Augustine, In Joannis Evangelium tractatus XXXV

TRACTATE 35.

1. Of the words of our Lord Jesus Christ, where He says, I am the light of the world: he who follows me shall not walk in darkness, but shall have the light of life (John 8:12), you who were present yesterday remember that it was long disputed; and if we should still wish to dispute concerning that light, we could speak long; for we cannot set it forth in brief. And so, my brothers, let us follow Christ the light of the world, lest we walk in darkness. Darkness is to be feared — of morals, not of the eyes: and if of the eyes, not the outer, but the inner, whereby is discerned not white and black, but just and unjust.

2. When therefore our Lord Jesus Christ had said this, the Jews answered: Thou bearest witness of Thyself; Thy testimony is not true. Before our Lord Jesus Christ came, He kindled and sent forth many prophetic lamps before Him. Among these was John the Baptist also, to whom the light itself, which is the Lord Christ, bore so great a testimony as to no other man: for He says, Among those born of women there has not arisen a greater than John the Baptist (Matt. 11:11). Yet this man, than whom none was greater among those born of women, says of the Lord Jesus Christ: I indeed baptize you in water; but He Who comes is stronger than I, Whose shoe I am not worthy to loose (John 1:26, 27). See how the lamp submits itself to the day. But that John himself was a lamp the Lord Himself testifies: He was, He says, a burning and shining lamp; and you were willing for an hour to exult in his light (John 5:35). But when the Jews said to the Lord, Tell us, by what power dost Thou these things? the Lord, knowing that they held John the Baptist to be great, and that he whom they held to be great had borne to them testimony concerning the Lord —

answered them: I also will ask you one thing: tell me, The baptism of John, whence is it? from heaven, or from men? They, troubled, reasoned within themselves, that if they said, From men, they might be stoned by the crowd, who believed John to be a prophet: if they said, From heaven, He would answer them, He whom you confess to have had prophecy from heaven has borne testimony to me, and from him you have heard by what power I do these things. They saw therefore that, whichever of these they answered, they would fall into a snare; and they said, We do not know. And the Lord said to them: Neither do I tell you by what power I do these things (Matt. 21:23–27). I do not tell you what I know, because you are unwilling to confess what you know. Most justly, at any rate, rebuffed, they went away confounded: and there was fulfilled what God the Father says in the Psalm through the Prophet, I have prepared a lamp for my Christ, that is, John himself; His enemies will I clothe with confusion (Ps. 131:17, 18).

3. The Lord Jesus Christ, then, had the testimony of the Prophets sent before Him, heralds going before the judge; He had the testimony of John: but He Himself was the greater testimony, which He bore to Himself. But they, with weak eyes, sought lamps, because they could not bear the day: for John himself, the same apostle whose Gospel we hold in our hands, says of John at the very head of his Gospel, «There was a man sent from God, whose name was John: this man came for a testimony, to bear witness of the light, that all might believe through him. He was not the light, but that he might bear witness of the light. It was the true light, which enlightens every man coming into the world.» If every, then John too. Whence John himself also says, Of His fullness we have all received (John 1:6–9, 16). Discern these things, then, that your mind may profit in the faith of Christ; lest you be always infants seeking the breast, and shrinking back from solid food. You ought to be nourished and weaned at the breast of our mother the holy Church of Christ, and to come on to more solid food, in mind, not in the stomach. Discern this, then: that the light which illumines is one thing, and that which is illumined another. For our eyes too are called lights; and each one so swears, touching his eyes, by his lights: So let my lights live: it is a customary oath. But if these lights are lights, let there be no light in your closed chamber, and let them lie open and shine for you: they assuredly cannot. As, then, these things which we have in the face, and call lights, both when they are sound and when they are open, need from without the help of light — which being taken away, or not brought in, they are sound, they are open, and yet do not see: so our mind, which is the eye of the soul, unless it be irradiated by the light of truth, and be wondrously lit up by Him Who illumines and is not illumined, will be able to attain neither to wisdom nor to justice. For this is our way, to live justly. But how shall he not stumble on the way, for whom no light shines? And on this account, on such a way it is needful to see, on such a way it is a great thing to see. For Tobias had his eyes closed in his face, and to his father the son

gave his hand; the father showed the way to the son by instructing him (Tob. 2:11; 4).

