Augustinus, In Joannis Evangelium tractatus CIII-CXVI

us before the foundation of the world, and then predestined what He was going to do at the end of the world.

5. "Righteous Father," He says, "the world has not known Thee." Because Thou art righteous, therefore it has not known Thee. For that world, predestined to damnation, deservedly has not known; but the world which He reconciled to Himself through Christ has known, not by merit but by grace. For what is it to know Him, but eternal life? which He certainly did not give to the damned world, but gave to the reconciled one. Therefore, then, the world has not known, because Thou art righteous, and Thou hast assigned to its merits that it should not know; and therefore the reconciled world has known, because Thou art merciful, and Thou hast come to its aid that it might know, not by its merit but by grace. Then follows, "But I have known Thee." He Himself is the fountain of grace, God by nature, but man by ineffable grace, of the Holy Spirit and the Virgin; then, on His account, because the grace of God is through Jesus Christ our Lord, "And these," He says, "have known that Thou hast sent Me." This is the reconciled world. But because Thou hast sent Me, therefore they have known; therefore they have known by grace.

6. "And I have made known to them," He says, "Thy name, and I will make it known." I have made it known through faith, I will make it known through sight; I have made it known to those on pilgrimage with an end, I will make it known to those reigning without end. "That the love," He says, "with which Thou hast loved Me may be in them, and I in them." It is not a customary expression, "the love which Thou hast loved Me may be in them, and I in them"; for in the customary way one would say, "the love with which Thou hast loved Me." It has indeed been translated from the Greek; but there are similar Latin expressions too, as we say, "He served a faithful service, he soldiered a vigorous soldiering," when it would seem that one ought to have said, "He served with faithful service, he soldiered with vigorous soldiering." Now of the same kind as this expression, "the love which Thou hast loved Me," is the one the Apostle too used, "I have contended the good contest" (2 Tim. 4:7): he does not say, "with the good contest," which would be said more customarily and as if more correctly. But how is the love with which the Father loved the Son in us also, unless because we are His members, and are loved in Him, when He is loved whole, that is, head and body? Therefore He added, "and I in them," as though He were saying, "since I also am in them." For in one way He is in us as in His temple; but in another way because we too are He Himself, since, in that He became man in order to be our head, we are His body. The Saviour's prayer is ended, the passion begins: therefore let this sermon also be ended, so that what He Himself shall have granted concerning the passion may be discussed in other sermons.

Tractate 112. On what follows, "When Jesus had said these things, He went out with His disciples," etc., as far as, "They seized Jesus, and bound Him." Chapter 18, verses 1-12.

1. When the great and lengthy discourse was finished which the Lord, being close to the shedding of His blood for us, held after supper with the disciples who were then with Him, with the prayer added which He addressed to the Father, John the evangelist next began His passion thus: "When Jesus had said these things, He went out with His disciples across the torrent Cedron, where there was a garden, into which

He Himself entered, and His disciples. And Judas also, who was betraying Him, knew the place; for Jesus had often met there with His disciples.» What he narrates, the Lord's entering the garden with His disciples, did not take place immediately when that prayer of His was finished, of whose words he says, When Jesus had said these things: rather, certain other things came in between, which, passed over by this [evangelist], are read in the other evangelists; just as in this one many things are found about which they likewise were silent in their narration. But how they all agree with one another, and how the truth that is brought forth by one is not contradicted by another, let whoever desires to know seek it not in these sermons but in other laborious writings; and let him learn those things not by standing and listening, but rather by sitting and reading, or by lending a most attentive ear and mind to one who reads. Yet let him believe, before he knows, whether he is able to know this too in this life or through some hindrances is not able, that nothing has been written by any evangelist, so far as concerns those whom the Church has received into canonical authority, which could be contrary to his own or another's no less truthful narration. Now therefore let us look at the narration of this blessed John, as we have undertaken to treat it, without comparison with the others, not lingering over those things that are plain; so that we may do this where there is need, as the matter requires. Let us not, then, take what he says, When Jesus had said these things, He went out with His disciples across the torrent Cedron, where there was a garden, into which He Himself entered and His disciples, as though He went into that garden immediately after those words: but let what was said, When Jesus had said these things, serve for this, that we should not suppose He entered before He had finished those words.

