St John Chapter v : Verses 31-38
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| The Trinity. Andrei Rublev (1410). Cathedral of Christ the Saviour, Moscow. |
31 If I bear witness of myself, my witness is not true.
32 There is another that beareth witness of me; and I know that the witness which he witnesseth of me is true.
33 You sent to John, and he gave testimony to the truth.
34 But I receive not testimony from man: but I say these things, that you may be saved.
35 He was a burning and a shining light: and you were willing for a time to rejoice in his light.
36 But I have a greater testimony than that of John: for the works which the Father hath given me to perfect; the works themselves, which I do, give testimony of me, that the Father hath sent me.
37 And the Father himself who hath sent me, hath given testimony of me: neither have you heard his voice at any time, nor seen his shape.
38 And you have not his word abiding in you: for whom he hath sent, him you believe not.
31 Ἐὰν ἐγὼ μαρτυρῶ περὶ ἐμαυτοῦ, ἡ μαρτυρία μου οὐκ ἔστιν ἀληθής·
31 Si ego testimonium perhibeo de meipso, testimonium meum non est verum.
32 ἄλλος ἐστὶν ὁ μαρτυρῶν περὶ ἐμοῦ, καὶ οἶδα ὅτι ἀληθής ἐστιν ἡ μαρτυρία ἣν μαρτυρεῖ περὶ ἐμοῦ.
32 Alius est qui testimonium perhibet de me : et scio quia verum est testimonium, quod perhibet de me.
33 ὑμεῖς ἀπεστάλκατε πρὸς Ἰωάννην, καὶ μεμαρτύρηκε τῇ ἀληθείᾳ·
33 Vos misistis ad Joannem, et testimonium perhibuit veritati.
34 ἐγὼ δὲ οὐ παρὰ ἀνθρώπου τὴν μαρτυρίαν λαμβάνω, ἀλλὰ ταῦτα λέγω ἵνα ὑμεῖς σωθῆτε.
34 Ego autem non ab homine testimonium accipio : sed haec dico ut vos salvi sitis.
35 ἐκεῖνος ἦν ὁ λύχνος ὁ καιόμενος καὶ φαίνων, ὑμεῖς δὲ ἠθελήσατε ἀγαλλιαθῆναι πρὸς ὥραν ἐν τῷ φωτὶ αὐτοῦ·
35 Ille erat lucerna ardens et lucens : vos autem voluistis ad horam exsultare in luce ejus.
36 ἐγὼ δὲ ἔχω τὴν μαρτυρίαν ⸀μείζω τοῦ Ἰωάννου, τὰ γὰρ ἔργα ἃ ⸀δέδωκέν μοι ὁ πατὴρ ἵνα τελειώσω αὐτά, αὐτὰ τὰ ἔργα ⸀ἃ ποιῶ, μαρτυρεῖ περὶ ἐμοῦ ὅτι ὁ πατήρ με ἀπέσταλκεν,
36 Ego autem habeo testimonium majus Joanne. Opera enim quae dedit mihi Pater ut perficiam ea : ipsa opera, quae ego facio, testimonium perhibent de me, quia Pater misit me :
37 καὶ ὁ πέμψας με πατὴρ ⸀ἐκεῖνος μεμαρτύρηκεν περὶ ἐμοῦ. οὔτε φωνὴν αὐτοῦ ⸂πώποτε ἀκηκόατε⸃ οὔτε εἶδος αὐτοῦ ἑωράκατε,
37 et qui misit me Pater, ipse testimonium perhibuit de me : neque vocem ejus umquam audistis, neque speciem ejus vidistis :
38 καὶ τὸν λόγον αὐτοῦ οὐκ ἔχετε ⸂ἐν ὑμῖν μένοντα⸃, ὅτι ὃν ἀπέστειλεν ἐκεῖνος τούτῳ ὑμεῖς οὐ πιστεύετε.
38 et verbum ejus non habetis in vobis manens : quia quem misit ille, huic vos non creditis.
Annotations
31. If I bear witness of myself, my witness is not true. If I bear witness of Myself, that I am the Son of God, and therefore as man altogether conformed to the judgment and will of God, My witness is not true, that is, legitimate, judicial, worthy of credit. The word true here is not opposed to false, but to untrustworthy, uncertain. It answers to the Hebrew word neeman, faithful, worthy of credit. For it may be that a man may utter most true testimony concerning himself, and yet may fail to gain credit because of a suspicion that he has too great love of himself, as Euthymius says.