4. The Jews therefore answered, Thou bearest witness of Thyself; Thy testimony is not true. Let us see what they hear: let us also hear, but not as they did. They in contempt, we in belief: they wishing to kill Christ, we desiring to live through Christ. Let this difference, meanwhile, mark off our ears and our minds, and let us hear what the Lord answered the Jews. Jesus answered, and said to them: Even though I bear witness of myself, my testimony is true; for I know whence I came, and whither I go. Light shows both other things and itself. You light a lamp, for instance, that you may look for a tunic, and the burning lamp affords you the means of finding the tunic: do you light a lamp in order to see the burning lamp? For a burning lamp is fit both to lay bare other things which were covered by darkness, and to show itself to your eyes. So too the Lord Christ distinguished between His own faithful and His enemies the Jews, as it were between light and darkness; as it were between those whom He suffused with the ray of faith, and those whose closed eyes He wrapped about. For this sun too both illumines the face of the one who sees, and of the blind man: both standing alike, and having their faces to the sun, are illumined in the flesh, but not both are illumined in their sight; the one sees, the other does not see; to both the sun is present, but to the sun that is present one of them is absent. So too the Wisdom of God, the Word of God, the Lord Jesus Christ, is present everywhere; because everywhere is truth, everywhere is wisdom. One man understands justice in the east; another understands justice in the west: is the justice which the one understands one thing, and that which the other understands another? They are separated in body, and have the sight of their minds fixed on one thing. The justice which I see, set here, if it is justice, the just man sees it too, separated from me in the flesh by I know not how many stages, yet joined with me in the light of that justice. Light, then, bears witness to itself: it opens sound eyes, and is itself its own witness, that it may be known as light. But what shall we say of unbelievers? is it not present to them? It is present to them too: but they have not the eyes of the heart by which to see it. Hear concerning them the sentence pronounced from the Gospel itself: And the light shines in darkness, and the darkness did not comprehend it (John 1:5). The Lord, then, speaks, and speaks truly: Even though I bear witness of myself, my testimony is true; for I know whence I came, and whither I go. He wished the Father to be understood; the Son gave glory to the Father. Does He, His equal, glorify Him by Whom He was sent: how much more ought man to glorify Him by Whom he was created?

5. I know whence I came, and whither I go. He Who is now speaking to you has that which He did not leave, and yet He came: for in coming He did not depart from that place, nor in returning has He forsaken us. What do you marvel at? He is God. This cannot be done by man; this cannot be done even by the sun itself. When it proceeds to the west, it leaves the east, and until, about to rise, it returns to the east, it is not in the east: but our Lord Jesus Christ both comes, and is there; and returns, and is here. Hear the Evangelist himself saying in another place — and if you can, grasp it; if you cannot, believe it: No man, he says, has ever seen God, except the only-begotten

Son, Who is in the bosom of the Father, He has declared Him (John 1:18). He did not say, Was in the bosom of the Father, as though by coming He had left the bosom of the Father. Here He was speaking, and He said that He was there: and when He was about to depart from here also, what did He say? Behold, I am with you even to the consummation of the world (Matt. 28:20).

6. The testimony of the light, then, is true, whether it shows itself or other things; because without light you cannot see light, and without light you cannot see anything else whatever that is not light. If light is fit to show the things which are not lights, does it fail in its own case? does it not disclose itself, without which other things cannot lie open? The Prophet spoke what is true; but whence would he have had it, unless he drew it from the fountain of truth? John spoke what is true; but whence he spoke, ask him himself: We all, he says, have received of His fullness. Our Lord Jesus Christ, then, is fit to bear witness to Himself. But assuredly, my brothers, in the night of this world let us listen attentively to prophecy also: for now, to our frailty and to the inmost nocturnal darkness of our heart, our Lord has willed to come in lowliness. He came as a man to be despised and to be honoured, He came to be denied and to be confessed; to be despised and denied by the Jews, to be honoured and confessed by us: to be judged and to judge; to be judged unjustly, to judge justly. Such, then, He came, that it was needful for a lamp to bear witness to Him. For what need was there that John, as a lamp, should bear witness to the day, if the day itself could be seen by our weakness? But we could not: He became weak for the weak, by weakness He healed weakness; by mortal flesh He took away the death of the flesh; of His own body He made an eye-salve for our eyes. Because, then, the Lord has come, and we are still in the night of the world, it is needful that we hear the prophecies also.

7. For it is from prophecy that we refute the Pagans who contradict us. Who is Christ? says the Pagan. To whom we answer: He Whom the Prophets foretold. And he: What Prophets? We recite Isaiah, Daniel, Jeremiah, and other holy Prophets; we tell how long before Him they came, by how great a time they preceded His coming. This, then, we answer: The Prophets came before Him, they foretold that He would come. One of them answers: What Prophets? We recite those who are recited to us daily. And he: Who are these Prophets? We answer: Those who also foretold the things which we see come to pass. And he: You, he says, have made these things up for yourselves; you saw them come to pass, and, as though they had been foretold as things to come, you wrote them down in whatever books you pleased. Here, against our Pagan enemies, the testimony of other enemies comes to our aid. We produce the books from the Jews, and we answer: You and they alike, to be sure, are enemies of our faith. For this reason they have been scattered among the nations, that we may refute the one set of enemies out of the other. Let the book of Isaiah be produced by the Jews; let us see whether I do not read there, «As a sheep He was led to be sacrificed, and as a lamb before its shearer He was without voice, so He did not open His mouth. In humility His judgement was taken away; by His bruise we have been healed: we have all gone astray like sheep, and He Himself was delivered up for our sins» (Isa. 53:5–8).