2. And Judas also, he says, who was betraying Him, knew the place. The order of the words is, He who was betraying Him knew the place. For Jesus, he says, had often met there with His disciples. There, then, the wolf covered with a sheep's skin, and tolerated among the sheep by the deep counsel of the Father of the household, learned where he might for a short time scatter the flock, by lying in wait to attack the shepherd. Judas then, he says, having received the cohort, and officers from the chief priests and the Pharisees, came there with lanterns and torches and weapons. The cohort was not of Jews but of soldiers. It is to be understood, therefore, as received from the governor, as though for seizing a criminal, with the order of lawful authority preserved, so that no one should dare to resist those seizing him; although so great a band had also been gathered, and came so armed, as either to terrify or even to fight back, if anyone should dare to defend Christ. For thus His power was hidden, and weakness was put forward, so that these things seemed necessary to His enemies against Him, against Whom nothing would have availed except what He Himself had willed; He, the Good, making good use of evil men, and making good things out of evil ones, for making good men out of evil ones and for separating the good from the evil.

3. «Jesus therefore,» as the Evangelist, following on, adds, «knowing all the things that were to come upon Him, went forward, and says to them: Whom are you seeking? They answered Him: Jesus of Nazareth. Jesus says to them: I am He. There was standing

also Judas, who was betraying Him, with them. When therefore He said to them, I am, they went backwards, and fell to the ground." Where now is the cohort of soldiers, and the servants of the chief men and of the Pharisees? where the terror and the defence of arms? Surely the one voice of Him saying, I am, without any weapon struck, drove back and laid low so great a crowd, fierce with hatred and terrible with arms. For God lay hidden in the flesh; and the everlasting day was so concealed in human limbs that it was sought with lanterns and torches by the darkness in order to be killed. I am, He says; and He casts down the ungodly. What will He do when about to judge, Who did this when about to be judged? What will He be able to do when about to reign, Who could do this when about to die? And now everywhere through the Gospel Christ says, I am; and by the Jews Antichrist is awaited, so that they go back again and fall to the ground, since, forsaking heavenly things, they desire earthly ones. Certainly the persecutors came with the traitor to seize Jesus; Him Whom they sought they found; they heard I am: why did they not seize Him, but went back and fell, unless because He willed this Who could do whatever He willed? Yet if He had never permitted Himself to be apprehended by them, they indeed would not have done that for which they had come, but neither would He have done that for which He had come. For they sought Him to kill Him by raging; but He too sought us by dying. Accordingly, since He has shown His power to those who wished to hold Him and were not able, let them now hold Him, that He may do His will through those who do not know it.

4. "Again therefore He asked them: Whom do you seek? And they said: Jesus of Nazareth. Jesus answered: I told you that I am. If therefore you seek Me, let these go away. That the word might be fulfilled which He spoke, Of those whom Thou gavest Me, I have not lost any of them. If," He says, "you seek Me, let these go away." He sees His enemies, and they do what He commands; they let those go away whom He does not will to perish. But were they not to die afterwards? Why then, if they had died at that time, would He have lost them, unless because they did not yet believe in Him in the way that all those believe who do not perish?

