49. Connect with this that saying, which you
lay hold of to support the imputation of infirmity, All that the
Father giveth Me shall come unto Me, and him that cometh to Me I will
in no wise cast out; for I am come down from heaven not to do Mine own
will, but the will of the Father that sent Me St. John vi. 37, 38.. But, perhaps you say, the Son has no
freedom of will: the weakness of His nature subjects Him to
necessity, and He is denied free-will, and subjected to necessity that
He may not reject those who are given to Him and come from the
Father. Nor was the Lord content to demonstrate the mystery of
the Unity by His action in not rejecting those who are given to Him,
nor seeking to do His own will instead of the will of him that sent
Him, but when the Jews, after the repetition of the words, Him that
sent Me, began to murmur, He confirms our interpretation by saying,
Every one who heareth from the Father and learneth, cometh unto
Me. Not that any man hath seen the Father, save He which is from
God, He hath seen the Father. Verily, verily, I say unto you, he
that believeth in Me hath eternal life Ib.
45–47.. Now, tell me first, where has the
Father been heard, and where has He taught His hearers? No one
hath seen the Father, save Him Who is from God: has any one ever
heard Him Whom no one has ever seen? He that has heard from the
Father, comes to the Son: and he that has heard the teaching of
the Son, has heard the teaching of the Father’s nature, for its
properties are revealed in the Son. When, therefore, we hear the
Son teaching, we must understand that we are hearing the teaching of
the Father. No one hath seen the Father, yet he who comes to the
Son, hears and learns from the Father to come: it is manifest,
therefore, that the Father teaches through the words of the Son, and,
though seen of none, speaks to us in the manifestation of the Son,
because the Son, by virtue of His perfect birth, possesses all the
properties of His Father’s nature. The Only-begotten God
desiring, therefore, to testify of the Father’s authority, yet
inculcating His own unity with the Father’s nature, does not cast
out those who are given to Him of the Father, or work His own will
instead of the will of Him that sent Him: not that He does not
will what He does, or is not Himself heard when He teaches; but in
order that He may reveal Him Who sent Him, and Himself the Sent, under
the aspect of one indistinguishable nature, He shews all that He wills,
and says, and does, to be the will and works of the Father.