Believe you not that I am in the Father, and the Father in me? the words that I speak unto you I speak not of myself: but the Father that dwells in me, he does the works.
Read Chapter 14
Alexander of Alexandria
AD 250
How, also, can He be changeable and mutable, who says indeed by Himself: "I am in the Father, and the Father in Me"
1. Give close attention, and try to understand, beloved; for while it is we who speak it is He Himself who never withdraws His presence from us who is our Teacher. The Lord says, what you have just heard read, The words that I speak unto you, I speak not of myself: but the Father, that dwells in me, He does the works. Even His words, then, are works? Clearly so. For surely he that edifies a neighbor by what he says, works a good work. But what mean the words, I speak not of myself, but, I who speak am not of myself? Hence He attributes what He does to Him, of whom He, that does them, is. For the Father is not God [as born, etc.] of any one else, while the Son is God, as equal, indeed, to the Father, but [as born] of God the Father. Therefore the former is God, but not of God; and the Light, but not of light: whereas the latter is God of God, Light of Light.
2. For in connection with these two clauses,— the one where it is said, I speak not of myself; and the other, which runs, but t...
Believe ye not that I am in the Father, &c. Observe1. Here again the distinction of the Divine Persons is signified. Nor is any one properly said to be in himself, but in another2. The oneness of the Divine Nature is signified. For because the Father and the Son are, and exist in one and the same Divine Nature, therefore the Father is in the Song of Solomon , and the Son in the Father. Christ proved this by the effect. For He had His doctrine and works from the Father, and common with the Father. Therefore He had the same common Nature with Him. Hence, 3. By this saying is consequently signified the perfect and intimate union and indwelling of one Divine person in the Other, and the converse. By which it comes to pass that the Father is in the Son and the Holy Ghost, the Son in the Father and the Holy Ghost, the Holy Ghost in the Father and the Son. Damascene (1. de Fid. c11) calls this, πεζιχώζησις, and from him the schoolmen call it circumincessio. Concerning which mystery...
The words that I speak, I speak not from Myself: but the Father abiding in Me Himself doeth the works.
"If," He would say, "My Father had spoken anything to you, He would have used words no other than these which I now speak. For so great is the equality in essence between Myself and Him, that My words are His words, and whatsoever I do may be believed to be His actions: for abiding in Me, by reason of the exact equivalence in essence, He Himself doeth the works." For since the Godhead is One, in the Father, in the Son, and in the Spirit, every word that cometh from the Father comes always through the Son by the Spirit: and every work or miracle is through the Son by the Spirit, and yet is considered as coming from the Father. For the Son is not apart from the essence of the Father, nor indeed is the Holy Ghost; but the Son, being in the Father, and having the Father again in Himself, claims that the Father is the doer of the works. For the nature of the Father is mighty in operatio...
Believest thou not that I am in the Father and the Father in Me?
"I indeed, O Philip," He would say, "in depicting in Myself the nature of My Father, am the Image of His essence, moulded as that implies after His likeness, not (as might be supposed) by the bestowal of glories that once were not Mine, nor even by the reflected brilliancy of Divine endowments that once were unfamiliar but have been granted from without: but rather in My own nature are contained the qualities peculiar to My Father; and whatsoever He may be, that in very truth am I, in regard to sameness in essence. To this thou wilt surely reply: for it seems thou didst not go on to realise that I am in the Father, and the Father in Me. And yet the force of my words shall constrain thee henceforth, even in spite of thyself, to acknowledge thy assent to this. Therefore, whatsoever I say is spoken as the words of the Father; and whatsoever I do, is done by the Father also." And Christ says this, not as one making use of ...
Do you not believe that I am in the Father, and the Father in me? These words confirm the equality of the Father and the Son: nor can they be expounded of an union of affection only, by what Christ told them before. (John v. 17. and 19.) As the Father worketh till now, so I work: and whatsoever things the Father worketh, these also in like manner the Son doth. (Witham)
In the Son and in the Father, there is one and the same essence, the same wisdom, the same power; so that what the Son says, he does not say it of himself, and what the Son does, he does not do it of himself; but it is the Father, who abideth in the Son, who both acts and speaks.
That is, I am seen in that Essence.
The words that I speak, I speak not of Myself,
Do you see the exceeding nearness, and the proof of the one Essence?
The Father that dwells in Me, He does the works.
How, beginning with words, does He come to works? For that which naturally followed was, that He should say, the Father speaks the words. But He puts two things here, both concerning doctrine and miracles. Or it may have been because the words also were works. How then does He them? In another place He says, If I do not the works of My Father, believe Me not. John 10:37 How then says He here that the Father does them? To show this same thing, that there is no interval between the Father and the Son. What He says is this: The Father would not act in one way, and I in another. Indeed in another place both He and the Father work; My Father works hitherto, and I work John 5:17; showing in the first passage the unvaryingness of the works, in the second the identity. And if the obvious me...
If, indeed, He meant the Father to be understood as the same with the Son, by saying, "He who seeth me seeth the Father "how is it that He adds immediately afterwards, "Believest thou not that I am in the Father, and the Father in me? ".
And yet He omitted not to explain how the Father was in the Son and the Son in the Father. "The words "says He, "which I speak unto you, are not mine"
