Augustinus, In Joannis Evangelium tractatus XXVII-XXXIV

which have perished of the house of Israel; how does He have other sheep to which He was not sent, unless because He signified that He was not sent to show His bodily presence except to the Jews alone, who saw and killed [Him]? And yet many from among them believed, both before and afterwards. The first harvest was winnowed from the cross, so that there might be seed from which another harvest should rise up. But now, when His faithful, roused by the fame of the Gospel and by its good fragrance, believe throughout all nations, there will be the expectation of the nations, when He comes Who has already come (Gen. 49:10); when He is seen by all, Who then was not seen by some, was seen by some; when He comes to judge Who came to be judged; when He comes to distinguish, Who came so as not to be distinguished. For Christ was not distinguished from the ungodly, but was judged with the ungodly: for of Him it was said, He was reckoned among the wicked (Isa. 53:12). The robber escaped: Christ was condemned (Mark 15:15; John 18:40). The criminal received pardon; He was condemned Who remitted the crimes of all who confess. Yet even the cross itself, if you consider it, was a tribunal: for with the Judge set in the middle, one robber, who believed, was set free (Luke 23:43), the other, who mocked, was condemned. Already He was signifying what He will do concerning the living and the dead, as He will place some at the right, others at the left: the one robber was like those who will be at the left, the other like those who will be at the right. He was being judged, and He was threatening judgement.

Tractate 32.

From the place, But on the last day of the feast Jesus stood and cried out, saying, If anyone thirsts, let him come to Me and drink; as far as this, For the Spirit had not yet been given, because Jesus had not yet been glorified. Chap. 7, vv. 37-39.

1. Amid the dissensions and doubts of the Jews about the Lord Jesus Christ, among the other things that He said, by which some were confounded and others taught, on the last day of that feast (for it was then that these things were being done), which is called Scenopegia, that is, the construction of tabernacles, about which feast Your Charity remembers that a discourse was given already before, the Lord Jesus Christ calls, and this not by speaking in just any manner but by crying out, that whoever thirsts should come to Him. If we thirst, let us come; and not with our feet, but with our affections; let us come not by journeying but by loving. Although, according to the inner man, he too who loves journeys. And it is one thing to journey in body, another in heart: he journeys in body who by the movement of the body changes place; he journeys in heart who by the movement of the heart changes affection. If you love one thing and used to love another, you are not where you were.

2. So the Lord cries out to us: for He stood and cried out, If anyone thirsts, let him come to Me and drink. He who believes in Me, as the Scripture says, rivers of living water shall flow from his belly. What this might be, since the Evangelist has explained it, we ought not to linger over. For why the Lord said, If anyone thirsts, let him come to Me and drink, and, He who believes in Me, rivers of living water shall flow from his belly, the Evangelist explained next, saying: But this He said of the Spirit which those who believed in Him were to receive. For the Spirit had not yet been given, because Jesus had not yet been glorified. There is therefore an inner thirst and a belly

within, because there is an interior man. And that interior one indeed is invisible, but the exterior visible: but the interior is better than the exterior. And what is not seen, that is loved more: for it is certain that the interior man is loved more than the exterior. Whence is this certain? Let each one prove it in himself. For although those who live badly devote their souls to the body, yet they wish to live, which belongs to nothing but the soul, and they show themselves to be more the things that rule than those that are ruled. For souls rule, bodies are ruled. Each one rejoices in pleasure, and takes pleasure from the body: but separate the soul, nothing remains in the body to rejoice; and if he rejoices from the body, it is the soul that rejoices. If it rejoices in its house, ought it not to rejoice in itself? and if the soul has from outside that by which it is delighted, does it remain without delights within? It is altogether certain that a man loves his soul more than his body. But in another man too a man loves the soul more than the body. For what is loved in a friend, where love is more sincere and more chaste? What is loved in a friend: the soul, or the body? If faithfulness is loved, the soul is loved: if goodwill is loved, the seat of goodwill is the soul: if you love this in another, that he himself also loves you, you love the soul; for it is not the flesh, but the soul that loves. For you love him for this reason, that he loves you: seek whence he loves you, and see what you love. Therefore it is loved more, and it is not seen.

3. I wish also to say something by which it may appear more clearly to Your Charity how much the soul is loved, and how it is preferred to the body. Those very wanton lovers, who are delighted by the beauty of bodies and are inflamed by the shapeliness of limbs, love more when they are loved. For if one loves and perceives that he is held in hatred, he is more angry than loving. Why is he more angry than loving? Because what he spends is not returned to him. If therefore the very lovers of bodies wish to be loved in return, and this delights them more, if they are loved, what sort are the lovers of souls? And if the lovers of souls are great, what sort are the lovers of God, Who makes souls beautiful? For as the soul makes the comeliness in the body, so God in the soul. For nothing makes for the body that whereby it is loved except the soul: and when it has departed, you shudder at the corpse; and however much you have loved those beautiful limbs, you hasten to bury them. The comeliness of the body, then, is the soul: the comeliness of the soul, God.

