Augustinus, In Joannis Evangelium tractatus XXXVI-XLV

have you grasped? If, then, you do not grasp it, faith sets you free. Therefore the Lord too did not say, Unless you grasp that I am; but He said what they were able to do, Unless you believe that I am, you will die in your sins.

11. And they, always minding earthly things and always hearing and answering according to the flesh, what did they say to Him? Who are you? For when you said, Unless you believe that I am, you did not add what you were. Who are you, that we may believe? And He: The Beginning. Behold what it is to be. The Beginning cannot be changed: the Beginning remains in itself and renews all things; the Beginning is He to Whom it was said, But Thou art the selfsame, and Thy years shall not fail (Ps. 101:28). The Beginning, He says, because I also speak to you. Believe Me to be the Beginning, lest you die in your sins. For as though in what they said, Who are you? they had said nothing other than, What are we to believe you to be? He answered, The Beginning; that is, Believe Me to be the Beginning. For in the Greek tongue a distinction is made which cannot be made in Latin. For among the Greeks principium (beginning) is of the feminine gender, just as with us lex (law) is of the feminine gender, which with them is masculine; just as sapientia (wisdom) is of the feminine gender both with us and with them. The custom of speech therefore varies the genders of words across different languages, because in the things themselves you do not find sex. For wisdom is not truly a woman, since Christ is the Wisdom of God (1 Cor. 1:24), and Christ is named in the masculine gender, wisdom in the feminine. When, therefore, the Jews said, Who are you? He who knew that some there would believe, and that they had therefore said, Who are you? so as to know what they ought to believe Him to be, answered, The Beginning: not as if He were saying, I am the Beginning; but as if He were saying, Believe Me to be the Beginning. This, as I said, is plainly apparent in the Greek language, where principium is of the feminine gender. It is as if He wished to say that He was the truth, and to those saying, Who are you? He were to answer, The truth [in the accusative]; whereas it would seem that to what was said, Who are you? He ought to have answered, The truth [in the nominative], that is, I am the truth. But He answered more profoundly, since He saw that they had said, Who are you? as if they were saying, Since we have heard from you, Unless you believe that I am, what shall we believe you to be? To this He answered, The Beginning: as if He were saying, Believe Me to be the Beginning. And He added, because I also speak to you: that is, because, having been made lowly for your sakes, I have come down to these words. For if the Beginning, as it is, were so to remain with the Father that it did not take the form of a servant and speak as a man to men, how would they believe Him, since weak hearts could not hear the intelligible Word without a sensible voice? Therefore, He says, believe Me to be the Beginning; because, that you may believe, I not only am, but I also speak to you. But it is already a great deal to speak to you on this matter: so let it please Your Charity that we keep what remains, with His help, to be rendered tomorrow.

Tractate 39.

From what is written, I have many things to say about you

and to judge; as far as, And they did not recognize that He was calling God His Father. Chap. 8, vv. 26, 27.

1. The words of our Lord Jesus Christ which He had with the Jews, so moderating His speech that the blind should not see and the faithful should open their eyes, which have been read today from the holy Gospel, are these: The Jews therefore said, Who are you? Because the Lord had said above, Unless you believe that I am, you will die in your sins (John 8:25, 24). To this, then, they said, Who are you? as if seeking to know in whom they ought to believe, so that they should not die in their sin. He answered those who said, Who are you? and said, The beginning, because I also speak to you. If the Lord said that He is the beginning, it may be asked whether the Father too is the beginning. For if the Son, who has a Father, is the beginning, how much more easily is God the Father to be understood to be the beginning, who has indeed a Son to whom He is Father, but does not have one from whom He is? For the Son is the Son of the Father, and the Father is certainly the Father of the Son; but the Son is called God from God, the Son is called light from light: the Father is called light, but not from light; the Father is called God, but not from God. If therefore God from God, light from light, is the beginning, how much more easily is the light from which the light is, and the God from whom God is, understood to be the beginning? It therefore seems absurd, dearly beloved, that we should call the Son the beginning and not call the Father the beginning.

2. But what shall we do? Will there be two beginnings? We must beware of saying this. What then? If both the Father is the beginning and the Son is the beginning, how are there not two beginnings? In the same way as we call the Father God and the Son God, and yet we do not speak of two gods. For it is wicked to speak of two gods, it is wicked to speak of three gods: and yet He who is the Father is not the Son; He who is the Son is not the Father; while the Holy Spirit, the Spirit of the Father and of the Son, is neither the Father nor the Son. Although, therefore, as catholic ears have been taught in the bosom of mother Church, neither is He who is the Father the Son, nor is He who is the Son the Father, nor is the Holy Spirit of the Father and the Son either the Son or the Father, yet we do not say that there are three gods: although if the question is asked about each one singly, it is necessary that, about whichever of them we have been asked, we confess that He is God.

