Augustinus, In Joannis Evangelium tractatus XX-XXV

who sent Him. And he will not come into judgement, but has passed from death to life: but he is given life by the Father, in Whom he believes. What, dost Thou not give life? See that the Son also gives life to whom He will. Amen, amen I say to you, that the hour is coming when the dead will hear the voice of the Son of God, and those who have heard will live. Here He did not say, "They will believe Him Who sent Me, and therefore they will live"; but by hearing the voice of the Son of God: those who have heard, that is, who have obeyed the Son of God, will live. Therefore they will live both from the Father, when they believe the Father, and from the Son, when they hear the voice of the Son of God. Why will they live both from the Father and from the Son? For as the Father has life in Himself, so He has given to the Son to have life in Himself.

15. He has finished concerning the resurrection of souls; it remains for Him to speak more plainly concerning the resurrection of bodies. And He has given Him power also to execute judgement: not only to raise souls through faith and wisdom, but also to execute judgement. But why this? Because He is the son of man. The Father therefore does something through the Son of man which He does not do from His own substance, to which the Son is equal; such as being born, such as being crucified, such as dying, such as rising again: for none of these things befell the Father. So also the raising of bodies. For the raising of souls the Father performs from His own substance through the substance of the Son, by which He is equal to Him; for souls become partakers of that unchangeable light, not bodies: but the raising of bodies the Father performs through the son of man. For He has given Him power also to execute judgement, because He is the son of man: in accordance with what He said above, For neither does the Father judge anyone. And to show that He said this concerning the resurrection of bodies: Do not marvel at this, for the hour is coming. It is not now. But the hour is coming, in which all who are in the tombs (you already heard this yesterday too most abundantly [In the preceding Tractate, no. 13]), will hear His voice and will come forth. And where to? Into judgement: Those who have done well, to the resurrection of life; those who have done evil, to the resurrection of judgement. And dost Thou do this alone, since the Father has given all judgement to the Son, and does not judge anyone? I, He says, do it. But how dost Thou do it? I cannot do anything of Myself: as I hear, I judge, and My judgement is just. When the resurrection of souls was being treated, He did not say, "I hear", but, "I see". For "I hear" is said as of the command of the Father giving the order. Now therefore as man, as One than Whom the Father is greater; now from the form of a servant, not from the form of God, as I hear, I judge; and My judgement is just. Whence is the just judgement of a man? My brothers, attend: Because I do not seek My own will, but the will of Him Who sent Me.

Tractate 24.

From what is written, After these things Jesus went away across the sea of Galilee, which is that of Tiberias; up to this, This is truly the prophet who is coming into the world. (John 6:1–14).

1. The miracles which our Lord Jesus Christ performed are indeed divine works, and for the understanding of

God they admonish the human mind by means of visible things. For since He is not such a substance as can be seen with the eyes, and His miracles, by which He rules the whole world and governs the entire creation, have grown cheap through their constancy, so that almost no one deigns to pay attention to the wonderful and astounding works of God in any grain of seed whatever, He, according to His very mercy, reserved certain things for Himself to do at a fitting time beyond the usual course and order of nature, so that those for whom everyday things had grown cheap might be astounded at seeing things not greater, but unusual. For the governance of the whole world is a greater miracle than the feeding of five thousand men from five loaves; and yet no one marvels at this. Men marvel at that, not because it is greater, but because it is rare. For who even now feeds the whole world, if not He who creates crops from a few grains? He acted, therefore, as God. For by the same power by which He multiplies crops from a few grains, He multiplied five loaves in His hands. For the power was in the hands of Christ, and those five loaves were as it were seeds, not indeed entrusted to the earth, but multiplied by Him who made the earth. This, therefore, was brought before the senses so that the mind might be raised up, and displayed to the eyes so that the understanding might be exercised on it, in order that we might marvel at the invisible God through visible works, and, raised up to faith and purified through faith, might desire to see invisibly Him Himself, whom from visible things we came to know as invisible.

2. Yet it is not enough to look at these things in the miracles of Christ. Let us question the miracles themselves as to what they tell us about Christ: for they have, if they are understood, a language of their own. For since Christ Himself is the Word of God, even the deed of the Word is a word to us. So then, as we have heard how great this miracle is, let us also inquire how deep it is: let us not merely delight in its surface, but let us also search out its depth. For this thing that we marvel at outwardly has something within. We have seen, we have beheld something great, something splendid, and altogether divine, which could not be done except by God: from the deed we have praised the doer. But just as, if we were to look at beautiful letters somewhere, it would not be enough for us to praise the writer's hand because he made them even, uniform and handsome, unless we also read what he has indicated to us through them, so he who only looks at this deed is delighted by the beauty of the deed so as to admire its maker; but he who understands it, as it were reads it. For a picture is seen in one way, letters are seen in another. When you have seen a picture, that is the whole of it: to have seen it, to have praised it. When you have seen letters, that is not the whole of it, since you are prompted to read them as well. For indeed, when you see letters, if perhaps you do not know how to read them, you say, What do we suppose it is that is written here? You ask what it is, although you already see something. He from whom you seek to learn what you have seen is going to show you something else. He has other eyes, you have others. Do you not see the characters alike? But you do not recognize the signs alike. You, then, see and praise; he sees, praises, reads and understands. Since, therefore, we have seen, since we have praised, let us read and understand.

