The Great Commentary of Cornelius a Lapide: S. John
To become the sons of God. How this is wrought, and how great is the dignity of this adoption, I have shown on Hosea i. 10, upon the words, “ It shall be said unto them, Ye are the sons of the living God.” Wherefore Cyril saith, “Let us rise to our supernatural dignity through Christ, — not indeed that we should be sons of God as He is, but that, through likeness to Him, we may be sons of God by grace.”
Ver. 13. — Which were born , not of bloods (Greek) nor of the will (Arabic, appetite) of the flesh , &c. S. John here gives an antithesis between human generation and Divine, and demonstrates the superiority of the latter. For (1.) he says that the former is of bloods , which is a Hebraism for blood, meaning the blood of man, produced
2. He asserts that it is of the will, i.e., the concupiscence of the flesh . This is what is elsewhere called flesh and blood, in which the will, or concupiscence of man, consists. He explains the will of the flesh to be the will of man. That is, the will, or appetite, or concupiscence of the flesh is the will, or concupiscence, for the generative act, which the carnal appetite desires.
On the other hand, the Divine generation of the sons of God is not of blood, nor of the will and concupiscence of the flesh, but is of God, that is, of the will, predestination, and love of God. Again, of God means of the Spirit and grace of God, by which the mind of man, beforetime carnal, is regenerated and justified, and so a man becomes spiritual, just, and holy, a friend, yea, a son of God.
3. Of God, because in this regeneration of man, God not only gives him His grace and love and all other virtues, but also Himself, that a man may be truly justified, and may have the Spirit really dwelling in his soul, yea, may have the whole Trinity, and so may become Divine, a son and heir of God, and a joint-heir with Christ.
Ver. 14. — And the Word was made flesh, &c. Thus it is literally translated in the Syriac, Persian, Egyptian, and Ethiopic versions. But the Arabic has, The Word was made a body. For flesh here means the human body , and so man. From this the heresiarch Apollinaris denied that the Word assumed a human soul and mind. He asserted that in their place were the mind and Divinity of the Divine Word. So says S. Augustine (Haeres. 55). For the faith teaches that the Word assumed as well true human flesh as a true reasonable soul, and therefore had two perfect and uncommingled natures, the Divine and the human, and consequently possessed two wills, and a twofold mind, the Divine and the human. So that these two natures with their attributes subsist in the one only Person of the Word, in which Person, but not in His nature, this union has taken place, as the Council of Ephesus defines against Nestorius, and the Council of Chalcedon against the Eutychians.
From this unity of Person there follows, as theologians teach, a participation of the attributes (communicatio idiomatum) of both natures, so that in Christ whatsoever is an attribute of man as man, the same may be predicated of His Divinity, and conversely. For example, we truly say, this Man, namely, Jesus, is God, is Almighty, is the Creator, is from eternity. And conversely we say that God, or the Son of God, truly suffered, was crucified, and died. For indeed there is one and the same Divine Person in Christ, God and man, who underwent all these things, although in accordance with two different natures. For actions and passions inhere in concrete individuals, or persons, in whatsoever nature they subsist. Hear S. Austin (in Dial. 65. quaest. ad Oros. qu. 4). “ The Word was made flesh, not being changed by the flesh ; so that He did not cease to be what He was, but began to be what He had not been. For He assumed flesh, He did not convert Himself into flesh. By that flesh , as a part for the whole, we understand the whole man, that is, flesh and reasonable soul. And as the first man had died both in the flesh and in the soul, so also it behoved that he should be quickened both in flesh and in soul, through the Mediator between God and man, the Man Christ Jesus.”
It follows (2.) that the Word was made flesh , not in the way in which water became wine when it was changed into wine, nor as food becomes our flesh, when it is changed into it, nor yet again as gold becomes a statue, by the addition to the material of gold of the accidental form of a statue, but after a similar manner to that in which soul and flesh being united become one man. So S. Athanasius in the Creed : “ One, not by confusion of substance, but of Person. For as the reasonable soul and flesh is one man, so God and man is one Christ.”
But man is one essentialiter ; Christ is one personaliter . Or again, it is after the manner in which a man is clothed by the putting on of a garment. So a new substance was added to the Word, as it were a garment, but substantially, not accidentally : for the Son of God clothed Himself with the substance of flesh, and of our nature, and joined, and most closely united it to Himself substantially in the same Hypostasis of the Word.
