Čeština

Theodore of Mopsuestia

Nicene & Post-Nicene · AD 325–500

490 passages across 31 books of the Bible · Who was this?

On John

20 of 161
  1. John 7:19
    If, he says, you really defend the law of Moses, prove to me that you actually preserve it, and tell me why you want to kill me: this is contrary to the law more than any other violation.

    COMMENTARY ON JOHN 3.7.18

  2. John 7:22-23
    Jesus then employs a very convincing argument: Moses, he says, established circumcision and the sabbath and ordered that men were to be circumcised on the sabbath. But Moses established the sabbath out of convenience. Indeed, at that time nobody observed it.… He also established circumcision needlessly because it had been already established by the patriarchs. But he established this rule [about circumcision] too, in order to teach that this observance [of the sabbath] does not exist when there are cases of necessity and that sometimes it must be broken. If the sabbath can be broken for circumcision, because Moses ordered it so—and this is not considered to be a violation of the law—why then do you think the fact that a man was healed on the sabbath is a violation of the law? And, he added, making them ashamed: “Do not judge by appearances, but judge with right judgment.” If a transgressor of the law is one who performs something on the sabbath, the first one to be blamed should be Moses. But if Moses is not considered to be a transgressor of the law, my action is the more excellent…
    Jesus then employs a very convincing argument: Moses, he says, established circumcision and the sabbath and ordered that men were to be circumcised on the sabbath. But Moses established the sabbath out of convenience. Indeed, at that time nobody observed it.… He also established circumcision needlessly because it had been already established by the patriarchs. But he established this rule [about circumcision] too, in order to teach that this observance [of the sabbath] does not exist when there are cases of necessity and that sometimes it must be broken. If the sabbath can be broken for circumcision, because Moses ordered it so—and this is not considered to be a violation of the law—why then do you think the fact that a man was healed on the sabbath is a violation of the law? And, he added, making them ashamed: “Do not judge by appearances, but judge with right judgment.” If a transgressor of the law is one who performs something on the sabbath, the first one to be blamed should be Moses. But if Moses is not considered to be a transgressor of the law, my action is the more excellent and I am even more above reproach.

    COMMENTARY ON JOHN 3.7.21-24

  3. John 7:30
    They wanted to arrest him, but no one laid hands on him—as if they were prevented by divine power—because the time had not come yet in which his passion had to be accomplished. From this it appears that he could not be arrested by them if he did not want to be.

    COMMENTARY ON JOHN 3.7.30-31

  4. John 7:32-33
    Why, he says, are you eager to arrest me, and why do you try to do something that is not in your power? Just wait a little bit, and I will give myself over to you. Indeed, after my death, I go to my Father, and by directing myself to him, I will certainly withdraw from you. And I will be exalted over you so that, even though you look for me, you may not find me. And even though you want to, you cannot come to where I am because I will be exalted over you in glory and honor. But the Jews did not understand a single word of this. And this is not surprising, because not even the disciples, as we have already demonstrated many times, could understand the words that were said at that time. At the end they learned these things from the facts.

    COMMENTARY ON JOHN 3.7.33-34

  5. John 7:38
    Clearly they referred the words, “As the Scripture has said,” to the sentence following and began to ask where “shall flow streams of living water” is written. But the phrase rather should be referred to the previous sentence. Since in the holy books there are many prophecies about the Messiah, as he had already said in another passage. Jesus, inciting every person to faith in him, means: Anyone who follows the Scriptures and believes in me will be filled by grace, and it will not only be like a river that never dries up but will also flow out of him, so that it may provide not only for him but for many others. And so the apostles, after they received the Spirit, provided for many others thanks to the gift they had received.

    COMMENTARY ON JOHN 3.7.37-39

  6. John 7:50-52
    It is evident that not all the doctors approved what they were doing, since one of the doctors was Nicodemus, who replied against their words.

    COMMENTARY ON JOHN 3.7.50-51

  7. John 7:50-52
    Nicodemus, either out of weakness or fear of the doctors, did not reply to them when they wanted to diminish the words and works of Christ by mentioning Galilee.

    COMMENTARY ON JOHN 3.7.52

  8. John 8:12
    Do you not recognize the words of the prophet, in the fact that the Galileans enjoy a great light? Therefore, [Jesus says], “I am that light.” And I not only provide [this light] for them but for all people. Whoever keeps close to me will not suffer; I have sufficient [light] for all people.

    COMMENTARY ON JOHN 3.8.12

  9. John 8:17
    Your law, [he says], states that any case about which there is doubt is settled if two testimonies are given about it. Therefore according to the will of the law, there must be two witnesses besides the one about whom the testimony is given. If the Father and the Son, as divinity, testify in favor of the human nature of our Lord, the rule of law is respected.

    COMMENTARY ON JOHN 3.8.17-18

  10. John 8:33
    They did not speak the truth. They had been freed from the bondage of the Egyptians, who were their neighbors, and from that of the Babylonians. And now, when they were speaking these words, they were subjects to the Romans. But our Lord did not lower himself to rebuke them about it, even though they were lying.

    COMMENTARY ON JOHN 3.8.33

  11. John 8:34
    This is what he means: The subject of what I am talking about is not corporeal bondage. I want to talk to you about real freedom. In one instance a master, at his discretion, drives away from the house a servant in whom he sees an evil will and subjects him to any punishment he considers to be appropriate. But … no master drives away his son from the house. So, one who is a slave to sin, since he is far removed from all divine goodness, is given a perpetual punishment. But the one who has been made worthy of freedom and has been given the status of son always enjoys divine goodness and can never be removed from it. If you, he says, are freed through me and are made worthy of the title of sons, then you will possess real freedom.

