But against this opinion is the fact that John was born from parents who were known, and his birth had been known to everyone. So it says in Luke (1:66) that all said, “What do you think this child will be?” One might say to this that it is not incredible that they should regard John in the manner described. For a similar situation is found in Matthew (14:1): for Herod thought that Christ was John, whom he had beheaded, even though Christ had been preaching and was known for some time before John had been beheaded. And so from a similar stupidity and madness the Jews asked John whether he was Elijah.
231 Why does John say, I am not Elijah, while Christ said, “He is Elijah” (Mt 11:14). The angel gives us the answer: “He will go before him in the spirit and power of Elijah” (Lk 1:17), i.e., in his works. Thus he was not Elijah in person, but in spirit and power, i.e., because he showed a similarity to Elijah in his works.
232 This likeness can be found in three matters. First, in their office: because as Elijah will precede the second coming of Christ, so John preceded the first. Thus the angel said, “He will go before him.” Secondly, in their manner of living. For Elijah lived in desert places, ate little food and wore coarse clothing, as recorded in 1 and 2 Kings. John, also, lived in the desert, his food was locusts and wild honey, and he wore clothing of camel’s hair. Thirdly, in their zeal. For Elijah was filled with zeal; thus it was said, “I have been very zealous for the Lord” (1 Kgs 19:10). So, also, John died because of his zeal for the truth, as is clear from Matthew (14:6)
233 Then when he says, Are you the Prophet? the third question is presented. Here there is a difficulty, for since it is said in Luke (1:76), “And you, child, shall be called the prophet of the Most High,” why does John, when asked if he is a prophet, answer that he is not a prophet?
There are three ways of answering this. One is that John is not just a prophet, but more than a prophet. For the other prophets only predicted future things from afar: “if there is a delay, wait for it” (Hb 2:2).. But John proclaimed that the Messiah was present, pointing him out with his finger: “Look, there is the Lamb of God,” as it says below (1:36). And so the Lord says that he is more than a prophet (Mt 11:9).
Again, in another way, according to Origen, because through a misunderstanding the Jews associated three great personages with the coming of Christ: Christ himself, Elijah, and some other person, the greatest of the prophets, about whom Deuteronomy (18:15) says: “The Lord your God will raise up a prophet for you.” And although this greatest of the prophets is in fact none other than Christ, according to the Jews he is someone other than Christ. And so they do not ask simply whether he is a prophet, but whether he is that “greatest of the prophets.” And this is clear from the order of their questions. For they first ask whether he is the Messiah; secondly, whether he is Elijah; thirdly, whether he is that prophet. Accordingly, in Greek, the article is used here as signifying the prophet, as it were, antonomastically.
In a third way, because the Pharisees were indignant at John for assuming the office of baptizing outside the order of the law and their tradition. For the Old Testament mentions three persons to whom this office could belong. First, to the Messiah, since “I will pour clean water upon you, and you will be cleansed” (Ez 36:25), are words considered as spoken by the person of the Messiah. Secondly, to Elijah, of whom it says in 2 Kings that he divided the water of the Jordan, and crossing over, was taken up. Finally, to Elisha, who made Naaman the Syrian wash seven times in the Jordan so as to be cured of leprosy, as mentioned in 2 Kings (c 5). And so when the Jews saw that John was baptizing, they believed that he was one of those three: the Messiah, or Elijah, or Elisha. Accordingly, when they ask here, Are you the Prophet? they are asking whether he is Elisha, who is called “prophet” in a special way because of the many miracles he had performed; hence he himself says, “Let him come to me, so that he may know that there is a prophet in Israel” (2 Kgs 5:8). And to this John answers, No, I am not Elisha.
234 Then he shows how he declared who he was. First, the question of the messengers is given; secondly, his answer (v 23).
235 They said, Who are you? We must take back an answer to those who sent us. As if to say: We were sent to learn who you are; so tell us, What have you to say about yourself?
Notice John’s devotion. He has already fulfilled what the Apostle says, “It is not I who now live, but Christ lives in me” (Gal 2:20). And so he does not answer, “I am the son of Zachary,” or this or that, but only the way in which he followed Christ.
236 So he says, I am a voice that cries in the wilderness. And he says that he is a voice because from the point of view of origin, a voice comes after the [mental, interior] word, but before the knowledge it causes. For we know a [mental, interior] word conceived in the heart by means of the voice which speaks it, since it is its sign. But God the Father sent the precursor John, who came to be in time, in order to make known his Word, which was conceived from eternity. And so he fittingly says, I am a voice.
237 The addition, that cries, can be understood in two ways: as referring to John, crying and preaching in the wilderness; or to Christ crying in him, according to, “Do you want proof that Christ is speaking in me” (2 Cor 13:3).
Now he cries for four reasons. First of all, a cry implies a showing; and so he cries in order to show that Christ is clearly speaking in John and in himself: “Now on the last, the great day of the feast, Jesus stood and cried out, saying, ‘If any one thirsts, let him come to me and drink’” (below 7:37). But he did not cry out in the prophets because prophecies were given in enigmas and figures; so it is said that he was “wrapped in dark rain-clouds” (Ps 17:12). Secondly, because a cry is made to those who are at a distance; and the Jews were far from God. Thus it was necessary that he cry: “You have taken my friends and neighbors away from me” (Ps 88:19). He cries, in the third place, because they were deaf: “Who is deaf, but my servant?” (Is 42:19). He cries, fourthly, because he speaks with indignation, for they deserved God’s wrath: “He will speak to them in his anger” (Ps 2:5).
238 Note that he cries in the wilderness, because “The word of the Lord came to John, the son of Zechariah, in the desert,” as we read in Luke (3:2). There can be both a literal and a mystical reason for this. The literal reason is that by living in the desert he would be immune from all sin, and so be more worthy to bear witness to Christ, and his testimony would be more credible to men because of his life.