4. The Lord therefore cries out that we should come and drink, if we thirst within; and He says that when we have drunk, rivers of living water will flow from our belly. The belly of the interior man is the conscience of the heart. When this liquid, then, has been drunk, the cleansed conscience comes to life; and drawing it up, it will have a fountain; indeed it will itself be a fountain. What is the fountain, and what is the river that flows from the belly of the interior man? Goodwill, by which one wishes to take care of his neighbour. For if he thinks that what he drinks ought to suffice for himself alone, living water does not flow from his belly: but if he hastens to take care of his neighbour, for this reason he does not run dry, because he flows. We shall see now what it is that they drink who believe in the Lord; for we are certainly Christians, and if we believe, we drink. And each one ought to recognize in himself whether he drinks, and whether he lives from what he drinks: for

the fountain does not desert us, if we do not desert the fountain.

5. The evangelist explained, as I said, from what cause the Lord had cried out, to what sort of drink He had invited, what He had offered to those who drink, saying, But this He said of the Spirit whom those who believed in Him were to receive. For the Spirit had not yet been given, because Jesus had not yet been glorified. What Spirit does he mean, if not the Holy Spirit? For each man has in himself his own spirit, of which I was speaking when I was commending the mind to you. For the mind of each man is his own spirit: of which the apostle Paul says, For who among men knows the things that are of a man, except the spirit of the man, which is in him? then he added, So also the things that are of God no one knows, except the Spirit of God (1 Cor. 2:11). Our things no one knows except our spirit. For I do not know what you are thinking, nor you what I am thinking: for the things we think inwardly are our very own; and of each man's thoughts his own spirit is the witness. So also the things that are of God no one knows, except the Spirit of God. We with our spirit, God with His: yet in such a way that God with His Spirit knows also what goes on in us; but we without His Spirit cannot know what goes on in God. And God knows in us even what we ourselves do not know in us. For Peter did not know his own weakness when he heard from the Lord that he would deny Him three times (Matt. 26:33–35), and the sick man was ignorant of himself; the physician knew the sick man. There are therefore certain things which God knows in us while we do not know them. Yet as far as men are concerned, no one knows [a man] as the man himself knows himself: another does not know what goes on in him, but his spirit knows. But when we have received the Spirit of God, we learn also what goes on in God: not the whole, because we have not received the whole. From the pledge we know many things: for we have received a pledge, and the fullness of this pledge will be given afterwards. Meanwhile in this pilgrimage let the pledge console us, because He who has deigned to give us a pledge is very ready to give much. If such is the earnest, what is that of which it is the earnest?

6. But what is it that he says, For the Spirit had not been given, because Jesus had not yet been glorified? The meaning is plain. For it is not that the Spirit of God, who was with God, did not exist; but He was not yet in those who had believed in Jesus. For the Lord Jesus so arranged it as not to give them this Spirit of whom we are speaking except after His resurrection; and this not without cause. And perhaps if we seek, He will grant that we find; and if we knock, He will open that we may enter. It is piety that knocks, not the hand: although the hand too knocks, if the hand does not cease from works of mercy. What then is the cause why the Lord Jesus Christ determined to give the Holy Spirit only when He had been glorified? Before we say this, as far as we can, it must first be asked, lest it perhaps trouble someone, how the Spirit was not yet in holy men, when it is read in the Gospel concerning the Lord Himself, newly born, that Simeon recognized Him in the Holy Spirit, that Anna too, the widow and prophetess, recognized Him (Luke 2:25–38); that John himself, who baptized Him, recognized Him (John 1:26–34): Zechariah, filled with the Holy Spirit, said many things (Luke 1:67–79); Mary herself, so as to conceive the Lord, the Holy Spirit

received (Luke 1:35). We have, therefore, many signs of the Holy Spirit going before, before the Lord was glorified by the resurrection of His flesh. For the Prophets too, who foretold that Christ would come, had no other spirit. But there was to be a certain manner of this giving which had never appeared before: it is of this that it is spoken here. For nowhere do we read before that men gathered together, on receiving the Holy Spirit, spoke in the tongues of all nations. But after His resurrection, when He first appeared to His disciples, He said to them: Receive the Holy Spirit. Of this, therefore, it was said: The Spirit had not been given, because Jesus had not yet been glorified. And He breathed upon their face (John 20:22), He Who by breath first gave life to man and raised him up from the clay, by which breath He gave a soul to the limbs (Gen. 2:7); signifying that He was the One Who breathed upon their face, that they might rise up from the mud and renounce muddy works. Then first, after His resurrection, which the Evangelist calls glorification, the Lord gave the Holy Spirit to His disciples. Then, having stayed with them forty days, as the book of the Acts of the Apostles shows, while they themselves watched and escorted Him with their gaze, He ascended into heaven (Acts 1:3 and 9). There, ten days having passed, on the day of Pentecost He sent the Holy Spirit from above. And when He had been received, as I said, those who had been gathered together in one place were filled, and spoke in the tongues of all nations (ibid. 2:1–6).

