Γαλιλαίαν ἀπῆλθεν πρὸς αὐτὸν καὶ ⸀ἠρώτα ἵνα καταβῇ καὶ ἰάσηται αὐτοῦ τὸν υἱόν, ἤμελλεν γὰρ ἀποθνῄσκειν.
47 Hic cum audisset quia Jesus adveniret a Judaea in Galilaeam, abiit ad eum, et rogabat eum ut descenderet, et sanaret filium ejus : incipiebat enim mori.
48 εἶπεν οὖν ὁ Ἰησοῦς πρὸς αὐτόν· Ἐὰν μὴ σημεῖα καὶ τέρατα ἴδητε, οὐ μὴ πιστεύσητε.
48 Dixit ergo Jesus ad eum : Nisi signa et prodigia videritis, non creditis.
49 λέγει πρὸς αὐτὸν ὁ βασιλικός· Κύριε, κατάβηθι πρὶν ἀποθανεῖν τὸ παιδίον μου.
49 Dicit ad eum regulus : Domine, descende priusquam moriatur filius meus.
50 λέγει αὐτῷ ὁ Ἰησοῦς· Πορεύου· ὁ υἱός σου ζῇ. ⸀ἐπίστευσεν ὁ ἄνθρωπος τῷ λόγῳ ⸀ὃν εἶπεν αὐτῷ ὁ Ἰησοῦς καὶ ἐπορεύετο.
50 Dicit ei Jesus : Vade, filius tuus vivit. Credidit homo sermoni quem dixit ei Jesus, et ibat.
51 ἤδη δὲ αὐτοῦ καταβαίνοντος οἱ δοῦλοι αὐτοῦ ⸀ὑπήντησαν ⸀αὐτῷ λέγοντες ὅτι ὁ παῖς ⸀αὐτοῦ ζῇ.
51 Jam autem eo descendente, servi occurrerunt ei, et nuntiaverunt dicentes, quia filius ejus viveret.
52 ἐπύθετο οὖν ⸂τὴν ὥραν παρ’ αὐτῶν⸃ ἐν ᾗ κομψότερον ἔσχεν· ⸂εἶπαν οὖν⸃ αὐτῷ ὅτι ⸀Ἐχθὲς ὥραν ἑβδόμην ἀφῆκεν αὐτὸν ὁ πυρετός.
52 Interrogabat ergo horam ab eis in qua melius habuerit. Et dixerunt ei : Quia heri hora septima reliquit eum febris.
53 ἔγνω οὖν ὁ πατὴρ ⸀ὅτι ἐκείνῃ τῇ ὥρᾳ ἐν ᾗ εἶπεν αὐτῷ ὁ ⸀Ἰησοῦς· Ὁ υἱός σου ζῇ, καὶ ἐπίστευσεν αὐτὸς καὶ ἡ οἰκία αὐτοῦ ὅλη.
53 Cognovit ergo pater, quia illa hora erat in qua dixit ei Jesus : Filius tuus vivit; et credidit ipse et domus ejus tota.
54 τοῦτο ⸀δὲ πάλιν δεύτερον σημεῖον ἐποίησεν ὁ Ἰησοῦς ἐλθὼν ἐκ τῆς Ἰουδαίας εἰς τὴν Γαλιλαίαν.
Scripture quotations marked SBLGNT
54 Hoc iterum secundum signum fecit Jesus, cum venisset a Judaea in Galilaeam.
Annotations
44. For Jesus himself gave testimony that a prophet hath no honour in his own country. The word for expresses the reason why Jesus left Nazareth, His own city, and went into the other parts of Galilee, because the Nazarenes despised Him as their fellow-citizen, and the son of an artisan.
45. And when he was come into Galilee, the Galileans received him, having seen all the things he had done at Jerusalem on the festival day; for they also went to the festival day. All the miracles, especially that He alone had cast out all the buyers and sellers from the Temple, as well as the many other signs that He had shown.