3. And these things seem absurd to men who drag the customary to the uncustomary, the visible to the invisible, comparing the creature to the Creator. For unbelievers sometimes question us and say: The Father whom you speak of, do you call Him God? We answer: God. The Son whom you speak of, do you call Him God? We answer: God. The Holy Spirit whom you speak of, do you call Him God? We answer: God. Then, they say, are the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit three gods? We answer: No. They are troubled, because they are not enlightened: they have a closed heart, because they do not have the key of faith. Let us therefore, brothers, with faith going before, which heals the eye of our heart, grasp without obscurity what we understand; what we do not understand, let us believe without doubting: let us not withdraw from the foundation of faith, so that we may come to the summit of perfection. The Father is God, the Son is God, the Holy Spirit is God: and yet the Father is not He who is the Son, nor is the Son He who is the Father, nor is the Holy Spirit, the Spirit of the Father and of the Son, either the Father

or the Son. The Trinity is one God: the Trinity, one eternity, one power, one majesty; three, but not gods. Let no slanderer answer me: What three, then? For if three, he says, you must say what three. I answer: the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. See, he says, you have said three; but state what three. No, you count: for I complete the three when I say, the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. For that which the Father is in relation to Himself, He is God; that which He is in relation to the Son, He is Father: that which the Son is in relation to Himself, He is God; that which He is in relation to the Father, He is Son.

4. These things that I say you can recognize from everyday likenesses. A man and another man, if the one is father and the other son: that he is a man, is in relation to himself; that he is a father, is in relation to the son: and the son, that he is a man, is in relation to himself; but that he is a son, is in relation to the father. For "father" is a name said in relation to something, and "son" in relation to something: but these are two men. But the Father, God, is Father in relation to something, that is, to the Son; and the Son, God, is Son in relation to something, that is, to the Father: but not as those are two men, so are these two gods. Why is it not so there? Because that is one thing, but this is another: because that is divinity. There is something ineffable there, which cannot be unfolded in words, such that there both is number and is not number. For see whether there does not, as it were, appear a number: the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, a Trinity. If three, what three? Number fails. Thus God neither withdraws from number nor is grasped by number. Because they are three, it is as though there is number: if you ask what three, there is no number. Hence it is said, Great is our Lord, and great is His power, and of His wisdom there is no number (Ps. 146:5). When you have begun to think, you begin to count: when you have counted, you cannot answer what you have counted. The Father is the Father; the Son is the Son; the Holy Spirit is the Holy Spirit: what are these three, the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit? Are they not three gods? No. Not three almighties? No. Not three creators of the world? No. Is the Father, then, almighty? Plainly almighty. Then is the Son not almighty? Plainly the Son too is almighty? Then is the Holy Spirit not almighty? He too is almighty. Three almighties, then? No; but one Almighty. They suggest number only in this, that they are in relation to one another, not in what they are in relation to themselves. For because God the Father in relation to Himself is God together with the Son and the Holy Spirit, they are not three gods; because in relation to Himself He is almighty together with the Son and the Holy Spirit, they are not three almighties: but because the Father is Father not in relation to Himself but in relation to the Son, nor is the Son Son in relation to Himself but in relation to the Father, nor is the Spirit [Spirit] in relation to Himself, in that He is called the Spirit of the Father and of the Son, there is nothing I may call three except the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, one God, one Almighty. Therefore one beginning.

5. Receive something from the holy Scriptures, by which you may in some fashion grasp what is being said. After our Lord Jesus Christ had risen again, and when He willed had ascended into heaven, when ten days had been completed there He sent the Holy Spirit from there: filled with Whom, those who were present in

in one room, began to speak in the tongues of all nations. Terrified by the miracle, the Lord's slayers were pierced to the heart and grieved; grieving, they were changed; changed, they believed: there were added to the body of the Lord, that is, to the number of the faithful, three thousand men. Likewise, when a certain other miracle had been performed, another five thousand were added; there came to be one people, and not a small one: in which all, having received the Holy Spirit, by Whom spiritual love was kindled, being brought into one by that very charity and fervour of spirit, began in the very unity of their fellowship to sell all that they had, and to lay the prices at the feet of the Apostles, so that it might be distributed to each one, as each had need. And of them Scripture says that they had one soul and one heart towards God (Acts 2-4). Consider then, brothers, and from this recognize the mystery of the Trinity, how we say: both the Father is, and the Son is, and the Holy Spirit is, and yet there is one God. Behold, they were so many thousands, and the heart was one; behold, they were so many thousands, and the soul was one. But where? In God. How much more God Himself? Do I err in my words when I say two men, two souls, or three men, three souls, or many men, many souls? Surely I speak rightly. Let them draw near to God, and there is one soul of all. If, in drawing near to God, many souls through charity are one soul, and many hearts one heart, what does the very fount of charity do in the Father and the Son? Is not the Trinity there all the more one God? For it is from there that charity comes to us, from the Holy Spirit Himself, as the Apostle says: The charity of God is poured out in our hearts through the Holy Spirit Who has been given to us (Rom. 5:5). If then the charity of God, poured out in our hearts through the Holy Spirit Who has been given to us, makes many souls one soul and makes many hearts one heart, how much more are the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit one God, one light, and one beginning?

