Father Cornelius a Lapide's Commentary on John 1:19-28

Jn 1:19 “And this is the testimony of John, when the Jews sent priests and Levites from Jerusalem to him to ask him, ‘Who are you?’”

John the Baptist very often bore witness to Jesus, that He Himself was the Messiah, that is, the Christ, both before the baptism and after. John the Evangelist here omits the testimony which the Baptist gave to Jesus before His baptism, because that had already been narrated by the other three Evangelists. Here, however, he relates the testimony which the same John gave concerning Jesus after he himself had baptized Him, because that testimony was public baptismal testimony and most renowned, having been juridically demanded and received by pontiffs and magistrates who were sent as envoys to John.

The cause of this embassy and of the question was that the pontiffs saw John living an angelic life in the desert, preaching with such power, baptizing, and moving people to repentance in a way that none of the other prophets had done. Therefore the pontiffs thought it part of their office to inquire of him who he was, because, since the scepter had been transferred from Judah to Herod and since the seventy weeks of Daniel had been fulfilled, they knew that the time of the coming of the Messiah was already imminent. For this reason they suspected that John himself might be the Messiah, and so they asked him, “Who are you?”

Saint Chrysostom adds another reason, namely that they asked this out of hatred and envy toward Jesus, for in order to show that Jesus was not the Messiah they attempted to transfer the title of Messiah to John. For they could scarcely endure that John should be preferred to them and that he should make Jesus the Messiah. The same Saint Chrysostom (Homily 11 on Matthew) thinks that they asked this out of envy of John, because they were grieved that John, by holiness of life, preaching, and baptism, should become so renowned and be preferred to them, and that the people should be drawn away from the scribes and priests to him.

Yet, even if some envy on the part of certain individuals may have been mixed in here, nevertheless the true and proper cause is that which I have stated. For it was God’s plan to exalt John in such a way that the pontiffs would be compelled to ask him whether he himself was the Messiah, so that, being questioned juridically, he might respond with what was true—namely, that he was not the Messiah, but that Jesus was the Messiah—in order that, convicted by John’s testimony, they might be forced to accept Jesus as the Messiah; and if they did not accept Him, they would be without excuse.

“Who are you?” The pontiffs and their envoys seem tacitly or explicitly to have asked John whether he himself was the Christ, saying, “Who are you? Are you the Christ?” For John, responding to their interrogation, says, “I am not the Christ.” The Evangelist, however, reports only the former question here, as being the principal one and most relevant to his purpose, namely that the Baptist, in answering it, might declare himself to be the voice crying in the wilderness, preparing the way of the Messiah and pointing Him out—testifying that Jesus is the Messiah whom they were seeking. Thus teach Jansenius, Maldonatus, Cajetan, and others.

Moreover, the pontiffs knew that John was someone important. Therefore when they ask, “Who are you?” they are asking: Who are you in office, dignity, and mission? What role do you bear? What office have you received from God? For what purpose has God sent you to preach and to baptize? For God was accustomed to entrust greater offices to priests.

Tropologically, let anyone frequently ask himself, “Who are you?”, by passing through the categories one by one.

First, in Substance: Who are you as to your substance? Let conscience answer: the name of my Creator God is “Ego sum qui sum” (“I am who am,” Exodus 3:14). Therefore my name, as a creature, is “I am who am not,” because of myself I am nothing, but have been brought forth by God from my nothingness and made a man. Hence my soul and body are not mine but God’s, who created them from the fullness of His being and gave them to me—or rather, loaned them to me—that I might use them for His will, love, and worship. Therefore it is fitting that I expend and consume them in His service. Thus John replies, “I am not the Christ.” And Saint Francis: “Who are You, Lord, and who am I? You are the abyss of wisdom, patience, power, and every good; I am the abyss of ignorance, weakness, sins, and every evil and misery. You are the abyss of being; I am the abyss of nothing.” Hence Christ, appearing to Saint Catherine of Siena, said: “You will be blessed if you know who I am and who you are. I am He who is; you are she who is not.”

Second, in Quantity: Who are you, that is, how great are you? If you consider continuous quantity, I am about four cubits tall; for each man has as much height as he has breadth when he stretches out his arms, which extended measure about four cubits. We are but a shadow and do not know it, since our days are like a shadow. If you consider discrete quantity, that is, number, I am one small and insignificant individual among so many millions of men. Therefore it is fitting that I acknowledge my smallness and humble myself deeply beneath God and the angels. For if Christ Himself was “despised and the last of men” (Isaiah 53:3), how small am I?

Third, in Quality: Who are you, that is, what are you like? In body I am weak, miserable, and afflicted; in soul I am rational and like the angels, but in sensitive appetite and concupiscence I am like beasts and donkeys. Therefore let me follow reason so as to be like the angels, not concupiscence, which makes me like beasts. “We are of yesterday and know nothing” (Job 8:9). By being born we begin to die; as soon as we are born we hasten—indeed we run swiftly—toward death. “For a thousand years in Your sight are like yesterday that has passed” (Psalm 90:4). Therefore despise all temporal things which pass like a flying bird; love and seek heavenly things which endure forever with God and the angels. Thus you will be eternal, eternally happy, and will abide forever in everlasting joys. As Saint Gregory says at the end of Moralia (Book 18): “In order that we may be blessed and eternal forever, let us imitate the Eternal.”