There is a prolepsis by which Christ meets a tacit objection of the scribes, to the following effect: “Thou, O Jesus, proclaimest Thyself to be the Son of God, and so in all things to follow the judgment of God. But we will not believe Thee unless Thou shalt prove what Thou sayest by the testimony of God, or of men worthy of credit. This testimony of Thine in a matter which peculiarly concerns Thyself appears to us open to suspicion.” Jesus replies, “I grant you that My testimony concerning Myself is not legitimate, nor worthy of credit, if I alone bear witness of Myself. I grant therefore that you need not believe Me alone; but I am not alone, but others worthy of credit bear witness of Me, as will appear by what follows.” Christ is here speaking of the common opinion of the Jews, not uttering His own sentiments, as appears from chap. viii.13, where the Jews openly object to Christ, Thou bearest testimony of Thyself, Thy testimony is not true. Then Christ answers, My testimony is true, &c., because I am not alone, but I, and the Father who sent Me. So S. Cyril.
32. There is another that beareth witness of me; and I know that the witness which he witnesseth of me is true.
another, viz., God the Father, who at My baptism spoke in thunder from heaven, This is My beloved Son. So S. Cyril, Bede. Again, another, i.e., John the Baptist, testifies to Me. So S. Chrysostom and others. another then here means, there are others who testify that I am the Son of God, namely, God the Father, John the Baptist, Moses and the Prophets, also My Divine works and miracles. For all of these Christ proceeds to adduce as witnesses to prove that He is Messiah, and the Son of God.
and I know that the witness which he witnesseth of me is true. So far as I Myself am concerned, I do not need these witnesses, for by Divine knowledge I know that what they testify is true, that I am the Son of God. But I bring forward their testimony for your sakes, that ye may believe what is attested by so many witnesses.
33. You sent to John, and he gave testimony to the truth. Ye sent messengers to him as a man in your estimation holy, and worthy of all credit, to ask him if he were the Messias. John answered that not he, but I, am the Messias. This testimony he gave not out of friendship, or favour to Me, but to the truth. For that he would testify to nothing but the truth, ye yourselves thought, when ye were willing to receive him as the Messiah. Therefore ye cannot reject his testimony, says Euthymius.
34. But I receive not testimony from man: I do not require the witness of John, for I am God, and the Son of God, to whom John, Moses, and the Prophets ought to yield, and be taught by, and receive authority from.
but I say these things, that you may be saved. meaning, as S. Chrysostom says, “I do not need the testimony of man, for I am God. But since John, whom ye admire as a prophet, is of so great authority with you, when ye do not believe Me working miracles, I bring back to your remembrance his testimony, that I may draw you and save you.”
35. He was a burning and a shining light: and you were willing for a time to rejoice in his light. Greek, ὁ λύχνος, the illustrious and famous lamp. John was not the light itself, shining of itself (for this was what Christ Himself was), but he was the lamp or lantern which, receiving light from Christ, burnt in himself with the knowledge and love of God, and afforded light to others by the example of his sanctity, and the fervour of his preaching. For God sent John after a long silence for ages of all the prophets, as it were a heavenly prophet, to be a lamp to illuminate the dark ignorance of the Jews, and to show them the true Light, Christ the Lord, and to bear a torch before Him. So S. Cyril and others. For the Only Begotten One is Light by nature, who, out of Light, that is, the Substance of the Father, hath shone forth. John indeed was a lamp, because he shone with light derived from Him. He shone through oil, i.e., with the grace of the Holy Spirit, which coming into our souls as it were lamps, nourishes and keeps them. Wherefore the type of John was the lamp of oil burning before God in the Temple in the Holy of Holies. For so did John shine before Christ. Therefore was John the Baptist always a burning and shining lamp in the tabernacle of witness, as Cyril says.
Moraliter, S. Bernard (Serm. de S. Joan Bapt.) teaches that holy men and preachers ought first to burn with charity and zeal in themselves before they shine in preaching to others. “John was a burning and shining lamp. It does not say, shining and burning, because the brightness of John sprang from his fervour, not his fervour from his splendour. For there are some who do not shine because they burn, but rather burn in order that they may shine. But these plainly do not burn with the spirit of charity, but with the love of vanity. Listen to Alcuin on this passage: “John was a lamp, enlightened by light from Christ, burning with faith and love, shining in word and action, who was sent before to confound the enemies of Christ, according to the words, ‘I have prepared a lamp for My Christ, I will clothe His enemies with confusion’ ” (Vulg.)