The mystical reason is twofold. For the wilderness or desert designates paganism, according to Isaiah (54:1); “She who is deserted has more children than she who has a husband.” Accordingly, in order to show that God’s teaching would from now on not be in Jerusalem alone, but also among the pagans, he cried in the wilderness. “The kingdom of God will be taken away from you, and given to a people that will produce its fruits” (Mt 21:43). Again, the desert can indicate Judea, which was already deserted: “Your house will be left to You, deserted” (Mt 23:38). And so he cried in the desert, in the wilderness, i.e., in Judea, to indicate that the people to whom he was preaching had already been deserted by God: “in a desert land, where there is no way or water, so I have come to your sanctuary” (Ps 62:3).
239 Why does he cry, Make a straight way for the Lord? Because this is the task for which he was sent. “And you, child, will be called the prophet of the Most High, for you will go before the face of the Lord to prepare his way” (Lk 1:76). The way, prepared and straight, for receiving the Lord is the way of justice, according to Isaiah (26:7): “The way of the just is straight.” For the way of the just is straight when the whole man is subject to God, i.e., the intellect through faith, the will through love, and actions through obedience, are all subject to God.
And this was spoken, i.e., predicted, by the prophet Isaiah. As if to say: I am the one in whom these things are fulfilled.
LECTURE13
24 Now these men had been sent from the Pharisees, 25 and they put this further question to him: “Why then do you baptize, if you are not the Messiah, nor Elijah, nor the Prophet?” 26 John replied, “I baptize with water. But there is one standing in your midst whom you do not recognize—27 the one who is to come after me, who ranks ahead of me—the strap of whose sandal I am not worthy to unfasten.” 28 This happened at Bethany, on the far side of the Jordan, where John was baptizing.
240 Above, we saw John bear witness to Christ as he was being questioned on matters concerning himself; here, on matters concerning his office. Four things are set forth: first, those who question him; secondly, their questions; thirdly, his answer, in which he bore witness; and fourthly, the place where all this happened.
241 His interrogators were Pharisees. Hence he says, Now these men had been sent from the Pharisees. According to Origen, what is being said from this point on describes a different testimony given by John; and further, those who were sent from the Pharisees are not the same as those priests and Levites sent by the generality of the Jews, but others who were specifically sent by the Pharisees. And according to this it says: Now these men had been sent, not by the Jews, as the priests and Levites had been, but were others, from the Pharisees. So he says about this that because the priests and Levites were educated and respectful, they ask John humbly and respectfully whether he is the Messiah, or Elijah, or the Prophet. But these others, who were from the Pharisees, according to their name “separated” and importunate, used disdainful language. Thus they asked him, Why then do you baptize, if you are not the Messiah, nor Elijah, nor the Prophet?
But according to others, such as Gregory, Chrysostom, and Augustine, these Pharisees are the same priests and Levites who had been sent by the Jews. For there was among the Jews a certain sect which was separated from the others by reason of its external cult; and for this reason its members were called Pharisees, i.e., “divided.” In this sect there were some priests and Levites, and some of the people. And so, in order that the delegates [to John] might possess a greater authority, they sent priests and Levites, who were Pharisees, thus furnishing them with the dignity of a priestly caste and with religious authority.
242 The Evangelist adds, these men had been sent from the Pharisees, to disclose, first, the reason why they asked about John’s baptizing, which was not why they were sent. It is as though he were saying: They were sent to ask John who he was. But they asked, Why do you baptize? because they were from the Pharisees, whose religion was being challenged. Secondly, as Gregory says, in order to show with what intention they asked John, “Who are you?” (1:19). For the Pharisees, more than all the others, showed themselves crafty and insulting to Christ. Thus they said of him: “He casts out devils by Beelzebub, the prince of devils” (Mt 12:24). Further, they consulted with the Herodians on how to trap Jesus in his speech (Mt 22:15). And so in saying that these men had been sent from the Pharisees, he shows that they were disrespectful and were questioning him out of envy.
243 Their questions concerned his office of baptizing. Hence he says that they asked him, Why then do you baptize? Here we should note that they are asking not to learn, but to obstruct. For since they saw many people coming to John because of the new rite of baptism, foreign both to the rite of the Pharisees and of the law, they became envious of John and tried all they could to hinder his baptism. But being unable to contain themselves any longer, they reveal their envy and say, Why then do you baptize if you are not the Messiah, nor Elijah, nor the Prophet? As if to say: You should not baptize, since you deny that you are any of those three persons in whom baptism was prefigured, as was said above. In other words, if you are not the Messiah, who will possess the fountain by which sins are washed away, nor Elijah, nor the Prophet, i.e., Elisha, who made a dry passageway through the Jordan (2 Kgs 2:8), how do you dare baptize’? They are like envious persons who hinder the progress of souls, “who say to the seers, ‘See no visions’” (Is 30:10).
244 His answer is true: and so he says that John answered, I baptize with water. As if to say: You should not be disturbed, if I, who am not the Messiah, nor Elijah, nor the Prophet, baptize; because my baptism is not completive but imperfect. For the perfection of baptism requires the washing of the body and of the soul; and the body, by its nature, is indeed washed by water, but the soul is washed by the Spirit alone. So, I baptize with water, i.e., I wash the body with something bodily; but another will come who will baptize perfectly, namely, with water and with the Holy Spirit; God and man, who will wash the body with water and the spirit with the Spirit, in such a way that the sanctification of the spirit will be distributed throughout the body. “For John indeed baptized with water but you will be baptized with the Holy Spirit not many days from now” (Acts 1:5).