And in what sense the devil is to be understood as the prince of the world, is still more clearly unfolded by the Apostle Paul, who, after saying, "We wrestle not against flesh and blood," that is, against men, went on to say, "but against principalities and powers, and the world-rulers of this darkness." ^ For in the very next word he has explained what he meant by "world," when he added, "of this darkness;" so that no one, by the name of the world, should understand the whole creation, of which in no sense are fallen angels the rulers. " Of this darkness," he says, that is, of the lovers of this world: of whom.
3 Eph. vi. 12: AusTUStin, rectores inimdi tettebrariiiii karum, original, tou5 KO<r(xoKpaTopas toO ckotoi/s toOtou.
nevertheless, there were some elected, not from any deserving of their own, but by the grace of God, to whom he says, "Ye were sometimes darkness; but now are ye light in the Lord."'* For all have been under the rulers of this darkness, that is, [under the rulers] of wicked men, or darkness, as it were, in subjection to darkness: but " thanks be to God, who hath delivered us," says the same apostle, "from the power of darkness, and hath translated us into the kingdom of the Son of His love. '^5 And in Him the prince of this world, that is, of this darkness, had nothing; for neither did He come with sin as God, nor had His flesh any hereditary taint of sin in its procreation by the Virgin. And, as if it were said to Him, Why, then, dost Thou die, if Thou hast no sin to merit the punishment of death? He immediately added, " But that the world may know that I love the Father, and as the Father gave me commandment, even so I do: arise, let us go hence." For He was sitting at table with those who were similarly occupied. But *' let us go," He said, and whither, but to the place where He, who had nothing in Him deserving of death, was to be delivered up to death? But He had the Father's commandment to die, as the very One of whom it had been foretold, "Then I paid for that which I took not away;"^ and so appointed to pay death to the full, while owing it nothing, and to redeem us from the death that was our due. For Adam had seized on sin as a prey, when, deceived, he presumptuously stretched forth his hand to the tree, and attempted to invade the incommunicable name of that Godhead which was disallowed him, and with which the Son of God was endowed by nature, and not by robbery.
4 Eph. V. 8.
5 Col. i. 12, 13.
6 Ps. Ixix. 4.
TRACTATE LXXX.
Chapter XV. 1-3.
I. This passage of the Gospel, brethren, where the Lord calls Himself the vine, and His disciples the branches, declares in so many words that the Mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus,' is the head of the Church, and that we are His meml)ers.
■ I Tim. li. 5.
For as the vine and its branches are of one nature, therefore, His own nature as God being different from ours, He became man, that in Him himian nature might be the vine, and we who also are men might become branches tiiereof. What mean, then, the words, " I am the true vine "? Was it to the literal vine, from which that metaphor was drawn, that [Tractate LXXX.
He intended to point them by the addition of " true "? For it is by similitude, and not by any personal propriety, that He is thus called a vine; just as He is also termed a sheep, a lamb, a lion, a rock, a corner-stone, and other names of a like kind, which are themselves rather the t7-ue ones, from which these are drawn as similitudes, not as realities. But when He says, " I am the true vine,'' it is to distinguish Himself, doubtless, from that [vine] to which the words are addressed: ^' How art thou turned into sourness,' as a strange vine? " " For how could that be a true vine which was expected to bring forth grapes and brought forth thorns? ^ 2. " I am," He says, "the true vine, and my Father is the husbandman. Every branch in me that beareth not fruit. He taketh away; and every one that beareth fruit, He purgeth it, that it may bring forth more fruit.'' Are, then, the husbandman and the vine one? Christ is the vine in the same sense as when He said, "The Father is greater than I;""* but in that sense wherein He said, " I and my Father are one," He is also the husbandman. And yet not such a one as those, whose whole service is confined to external labor; but such, that He also supplies the increase from within. " For neither is he that planteth anything, neither he that watereth; but God that giveth the increase." But Christ is certainly God, for the Word was God; and so He and the Father are one: and if the AVord was made flesh, — that which He was not before, — He nevertheless still remains what He was. And still more, after saying of the Father, as of the husbandman, that He taketh away the fruitless branches, and pruneth the fruitful, that they may bring forth more fruit. He straightway points to Himself as also the purger of the branches, when He says, " Now ye are clean through the word which I have spoken unto you." Here, you see, He is also the pruner of the branches — a work which belongs to the husbandman, and not to the vine; and more than that. He maketh the branches His workmen. For although they give not the increase, they afford some help; but not of themselves: *' For without me," He says, " ye can do nothing.'" And listen, also, to their own confession: "What, then, is Apollos? and what is Paul? but ministers by whom ye believed, even as the Lord gave I Hebrew ''TID, pass. part, of ~]^Q, to depart [from God], and so, perhaps, ^^ stragglers,'" i.e. " straggling branches of [a strange vine];" or, as in English version, '^degenerate iratickes,'" rather than as in text, where Augustin gives, in aniaritudineni, vitis alieita, following the LXX., which reads, " eis Tri/cpias r; afiTreAo! r; aAAoTpia.'' The Vulgate is better: in pravu/n, vinca aliena. — Tr.
