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1. In this discourse we purpose speaking, as He gives us grace, on
these words of the Lord which run thus: "I have manifested Thy name
unto the men whom Thou gavest me out of the world." If He said this
only of those disciples with whom He had supped, and to whom, before
beginning His prayer, He had said so much, it can have nothing to do
with that clarification, or, as others have translated it,
glorification, whereof He was previously speaking, and whereby the
Son clarifies or glorifies the Father. For what great glory, or
what like glory, was it to become known to twelve, or rather eleven
mortal creatures? But if, in saying, "I have manifested Thy name
unto the men whom Thou gavest me out of the world," He wished all to
be understood, even those who were still to believe on Him, as
belonging to His great Church which was yet to be made up of all
nations, and of which it is said in the psalm, "I will confess to
Thee in the great Church [congregation];" it is plainly that
glorification wherewith the Son glorifies the Father, when He makes
His name known to all nations and to so many generations of men. And
what He says here, "I have manifested Thy name unto the men whom
Thou gavest me out of the world," is similar to what He had said a
little before, "I have glorified Thee upon the earth" (vet.
4); putting both here and there the past for the future, as One who
knew that it was predestinated to be done, and therefore saying that
He had done what He had still to do, though without any uncertainty,
in the future.
2. But what follows makes it more credible that His words, "I
have manifested Thy name to the men whom Thou gavest me out of the
world," were spoken by Him of those who were already His disciples,
and not of all who were yet to believe on Him. For after these
words, He added: "Thine they were, and Thou gavest them me; and
they have kept Thy word. Now they have known that all things,
whatsoever Thou hast given me, are of Thee: for I have given unto
them the words which Thou gavest me; and they have received them, and
have known surely that I came out from Thee, and they have believed
that Thou didst send me." Although all these words also might have
been said of all believers still to come, when that which was now a
matter of hope had been turned into fact, inasmuch as they were words
that still pointed to the future; yet we are impelled the more to
understand Him as uttering them only of those who were at that time
His disciples, by what He says shortly afterwards: "While I was
with them, I kept them in Thy name: those that Thou gavest me I
have kept, and none of them is lost, but the son of perdition; that
the Scripture might be fulfilled" (ver. 12); meaning Judas,
who betrayed Him, for He was the only one of the apostolic twelve
that perished. And then He adds, "And now come I to Thee,"
from which it is manifest that it was of His own bodily presence that
He said, "While I was with them, I kept them," as if already
that presence were no longer with them. For in this way He wished to
intimate His own ascension as in the immediate future, when He said,
"And now come I to Thee:" going, that is, to the Father's
right hand; whence He is hereafter to come to judge the quick and the
dead in the self-same bodily presence, according to the rule of faith
and sound doctrine: for in His spiritual presence He was still, of
course, to be with them after His ascension, and with the whole of
His Church in this world even to the end of time. We cannot,
therefore, rightly understand of whom He said, "While I was with
them, I kept them," save as those only who believed on Him, whom
He had already begun to keep by His bodily presence, but was now to
leave without it, in order that He might keep them with the Father by
His spiritual presence. Thereafter, indeed, He also unites with
them the rest of His disciples, when He says, "Neither pray I for
these alone, but for those also who shall believe on me through their
word." Where He shows still more clearly that He was not speaking
before of all who belonged to Him, in the passage where He saith,
"I have manifested Thy name unto the men whom Thou gavest me," but
of those only who were listening to Him when He so spoke.
3. From the very outset, therefore, of His prayer, when "He
lifted up His eyes to heaven, and said, Father, the hour is come;
glorify Thy Son, that Thy Son also may glorify Thee," on to what
He said a little afterwards, "And now, O Father, glorify Thou
me with Thine own self with the glory which I had with Thee before
the world was," He wished all His disciples to be understood, to
whom He makes the Father known, and thereby glorifies Him. For
after saying, "That Thy Son may glorify Thee," He straightway
showed how that was to be done, by adding, "As Thou hast given Him
power over all flesh, that He should give eternal life to as many as
Thou hast given Him: and this is life eternal, that they might know
Thee the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom Thou hast sent."
