John 17:14Meaning & Commentary from the Church Fathers

Therefore here too He says, "I have given them Your word, and the world has hated them." By this He again states the reason why they are worthy of the Father's great care. For Your sake, He says, and for Your word they have been hated. Therefore they are worthy of all providential care. Scripture is accustomed to call sinful deeds "the world," as in Christ's saying: "They are not of the world, as I am not of the world" (Jn 17:14).

The apostles were not as holy and free from worldly passions as the Lord. He committed no sin, and no deceit was found in His mouth (1 Pet 2:22). But they did not escape the weakness of human nature. Therefore, when you hear the words, "as I am not of the world," do not take them as implying a perfect likeness of the apostles to the Lord. Only when this "as" is said of the Father and Him should you understand equality.

Therefore the Savior says, 'I have given them Thy word, and the world has hated them, because they are not of the world, even as I am not of the world.' They received, He says, and very gladly, Thy word, Father, which came to them through Me. This is the evangelical preaching, which easily turns those who receive it away from worldly life and earthly thoughts. For this reason they were hated by the world, that is, by those who wished to think worldly thoughts and who love this sensual and defiled life. For the words of the saints are unpleasant to worldly people. They always draw them away from the evils of this life and reveal the impurity of worldly living. They accuse the sinfulness of the world and strike with bitter reproofs those who find pleasure in falling and moving about in earthly evil. They also wage war against every kind of violence, remove vainglory, and teach men to renounce covetousness and keep as far away from it as possible, since it is the mother of all evils. They command men to stand outside the ancient deception, and urge those caught in the devil's snares to go to the God of all. For this reason, Father, He says, they are hated. Though guilty of nothing shameful or impious, they became almost unbearable to worldly people. But because 'I have given them' from Thee 'the word,' they too have now become outside the world, as I am. For conduct and life in Christ are wholly removed from earthly thought and worldly condition. Following this life as far as we can, we ourselves also escape being numbered among worldly people. Therefore the divine Paul commanded us to walk in His steps (cf. 1 Pet 2:21). We follow Him as we ought especially when we love thoughts only of things above the world. Then, setting our mind above fleshly thought, we look only to heavenly things. He again numbers Himself with the disciples according to His humanity. In imitation of Him, when He is understood as man, we ascend to every form of virtue, as we recently said. We flee every sin in the world and become strangers to its evils. This is surely what the divine Paul writes to us about himself and Christ: 'through Whom the world has been crucified to me, and I to the world' (Gal 6:14). Elsewhere he also commands, 'Be imitators of me, as I am of Christ' (1 Cor 11:1). Paul imitated our Lord Jesus Christ, of course, not in the sense that the Lord is the Creator of all. Besides the things already created, Paul did not create other heavens for us, nor did he bring seas or earth into being. How then did he imitate Him? Clearly, by reflecting in his morals and conduct the wondrous pattern of the life He manifested to us, insofar as this was possible for him. For who can be compared with Christ? Therefore, having united Himself with us according to His humanity, or rather, having appeared for us as the leader into a great good, I mean departure from the world through a life above the world, He says, 'I am not of the world.' For evangelical life and preaching are above the world. This also applies to you, since His divine word has settled in your souls. But as the world 'hates' Me, He says, so it hates 'them.' The world hates Christ because it opposes His words and does not receive His teaching, having wholly surrendered its thought to impulses toward evil. And in the likeness of our Savior Christ, the world clearly hated the disciples themselves, who preached His word for His sake. Paul did this when he said, 'We are ambassadors for Christ, since God exhorts through us. We beseech you on behalf of Christ: be reconciled to God' (2 Cor 5:20). What then does He ask, after revealing that the disciples will be hated by those attached to worldly evil? 'I do not ask,' He says, 'that Thou shouldest take them out of the world. But that Thou shouldest keep them from evil.' Christ does not desire that the saints be freed from human affairs or separated from bodily life while they have not yet completed the course of their apostleship and have not yet shone with the virtues of piety. Rather, after living among worldly people and guiding them toward a way of life pleasing to God, they are then to be carried with glorious struggles to the city above and dwell in the regions of the holy Angels. Therefore, as we find, one of the saints approaches the God Who loves good and sings, 'Take me not up in the midst of my days' (Ps 101:25). For it is not harmless for God-loving souls to be separated from life in the flesh before completing their excellent way of life. Therefore the law of Moses also teaches that death at an improper time is sent to lovers of sin as a kind of wrath and punishment. It often cries out that one must depart from evil, 'lest you die before your time' (Ex 28:35; Lev 8:35; Lev 10:7; Lev 22:9; Num 18:32 and elsewhere; cf. Eccl 7:17). Otherwise, the desire of the saints to depart from our affairs, that is, earthly life, would cause no small harm to those weak in faith. Indeed, they would be left altogether without guides in piety, since they would have no one able to do this. Knowing this, Paul also said, 'It is better to depart and be with Christ, but to remain in the flesh is more necessary for your sake' (Phil 1:23-24). Therefore, providing for the salvation of those not yet converted to the faith, the Lord says that worldly people must not be left without enlighteners and guides. Rather, He prays that the saints be preserved, always remaining outside evil living and turning away the assault of temptations by the power of the almighty Father. Again we must observe that He calls His own word, which came from Him, namely the evangelical word, the word of God the Father. He thereby shows that He is not other than the Father, because of consubstantiality. Thus in the Gospel books we find that the Jewish people were astonished at Him, because He taught them 'as one having authority, and not as their scribes' (Mt 7:29). For they conversed with the people while wholly preferring what the law demanded. But our Lord Jesus Christ did not follow at all the patterns contained in shadow and letter. Rather, uttering His word with divine authority, He says, 'It was said to those of old: You shall not kill. But I say to you' (Mt 5:21-22): do not desire. Although the law decreed concerning the divine sayings that nothing should be added to them or taken away from them (Deut 4:2), Christ both took away and added, transforming the figures into truth. Therefore He must not be reckoned among those under the law, that is, among creatures. For whoever by nature belongs among servants must certainly also be subject to the law. Thus Christ called His own word the word of the Father, for He is the Word in the Father and from the Father. He proclaims the will of the Godhead, I mean the true and one Godhead, contemplated in the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit.