to every man. I have planted, Apollos watered." And this, too, "as the Lord gave to every man;" and so not of themseLves. In that, however, which follows, "but God gave the increase," ^ He works not by them, but by Himself; for work like that exceeds the lowly capacity of man, transcends the lofty powers of angels, and rests solely and entirely in the hands of the Triune Husbandman. "Now ye are clean," that is, clean, and yet still further to be cleansed. For, had they not been clean, they could not have borne fruit; and yet every one that beareth fruit is purged by the husbandman, that he may bring forth more fruit. He bears fruit because he is clean; and to bear more, he is cleansed still further. For who in this life is so clean as not to be in need of still further and further cleansing? seeing that, " if we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us; but if we confess our sins. He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness; " to cleanse in very deed the clean, that is, the fruitful, that they may be so much the more fruitful, as they have been made the cleaner.
3. " Now ye are clean through the word which I have spoken unto you." Why does He not say. Ye are clean through the baptism wherewith ye have been washed, but " througii the word which I have spoken unto you," save only that in the water also it is the word thatcleanseth? Take away the word, and the water is neither more nor less than water. The word is added to the element, and there results the Sacrament, as if itself also a kind of visible word. For He had said also to the same effect, when washing the disciples' feet, " He that is washed needeth not, save to wash his feet, but is clean every whit."^ And whence has water so great an/Cfificacy, as in touching the body to cleanse the soul, save by the operation of the word; and that not because it is uttered, but because it is believed? For even in the word itself the passing sound is one thing, the abiding efificacy another. " This is the word of faith which we preach," says the apostle, "that if thou shalt confess with thy mouth that Jesus is the Lord, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised Him from the dead, thou shalt be saved. For with the heart man believeth unto righteousness, and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation."' Accordingly, we read in the Acts of the Apostles, " Purifying their hearts by faith; " ^ and, says the blessed Peter in his epistle, " Even as 6 Chap. xiii. 10.
8 Acts XV. 9.
Tractate LXXXI.]
baptism doth also now save us, not the putting away of the filth of the flesh, but the answer' of a good conscience."
"This is the word of faith which we preach," whereby baptism, doubtless, is also consecrated, in order to its possession of the power to cleanse. For Christ, who is the vine with us, and the husbandman with the Father, "loved the Church, and gave Himself for it.'' And then read the apostle, and see what he adds: "That He might sanctify it, • cleansing it with the washing of water by the word."- The cleansing, therefore, would on no account be attributed to the fleeting and perishable element, were it not for that which is added, '' by the word." This word of faith possesses such virtue in the Church of God, that throusfh the medium of him who in faith presents, and blesses, and sprinkles it. He cleanseth even the tiny infant, although itself unable as yet with the heart to believe unto righteousness, and to make confession with the mouth unto salvation. All this is done by means of the word, whereof the Lord saith, " Now ye are clean through the word which I have spoken unto you."
TRACTATE LXXXI.
Chapter XV. 4-7.
