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Anti-Marcion
Consider, therefore, how many passages present their prescriptive authority to you in this very Gospel before this inquiry of Philip, and previous to any discussion on your part. And first of all there comes at once to hand the preamble of John to his Gospel, which shows us what He previously was who had to become flesh. “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God: all things were made by Him, and without Him was nothing made.”[8009] Now, since these words may not be taken otherwise than as they are written, there is without doubt shown to be One who was from the beginning, and also One with whom He always was: one the Word of God, the other God (although the Word is also God, but God regarded as the Son of God, not as the Father); One through whom were all things, Another by whom were all things. But in what sense we call Him Another we have already often described. In that we called Him Another, we must needs imply that He is not identical—not identical indeed, yet not as if separate; Other by dispensation, not by division. He, therefore, who became flesh was not the very same as He from whom the Word came. “His glory was beheld—the glory as of the only-begotten of the Father;”[8010] not, (observe,) as of the Father. He “declared” (what was in) “the bosom of the Father alone;”[8011] the Father did not divulge the secrets of His own bosom. For this is preceded by another statement: “No man hath seen God at any time.”[8012] Then, again, when He is designated by John (the Baptist) as “the Lamb of God,”[8013] He is not described as Himself the same with Him of whom He is the beloved Son. He is, no doubt, ever the Son of God, but yet not He Himself of whom He is the Son. This (divine relationship) Nathanæl at once recognised in Him,[8014] even as Peter did on another occasion: “Thou art the Son of God.”[8015] And He affirmed Himself that they were quite right in their convictions; for He answered Nathanæl: “Because I said, I saw thee under the fig-tree, therefore dost thou believe?”[8016] And in the same manner He pronounced Peter to be “blessed,” inasmuch as “flesh and blood had not revealed it to him”—that he had perceived the Father—“but the Father which is in heaven.”[8017] By asserting all this, He determined the distinction which is between the two Persons: that is, the Son then on earth, whom Peter had confessed to be the Son of God; and the Father in heaven, who had revealed to Peter the discovery which he had made, that Christ was the Son of God. When He entered the temple, He called it “His Father’s house,”[8018] speaking as the Son. In His address to Nicodemus He says: “So God loved the world, that He gave His only-begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life.”[8019] And again: “For God sent not His Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world through Him might be saved. He that believeth on Him is not condemned; but he that believeth not is condemned already, because he hath not believed in the name of the only-begotten Son of God.”[8020] Moreover, when John (the Baptist) was asked what he happened to know of Jesus, he said: “The Father loveth the Son, and hath given all things into His hand. He that believeth on the Son hath everlasting life; and he that believeth not the Son shall not see life, but the wrath of God abideth on him.”[8021] Whom, indeed, did He reveal to the woman of Samaria? Was it not “the Messias which is called Christ?”[8022] And so He showed, of course, that He was not the Father, but the Son; and elsewhere He is expressly called “the Christ, the Son of God,”[8023] and not the Father. He says, therefore,” My meat is to do the will of Him that sent me, and to finish His work;”[8024] whilst to the Jews He remarks respecting the cure of the impotent man, “My Father worketh hitherto, and I work.”[8025] “My Father and I”—these are the Son’s words. And it was on this very account that “the Jews sought the more intently to kill Him, not only because He broke the Sabbath, but also because He said that God was His Father, thus making Himself equal with God. Then indeed did He answer and say unto them, The Son can do nothing of Himself, but what He seeth the Father do; for what things soever He doeth these also doeth the Son likewise. For the Father loveth the Son, and showeth Him all things that He Himself doeth; and He will also show Him greater works than these, that ye may marvel. For as the Father raiseth up the dead and quickeneth them, even so the Son also quickeneth whom He will. For the Father judgeth no man, but hath committed all judgment unto the Son, that all men should honour the Son, even as they honour the Father. He that honoureth not the Son, honoureth not the Father, who hath sent the Son. Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that heareth my words, and believeth on Him that sent me, hath everlasting life, and shall not come into condemnation, but is passed from death unto life. Verily I say unto you, that the hour is coming, when the dead shall hear the voice of the Son of God; and when they have heard it, they shall live. For as the Father hath eternal life in Himself, so also hath He given to the Son to have eternal life in Himself; and He hath given Him authority to execute judgment also, because He is the Son of man”[8026]—that is, according to the flesh, even as He is also the Son of God through His Spirit.[8027] Afterwards He goes on to say: “But I have greater witness than that of John; for the works which the Father hath given me to finish—those very works bear witness of me that the Father hath sent me. And the Father Himself, which hath sent me, hath also borne witness of me.”[8028] But He at once adds, “Ye have neither heard His voice at any time, nor seen His shape;”[8029] thus affirming that in former times it was not the Father, but the Son, who used to be seen and heard. Then He says at last: “I am come in my Father’s name, and ye have not received me.”[8030] It was therefore always the Son (of whom we read) under the designation of the Almighty and Most High God, and King, and Lord. To those also who inquired “what they should do to work the works of God,”[8031] He answered, “This is the work of God, that ye believe on Him whom He hath sent.”[8032] He also declares Himself to be “the bread which the Father sent from heaven;”[8033] and adds, that “all that the Father gave Him should come to Him, and that He Himself would not reject them,[8034] because He had come down from heaven not to do His own will, but the will of the Father; and that the will of the Father was that every one who saw the Son, and believed on Him, should obtain the life (everlasting,) and the resurrection at the last day. No man indeed was able to come to Him, except the Father attracted him; whereas every one who had heard and learnt of the Father came to Him.”[8035] He goes on then expressly to say, “Not that any man hath seen the Father;”[8036] thus showing us that it was through the Word of the Father that men were instructed and taught. Then, when many departed from Him,[8037] and He turned to the apostles with the inquiry whether “they also would go away,”[8038] what was Simon Peter’s answer? “To whom shall we go? Thou hast the words of eternal life, and we believe that Thou art the Christ.”[8039] (Tell me now, did they believe) Him to be the Father, or the Christ of the Father?
Again, whose doctrine does He announce, at which all were astonished?[8040] Was it His own or the Father’s? So, when they were in doubt among themselves whether He were the Christ (not as being the Father, of course but as the Son), He says to them “You are not ignorant whence I am; and I am not come of myself, but He that sent me is true, whom ye know not; but I know Him, because I am from Him.”[8041] He did not say, Because I myself am He; and, I have sent mine own self: but His words are, “He hath sent me.” When, likewise, the Pharisees sent men to apprehend Him, He says: “Yet a little while am I with you, and (then) I go unto Him that sent me.”[8042] When, however, He declares that He is not alone, and uses these words, “but I and the Father that sent me,”[8043] does He not show that there are Two—Two, and yet inseparable? Indeed, this was the sum and substance of what He was teaching them, that they were inseparably Two; since, after citing the law when it affirms the truth of two men’s testimony,[8044] He adds at once: “I am one who am bearing witness of myself; and the Father (is another,) who hath sent me, and beareth witness of me.”[8045] Now, if He were one—being at once both the Son and the Father—He certainly would not have quoted the sanction of the law, which requires not the testimony of one, but of two. Likewise, when they asked Him where His Father was,[8046] He answered them, that they had known neither Himself nor the Father; and in this answer He plainly told them of Two, whom they were ignorant of. Granted that “if they had known Him, they would have known the Father also,”[8047] this certainly does not imply that He was Himself both Father and Son; but that, by reason of the inseparability of the Two, it was impossible for one of them to be either acknowledged or unknown without the other. “He that sent me,” says He, “is true; and I am telling the world those things which I have heard of Him.”[8048] And the Scripture narrative goes on to explain in an exoteric manner, that “they understood not that He spake to them concerning the Father,”[8049] although they ought certainly to have known that the Father’s words were uttered in the Son, because they read in Jeremiah, “And the Lord said to me, Behold, I have put my words in thy mouth;”[8050] and again in Isaiah, “The Lord hath given to me the tongue of learning that I should understand when to speak a word in season.”[8051] In accordance with which, Christ Himself says: “Then shall ye know that I am He and that I am saying nothing of my own self; but that, as my Father hath taught me, so I speak, because He that sent me is with me.”