John 7:17

"If any man will do His will, he shall know of the doctrine, whether it be of God, or whether I speak of Myself." What He saith is this, "Cast out from yourselves the malice and wrath and envy and hatred which has without cause been conceived against Me, then there is nothing to hinder you from knowing that My words are indeed the words of God. For at present these things cast a darkness over you, and destroy the light of right judgment, while if ye remove them this shall no longer be your case." Yet He spake not (plainly) thus, (for so He would have confounded them exceedingly,) but implied it all by saying, "He that doeth His will shall know of the doctrine, whether it is of God, or whether I speak of Myself"; that is, "whether I speak anything different and strange and contrary to God." For, "of Myself" is always put with this meaning, that "I say nothing except what seemeth good to Him, but all that the Father willeth, I will also."

"If any man do His will, he shall know of the doctrine." What meaneth, "If any man do His will?" "If any man be a lover of the life which is according to virtue, he shall know the power of the sayings." "If any man will give heed to the prophecies, to see whether I speak according to them or not."

How then did the Lord answer those that were marvelling how He knew letters which He had not learned? "My doctrine," saith He, "is not mine, but His that sent me." This is the first profundity. For He seems as if in a few words He had spoken contraries. For He says not, This doctrine is not mine; but, "My doctrine is not mine." If not Thine, how Thine? If Thine, how not Thine? For Thou sayest both: both, "my doctrine;" and, "not mine." For if He had said, This doctrine is not mine, there would have been no question. But now, brethren, in the first place, consider well the question, and so in due order expect the solution. For he who sees not the question proposed, how can he understand what is expounded? The subject of inquiry, then, is that which He says, "My, not mine" this appears to be contrary; how "my," how "not mine"? If we carefully look at what the holy evangelist himself says in the beginning of his Gospel, "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God;" thence hangs the solution of this question. What then is the doctrine of the Father, but the Father's Word? Therefore, Christ Himself is the doctrine of the Father, if He is the Word of the Father. But since the Word cannot be of none, but of some one, He said both "His doctrine," namely, Himself, and also, "not His own," because He is the Word of the Father. For what is so much "Thine" as Thyself? And what so much not Thine as Thyself, if that Thou art is of another? The Word then is God; and it is also the Word of a stable, unchangeable doctrine, not such as can be sounded by syllables and fleeting, but abiding with the Father, to which abiding doctrine let us be converted, being admonished by the transitory sounds of the voice. For that which is transitory does not so admonish us as to call us to transitory things. We are admonished to love God. All this that I have said were syllables; they smote through the air to reach your sense of hearing, and by sounding passed away: that, however, which I advise you ought not so to pass away, because He whom I exhort you to love passes not away; and when you, exhorted in transient syllables, shall have been converted, you shall not pass away, but shall abide with Him who is abiding. There is therefore in the doctrine this great matter, this deep and eternal thing which is permanent: whither all things that pass away in time call us, when they mean well and are not falsely put forward. For, in fact, all the signs which we produce by sounds do signify something which is not sound. For God is not the two short syllables "Deus," and it is not the two short syllables that we worship, and it is not the two short syllables that we adore, nor is it to the two short syllables that we desire to come-two syllables which almost cease to sound before they have begun to sound; nor in sounding them is there room for the second until the first has passed away. There remains, then, something great which is called "God," although the sound does not remain when we say the word "God." Thus direct your thoughts to the doctrine of Christ, and ye shall arrive at the Word of God; and when you have arrived at the Word of God, consider this, "The Word was God," and you will see that it was said truly, "my doctrine:" consider also whose the Word is, and you will see that it was rightly said, "is not mine." Therefore, to speak briefly, beloved, it seems to me that the Lord Jesus Christ said, "My doctrine is not mine," meaning the same thing as if He said, "I am not from myself." For although we say and believe that the Son is equal to the Father, and that there is not any diversity of nature and substance in them, that there has not intervened any interval of time between Him that begets and Him that is begotten, nevertheless we say these things, while keeping and guarding this, that the one is the Father, the other the Son. But Father He is not if He have not a Son, and Son He is not if He have not a Father: but yet

(Tract. xxix. s. 3) Mine is not mine, appears a contradiction; why did He not say, This doctrine is not Mine? Because the doctrine of the Father being the Word of the Father, and Christ Himself being that Word, Christ Himself is the doctrine of the Father. And therefore He calls the doctrine both His own, and the Father's. A word must be a word of some one's. What is so much Thine as Thou, and what is so much not Thine as Thou, if what Thou art, Thou art of another. His saying then, My doctrine is not Mine own, seems briefly to express the truth, that He is not from Himself; it refutes the Sabellian heresy, which dares to assert that the Son is the same as the Father, there being only two names for one thing. (de Trin. i. c. xi) Or thus: In one sense He calls it His, in another sense not His; according to the form of the Godhead His, according to the form of the servant not His. (Tract. xxix. s. 6) Should any one however not understand this, let him hear the advice which immediately follows from our Lord: If any man will do His will, he shall know of the doctrine, whether it be of God, or whether I speak of Myself. What meaneth this, If any man will do His will? To do His will is to believe on Him, as He Himself says, This is the work of God, that ye believe on Him whom He hath sent. (c. 6:29) And who does not know, that to work the work of God, is to do His will? To know is to understand. Do not then seek to understand in order to believe, but believe in order to understand, for, Except ye believe, ye shall not understand. (Is. 7:9. Vulg.)