1. Jesus called Himself the vine, and His disciples the branches, and His Father the husbandman; whereon we have already discoursed as we were able. But in the present passage, while still speaking of Himself as the vine, and of His branches, or, in other words, of the disciples. He said, "Abide in me, and I in you."' They are not in Him in the same kind of way that He is in them. And yet both ways tend to their advantage, and not to His. For the relation of the branches to the vine is such that they contribute nothing to the vine, but from it derive their own means of life; while that of the vine to the branches is such that it supplies their vital nonrisliment, and receives nothing from them. And so their having Christ abiding in them, and abiding themselves in Christ, are in botli resiiects advantageous, not to Christ, l)ut to the disciples. For when the branch is cut off, another may spring up from the living root; but that which is cut off cannot live apart from the root.
2. And then He proceeds to say: "As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, except it abide in the vine; no more can ye, except ye abide in me." A great encomium on grace, my brethren, — one that will instruct the souls of the humble, and stop the mouths of the l^roud. Let those now answer it, if they dare, who, ignorant of God's righteousness, and going about to establish their own, have not submitted themselves luito the righteousness of Ciod. ' Let the self-complacent answer it, who think they have no need of God for > Rom. X. 3.
I the performance of good works. Fight they not against such a truth, those men of corrupt mind, reprobate concerning the faith,- whose reply is only full of impious talk, when they say: It is of God that we have our existence as men, but it is of ourselves that we are righteous? What is it you say, you who deceive yourselves, and, instead of establishing freewdl, cast it headlong down from the heights of its self-elevation through the empty regions of presumption into the depths of an ocean grave? Why, your assertion that man of himself worketh rigliteousness, ///<// is the height of your self-elation. But the Truth contradicts you, and declares, " 'I'he branch cannot bear fruit of itself, except it abide in the vine." Away with you now over your giddy precipices, and, without a spot whereon to take your stand, vapor away at 3'our windy talk. These are the empty regions of your presumj)tion. But look well at wiiat is tracking your steps, and, if you have any sense remaining, let your hair stand on end. For whoever imagines that he is bearing fruit of himself is not in the vine, and he that is not in the vine is not in Christ, and he that is not in Christ is not a Christian. Such are the ocean depths into which you have plunged. 3. Ponder again and again what the Truth has still further to say: " I am the vine," He adds, " ye are the branches: he that abideth in me, and 1 in him, the same bringeth forth much fruii; tor without me ye can do nothing." For just to keep any from supposing that the brancii can bear at least some little = 2 Tim. iii. 8.
[Tractate LXXXII.
fruit of itself, after saying, "the same bringeth forth much fruit," His next words are not, Without me ye can do but little, but " ye can do nothing." Whether then it be little or much, without Him it is impracticable; for without Him nothing can be done. For although, when the branch beareth little fruit, the husbandman purgeth it that it may bring forth more; yet if it abide not in the vine, and draw its life from the root, it can bear no fruit whatever of itself. x\nd although Christ would not have been the vine had He not been man, yet He could not have supplied such grace to the branches had He not also been God. And just because such grace is so essential to life, that even death itself ceases to be at the disposal of free-will, He. adds, " If any one abide not in me, he shall be cast forth as a branch, and wither; and they shall gather him, and cast him into the fire, and he is burned." The wood of the vine, therefore, is in the same proportion the more contemptible if it abide not in the vine, as it is glorious while so abiding; in fine, as the Lord likewise says of them in the prophet Ezekiel, when cut off, they are of no use for any purpose of the husbandman, and can be applied to no labor of the mechanic' The branch is suitable only for one of two things, either the vine or the fire: if it is not in the vine, its place will be in the fire; and that it may escape the latter, may it have its place in the vine.