3. The Lord on the mountain: much more let us understand

that the Lord on the mountain is the Word on high. Therefore what was done on the mountain does not lie there as something lowly, nor is it to be passed over in passing, but to be looked up to. He saw the crowds, He recognized that they were hungry, He mercifully fed them: not only out of goodness, but also out of power. For what would goodness alone have availed, where there was no bread with which the hungry crowd might be fed? Unless power had been present to goodness, that crowd would have remained fasting and hungry. Then too the disciples who were with the Lord in hunger, they too wished to feed the crowds, so that they should not remain empty, but they did not have the means to feed them. The Lord asked where loaves might be bought to feed the crowds. And Scripture says, But this He said testing him: that is, the disciple Philip, whom He had questioned. For He Himself knew what He would do. To what good end, then, was He testing him, except that He was showing the ignorance of the disciple? And perhaps in showing the ignorance of the disciple He signified something. It will appear, then, when the very sacrament of the five loaves begins to speak to us and to indicate what it signifies: for there we shall see why the Lord in this deed wished to show the ignorance of the disciple by asking what He knew. For sometimes we ask what we do not know, wishing to hear so that we may learn; sometimes we ask what we know, wishing to know whether he too whom we ask knows it: the Lord knew both of these; He both knew what He was asking, for He Himself knew what He would do; and He likewise knew that Philip did not know this. Why then did He ask, except that He was showing that man's ignorance? And why He did this, as I said, we shall understand later.

4. Andrew says: There is a certain boy here who has five loaves and two fishes; but what are these among so many? When Philip, on being questioned, had said that two hundred denarii's worth of loaves would not suffice for so great a crowd to be refreshed, there was there a certain boy carrying five barley loaves and two fishes. And Jesus says: Make the men sit down. Now there was much hay in that place, and about five thousand men sat down. And the Lord Jesus took the loaves, gave thanks, gave the command, the loaves were broken and set before those reclining. No longer five loaves, but what He had added, He Who had created that which was increased. And of the fishes as much as was enough. It is a small thing that that crowd was satisfied; even fragments remained over: and these were ordered to be gathered, lest they perish; and they filled twelve baskets with fragments.

5. To run through it briefly, the five loaves are understood as the five books of Moses: fittingly not of wheat, but of barley, because they belong to the Old Testament. Now you know that barley is so made that one scarcely gets through to its kernel: for that kernel is clothed with a covering of chaff, and the chaff itself is tenacious and clinging, so that it is stripped off only with labour. Such is the letter of the Old Testament, clothed with the coverings of carnal sacraments: but if one gets through to its kernel, it feeds and satisfies. A certain boy, then, was carrying five loaves and two fishes. If we ask who this boy was, perhaps he was the people of Israel: with a childish understanding he carried them, and did not eat them.

For the things that he carried burdened him while closed, and fed when opened. The two fishes, moreover, seem to us to signify those two exalted persons in the Old Testament who were anointed for sanctifying and ruling the people, that of the priest and that of the king. And He Himself, Who was signified by them, came at length in mystery: He came at length Who was shown through the marrow of the barley, but hidden through the chaff of the barley. He came, one Person bearing both persons in Himself, of priest and of king: of priest through the victim, Himself, whom He offered for us to God; of king, because we are ruled by Him: and the things which were carried closed are opened. Thanks be to Him; He fulfilled through Himself what was promised through the Old Testament. And He commanded the loaves to be broken: by being broken they were multiplied. Nothing is truer. For those five books of Moses, how many books have they made when they are expounded, as it were by being broken, that is, by being discussed? But because in that barley the ignorance of the first people was covered, of which first people it was said, As long as Moses is read, a veil is laid over their hearts (2 Cor. 3:15): for the veil had not yet been taken away, because Christ had not yet come; the veil of the temple had not yet been rent while He hung on the cross: because, then, the ignorance of the people was in the Law, for that reason that testing by the Lord displayed the ignorance of the disciple.

6. Nothing, therefore, is idle; all things give hints, but they require one who understands: for this number too of the people fed signified the people set under the Law. For why were there five thousand, unless because they were under the Law, which Law is set forth in the five books of Moses? Hence also in those five porches the sick were exposed, not healed. But He healed the sick man there (John 5:2–9) Who here also fed the crowds from five loaves. For they also reclined upon the grass: therefore they had a carnal understanding, and rested in carnal things. For all flesh is grass (Isa. 40:6). And what are those fragments, unless what the people could not eat? There are understood, then, certain more secret matters of understanding which the multitude cannot grasp. What then remains, except that the more secret matters of understanding, which the multitude cannot grasp, be entrusted to those who are fit to teach others also, as the Apostles were? Hence twelve baskets were filled. This was done both wonderfully, because a great thing was done, and usefully, because a spiritual thing was done. Those who saw it then marvelled: but we do not marvel when we hear it. For it was done that they might see, but it was written that we might hear. What eyes availed for in them, faith avails for in us. For we discern with the mind what we could not with the eyes: and we have been preferred to them, since of us it was said, Blessed are they who do not see, and believe (John 20:29). But I add that perhaps we have also understood what that crowd did not understand. And truly we have been fed, who have been able to reach the marrow of the barley.

7. Finally, those men who saw this, what did they think? Those men, it says, when they had seen the sign that He had done, said, This is truly a prophet. Perhaps they still thought Christ a prophet for this reason, that they had reclined upon the grass. But He was the Lord