John 20:29Meaning & Commentary from the Church Fathers

The Lord says to him: “You have believed because you have seen Me.” Yet take heed, lest when I ascend with the flesh to the place from which I came without flesh, unbelief again awaken in you. Do not begin to say: Unless I again see in His hands the wounds of the nails, I will not believe. You have already declared your unbelief. You have touched, and you have believed once for all. Now only this remains for you: preach what you have been assured of.

Blessed are those who saw Me and believed. Yet far more blessed are those who have not seen Me and have believed. This blessing, brethren, refers to us, who were not counted worthy to behold Him, yet have believed in Him. Truly blessed are those who behold the Invisible One by faith.

Blessed are you, who see Him at each of our gatherings here. With your eyes you perceive Him, with your lips you kiss Him, and with your teeth you taste Him. Yet He whom you eat is not consumed and does not diminish. O wondrous mystery! O dread mystery! He who sits at the right hand of the Father rests in the right hands of sinners. He who is hymned by the angels is embraced by unclean hands, and permits Himself to be carried by His sinful servants.

He does not disdain our sinful palms. He does not disdain fingers worthy of condemnation. Our Creator does not strike us, though we are frail. Rather, He Himself urges us and says: “Take, eat” (Matt 26:26; Mark 14:22). “Take,” “drink” (Luke 22:17; Matt 26:27). Come to Me and touch My side with your hands. All of you, delight in My Body. Whatever portion of Me you receive, in it I am wholly present, the One who was touched by Thomas.

Let us all draw near in purity to the Pure One. But let us draw near with due reverence, without any haste that would show disrespect toward our Master. As each one approaches and speaks privately with the Redeemer, let us say to Him: Lord, we are not worthy that You should enter under the roof of our souls (Matt 8:8). Yet since You Yourself desire to be in us, and since it pleases You, as the Lover of mankind, to dwell in us, we draw near to You with boldness and confess to You. If You command, Master, we open the gates of our mouths, which You alone created.

Enter us with Your accustomed love for mankind. Enter and loose the bonds of our folly. Enter and enlighten our darkened minds. We believe, Lord, that You will do this. For You did not thrust away the harlot who fell before You with tears. You did not reject the repentant publican. You did not drive away the thief who confessed Your Kingdom. You did not leave the repentant persecutor as he had been. Rather, all whom repentance brought to You, You numbered among the choir of Your friends.

With such prayer, and with a pure soul, may we be counted worthy of the heavenly mysteries. May we guard ourselves by a chaste life. May no shameful word proceed from our mouths, which have received Christ, our Lord and God. Make this your own as well, newly illumined children of the Church. Honor the painless birth pangs of the font. Do not reject its divine womb, lest God say also of you: “I have nourished and brought up sons, but they have rebelled against Me” (Isa 1:2).

Your names are written in the heavens. Therefore do not defile yourselves again with the filth of pleasures. Do not draw upon yourselves the reproach of the Lord’s Apostle Paul: “You were running well. Who hindered you from obeying the truth?” (Gal 5:7). You have just taken off your white garments. But let the whiteness of your souls not be taken off with them. If you do not take this garment off yourselves, no one else will be able to strip you.

Therefore remain always newly illumined, that you may be counted worthy to hear those blessed words: “Come, blessed of My Father, inherit the Kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world” (Matt 25:34). May we all be counted worthy of it by the grace and love for mankind of our Lord Jesus Christ. With Him be glory, dominion, honor, and worship to the Father, together with the Holy Spirit, unto ages of ages. Amen.

Yet it was also necessary that He should deem us worthy of due care. He had another matter in view as well. He would leave to those of later times not the slightest occasion for unbelief. For it is entirely possible that some, not walking the straight path, and through ignorance surrendering themselves to false piety, would reject the faith. They would not admit the resurrection. Like that unbelieving disciple, they would come forward saying: “Unless I see in His hands the mark of the nails, and put my hand into His side, I will not believe” (John 20:25).

What kind of assurance would be sufficient for them, when Christ is no longer bodily on earth, but has ascended into the heavens? Would not those who said this seem wholly justified? They would be imitators of the Savior’s disciple. They would choose, as though it were praiseworthy, not simply to believe. Rather, they would resolve to demand, for their full assurance, the same thing shown to the holy disciples themselves.

