Ignorance of the Prophets and the Nature of Faith

They are shown to be ignorant regarding the prophets and lacking precise knowledge of the written things; for they have received voices saying that the Christ remains forever, but they did not understand the mystery of death occurring in between and the brief dissolution of the soul from the body (John 12:36).

He does not wish to be seized while wandering in the midst or discussing in between, but withdrawing and overshadowing himself; for in this He reproved the treachery of the traitor as a hired teacher receiving wages, and He guarded His own gentleness and was completely removed from audacity, even to the point of coming into the midst only to testify the truth; for it was not an act of wrath against the Savior that their work had to be, but a plan of malice; for everything done out of wrath is lesser for condemnation, but the extreme is to do evil with a plan.

Let us not think that a hardening and a callousness of heart is brought on by God as the operation of the holy power (John 12:40), but rather a concession to the divine judgment, and the operation of the evil and opposing power.

It is evident that before the fully revealed departure these things were said to the Lord (John 12:44-45), and after these words He withdrew, whom John, repeating, foretells having seen both the believers and those guarding their confession. He reproved the terrible sin of standing against confession; for he said that those doing this are setting aside faith in God; for one does not believe in something other than God, who is seen in Him, because, he says, the Father is seen in the Son. Therefore, just as one who received him as a servant did not receive the one who sent him, so he spoke of the one believing in Him as believing in God; for he would no longer follow as the one seeing Me sees the one who sent Me; for the faith toward the one serving is directed toward the servant seeing the sender, but he who, in the vision of the Son, sees the Father, does not turn beyond Jesus to the Father, but remaining in the Son and standing, receives the Father.

So that the one believing in me does not believe in me until he has the manifestation of the flesh and the human face. From the time that he who leads forward and brings up the hearts of men sees me, he says, he sees me fivefold; that is, the one able to know through insight who is present through the flesh, and grasping with a beautiful theory, this one finds me truly, and he finds in his faith toward me the faith toward the Father. So then, as he was saying, the one believing in me does not believe in a mere human, but in the power of God, in whom the Father is known and believed.

His words are spoken with authority, because he is both Creator and the lawgiver to his own creatures, according to the word of God, through whom all things came into being (John 1:3), who came to his own (John 1:11) and converses with authority, not as if he were any servant of the words given from God. For to none of such things would the 'I say to you' and the comparison to the laws toward the gods be appropriate; for having placed alongside what was spoken from a divine person the 'you shall not murder' and the 'you shall not commit adultery,' he brings forth for each case the 'but I say to you.' Nor is the lawgiving foreign to the Savior, nor does he speak from revelation, nor does he converse as if things were commanded, if we think according to divinity his own nature and his eternal existence.

First and readily available is the benefit of humility exceeding all by example and of the greatest love. He speaks of a transition from human weakness to the super-heavenly glory.

The washing of the feet here alludes to the deeper matter, which seems to be a preparation of the apostolic feet for the work of the apostolate; for he sends them having been cleansed with the feet, through the purity being given by himself, so that indeed they might be able to run through the world, promising the gospels of salvation, according to the saying, 'how beautiful are the feet of those announcing peace' (Romans 10:15). Since they were clean, he said, it remains for the body also to have the cleansing of the feet; that is, so that they might not only be clean for themselves, but also in the course of their journey might be clean, bringing purity to all men. And he said that they are not all clean because of the twelfth one in them having all the uncleanness in himself.