6. Let us hear, then, the Beginning Who speaks to us. I have many things, He says, to say about you and to judge. You remember that He said, I judge no one (John 8:15): behold, now He says, I have many things to say about you and to judge. But it is one thing to say, I do not judge; another, I have to judge. I do not judge, He said, for the present; for He had come to save the world, not to judge the world (ibid. 12:47): but when He says, I have many things to say about you and to judge, He speaks of the judgement to come. For this is why He ascended, that He may come to judge the living and the dead. No one will judge more justly than He Who was unjustly judged. I have many things, He says, to say about you and to judge: but He Who sent Me is truthful. See how the equal Son gives glory to the Father. For He offers us an example, and speaks as it were in our hearts: O faithful man, if you hear My Gospel, the Lord your God says to you, I, Who in the beginning am the Word, God with God, equal to the Father, coeternal with Him Who begets, give glory to Him Whose Son I am; how are you proud against Him Whose servant you are?

7. I have many things, He says, to say about you and to judge: but He Who sent Me is truthful: as if He were saying, I judge truly for this reason, that I, the Son of the truthful One, am the Truth. The Father truthful, the Son the Truth: which do we think is the greater? Let

us consider, if we can, which is greater, the truthful or truth. Let us inquire about certain things. Is a pious man greater, or piety? But piety itself is greater: for the pious man is from piety, not piety from the pious man. For piety can exist, even if he who was pious has become impious. He has lost piety; from piety he has taken nothing away. What, again, of the beautiful man and beauty? Beauty is greater than the beautiful man: for beauty makes the beautiful man, the beautiful man does not make beauty? The chaste man and chastity? Chastity is plainly greater than the chaste man. For if chastity did not exist, this chaste man would not have whence to be chaste: but if he should be unwilling to be chaste, chastity continues intact. If therefore piety is greater than the pious man, beauty greater than the beautiful man, chastity greater than the chaste man, are we going to say that truth is greater than the truthful? If we say this, we shall begin to say that the Son is greater than the Father. For the Lord Himself says most plainly: I am the way and the truth, and the life (John 14:6). Therefore if the Son is the truth, what is the Father, except what the Truth itself says: He Who sent Me is truthful? The Son is truth, the Father is truthful: I ask which is greater, but I find equality. For the Father is truthful not from that truth of which He took a part, but from that which He begot whole.

8. I see that it must be said more plainly. And indeed, so as not to keep you long, let the treatment go thus far today: when I have finished what I wish to say, with God's help, let the sermon be closed. I have said this so that I might make you attentive. Every soul, since it is a mutable thing, and though a great creature, yet a creature; though better than the body, yet made: every soul, then, since it is mutable, that is, now believes, now does not believe; now wills, now does not will; now is adulterous, now chaste; now good, now bad; is mutable: but God is that which He is; therefore He kept for Himself His proper name, I am Who am (Exod. 3:14). This is what the Son is, in saying, Unless you believe that I am: to this pertains also, Who are You? The Beginning (John 8:24–25). God therefore is unchangeable, the soul changeable. When the soul receives from God that whereby it may be good, it becomes good by participating: just as your eye sees by participating. For when the light is withdrawn it does not see, the light by becoming a participant of which it sees. Since therefore the soul becomes good by participating, if, being changed, it begins to be bad, the goodness remains of which, when good, it was a participant. For it was made a participant of a certain goodness when it was good; when it is changed for the worse, the goodness remains intact. If the soul withdraws and becomes bad, goodness is not diminished; if it returns and becomes good, goodness does not increase. Your eye has been made a participant of this light, and you see: is it closed? you have not diminished this light: is it open? you have not increased this light. With this likeness given, brethren, understand that if the soul is pious, there is piety with God, of which the soul becomes a participant; if the soul is chaste, there is chastity with God, of which the soul is a participant; if the soul is good, there is goodness with God, of which the soul is a participant; if the soul is truthful, there is truth with God, of which the soul is a participant. If the soul is not a participant of this, every man is a liar (Ps. 115:11): if every man is a liar, no man is truthful of his own. But the Father, truthful, is truthful of His own; because He begot the Truth. It is another thing [to say], This man is truthful, because