[8052] This also amounts to a proof that they were Two, (although) undivided. Likewise, when upbraiding the Jews in His discussion with them, because they wished to kill Him, He said, “I speak that which I have seen with my Father, and ye do that which ye have seen with your father;”[8053] “but now ye seek to kill me, a man that hath told you the truth which I have heard of God;”[8054] and again, “If God were your Father, ye would love me, for I proceeded forth and came from God,”[8055] (still they are not hereby separated, although He declares that He proceeded forth from the Father. Some persons indeed seize the opportunity afforded them in these words to propound their heresy of His separation; but His coming out from God is like the ray’s procession from the sun, and the river’s from the fountain, and the tree’s from the seed); “I have not a devil, but I honour my Father;”[8056] again, “If I honour myself, my honour is nothing: it is my Father that honoureth me, of whom ye say, that He is your God: yet ye have not known Him, but I know Him; and if I should say, I know Him not, I shall be a liar like unto you; but I know Him, and keep His saying.”[8057] But when He goes on to say, “Your father Abraham rejoiced to see my day; and he saw it, and was glad,”[8058] He certainly proves that it was not the Father that appeared to Abraham, but the Son. In like manner He declares, in the case of the man born blind, “that He must do the works of the Father which had sent Him;”[8059] and after He had given the man sight, He said to him, “Dost thou believe in the Son of God?” Then, upon the man’s inquiring who He was, He proceeded to reveal Himself to him, as that Son of God whom He had announced to him as the right object of his faith.[8060] In a later passage He declares that He is known by the Father, and the Father by Him;[8061] adding that He was so wholly loved by the Father, that He was laying down His life, because He had received this commandment from the Father.[8062] When He was asked by the Jews if He were the very Christ[8063] (meaning, of course, the Christ of God; for to this day the Jews expect not the Father Himself, but the Christ of God, it being nowhere said that the Father will come as the Christ), He said to them, “I am telling you, and yet ye do not believe: the works which I am doing, in my Father’s name, they actually bear witness of me.”[8064] Witness of what? Of that very thing, to be sure, of which they were making inquiry—whether He were the Christ of God. Then, again, concerning His sheep, and (the assurance) that no man should pluck them out of His hand,[8065] He says, “My Father, which gave them to me, is greater than all;”[8066] adding immediately, “I am and my Father are one.”[8067] Here, then, they take their stand, too infatuated, nay, too blind, to see in the first place that there is in this passage an intimation of Two Beings—“I and my Father;” then that there is a plural predicate, “are,” inapplicable to one person only; and lastly, that (the predicate terminates in an abstract, not a personal noun)—“we are one thing” Unum, not “one person” Unus. For if He had said “one Person,” He might have rendered some assistance to their opinion. Unus, no doubt, indicates the singular number; but (here we have a case where) “Two” are still the subject in the masculine gender. He accordingly says Unum, a neuter term, which does not imply singularity of number, but unity of essence, likeness, conjunction, affection on the Father’s part, who loves the Son, and submission on the Son’s, who obeys the Father’s will. When He says, “I and my Father are one” in essence—Unum—He shows that there are Two, whom He puts on an equality and unites in one. He therefore adds to this very statement, that He “had showed them many works from the Father,” for none of which did He deserve to be stoned.[8068] And to prevent their thinking Him deserving of this fate, as if He had claimed to be considered as God Himself, that is, the Father, by having said, “I and my Father are One,” representing Himself as the Father’s divine Son, and not as God Himself, He says, “If it is written in your law, I said, Ye are gods; and if the Scripture cannot be broken, say ye of Him whom the Father hath sanctified and sent into the world, that He blasphemeth, because He said, I am the Son of God? If I do not the works of my Father, believe me not; but if I do, even if ye will not believe me, still believe the works; and know that I am in the Father, and the Father in me.”[8069] It must therefore be by the works that the Father is in the Son, and the Son in the Father; and so it is by the works that we understand that the Father is one with the Son. All along did He therefore strenuously aim at this conclusion, that while they were of one power and essence, they should still be believed to be Two; for otherwise, unless they were believed to be Two, the Son could not possibly be believed to have any existence at all.
