The multitude therefore that stood and heard said that it thundered. Others said: An angel spoke to him.
ο ουν οχλος ο εστως και ακουσας ελεγεν βροντην γεγονεναι αλλοι ελεγον αγγελος αυτω λελαληκεν
13 Church Fathers comment on this verse
The Jews thought that it was thunder, or that an angel had spoken to Him. Why did they think this? Was the voice not clear and intelligible? No. They were coarse, fleshly, and heedless people, and therefore the voice immediately vanished for them. Some retained only the sound. Others knew that it was an articulate voice, but did not know what it meant.
Since very many were coarse and ignorant, they took the voice for thunder, although the voice was articulate and very clear. They quickly forgot the words of the voice and retained only its echo. Others remembered the very words of the voice, "I have glorified it, and I will glorify it again." Yet, not understanding the meaning of these words, they thought an angel had spoken to Him. Therefore these words, as spoken by an angel, were incomprehensible to them.
The Father answered His Son in a manner known to Him alone. By this He manifested His will that those who heard should honor Him, believing without hesitation that He is by nature the Son of God and the Father.
But the people were perplexed, senselessly dividing themselves among various conjectures. They ought to have known that the Father was the One answering, to whom the Son was addressing His words.
For He did not ask that there should be thunder, nor that an angel should cry out. Rather, the Son says, “This voice did not come for My sake, but for yours.”
Certainly He knew the will of the Begetter, even had He said nothing, since He was and is the Wisdom and Word of the Father.
Therefore, “for your sake,” He says, “the voice came,” so that you might receive Me as the Son of God, whom the Father acknowledges as His Son by nature.
The Lord says specifically that “a voice came,” but He does not add that it was the Father’s voice, or how it came, for this is superfluous.
Nevertheless, He turns it into a testimony that even after hearing a voice as if from heaven, they still remained in their impiety.
By this He showed that in that voice nothing was communicated to Him that He did not already know, but rather to those to whom it had to be communicated. Therefore, as that voice sounded not for His sake but for others, so His soul was troubled not for His sake, but by His will for others.
How does God speak? By a bodily voice? By no means. He proclaims oracles by a voice immeasurably surpassing bodily voice. Such a voice the prophets heard. Such a voice believers hear, but the impious do not perceive it. In the Gospel you read how the Evangelist heard the Father saying, "I have glorified it, and I will glorify it again." But the Jews did not hear the voice, and therefore said, "It is thunder." Thus God was heard, He who both spoke and did not speak.
"The people who stood by and heard it said, It has thundered." Those who did not distinguish the words, but heard only the sound, said this. "Others said, An angel has spoken to Him." Those who heard the words clearly said this.
When God speaks so that He can be heard, as in this case, while remaining unseen, He speaks through a rational creature, that is, by the voice of an angel.
Until now Jesus Christ had contemplated chiefly the lofty purpose of His coming to earth: the salvation of men. His spirit was full of exaltation, and the tone of His speech was joyful and solemn.
But now His thought pauses on the path that leads to this purpose, namely the sufferings and death that stand close before Him.
His God-human spirit is troubled at the vivid representation of death, that unnatural end of human life.
Yet the involuntary feeling of some trembling before death, a tribute to human nature, had no influence on the will of Jesus Christ.
It is quickly replaced in Him by complete resolve to endure even death, in order to glorify the Father.
“My soul is troubled; and what shall I say? Shall I say, Father, deliver Me from this hour? But for this purpose I came to this hour.
No, I will say: Father, glorify Your name through Me, through all that must happen to Me, in accordance with the purpose of My coming to earth.”
Then a voice came from heaven: “I have glorified it, and I will glorify it again.”
This voice was differently received and understood by different hearers. For those completely incapable of receiving the heavenly voice, it was simply thunder.
Others heard articulate sounds, although they did not distinguish or understand them. They concluded that an angel had spoken with Jesus.
The apostles, as is evident from the fact that one of them, John, gives us the account of this event, probably were deemed worthy to hear and understand this voice clearly.
In this case, with the different hearers, the same thing occurred as at the conversion of the Apostle Paul with his companions (Acts 9:3 and following; 26:13 and following).