Therefore Christ here forestalls such a future demand and averts the harm. Since He is true God, He knew the devil’s malicious design and his power of deception. Therefore He declares blessed those who believe without seeing. They are indeed worthy of admiration. For what reason? Because we must give full faith to what is before our eyes, since nothing there gives rise to doubt. But if someone receives what he has not seen, and counts true what the words of the mystagogue have implanted in his hearing, he thereby gives most honorable faith to the preacher.

Therefore blessedness follows everyone who believes according to the word of the holy Apostles. They were “eyewitnesses,” spectators of the events, and “ministers of the Word,” as Luke says (Luke 1:2). We too must heed them, if we prove to be lovers of eternal life and strive with great zeal to dwell in the habitations above.

Thomas, the blessed disciple, heard the other apostles announce to him: “We have seen (τεθεάμεθα) the Lord risen from the dead.” Having been somewhat unbelieving (ολίγον άπιστησας), he said: “Unless I put my hands (τας χεΐράς μου) into the marks of the nails, I will not believe.”

When the Savior came also to assure him, and offered him to put his hands into the marks of the nails, the disciple, summoned to faith, said to Him: “My Lord and my God.” Having said this, he became an object of wonder not only to his contemporaries. Even now we marvel at him, as one who spoke rightly and truly concerning the Savior.

Therefore, if He is both Lord and God, how will He be one of created things? Every created thing is by nature a slave, and is not God by nature. But the Savior is by nature Lord and God. Therefore He is not created, to whom the beauties of the divine essence belong.

Another argument drawn from the same point. If, according to them, the Son is by nature a creature, and Thomas said to such a one, “My Lord and my God,” yet escaped the charge of blasphemy. As though such words could be spoken even to a creature, what prevents us from saying this to angels and to any of the saints, whenever we admire them because of some wonder?

But no one in his right mind would say such words to any of those named, because they befit God alone. Yet we say that the disciple was far from error. Therefore he speaks the truth when he calls Him God and Lord. But He who is such by nature, and is so called, how will He be created?

Was Jacob not blessed? He left his father's house and endured exile while serving as a hired shepherd. See Gen 31:41. He mourned his dishonored daughter. See Gen 34:5. He suffered hunger. See Gen 42:2. Are not those blessed whose good faith is witnessed by God, when it is said, "I am the God of your father, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob" (Ex 3:6)?

Slavery is lowly, but Joseph was not lowly. He was plainly blessed when, as a slave, he restrained the lusts of his mistress. See Gen 39:7. What shall I say of holy David, who mourned the loss of three sons, and, what is more terrible, the incest committed against his own daughter? See 2 Kgs 12:16; 2 Kgs 13:31; 2 Kgs 18:33; 2 Kgs 13:21.

How could he not be blessed, from whom came the very Author of blessedness, who made many blessed? For "blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed." All of them felt their weakness, but decisively overcame it.

What could be more terrible than what happened to righteous Job, whether the fire in his house, the sudden death of ten children, or bodily torments? See Job 1:14 and following. Was he less blessed than he would have been if he had not endured all that by which he truly confirmed himself?

It is also true that in these sufferings there is something bitter, whose pain the power of reason cannot soothe. I would not say that the sea is not deep because its shores are not covered by water. Nor would I say that the sky is not clear because it is sometimes covered by clouds. Nor would I say that the earth is not fertile because there are places on it that are wholly bare. Nor would I say that grain is not abundant because wild stalks sometimes mingle with it.

In a similar way, allow that bitterness of sorrow can mingle with the harvest of a good conscience. If, in the full sheaf of blessed life, something contrary and bitter suddenly appears, is it not like wild stalks hidden among the grain? Is it not like the bitterness of tares concealed by the sweet fragrance of the grain?

The Evangelist said this because the disciples then felt this way not because they did not believe that Jesus Christ had risen. They doubted whether it was Jesus Christ who had appeared to them, and wished to be assured of this more certainly.

