Against Praxeas 24
Summary: When Jesus tells Philip “he who has seen me has seen the Father,” he means that the invisible Father is known through the Son's works and words, not that he himself is the Father; he says “I am in the Father,” not “I am the Father.”
Latin text · CSEL 47:273–276
Erant plane, qui et tunc non intellegerent, quoniam et Thomas aliquamdiu incredulus. domine, enim inquit, non scimus, quo eas. et quomodo uiam nouimus? et Iesus: ego sum uia ueritas et uita: nemo uenit ad patrem nisi per me; si cognouissetis me, cognouissetis et patrem; sed abhinc nostis illum et uidistis illum. et peruenimus iam ad Philippum, qui spe excitatus uidendi patris, nec intellegens quomodo uisum patrem audisset: ostende, inquit, nobis patrem, et sufficit nobis. et dominus: a Philippe, tanto tempore uobiscum sum, et non cognouistis me? quem dicit cognosci ab illis debuisse (se) — hoc enim solum discuti oportet — quasi patrem, an quasi filium? si quasi patrem, doceat Praxeas tanto tempore Christum cum eis conuersatum patrem aliquando non dico intellegi, uerum uel aestimari potuisse. nobis omnes scripturae, et ueteres et nouae, Christum dei filium dei praefiniunt. hoc et retro praedicabatur, hoc et ab ipso Christo pronuntiabatur, immo iam et ab ipso patre, coram de caelis filium profitente et filium glorificante: hic est filius meus, et: glorificaui et glorificabo, hoc et a discipulis credebatur, hoc et a Iudaeis non credebatur. hoc se uolens credi ab illis omni hora patrem nominabat et patrem praeferebat et patrem honorabat. si ita est, ergo non patrem tanto tempore secum conuersatum ignorauerant, sed filium; et dominus, eum se ignorari exprobrans, quem ignorauerant, eum utique agnosci uolebat, quem tanto tempore non agnosci exprobrauerat, id est filium. et apparere iam potest, quo modo dictum sit: qui me uidet, uidet et patrem, scilicet quo et supra: ego et pater unum sumus; — quare? quia ego ex deo exiui et ueni — et: ego sum uia, nemo ad patrem uenit nisi per me; et: nemo ad me uenit nisi pater eum adduxerit; et: omnia mihi pater tradidit; et: sicut pater uiuificat, ita et filius; et: si me cognouistis, et patrem cognouistis. secundum haec enim uicarium se patris ostenderat, per quem pater et uideretur in factis et audiretur in uerbis et cognosceretur in filio facta et uerba patris administrante, quia inuisibilis pater, quod et Philippus didicerat in lege et meminisse debuerat: deum nemo uidebit et uiuet. et ideo suggillatur patrem uidere desiderans quasi uisibilem et instruitur uisibilem eum in filio fieri ex uirtutibus, non ex personae repraesentatione. denique si patrem eundem filium uellet intellegi dicendo: qui me uidet, patrem uidet, quomodo subicit: non credis, quia ego in patre et pater in me? debuerat enim subiunxisse: (non credis, quia ego sum pater? aut quo exaggerauit, si non illud manifestauit, quod uoluerat intellegi, se scilicet filium esse? porro dicendo: non credis, quia ego in patre et pater in me, propterea potius exaggerauit, ne, quia dixerat: qui me uidit et patrem uidit, pater existimaretur, quod numquam se existimari uoluit, qui semper se filium et a patre uenisse profitebatur. igitur et manifestam fecit duarum personarum coniunctionem, ne pater seorsum quasi uisibilis in conspectu desideraretur, et ut filius repraesentator patris haberetur, et nihilominus hoc quoque interpretatus est, quomodo pater esset in filio et filius in patre: uerba, inquit, quae ego loquor uobis, non sunt mea, — utique quia patris — pater autem manens in me facit opera. per opera ergo uirtutum et uerba doctrinae manens in filio pater per ea uidetur, per quae manet, et per eum, in quo manet, ex hoc ipso apparente proprietate utriusque personae, dum dicit: ego sum in patre, et pater in me. atque adeo: credite, ait. quid? me patrem esse? non puto scriptum esse, sed: quia ego in patre et pater in me, si quo minus, uel propter opera credite, ea utique opera, per quae pater in filio non uisu, sed sensu uidebatur.