This loud voice struck those present by its suddenness. Everyone’s attention was concentrated exclusively on the praying Jesus. Their hearing was strained intensely, so as not to miss a single word of His.
In such moments of inward disposition, one may entirely fail to hear what is happening around him. Or one may hear, for example, the speech of other people nearby, yet not understand it and not distinguish it from a simple rumble.
Being in such a disposition, the crowd surrounding Jesus heard the voice from heaven. But, not distinguishing its individual words, they took this manifestation for thunder.
Some, however, though they did not understand the words of the heavenly voice, did understand that it was not thunder, but words spoken by someone.
Although Jesus in His prayer was addressing God, they took these words, unknown to them, for the speech of an angel.
For Jesus Himself and the apostles, however, these words were clear and comprehensible. This is proved by the fact that the Apostle and Evangelist John, who heard them, transmits them in his Gospel not as supposed, but as heard by himself.
The appearance of these foreigners showed that the hour had come for the Son of Man to be glorified among the nations. He cried out, "Father, glorify Your name!" In answer to this a voice came from heaven: "I have glorified it, and I will glorify it again." This voice was not heard by all in the same way. To many it seemed a mere peal of thunder. Others said that "an angel had spoken to Him," and only a few heard it distinctly.
The impression of this heavenly voice upon those surrounding the Lord was not the same, because their spiritual condition was not the same.
The people, that is, the crowd or the majority, in contrast to the others, the minority, only some of the people, heard only a sound and said that it was thunder.
Others heard an articulate voice and said that an angel was speaking to Him. Probably, hearing articulate sounds, they nevertheless did not understand them.
Otherwise they would not have attributed the spoken words to an angel. In connection with the Lord’s prayer, the words of the Voice would necessarily have had to be ascribed to the Heavenly Father Himself.
The Lord, and perhaps the apostles, both heard the words and understood their meaning. At least one of them, John, recorded it as a voice from heaven with definite words and their meaning.
We see such a varied impression of a heavenly voice on people of varied spiritual condition and disposition at the conversion of Saul to Christ.
At the appearance of Jesus Christ to him, there was a voice from heaven. Saul heard this voice and understood the meaning of the words addressed to him.
Of those who were with him and were also struck by the manifestation, some heard the voice but did not understand what was said. Others did not even hear the voice. Cf. Acts 9:3 and following; Acts 22:6 and following; Acts 26:13 and following.
Verses 27-30. The sight of the depth of self-sacrifice chosen by the Son of God for the salvation of men brings trembling to the soul of the Son of Man.
This self-sacrifice is so heavy. Yet if it were easy, it could not have the value it has in reconciling the offended righteousness of God with guilty humanity.
Therefore, immediately after saying, “My soul is troubled. Father, save Me from this hour,” the Savior says: “But for this purpose I came to this hour.” “This must be,” He also said later, Mt 26:54.
“There came a voice from heaven: I have glorified it, and I will glorify it again.” This moment in the life of the Savior, ready for death, is very important.
For the third time a voice from heaven, from the Heavenly Father, resounds over the Son of Man. The first time it was heard at the baptism in the Jordan, Mt 3:17; Mk 1:11; Lk 3:22.
The second time was on Tabor, Mt 17:5; 2 Pet 1:17-18; Lk 9:35. The third time is now.
At the beginning, middle, and end of Christ’s ministry, the Heavenly Father bears witness to the significance of the Son.
Frivolity may say that “unclear thought mistook the thunder that struck the senses for the voice of God” (De Bette, Stud. und Krit. 1834, 4, 939).
On the contrary, the historian and eyewitness firmly says that this was a voice from heaven, articulate and clear.
He also states what the opinions of spiritually undeveloped people about this matter were: “The people standing by, who heard it, said that it had thundered. Others said, ‘An angel has spoken to Him.’”
The latter opinion deserves special notice, though De Bette entirely overlooks it. Even among the people there were some who distinguished articulate signs, words, in the heavenly voice.
They therefore did not regard it as mute thunder or a dull rumble.
