John 5:36Meaning & Commentary from the Church Fathers

They had shown zeal for John only for a time, and it was unstable. He calls him a 'lamp,' and thereby shows that John did not have light from himself, but from the grace of the Spirit.

Still, in contrast with this light, Christ does not yet declare that He Himself is the Sun of righteousness. He only hints at it. By this He strikes them powerfully and shows that they could not believe in Christ for the same dispositions of heart by which they despised John.

Even the man whom they respected, they respected only 'for a little while.' Had they not acted so, he would quickly have led them to Jesus.

Having therefore shown that they were in every respect without excuse, He adds: 'But I have a testimony greater than John's.' What testimony? The testimony from His works.

'For the works,' He says, 'which the Father gave Me to accomplish, the very works which I do, bear witness of Me, that the Father has sent Me.' Here He reminds them of the paralytic, of the man with the withered hand who was healed, and of many others.

Concerning John's testimony, one of them might perhaps have said that it was exaggerated and spoken out of friendship. Yet they could not say even this about John, a man filled with strict philosophy and so highly respected by themselves.

But concerning Christ's works, even the utterly senseless could not have such a suspicion. Therefore Christ brought forward this second testimony, saying: 'The works which the Father gave Me to accomplish, the very works which I do, bear witness of Me, that the Father has sent Me.'

Here also He refutes the accusation that He violated the Sabbath. They said: How can He be from God, when He does not keep the Sabbath? To this He answered: 'which the Father gave Me.'

Although He acted by His own authority, He wanted to show completely that He does nothing contrary to the Father. Therefore He used a most humble expression.

But why did He not say, The works which the Father gave Me to accomplish bear witness that I am equal to the Father? Both things could be seen from His works: that He does nothing contrary, and that He is equal to Him who begot Him.

Likewise, in another place, affirming this, He said: 'If you do not believe Me, believe My works, that you may know and believe that the Father is in Me, and I in Him' (Jn 10:38).

The works bore witness to both things concerning Him. They showed that He is equal to the Father, and that He does nothing contrary to Him.

Why then did He not speak in this way, but leave aside the greater matter and say only the words given above? Because this was the question that had to be addressed first.

To convince them that He came from God was much less than to convince them that He is God, equal to the Father. The prophets also said the former, but they could not say the latter.

Nevertheless, He carefully establishes the lesser point, knowing that when the lesser is accepted, the greater will also easily be accepted. Therefore He does not mention the higher testimony at all. He brings forward the lesser, so that through the latter they may accept the former as well.

He is all the more from God because He performs the works entrusted to Him by God.

"The works," He says, "which the Father has given Me to accomplish." If the Father gave them, then by opposing such works, you oppose God.

I am no longer glorified by human words and judgments. I shall not think it necessary to gather testimonies concerning Myself from words alone. Rather, I shall present Myself to what is most wondrous and far greater than words.

From the very greatness of the works I clearly reveal that I am God by nature and have appeared from God the Father. I do no harm to My laws if I transform them according to My will. I turn what was spoken obscurely to the ancients from the coarse letter into spiritual contemplation.

Let the lover of knowledge turn his attention again to this. In speaking of the testimony of the works in favor of His divine nature, the Savior clearly teaches that no one could possess power and operation wholly proper to God, unless He Himself were God by nature.

For He is witnessed through the works, I think, in no other way than this. If He is the accomplisher of the works of the Begetter, and if He Himself by His own power performs what is fully fitting to that One alone, is it not clear to all that He has inherited the same nature with Him?

Shining with the properties of the Begetter, as One who is from Him, He possesses equal power and operation with Him. Yet He says that He received the works from Him. He says this either according to the mode of humanity and the form of a servant, in a humbler and economic manner.

Or else, by the word 'giving,' He indicates the good pleasure and agreement of God the Father in all His wondrous deeds. Thus He also affirms that He was sent, since He 'emptied Himself,' as it is written (Phil 2:7), because of His love for us.

This was in relation to the dignity truly proper to God. He humbled Himself, and we can find this abasement of humiliation in no other ways than those by which He sometimes spoke as man.

In agreement with this is what He says through the Psalmist, again in human fashion and for our sake: 'But I have been established by Him as King over Zion, His holy mountain, to proclaim the decree of the Lord' (Ps 2:6-7).

He is always King with the Father, enthroned and seated together with Him, as God with God the Begetter. Yet He says that He was ordained King and Lord.

He calls Himself one who receives what He possessed as God, when He appeared as man. For it does not belong to man by nature to reign. Both the name and the reality of lordship are, of course, given to him from another.

If Christ asserts that John's words are insufficient as testimony concerning Him, this is not because John's testimony is unworthy of trust. For in a certain manner he came for testimony, to bear witness to the Light (Jn 1:5), and indeed he was sent from God (Jn 1:6).

