725 Then, since they could not very well charge the man who was cured, they try to belittle Christ’s cure, for this man defended himself through Christ. But since he did not indicate precisely who he was, they maliciously ask him who it was. With respect to this, first, the search for Christ is set down. Secondly, his discovery. And thirdly, his persecution (v 16).
726 Three things are mentioned about the first: the Jews’ interrogation; the ignorance of the man who was cured, and the cause of that ignorance.
As to the first, we read: They then asked him, not with the good intention of making progress, but for the evil purpose of persecuting and destroying Christ: “You will seek me, and you will die in your sin” (below 8:21), Their very words show their malice: for while our Lord had commanded the man who was sick to become healed and to pick up his mat, they ignored the first, which is an undeniable sign of divine power, and harped on the second, which seemed to be against the law, saying, Who is this man who told you to pick up your mat and walk? “He lies in wait, and turns good into evil, and he will put blame,” i.e., attempt to put blame, “on the elect” (Sir 11:33).
727 As to the second, the Evangelist says, But he who was cured had no idea who it was. This cured man signifies those who believe and have been healed by the grace of Christ: “You are saved by grace” (Eph 2:8). Indeed, they do not know who Christ is, but they know only his effects: “While we are in the body, we are absent from the Lord: for we walk by faith, and not by sight” (2 Cor 5:6). We will know who Christ is when “we shall see him as he is,” as said in 1 John (3:2).
728 Next, the Evangelist gives the reason for the man’s ignorance, saying, for Jesus had slipped away from the crowd that had gathered in that place. There are both literal and mystical reasons why Christ left. Of the two literal reasons, the first is to give us the example of concealing our good deeds and of not using them to seek the applause of men: “Take care not to perform your good actions in the sight of men, in order to be seen by them” (Mt 6:1). The second literal reason is to show us that, in all our actions, we should leave and avoid those who are envious, so as not to feed and increase their envy: “Do not be provoked by one who speaks evil of you, so he will not trap you by your own words” (Sir 8:14).
There are also two mystical reasons why Christ slipped away. First, it teaches us that Christ is not easy to find in the midst of men, or in the whirlwind of temporal cares; rather, he is found in spiritual seclusion: “I will lead her into the wilderness, and there I will speak to her heart” (Hos 2:14); and in Ecclesiastes (9.17): “The words of the wise are heard in silence.” Secondly, this suggests to us that Christ was to leave the Jews for the Gentiles: “He hid his face for a while from the house of Jacob” (Is 8:17), i.e., he withdrew the knowledge of his truth from the Jewish people.
729 Then (v 14), the Evangelist tells us how Jesus was found. First, he says that he was found. Secondly, that after having been found, he taught. Thirdly, that after having taught, his identity was reported to the Jews.
730 The Evangelist tells us both where and the way in which Christ was found. The way in which he was found was remarkable, for Christ is not found unless he first finds; hence he says, Later, after the above events, Jesus found the man. For we cannot find Jesus by our own power unless Christ first presents himself to us; so we read: “Seek your servant” (Ps 118:176); and, “She [wisdom] goes to meet those who desire her” (Wis 6:14).
The place Christ was found was holy, in the temple, according to: “The Lord is in his holy temple” (Ps 10:5). For his mother had also found him in the temple (Lk 2:46); and he was there for he had to be concerned with his Father’s affairs. We see from this that this man was not cured in vain, but having been converted to a religious way of life, he visited the temple and found Christ: because if we desire to come to a knowledge of the Creator, we must run from the tumult of sinful affections, leave the company of evil men, and flee to the temple of our heart, where God condescends to visit and live.
731 After Christ was found, he began to teach (v 14). First, Christ reminded the man of the gift he was given. Secondly, he offered him sound advice. And thirdly, he pointed out an imminent danger.
