But of that day and hour knows no man, no, not the angels of heaven, but my Father only.
All Commentaries on Matthew 24:36 Go To Matthew 24
John Chrysostom
AD 407
By saying, not the angels, He stopped their mouths, that they should not seek to learn what these angels know not; and by saying, neither the Son, forbids them not only to learn, but even to inquire. For in proof that therefore He said this, see after His resurrection, when He saw they had become over curious, how He stopped their mouths more decidedly. For now indeed He has mentioned infallible signs, many and endless; but then He says merely, It is not for you to know times or seasons. And then that they might not say, we are driven to perplexity, we are utterly scorned, we are not held worthy so much as of this, He says, which the Father has put in His own power. And this, because He was exceedingly careful to honor them, and to conceal nothing from them. Therefore He refers it to His Father, both to make the thing awful, and to exclude that of which He had spoken from their inquiry. Since if it be not this, but He is ignorant of it, when will He know it? Will it be together with us? But who would say this? And the Father He knows clearly, even as clearly as He knows the Son; and of the day is He ignorant? Moreover, the Spirit indeed searches even the deep things of God, 1 Corinthians 2:10 and does not He know so much as the time of the judgment? But how He ought to judge He knows, and of the secrets of each He has a full perception; and what is far more common than that, of this could He be ignorant? And how, if all things were made by Him, and without Him was not even one thing made, was He ignorant of the day? For He who made the worlds, it is quite plain that He made the times also; and if the times, even that day. How then is He ignorant of that which He made?
And ye indeed say that you know even His substance, but that the Son not even the day, the Son, who is always in the bosom of the Father; and yet His substance is much greater than the days, even infinitely greater. How then, while assigning to yourselves the greater things, do you not allow even the less to the Son, in whom are hid all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge. Colossians 2:3 But neither do you know what God is in His substance, though ten thousand times ye talk thus madly, neither is the Son ignorant of the day, but is even in full certainty thereof.
For this cause, I say, when He had told all things, both the times and the seasons, and had brought it to the very doors (for it is near, He says, even at the doors), He was silent as to the day. For if you seek after the day and hour, you shall not hear them of me, says He; but if of times and preludes, without hiding anything, I will tell you all exactly.
For that indeed I am not ignorant of it, I have shown by many things; having mentioned intervals, and all the things that are to occur, and how short from this present time until the day itself (for this did the parable of the fig tree indicate), and I lead you to the very vestibule; and if I do not open unto you the doors, this also I do for your good.