5. Simon Peter therefore, having a sword, drew it, and struck the servant of the chief of the priests, and cut off his right ear. Now the servant's name was Malchus. This evangelist alone has also stated the name of this servant: just as Luke alone [has stated] that the Lord touched his ear and healed him (Luke 22:51). Now Malchus is interpreted "about to reign". What then does the ear, cut off for the Lord and healed by the Lord, signify, unless the hearing renewed, its oldness cut away, so that it may be in newness of the spirit and not in the oldness of the letter (Rom. 7:6)? Who would doubt that he to whom this has been granted by Christ is to reign with Christ? And that he was found to be a servant, this too pertains to that oldness which brings forth into servitude, which is Hagar (Gal. 4:24). But when healing came, liberty also was prefigured. Yet the Lord disapproved of Peter's deed, and forbade him to go further, saying: Put the sword into the sheath. The cup which the Father has given Me, shall I not drink it? For in his own

deed that disciple wished to defend his Master; he did not think of what was to be signified. And so he had to be admonished to patience, and this had to be written down for [our] understanding. But as for His saying that the cup of the passion was given Him by the Father, that is surely what the Apostle says: If God is for us, who is against us? He Who did not spare His own Son, but handed Him over for us all (Rom. 8:31–32). Yet the author of this cup is also the very One Who drinks it. Hence the same apostle likewise says: Christ loved us, and handed Himself over for us as an offering and a sacrifice to God for an odour of sweetness (Eph. 5:2).

6. Then the cohort and the tribune and the officers of the Jews seized Jesus, and bound Him. They seized Him to Whom they did not draw near: for He was day, but they remained darkness; nor did they hear, Draw near to Him and be enlightened (Ps. 33:6). For if they drew near in that way, they would seize Him not with their hands to kill Him, but with their heart to receive Him. But now, when they seized Him in that manner, then they withdrew further from Him: and they bound Him by Whom they ought rather to have wished to be loosed. And perhaps there were among them some who then put their bonds upon Christ, and afterwards, set free by Him, said, Thou hast broken my bonds (Ps. 115:16). Let these things suffice for today; what follows will be treated, God willing, in another sermon.

Tractate 113.

From what is read, And they led Him to Annas first; as far as this, Peter therefore denied again, and immediately the cock crowed. Chap. 18, vv. 13-27 (John 18:13–27).

1. After the persecutors, with Judas handing Him over, had seized the Lord and bound Him, Who loved us and handed Himself over for us (Eph. 5:2), and Whom the Father did not spare, but handed Him over for us all (Rom. 8:32), so that Judas may be understood to be not praiseworthy for the usefulness of this handing over, but damnable for the will of his crime: They led Him, as John the evangelist narrates, to Annas first. Nor is he silent about the reason why it was done so: For he was, he says, the father-in-law of Caiaphas, who was high priest of that year. Now Caiaphas, he says, was the one who gave counsel to the Jews, That it is expedient that one man die for the people. Rightly too did Matthew, since he wished to narrate this more briefly, record that He was led to Caiaphas (Matt. 26:57); because He was also led first to Annas for this reason, that he was his father-in-law: whereby it is to be understood that this same Caiaphas wished it to be done.

2. Now Simon Peter, he says, was following Jesus, and another disciple. Who this disciple may be is not to be rashly affirmed, since it is passed over in silence. Now the same John is accustomed to indicate himself thus, and to add, whom Jesus loved (John 13:23, and 19:26). Perhaps, then, this too is he: but whoever he may be, let us look at what follows. "Now that disciple," he says, "was known to the high priest, and went in with Jesus into the court of the high priest: but Peter was standing at the door outside. So the other disciple, who was known to the high priest, went out, and spoke to the portress, and brought Peter in. So the maidservant who was portress says to Peter: Are you also one of the disciples of this man? He says

