Sermons to the People 288.1–288.5

The festival of today, by its yearly return, renews the memory that the forerunner of the Lord was born wonderfully before the Wonderful One; and it is most fitting that we consider and praise his birth today. For this is why a yearly day has been dedicated to this miracle: so that forgetfulness may not erase from our hearts the benefits of God and the mighty works of the Most High. John, then, is the herald of the Lord, sent before him, but made through him. “For all things were made through him, and without him nothing was made.” A man was sent before the man who is God; he recognized his Lord, announced his Creator, discerned him in mind as already present on earth, pointed him out with his finger. For these are his words as he points out the Lord and bears witness: “Behold the Lamb of God, behold him who takes away the sin of the world.” Rightly, then, a barren woman bore the herald, a virgin the judge. In John’s mother barrenness received fruitfulness; in Christ’s mother fruitfulness did not corrupt integrity. If your patience, quiet eagerness, and attentive silence give me the opportunity to say, with the Lord’s help, what he grants me to say, there will doubtless be a fruit of your attention and a reward for our effort, so that something belonging to a great mystery may be brought into your thirsting ears and hearts.

There were prophets before John, many and great and holy, worthy of God, full of God, foretellers of the Savior, witnesses of the truth. Yet of none of them could it be said what was said of John: “Among those born of women none has arisen greater than John the Baptist.” What, then, does this greatness sent before the Great One mean? It serves as testimony to great humility. For he was so great that he could be thought to be the Christ. John could have taken advantage of people’s error and not even had to labor to persuade them that he was the Christ, because those who heard him and saw him had already thought so without his saying it. He had no need to sow the error, only to confirm it. But he, the humble friend of the bridegroom, jealous for the bridegroom, not putting himself forward as an adulterer in the bridegroom’s place, bears witness to his friend and commends to the bride him who was truly the bridegroom: so that Christ might be loved in him, he hated being loved instead of him. “He who has the bride,” he says, “is the bridegroom.” And as if you were to ask, “What about you?” “But the friend of the bridegroom,” he says, “stands and hears him, and rejoices with joy because of the bridegroom’s voice.” He stands and hears: the disciple hears the master; because he hears, he stands; because if he does not hear, he falls. Here John’s greatness is commended above all: that although he could have been thought to be the Christ, he preferred to bear witness to Christ and commend him, to humble himself, rather than be taken for him and deceived by himself. Rightly he was called more than a prophet. For of the prophets who were before the Lord’s coming the Lord himself speaks thus: “Many prophets and righteous men desired to see what you see, and did not see it.” For those who were filled with the Spirit of God to announce Christ’s coming longed, if it could be, to see him present on earth. Hence that Simeon was kept from departing this world until he should see, born, him through whom the world was made. And he indeed saw the Word of God as an infant in the flesh; but he was not yet teaching, he had not yet taken on the role of master, he who was already master of the angels with the Father. Simeon, then, saw him, but as an infant; John saw him already preaching, already choosing disciples. Where? At the river Jordan. For there Christ’s teaching began. There Christ’s baptism that was to come was commended, since a baptism was received that went before and prepared the way and said, “Prepare the way of the Lord, make his paths straight.” For the Lord willed to be baptized by a servant, so that people might see what those receive who are baptized by the Lord. He began, then, where prophecy had rightly gone before: “He shall have dominion from sea to sea, and from the river to the ends of the earth.” At that very river where Christ began to have dominion, John saw Christ, recognized him, bore witness. He humbled himself before the Great One, so that the humble might be exalted by the Great One. And he called himself the bridegroom’s friend: and what kind of friend? Perhaps an equal? Far from it: far below. How far? “I am not worthy,” he says, “to loosen the strap of his sandal.” This prophet, rather more than a prophet, deserved to be foretold by a prophet. For of him Isaiah said, as was read to us today: “The voice of one crying in the wilderness, Prepare the way of the Lord, make his paths straight. Every valley shall be filled, and every mountain and hill shall be brought low; and the crooked shall become straight, and the rough ways smooth; and all flesh shall see the salvation of God. Cry out. What shall I cry? All flesh is grass, and all its glory like the flower of grass: the grass has withered, the flower has fallen; but the word of the Lord abides forever.” Let Your Love attend. When John was asked who he was, whether he was the Christ, whether Elijah, whether the prophet, he said, “I am not the Christ, nor Elijah, nor the prophet.” And they: “Who are you, then?” “I am the voice of one crying in the wilderness.” He called himself a voice. You have John as the voice. What do you have Christ as, if not the Word? The voice is sent first, so that the Word may be understood afterward. And what Word? Listen to him showing it to you clearly: “In the beginning,” he says, “was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things were made through him, and without him nothing was made.” If all things, John too. Why do we wonder if the Word made a voice for himself? See, see both at the river, both the voice and the Word. John the voice, Christ the Word.