If the other apostles, besides John, had not understood the voice along with the people, the exact historian would have said so. He is not ashamed to display the apostles’ lack of understanding where it occurred.
Therefore it must be accepted as certain that not John alone, but all the apostles, heard and understood the heavenly voice as John transmits it.
Finally, one must not forget that the Apostles Peter and Paul heard a voice from heaven, articulate signs (Acts 9:7; Acts 22:7, 10; Acts 13:15). Later many saints also heard such voices, for example St. Polycarp (Ep. de mart. Polycarpi § 9).
“I have glorified it, and I will glorify it again.” The Heavenly Father embraces His whole relation to the Son, in its past and future.
He does not point to some particular manifestation of His will to the Son. Rather, embracing the whole course of events concerning sinful humanity, taken under the protection of the Son of God, He speaks.
He says that the Father’s good pleasure always rests upon the work of the Son, the Redeemer.
“This voice was not for My sake, but for the sake of the people.” At the Jordan the voice from heaven was heard by the Baptist. On Tabor it was heard by the three apostles.
Now it resounds in the hearing of the people, to warn the simple-hearted against participation in the fearful crime being prepared. It also instructs those among the people who, if not now, then later, would attend to the significance of Christ Jesus.
Three times there was a voice from heaven bearing witness to the Lord Jesus. The first voice from heaven came at the Lord's Baptism. The second came at His Transfiguration on Tabor. The third came in Jerusalem after the Lord's prayer: "Father, glorify Your name."
The first voice from heaven bore witness to John the Baptist, the first witness of Christ on earth. The second heavenly voice came before the three disciples who were on the holy mountain.
Together with the other Apostles, they were to bear witness to the Lord before the whole world. Finally, the third time, "this voice came for the sake of the people."
At that moment the Lord stood surrounded by a crowd, among whom were also Gentiles who had come to Jerusalem to worship. It pleased the Lord that a sign from heaven should confirm in hearts capable of faith the conviction of His divinity as the God-man.
"The Word was always glorified before all ages, but He became flesh in order to sanctify and deify men, and in Himself to glorify the flesh," says Saint Athanasius the Great.
Therefore the voice from heaven bore witness that faith in the Lord Jesus, who stood before the people in the form of a man, is truly faith in God, revealed to men in the second Hypostasis.
This voice was heard by all, but not understood by all. The understanding of it, like every utterance of God, depends on how ready the human heart is to receive the word of God.
The people in general are said to have heard. The sounds reached them, but not all understood the sign. Some said that it was thunder. Others, better prepared, said that it was the voice of an angel.
Probably only the Lord's disciples clearly understood the words of God. Yet even they fully understood their meaning only after the Lord's Resurrection and glorification.
All the people had to understand one thing: a solemn manifestation of God's will had taken place. It had taken place in answer to the prayer of Him who had called the dead Lazarus from the tomb.
This was the One whom the people had recently greeted as their king on the descent from the Mount of Olives. Above, in verse 24, the Lord had pointed to His suffering death.
The voice from heaven points to the glorification of God in His Son, who assumed flesh. Yet in the Lord's voluntary death itself, and in the Resurrection that followed it, the highest glorification of the God-man is revealed.
He is God Almighty, suffering together with all mankind in the most terrible sufferings that can befall man on earth. The disciples had to learn this.
On the one hand, the voice from heaven had to save them from despair when they would see the Lord dying on the cross. In the future, it had to illumine for them the whole plan of divine wisdom.
It had to show how the salvation of men was prepared and fulfilled. After the Lord's Resurrection, they were entrusted with preaching this salvation to the whole world.
For the people of Jerusalem, the voice from heaven had another meaning also. It was a witness against the people. All heard the sign, and all knew that this sign came in answer to the prayer of the Lord Jesus.
Yet a few days later, at the instigation of the Pharisees, this people cried: "Crucify Him, crucify Him!" "This voice came for the sake of the people."
After this, the Lord continues to reveal the mysteries accomplished by His coming and says: Jn 12:31. "Now is the judgment of this world; now the ruler of this world will be cast out."
Passages read together with this verse.
Greek text, 15 words with lemma, transliteration and Strong’s number. Tap to expand.
THEOSIS