Chapter III.
Those who do not accept John's testimony about the eternity of the Word, you rebuke. And at the same time, you praise the same evangelist and explain the passage: where he not only teaches that the eternity and divinity of the Word are signified, but also that the same attributes are demonstrated in the Father. In the Word, nothing corporeal should be considered, and although we do not fully grasp its nature, we should be satisfied with the authority of John, who explains how he saw the Word.
Let it not be believed by us, let the Scripture be recited. It is not I who say that in the beginning was the Word (John 1:1), but I hear: I do not fabricate, but I read; which we all read, but not all understand. And when it is read, we all hear, and not all hear: For the heart of some has become thick, and their ears have become heavily burdened (Acts 28:27); namely, the ears of the inner affection. For it is not the flesh that sins, which keeps its duty and receives sound, but it is the corrupt interpreter of a pure hearing, who refuses to hear what is said, and to understand what is read. Why do you close your ears like wax and lead, and yet you cannot exclude the benefits and services of nature on Sundays? You hear against your will, you hear with disgust: you hear, so that you cannot excuse yourself for not having heard.
Therefore, when it is read 'In the beginning was the Word' (John 1:1). Who says this? John, certainly that fisherman: but he does not say this as a fisherman, but as one affected by a human fisherman; who now no longer catches fish, but gives life to men (Luke 5:10). It is not his own statement, but that of the one who granted him the power to give life. For the fisherman, he was more silent about the fish he used to catch; and about divine mysteries, more mute, who did not know the author of his voice: but being given life by Christ, he heard a voice in John, recognized the Word in Christ.
And therefore, being full of the Holy Spirit, who knew that the beginning was not of time, but above time, he left the ages, and ascending by the spirit above every beginning, said: In the beginning was the Word, that is, let there be heaven; for it was not yet, when in the beginning was the Word. For although heaven has a beginning, God does not. Finally, in the beginning, God made heaven and earth (Gen. 1:1). It is one thing to have made; it is another thing to have been. What happens, begins: what was, does not receive a beginning, but precedes. Let time also remain, for after the sky there is time. Let angels and archangels also remain. And if I do not find the beginning of them, nevertheless there was a time when they were not. For they were not always. Therefore, if I cannot find the beginning of them, whom it is certain have a beginning, how can I find the beginning of the Word, by whom every beginning, not only of creatures, but also of all our thoughts, is preceded?
Therefore, he had openly expressed his eternal divinity; but to ensure that no one would divide the eternity of the Word from the Father, so that we would believe that the Word is the same as the Father’s, that good fisherman added: And the Word was with God (John 1:1). This statement should be understood in the following way: The Word was, just as the Father was; because he was with the Father, and in the Father, and with the Father always. Indeed, just as we read about the Father, was; so also we read about the Word, was.
What do you distinguish in understanding, if you do not distinguish in hearing? It is of the Father's nature to be the Word: It is of the Father's nature to be with the Word; for we read that the Word was with God. Therefore, if, according to your opinion, it was sometimes not, then, according to your opinion, neither was He in the beginning, with whom the Word was. For by the Word I hear, by the Word I understand that God was. For if I believe that the Word is everlasting, which I believe, I cannot doubt the eternity of the Father, of whom the Son is everlasting. If I consider his temporal generation, he begins to have communion with us, so that he appears to have started as the Father: but if you have no doubt about the Father, because it is not possible for God to begin to exist, you have no doubt about the Father, because he has eternal perfection as God; lest perhaps you stumble in the use of human speech, when you say Word and Son, therefore he added: And the Word was God (John 1).
Certainly, He has what the Father has, because He was God. How do you deny eternity to Him, whose name is one with the Father's God? Let not the sound and similarity of speech deceive you: there is another Word, which has time, which is composed of syllables and formed by letters: the Son is not such a Word, because the Father of the Word is not such.
Therefore, we must be careful not to introduce the question of the corporeal voice there either. God is incorporeal: He certainly does not have a corporeal voice. If the corporeal voice is not in the Father, neither is the Son a corporeal word. If there is no body in the Father, there is no time in the Father either. If there is no time in the Father, there is certainly no time in the Word. If there is no beginning of time in the Word, there is no number or degree of the Word either. Because if there is number in the Word, then there are many words. If there are many words, then there are many sons. But there is one Word, which excludes both degree and number: one according to nature.
Do not inquire about the nature of things. I do not know much better than I know this. This is the only thing I know well, that I do not know what I cannot know. He says, 'What we have seen and heard' (1 John 1:3), John says: he said that he knows only this well, what he heard and what he saw, who was reclining on the chest of Christ. Therefore, it is enough for them to hear, but it is not enough for me.
But what he heard, he told me; and what he heard from Christ, I cannot deny that it is true about Christ. Therefore, what he heard, I heard; and what he saw, I saw; for he saw what he saw: not, of course, the divinity, which cannot be seen according to its own nature. But because it could not be seen according to its own nature, he assumed what was beyond the nature of divinity; so that he could be seen according to the nature of the body. Finally, the Holy Spirit appeared in the form of a dove (Luke 3:22); because the divine nature could not be seen in the truth of its glory.