John 10:31-38

Ver 31. Then the Jews took up stones again to stone him, 32. Jesus answered them, "Many good works have I showed you from my Father; for which of those works do you stone me?" 33. The Jews answered him, saying, "For a good work we stone you not; but for blasphemy; and because that you, being a man, make yourself God." 34. Jesus answered them, "Is it not written in your law, 'I said, you are gods?' 35. If he called them gods, to whom the word of God came, and the scripture cannot be broken; 36. Say you of him, whom the Father has sanctified, and sent into the world, you blaspheme; because I said, I am the Son of God? 37. If I do not the works of my Father, believe me not. 38. But if I do, though you believe not me, believe the works: that you may know, and believe, that the Father is in me, and I in him."

AUG. At this speech, I and My Father are one, the Jews could not restrain their rage, but ran to take up stones, after their hardhearted way: Then the Jews took up stones again to stone Him.

HILARY. The heretics now, as unbelieving and rebellious against our Lord in heaven, show their impious hatred by the stones, i.e. the words they cast at Him; as if they would drag Him down again from His throne to the cross.

THEOPHYL. Our Lord remonstrates with them; Many good works have I showed you from My Father, strewing that they had no just reason for their anger.

ALCUIN. Healing of the sick, teaching, miracles. He showed them of the Father, because He sought His Father's glory in all of them. For which of these works do you stone Me? They confess, though reluctantly, the benefit they have received from Him, but charge Him at the same time with blasphemy, for asserting His equality with the Father;

For a good work we stone you not, but for blasphemy; and because that You, being a man, make Yourself God.

AUG. This is their answer to the speech, I and My Father are one. Lo, the Jews understood what the Arians understand not. For they are angry, for this very reason, that they could not conceive but that by saying, I and My Father are one, He meant the equality of the Father and the Son.

HILARY. The Jew said, You being a man, the Arian, you being a creature: but both say, You make yourself God. The Arian supposes a God of a new and different substance a God of another kind, or not a God at all. He said, You are not Son by birth, you art not God of truth; you art a superior creature.

CHRYS. Our Lord did not correct the Jews, as if they misunderstood His speech, but confirmed and defended it, in the very sense in which they had taken it. Jesus answered them, Is it not written in your law,

AUG. i.e. the Law given to you, I have said, you are gods? God saith this by the Prophet in the Psalm. Our Lord calls all those Scriptures the Law generally, though elsewhere He spiritually distinguishes the Law from the Prophets. On these two commandments hang all the Law and the Prophets.

In another place He makes a threefold division of the Scriptures; All things must he fulfilled which were written in the Law of Moses, and in the Prophets, and in the Psalms concerning Me. Now He calls the Psalms the Law, and thus argues from them; If he called them gods to whom the word of God came, and the scripture cannot be broken, say you of Him whom the Father has sanctified, and sent into the world, you blaspheme, because I said, I am the Son of God?

HILARY. Before proving that He and His Father are one, He answers the absurd and foolish charge brought against Him, that He being man made Himself God. When the Law applied this title to holy men, and the indelible word of God sanctioned this use of the incommunicable name, it could not be a crime in Him, even though He were man, to make Himself God.

The Law called those who were mere men, gods; and if any man could bear the name religiously, and without arrogance, surely that man could, who was sanctified by the Father, in a sense in which none else is sanctified to the Sonship; as the blessed Paul said, Declared to be the Son, of God with power, according to the Spirit of holiness. For or all this reply refers to Himself as man; the Son of God being also the Son of man.

AUG. Or sanctified, i.e. in begetting, gave Him holiness, begat Him holy. If men to whom the word of God came were called gods, much more the Word of God Himself is God. If men by partaking of the word of God were made gods, much more is the Word of which they partake, God.

THEOPHYL. Or, sanctified, i.e. set apart to be sacrificed for the world: a proof that He was God in a higher sense than the rest. To save the world is a divine work, not that of a man made divine by grace.

CHRYS. Or, we must consider this a speech of humility, made to conciliate men. After it he leads them to higher things; If I do not the works of My Father, believe Me not; which is as much as to say, that He is not inferior to the Father. As they could not see His substance, He directs them to His works, as being like and equal to the Father's. For the equality of their works, proved tile equality of their power.

HILARY. What place has adoption, or the mere conception of a name then, that we should not believe Him to be the Son of God by nature, when He tells us to believe Him to be the Son of God, because the Father's nature showed itself in Him by His works?

A creature is not equal and like to God: no other nature has power comparable to the divine. He declares that He is carrying on not His own work, but the Father's, lest in the greatness of the works, the nativity of His nature be forgotten.

And as under the sacrament of the assumption of a human body in is the womb of Mary, the Son of God was not discerned, this must be gathered from His work; But if I do, though you believe not Me, believe the works.

Why does the sacrament of a human birth hinder the understanding of the divine, when the divine birth accomplishes all its work by aid of the human? Then He tells them what they should gather from His works; That you may know and believe that the Father is in Me, and I in Him. The same declaration again, I am the Son of God: I and the Father are one.

AUG. The Son does not say, The Father is in Me, and I in Him, in the sense in which men who think and act aright may say the like; meaning that they partake of God's grace, and are enlightened by His Spirit. The Only-begotten Son of God is in the Father, and the Father in Him, as an equal in an equal.