For the Father cannot be glorified through any knowledge attained by
men, unless He also be known by whom He is glorified, that is to
say, by whom He is made known to the nations of the world. The
glorification of the Father is not that which was displayed in
connection with the apostles only, but that which is displayed in all
men, of whom as His members Christ is the head. For the words
cannot be understood as applied to the apostles only, "As Thou hast
given Him power over all flesh, that He should give eternal life to
as many as Thou hast given Him;" but to all, assuredly, on whom,
as believing on Him, eternal life is bestowed.
4. Accordingly, let us now see what He says about those disciples
of His who were then listening to Him. "I have manifested," He
says. "Thy name unto the men whom Thou gavest me." Did they not,
then, know the name of God when they were Jews? And what of that
which we read, "God is known in Judah; His name is great in
Israel"? Therefore, "I have manifested Thy name unto these men
whom Thou gavest me out of the world," and who are now hearing my
words: not that name of Thine whereby Thou art called God, but that
whereby Thou art called my Father: a name that could not be
manifested without the manifestation of the Son Himself. For this
name of God, by which He is called, could not but be known in some
way to the whole creation, and so to every nation, before they
believed in Christ For such is the energy of true Godhead, that it
cannot be altogether and utterly hidden from any rational creature, so
long as it makes use of its reason. For, with the exception of a few
in whom nature has become outrageously depraved, the whole race of man
acknowledges God as the maker of this world. In respect, therefore,
of His being the maker I of this world that is visible in heaven and
earth around us, God was known unto all nations even before they were
indoctrinated into the faith of Christ. But in this respect, that
He was not, without grievous wrong being done to Himself, to be
worshipped alongside of false gods, God was known in Judah alone.
But in respect of His being the Father of this Christ, by whom He
taketh away the sin of the world, this name of His, previously kept
secret from all, He now made manifest to those whom the Father
Himself had given Him out of the world. But how had He done so, if
the hour were not yet come, of which He had formerly said that the
hour would come, "when I shall no more speak unto you m proverbs,
but I shall show you plainly of my Father"? Can it be supposed that
the proverbs themselves contained such a plain anouncement? Why,
then, is it said, "I will declare to you openly," but just because
that "in proverbs" is not "openly"? But when it is no longer
concealed in proverbs, but uttered in plain words, then without a
doubt it is spoken openly. How, then, had He manifested what He
had not as yet openly declared?
It must be understood, therefore, in this way, that the past tense
is put for the future, like those other words, "All things that I
have heard of my Father, I have made known unto you:" as something
He had not yet done, but spoke of as if He had, because His doing
of it He knew to be infallibly pre-determined.
5. But what are we to make of the words. "Whom Thou gavest me out
of the world"? For it is said of them that they were not of the
world. But this they attained to by regeneration, and not by
generation. And what, also, of that which follows, "Thine they
were, and Thou gavest them me"? Was there a time when they belonged
to the Father, and not to His only-begotten Son; and had the
Father once on a time anything apart from the Son? Surely not.
Nevertheless, there was a time when God the Son had something,
which that same Son as man possessed not; for He had not yet become
man of an earthly mother, when He possessed all things in common with
the Father. Wherefore in saying, "Thine they were," there is
thereby no self-disruption made by God the Son, apart from whom
there was nothing ever possessed by the Father; but it is His custom
to attribute all the power He possesses to Him, of whom He Himself
is, who has the power. For of whom He has it that He is, of Him
He has it that He is able; and both together He always had, for He
never had being without having ability. Accordingly, what ever the
Father could , always side by side with Him could the Son; since
He, who never had being without having ability, was never without the
Father, as the Father never was without Him. And thus, as the
Father is eternally omnipotent, so is the Son co-eternally
omnipotent; and if all-powerful, certainly all-possessing. For
such rather, if we would speak exactly, is the word by which we
translate what is called by the Greeks pantokratwr which our writers
would not interpret by the term omnipotent, seeing that pantokratwr is
all-possessing, were it not that they felt it to be equivalent in
meaning. What, then, could the eternal all-possessing ever have,
that the co-eternal all-possessing had not likewise? In saying,
therefore, "And Thou gavest them me," He intimated that it was as
man He had received this power to have them; seeing that He, who was
always omnipotent, was not always man. Accordingly, while He seems
rather to have attributed it to the Father, that He received them
from Him, since all that is, is of Him, of whom He is; yet He
also gave them to Himself, that is, Christ, God with the Father,
gave men to the manhood of Christ, which had not its being with the
Father. Finally, He who says in this place, "Thine they were,
and Thou gavest them me," had already said in a previous passage to
the same disciples, "I have chosen you out of the world." Here,
then, let every carnal thought be crushed and annihilated. The Son
says that the men were given Him by the Father out of the world, to
whom He says elsewhere, "I have chosen you out of the world."