Rather, it is because the impious Jews counted even him as nothing, though he was so great in virtue. Nevertheless, He says that the proof arising from His works is more significant, namely that He is God, proceeding from God the Father.

For He deems it right that from the greatness manifested in the works they should know, as He Himself says, that He came forth from the Father Himself and came into the world (Jn 8:42).

He could not do anything that befits God alone if He were in truth of another nature than the One who begot Him. Since He is shown able to do the same things as the Father, one must believe that He is God from God.

And one must not blaspheme ignorantly and impiously by calling Him a creature. If this is so, He is not a created thing or a creature.

In today's reading we heard of the Lord's testimony. He has no need of testimony from men, but He had a testimony greater than men. He said what this testimony was: 'The works which I do bear witness of Me.'

He adds to this: 'And the Father who sent Me has Himself borne witness of Me' (Jn 5:36-37). He says that the very works which He does He received from the Father. Therefore the works bear witness to that to which the Father bears witness.

Did John not bear witness? Certainly he did, but as a lamp. It was not to satisfy friends, but to confound enemies. For long before, it had been foretold in the person of the Father: 'I will set up a lamp for My Christ. His enemies I will clothe with confusion, but upon Him My sanctification shall flourish' (cf. Ps 131:17-18).

Imagine that you are in the darkness of night. You used a lamp, admired the lamp, and rejoiced in the light from the lamp. But this lamp tells you that there is a sun in which you ought to rejoice.

Although the lamp burns in the night, it commands you to wait for the day. Therefore one must not say that there was no need for this man's testimony. For why was he sent, if there was no need for him?

Yet lest a man remain with the lamp and think the lamp's light sufficient for him, the Lord does not say that this lamp was unnecessary. Nor does He say that you must remain forever with the lamp.

The Scripture of God gives another testimony: 'He was the true Light, which enlightens every man coming into the world' (Jn 1:9).

This was said of the Lord when it was necessary to distinguish Him from John the Baptist. Of John it was said: 'He was not the Light, but was sent to bear witness to the Light' (Jn 1:8).

And lest you say, 'How was he not light, when Christ says that he was a lamp?' (Jn 5:35), I answer: in comparison with the other Light, he was not light. For He was 'the true Light, which enlightens every man coming into the world' (Jn 1:9).

Therefore, after He said to the disciples, 'You are the light of the world,' He at once added what would prevent them from thinking that something had been assigned to them which should be thought only of Christ.

He did this also so that the lamps might not be extinguished by the wind of pride after His words, 'You are the light of the world.' He immediately added: 'A city set on a hill cannot be hidden.

'Nor do they light a lamp and put it under a vessel, but on a lampstand, and it gives light to all who are in the house' (Mt 5:14-15).

But what if He did not call the apostles a lamp, but rather those who light a lamp in order to put it on a lampstand? Hear how He called them a lamp: 'Let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works and glorify, not you, but your Father in heaven' (Mt 5:14-16).

He wanted them first to believe that God had sent Him. Once they believed this, it would be easier to believe everything else.

But why did the works testify that God had sent Him? Because these works belonged to divine power alone. One who opposed God could not perform them.

They shamelessly dared to object even against the miracles of Jesus Christ, as the twelfth chapter of Matthew's Gospel recounts, Mt 12:24.

They said, "This man casts out demons only by Beelzebul, the prince of demons." But they were immediately forced to be silent and were convicted of idle talk.

Are those free from guilt, then, who do not know the Father's testimony, which they have neither heard nor seen, and whose word does not abide in them?

No. They do not deserve excuse for ignorance of the testimony, because the Father's testimony about Him is the testimony from His works.

Thus the works bear witness of Him, that He has been sent by the Father. But this testimony of the works is from the Father.

Since the work of the Son is the Father's testimony, we must understand that the nature through which the Father also bears witness was active in Christ.

Thus Christ, who performs the work, and the Father, who bears witness in His work, show that by the Son's birth They are of one nature.

For Christ's very activity signifies God's testimony concerning Christ.

I remind you of him for your own sake, since you regard him as a true prophet and believe his testimony.

And you do well to believe him. He truly was a prophet, abundantly filled with the light of divine revelation and spreading around himself the bright light of the knowledge of truth.

But you are like children who suddenly become excited with joy when a candle is brought into their dark room.

Yet in that joy they forget to use the light in order to do the very thing for which it was brought into the room.

Likewise, for a time you were stirred by the gift of prophecy dwelling in John. Yet you did not make use of the light of his preaching about repentance.

You did not repent. You did not prepare yourselves to receive the Messiah, although this was precisely his purpose for you.