4. "If ye abide in me," He says, "and my words abide in you, ye shall ask what ye will, and it shall be done unto you." For abiding thus in Christ, is there aught they can wish but what will be agreeable to Christ? So abiding in the Saviour, can they wish anything that is inconsistent with salvation? Some things, indeed, we wish because we are I Ezek. XV. 5.
in Christ, and other things we desire because still in this world. For at times, in connection with this our present abode, we are inwardly prompted to ask what we know not it would be inexpedient for us to receive. But God forbid that such should be given us if we abide in Christ, who, when we ask, only does what will be for our advantage. Abiding, therefore, ourselves in Him, when His words abide in us we shall ask what we will, and it shall be done unto us. For if we ask, and the doing follows not, what we ask is not connected with our abiding in Him, nor with His words which abide in us, but with that craving and infirmity of the flesh which are not in Him, and have not His words abiding in them. For to His words, at all events, belongs that prayer which He taught, and in which we say, "Our Father, who art in heaven."^ Let us only not fall away from the words and meaning of this prayer in our petitions, and whatever we ask, it shall be done unto us. For then only may His words be said to abide in us, when we do what He has commanded us, and love what He has promised. But when His words abide only m the memory, and have no place in the life, the branch is not to be accounted as in the vine, because it draws not its life from the root. It is to this distinction that the word of Scripture has respect, " and to those that remember His commandments to do them." 3 For many retain them in their memory only to treat them with contempt, or even to mock at and assail them.
It is not in such as have only some kind of contact, but no connection, that the words of Christ abide; and to them, therefore, they will not be a blessing, but a testimony against them; and because they are present in them without abiding in them, they are held fast by them for the very purpose of being judged according to them at last, / 2 Matt. vi. g.
3 Ps. ciii. 18.
TRACTATE LXXXII.
Chapter XV. 8-10.
I. The Saviour, in thus speaking to the disciples, commends still more and more the grace whereby we are saved, when He says, " Herein is my Father glorified,' that ye bear very much fruit, and be made my disciples," Whether we say glorified, or made bright, both ^ Clarijicatits, literally, "clarified," or made bright, clear to men s eyes. See immediately afterwards in text. ' are the rendering given us of one Greek verb, namely doxazein (do^rO^sr/). For what is doxa (rW|a) in Greek, is in Latin glory. I have thought it worth while to mention this, because the apostle says, " If Abraham was justified by works, he hath glory, but not before God." ^ For this is the glory before God, = Rom. iv. 2.
Tractate LXXXIL] j4/ whereby God, and not man, is glorified, when! he is justified, not by works, but by faith, so ' that even his doing well is imparted to him by God; just as the branch, as I have stated above,' cannot bear fruit of itself. For if herein God the Father is glorified, that we bear much fruit, and be made the disciples of Christ, let us not credit our own glory therewith, as if we had it of ourselves. For of Him is such a grace, and accordingly therein the glory is not ours, but His. Hence also, in another passage, after saying, " Let your light so shine before men that they may see your good works; " to keep them from the thought that such good works were of themselves. He immediately added, " and may glorify your Father who is in heaven." ^ For herein is the Father glorified, that we bear much fruit, and be made the disciples of Christ. And by whom are we so made, but by Him whose mercy hath forestalled us? For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus unto good works. ^ 2. "As the Father hath loved me,^' He says, " so have I loved you: continue ye in my love." Here, then, you see, is the source of our good works. For whence should we have them, were it not that faith worketh by love?■* And \\o\v should we love, were it not that we were first loved? With striking clearness is this declared by the same evangelist in his epistle: " We love God because He first loved us." 5 But when He says, "As the Father hath loved me, so have I loved you,^' He indicates no such equality between our nature and His as there is between Himself and the Father, but the grace whereby the Mediator between God and men is the man Christ Jesus.* For He is pointed out as Mediator when He says, "The Father — me, and I — you." For the Father, indeed, also loveth us, but in Him; for herein is the Father glorified, that we bear fruit in the vine, that is, in the Son, and so be made His disciples.