Again, when Martha in a later passage acknowledged Him to be the Son of God,[8070] she no more made a mistake than Peter[8071] and Nathanæl[8072] had; and yet, even if she had made a mistake, she would at once have learnt the truth: for, behold, when about to raise her brother from the dead, the Lord looked up to heaven, and, addressing the Father, said—as the Son, of course: “Father, I thank Thee that Thou always hearest me; it is because of these crowds that are standing by that I have spoken to Thee, that they may believe that Thou hast sent me.”[8073] But in the trouble of His soul, (on a later occasion,) He said: “What shall I say? Father, save me from this hour: but for this cause is it that I am come to this hour; only, O Father, do Thou glorify Thy name”[8074]—in which He spake as the Son. (At another time) He said: “I am come in my Father’s name.”[8075] Accordingly, the Son’s voice was indeed alone sufficient, (when addressed) to the Father. But, behold, with an abundance (of evidence)[8076] the Father from heaven replies, for the purpose of testifying to the Son: “This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased; hear ye Him.”[8077] So, again, in that asseveration, “I have both glorified, and will glorify again,”[8078] how many Persons do you discover, obstinate Praxeas? Are there not as many as there are voices? You have the Son on earth, you have the Father in heaven. Now this is not a separation; it is nothing but the divine dispensation. We know, however, that God is in the bottomless depths, and exists everywhere; but then it is by power and authority. We are also sure that the Son, being indivisible from Him, is everywhere with Him. Nevertheless, in the Economy or Dispensation itself, the Father willed that the Son should be regarded[8079] as on earth, and Himself in heaven; whither the Son also Himself looked up, and prayed, and made supplication of the Father; whither also He taught us to raise ourselves, and pray, “Our Father which art in heaven,” etc.,[8080]—although, indeed, He is everywhere present. This heaven the Father willed to be His own throne; while He made the Son to be “a little lower than the angels,”[8081] by sending Him down to the earth, but meaning at the same time to “crown Him with glory and honour,”[8082] even by taking Him back to heaven. This He now made good to Him when He said: “I have both glorified Thee, and will glorify Thee again.” The Son offers His request from earth, the Father gives His promise from heaven. Why, then, do you make liars of both the Father and the Son? If either the Father spake from heaven to the Son when He Himself was the Son on earth, or the Son prayed to the Father when He was Himself the Son in heaven, how happens it that the Son made a request of His own very self, by asking it of the Father, since the Son was the Father? Or, on the other hand, how is it that the Father made a promise to Himself, by making it to the Son, since the Father was the Son? Were we even to maintain that they are two separate gods, as you are so fond of throwing out against us, it would be a more tolerable assertion than the maintenance of so versatile and changeful a God as yours! Therefore it was that in the passage before us the Lord declared to the people present: “Not on my own account has this voice addressed me, but for your sakes,”[8083] that these likewise may believe both in the Father and in the Son, severally, in their own names and persons and positions. “Then again, Jesus exclaims, and says, He that believeth on me, believeth not on me, but on Him that sent me;”[8084] because it is through the Son that men believe in the Father, while the Father also is the authority whence springs belief in the Son. “And he that seeth me, seeth Him that sent me.”[8085] How so? Even because, (as He afterwards declares,) “I have not spoken from myself, but the Father which sent me: He hath given me a commandment what I should say, and what I should speak.”[8086] For “the Lord God hath given me the tongue of the learned, that I should know when I ought to speak”[8087] the word which I actually speak. “Even as the Father hath said unto me, so do I speak.”[8088] Now, in what way these things were said to Him, the evangelist and beloved disciple John knew better than Praxeas; and therefore he adds concerning his own meaning: “Now before the feast of the passover, Jesus knew that the Father had given all things into His hands, and that He had come from God, and was going to God.”[8089] Praxeas, however, would have it that it was the Father who proceeded forth from Himself, and had returned to Himself; so that what the devil put into the heart of Judas was the betrayal, not of the Son, but of the Father Himself. But for the matter of that, things have not turned out well either for the devil or the heretic; because, even in the Son’s case, the treason which the devil wrought against Him contributed nothing to his advantage. It was, then, the Son of God, who was in the Son of man, that was betrayed, as the Scripture says afterwards: “Now is the Son of man glorified, and God is glorified in Him.”[8090] Who is here meant by “God?” Certainly not the Father, but the Word of the Father, who was in the Son of man—that is in the flesh, in which Jesus had been already glorified by the divine power and word. “And God,” says He, “shall also glorify Him in Himself;”[8091] that is to say, the Father shall glorify the Son, because He has Him within Himself; and even though prostrated to the earth, and put to death, He would soon glorify Him by His resurrection, and making Him conqueror over death.
