St John Chapter xv : Verses 16-20
Contents
- St John Chapter xv : Verses 16-20. 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 16-20
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| The servant is not greater than his master. Victor. c 1674. Hellenic Institute of Venice. |
17 These things I command you, that you love one another.
18 If the world hate you, know ye, that it hath hated me before you.
19 If you had been of the world, the world would love its own: but because you are not of the world, but I have chosen you out of the world, therefore the world hateth you.
20 Remember my word that I said to you: The servant is not greater than his master. If they have persecuted me, they will also persecute you: if they have kept my word, they will keep yours also.
16 οὐχ ὑμεῖς με ἐξελέξασθε, ἀλλ’ ἐγὼ ἐξελεξάμην ὑμᾶς, καὶ ἔθηκα ὑμᾶς ἵνα ὑμεῖς ὑπάγητε καὶ καρπὸν φέρητε καὶ ὁ καρπὸς ὑμῶν μένῃ, ἵνα ὅ τι ἂν αἰτήσητε τὸν πατέρα ἐν τῷ ὀνόματί μου δῷ ὑμῖν.
16 Non vos me elegistis, sed ego elegi vos, et posui vos ut eatis, et fructum afferatis, et fructus vester maneat : ut quodcumque petieritis Patrem in nomine meo, det vobis.
17 ταῦτα ἐντέλλομαι ὑμῖν ἵνα ἀγαπᾶτε ἀλλήλους.
17 Haec mando vobis : ut diligatis invicem.
18 Εἰ ὁ κόσμος ὑμᾶς μισεῖ, γινώσκετε ὅτι ἐμὲ πρῶτον ⸀ὑμῶν μεμίσηκεν.
18 Si mundus vos odit, scitote quia me priorem vobis odio habuit.
19 εἰ ἐκ τοῦ κόσμου ἦτε, ὁ κόσμος ἂν τὸ ἴδιον ἐφίλει· ὅτι δὲ ἐκ τοῦ κόσμου οὐκ ἐστέ, ἀλλ’ ἐγὼ ἐξελεξάμην ὑμᾶς ἐκ τοῦ κόσμου, διὰ τοῦτο μισεῖ ὑμᾶς ὁ κόσμος.
19 Si de mundo fuissetis, mundus quod suum erat diligeret : quia vero de mundo non estis, sed ego elegi vos de mundo, propterea odit vos mundus.
20 μνημονεύετε τοῦ λόγου οὗ ἐγὼ εἶπον ὑμῖν· Οὐκ ἔστιν δοῦλος μείζων τοῦ κυρίου αὐτοῦ· εἰ ἐμὲ ἐδίωξαν, καὶ ὑμᾶς διώξουσιν· εἰ τὸν λόγον μου ἐτήρησαν, καὶ τὸν ὑμέτερον τηρήσουσιν.
20 Mementote sermonis mei, quem ego dixi vobis : non est servus major domino suo. Si me persecuti sunt, et vos persequentur; si sermonem meum servaverunt, et vestrum servabunt.
Annotations
16. You have not chosen me: but I have chosen you; and have appointed you, that you should go, and should bring forth fruit; and your fruit should remain: S. Augustine, both on this passage and elsewhere (lib. 1, c. 17, de Predest. Sanct.) understands by this choosing the predestination of God: I have predestinated you, and chosen you, without any merits of yours, to glory. But this does not agree rightly with the words, you have not chosen Me. For neither could the Apostles choose Christ to heavenly glory, nor does Christ here seem to have wished to reveal His predestination to the Apostles. For this He Himself is wont to attribute to the Father. For to the Father providence is attributed, a part of which is predestination.
More literally the meaning is, Ye did not first choose Me for your Master and Lord, but I first chose and called you, and by My vocation and grace I made you My friends, disciples, and Apostles. So S. Cyril, Chrysostom, and others. Wherefore S. Chrysostom thinks that Christ is here still dwelling upon the parable of the vine and its branches. The meaning then will be, As the husbandman chooses the best vines and grafts to plant in his vineyard, so have I chosen you, O My Apostles, that I should plant you, being made the most excellent vines by My grace, in My vineyard, for the production of grapes, i.e. of very many and very excellent believers.
Moreover, Christ saith this, 1st, To show His exceeding love for His Apostles, because He first chose them alone, above all other men who were more noble, learned, and eloquent, to be Apostles, i.e. to be His chief friends, and the Apostles of His Church. Wherefore He tacitly admonishes them that they should love Him in return, and abide constant in His love and obedience.
2d. That considering the lofty height of their dignity and apostleship to which they had been called by Christ, they should labour to be true to it, and so should be beforehand with all nations, and by their preaching should bring them to Christ.
Some writers add that Christ here wished to give the Apostles an incentive to humility: thus, Be it that I have called you friends, and admitted you to share in My secrets, yet do not ye be proud because of this. For ye have not merited it, but it is I who have freely chosen and exalted you.
and have appointed you, that you should go, and should bring forth fruit ( preach the gospel throughout all nations). S. Chrysostom being of opinion that there is an allusion here to the parable of the Vine, explains the words I have placed, to mean, I have planted, as it were fruitful vines in the vineyard of My Church. Maldonatus explains more simply, I have declared. For when any one is made a magistrate, he is first chosen, that is, designated, and settled in his office.