732 The gift was remarkable, for it was a sudden restoration to health; so he says, Remember, you have been made well. Therefore, you should always keep this in mind, according to: “I will remember the tender mercies of the Lord” (Is 63:7).
733 His advice, too, was useful, that is, do not sin again. “My son, you have sinned. Do not sin again” (Sir 21:1).
Why did our Lord mention sin to this paralytic and to certain others that he cured, and not to the rest? He did this to show that illness comes to certain people as a result of their previous sins, according to: “For this reason many of you are weak and sick, and many have died” (1 Cor 11:30). In this way he even showed himself to be God, pointing out sins and the hidden secrets of the heart: “Hell and destruction are open to the Lord; how much more the hearts of the children of men” (Prv 15:11). And so Christ mentioned sin only to some he cured and not to all, for not all infirmities are due to previous sins: some come from one’s natural disposition, and some are permitted as a trial, as with Job. Or, Christ might have brought up sin to some because they were better prepared for his correction: “Do not rebuke one who mocks, lest he hate you; rebuke a wise man, and he will love you” (Prv 9:8). Or, we could say, in telling some not to sin, he intended his words for all the others.
734 The imminent danger was great, so he says, lest something worse happen to you. This can be understood in two ways, according to the two events that preceded. For this man was first punished with a troublesome infirmity, and then received a marvelous favor. Accordingly, Christ’s statement can refer to each. To the first, for when anyone is punished for his sin, and the punishment does not check him from sinning, it is just for him to be punished more severely. So Christ says, do not sin again, because if you do sin, something worse will happen to you: “I have struck your children in vain” (Jer 2:30). It can refer to the second, for one who falls into sin after receiving favors deserves a more severe punishment because of his ingratitude, as we see in 2 Peter (2:20): “It would be better for them not to know the way of truth, than to turn back after knowing it.” Also, because after a man has once returned to sin, he sins more easily, according to Matthew (12:45): “The last state of that man becomes worse than the first”; and in Jeremiah (2:20): “You broke your yoke a long time ago, and snapped off your chains, and said: I will not serve.’”
735 Then when he says, The man went off and related to the Jews, we see Jesus identified. Some think, as Chrysostom reports, that this man identified Jesus out of malice. But this does not seem probable: that he would be so ungrateful after receiving such a favor. He related to the Jews that it was Jesus who had cured him, in order to make it clear that Christ had the power to heal: “Come... and I will tell you what great things the Lord has done for me,” as we read in the Psalm (65:16). This is obvious, for they had asked him who commanded him to pick up his mat, but he told them that it was Jesus who had cured him.
736 Next (v 16), we have the persecution of Christ, begun because he performed a work of mercy on the Sabbath. Thus the Evangelist says, For reasons like this the Jews began to persecute Jesus, because he performed such works on the Sabbath. “Princes have persecuted me without cause” (Ps 118:161).
737 Then (v 17), the second reason for his persecution is given: what he taught. First, we are given the truth he taught; and secondly, the perversity of his persecutors (v 18).
738 Our Lord taught the truth while justifying his breaking of the Sabbath. Here we should note that our Lord justified both himself and his disciples from breaking the Sabbath. He justified his disciples, since they were men, by comparing them to other men: as the priests who, although they worked in the temple on the Sabbath, did not break the Sabbath; and to David, who, while Ahimelech was priest, took the consecrated bread from the temple on the Sabbath when he was running from Saul (1 Sm 21:1).
Our Lord, who was both God and man, sometimes justified himself in breaking the Sabbath by comparing himself to men, as in Luke (14:5): “Which of you, if his donkey or ox falls into a pit, will not take him out on the Sabbath?” And sometimes he justified himself by comparing himself to God: particularly on this occasion, when he said: My Father works even until now, and so do I. As if to say: Do not think that my Father rested on the Sabbath in such a way that from that time he does not work; rather, just as he is working even now without laboring, so I also am working.
