St John Chapter xv : Verses 9-12
Contents
- St John Chapter xv : Verses 9-12. Douay-Rheims (Challoner) text, Greek (SBLG) & Latin text (Vulgate);
- Annotations based on the Great Commentary of Cornelius A Lapide (1567-1637)
St John Chapter xv : Verses 9-12
.png) |
| Love one another, as I have loved you. Victor. c 1674. Hellenic Institute of Venice. |
10 If you keep my commandments, you shall abide in my love; as I also have kept my Father's commandments, and do abide in his love.
11 These things I have spoken to you, that my joy may be in you, and your joy may be filled.
12 This is my commandment, that you love one another, as I have loved you.
9 καθὼς ἠγάπησέν με ὁ πατήρ, κἀγὼ ⸂ὑμᾶς ἠγάπησα⸃, μείνατε ἐν τῇ ἀγάπῃ τῇ ἐμῇ.
9 Sicut dilexit me Pater, et ego dilexi vos. Manete in dilectione mea.
10 ἐὰν τὰς ἐντολάς μου τηρήσητε, μενεῖτε ἐν τῇ ἀγάπῃ μου, καθὼς ἐγὼ ⸂τὰς ἐντολὰς τοῦ πατρός μου⸃ τετήρηκα καὶ μένω αὐτοῦ ἐν τῇ ἀγάπῃ.
10 Si praecepta mea servaveritis, manebitis in dilectione mea, sicut et ego Patris mei praecepta servavi, et maneo in ejus dilectione.
11 ταῦτα λελάληκα ὑμῖν ἵνα ἡ χαρὰ ἡ ἐμὴ ἐν ὑμῖν ⸀ᾖ καὶ ἡ χαρὰ ὑμῶν πληρωθῇ.
11 Haec locutus sum vobis : ut gaudium meum in vobis sit, et gaudium vestrum impleatur.
12 Αὕτη ἐστὶν ἡ ἐντολὴ ἡ ἐμὴ ἵνα ἀγαπᾶτε ἀλλήλους καθὼς ἠγάπησα ὑμᾶς·
12 Hoc est praeceptum meum, ut diligatis invicem, sicut dilexi vos.
Annotations
9. As the Father hath loved me, I also have loved you. —This is the sixth reason by which Christ stirs his disciples up to persevere in Him and in His love and faith. The word as does not imply equality, but similitude of love. For the Father loveth Christ far more than Christ loveth us. The meaning therefore is, As God the Father hath loved Me as man without any merits of mine freely before all others, and hath raised me to the Hypostasis of the Word, that I should be the Son of God, the Saviour and Redeemer of the world, and therefore not a natural vine but a Vine of salvation, so in like manner have I freely chosen you before other men, without any merits of your own, and raised you to the Apostolate, that ye should be made very near to Me as branches to the Vine, and that I through you should work out the salvation of all nations. Take heed therefore that ye abide in this My love. And this ye will do by loving Me and keeping my commandments. For so ye will deserve to be loved in return by Me, and be by Me constantly endowed with the benefits of which I have spoken. So S. Augustine.
Observe here, that Christ’s predestination, election, love, and grace are the means, the end, and exemplar of our predestination, election, love, and grace. See what I have said on Rom. i. 4.
Abide in my love; take care that I always love you. For it is a great thing to be loved by Christ. It is the fount and the cause of all graces. This is the active sense of the word My. But Rupertus here takes the love of Christ in a passive sense, meaning, abide in My love, advance in My love. This is an apposite, but not the direct meaning. It is inferential, thus, Take care that I love you. And this ye will be careful about if ye proceed to love Me. For I love those that love Me. Wherefore as the Father greatly loves Me, and so works through Me so many miracles and the salvation of the world, so also do I exceedingly love you, and therefore heap upon you so many benefits, gifts, and apostolic graces. Take heed then that ye continue in this My love and My grace. For so shall ye receive a daily increase of gifts from Me. Perceive from this the excellence and Divine virtue of love and affection. As Climacus says (Gradu 30), “I contemplate faith as a ray of the sun, charity like its orb in its fulness. Charity from its own very nature is likeness to God, so far as mortals can attain unto it. As regards its efficacy it is a sort of intoxication of the soul. Lastly, as regards its properties, it is the fountain of faith, the abyss of a just and patient mind, a sea of humility.”
10. If you keep my commandments, you shall abide in my love; If ye advance in loving Me and keeping my commandments, ye shall abide in My grace, favour, and affection, so that I shall proceed to heap My love and favours upon you.
as I also have kept my Father's commandments, and do abide in his love. That is, as I proceed to obey the Father’s commandments, and to preserve His grace and love towards Me. Hear St. Augustine: “Love precedes the keeping of commandments. For he who loveth not hath nothing from whence he may keep them. In what therefore He here saith He does not show from whence love is generated, but how it is shown, that no one may deceive himself by saying that he loves Him when he keeps not His commandments. This, however, must be referred to the love wherewith He loves us, thus: By this ye shall know that ye abide in the love with which I love you, if ye keep My precepts, not indeed that we first keep His commandments in order that He may love us, but that unless He loved us we could not keep His commandments. This is the grace which is plain to the humble, but hidden from the proud.”
Prior therefore is that love of God which is the cause of love in us, and of the keeping His commandments. And this in turn is the cause of God’s love towards us being maintained. So fire kindles and burns wood, and by its ignition is preserved and lasts.
11. These things I have spoken to you, that my joy may be in you, and your joy may be filled. This is the seventh and last reason of Christ, by which He persuades them to abide in His love and charity. Because in so doing they would give great joy both to Christ and to themselves.