Such a one was S. Athanasius. Hence S. Gregory Nazianzen (Orat. 21), speaking in his praise, calls him “the eye of the world, the prelate of priests, the leader and master of confessors, a sublime voice, a firm pillar of the faith, next to John the Baptist, a second burning and shining lamp.” He adds, “Athanasius was as an adamant to the persecutors” (by his invincible patience), “a magnet to disputers, to attract them to himself, and to make them be at harmony one with another.” And again, “Let virgins praise him as their betrothed, wives as their director, anchorites as him who wakes them up, monks as their lawgiver, the simple as their guide, those given to speculation as their theologian, the joyous as their moderator, the unfortunate as their consoler, the aged as their staff, youths as their instructor, the poor as a dispenser, the rich as their almoner, the sick as their physician, the whole as the guardian of their health, and, in short, all as he who is made all things to all that he may gain all, or as many as possible.” Such a one was S. Basil, of whom the same Nazianzen says, “The voice of Basil was as thunder, because his life was as lightning.” Because he lightened in his life, therefore did he thunder with his voice.
and you were willing for a time to rejoice in his light. (Vulg.), i.e., for a short time, in his light. When John began to preach with so much sanctity of life and zeal, ye rejoiced because so great a prophet had been sent by God, who, ye trusted, would be your Messiah. But when John began to rebuke your wickedness, and to indicate that I, the poor and lowly One, was the Messiah, ye despised John. Ye would not believe his testimony, because if ye had believed it, ye would have received Me as the Messiah.
36. But I have a greater testimony than that of John: for the works which the Father hath given me to perfect; i.e., than John’s witness; greater in the sense of surer, more efficacious, that I am Messiah, the Son of God. This greater testimony is My works, My miracles which the Father hath given Me, that by them I may show that He hath sent Me. “For one might find fault with John’s testimony, as if it were given out of favour,” says Euthymius; “but the works being free from all suspicion stop the mouths of the contentious,” says S. Chrysostom. “For the works might convince even the insane.”
the works themselves, which I do, give testimony of me, that the Father hath sent me: such as the recent healing of the paralytic. I speak of My supernatural works, which could not be effected by any natural cause, but are peculiar to God alone. Wherefore they are as it were the seal of God, by which He bears testimony to Me, and seals and confirms My doctrine. So S. Chrysostom and others.
From this it follows that the Jews both could and ought to have known of a certainty that Jesus was the Messiah, or the Christ, and the Son of God, by the miracles which He wrought. 1. Because He did them with this end and object, that by them He might prove that He was Christ and God. 2. Because Jesus did all the miracles which the prophets had foretold would be done by Christ. 3. Because although certain of the prophets and holy men had done some miracles, they had done neither so many nor so great as Jesus had done. Again, the prophets had wrought miracles, not by their own power, but through invoking God; but Christ did them by His own power, and His own authority, as being the Lord. Whence it was easy to discern that He was the Messiah and God.
In two special ways therefore the miracles of Jesus prove that He is God. First, by the way in which He wrought them, as I have said; because He employed that most mighty power, peculiar to Himself, in working miracles. Then He reserved some miracles to Himself, which by their very nature prove beyond possibility of doubt that He was God. Of this sort was His birth of a Virgin, His knowing the secrets of the heart, and what was in man, and all things. This last was the reason which the apostles gave for believing that He came forth from God. Of like nature was His foretelling all things which were about to happen in His Passion, death, and resurrection, according to the Scriptures. Also that when He willed He laid down His life upon the cross, and resumed it on the third day; that He ascended into heaven; that He sent the Holy Ghost; lastly, that He transmitted that marvellous power of working miracles to His apostles and seventy-two disciples. This also was peculiar to Christ of which I am about to speak,—the force and the power at all times and in all places, ready and at hand, wholly unrestricted, of working such great, such incredible miracles, and so wholly beyond the power of nature; so full and perfect, so salutary, so true, so sure and glorious, so Divine, and so in accordance with the character of the Son of God; among which stands pre-eminent that salutary and instantaneous power of healing every kind of disease in all who in all places and at all times approached Him for the sake of recovering their health. This absolute power, and ever-abiding virtue, belongs to Christ alone Neither Elijah, nor Eliseus, nor even Moses, nor any angel, had it in the time of the Old Testament; for all these only wrought miracles at intervals, as appears from perusing their histories. Moreover, their miracles are summed up in a definite number; the miracles of Christ were continuous and incessant, and could not be numbered. So S. Augustine and others. Add to all this the results of the death of Christ, the conversion of the whole world by twelve fishermen, the fervour of the faithful in the primitive Church, the unconquerable strength of innumerable martyrs, yea, the exultation in their torments of even boys, virgins, and women. All these things proclaim aloud that Christ is to be worshipped, loved, and adored as the Son of God, for He alone could work such Divine works peculiarly belonging to God.