3. "Continue ye," He says, " in my love.*' How shall we continue? Listen to what follows: " If ye keep my commandments, ye shall abide in my love." Love brings about the keeping of His commandments; but does the keeping of His commandments bring about love? Who can doubt that it is love which precedes? For he has no true ground for keeping the commandments who is destitute of love. And so, in saying, " H ye keep my commandments, ye shall abide in my love," He shows not the source from wliich love springs, but the means whereby it is manifested. As if He said, Think not tliat 'Tract. LXXXI. sec. 2. 4 Gal. V. 6.
ye abide in my love if ye keep not my commandments; for it is only if ye have kept them that ye shall abide, hi other words, it will thus be made apparent that ye shall abide in my love if ye keep my commandments. So that no one need deceive himself by saying that he loveth Him, if he keepeth not His commandments. For we love Him just in the same measure as we keep His commandments; and the less we keep them, the less we love. And although, when He saith, " Continue ye in my love,^' it is not apparent what love He spake of; whether the love we bear to Him, or that which He bears to us: yet it is seen at once in the previous clause. For He had there said, "So have I loved you;" and to these words He immediately adds, "Continue ye in my love:" accordingly, it is that love which He bears to us. What, then, do the words mean, " Continue ye in my love," but just, continue ye in my grace? And what do these mean, " If ye keep my commandments, ye shall abide in my love,'' but, hereby shall ye know that ye shall abide in the love which I bear to you, if ye keep my commandments? It is not, then, for the purpose of awakening His love to us that we first keep His commandments; but this, that unless He loves us, we cannot keep His commandments. This is a grace which lies all disclosed to the humble, but is hid from the proud.
4. But what are we to make of that which follows: "Even as I have kept my Father's commandments, and abide in His love"? Here also He certainly intended us to understand that fatherly love wherewith He was loved of the Father. For this was what He has just said, "As the Father hath loved me, so have I loved you; " and then to these He added the words, " Continue ye in my love; " in that, doubtless, wherewith I have loved you. Accordingly, when He says also of the Father, " I abide in His love," we are to understand it of that love which was borne Him by the Father. But then, in this case also, is that love which the Father bears to the Son referable to the same grace as that w'herewith we are loved of the Son: seeing that we on our part are sons, not by nature, but by grace; while the Only-begotten is so by nature and not by grace? Or is this even in the Son Himself to be referred to His condition as man? Certainly so. For in saying, "As the Father hath loveil me, so have I loved you," He pointed to the grace that was His as Mediator. For Christ Jesus is tlie Mediator between God and men, not in respect to His Godhead, but in respect to His manhootl. ' 7 Non in guantum Deus, sed in quantum homo est.
;48 [Tractate LXXXIII.
And certainly it is in reference to this His human nature that we read, "And Jesus increased in wisdom and age, and in favor [grace] with God and men." ' In harmony, therefore, with this, we may rightly say that while human nature belongs not to the nature of God, yet such human nature does by grace belong to the person of the only-begotten Son of God; and that by grace so great, that there is none greater, yea, none that even approaches equality. For there were no merits that pre- ' Luke ii. 52.
ceded that assumption of humanity, but all His merits began with that very assumption. The Son, therefore, abideth in the love wherewith the Father hath loved Him, and so hath kept His commandments. For what are we to think of Him even as man, but that God is His lifter up?- for the Word was God, the Only-begotten, co-eternal with Him that begat; but that He might be given to us as Mediator, by grace ineffable, the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us. ^ 2 Ps. iii. 3.
3 Chap. i. I, 14.
TRACTATE LXXXIII.
Chapter XV. ii, 12.
