John 1 - CSB Ancient Faith Study Bible

1:1 Hilary of Poitiers: Consider and decide whether it were the greater feat to raise the dead or impart to an untrained mind the knowledge of mysteries so deep as [God] reveals by saying, “In the beginning was the Word.” . . . [With this statement John] ranges backward over the spaces of time, centuries are left behind, and ages are cancelled. Fix in your mind what date you will for this “beginning”; you miss the mark, for even then [Christ] “was.” Survey the universe; note well what is written of it: “In the beginning God made the heaven and the earth” [Gn 1:1]. This word beginning fixes the moment of creation; you can assign its date to an event that is definitely stated to have happened “in the beginning.” But this fisherman of mine [that is, John], unlettered and unread, is untrammeled by time, undaunted by its immensity; he pierces beyond the beginning. For his “was” has no limit of time and no commencement; the uncreated Word “was in the beginning.” On the Trinity 2.13.

1:1-3 Chrysostom: As therefore the expression “in the beginning was the Word” shows [Christ’s] eternity, so “was in the beginning with God” has declared to us his co-eternity. For, so that you may not think the Word is eternal when you hear “in the beginning was the Word,” but yet imagine the life of the Father to differ from [Christ’s] by some interval and longer duration and thus assign a beginning to the Only Begotten—this is why John adds, “was in the beginning with God.” [Christ] exists eternally even as the Father himself does, for the Father was never without the Word, but he was always God with God, yet each in his proper person. . . . So that no one might suppose the Godhead of the Son to be inferior, [John] immediately added the characteristics of genuine Godhead, including eternity (for “He was,” says he, “in the beginning with God,”) and attributed to him the office of Creator. For “by him were all things made.” Homilies on the Gospel of John 4.1, 3.

1:6 Irenaeus: By what God, then, was John, the forerunner, who testifies of the Light, sent [into the world]? Truly it was by him of whom Gabriel is the angel, who also announced the glad tidings of his birth [see Lk 1:11-17]: [that God] who also had promised by the prophets that he would send his messenger before the face of his Son, who should prepare his way, that is, that he should bear witness of that Light in the spirit and power of Elijah [see Mal 4:5]. But, again, of what God was Elijah the servant and the prophet? Of him who made heaven and earth, as he does himself confess. John, therefore, having been sent by the founder and maker of this world is . . . deemed “more than a prophet” [Lk 7:26]. For all the other prophets preached the advent of the paternal Light and desired to be worthy of seeing him whom they preached. But John both announced [the advent] beforehand in the same way as the others did, and actually saw him when he came and pointed him out and persuaded many to believe on him, so that he did himself hold the place of both prophet and apostle. Against Heresies 3.11.4.

1:12 Augustine: When any person . . . is . . . considered to be among the children of God, such an achievement must not be considered to have been accomplished by their ability alone. This ability they have received through the grace of God, because they did not possess it in a nature that had become corrupted and depraved. on nature and grace 64.77.

1:13-14 Chrysostom: [Declaring] that they who received [Christ] were “born of God” and had become “sons of God,” [John the apostle] adds the cause and reason of this unspeakable honor. It is that “the Word became flesh,” that the Master took on him the form of a servant. For [Jesus] became Son of man, who was God’s own Son, in order that he might make the sons of men [that is, humankind] to be children of God. For when the high associates with the low, it does not touch its own honor at all. Instead, it raises up the other from its excessive lowness. So it was with the Lord. By no means did he diminish his own nature by his condescension, but he raised us, who had always sat in disgrace and darkness, to unspeakable glory. Likewise, it may be that a king, conversing with interest and kindness with a poor person of lower social status, does not shame himself at all but makes the other illustrious and observed by all. Now, if, in the case of the extrinsic dignity of people, association with the humbler person in no way injures the more honorable one, then much less can it do so in the case of that simple and blessed essence that has nothing extrinsic or subject to growth or decay but has all good things immovable and fixed forever. So, when you hear that “the Word became flesh,” do not be disturbed or cast down, for that essence did not change to flesh—it is impiety to imagine this—but continuing what it is, it took the form of a servant. Homilies on the Gospel of John 11.1.

1:18 Hilary of Poitiers: In the nature of God, God is one, yet in such a way that the Son also is God, because in him there is not a different nature. And since he is God of God, both must be God, and since there is no difference of kind between them, there is no distinction in their essence. The idea of having a number of titular gods is rejected because there is no diversity in the quality of the divine nature. Therefore he is anathema who says there are many gods, and he is anathema who denies that the Son is God. It is fully shown that the fact that each has one and the same name arises from the real character of the similar substance in each. . . . In confessing the unborn God the Father, and the only begotten God the Son, with no dissimilarity of essence between them, each is called God. And yet, God must be believed and be declared to be one. So by the diligent and watchful care of the bishops the creed guards the similarity of the nature begotten and the nature begetting, confirming it by the application of one name. On the Councils 36.

1:22-23 gregory the great: [T]he prophet called [John the Baptist] a voice because he preceded the Word. What he was crying is disclosed to us, “Prepare the way of the Lord, make straight his paths.” What else is anyone doing who is preaching the true faith and good works but preparing the way for the Lord to come to his hearers’ hearts so that the power of grace may enter them and the light of truth pervade them? He makes the Lord’s paths straight when he predisposes the mind for good thoughts by his good preaching. forty gospel homilies 6.

1:34 Cyril of Alexandria: A confident witness is one who not only sees but actually speaks about what he has seen. [John] surely was not ignorant of what was written, “Tell what your eyes have seen” [see Dt 4:9]. “I saw” then, he says, the sign, and I understood what was signified by it. I bear witness “that this is the Son of God,” who was proclaimed by the law through Moses and heralded by the voice of the holy prophets. The blessed Evangelist seems to me again to say with supreme confidence, “This is the Son of God,” that is, the one and only one who is by nature the unique heir of the Father to whom we too, sons by adoption, are conformed and through whom we are called by grace to the dignity of sonship. Commentary on the Gospel of John 2.1.

1:37-42 Bede: From [John’s] disciples [Jesus] summoned two to follow him, and one of them, Andrew, led his brother Peter to him also. According to the spiritual sense, it is clear what it means to follow the Lord. . . . You follow the Lord if you imitate him. You follow the Lord if, insofar as human weakness allows, you do not abandon those examples of humility that, as a human being, the Son of God demonstrated. You follow [the Lord] if, by showing yourself to be a companion of his sufferings, you painstakingly long to attain communion in his resurrection and ascension. Homilies on the Gospels 1.17.

1:50-51 Theodore of Mopsuestia: The Lord shows that nothing he had said was so great or sufficient enough to demonstrate all of what he really was. So then he declares what the greater things are that Nathanael would have seen. . . . He spoke of angels ascending and descending on him, because they assist him in dealing with the whole of creation. Commentary on John 1.1.50–51.