he: I am not. » Behold, the firmest of pillars trembled through and through at the impulse of a single breath of air. Where is that boldness of the one who promised, and who was so greatly over-confident of himself? Where are those words of his, when he says, Why can I not follow Thee now? I will lay down my life for Thee (John 13:37)? Is this following the master, to deny that one is a disciple? Is it thus that a life is laid down for the Lord, that the voice of a maidservant is dreaded lest this should happen? But what wonder if God foretold what was true, while man presumed what was false? Certainly, in this denial of the apostle Peter which has now begun, we ought to notice that Christ is denied not only by him who says that He is not the Christ, but also by him who, though he is one, denies that he is a Christian. For the Lord did not say to Peter, You will deny that you are My disciple; but, You will deny Me (Matt. 26:34). He therefore denied Him when he denied that he was His disciple. And what else did he do in this way but deny that he was a Christian? For although the disciples of Christ were not yet called by this name (for it was after His ascension that the disciples first began to be called Christians, at Antioch (Acts 11:26)), yet the thing itself, which was afterwards to be designated by that word, already existed; there already were disciples who were afterwards called Christians, and this common name, like their common faith, they handed on to those who came after them as well. He therefore who denied that he was a disciple of Christ denied the very thing whose name is to be called a Christian. How many afterwards, I do not say old men and old women, in whom weariness of this life could more easily despise death for the confession of Christ, nor only the youth of both sexes, of which age fortitude seems fittingly to be demanded, but even boys and girls were able to do it, and an innumerable company of holy martyrs entered the kingdom of heaven bravely and by force, which this man could not do at that time, he who received the keys of His kingdom (Matt. 16:19)? Behold why it was said, Let these go away, when He Who redeemed us by His blood handed Himself over for us: that the word which He spoke might be fulfilled, Of those whom Thou gavest Me I have not lost any. For certainly, if Peter had gone away from here having denied Christ, what else would he have done but perish?

3. Now the servants and attendants were standing at the coals, because it was cold, and were warming themselves. It was not winter, but it was cold nevertheless, which is apt to happen sometimes even at the spring equinox. « And Peter also was with them, standing and warming himself. The high priest then questioned Jesus about His disciples and about His teaching. Jesus answered him: I have spoken openly to the world; I have always taught in the synagogue and in the temple, where all the Jews come together, and in secret I have spoken nothing. Why do you question Me? Question those who heard what I spoke to them: behold, these know what I have said. » A question arises which must not be passed over: how the Lord Jesus said, I have spoken openly to the world, and above all what He says, In secret I have spoken nothing. Did He not, in this very more recent discourse which He spoke to the disciples after supper, say to them: These things I have spoken to you in proverbs; the hour is coming when no longer in proverbs

speak to you, but I will tell you openly of My Father (John 16:25)? If, then, He did not speak openly even to His more closely joined disciples themselves, but promised an hour when He would speak openly, how did He speak openly to the world? Next, to those very ones of His own, as the authority of the other evangelists also testifies, in comparison with those who were not His disciples, He certainly spoke far more plainly when He was with them alone, removed from the crowds: for then He also opened to them the parables which He put forth closed to others. What, then, is this, In secret I have said nothing? But it must be understood that He said, I have spoken openly to the world, as if He had said, Many have heard Me. Now this very openly was in a certain manner openly, and in a certain manner was not openly. It was openly indeed, because many heard; and again it was not openly, because they did not understand. And what He spoke to the disciples apart, He certainly did not speak in secret. For who speaks in secret who speaks in the presence of so many men, since it is written, In the mouth of two or three witnesses every word shall stand (Deut. 19:15), especially if he speaks to a few what he wishes to become known to many through them; as the Lord Himself said to those whom He as yet had few, What I say to you in darkness, speak in the light; and what you hear in the ear, preach upon the housetops (Matt. 10:27)? Therefore even this very thing which seemed to be said by Him secretly was in a certain way not said in secret: because it was not said in such a way that it should be kept silent by those to whom it had been said, but rather in such a way that it should be preached everywhere. So, then, something can be said both openly and at the same time not openly, or in secret and at the same time not in secret, in the way in which it was said, That seeing they may see, and not see (Mark 4:12). For how do they see, unless because [it is] openly, not in secret; and how do the same ones in turn not see, unless because [it is] not openly, but in secret? Yet those very things which they had heard and had not understood were such that they could not justly and truthfully bring a charge against Him from them: and as often as they tempted Him by questioning, so as to find something on which to accuse Him, He answered them in such a way that all their deceits were blunted and their slanders frustrated. Therefore He said, Why do you question Me? Question those who heard what I spoke to them: behold, these know what I said.

