Augustinus, In Joannis Evangelium tractatus LXXXV-CII

were persecutors of the godly, they surely also punished murderers, and adulterers, and whatever evildoers they found to have acted against the public laws; how then is what the Lord says to be understood, If you were of the world, the world would love what was its own (John 15:19)? For the world does not love those whom it punishes, by which we see the kinds of crime mentioned above generally punished: unless it is because the world is in those by whom such crimes are punished, and the world is in those by whom such crimes are loved. So that world which is understood in the wicked and ungodly both hates what is its own, in that part of men by which it harms the criminals; and loves what is its own, in that part of men by which it favours those very same partners in crime. Therefore, All these things they will do to you for My name's sake, was said either thus, on account of that for which you suffer; or thus, on account of that for which they themselves also act: because they hate this too in you while they persecute you. And He added: Because they do not know Him Who sent Me. This is to be understood as said according to that knowledge of which it is also written elsewhere, But to know Thee is perfect understanding (Wis. 6:16). For those who with this knowledge know the Father by Whom Christ was sent in no way persecute those whom Christ gathers; because they themselves too are gathered together with them by Christ.

Tractate 89. On what the Lord says, If I had not come and spoken to them; as far as this, He who hates Me hates My Father also. Chap. 15, vv. 22, 23.

1. Earlier the Lord had said to His disciples: If they have persecuted Me, they will persecute you also; if they have kept My word, they will keep yours also: but all these things they will do to you for My name's sake, because they do not know Him Who sent Me. But if we ask of whom He said this, we find that He came to these words from what He had said, If the world hates you, know that it has held Me in hatred before you: but now, by what He added, If I had not come and spoken to them, they would not have sin, He points out the Jews more expressly. Of them, therefore, He was saying those things too; for the very connection of the words shows this. For He says, If I had not come and spoken to them, they would not have sin, of those of whom He was saying, If they have persecuted Me, they will persecute you also; if they have kept My word, they will keep yours also: but all these things they will do to you for My name's sake, because they do not know Him Who sent Me: for to these words He also joins these, If I had not come and spoken to them, they would not have sin. The Jews, therefore, persecuted Christ, as the Gospel most evidently shows; to the Jews Christ spoke, not to other nations: in them, therefore, He wished the world to be understood which hates Christ and His disciples; nay rather, not in them alone, but He showed that these too belong to the same world. What then is, If I had not come and spoken to them, they would not have sin? Were the Jews without sin before Christ came to them in the flesh? Who, even the most foolish, would say this? But He wishes a certain great sin, not every sin, to be understood as if under a general name. For this is the sin by which all sins are held, which

each one, if he does not have it, all his sins are forgiven him: and this is that they did not believe in Christ, Who came for this very reason, that He might be believed in. This sin, had He not come, they would certainly not have. For His coming, as much as it was saving for those who believe, so much did it become deadly for those who do not believe: as though He Himself, the head and prince of the Apostles, proved to be what they said of themselves, to some indeed the odour of life unto life, but to others the odour of death unto death (2 Cor. 2:16).

2. But what He added, saying, But now they have no excuse for their sin, may move those who inquire whether those to whom Christ has not come, nor spoken to them, have an excuse for their sin. For if they do not have one, why is it said here that these do not have one for the reason that He came and spoke to them? But if they do have one, do they have it to this end, that they be freed from punishments, or that they be punished more mildly? To these questions I answer according to my capacity, the Lord granting it, that they have an excuse, not for every sin of theirs, but for this sin by which they did not believe in Christ, those to whom He did not come and to whom He did not speak. But those are not in that number to whom He came in His disciples, and to whom He spoke through His disciples, which He is also doing now: for through His Church He has come to the Gentiles, and through His Church He speaks to the Gentiles. For to this pertains what He says, He who receives you receives Me (Matt. 10:40); and, He who despises you despises Me (Luke 10:16). Or do you wish, says the apostle Paul, to receive proof of Him Who speaks in me, Christ (2 Cor. 13:3)?

3. It remains to inquire whether those who, before Christ came to the Gentiles in the Church and before they heard His Gospel, were overtaken, or are being overtaken, by the end of this life, can have this excuse. They plainly can, but they cannot on that account escape condemnation. For whoever have sinned without the Law will also perish without the Law; and whoever have sinned in the Law will be judged by the Law (Rom. 2:12). These words of the Apostle indeed, since what he says, they will perish, sounds more terrible than what he says, they will be judged, seem to show not only that they do nothing to help this excuse, but even that they weigh it down further. For those who will excuse themselves because they have not heard will perish without the Law.

