John 8:57Meaning & Commentary from the Church Fathers

He was clothed in flesh and wished to assure both His contemporaries and all later generations that He was not some shadow. Nor was His manifestation only a phantom, but actual truth. Even after the apostles had said so many lowly and human things about Him, and He Himself had said them about Himself, the devil still succeeded in persuading some wretched and miserable men to deny the teaching of His divine economy. They dared to say that He did not assume flesh, and they overthrew the whole work of His love for mankind. If nothing of this kind had been said, how many would have fallen into this abyss? Do you not hear how even now Marcion, Mani, Valentinus, and many others deny this divine economy?

The Jews were unable to rise to the meaning of His words. Instead of asking and learning what day He meant, the day which Abraham saw, they mock Him still more, as though He were saying something absurd. You are not yet fifty years old, they say, and have You seen Abraham? They said this thinking that the Lord was close to fifty years old, though He was about thirty-three. Why did they not say, "You are not yet forty years old," but "fifty"? It would be unnecessary even to ask this. Perhaps they mentioned fifty years without any definite thought. Yet some say they spoke this way because the fiftieth year was especially honored among them. This was the jubilee year, when slaves were released, buyers yielded up their acquisitions, and everything else connected with honor was done.

The speech of the Jews is altogether mad and provokes great laughter. What deserves just amazement is that they reached such irrationality that they could understand nothing as they ought. Our Savior Christ used many turns of speech for them. He constantly used the same words and in many ways pointed them to His eternity. Yet they understood absolutely nothing beyond what they saw with bodily eyes. As men who had wholly lost the activity of the mind, they do not direct the heart toward what befits God. Instead, they again senselessly accuse Him of falsehood, as though He were one of us. They treat Him as a man who began to exist and to be among existing things only when He was born. They did not rightly understand the words they heard from Him. For He said that "Abraham saw" His day.

The angered Jews answered, "You are not yet fifty years old, and have You seen Abraham?" (Jn 8:57). And the Lord said, "Truly, truly, I say to you, before Abraham was made, I am" (cf. Jn 8:58). Weigh the words and understand the mystery. "Before Abraham was made." Understand this: "was made," fieret, belongs to human creation, but "I am," sum, to the divine essence. "Was made," because Abraham was a creature. He did not say, "Before Abraham was, esset, I was, eram." Rather He said, "Before Abraham was made, who could not have been made except by Me, I am." Nor did He say, "Before Abraham was made, I was made." For "in the beginning God created the heaven and the earth" (Gen 1:1). But "in the beginning was the Word" (Jn 1:1). "Before Abraham was made, I am." Know the Creator. Distinguish the creature. He who spoke became the seed of Abraham. But so that Abraham himself might appear, He existed before Abraham.

Considering the maturity of His mind and, in general, His great experience, they supposed that Jesus Christ was about fifty years old. Some manuscripts have “forty,” which seems more accurate.

But the carnal minds of the hearers do not lift their eyes above the flesh. They consider in Him only the age of the flesh, saying, "You are not yet fifty years old, and have You seen Abraham?" Our Redeemer mercifully restrains them from looking upon His flesh and leads them to the contemplation of His divinity. Saying, "Truly, truly, I say to you, before Abraham was, I am." "Was before" is past tense, but "I am" is present. Since in the Godhead there is neither past nor future time, but always the present, He does not say, "I was before Abraham," but "I am before Abraham." Therefore it is also said to Moses, "I am He who is" (Ex 3:14). And again, "Say to the sons of Israel, He who is has sent Me to you" (Ex 3:14).

The Jews understand the saying of Jesus Christ, that Abraham saw His day, in the sense that Abraham saw with bodily eyes the time of Jesus Christ's appearing on earth and saw Him Himself. Therefore, they infer from this, Jesus wants to say that He lived already in Abraham's time. Fifty years was the age until which Levites served at the tabernacle (Num 7:3; 8:25). The meaning of the objection is that Jesus Christ had not even grown old. To this Jesus Christ answers by pointing to His pre-eternal being and existence: "Before Abraham was, I am." The present tense of the verb "am" points to eternal existence, for which even the past is present. Moreover, the very verb εἰμί forms a contrast with γενέσθαι. It is the contrast between eternal being and created appearance.

The learned Pharisees did not understand even this, and they said to Him: “You are not yet fifty years old, and do You say that You have seen Abraham?”

These last words seemed strange and blasphemous to the Jews. Not understanding their real meaning, they said in astonishment: “You are not yet fifty years old, and have You seen Abraham?”

"At this the Jews said," and so forth. The Jews refer the Lord's statement about Abraham, that he saw His day and rejoiced, to the time of Abraham's earthly life. They thought this saying meant that the Lord lived in Abraham's time and knew him personally. This seemed to them the greatest absurdity. Therefore they reproachfully point out this supposed absurdity to the Lord. "You are not yet fifty years old." Fifty years is taken here as a round number, as the time of full manhood (cf. Num 4:3, 39; Num 8:1 and following). The meaning is this: You are not only not a very old man; You have not even reached the years of full manhood. How then could You have seen Abraham? Therefore nothing can be inferred from this passage about the Savior's actual age. There is a more precise indication of His age at the beginning of His public ministry in Luke (Lk 3:23).

The Pharisees gave Jesus' words their own false meaning. He said that Abraham joyfully saw His day. But they interpret this as though, according to His words, He had lived in Abraham's time. Why did they say, "You are not yet fifty years old"? Among the Jews, the age of fifty was regarded as the most mature age of manhood, after which old age followed. The Levites could continue their service only until fifty years of age (Num 4:3, 23, 35, 39; Num 8:24-25). Thus the Jews meant to say to Christ: You have not yet reached mature manhood, yet You present Yourself as a contemporary of Abraham. "Before Abraham was born, I am," the Savior answered. Πρὶν γενέσθαι means not "was," but "was born." γενέσθαι stands in contrast to being, εἶναι, as in the usage of Mk 4:22; Acts 26:29; 1 Cor 3:18.

We have already seen in verse 24 that this "I am" is the same most sacred name that was declared to Israel through Moses: Yahweh, or Jehovah, "He who is," or "I am Yahweh." When in the Old Testament the Lord speaks of Himself as known by revelation, He says, "I am Jehovah," or Yahweh. That is, "I am He who is." This means, "I am He who is unchangeably and eternally the same as Himself, and who is known to Israel under the name He who is." This is the name of the second Hypostasis of the holy and consubstantial Trinity, the Hypostasis who reveals God to men. By saying of Himself, "I am," the Lord clearly reveals to His hearers who He is. He shows His identity with the God of the Covenant.