Let us ask what the difference is between a voice and a word: let us ask attentively; it is no small matter, and it calls for no small attention. The Lord will grant that neither I tire in explaining nor you in listening. See, here are two things, voice and word. What is a voice? What is a word? What? Listen to what you will approve in yourselves, and, questioned by yourselves, answer yourselves. A word, if it does not have a signifying meaning, is not called a word. But a voice, even if it only sounds and makes a noise without meaning, like the sound of someone shouting, not speaking, can be called a voice; it cannot be called a word. Someone or other groaned: that is a voice; he wailed: that is a voice. It is a certain shapeless sound, carrying or bringing a noise to the ears without any meaning for the understanding. But a word, unless it signifies something, unless it brings one thing to the ears and another to the mind, is not called a word. So, as I was saying, if you shout, it is a voice; if you say “man,” it is a word; if you say “cattle,” if “God,” if “world,” or something else. For all these I have spoken are signifying voices, not empty ones, not ones that sound and teach nothing. If, then, you have now distinguished between voice and word, listen to something to wonder at in these two, John and Christ. A word is very powerful even without a voice; a voice is empty without a word. Let us give the reason, and explain, if we can, what we have proposed. Look, you wanted to say something: the very thing you want to say has already been conceived in the heart; it is held by memory, made ready by the will, alive in the understanding. And this very thing you want to say belongs to no language. The thing itself which you want to say, which has been conceived in the heart, belongs to no language, neither Greek nor Latin nor Punic nor Hebrew nor that of any nation. It is only a thing conceived in the heart, ready to come forth. So, as I said, it is a certain thing, a certain thought, a meaning conceived in the heart, ready to come forth so as to be conveyed to a hearer. As it is known, then, to him in whose heart it is, it is a word, already known to the one who will speak, not yet to the one who will hear. See, then, a word already formed, already whole, remains in the heart: it seeks to come forth so as to be spoken to a hearer. He who conceived the word that he is to speak, and has the word known to himself in his heart, considers to whom he is going to speak. I am speaking in the name of Christ to learned ears in the Church, and I dare even to convey something rather subtle to those who are not unskilled. Let Your Love attend, then. See the word conceived in the heart: it seeks to come forth so as to be spoken; it considers to whom it is to be spoken. Does it find a Greek? It seeks a Greek voice by which to come forth to the Greek. Does it find a Latin? It seeks a Latin voice by which to come forth to the Latin. Does it find a Punic speaker? It seeks a Punic voice by which to come forth to the Punic speaker. Remove the difference of hearers, and that word which has been conceived in the heart is neither Greek nor Latin nor Punic nor of any language. It seeks such a voice for coming forth as the hearer is who stands by. Now, brothers, so that something may be set before you to understand, I have conceived in my heart to say “God.” What I have conceived in my heart is something great. For God is not two syllables; God is not this short sound. I want to say “God”; I consider to whom I am to say it. Is he a Latin? I say Deum. Is he a Greek? I say Theon. To the Latin I say Deum, to the Greek Theon. Between Deum and Theon there is a difference of sound: the letters here are different, the letters there are different; but in my heart, in what I want to say, in what I think, there is no difference of letters, no varied sound of syllables: it is what it is. That it might be uttered to a Latin, one voice was used; to a Greek, another. If I wanted to utter it to a Punic speaker, I would use another; to a Hebrew, another; to an Egyptian, another; to an Indian, another. How many voices the word of the heart would make by changing the persons, without any change or variation of itself! It goes to the Latin by a Latin voice, to the Greek by a Greek one, to the Hebrew by a Hebrew one. It reaches the hearer, and does not depart from the speaker. For do I lose what by speaking I bring about in another? That sound used in between has propagated something in you; it has not emigrated from me. I was already thinking of God; you had not yet heard my voice; when you heard it, you too began to have what I was thinking; but I did not lose what I had. So in me, as on the hinge of my heart, as in the inner chamber of my mind, the word preceded my voice. The voice has not yet sounded in my mouth, and the word is already in my heart. But so that what I conceived in my heart may go out to you, it seeks the ministry of the voice.