4. But whether those who, when they heard, despised it, or even resisted, not only by contradicting but also by persecuting with hatred those from whom they heard it, are to be counted among those of whom what was said, they will be judged by the Law, seems to have sounded something lighter, is rightly asked. But if it is one thing to perish without the Law and another to be judged by the Law, and the former is heavier, the latter lighter, beyond doubt these are not to be placed in this lighter punishment; for they did not sin in the Law, but utterly refused to receive the Law of Christ, and, as far as it concerned them, willed that it should not exist at all. But those sin in the Law who are in the Law, that is, who accept it and confess it holy, and the commandment holy and just and good (Rom. 7:12); but through weakness they do not fulfil what they cannot doubt is most rightly commanded by it. These are they who

can in some way perhaps be distinguished from the perdition of those who are without the Law: if, however, what the Apostle says, they will be judged by the Law, is to be taken as though he had said, they will not perish; which would be surprising if it is so. For his discourse was not about unbelievers and believers, so that he should say this, but about Gentiles and Jews: and both of these, unless they are saved in that Saviour Who came to seek what had been lost (Luke 19:10), will without doubt belong to perdition. Although it may be said that some will perish more grievously, others more lightly, that is, that some will suffer heavier, others lighter punishments in their perdition. For whoever is separated through punishment from that blessedness which God gives to His saints is said to perish to God: and the diversity of punishments is as great as the diversity of sins; and how this stands, divine wisdom judges more deeply than human conjecture investigates or declares. Certainly those to whom Christ came, and to whom He spoke, do not have, concerning the great sin of unbelief, that excuse by which they could say, We have not seen, we have not heard: whether that excuse would not be accepted by Him Whose judgements are inscrutable, or whether it would be accepted, if not so that they might be freed from all damnation, then certainly so that they might be damned somewhat more leniently.

5. He who hates Me, He says, hates My Father also. Here it may perhaps be said to us: Who can hate one whom he does not know? And indeed, before He said, If I had not come and spoken to them, they would not have sin, He had said to His disciples, These things they will do to you, because they do not know Him Who sent Me. How then do they not know and yet hate? For if they think not what He Himself is, but something or other else about Him, then they are found to hate not Him Himself, but that which they invent, or rather suspect through erring. And yet, unless men could hate what they do not know, the Truth would not have said both things, namely that they both do not know and hate His Father. But how this can come about, if with the Lord's help it can be shown by us, cannot be shown now, because this discussion must now be closed.

Tractate 90. On the words, He who hates Me, hates My Father also. Chapter 15, verse 23.

1. You have heard the Lord saying, He who hates Me, hates My Father also; He Who had said above, These things they will do to you, because they do not know Him Who sent Me. Thus there arises a question that must not be passed over, how they can hate one whom they do not know. For if they suspect or believe God to be not what He Himself is, but something or other else, and hate this, then certainly they do not hate Him Himself, but what they conceive by their own lying suspicion or vain credulity: but if they think of Him that which He is, how are they said not to know Him? And indeed with regard to men it can happen that we often love those whom we have never seen; and for this reason the converse is not impossible either, that we should hate those whom we have never seen. For when report speaks of someone, whether well or ill, it comes about not undeservedly that we love or hate one unknown. But if the report is truthful, how is he of whom we have learnt true things to be called unknown? Is it because we have not seen his face? Yet since he himself does not see it either, to no one, however,

can he be better known than to himself. Therefore the knowledge of each person is not conveyed to us in his bodily face. Rather, he lies open to our knowledge when his character and life are not hidden. Otherwise no one could know even himself, since he cannot see his own face. But surely he knows himself so much more certainly than he is known to others, as he can more certainly see with his inward sight what he thinks, see what he desires, see how he lives: and when these things are disclosed to us also, then he truly becomes known to us. Since, then, these things are mostly brought to us concerning those who are absent or even dead, whether by report or by writings, hence it happens that we often either hate or love men whom we have never seen in bodily face (yet not men whom we do not know at all).

2. But often our credulity is deceived in their regard, because sometimes history, and much more often report, tells lies. It concerns us, however, not to be deceived by a pernicious opinion, so that, since we cannot search out the conscience of men, we may hold a true and certain judgement about the things themselves. That is, if we do not know whether this or that man is unchaste or chaste, let us nevertheless hate unchastity and love chastity; and if we do not know whether this or that man is unjust or just, let us nevertheless love justice and detest injustice; not such as we ourselves invent for ourselves by erring, but such as we faithfully behold in the truth of God, the one to be sought, the other to be shunned: so that, when concerning the things themselves we seek what is to be sought and shun what is to be shunned, we may be pardoned for sometimes, nay constantly, thinking untrue things about the hidden matters of men. For this I judge to belong to human temptation, without which this life cannot be led, so that the Apostle said, Let no temptation seize you but what is human (1 Cor. 10:13). For what is so human as to be unable to look into the human heart, and therefore not to search out its hiding places, but often to suspect something other than what is going on there? And yet even in these darknesses of human things, that is, of the thoughts of others, although we cannot understand suspicions, because we are men, we ought nevertheless to restrain judgements, that is, definite and firm verdicts, and not to judge anything before the time, until the Lord comes and lights up the hidden things of darkness and makes manifest the thoughts of the heart; and then each one will have praise from God (ibid. 4:5). When, therefore, there is no error about things, so that the disapproval of vices and the approval of virtues is right, then surely, if there is error about men, human temptation is pardonable.

3. Through these darknesses of human hearts, however, a thing much to be wondered at and much to be lamented comes about: that sometimes the man whom we think unjust, while yet he is just and we love the justice in him without knowing it, we shun, turn away from, bar from approaching us, and refuse to share life and table with him; and even, if the need to impose discipline compels, whether so that he may not harm others or so that he himself may become more upright, we pursue him with wholesome severity; and we afflict a good man as if he were bad, whom we love without knowing it. This happens if someone, for example,