The Lord, still addressing the Father and praying for His disciples, said: "I have given them Your word, and the world has hated them." They had not yet experienced this hatred in their own sufferings, which would later come upon them. But He speaks in His customary manner, foretelling the future with verbs in the past tense. Then, further giving the reason for the world's hatred of them, He says: "because they are not of the world, as I am not of the world." This was given to them through regeneration. By regeneration is usually meant the Mystery of Holy Baptism. But in the case of the apostles, the reference is rather to the descent of the grace of the Holy Spirit upon them on the day of Pentecost. By birth they were of the world, concerning which He had already said to them: "I chose you out of the world" (Jn 15:19). Thus it was granted to them that, like Him, they should not be of the world, because He delivered them from the world. But He Himself was never of the world. Even according to the form of a servant (cf. Phil 2:7), He was born of the Holy Spirit, by whom they were regenerated. For if they, because they were regenerated by the Holy Spirit, are no longer of the world, He Himself was never of the world because He was born of the Holy Spirit.

Their calling is that through them the world itself be transformed and changed by the knowledge of God revealed through Jesus Christ. He prays only that the heavenly Father preserve them from the inner temptations of evil. He prays that inwardly they remain strangers to the world, as those sanctified by the truth He preached. He prays that His holy life, which He is ready to give for them, may be the foundation of their sanctification. "And for their sake I sanctify Myself, that they also may be sanctified in truth."

He adds that He says this aloud before His disciples so that, in all the temptations that would come upon them, they might remember this intercession of Christ for them. Thus they would be filled with the same joy with which He is filled as He goes to the Father. He goes to the Father after having fully handed over and revealed to His disciples all that the Father entrusted Him to reveal to men. Yet at the same time the world, the unbelieving part of mankind, hated them because they were not of the world. Therefore they need the special help of God, protecting them from the evil of the world. And the Lord prays to the Father that He preserve them from this evil.

Foreseeing all this, Jesus knew that victory would not come easily to His disciples. Without special support from above they could not emerge victorious from the struggle before them. Therefore, after giving them all His final farewell instructions, He turns in supplication to His Father. He asks Him to guard their faith from every temptation and wavering, and to sanctify them by His truth. He asks that, after completing their earthly contest, they may be worthy to be where He, Christ, will be. He asks that not only they, but all who believe through their word, may be united by self-sacrificing love for one another. He asks that they remain in constant union with Him, Jesus Christ, and with the Father who sent Him.

I pray only that You keep them from evil, from the evil this hostile world can inflict on them together with the prince of the world. Cf. Mt 6:13; Lk 11:4. "They are not of the world," and so forth. See the note on Jn 15:19. "As I am not of the world." Do not be troubled by this. The word "as" does not here signify perfect likeness. When it is said of Christ and the Father, the word "as" expresses complete equality. When it is said of us and of Christ, it allows a great difference, because of the great and boundless difference between His nature and ours. See Chrysostom, cf. Theophylact.

"I have given them Your word, and the world has hated them, because they are not of the world, as I am not of the world." The world hates them for the very teaching they received from the Son of God. It also hates them because they do not belong to the world, just as He did not belong to it. How is it that the world hates Christ's disciples for Christ's teaching? Christ's teaching is pure, holy, and divine. But it displeases the world because it rises up against passions, errors, and prejudices. For the world to receive it with a sincere soul would mean the same as renouncing itself. "For everyone who does evil hates the light and does not come to the light, lest his deeds should be exposed, because they are evil" (Jn 3:20). On the other hand, Christ's followers are hated by the world because, transformed by Christ's teaching, they do not love what the world loves. They do not accept what the world praises, and they approve rules of life wholly displeasing to the world. Yet the world is exceedingly self-loving. It loves its own and does not permit its judgment to be despised. See Jn 18:15; Jn 13:19. It is strange to be alone in the world. Yet the sweetest Jesus consoles His disciples by pointing out that He Himself was a stranger to the world. He is their Lord and Teacher, the highest wisdom and the highest holiness, the beloved Son of the heavenly Father.