But there were some who even then did not understand. For Thomas, who was so long incredulous, said: “Lord, we know not whither Thou goest; and how can we know the way? Jesus saith unto him, I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by me. If ye had known me, ye would have known the Father also: but henceforth ye know Him, and have seen Him.”[8092] And now we come to Philip, who, roused with the expectation of seeing the Father, and not understanding in what sense he was to take “seeing the Father,” says: “Show us the Father, and it sufficeth us.”[8093] Then the Lord answered him: “Have I been so long time with you, and yet hast thou not known me, Philip?”[8094] Now whom does He say that they ought to have known?—for this is the sole point of discussion. Was it as the Father that they ought to have known Him, or as the Son? If it was as the Father, Praxeas must tell us how Christ, who had been so long time with them, could have possibly ever been (I will not say understood, but even) supposed to have been the Father. He is clearly defined to us in all Scriptures—in the Old Testament as the Christ of God, in the New Testament as the Son of God. In this character was He anciently predicted, in this was He also declared even by Christ Himself; nay, by the very Father also, who openly confesses Him from heaven as His Son, and as His Son glorifies Him. “This is my beloved Son;” “I have glorified Him, and I will glorify Him.” In this character, too, was He believed on by His disciples, and rejected by the Jews. It was, moreover, in this character that He wished to be accepted by them whenever He named the Father, and gave preference to the Father, and honoured the Father. This, then, being the case, it was not the Father whom, after His lengthened intercourse with them, they were ignorant of, but it was the Son; and accordingly the Lord, while upbraiding Philip for not knowing Himself who was the object of their ignorance, wished Himself to be acknowledged indeed as that Being whom He had reproached them for being ignorant of after so long a time—in a word, as the Son. And now it may be seen in what sense it was said, “He that hath seen me hath seen the Father,”[8095]—even in the same in which it was said in a previous passage, “I and my Father are one.”[8096] Wherefore? Because “I came forth from the Father, and am come into the world”[8097] and, “I am the way: no man cometh unto the Father, but by me;”[8098] and, “No man can come to me, except the Father draw him;”[8099] and, “All things are delivered unto me by the Father;”[8100] and, “As the Father quickeneth (the dead), so also doth the Son;”[8101] and again, “If ye had known me, ye would have known the Father also.”[8102] For in all these passages He had shown Himself to be the Father’s Commissioner,[8103] through whose agency even the Father could be seen in His works, and heard in His words, and recognised in the Son’s administration of the Father’s words and deeds. The Father indeed was invisible, as Philip had learnt in the law, and ought at the moment to have remembered: “No man shall see God, and live.”[8104] So he is reproved for desiring to see the Father, as if He were a visible Being, and is taught that He only becomes visible in the Son from His mighty works, and not in the manifestation of His person. If, indeed, He meant the Father to be understood as the same with the Son, by saying, “He who seeth me seeth the Father,” how is it that He adds immediately afterwards, “Believest thou not that I am in the Father, and the Father in me?”[8105] He ought rather to have said: “Believest thou not that I am the Father?” With what view else did He so emphatically dwell on this point, if it were not to clear up that which He wished men to understand—namely, that He was the Son? And then, again, by saying, “Believest thou not that I am in the Father, and the Father in me,”[8106] He laid the greater stress on His question on this very account, that He should not, because He had said, “He that hath seen me, hath seen the Father,” be supposed to be the Father; because He had never wished Himself to be so regarded, having always professed Himself to be the Son, and to have come from the Father. And then He also set the conjunction of the two Persons in the clearest light, in order that no wish might be entertained of seeing the Father as if He were separately visible, and that the Son might be regarded as the representative of the Father. And yet He omitted not to explain how the Father was in the Son and the Son in the Father. “The words,” says He, “which I speak unto you, are not mine,”[8107] because indeed they were the Father’s words; “but the Father that dwelleth in me, He doeth the works.”[8108] It is therefore by His mighty works, and by the words of His doctrine, that the Father who dwells in the Son makes Himself visible—even by those words and works whereby He abides in Him, and also by Him in whom He abides; the special properties of Both the Persons being apparent from this very circumstance, that He says, “I am in the Father, and the Father is in me.”[8109] Accordingly He adds: “Believe—” What? That I am the Father? I do not find that it is so written, but rather, “that I am in the Father, and the Father in me; or else believe me for my works’ sake;”[8110] meaning those works by which the Father manifested Himself to be in the Son, not indeed to the sight of man, but to his intelligence.
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