Heaven and earth shall pass away, but my words shall not pass away.
All Commentaries on Matthew 24:35 Go To Matthew 24
Cornelius a Lapide
AD 1637
Heaven and earth, &c, shall pass away, i.e, shall be changed, shall cease to be, shall perish, as regards their present state and condition, that they may pass into one which is better, and be glorified with the Saints.
Some are of opinion that at the end of the world the heavens will be changed as regards their form and substance. Of this question I have treated at length on2Peter and Isaiah 34:4.
Lastly, this sentence may be understood comparatively, thus, "The heavens shall pass away and perish, sooner than My words shall come to naught."
But of that day (namely, of My glorious coming to judgment) and hour, &c. As if He had said, "Do not, 0 My apostles, ask Me when I shall come again as Judges , or what shall be the day of the general Judgment, for no one except God knoweth this: and He willeth not any other being to know it." "He held them back," says Chrysostom, "from wishing to learn that which the angels are ignorant of." As to the time when the world shall come to an end, there are various opinions.
1. Many suppose that the world will come to an end after it has existed for six thousand years, as it was created in six days, according to the saying or prophecy of Elias, "six thousand" (years?) "the world." (Sex millia mundus, Lat.) This opinion is probably true, as I have shown at length on Revelation 20:4.
2. Some think that there will be just as many years after Christ to the end of the world as there were from the Creation to Christ. They gather this idea from Habakkuk 3:2, "0 Lord, revive Thy work in the midst of the years, in the midst of the years Thou shalt make it known." But this passage has a different meaning, as I have there shown.
The third opinion was one which supposed the world would last as many jubilees after Christ as there were years in His earthly life. This calculation would place the end in A.D1700.
4. Druitlimarns, who flourished about A.D800 , and who wrote upon S. Matthew , says, "Our ancestors have left in writing that the world was created, the Lord was conceived and crucified, on the25th of March, and in like manner the world will be destroyed upon the same day; but in what year they say not." But these things have no foundation.
5. A fifth calculation was put forth by a contemporary of Lapide, whose name he does not give, whom he calls a jester rather than a reckoner, which fixed on1666 as the end of the world.
"If," says Lapide, "you object to this "joculator" the words of Christ, "of that day knoweth no Prayer of Manasseh ," he answers, that only applied to the time when He was speaking, and that the day might be known afterwards by revelation or in some other way."
But all this Lapide characterises as frivolous and old wives" fables.
My Father only: because from eternity He had determined in His own mind, and appointed this day, which He keeps secret. Now by the word only, the Son is not excluded, neither the Holy Ghost, for They know the day and the hour of the Judgment equally with the Father, since They have all the same essence, majesty, will, mind, power, understanding, and knowledge. For it is a theological principle, that if the word "only" be added to any of the essential attributes of the Godhead, such as Wisdom of Solomon , and be ascribed to one of the Divine Persons, it does not exclude the other two Persons, but only creatures, which are of a different nature and essence. But in Personal Attributes, the expression "only" does exclude two of the, Divine Persons, as when it is said, "The Father only begets;" "The Son only is begotten."
You will say, Mark adds ( Mark 13:32), neither the Song of Solomon , for so it is in the Greek, Latin, Syriac, Arabic, Persian, Egyptian, Ethiopic. Various answers are given. The best is that which is common among the Fathers. It is that the Song of Solomon , both as God and as Prayer of Manasseh , by infused knowledge, knows the Day of Judgment and of the end of the world, for it pertains for Him to know this, inasmuch as He has been appointed the Judge of the world. But Christ denies that He knoweth this as Prayer of Manasseh , and as He is God"s messenger to us, because He did not know it so that He could reveal it to us, or because He had not been commissioned by the Father to reveal it to us. As an ambassador who was questioned concerning the secrets of his prince would reply that he did not know them, although he did know them, because he did not know them as an ambassador. For an ambassador declares only those things which he has a commission to declare.
Christ"s meaning then Isaiah , "God only knows what year and day and hour the end of the world and the Judgment shall be. And although God has caused Me, Christ, as I am Prayer of Manasseh , to know the same, as I am that one man who is united to the WORD; yet as I am the Father"s ambassador to men, He hath not willed Me to make known that day, but to keep it secret, and to stir them up continually to prepare themselves for it." There is a like mode of expression in S. John 15:15.
There are some who explain thus: that Christ, qua Prayer of Manasseh , knoweth not the Day of Judgment; but that He knoweth it as He is the God-man. That is to say, Christ as man knoweth it not by virtue of His humanity, but of His divinity. So S. Athanasius (Serm4 , contra Arian.), Nazianzen (Orat4 , de .Theolog.), Cyril (lib9 , Thesaur. c4), Ambrose (lib5 , de Fide, c8).
Maldonatus gives another explanation. He says that Christ, even as He is God, knoweth not the Day of Judgment in, as it were, an ex officio sense, because it is the office of the Father, alone to predestinate, decree, and determine the Day of Judgment; and, by consequence, that He knows it, and reveals it when He wills. For providence, in which predestination is included, is a special attribute of the Father. But this explanation is somewhat too subtle and abstruse.
But as the days of Noah, &c. Like the Deluge, which suddenly and unexpectedly drowned all men, shall My Advent come upon all. This is made plain by the subsequent verse.
As in the days that were before the flood, &c.
