If I had not done among them the works which no other man did, they would not have sin: but now have they both seen and hated both me and my Father.
Read Chapter 15
Augustine of Hippo
AD 430
1. The Lord had said, He that hates me, hates my Father also. For of a certainty he that hates the truth must also hate Him of whom the truth is born; on which subject we have already spoken, as we were granted ability. And then He added the words on which we have now to discourse: If I had not done among [in] them the works which none other man did, they had not had sin. To wit, that great sin whereof He also says before, If I had not come and spoken unto them, they had not had sin. Their sin was that of not believing on Him who thus spoke and wrought. For they were not without sin before He so spoke to them and did such works among them; but this sin of theirs, in not believing on Him, is thus specially mentioned because really inclusive in itself of all sins besides. For had they been clear of this one, and believed on Him, all else would also have been forgiven.
2. But what is meant when, after saying, If I had not done among them works, He immediately added, which none other ma...
Christ none the less shows by these words that no excuse was left to the Jews why they should not encounter the doom of punishment and meet irretrievable damnation For clearly nothing that could profit them is left undone, as both a long discourse is vouchsafed them which might easily have put them on the way of salvation, and miracles were shown to them which no one in the world had ever seen before. For what saint ever vied with the Saviour in working miracles? As then the desire of honouring Him was so far repugnant to the Jews that they even preferred to hate Him in the impiety of their minds, will not the burden of the charge weigh most grievously upon them? For it would be better for them that they should never have heard His wise words or witnessed His unspeakable wonder-working power; for perhaps then they might have devised some such specious plea as this for pardon: "We never heard any of the truths essential to salvation, nor did we see anything to induce faith in us," But s...
How can this be true, that Christ wrought greater wonders than any one else had ever done? We find recounted in the Old Testament, the miracles of Elias and Eliseus, who raised the dead to life, healed the sick, and brought down fire from heaven; of Moses, who afflicted Egypt with plagues, divided the Red Sea, for the passage of the Israelites, and brought water from the rock; of Josue, who stopped the waters of the Jordan, for the passage of the children of Israel, and in the battle of Gabaon, made the sun and moon stand still; in all which miracles, there appeared a greater manifestation of power, than in any of the miracles wrought by our Saviour, during his ministry. But to this may be answered, that the miracles of our Saviour were much more numerous than those of any of the saints of the Old Testament, even of Moses himself; particularly when we compare the few years which he preached, and manifested the glory of his Father by his miracles, with the long life of Moses: Christ did...
And of this they themselves are witnesses, speaking in this way; It was never so seen in Israel Matthew 9:33; and, Since the world began was it not heard that any man opened the eyes of one that was born blind John 9:32; and the matter of Lazarus was of the same kind, and all the other acts the same, and the mode of wonder-working new, and all beyond thought. Why then, says one, do they persecute both You and us? Because you are not of the world. If you were of the world, the world would love its own. John 15:19 He first reminds them of the words which He spoke also to His own brethren John 7:7; but there he spoke more by way of a reflection, lest He should offend them, while here, on the contrary, He revealed all. And how is it clear that it is on this account that we are hated? From what was done to Me. For, tell Me, which of My words or deeds could they lay hold on, that they would not receive Me? Then since the thing would be astounding to us, He tells the cause; that is, their w...