Behold, one lamp. Let another be brought forward, let a Psalm be opened, and from it too let the foretold Passion of Christ be recited. «They pierced my hands and my feet, they numbered all my bones: but they looked and stared upon me, they parted my garments among them, and upon my vesture they cast lots. My praise shall be of Thee; in the great Church I will confess to Thee. All the ends of the earth shall remember, and shall be turned to the Lord: and all the kindreds of the nations shall worship in His sight; for the kingdom is the Lord's, and He shall have dominion over the nations» (Ps. 21:17–29). Let one enemy blush, that another enemy furnishes me with the book. But behold, from the books brought forward by one enemy I have conquered a second: and let not the very one who brought me the book be left aside; let it be brought forward from him too, whereby he himself may be overcome. I read another prophet, and I find the Lord speaking to the Jews: I have no pleasure in you, says the Lord, neither will I accept a sacrifice from your hands: for from the rising of the sun even to its going down, a clean sacrifice is offered to my name (Mal. 1:10, 11). You do not come, O Jew, to a clean sacrifice; I convict you of being unclean.

8. Behold, lamps too bear witness to the day, on account of our weakness, because we cannot bear and look upon the brightness of the day. For we ourselves also, Christians, are already light, in comparison, that is, with unbelievers; whence the Apostle says, For you were once darkness; but now light in the Lord: walk as sons of light (Eph. 5:8): and elsewhere he said, The night has gone before, but the day has drawn near: let us therefore cast off the works of darkness, and let us put on the arms of light; as in the day let us walk honestly (Rom. 13:12, 13). Yet because, in comparison with that light to which we are to come, even the day in which we are is still night, hear Peter the apostle: he says that a voice was borne to the Lord Christ from the magnificent power, Thou art my beloved Son, in Whom I was well pleased. This voice, he says, we heard borne from heaven, when we were with Him on the holy mount. But because we were not there, and did not then hear that voice from heaven, Peter himself says to us, And we have a surer prophetic word. You did not hear the voice borne from heaven, but you have a surer prophetic word. For the Lord Jesus Christ, foreseeing that certain impious men would come who would slander His miracles, attributing them to magic arts, sent the Prophets on before. For surely, if He was a magician, and by magic arts brought it about that He was worshipped even when dead, was He a magician before He was born? Hear the Prophets, O dead man, slanderous even as you turn to worms, hear the Prophets: I read them; hear those who came before the Lord. We have, says the apostle Peter, a surer prophetic word, to which you do well to attend, as to a lamp in a dark place, until the day dawn, and the day-star arise in your hearts (2 Pet. 1:17–19).

9. When therefore our Lord Jesus Christ shall have come, and, as the apostle Paul also says, shall have brought to light the hidden things of darkness, and made manifest the thoughts of the heart, so that each may have praise from God (1 Cor. 4:5);

then, with such a day present, lamps will not be necessary: the Prophet will not be read to us, the book of the Apostle will not be opened, we shall not seek the testimony of John, we shall not need the Gospel itself. Therefore all the Scriptures will be taken out of the way, which in the night of this world were kindled for us like lamps, so that we should not remain in darkness: all these being taken away, lest they should shine as it were for us in our need, and the very men of God through whom these things were ministered seeing with us that true and clear light, these aids then being removed, what shall we see? whence shall our mind be fed? whence shall that gaze rejoice? whence shall come that joy which neither eye has seen, nor ear heard, nor has it gone up into the heart of man (1 Cor. 2:9)? what shall we see? I beseech you, love with me, run with me by believing: let us long for the fatherland above, let us sigh for the fatherland above, let us feel that we are pilgrims here. What then shall we see? Let the Gospel say it now: In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and God was the Word (John 1:1). From where the dew was sprinkled upon you, to the fountain you shall come: from where a ray was sent to you, slantwise and by winding ways, into a darkened heart, the light itself you shall see bare, for the seeing and bearing of which you are being cleansed. Beloved, as I also recalled yesterday, John himself says, we are sons of God, and it has not yet appeared what we shall be: we know that when He shall appear, we shall be like Him, because we shall see Him as He is (1 John 3:2). I feel your affections being lifted up with me into the things above: but the body which is corrupted weighs down the soul; and the earthly dwelling presses down the mind that thinks many things (Wis. 9:15). I too am about to lay down this book, and you are about to depart, each to his own affairs. It has been good for us in the common light, we have rejoiced well, we have exulted well: but when we withdraw from one another, let us not withdraw from Him.