Flesh here, as often in Scripture, signifies by synecdoche the whole man. The Word was made flesh , i.e., the Son of God became man. In a similar manner, S. John might have said, The Word of God became a soul. But he preferred to say flesh rather than soul, that he might show how great was the kindness of God, that for love of us He emptied Himself. For God was made flesh , that we instead of flesh that was most corrupt through concupiscence and sin might become as it were Divine, and sons of God, and akin to God Himself. “The Word,” says S. Cyril (epist. 8. ad Nestor.), “uniting to Himself, according to His substance, flesh animated by a reasonable soul, was ineffably made man.”
We will now comment upon each word of this passage singly.
And: this word conjoins the sentence with those preceding it. It has partly an historical, partly a causative force. Historically — that Eternal Word, whose generation I have declared, and of whom I have said, that He was with God, and was God, was in the time divinely appointed made flesh, for He assumed our flesh of the Blessed Virgin, and when He was born of her was called Jesus. So that and in this place may stand for therefore. As thus, Therefore was the Word made flesh, that He might make us to be the sons of God. Therefore S. Augustine says, “Let us not be amazed, or astounded at such grace, and let it not seem a thing incredible to us, that men should be born of God, when He asks you to consider that God was born of men.”
The Word : the Greek has the article, and is emphatic — that Divine and Eternal Word, of whom we have been thus far speaking. Wherefore S. Athanasius ( Epist . ad Epictetum) cites Gal. iii. as a parallel passage, and says, “ For as Christ is called a curse, not because He Himself was made a curse, but because for us He bore the curse, so is He said to be made flesh, not because He Himself was changed into flesh, but because He assumed flesh for us.”
The Word was made flesh is explained by the same parallel of a curse by S. Gregory Nazianzen (Epist ad Cledon .), S. Flavian, Patriarch of Antioch, S. Ignatius, S. Irenaeus, S. Hippolytus, S. Basil, S. Chrysostom, S. Gregory Nyssen, Amphilochius, and others, who are cited by Theodoret in a Dialogue entitled Immutabilis . In this he confutes those Eutychians who said that the Word was changed by His Incarnation, and transformed into flesh. He confutes others who said that flesh was changed into the Word, and that the Word absorbed the flesh in the same way that the sea swallows up a stream which flows into it. These he confutes in his Dialogue Inconfusus. He confutes a third section of the Eutychians, who said that the Godhead in Christ suffered and was crucified, in a third Dialogue called Impassibilis.
Lastly, listen to S. Cyril in the Council of Ephesus, “By the Word flesh the whole man must be understood, as in the place where it is said, ‘All flesh shall see the salvation of God,’ and ‘I communed not with flesh and blood’ (Gal. i.). Soul is understood in a similar way, as ‘Seventy-five souls of our fathers went down into Egypt’ (Acts vii.). As often therefore as we hear that the Word was made flesh, we understand that He became a man of flesh and blood.” S. Cyril elsewhere repeats this, and adds, “ Not according to transference , or conversion, or commutation, as though there were a transformation into the nature of flesh, nor as having commingling, nor consubstantiation, &c.”
Flesh, i.e., man. To the Word he opposes flesh, as it were the lowest to the highest, what is wretched to what is blessed, what is most vile, weak, and impure, to what is most glorious. For what is more vile, weak, and filthy than human flesh ? And yet the Word of God deigned to stoop to such flesh as this, from love of us. This is that φιλανθρωπία and ecstasy of love which the Apostle celebrates (Titus iii. 4). Hear S. Bernard (Serm. 3. de Nativ.) : “ Forasmuch as He was in the beginning with God, He dwelt in the unapproachable light, and none could comprehend Him. For ‘ who hath found out the mind of the Lord, or who hath been His counsellor ?’ ‘The carnal mind perceiveth not the things of the Spirit of God,’ but now even the carnal man may receive them, because the Word has been made flesh . O man who art in the flesh, to thee is manifested that wisdom which afore was hid. Behold, now is it drawn forth from its hiding-place, and introduces itself into the very senses of thy flesh. After a fleshly manner, that I may so say, is it preached unto thee. Flee from voluptuousness, for death has been placed beside the gate of pleasure.”