The blessedness spoken by Jesus Christ to those who have not seen and yet have believed extends also to those who believed through preaching. Therefore, if anyone says, "Blessed are those who lived in the time of Jesus Christ and saw Him," let him remember: "Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed."

But how can an incorrupt body have marks from blows and be subject to touch? How? This is supernatural and was permitted by the divine economy, since Jesus Christ ate and drank only to give the disciples greater assurance.

Therefore the Lord says to blessed Job concerning the ancient enemy of the human race: "Behold, he drinks up a river and does not hurry; he is confident though Jordan should rush into his mouth" (Job 40:18). For what is signified by the flood, if not the torrent of the human race? The human race pours forth from beginning to end, and as a sea of water from the fluidity of flesh it runs to its appointed limit.

What is signified by Jordan, if not the form of the baptized? Since in the river Jordan the very Author of our redemption deigned to be baptized, the multitude of those immersed in the mystery of Baptism is rightly expressed by the name Jordan.

Thus the ancient enemy swallowed the torrent of the human race. From the beginning of the world until the coming of Christ, with the exception of scarcely a few elect, he drew the human race into the belly of his malice. Of this it is rightly said: "If there is a flood, you will not perceive it," because he does not count it a great thing when he seizes unbelievers.

But what is added is very grave: "He remains confident though Jordan should rush into his mouth." After he seized all unbelievers from the beginning of the world, he presumed that he could still receive believers. For daily he devours with the mouth of deadly seduction those whose impious life does not agree with the confession of faith.

Therefore, most beloved brethren, fear this with all attention. Ponder this soundly within yourselves. Behold, we celebrate the Paschal solemnities. Yet we must live so as to deserve admission to the eternal feasts. Everything temporal that is celebrated with glory on feast days passes away. You who take part in these solemnities, strive not to be separated from the eternal solemnity.

What profit is there in taking part in human feasts if one should be excluded from the feasts of the Angels? The present solemnity is a shadow of the future solemnity. We celebrate the present one each year so that we may be counted worthy to pass to that one, which is not yearly but unceasing.

When the present solemnity is celebrated at the appointed time, our remembrance of the desired future is renewed. Thus, by repeated temporal joy, the soul is kindled and inflamed toward eternal joys. In the homeland it will enjoy true joy because on the way it meditates on the shadow of joy.

Therefore, brethren, order your life and your conduct. Foresee how strict in judgment He will appear who rose gently from death. Without doubt, on the day of the fearful examination He will appear with Angels, Archangels, Thrones, Dominions, Principalities, and Powers. Heaven and earth will burn, and all the elements will tremble in fear of their obedience.

Set before your eyes this Judge, so fearful. Fear Him as He comes, so that when He comes you may see Him not with fear, but with safety. He must therefore be feared, so that He may not be feared. Fear of Him must dispose us to good action. Dread of Him must restrain our life from impiety.

Believe me, brethren, that the more we now fear being convicted of guilt, the safer we shall then be in His presence. There is no doubt that if one of you, having a case with his adversary, had to defend it tomorrow before my judgment, he would perhaps spend the whole night without sleep. He would consider soundly and with intense mind what he might say, and how he might answer objections. He would not wish to fear finding me harsh, nor to fear appearing guilty before me.

And who am I? Or what am I? In a short time, after being a man, I shall be a worm, and after a worm, dust. Therefore, if the judgment of dust is feared with such anxiety, we must consider with what attention and fear the judgment of such majesty must be awaited.

But since there are some who doubt the resurrection of the body, and we shall teach this resurrection more surely when we anticipate even the hidden questions of your hearts, we must say a little about the very faith in the resurrection. Many doubt the resurrection, as we once did. When they see that through tombs flesh turns into decay and bones into dust, they do not hope that flesh and bones can be restored from dust.

Reasoning within themselves, they say as it were: "When is man reproduced from dust? When does it happen that ashes are made living?" We briefly answer them that for God it is less to restore what has been than to create what had not been. What wonder is it if He raises man from dust, who created all things together from nothing?