You will ask, what is this joy? 1st. Jansen explains thus, These things I have said unto you that your joy may be always like unto mine. My joy is because I am loved of My Father. Do you so keep My commandments that ye may be always loved of My Father and rejoice, and that thus your joy may be full through My Resurrection and the sending of the Holy Spirit.
2d. S. Cyril explains, These things have I spoken unto you that ye may have joy in those things in which I have joy, namely, in labours and perils endured for the salvation of mankind.
3d. S. Augustine expounds of the joy which God had from eternity at our salvation, thus, “These things have I spoken unto you that what has been from eternity, a cause of joy to Me, namely, grace and salvation, may be in you. And that your joy which you have in My company may be fulfilled by your gradual advancement to everlasting felicity.” And he again says, “What is that joy of ours which He says is to be full, but to enjoy His company? He indeed had perfect joy over us when He rejoiced in His foreknowledge and predestination of us. But that joy was not our joy, because we were not yet in being. This joy began to be in us when He called us. It begins to be in the faith of those who are born again: it shall be full in the faith of those who rise again.”
4th. And most plainly, Christ here brings His disciples a twofold joy as a reward. The first joy is His own, the second that of the disciples. The meaning is, These things have I spoken unto you that in doing them ye may give Me joy. For parents and masters rejoice when they see their children and scholars act aright in obedience to their commands. This is the meaning of, that My joy may be in you, namely, that I may rejoice at your conformity to My will. As S. Augustine says, “What is the joy of Christ in us save that wherein He deigns to rejoice concerning us?” The second joy is that of the disciples, concerning which He says, and your joy may be filled. This was the joy which the disciples had in Christ, that they were His disciples. Christ has reference to the explanation which He subjoins to the parable of the vine and its branches, Abide in Me, and I in you. The meaning is, Like as the vine, if it could rejoice, would rejoice because its branches abode in it, and bore fruit, and as the branches for their part would rejoice because they adhered to the vine, and derived sap from it to bring forth grapes, so likewise if ye, O ye disciples, abide in Me, the true Vine, by love, and I also abide in you by the continual influx of the Spirit of grace for the bringing forth of good works, then shall I have joy in you thus cleaving unto Me, and ye shall have joy in Me because ye derive from Me grace and the Holy Spirit for the conversion of all nations. And this joy shall gradually be fulfilled here, but shall have its perfect consummation in eternal glory.
Lastly, the words in you may be taken simply, just as they stand, thus, These things have I spoken unto you, that My joy with which I rejoice concerning the glory of God and the salvation of the whole world to be accomplished by Me, I may transfuse into you as My Apostles and fellow-workers; and that this joy may increase as your labours and your fruit increase; until it be fulfilled in this life, but yet more completely in the life to come. For My good is your good, as the good of the Vine is the good of its branches.
This meaning seems the simplest, and is therefore sound. The words, That my joy may be in you, are exactly as if He said, That My joy may flow into you, may be communicated to you, and so be made your own.
Admirably saith S. Bernard (Epist. 114), “Verily that is the true and only joy which comes not from a creature, but from the Creator, and which no one shall take away from him who possesses it. Compared with this all other gladness is only sorrow; all other pleasantness is pain, all sweetness bitter, all beauty but as ugliness.” And elsewhere he says, “A sure sign of the indwelling of the Holy Ghost in the soul is spiritual joy.” For the soul which exults in God exults because God inhabits it.
12. This is my commandment, that you love one another, as I have loved you. The Greek is emphatic with the double art., ἡ ἑντολὴ ἡ ἑμὴ, i.e. My precept, even Mine. This is to be referred partly to the words, if ye keep My commandments, partly to, in My love, which is the scope of the whole parable from the beginning of the chapter to this place. The meaning therefore is, I have commanded you to keep My precepts, among which know ye that the chief is this, that ye love one another as I have loved you. Again, I have bidden you, Abide in My love, i.e. continue and persevere in loving Me. And this ye will do if ye love one another, and bestow your kindnesses and offices of charity upon your neighbours. For ye can bestow nothing upon Me, but whatsoever ye shall bestow upon them, I shall account as bestowed upon Myself as the Parent of all. Wherefore He calls this “My commandment.” There is an allusion to His words in xiii. 34, A new commandment I give unto you, &c. For what He here calls My commandment He there calls a new commandment. For He gives this precept to all Christians. For all were represented by the Apostles. For Christ willed by the Apostles and their successors to convert the whole world. He bids them therefore that out of love to Him they should love and seek the salvation of all nations, should expend all their faculties and labours upon that work, undergo all perils, sustain all persecutions, and lastly, should shed their blood for it. For so He loved them and all other men that He gave His life and endured the death of the Cross for them. Moreover, this precept in the first place concerned the Apostles, because Christ by them was about to accomplish His own work of preaching throughout the world. Wherefore it was the duty of every one to co-operate with and assist every other. For this union and mutual co-operation of many was most efficacious for overcoming all difficulties, and converting all nations however barbarous. And so we see the same thing at the present day in Religious Orders and in Religious and Apostolic men united among themselves. Thus it is said (Eccles. iv.12), “a threefold cord is not easily broken.”
This example of Christ was followed by S. Elizius, who died in the year 665. This was his last admonition to his people, as Sigobert testifies in his Chronicle: “If ye would pay me back my love for you, keep the commandments of Almighty God. Always breathe after Jesus Christ. Fix firmly His precepts in your minds. Love His name even as I have done.”
+ + +
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.
No comments:
Post a Comment