Observe: The Jews, after the many miracles of Christ which they saw, did not believe in His preaching, nor even receive Him. The Galileans, who also saw many miracles, received Him kindly but did not believe in Him. But the Samaritans, although they saw no miracles, received Him, and believed Him to be the Messiah, sent by God for the salvation of the whole world. So those who are without, often receive what those of the household disdain and despise.
46. He came again therefore into Cana of Galilee, where he made the water wine. And there was a certain ruler, whose son was sick at Capharnaum.
a certain ruler. The Latin translator seems to have had in his Greek copies βασιλισκος, i.e., regulus, a little king. The present reading is βασιλικος, i.e., royal, understand counsellor, or public minister, of Herod Antipas; a prefect, or intimate friend of his. The Syriac has, a royal servant: S. Chrysostom says, “because he was of the royal race, or discharged some princely function.” Nonnus says, “he was a courtier, who was over the army.” Origen says, “he was perhaps of the family of Tiberius Cæsar, employed by him in some office of Judea.”
Capharnaum: it is probable that this nobleman’s son lay ill at Capharnaum, because it was his father’s usual place of abode. And his father, hearing that Jesus, who healed so many sick, was come out of Judea into Cana of Galilee, went thither, to ask of Jesus the healing of his son; as is plain from what follows. The nobleman seems to have been a Jew, not a Gentile, as both S. Jerome and Origen think. We may think so, because he had little faith, and for that reason was reproved by Christ; whereas the Gentiles were prompt to believe, and so were praised by Him, as was the case with the centurion, and the woman of Canaan.
Some, as Irenæus, think that this nobleman was the same person as the centurion mentioned in Matthew viii. But they were different persons. For the centurion, when Christ was willing to go to him, asked him to remain where he was. But this nobleman asks Christ to come to his sick son. The former came to Christ as He was descending from the mountain to Capharnaum. The nobleman comes to Jesus as He is going into Cana. The boy of the former was sick with palsy; this one’s child was ill with a fever. Christ was all but present when He healed the former this He healed being absent. The one was a servant, the other a son. So S. Chrysostom, Theophylact, and others.
47. He having heard that Jesus was come from Judea into Galilee, went to him, and prayed him to come down, and heal his son; for he was at the point of death. The nobleman having heard the fame of Christ, that He healed all sick persons whatsoever, proceeded from Capharnaum to Cana, to ask Jesus, who was staying there, to come back with him to Capharnaum, to heal his son. This was a journey of fourteen hours, or leagues, and therefore long and difficult. Wherefore he had little faith in Jesus, says S. Gregory, since he did not think He could save unless He were corporeally present.
48. Jesus therefore said to him: Unless you see signs and wonders, you believe not. Signs and prodigies mean nearly the same thing. Signs, however, are properly what take place in natural things, and by nature, slowly operating, but which Christ wrought in a moment, and therefore miraculously. Such are the healing of the sick. But prodigies are things which surpass the whole power of nature, as the raising of the dead.
Christ reproved the small faith of the nobleman, in order that He might sharpen and augment it. As though He said, “Thou and thine hast heard of certain signs and prodigies which I have wrought; still thou believest not that I am the Messiah, unless I do very many more, and that thou thyself mayest behold them with thine eyes.” “He teaches,” says S. Chrysostom, “that it is not His miracles that we are to attend to, but His doctrine. He shows that signs are especially made gracious to the soul; and in this case He heals the father who was labouring under a disease of the mind, no less than the (bodily) disease of the son.” Indeed, He first cures the unbelief, or the imperfection of faith, in the father, and then the fever of the son.
49. The ruler saith to him: Lord, come down before that my son die.
my son, Greek, παιδιον μου, i.e., my little son, meaning, my most beloved, my only delight. “The ruler,” says S. Chrysostom, “being distressed by his son’s affliction, did not pay much attention then to the words of Jesus, but was wholly taken up with the cure. See how he grovels on the earth—Come down, ere my child die—as if Jesus could not raise the dead, or knew not that he had a son.”
