Yet you have not known him; but I know him: and if I should say, I know him not, I shall be a liar like unto you: but I know him, and keep his saying.
Read Chapter 8
Cyril of Alexandria
AD 444
But I know Him and keep His Word.
As far as belongs to the first contact of the words before us, we say this, that Christ is speaking again as man and abasing Himself to our level, not rejecting at its proper time servant-befitting guise. He says therefore that He knows the Father and keeps His word. And we do not surely say that He of necessity witnesses these things to Himself nor yet that He is recounting ought of what pertains to Him, but there is much art mixed up herein. For through His saying that He knows the Father and keeps His word, He shews that the Jews mind the contrary to the things which He affirms that He has, in that they neither know God, nor yet think that they ought to keep His word: for then would they have received with all zeal Him that was foreheralded through Moses and the Prophets. And we shall find among ourselves too some such fashion of speech, goodly and most excellent, having the force of rebuke and gently intimating to some the evils wherein they are...
Of Whom YE say that He is your God and ye have not known Him.
He refutes them again and that with might as practising the piety of bare words only, but exceeding far removed from truly knowing God: and all but utters against them that which was declared through the Prophet: for then He said, This people draweth nigh to Me, with their lips they do honour Me, but their heart is far from Me, and now profitably and in conformity with that olden [utterance] does He say, Ye have not known Him. And it is true, for not the mere knowing that He is God,----not this surely is having knowledge of God (for that God exists and is, the devils too believe and tremble, as it is written) but in addition to knowing that He is, it is meet to have fit and due thoughts of Him; thus----what God really is by Nature, I suppose that no sober minded person would enquire (for it were impossible to find out) but what things are His Attributes or not His Attributes, one may recognize and that with ease, if one i...
But I know Him and if I say that I know Him not I shall be like you a liar.
I spake not falsely (He says) in saying to the Jews, If any keep My word he shall not see death for ever; for I am able to render undying, seeing I know that He of whom I am is mighty to do this, seeing I know that My Father is by Nature Life. I too am therefore as He is, Life that is by Nature and Lifegiving. But if I denied My power of quickening, I should be ignorant of My Father, the Property of whose Essence I possessing, am able to quicken as He. Hence I confess that I have all things that are in the Father, and affirming that I am as He, and for this reason professing to do His works, I full surely hnow Him; and if I say that I have not the properties of the Father uncounterfeit in Myself, I shall he a liar, as you are, as though I knew not the Father. Yea and when I say that the glory of Abraham and the Prophets is nothing, seeing they were of earth and men by nature, to whom death is not foreign, an...
Because He desired to show that they not only knew not His Father, but that they knew not God.
But I know Him.
So that to say, 'I know Him,' is not a boast, while to say, 'I know Him not,' would be a falsehood; but you when you say that you know Him, lie; as then ye, when you say that you know Him, lie, so also should I, were I to say that I know Him not.
If I honor Myself. Since they said, Whom makest you yourself? He replies, If I make (Myself anything,) My honor is nothing. As then I know Him exactly, so ye know Him not. And as in the case of Abraham, He did not take away their whole assertion, but said, I know that you are Abraham's seed, so as to make the charge against them heavier; thus here He does not remove the whole, but what? Whom ye say. By granting to them their boast of words, He increases the force of the accusation against them. How then do ye not know Him? Because ye insult One who says and does everything that He may be glorified, even when that One is sent from...