If I can, helped by your attention and prayers, say what I want, I think that whoever understands will rejoice; and whoever does not understand, let him forgive a man laboring, and pray to a merciful God. For what I say also comes from there. From there I now speak; what I am to say is in my heart, but the ministries of the voice labor to reach your ears. What then, brothers? What then? Surely you have attended, surely you now understand that the word was in my heart before it took to itself a voice in which to come forth to your ears. I think all people understand, because what happens to me happens to everyone who speaks. See, I already know what I want to say, I hold it in my heart, I seek the ministry of the voice; before the voice sounds in my mouth, the word is already held in my heart. So the word preceded my voice, and in me the word is first, the voice later; but to you, so that you may understand, the voice comes first to your ear, so that the word may be conveyed to your mind. For you could not know what had been in me before the voice unless it were in you after the voice. So if John is the voice and Christ the Word, Christ is before John, but with God; Christ is after John, but with us. A great mystery, brothers. Attend, take in the greatness of the matter again and again. For your understanding delights me and makes me bolder toward you, with the help of him whom I proclaim, so small a one so great a one, a man of whatever sort God the Word. With his help, then, I grow bolder toward you, and having set out this instruction on the distinction between voice and word, I convey what follows from it. John bore the role of the voice in a mystery: for he was not the only voice. For every man who announces the Word is a voice of the Word. For what the sound of our mouth is to the word we carry in our heart, this every devout soul that preaches is to that Word of which it was said: “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God.” How many words, or rather how many voices, a word conceived in the heart makes! How many preachers the Word remaining with the Father has made! He sent patriarchs, he sent prophets, he sent so many and such great heralds of himself. The Word, remaining, sent voices; and after many voices had been sent ahead, the one Word himself came as in his own vehicle, in his own voice, in his own flesh. Gather, then, as into one all the voices that went before the Word, and set them all in the person of John. He carried the mystery of them all; he alone was the sacred and mystical person of them all. Therefore he was properly called the voice, as the seal and mystery of all voices.

Attend now, then, to what this refers to: “He must increase, but I must decrease.” Attend, if I can express it; if I cannot convey it, may I at least be able to think out in what manner, by what reasoning, with what intention, for what cause, according to the distinction I have spoken of between voice and word, the voice itself, John himself, said, “He must increase, but I must decrease.” O great and wonderful mystery! Attend to the person of the voice, in which person were the mysteries of all voices, saying of the person of the Word, “He must increase, but I must decrease.” Why? Attend. The apostle says, “We know in part and we prophesy in part; but when what is perfect has come, what is in part will be done away.” What is the perfect? “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.” This is the perfect. What is the perfect? Let the apostle Paul say it too: “Who, though he was in the form of God, did not think it robbery to be equal with God.” This one equal to God the Father, this Word of God with God through whom all things were made, we shall see as he is, but at the end. For now, as the evangelist John says, “Beloved, we are children of God, and it has not yet appeared what we shall be. Beloved, we know that when he appears we shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is.” This vision is promised us; for this vision we are being instructed; for this vision we cleanse our hearts. “For blessed,” he says, “are the pure in heart, for they shall see God.” He showed his flesh; he showed it to servants, but the form of a servant; as his own proper voice, among the many voices he had sent ahead, he showed even his flesh itself. The Father was sought, as though he himself were already seen as he is: the Son, equal to the Father, was speaking in the form of a servant to servants. “Lord,” Philip said to him, “show us the Father, and it is enough for us.” He was seeking the end of all his striving, that is, the goal of his progress, having reached which he would seek nothing further. “Show us,” he said, “the Father, and it is enough for us.” Well, Philip, well; you understand excellently that the Father is enough for you. What is “it is enough”? You will seek nothing beyond: he will fill you, satisfy you, perfect you. But see whether this one too whom you hear may not be enough for you. Is he enough alone, or with the Father? But how alone, when he never departs from the Father? So let him answer Philip, who wishes to see: “Have I been with you so long, and you have not known me? Philip, whoever has seen me has seen the Father too.” What is, Philip, “whoever has seen me has seen the Father too,” if not, “You have not seen me; that is why you seek the Father”? Philip, whoever has seen me has seen the Father too. But you see me and you do not see me. For you do not see me who made you; but you see what I was made for your sake. “Whoever has seen me,” he says, “has seen the Father too.” Why, if not because, in the form of God, he did not think it robbery to be equal with God? What, then, did Philip see? That “he emptied himself, taking the form of a servant, being made in the likeness of men, and found in appearance as a man.” This is what Philip saw: the form of a servant, he who was to be free for the form of God. So John is the person of all voices; Christ the person of the Word. All voices must decrease as we advance toward seeing Christ. For the more you advance toward seeing wisdom, the less you need the voice. The voice in the prophets, the voice in the apostles, the voice in the psalms, the voice in the Gospel. Let that come: “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.” When we see him as he is, will the Gospel be recited there? Shall we hear prophecies? Shall we read the letters of the apostles? Why? Because voices fail as the Word increases: because “He must increase, but I must decrease.” And the Word in itself neither increases nor diminishes. But it is said to increase in us when by advancing we grow into him: as light increases in the eyes, being seen more as the sight grows strong, which surely was seen less when the sight was weak. And it was smaller to sick eyes, it is greater to healthy eyes, though in itself it neither diminished before nor increased afterward. So the ministry of the voice diminishes as the mind advances toward the Word. Thus Christ must increase and John must decrease. Their deaths show this. For John was diminished, beheaded; Christ was exalted, he increased as it were on the cross. Their birthdays show this. For from John’s birthday the days begin to shorten; from Christ’s they begin again to lengthen.