Most simply, you may expound I have appointed you by I have constituted you, or that Christ by this word signifies the authority, the firmness, and the fruit of His Apostles, namely, that they were commissioned, and therefore made strong, by Christ, so that no one could deprive them of their dignity, nor hinder their bringing forth fruit, even a most abundant harvest of souls throughout the whole world.
and your fruit should remain: Cyril refers this to the Gospel which remains, whilst the old Law was not to abide, but to be abrogated by Christ. More plainly and fully, you may refer the word remain to the conversion of all nations brought about by the Apostles, which remained even after their death, and which will remain in due and continual succession unto the end of the world. And this as it were the heavenly fruit and reward of the Apostles does remain, and will remain eternally.
that whatsoever you shall ask of the Father in my name, he may give it you. The word that signifies not so much the end aimed at as the effect. The meaning is this, If ye bring forth the fruit for which I have chosen you, it will follow and come to pass that the Father will give you whatsoever ye shall ask in the same sense that I have shown (chap. xiv.13). The Greek for I may give is δῶ, which may be rendered, with S. Chrysostom and Theophylact, in the first person, I may give. Wherefore Theophylact gathers from this passage against the Arians that the Son of God is of the same substance with the Father, so that He equally with the Father gives as God the things which are asked of Him. In My Name, i.e. by My merits. Moreover, S. Augustine says, “That which we ask in the Saviour’s name is what pertains to salvation.”
17. These things I command you, that you love one another. He says these things in the plural to signify that there were indeed many particular precepts commanded by Him, but that all of them were included in the one common and easy precept of love, so that if one fulfils that, one fulfils all.
Secondly, You may explain more simply with S. Chrysostom if you take the conjunction that to signify the end. Then the meaning will be, These things which I have spoken concerning My love I have said with this only end in view, that ye should have mutual love among yourselves, and that thus ye should endure all things for the salvation of men. To this pertains the exposition of S. Augustine (Tract. 87), “Because He had said, I have placed you that ye should go and bear fruit, now He saith, These things I command you, wishing to teach that the fruit which we are to bear must be love of our neighbour.” And again, “The fruit of the Spirit, saith the apostle, is charity. Concerning this therefore He gives commandment. Deservedly indeed does He often speak of love, as if it were the only thing to be commanded, as being that without which all other good things cannot profit, and which we cannot have without having all other good things by which a man becomes good with it.”
18. If the world hate you, know ye, that it hath hated me before you. The Greek is πρῶτον ὑμῶν, which is best rendered adverbially, meaning, the world hated Me before it hated you. I have trodden before you this path of hatred, and made it smooth for you, so that ye, following Me, may walk joyfully in the same way. For I give Myself to you not only as your companion in persecutions, but your standard bearer, your leader and your guide. Worldly people He calls the world. By them He means 1st, The Jews. 2d, Gentiles addicted to the spirit of the world, and therefore enemies of the doctrine and spirit of Christ.
Christ forewarns His Apostles against the impending hatred and persecutions of the Jews and Gentiles. For the darts which are foreseen are less apt to strike. Thus they would nobly overcome, yea, despise them, and would glory in them as the tokens of Christ. It is, as Ribera remarks, as though He said, Do not wonder or be troubled when the world hates you. It hated Me before you. Rejoice because ye are partakers with Me. This hatred shall do you no harm, even as it has not hurt Me. The world persecutes you because ye are not of it, i.e. because ye do not favour its works, but oppose them, as I do. And when He saith this, He leaves it to be understood, But I nevertheless will love you, because ye belong to Me, and are My elect, chosen to condemn the works of the world. Far greater shall be to you the benefit of My love than the harm of the world’s hate.
Great then is this consolation which the members derive from their Head. Listen to S. Cyprian (lib. 4, Epist. 6),
“The Son of God hath suffered that He might make us sons of God. And shall a son of man not be willing to suffer that he may persevere in being a son of God? If we labour under the world’s hate, Christ bore this hatred before us. If we endure shame in this world, or banishment, or torture, the world’s Maker and its Master experienced yet more grievous trials. He it is who admonishes us, saying, If the world hate you, remember that it first hated Me.”
Lastly, hear S. Bernard (Hom. 47, in Cant.),
“Thou art two things to Me, O Lord Jesus, a mirror of endurance, and a reward of suffering. Thou art the pattern of the warrior, and the glory of the victor. Thou teachest my hands to war by the example of Thine own valour. Thou crownest my head after the victory by the presence of Thy majesty.”
19. If you had been of the world, the world would love its own: but because you are not of the world, but I have chosen you out of the world, therefore the world hateth you. Christ here adds another reason, says Chrysostom, showing that it is a proof of virtue to be hated by the world, and of wickedness to be loved by it. The meaning is, if ye loved riches, honours, pleasures, lusts, such as the world loves, it would love you as being like itself. But since it sees you loving the things which are contrary to its base desires, and teaching contempt for earthly pleasures, honours, and lusts, therefore it hateth you. For agreement in character and desires is a cause of love, dissimilarity a cause of aversion and hatred.
S. Augustine considers an objection which may be raised. The wicked persecute the wicked: unrighteous kings and judges punish murderers and adulterers. Then he gives this answer. The world indeed hates its own so far as this, that it injures the wicked. But still it loves them, in that it favours them. To me it seems another answer may be given: worldly men love their own, that is, those who help and share in their designs. If at any time they hate other worldly persons, it is because they oppose their designs, and so are counted their adversaries. And therefore they hated Christ because He reproved their deeds, and exposed them to men. For the same cause they hated the Apostles.
20. Remember my word that I said to you: The servant is not greater than his master. For if I suffer the hatred of the Jews, yea even the death of the Cross, ye ought not to be unwilling to undergo the same. For as S. Peter saith, “Christ hath suffered for us, leaving us an example that we should follow His steps.”
If they have persecuted me, they will also persecute you: if they have kept my word, they will keep yours also. My word, i.e. My doctrine, law, and precepts.
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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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