Homilies on the Gospel of John — Homily 9

St. John Chrysostom

1. Chapter 1
2. Chapter 2

If you remember our former reflections, we shall the more zealously proceed with the building up of what remains, as doing so for great gain. For so will our discourse be more intelligible to you who remember what has been already said, and we shall not need much labor, because you are able through your great love of learning to see more clearly into what remains. The man who is always losing what is given to him will always need a teacher, and will never know anything; but he who retains what he has received, and so receives in addition what remains, will quickly be a teacher instead of a learner, and useful not only to himself, but to all others also; as, conjecturing from their great readiness to hear, I anticipate that this assembly will specially be. Come then, let us lay up in your souls, as in a safe treasury, the Lord's money, and unfold, as far as the grace of the Spirit may afford us power, the words this day set before us.

He (St. John) had said, speaking of the old times, that the world knew him not [[John 1.10]]; afterwards he comes down in his narrative to the times of the proclamation (of the Gospel ), and says, He came to His own, and His own received Him not, now calling the Jews His own, as His peculiar people, or perhaps even all mankind, as created by Him. And as above, when perplexed at the folly of the many, and ashamed of our common nature, he said that the world by Him was made, and having been made, did not recognize its Maker; so here again, being troubled beyond bearing at the stupidity of the Jews and the many, he sets forth the charge in a yet more striking manner, saying, that His own received Him not, and that too when He came to them. And not only he, but the prophets also, wondering, said the very same, as did afterwards Paul, amazed at the very same things. Thus did the prophets cry aloud in the person of Christ, saying, A people whom I have not known, have served Me; as soon as they heard Me, they obeyed Me; the strange children have dealt falsely with Me. The strange children have waxed aged, and have halted from their paths. Psalm 18:43-45, Septuagint And again, They to whom it had not been told concerning Him, shall see, and they which had not heard, shall understand. And, I was found of them that sought Me not [[Isaiah 52.15]]; I was made manifest unto them that asked not after me. [[Isaiah 45.1]], as quoted in [[Romans 10.20]] And Paul, in his Epistles to the Romans, has said, What then? Israel has not obtained that which he seeks for: but the election has obtained it. [[Romans 11.7]] And again; What shall we say then? That the Gentiles which followed not after righteousness, have attained unto righteousness: but Israel which followed after the law of righteousness, has not attained to the law of righteousness. [[Romans 9.30]]

For it is a thing indeed worthy of our amazement, how they who were nurtured in ( knowledge of) the prophetical books, who heard Moses every day telling them ten thousand things con