    COMMENTARY ON JOHN 3.8.34-36

  12. John 8:44
    When Satan, he says, speaks lies and similar words, he does not use those of others but his own. He is the father of falsehood because he generated it and was the first to use it by speaking to Adam when he substituted certain words in place of others. The expression “He is a liar and the father of it” signifies that he is a liar and the father of lies. In other words, the devil not only generated lies. He was also the first to introduce them and to use them.

    COMMENTARY ON JOHN 3.8.44

  13. John 8:53
    Abraham and the prophets died, yet you say that you will make those who believe in you immortal. So, it would seem that you [Jesus] are exalting yourself over them.

    COMMENTARY ON JOHN 3.8.53

  14. John 8:54
    Since they were openly rebuking him for exalting himself over Abraham and the prophets and since they accuse him by saying, “Who do you make yourself out to be?”—he in effect responds by saying: … If I spoke about my glory and the things that belong to me, you would not believe me—and with good reason, because I would be testifying about myself. But it is my Father who revealed my glory by testifying about me, as he said above, “The Father who sent me testifies on my behalf.” You then say you belong to God, but you do not know him; you are not even familiar with him because you do not obey his words. “I do know him,” and what I do matches perfectly with his testimony about me. Even if I say something pleasing about myself, I say nothing contrary to the previous testimony of the Father about me. This is what he means when he says, “And I keep his word. If I would say that I do not know him, I would be a liar like you.”

    COMMENTARY ON JOHN 3.8.54-55

  15. John 8:56
    Therefore, he says, after my Father’s testimony about me has been explained, now listen to what is in conformity with that [testimony] about me: I am certainly enough of Abraham’s superior that he also wished and hoped to see the time when I would reform the world through my passion. And in his desire he saw this, as much as he was allowed to, and clearly rejoiced when, by sacrificing his own son, he revealed his will and received from God the revelation so that he might know what would happen. As he accepted giving his son as a victim for God, so also God would give his Only Begotten for the salvation of the world.

    COMMENTARY ON JOHN 3.8.56

  16. John 8:59
    He passed through them and left the place as if their eyes were closed by divine power so that they might not know how he had left from their midst.… Clearly, then, he slipped away from the Jews and, moving on, he performed the work on the blind man. Right after his discourse, then, one miracle was followed by another. This is so since, on the one hand, he was not seen by those who could see (because they were possessed by blindness) while on the other, he gave sight to the one who did not have the natural ability to see.

    COMMENTARY ON JOHN 3.8.57-59

  17. John 9:3
    The Lord taught the disciples that there are many reasons for all these events and that they are certainly secret and unexplainable. And so, we always complain about events whose causes we ignore, but then we also learn that nothing happens in vain. This knowledge will be given to us in the future world, because what is hidden now will be revealed to us.

    COMMENTARY ON JOHN 4.9.3

  18. John 9:3
    It was not unusual for his disciples to ask this kind of question about all that was happening to the Lord so that they could learn those things that lead to godliness. Indeed, since they had left everything and had given themselves completely to the Lord in order to learn from him godliness and piety, it is with laudable care that they took the opportunity from what happened around them to ask him such questions. When they saw this man born blind who, before he could sin, had this damage, and to whom this defect of the eyes happened when he was still in the womb, they were upset in their human way about this fact in trying to relate it to their faith. They thought that there was a just reason for such an accident and that such adversity had occurred not without good cause because they knew that God rules all human things. They were not able to understand what had happened in any other way because of their human weakness, attributing the reason for what happened either to the sin of the parents or to the blind man himself. It was not that he had been injured because he had sinned alr…
    It was not unusual for his disciples to ask this kind of question about all that was happening to the Lord so that they could learn those things that lead to godliness. Indeed, since they had left everything and had given themselves completely to the Lord in order to learn from him godliness and piety, it is with laudable care that they took the opportunity from what happened around them to ask him such questions. When they saw this man born blind who, before he could sin, had this damage, and to whom this defect of the eyes happened when he was still in the womb, they were upset in their human way about this fact in trying to relate it to their faith. They thought that there was a just reason for such an accident and that such adversity had occurred not without good cause because they knew that God rules all human things. They were not able to understand what had happened in any other way because of their human weakness, attributing the reason for what happened either to the sin of the parents or to the blind man himself. It was not that he had been injured because he had sinned already—indeed, how could he sin if he was not born yet? But, since he would commit future sins, God, in his foreknowledge, restrained him by that disability. They justly and piously thought that the sins of people were the cause of all evils. But since, because of their human weakness, they could understand nothing more by themselves, they thought that the cause for this disability could only be attributed to the blind man himself or to his parents; as if the son had received that punishment for their sins, or he was the cause of his misfortune because he had received that punishment for his future sins.

    COMMENTARY ON JOHN 4.9.1-2

  19. John 9:8
    After having gone and washed, he encountered grace. And yet his neighbors and those who were with him when he was begging did not all come to the same conclusion about him. There were some who said that he was indeed the blind man, but others, because of the miracle that had happened to him, said it was not him but someone like him. He, however, says that it is him, not because the event itself compelled him to but because he was eager to proclaim before everyone what had happened.

    COMMENTARY ON JOHN 4.9.8

  20. John 9:12
    They were asking him, “Where is he?” His reply was that he did not know because he had not seen him, since at the time [of the healing] he was blind.

    COMMENTARY ON JOHN 4.9.12

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