But I have testimony greater than John's. The miracles which I perform irrefutably prove the divinity of My person and that I am sent from the Father.

'You sent chosen men from among yourselves to John to ask him, Who are you? Are you not the Christ? If you regarded John as trustworthy even in his testimony concerning himself, then you must also acknowledge him as trustworthy concerning others.

'And this very witness bore witness concerning Me as the Messiah, the Christ. If this witness is trustworthy, and if the testimony by which he testifies of Me is therefore true, why then do you not believe Me? Is it not because you do not believe John either?

'He was a burning and shining lamp. At first you rejoiced at his appearing, but not for long. The shining lamp illumined your deeds, which you performed in darkness, and those deeds appeared in their true form. He rebuked you for your iniquities, and you hated him.

'Nevertheless, I do not receive testimony from man ... But I have a testimony greater than John's. For the works which the Father has given Me to accomplish, these very works which I do, bear witness of Me, that the Father has sent Me.

'No one has ever done such works as I do. Only God can do them. If I do them, these very works which I do bear witness that I am sent from God. By these works the Father who sent Me has Himself borne witness concerning Me.'

Chrysostom, interpreting Jesus' words, 'And the Father who sent Me has Himself borne witness concerning Me,' says that the Father bore witness to the Son at His Baptism in the Jordan, by the voice from heaven: 'This is My beloved Son' (Mt 3:17). Blessed Theophylact thinks that God bore witness concerning Him throughout the whole Scripture, in the Law and the Prophets.

But these words cannot be referred to Scripture, because Jesus speaks later of Scripture as an independent testimony (verse 39). Nor can we suppose here the voice from heaven at Jesus' Baptism, because only Jesus Himself and John heard that voice.

Therefore only one possible explanation remains, one that refers these words to the miracles performed by Jesus. In verse 36 Jesus' words are given: 'The very works which I do bear witness of Me, that the Father has sent Me.' Verse 37 begins by repeating what has been said: 'And the Father who sent Me has Himself borne witness concerning Me.'

In both expressions there is one and the same thought: 'The works done by Me bear witness that the Father has sent Me. Since the Father gave Me these works to accomplish, He Himself bears witness concerning Me through these works.

'In them, in these works done by Me, He appeared to you and spoke with you. But you did not believe Him whom He sent to perform them. Therefore you were deaf and did not hear His voice. You were blind and did not see His manifestation. His word is foreign and incomprehensible to you. It leaves no trace in your hearts.'

'And you were willing to rejoice for a little while in his light.' Why were they willing to rejoice, and in what were they to rejoice? They did not accept John's testimony concerning Christ, and therefore there was nothing to rejoice in.

In answering this question, one must keep in mind that John's departure from the wilderness and his passage through all the country around the Jordan coincided with those significant events that pointed to the Messiah's imminent coming.

The scepter had departed from Judah, according to Jacob's prophecy. That is, royal authority over the Jews had passed to a foreigner. Daniel's weeks were coming to an end.

The chief priests, Pharisees, and scribes knew these prophecies. They had to expect the Messiah's imminent coming, and naturally they had to rejoice that this coming would occur in their lifetime.

Having distorted the prophecies concerning the Messiah, they expected Him as an invincible king and conqueror. He would subdue the whole world to the Jews and set them as kings over the conquered nations.

With such ideas about the Messiah, they hear of a new Prophet preaching in the country of the Jordan. The thought that perhaps this Prophet was the long-awaited Messiah must certainly have occupied the leaders of the Jewish people.

Their dreams of the time when they would reign over the whole world must have delighted them. Thus, giving themselves over to their fantasies, they rejoiced at their speedy fulfillment.

But they did not rejoice for long. They went to the Jordan, where John was baptizing. When they saw him and heard his thunderous rebuke addressed to them as offspring of vipers, they decided that John did not fit the idea of the Messiah they had formed. Therefore they left him, disappointed and embittered.

Yes, their joy was brief. They rejoiced only for a little while.

"Although He acted by His own authority, yet wishing to show fully that He does nothing contrary to the Father, He used a most humble expression," says Chrysostom.

"To accomplish": for one highest purpose, the redemption of mankind and the founding of the new Kingdom of God on earth, Jn 4:34.

"These very works": the indication is strengthened by repetition.

These works bear witness concerning Jesus as Christ and as God's extraordinary envoy. For no one who is not sent by God can do such works.

"The Father has sent Me": see the note on Jn 3:17.

"If the Father gave them, the works, to Me, then by opposing such works you oppose God," says Theophylact.

The Spirit, the third Hypostasis, in the form of a dove, manifested the unity of God and His Trinity. He did so in His works, at Theophany, and as the Comforter in fiery tongues after the Lord's departure from earth.