Those whom God the Son chose along with the Father out of the
world, the very same Son as man received out of the world from the
Father; for the Father had not given them to the Son had He not
chosen them. And in this way, as the Son did not thereby set the
Father aside, when He said, "I have chosen you out of the
world," seeing that they were simultaneously chosen by the Father
also: as little did He thereby exclude Himself, when He said,
"Thine they were," for they were equally also the properly of the
Son. But now that same Son as man received those who belonged not to
Himself, because He also as God received a servant-form which was
not originally His own.
6. He proceeds to say, "And they have kept Thy word: now they
have known that all things, whatsoever Thou hast given me, are of
Thee;" that is, they have known that I am of Thee. For the
Father gave all things at the very time when He begat Him who was to
have all things. "For I have given unto them," He says, "the
words which Thou gavest me; and they have received them;" that is,
they have understood and kept hold of them. For the word is received
when it is perceived by the mind. "And they have known truly," He
adds, "that I came out from Thee, and they have believed that Thou
didst send me." In this last clause we must also supply "truly;"
for when He said, "They have known truly," He intended its
explanation by adding, "and they have believed." That, therefore,
"they have believed truly" which "they have known truly;" just as
"I came out from Thee" is the same as "Thou didst send me."
When, therefore, He said, "They have known truly," lest any
might suppose that such a knowledge was already acquired by sight, and
not by faith, He subjoined the explanation, "And they have
believed," so that we should supply "truly," and understand the
saying, "They have known truly," as equivalent to "They have
believed truly:" not in the way which He intimated shortly before,
when He said, "Do ye now believe? The hour cometh, and is now
come, that ye shall be scattered, every man to his own, and shall
leave me alone. But "they have believed truly," that is, in the
way it ought to be believed, without constraint, with firmness,
constancy, and fortitude: no longer now to go to their own, and leave
Christ alone. As yet, indeed, the disciples were not of the
character He here describes in words of the past tense, as if they
were so already, but as thereby declaring beforehand what sort they
were yet to be, namely, when they had received the Holy Spirit,
who, according to the promise, should teach them all things. For how
was it, before they received the Spirit, that they kept that word of
His which He spoke regarding them, as if they had done so, when the
chief of them thrice denied Him, after hearing from His lips the
future fate of the man who denied Him before men? He had given them,
therefore, as He said, the words which the Father gave Him; but
when at length they received them spiritually, not in an outward way
with their ears, but inwardly in their hearts, then they truly
received them, for then they truly knew them; and they truly knew
them, because they truly believed.
7. But what human language will suffice to explain how the Father
gave those words to the Son? The question, of course, will appear
easier if we suppose Him to have received such words in His capacity
as the Son of man. And yet, although thus born of the Virgin, who
will undertake to relate when and how it was that He learned them,
since even that very generation which He had of the Virgin who will
venture to declare?
But if our idea be that He received these words of the l Father in
His capacity as begotten of, and co-eternal with, the Father, let
us then exclude all such thoughts of time as if He existed previous to
His possessing them, and so received the possession of that which He
had not before; for whatever God the Father gave to God the Son,
He gave in the act of begetting. For the Father gave those things to
the Son without which He could not be the Son, in the same manner as
He gave Him being itself. For how otherwise would He give any words
to the Word, wherein in an ineffable way He hath spoken all things?
But now, in reference to what follows, you must defer your
expectations till another discourse.
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