I, You have just heard, beloved, the Lord saying to His disciples, " These things have I spoken unto you, that my joy might be in you, and that your joy might be full." And what else is Christ's joy in us, save that He is pleased to rejoice over us? And what is this joy of ours which He says is to be made full, but our having fellowship with Him? On this account He had said to the blessed Peter, " If I wash thee not, thou shalt have no part with me.'' '■ His joy, therefore, in us is the grace He hath bestowed upon us: and that is also our joy. But over it He rejoiced even from eternity, when He chose us before the foundation of the world.- Nor can we rightly say that His joy was not full; for God's joy was never at any time imperfect. But that joy of His was not in us: for we, in whom it could be, had as yet no existence; and even when our existence commenced, it began not to be in Him. But in Him it always was, who in the infallible truth of His own foreknowledge rejoiced that we should yet be His own. Accordingly, He had a joy over us that was already full, when He rejoiced in foreknowing and foreordaining us: and as little could there be any fear intermingling in that joy of His, lest there should be any possible failure in what He foreknew would be done by Himself. Nor, when He began to do what He foreknew that He would do, was there any increase to His joy as the expression of His blessedness; otherwise His making of us must have added to His blessedness. Be such a supposition, brethren, far from our thoughts; for the blessedness of God was neither less without us, nor became greater because of us. His joy, therefore, over our salvation, which was always in Him, when He foreknew and foreordained us, began to be in us when He called us; and this joy we properly call our own, as by it we, too, shall yet be blessed: but this joy, as it is ours, increases and advances, and presses onward perseveringly to its own completion. Accordingly, it has its beginning in the faith of the regenerate, and its completion in the reward when they rise again. Such is my opinion of the purport of the words, " These things have I spoken unto you, that my joy might be in you, and that your joy might be made full:" that mine "might be in you;'' that yours " might be made full." For mine was alwavs full, even before ye were called, when ye were foreknown as those whom I was afterwards to call; but it finds its ph(ce in you also, when ye are transformed into that which I have foreknown regarding you. And "that yours may be full: " for ye shall be blessed, what ye are not as yet; just as ye are now created, who had no existence before.
2. "This," He says, "is my injunction, that ye love one another, as I have loved you." Whether we call it injunction or commandment,^ both are the rendering of the same Greek word, entole (i>To/5j). But He had already made this same announcement on a former occasion, when, as ye ought to remember, I repounded it to you to the best of my ability. ■♦ For this is what He says there, "A new commandment I give unto you, that ye love one another; as I have loved you, I Chap. xiii. 8.
2 Eph. i. 4.
3 Prcecepttim, sive iitatidatuiu.
4 See Tract. LXV.
Tractate LXXXIV.]
greater, Or has God in that ye also love one another."' And so the repetition of this commandment is its commendation: onl}' that there He said, "A new commandment I give unto you;" and here, *' This is my commandment:" there, as if there had been no such commandment before; and here, as if He had no other commandment to give them. But there it is spoken of as " new,'' to keep us from persevering in our old courses; here, it is called " mine," to keep us from treating it with contempt.
3. But when He said in this way here, " This is my commandment," as if there were none else, what are we to think, my brethren? Is, then, the commandment about that love, wherewith we love one another, His only one? Is there not also another that is still — that we should love God? very truth given us such a charge about love alone, that we Iiave no need of searching for others? There are three things at least that the apostle commends when he says, " But now abide faith, hope, charity, these three; but the greatest of these is charity."^ And although in charity, that is, in love, are comprehended the two commandments; yet it is here declared to be the greatest only, and not the sole one. Accordingly, what a host of commandments are given us about faith, what a multitude about hope! who is there that could collect them together, or suffice to number them? But let us ponder the words of the same apostle: " Love is the fullness of the law." 3 And so, where there is love, what can be wanting? and where it is not, what is there that can possibly be profitable? The devil believes,'' but does not love: no one loveth who doth not believe. One may, indeed, hope for pardon who does not love, but he hopes in vain; but no one can despair who loves. Therefore, where there is love, there of necessity W'ill there be faith and hope; and where there is the love of our neighbor, there also of necessity will be the love of God. For he that loveth not God, how loveth he his neighbour as himself, seeing that he loveth not even himself? Such an one is both impious and iniquitous; and he that loveth iniquity, manifestly loveth not, but hateth his own soul. 5 Let us, therefore, be holding fast to this precept of the Lord, to love one another; and then all else that is commanded we shall do, for all else we have contained in this. But this love is distinguished from that which men bear to one another as such; for in order to mark the distinction, it is added, " as I have loved you." And wherefore is it that Christ loveth us, but that we may be fitted to reign with Christ? With this aim, therefore, let us also be loving one another, that we may manifest the difference of our love from that of others, who have no such motive in loving one another, because the love itself is wanting. But those whose mutual love has the possession of God Himself for its object, will truly love one another; and, therefore, even for the very purpose of loving one another, they love God. There is no such love as this in all men; for few have this motive for their love one to another, that God may be all in all. *