4. And when He had said these things, one of the attendants standing by gave Jesus a slap, saying: Answerest Thou the high priest so? Jesus answered him: If I have spoken evil, bear witness of the evil; but if well, why do you strike Me? What is truer, gentler, more just than this answer? For it is His of Whom the prophetic voice had gone before, Set out, and proceed prosperously, and reign; because of truth, and gentleness, and justice (Ps. 44:5). If we consider Who it was that received the slap, would we not wish that he who struck Him should either be consumed by fire from heaven, or swallowed up by the earth gaping open, or seized by a demon and rolled about, or be punished with some penalty of this kind, whatever it might be, or even a heavier one? For which of these could He through Whom the world was made not have commanded by His power, had He not preferred to teach us the patience by which the world is conquered? Here someone will say: Why did He not do what He Himself commanded (Matt. 5:39)? For to the one who strikes [He should] not

answer thus, but He ought to have offered the other cheek. What of the fact that He answered truly, gently and justly, and prepared not only the other cheek for the one who would strike again, but His whole body to be fastened on the wood? And by this He rather showed what had to be shown, namely that those great precepts of His concerning patience are to be fulfilled not by a display of the body but by a preparation of the heart. For it can happen that even an angry man visibly offers the other cheek. How much better, then, is it that one who is at peace both answers what is true and is made ready with a tranquil mind to endure heavier things? For blessed is he who, in all that he unjustly suffers for justice's sake, can truly say, My heart is ready, O God, my heart is ready: for from this comes what follows, I will sing and play psalms (Ps. 56:8); which Paul and Barnabas were able to do even in the harshest chains.

5. But let us return to what follows in the Gospel narrative. And Annas sent Him bound to Caiaphas the high priest. It was to him, as Matthew says, that He was being led from the beginning, since he was the chief of the priests for that year. For it is to be understood that both high priests, that is, chiefs of the priests, who at that time were Annas and Caiaphas, were accustomed to hold office in alternate years; these Luke the evangelist mentions when he relates at what time the Lord's forerunner John began to preach the kingdom of heaven and to gather disciples. For he says thus: Under the chiefs of the priests Annas and Caiaphas, the word of the Lord came upon John the son of Zachariah in the desert (Luke 3:2), and so on. Accordingly these two high priests held their years by turns; and it was the year of Caiaphas when Christ suffered. Therefore according to Matthew, when He had been seized, He was led to him; but according to John they came with Him first to Annas, not because he was his colleague, but because he was his father-in-law. And it is to be believed that this was done according to the will of Caiaphas, or else that their houses were so situated that Annas ought not to be passed by those going by.

6. But when the Evangelist had said that Annas sent Him bound to Caiaphas, he went back to the place in the narrative where he had left Peter, in order to set out what had happened in the house of Annas concerning his threefold denial. Now Simon Peter, he says, was standing and warming himself. He recapitulates this, which he had already said before; then he joins on what followed. They said therefore to him: Are you not also one of His disciples? He denied it, and said: I am not. He had already denied once; behold, a second time. Then, so that the third denial may be completed, One of the servants of the high priest, a kinsman of him whose ear Peter cut off, says: Did I not see you in the garden with Him? Peter therefore denied again, and at once the cock crowed. Behold, the prediction of the physician is fulfilled, the presumption of the sick man is refuted. For what this one had said, I will lay down my life for Thee, did not happen; but what that One had foretold happened, You will deny Me three times (John 13:38). But now that Peter's threefold denial is completed, let this sermon also now be completed, so that hereafter