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1. The Lord, in exhorting His servants to endure with patience the
hatred of the world, proposes to them no greater and better example
than His own; seeing that, as the Apostle Peter says, "Christ
suffered for us, leaving us an example, that we should follow His
steps." And if we really do so, we do it by His assistance, who
said, "Without me ye can do nothing." But further, to those to
whom He had already said, "If the world hate you, know that it
hated me before fit hated] you," He now also says in the word you
have just been hearing, when the Gospel was read, "Remember my word
that I said unto you, The servant is not greater than his lord: if
they have persecuted me, they will also persecute you; if they have
kept my saying, they will keep yours also." Now in saying, "The
servant is not greater than his lord," does He not clearly indicate
how He would have us understand what He had said above, "Henceforth
I call you not servants"? For, you see, He calleth them
servants. For what else can the words imply, "The servant is not
greater than his lord: if they have persecuted me, they will also
persecute you"? It is clear, therefore, that when it is said,
"Henceforth I call you not servants," He is to be understood as
speaking of that servant who abideth not in the house for ever, but is
characterized by the fear which love casteth out; whereas, when it is
here said, "The servant is not greater than his lord: if they have
persecuted me, they will also persecute you," that servant is meant
who is distinguished by the clean fear which endureth for ever. For
this is the servant who is yet to hear, "Well done, thou good
servant: enter thou into the joy of thy Lord."
2. "But all these things," He says, "will they do unto you for
my name's sake, because they know not Him that sent me." And what
are "all these things" that "they will do," but what He has just
said, namely, that they will hate and persecute you, and despise your
word? For if they kept not their word, and yet neither hated nor
persecuted them; or if they even hated, but did not persecute them:
it would not be all these things that they did. But "all these things
will they do unto you for my name's sake," what else is that but to
say, they will hate me in you, they will persecute me in you; and
your word, just because it is mine, they will not keep? For "all
these things will they do unto you for my name's sake:" not for
yours, but mine. So much the more miserable, therefore, are those
who do such things on account of that name, as those are blessed who
suffer such things in its behalf: as He Himself elsewhere saith,
"Blessed are they that suffer persecution for righteousness' sake."
For that is on my account, or "for my name's sake:" because, as
we are taught by the apostle, "He is made of God unto us wisdom,
and righteousness, and santification, and redemption; that,
according as it is written, He that glorieth, let him glory in the
Lord." For the wicked do such things to the wicked, but not for
righteousness' sake; and therefore both are alike miserable, those
who do, and those who suffer them. The good also do such things to
the wicked: where, although the former do so for righteousness'
sake, yet the latter suffer them not on the same behalf.
3. But some one says, If, when the wicked persecute the good for
the name of Christ, the good suffer for righteousness' sake, then
surely it is for righteousness' sake that the wicked do so to them;
and if such is the case, then also, when the good persecute the wicked
for righteousness' sake, it is for righteousness' sake likewise that
the wicked suffer. For if the wicked can assail the good with
persecution for the name of Christ, why cannot the wicked suffer
persecution at the hands of the good on the same account; and what is
that, hut for righteousness' sake? For if the good act not so on the
same account as that on which the wicked suffer, because the good do so
for righteousness' sake, while the wicked suffer for unrighteousness,
so then neither can the wicked act so on the same account as that for
which the good suffer, because the wicked do so by unrighteousness,
while the good suffer for righteousness' sake. And how then will that
be true, "All these things will they do unto you for my name's
sake," when the former do it not for the name of Christ, that is,
for righteousness' sake, but because of their own iniquity? Such a
question is solved in this way, if only we understand the words, All
these things will they do unto you for my name's sake," as referring
entirely to the righteous, as if it had been said, All these things
will ye suffer at their hands for my name's sake, so that the words,
"they will do unto you," are equivalent to these, Ye will suffer at
their hands. But if "for my name's sake" is to be taken as if He
had said, For my name's sake which they hate in you, so also may the
other be taken for that righteousness' sake which they hate in you;
and in this way the good, when they institute persecution against the
wicked, may be rightly said to do so both for righteousness' sake, in
their love for which they persecute the wicked, and for that
wickedness' sake which they hate in the wicked themselves; and so also
the wicked may be said to suffer both for the iniquity that is punished
in their persons, and for the righteousness which is exercised in their
punishment.
4. It may also be inquired, if the wicked also persecute the
wicked, just as ungodly princes and judges, while they were the
persecutors of the godly, certainly also punished murderers and
adulterers, and all classes of evil-doers whom they ascertained to be
acting contrary to the public laws, how are we to understand the words
of the Lord, "If ye were of the world, the world would love its
own"? (ver. 19.) For those whom it punisheth cannot be loved by
the world, which, we see, generally punisheth the classes of crimes
mentioned above, save only that the world is both in those who punish
such crimes, and in those that love them. Therefore that world,
which is to be understood as existing in the wicked and ungodly, both
hateth its own in respect of that section of men in whose case it
inflicts injury on the criminal, and loveth its own in respect of that
other section in whose case it shows favor to its own partners in
criminality. Hence, "All these things will they do unto you for my
name's sake," is said either m reference to that for the sake of
which ye suffer, or to that on account of which they themselves so deal
with you, because that which is in you they both hate and persecute.
And He added, "Because they know not Him that sent me." This is
to be understood as spoken of that knowledge of which it is also
elsewhere recorded, "But to know Thee is perfect intelligence."
For those who with such a knowledge know the Father, by whom Christ
was sent, can in no wise persecute those whom Christ is gathering;
for they also themselves are being gathered by Christ along with the
others.
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