By saying this, Christ eliminated the misunderstanding of the Jews: for in their desire to imitate God, they did not do any work on the Sabbath, as if God entirely ceased from work on that day. In fact, although God rested on the Sabbath from producing new creatures, he is working always and continuously even till now, conserving creatures in existence. Hence it is significant that Moses used the word “rest,” after recounting the works of God from which he rested: for this signifies, in its hidden meaning, the spiritual rest which God, by the example of his own rest, promised to the faithful, after they have done their own good works. So we may say that this command was a foreshadowing of something that lay in the future.
739 He expressly says, works even until now, and not “has worked,” to indicate that God’s work is continuous. For they might have thought that God is the cause of the world as a craftsman is the cause of a house, i.e., the craftsman is responsible only for the making or coming into existence of the house: in other words, just as the house continues in existence even when the craftsman has ceased working, so the world would exist if God’s influence ceased. But according to Augustine, God is the cause of all creatures in such a way as to be the cause of their existing: for it his power were to cease even for a moment, all things in nature would at once cease to be, just as we may say that the air is illuminated only as long as the light of the sun remains in it. The reason for this is that things which depend on a cause only for their coming into existence, are able to exist when that cause ceases; but things that depend on a cause not only for their coming into existence but also to exist, need that cause for their continuous conservation in existence.
740 Further, in saying that My Father works even until now, he rejects the opinion of those who say that God creates through the instrumentality of secondary causes. This opinion conflicts with Isaiah (26:12): “O Lord, you have accomplished all our works for LIS.” Therefore, just as my Father, who in the beginning created nature, works even until now, by preserving and conserving his creation by the same activity, so (to I work, because I am the Word of the Father, through whom he accomplishes all things: “God said: ‘Let there be light’” (Gn 1:3). Thus, just as he accomplished the first production of things through the Word, so also their conservation. Consequently, if he works even until now, so do I, because I am the Word of the Father, through whom all things are made and conserved.
741 Then (v 18), the Evangelist mentions the persecution of Christ, which resulted from his teaching: for it was because of his teaching that the Jews tried all the harder, i.e., with greater eagerness and a higher pitch of zeal, to kill him. For in the law two crimes were punished by death: the crime of breaking the Sabbath—thus anyone who gathered wood on the Sabbath was stoned, as we see from Numbers (15:32); and the crime of blasphemy—so we read: “Bring the blasphemer outside the camp... and let all the children of Israel stone him” (Lv 24:14). Now they thought it was blasphemy for a man to claim that he was God: “We are not stoning you for any good work, but for blasphemy: because although you are a man, you make yourself God” (below 10:33). It was these two crimes they imputed to Christ: the first because he broke the Sabbath; the second because he said he was equal to God. So the Evangelist says that the Jews tried all the harder to kill him, because he not only broke the Sabbath rest, but even called God his own Father.
Because other just men had also called God their Father, as in “You will call me ‘Father’” (Jer 3:19), they do not just say that he called God his own Father, but added what made it blasphemy, making himself equal to God, which they understood from his statement: My Father works even until now, and so do I. He said that God was his Father so that we might understand that God is his Father by nature, and the Father of others by adoption. He referred to both of these when he said: “I am going to my Father,” by nature, “and to your Father,” by grace (below 20:17). Again, he said that as the Father works, so he works. This answers the accusation of the Jews about his breaking the Sabbath: for this would not be a valid excuse unless he had equal authority with God in working. It was for this reason they said he made himself equal to God.
742 How great then is the blindness of the Arians when they say that Christ is less than God the Father: for they cannot understand in our Lord’s words what the Jews were able to understand. For the Arians say that Christ did not make himself equal to God, while the Jews saw this. There is another way to settle this, from the very things mentioned in the text. For the Evangelist says that the Jews persecuted Christ because he broke the Sabbath, because he said God is his Father, and because he made himself equal to God. But Christ is either a liar or equal to God. But if he is equal to God, Christ is God by nature.