50. Jesus saith to him: Go thy way; thy son liveth. The man believed the word which Jesus said to him, and went his way. “This one word,” saith Rupert, “was a true declaration concerning things present, and a command of life.” For this word of Christ was not only declaratory, but effectual: for it produced that which it declared, namely, the life and healing of the sick. So in the Eucharist, the words, This is My Body, enunciate in such manner that the Body of Christ is there, that they cause It to be there present.
Moreover, Christ went to the servant of the centurion: He was not willing to go to the son of the ruler, because there was in the centurion confirmed faith, but in the ruler faith was imperfect.
The man believed the word which Jesus said to him, “The Saviour cured two persons,” says Cyril, “by the same words. He brought the mind of the ruler to believe, and He delivered the youth from bodily disease.”
51. And as he was going down, his servants met him; and they brought word, saying, that his son lived. “His servants met him,” says Cyril, “telling of the swiftness and power of the words of Christ, the Lord so ordering that by the sequence of events the faith of the ruler might be confirmed.”
52. He asked therefore of them the hour wherein he grew better. And they said to him: Yesterday, at the seventh hour, the fever left him. “He studies to be informed concerning the hour,” says Cyril, “to see if it coincides with the time when the Saviour’s favour was bestowed upon him.”
Yesterday, at the seventh hour, the fever left him.: this was an hour after noon, when, the child being healed, the servants had immediately set out to tell the glad news to the father. But they could not reach him on the same day. They travelled therefore the rest of that day, and all through the night, and came to him the next morning, for, as we have said, Capharnaum was fourteen leagues or hours distant from Cana.
53. The father therefore knew, that it was at the same hour that Jesus said to him, Thy son liveth; and himself believed, and his whole house. “From hence we may understand,” says Bede (in Catena), “that there are degrees of faith, as well as of other virtues. There is the beginning, the increase, and the perfection of faith. This man’s faith had its beginning when he asked for his son’s safety: its increase when he believed the word of the Lord saying, Thy son liveth: it was perfected by the announcement of his servants.”
Moreover, because this nobleman dwelt at Capharnaum, as well as the centurion, we need not doubt that they were friends; and that the centurion through this miracle, which was prior in point of time, conceived so great faith in Christ that he said, “Lord, I am not worthy that thou shouldst enter under my roof: but only say the word, and my servant shall be healed.” (Matt. viii. 8).
Tropologically, listen to Theophylact,
“The little king (regulus) is every man, not only because, according to the soul, he is nigh to the King of all, but because he has assumed dominion over all things. The son is a mind fevered with depraved pleasures and desires. The going down of Christ is His merciful condescension. Christ saith, Go thy way, i.e., show continual progress in good things: then thy son shall live. Otherwise he will die, if thou ceasest to walk (aright).”
Finally, he was healed at the seventh hour, 1. because, as Origen says, seven is the symbol of the Sabbath, and of rest, in which is health. 2. Because the same number is the symbol of the sevenfold Holy Spirit, in Whom is all salvation.
54. This is again the second miracle that Jesus did, when he was come out of Judea into Galilee. The word again must be joined with when He was come. Meaning, this was the second miracle which Christ wrought in Cana of Galilee, when again—that is, a second time—He was come thither out of Judea. For the first miracle was the conversion of water into wine, which Christ did, when He came the first time out of Judea into Galilee. He came, therefore, twice out of Judea into Galilee, and illustrated each of His comings by a new miracle. “It is called the second,” says Euthymius, “not because after the first He had done no other miracle in the whole of Palestine (for He had already done many in Judea), but because, after the first, this was (only) the second which He had done in Cana.” John says this, indicating that an abundance of miracles were performed subsequently by Christ in Galilee, which Matthew relates (iv. 23, &c.), and which after this are related by S. John.
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SUB tuum præsidium confugimus, Sancta Dei Genitrix. Nostras deprecationes ne despicias in necessitatibus, sed a periculis cunctis libera nos semper, Virgo gloriosa et benedicta. Amen.
The Vladimirskaya Icon. >12th century.
Totus tuus ego sum
Et omnia mea tua sunt;
Tecum semper tutus sum:
Ad Jesum per Mariam.
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