It is more wondrous to create heaven and earth from nothing than to restore man from earth. Yet they look at ashes and despair that they can again become a body. They wish, as it were, to limit by reason the power of divine action. They say this in their thoughts because daily divine wonders have lost their value for them through their continual occurrence.

Behold, in one tiny grain of seed the whole future vastness of a tree is hidden. Let us set before our eyes the wondrous size of some tree. Let us consider whence it received its beginning when it reached such vastness through growth. Without any doubt, we find its beginning in the smallest seed.

Now let us consider where in that small grain of seed are hidden the strength of the wood, the hardness of the bark, the abundance of scent and fragrance, the plenty of fruit, and the greenness of the leaves. The grain of seed, when touched, is not strong. Whence came the strength of the tree? It is not hard. Whence appeared the hardness of the bark?

It is not fragrant. Whence fragrance in the fruits? It shows nothing green within itself. Whence came the greenness of the leaves? It offers no fragrance to the sense of smell. Whence does the fragrance in the fruits arise? Thus everything is hidden together in the seed, though not everything comes forth from the seed together.

From the seed a root is produced. From the root a shoot grows. From the shoot fruit comes forth. In the fruit seed is produced again. Let us add, then, that seed too is hidden in seed. After this, what wonder is it if He restores bones, sinews, flesh, and hair from dust, who daily restores in the great bulk of a tree wood, fruits, and leaves from a little seed?

Therefore, when a mind doubting the possibility of resurrection demands proof, questions in return should be proposed to it about things that occur without ceasing and yet cannot be comprehended by reason. Since it cannot grasp by sight the nature of what it sees, let it believe, by the promise of divine power, what it hears.

Therefore, most beloved brethren, meditate within yourselves on the promises that are unchangeable. Despise those things that pass away with time as though already left behind. Hasten with full attention toward the glory of that resurrection which the Truth showed in Himself. Flee earthly desires, which separate from the Creator. For the more exclusively you love the Mediator between God and men, the higher you are lifted to the contemplation of Almighty God.

He lives and reigns with the Father in the unity of the Holy Spirit, God through all ages of ages. Amen.

18. O Most High God, moved by Thy mercy, strengthen and save me, that I may touch Thy life-giving side. Receiving Thy grace, Thy most pure Body and holy Blood, may I be delivered from all my evils and receive forgiveness of sins. Thomas, by touching Thee, knew Thy glory. But I fear, for I know Thy powers. I acknowledge my sinful deeds, and my conscience troubles me. Spare me, my Savior. Spare me, O Merciful One, that in word and deed, with faith, I may cry to Thee: "Thou art our Lord and our God."

But when they had been called by the Lord, they saw His hands and feet. "See My hands and My feet," He said to them, "for a spirit does not have flesh and bones as you see that I have." And when He had said this, He showed them His hands and feet (Lk 24:39-40).

What follows from this? Were they therefore not blessed? God forbid. When the Lord said, "Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed," He did not exclude from this blessedness those who saw and believed. Nor did He call the former more blessed than the latter.

But before His Resurrection from the dead He had blessed the Apostles because they saw Him and His miracles. Therefore He said, "Blessed are your eyes, for they see, and your ears, for they hear. Truly I say to you, many prophets and righteous men desired to see what you see, and did not see it, and to hear what you hear, and did not hear it" (Mt 13:16-17).

Thus, so that we might not think only those who saw Him and believed are blessed, and so that He might assure all who later did not see but believed that they too are worthy of the same blessedness, He said: "Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed."

How, then, were the wounds of the nails and spear visible in the Lord's incorrupt body? How did Thomas touch the incorrupt body? This happened by the condescension and power of God, to give assurance of His Resurrection from the dead. When the Lord ascended from earth, the Angels saw His garments reddened and cried: "Why are Thy garments red, and Thy raiment like that of one who treads the winepress?" (Is 63:2). So also the Apostles saw the wounds of the nails and spear, and Thomas touched His untouchable side.

