ACC ~ John 5 v17

DIVINE PRECEDENT IN THE FATHER

HILARY OF POITIERS: He refers to the charge of violating the sabbath, brought against him. My Father works up to this time, and I work. He means that he had a precedent for claiming the right he did, and that what he did was in reality his Father’s doing who acted in the Son. And to quiet the jealousy that had been raised, because by the use of his Father’s name he had made himself equal with God, and to assert the excellence of his birth and nature, he says, “Truly, truly, I say to you, the Son can do nothing of himself, but what he sees the Father do.” [1] ON THE TRINITY 7.17. [2]

[1] Jn 5:19.

[2] NPNF 2 9:124-25**; CCL 62:277-78.

THE FATHER WORKS IN CHRIST WHILE CHRIST WORKS

HILARY OF POITIERS: Their anger was so kindled against him that they wanted to kill him, because he did his works on the sabbath. But let us see also what the Lord answered: “My Father is still working, and I also am working.”… He speaks that we may recognize in him the power of the Father’s nature employing the nature that has that power to work on the sabbath. The Father works in him while he works. Without doubt, then, Jesus works along with the working of the Father…. We must regard Jesus as referring to that very work of the Father’s which he was then doing since it implies the working of the Father at the very time of his words…. If the Father works and the Son works, no union exists between them that merges them into a single person. ON THE TRINITY 9.44. [1]

[1] NPNF 2 9:170*. See also Ambrose On the Holy Spirit 2. Intro (2).

THE FATHER AND SON ARE OF THE SAME ESSENCE

ATHANASIUS: The word still [1] shows [the Son’s] eternal existence in the Father as the Word. For it is proper to the Word to do the Father’s works and not to be external to him…. He is either seen to be the efficient cause of things that he himself has brought about, or he has no power to cause anything at all…. For none of the things that are brought to be is an efficient cause, but all things were made through the Word who would not have brought anything into being if he himself were numbered among the creatures…. For by the Word, the things that were not have come into existence. And if through him [i.e., the Son] the [Father] creates and makes, [the Son] is not himself of things created and made. Rather, he is the Word of the Creator God and is known, from the Father’s works which he himself works, to be “in the Father and the Father in him”… because the Son’s essence is proper to the Father, and he is in all points like his Father. DISCOURSES AGAINST THE ARIANS 2.16.20-22. [2]

[1] “My Father is working still.”

[2] NPNF 2 4:359-60*.

THE SON EQUAL TO GOD

AUGUSTINE: Here he has already indicated that he is equal to God. “My Father,” he says, “is working until now, and I too am working.” Their literal-minded understanding of the sabbath is disturbed. They imagined that it was because the Lord was tired that he rested, in order to do no more work. They hear, “My Father is working until now,” and they are disturbed. But then he adds, “And I too am working,” making himself equal to God, and again they are disturbed. SERMON 125.6. [1]

[1] WSA 3 4:257**. See also Novatian On the Trinity 28 (ANF 5:639).

THE SON HAS THE SAME POWER AS THE FATHER

THEODORE OF MOPSUESTIA: Here he brings up his Father, who always acts according to his will and authority. He too does not abstain from those works on the sabbath that are beneficial to us. Christ, too, knew that any time is suitable for our salvation. He brings up the Father, he says, in order to show us that this same authority is also in him. As the Father always has the authority to do work without being subject to the law—even though he has decreed the law of rest on the sabbath—so the Son has the same privilege. And there is no precept or law that might prevent him from doing whatever he wants. COMMENTARY ON JOHN 2.5.17. [1]

[1] CSCO 4 3:103. See also Ephrem, Commentary on Tatian’s Diatessaron 13.4 (ECTD 206-7).

HOW DID GOD REST ON THE SEVENTH DAY?

AUGUSTINE: How can both be true when it says that God rested on the seventh day from all his works which he had made, and what he himself through whom they were made says in the gospel, “My Father is working until now; and I myself am working.”… The Lord Jesus Christ, who suffered only at the precise time he willed, underlined the mystery of this [Genesis] rest by his burial. It was of course on the day of the Sabbath that he rested in the tomb, and he had the whole of that day as a kind of holy vacation, after he had finished all his works on the sixth day, that is, Preparation Day … when he said, “It is finished; and bowing his head he surrendered his spirit.” [1] So why should we be surprised if God wished to point forward to this day on which Christ would rest in the grave, before proceeding from then on to work the unfolding of the ages, in order to verify these other words too, “My Father is working until now?”

God can be understood to have rested from establishing different kinds of creatures, because he did not now establish any new kinds any more. But he rested like this in such a way as to continue from then on and up till now to operate the management of the things that were then set in place, not as though at least on that seventh day his power was withheld from the government of heaven and earth and of all the things he had established. If that had been done, they would immediately have collapsed into nothingness. It is the creator’s power, after all, and the virtuosity, the skill and tenacity of the almighty, that causes every created thing to subsist. If this tenacious virtuosity ceased for one moment to rule and direct the things that have been created, their various species would at once cease to exist, and every nature would collapse into nothingness. It is not, you see, like a mason building houses; when he has finished he goes away, and his work goes on standing when he has stopped working on it and gone away. No, the world will not be able to go on standing for a single moment if God withdraws from it his controlling hand.

Indeed, the very expression employed by the Lord, “My Father is working until now,” points to the continuousness of his work by which he holds together and manages the whole of creation. It could, you see, have been understood differently if he had said, “and is now working,” where we would not have to take the work as being continuous. But by saying “until now,” he forces us to understand it in the other sense as meaning, that is, from the time when he had worked at the original establishment of all things. ON THE LITERAL INTERPRETATION OF GENESIS 4.11[.21]-12 [.23]. [2]

[1] Jn 19:30.

[2] WSA 1 13:253-54**.

THE FATHER CONTINUES THE WORK OF CREATION THROUGH THE SON

AUGUSTINE: Therefore it is as if he said to the Jews, “Why do you expect that I should not work on the sabbath? The sabbath day was ordained for you as a sign about me. You observe the works of God: I was there when they were made. They were all made by me…. The Father made the light, but he spoke that there should be light. If he spoke, it was by his Word that he made it. I was his Word, and I am [his Word]. The world was made by me in those works, and the world is also ruled by me in those works. My Father worked when he made the world, and he still works while he rules the world. Therefore, just as it was by me that he created when he made the world, so it is by me that he rules when he rules.” TRACTATES ON THE GOSPEL OF JOHN 17.15. [1]

[1] NPNF 1 7:116*.

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