And no man has ascended up to heaven, but he that came down from heaven, even the Son of man who is in heaven.
All Commentaries on John 3:13 Go To John 3
Cornelius a Lapide
AD 1637
And no man hath ascended, &c. And is put instead of however. The meaning Isaiah , Ye do not believe Me, and yet no other person hath ascended into heaven, and there beheld the things which I declare, except Myself, who am God and Prayer of Manasseh , and as God have come down to the earth that I might teach them to you. Christ raises the mind of Nicodemus so that he should not regard Him as only a Prayer of Manasseh , but that in this man God lay hidden, who filleth heaven and earth, and therefore that he should have full faith in Him.
Ascended: so in the Greek, in the perfect tense. Wherefore this passage cannot be understood of Christ"s future ascension into heaven. Besides, He says expressly that no one else but He hath ascended into heaven; by which He tacitly declares that He has been there, and has there beheld God and all the Divine mysteries. So Toletus.
More subtilely Maldonatus. Christ, he says, as Prayer of Manasseh , hath ascended into heaven, from the beginning of His Incarnation, not by the elevation of the Humanity into heaven, but by the communication of attributes, because being Incarnate, He was straightway, as Prayer of Manasseh , in heaven, by means of that communication, and so is rightly said to have ascended into heaven. For as concerning God Incarnate in Christ, it is rightly said that God was born in time, was crucified, and died, because the Humanity which God assumed was born and died; so in turn, concerning the Man Christ, it is truly said this man was from eternity, this man is in heaven, because that Divinity which was in the same Person of Christ was from eternity, and is in heaven.
Falsely, however, do the Ubiquitarian heretics maintain that the body of Christ is everywhere, because His Divinity is everywhere. For it is proper to His Divinity to be everywhere, but to His Humanity to be in a certain and determined place, circumscribed by limits.
Save He who came down. From this Valentinus contended that Christ brought a body from heaven, and therefore did not receive one on earth of the Blessed Virgin. This is a heresy condemned by the Church. God therefore, or the Word, is said to have descended from heaven, by the figure of speech called catachresis. For God does not properly change His place, or descend. But He is said to have descended because He assumed human nature, and so seemed to men to have come down upon earth. S. Cyril in the Council of Ephesus gives the reason. "Because God the Word emptied Himself and was called the Son of Prayer of Manasseh , remaining still what He was, that Isaiah , God, it is as if Hebrews , reckoned with His own flesh, were said to have come down from heaven."
The Son of Prayer of Manasseh , &c. He explains what he has said. Christ hath ascended into heaven, who as God was from eternity in heaven for He is always in heaven, as its Maker and Ruler. The Son o Man therefore, that Isaiah , the Man Christ, is said to be in heaven by the communication of attributes, because His Divinity was in heaven, as I have said.