Perhaps the royal Prophet prophesied of this touch when he said, "I sought God with my hands by night before Him, and I was not deceived" (Ps 76:3). Since this was done by almighty action, the divinely inspired Evangelist therefore numbers it among the other signs and miracles, saying:

In response to the Apostle's confession, the Lord blessed those who had not seen and yet believed. The Lord remembered us also. He remembered all who have not seen Him with bodily eyes. He remembered us also, separated from Him by both space and time. He remembered us at the moment when, in the humanity He had assumed, offered as a sacrifice for mankind and already glorified with the glory of the Resurrection, He stood in the midst of His holy Apostles. [...]

"Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed." By these words the Lord joined into one with the Apostles all believers of the whole earth and of all times. When, before going forth to His saving sufferings for us, He offered prayer for the Apostles to His Father, He united all true Christians with the Apostles. "I do not pray for these only," He said. "I pray not only for the Apostles, but also for those who believe in Me through their word" (Jn 17:20).

So also here, He makes all children of the Church participants in the blessedness of the Apostles. "Blessed are your eyes, for they see," He said to the Apostles, "and your ears, for they hear. Truly I say to you, many prophets and righteous men of the Old Testament desired to see what you see, and did not see it, and to hear what you hear, and did not hear it" (Mt 13:16-17).

The blessed eyewitnesses and servants of the Word handed down to us what they had seen and heard when "the Word became flesh and dwelt among us." One of these eyewitnesses of the Word says, "We beheld His glory, glory as of the Only-begotten from the Father, full of grace and truth" (Jn 1:14).

The most clear testimony of the Apostles makes us, as it were, spectators of the events whose eyewitnesses the Apostles were. Through the Church's mysteries we entered into essential communion with the Lord, and through these mysteries we remain in that communion. Living faith makes God, invisible to bodily eyes, visible to the spiritual eye, the mind.

This is the same as what had happened earlier with Nathanael (Jn 1:46-49 and note). There, as here, a strong ray of the light of truth penetrated with power and swiftness into the very depth of the soul and drove out every darkness. As sometimes happens in the development of inward spiritual life, faith suddenly rises from a lower degree to an immeasurable height. Thomas expresses his faith in the Lord as Messiah and God with such force, clarity, and definiteness that at that time perhaps only Peter had expressed it so.

Yet this faith of Thomas rested on sensory assurance. The Lord opens to him a still higher path to faith and blesses those who have reached, and are reaching, strength of faith by a path other than Thomas's. "You have believed because you have seen Me. Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed."

Since the faith of the other disciples in the Lord's Resurrection was also confirmed by seeing and touching Him (Lk 24:39 and parallels), the word now addressed to Thomas also applies to them, though not to the same degree, since Thomas's unbelief was stronger. He Himself reproached them for unbelief and hardness of heart, because they did not believe those who had seen Him risen (Mk 16:14).

The contrast between faith from sight and faith without sight, of which the Lord speaks here, is the contrast between two kinds of faith. One requires, for its rise and support, sensory vision of a wondrous object or fact. In general, it requires a miracle. The other is based on simple testimony concerning the object of faith, on the word, on teaching. The Lord often made such a contrast (Jn 14:11 and parallels), and gave preference to faith based not on miracle, but on the word.

From the standpoint of miracle, faith in the whole world would be impossible without a continually repeated miracle of Christ's appearing to each individual person, if each demanded for his faith what Thomas demanded. Such a course and development of the divine work on earth is impossible. The Lord blesses those who reach faith by another path, the path of trust in testimony, word, and teaching.

The path of Thomas's faith is not deprived of blessing and blessedness, but a better path of faith is indicated. "He said this not in order to deprive Thomas of blessedness, but to comfort those who had not seen. For many say, 'Blessed are the eyes that saw the Lord.' He comforts such people by saying that there is greater blessedness in not seeing and believing" (Theophylact; cf. Chrysostom).

In the person of Thomas, the last shoot of unbelief was torn up from the company of the Lord's closest disciples. By the great saying to Thomas, a new path to faith was indicated. Soon it would be the only possible path, after the Lord's bodily ascension from earth to heaven, to the Father. This saying is, as it were, an indication of the end of Gospel history and the beginning of apostolic history. Immediately after it, the Evangelist John gives the conclusion to his Gospel book. Thus the final chapter of his Gospel is a special addition, perhaps made by him later, with a new conclusion added to the whole book.