37. And the Father himself who hath sent me, hath given testimony of me: neither have you heard his voice at any time, nor seen his shape..…
hath given testimony, as at My baptism. Again, He hath borne witness concerning Me, through the Scriptures by Moses and the prophets.
Observe, Christ in this place, besides the testimony of John, adduces three other and greater witnesses to show that He is the Messiah: 1. By His miracles (ver. 36); 2. By the Father’s voice at His baptism; 3. By the Scriptures (ver. 39).
38. And you have not his word abiding in you: for whom he hath sent, him you believe not. The connection and subsequent argument of these words is obscure, which different writers explain in different ways.
1. You may explain them as a sort of concession, thus: “You, O ye scribes, when I allege the testimony of God My Father concerning Me, make objection that ye have not heard it, that ye have neither seen His face, nor His appearance, as Moses saw, whom ye profess to believe. I grant what you say, but I add that no one, not even Moses, heard God’s own voice, nor saw His appearance, nor His face. They only beheld that immense fire by which God was concealed, and heard a sound formed in the air by an angel, instead of God’s voice. For I alone, who am the Son of God by nature, have heard His real voice, and seen His appearance, or His Divine face, which I see continually. Nevertheless I urge upon you that ye have heard the voice of God giving attestation to Me, when at My baptism the Father publicly declared, This is My beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased. Again, ye have heard the word of God concerning Me in the Holy Scriptures, Moses and the prophets, who bear witness that I am the Messiah. But ye, although ye have heard this word and testimony of God concerning Me, yet have it not abiding in you, because ye receive not in your minds, nor understand, nor believe it, inasmuch as ye do not believe in Me, as sent by God. In this ye gravely err and sin. For if ye have heard the word of an angel in God’s stead speaking with Moses as His servant, and believe him, much more ought ye to believe the Word of God bearing witness to Me that I am His Son, especially since Moses bears witness to Me, and bids you to hearken unto Me, as follows. So Euthymius. This meaning seems clear, plain, and true.
2. However, S. Hilary (lib. 9, de Trin.) thus connects and expounds this whole passage. “This is why ye have not heard His voice, nor seen His appearance, neither doth His word abide in you, because ye do not believe in Me.” As though it were said, “If ye would believe in Me, ye would hear the Father’s voice, and see His appearance. For he that seeth Me seeth the Father also. In like manner, he that heareth Me heareth the Father also, and the word of the Father abideth in him.”
3. SS. Cyril and Chrysostom think that these words were spoken to confound the Jews, who boasted that they had heard and seen God promulging the Decalogue on Sinai. “Ye boast falsely, O ye Jews, that ye have seen and heard God on Sinai, for God is a pure Spirit. Wherefore that voice which ye heard, and that appearance of fire which ye saw on Sinai, was neither the voice nor the true appearance of God, but only a corporeal symbol and figure, shadowing forth to you who are fleshly and ignorant the invisible Godhead.”
4. S. Athanasius (lib. 4, cont. Arian.) by the Word, Greek, λόγος, understands Christ the Son of God, who is the Word of the Father. This he asserts is aptly joined with the appearance and form of God, because He is the character, and the lively image of the Father. And the meaning is, “Ye have not heard the voice of God, nor seen His form; and when there remained for you one only way to do this, by believing in Me, who am the Word of the Father, and the image of His Substance (or Person), whom whosoever seeth sees also the Father, ye despise this way, and will not believe Me. Wherefore ye know not the Father, and are deprived of Divine knowledge.”
5. Toletus: “Ye, O ye Jews, being terrified by the voice of the angel’s trumpet, and by the fire that lightened on Sinai, asked that ye might not hear any more that terrible voice, nor see the dreadful fire, but that God might speak to you by Moses as a mediator. But you keep not the promise by which you bound yourselves. You accepted the stipulation that ye would hear the Prophet of your own nation whom He should send. But His word and compact abide not in you, because what ye promised ye are not willing to fulfil. For, behold, I am He whom He has sent, and ye neither believe Me, nor hear Me, as ye promised.”
The first meaning seems the best and most apposite.
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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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