7. What then, brethren? Because one who is now baptized in Christ and believes in Christ does not speak in the tongues of all nations, is he not to be believed to have received the Holy Spirit? God forbid that our heart should be tempted by such faithlessness. We are certain that every man receives: but as much as the vessel of faith he has brought to the font, so much does it fill. Since, then, He is received even now, someone may say, why does no one speak in the tongues of all nations? Because the Church herself now speaks in the tongues of all nations. Formerly the Church was in one nation, where it spoke in the tongues of all. By speaking in the tongues of all, it signified what was to come: that by growing throughout the nations it would speak in the tongues of all. He who is not in this Church does not receive the Holy Spirit even now. For cut off and divided from the unity of the members, which unity speaks in the tongues of all, let him declare it to himself: he does not have it. For if he has it, let him give the sign that was given then. What does "let him give the sign that was given then" mean? Let him speak in all tongues. He answers me: What then, do you speak in all tongues? I do indeed speak, because every tongue is mine, that is, of that body of which I am a member. The Church, spread throughout the nations, speaks in all tongues; the Church is the body of Christ, in this body you are a member: since, then, you are a member of that body which speaks in all tongues, believe that you speak in all tongues. For the unity of the members is in concord through charity; and that unity speaks as one man spoke then.

8. We too, then, receive the Holy Spirit, if we love the Church, if we are joined together by charity, if we rejoice in the catholic name and faith. Let us believe, brethren;

as much as each one loves the Church of Christ, so much does he have the Holy Spirit. For the Spirit is given, as the Apostle says, for manifestation. What manifestation? As the same man says, For to one is given through the Spirit the word of wisdom, to another the word of knowledge according to the same Spirit, to another faith in the same Spirit, to another the gift of healings in the one Spirit, to another the working of mighty deeds in the same Spirit. For many things are given for manifestation, but you perhaps have none at all of the things I have mentioned. If you love, you do not have nothing: for if you love unity, whoever has anything in it has it for you too. Take away envy, and what I have is yours; let me take away envy, and what you have is mine. Envy separates, soundness joins. The eye alone sees in the body; but does the eye see for itself alone? It sees for the hand, and it sees for the foot, and it sees for the other members: for if some blow comes at the foot, the eye does not turn away from it so as not to give warning. Again, the hand alone works in the body; but does it work for itself alone? It works for the eye too: for if some blow comes, not at the hand but only at the face, does the hand say, I do not move, because it is not aimed at me? So the foot by walking serves all the members: the other members are silent, and the tongue speaks for all. We have the Holy Spirit, therefore, if we love the Church; and we love it if we stand firm within its bond and charity. For the Apostle himself, when he had said that diverse gifts are given to diverse men, as the offices of the several members, says, Yet I show you a still more excellent way; and he began to speak of charity. He set it above the tongues of men and of angels, set it above the miracles of faith, set it above knowledge and prophecy, set it even above that great work of mercy by which each one distributes what he possesses to the poor; and finally he set it even above the suffering of the body: above all these things, so great, he set charity (1 Cor. 12:7–13:3). Have it, and you will have all things: for without it nothing will profit, whatever you may be able to have. And since the charity of which we are speaking pertains to the Holy Spirit (for it is the question of the Holy Spirit that is now being treated in the Gospel), hear the Apostle saying, The charity of God is poured out in our hearts through the Holy Spirit, Who has been given to us (Rom. 5:5).

9. Why then did the Lord will to give the Spirit, Whose greatest benefits are in us, since the charity of God is poured out in our hearts through Him, after His resurrection? What did He signify? That in our resurrection our charity may blaze, and may separate [us] from the love of the world, so that it may run wholly towards God. For here we are born and die; let us not love this: let us depart by charity, let us dwell above by charity, by that charity with which we love God. Let us meditate on nothing else in this pilgrimage of our life but that we shall not always be here, and that by living well we shall prepare for ourselves a place there whence we shall never depart. For our Lord Jesus Christ, after He rose again, now dies no more; death, as the Apostle says, shall no longer have dominion over Him (Rom. 6:9). Behold what we should love. If we live,