English · Claude translation
There were certainly some who did not understand even then, since Thomas too was unbelieving for a while. “Lord,” he says, “we do not know where you are going; and how can we know the way?” And Jesus: “I am the way, the truth, and the life; no one comes to the Father except through me. If you had known me, you would have known the Father also; but from now on you know him and have seen him.” And now we come to Philip, who, roused by the hope of seeing the Father, and not understanding how he had heard that the Father was seen, says, “Show us the Father, and it is enough for us.” And the Lord: “O Philip, have I been with you so long, and you have not known me?” As whom does he say he ought to have been known by them (for this alone needs to be discussed): as the Father, or as the Son? If as the Father, let Praxeas teach how Christ, having lived with them so long, could ever have been, I do not say understood, but even supposed to be the Father. For us all the Scriptures, old and new, define Christ as the Son of God. This was preached in former times; this was declared by Christ himself, and indeed by the Father himself, openly acknowledging the Son from heaven and glorifying the Son: “This is my Son,” and, “I have glorified, and I will glorify”; this the disciples believed, this the Jews did not believe. Wishing this to be believed by them, he named the Father every hour, set the Father before himself, and honored the Father. If this is so, then it was not the Father who had lived with them so long that they had not known, but the Son; and the Lord, reproaching them for not knowing the one they had not known, certainly wanted that one to be recognized whom he had reproached them for not recognizing so long, that is, the Son. And now it can be seen how it was said, “He who sees me sees the Father also”: in the same way, namely, as above, “I and the Father are one” (why? “because I came forth from God and have come”); and, “I am the way; no one comes to the Father except through me”; and, “No one comes to me unless the Father draws him”; and, “All things have been handed over to me by the Father”; and, “As the Father gives life, so does the Son”; and, “If you have known me, you have known the Father also.” For by these sayings he had shown himself to be the Father's vicar, through whom the Father might be both seen in deeds and heard in words and known in the Son, who carries out the Father's deeds and words; because the Father is invisible, as Philip too had learned in the law and ought to have remembered: “No one shall see God and live.” And so he is rebuked for desiring to see the Father as if he were visible, and is taught that he becomes visible in the Son from his mighty works, not from a presentation of his person. In fact, if he wanted the Father to be understood as the same as the Son, by saying, “He who sees me sees the Father,” how is it that he adds, “Do you not believe that I am in the Father and the Father in me?” He should have added, “Do you not believe that I am the Father?” Or why did he press the point, if he did not make plain what he wanted understood, namely that he was the Son? Rather, by saying, “Do you not believe that I am in the Father and the Father in me?” he pressed it so that he should not be thought to be the Father because he had said, “He who has seen me has seen the Father also,” which he never wanted to be thought, he who always professed that he was the Son and had come from the Father. So he both made plain the conjunction of the two persons, so that the Father should not be desired separately, as if visible to sight, and so that the Son should be held as the representative of the Father; and he nonetheless explained this too, how the Father was in the Son and the Son in the Father: “The words,” he says, “that I speak to you are not mine” (because they are the Father's, of course); “but the Father, abiding in me, does the works.” So through the mighty works and the words of teaching, the Father, abiding in the Son, is seen through those things through which he abides, and through him in whom he abides; and from this very fact the individuality of each person appears, when he says, “I am in the Father, and the Father in me.” And so: “Believe,” he says. What? “That I am the Father”? I do not think that is written, but: “that I am in the Father and the Father in me; or else believe for the works' sake”: the works, that is, through which the Father was seen in the Son, not by sight but by understanding.
About this passage
Notes
Translation notes
- The quotations are John 14:5-11, Matt 17:5, John 12:28, 10:30, 8:42, 6:44, Matt 11:27, John 5:21, and Exod 33:20. “Vicar” renders vicarius; “representative” renders repraesentator.
Cite this passage
Tertullian, Prax. 24 (trans. Sophia Scriptura, https://sophiascriptura.com/fathers/tertullian-praxean/24/).
Plain text
Tertullian, Prax. 24 (trans. Sophia Scriptura, https://sophiascriptura.com/fathers/tertullian-praxean/24/).
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