Ninth and tenth, in Position and Habit: Who are you? What position do you have? What habit do you wear? Now I stand, now I sit, now I lie down. I wear the habit and dress of a Christian, a priest, a bishop, a religious. See that you live worthily according to your habit and state.

Fourth, in Relation: Who are you, whose son are you? I am a son of Adam, the first sinner, and therefore born a sinner; I live in sins and will die in sins unless the grace of Christ rescues me from them. The habit makes the Christian or the monk, but life sanctifies and saves him. Therefore let me humbly and continually implore grace. Ask Solomon, the wisest, richest, and happiest king, “Who are you?” and he will answer (Wisdom 7:1–6): “I also am a mortal man, like all others, descended from him who was first formed of the earth… No king has had any other beginning of birth. There is one entrance into life for all, and a similar exit.” This is purity, humility, charity, holiness.

Jn 1:20 “And he confessed the truth and did not deny; and he confessed, ‘I am not the Christ.’” That is, he publicly, plainly, and fully confessed that he was not the Christ. For when the Hebrews wish to assert and strongly confirm something, they repeat it affirmatively and triple it negatively. Hence it is clear that the envoys asked John whether he himself was the Christ, and he replied to this: “I am not the Christ.” Nonnus the priest likewise says that they questioned him with rapid speech: “Who are you? Are you the Christ?” Note here the remarkable humility of Saint John, who steadfastly refused the name of Christ when it was offered to him, because he loved the truth and Jesus.

Fifth, in Action: Who are you? What do you do? What is your work? You who bear the title of Christian, what do you practice? I practice a craft, tailoring, baking; I act as magistrate, shepherd, advocate, and so forth. See that you do these things as the divine law requires, namely, that you live soberly, justly, and piously in this world, awaiting the blessed hope and the coming of the glory of the great God, so that through temporal goods you may pass in such a way as not to lose but to acquire eternal ones. Act, strive, labor, live for eternity. Do this, for this is the whole of man. Hence Saint Bernard often said to himself, “Bernard, tell me, why are you here?” and by this spur he stirred himself to every pursuit of virtue.

Sixth, in Passion: Who are you? What do you suffer? In body I suffer hunger, thirst, cold, fatigue, heat, diseases, and continual tribulations, so that scarcely a moment of an hour passes in which this or that—indeed many things at once—do not befall me to suffer. In soul I suffer far greater and more bitter things: pains, anxieties, scruples, sorrows, angers, indignations, darkness, fears, and the like, so that I seem to be a target at which all miseries hurl their weapons and pierce me with their arrows. Therefore be an adamant of patience, that you may patiently and generously endure all things, and thus obtain the eternal crown of patience in heaven.

Seventh, in Place: Where are you? I am on earth, placed between heaven and hell, so that if I live holy I may be transferred to heaven, but if wickedly, cast into hell and its fires. Therefore live carefully, cautiously, and holily, lest hell receive you after death rather than heaven.

Eighth, in Time: When are you? When were you born? How long have you lived? When will you die? Yesterday I was born, today I live, tomorrow I die. As Chrysostom says, it is the duty not only not to seek one’s own glory but even to repel that which is offered by the multitude. This was likewise John’s remarkable prudence, that he preferred to stand firmly in himself rather than be vainly carried away by empty opinion about himself, as Saint Gregory says. Worldly men are accustomed to boast and say: “I am noble, rich, wise, a magistrate, a canon, a bishop.” But John teaches us to say: “I am not,” because if I am anything, I am so from God.

Jn 1:21 “And they asked him, ‘What then? Are you Elijah?’ And he said, ‘I am not.’” After John denied that he was the Christ, the envoys asked whether he was Elijah, for Elijah had been taken up by God to be the forerunner of Christ, whom they were expecting at that time, according to Malachi 4:5: “Behold, I will send you Elijah the prophet before the great and terrible day of the Lord comes,” namely before the day of judgment, when Christ will return as judge of all. But the scribes did not understand this, for they thought there would be only one coming of Christ, the glorious one, which Elijah would precede, as the Jews still think, who therefore believe that Christ has not yet come but expect Him to come with Elijah. Yet from the same Malachi (3:1) they ought to have known that there would be another forerunner of the first coming of Christ in the flesh, namely John the Baptist: “Behold, I send my messenger, and he shall prepare the way before my face.”

Are you the Prophet?” And he answered, “No.”
The Greek has ὁ προφήτης (ho prophētēs), that is, the Prophet by way of excellence. The sense is: Are you that new and great Prophet, surpassing all the others, whom we suppose will come together with the Messiah as His herald? Thus understand Saint Chrysostom, Cyril, Theophylact, and Euthymius.

For Christ had no need of a prophet such as Moses, just as the tongue-tied Moses needed Aaron (Exodus 7:1–2); rather, Christ Himself was His own prophet, herald, priest, lawgiver, and prince. Moreover, John was not a prophet in this sense, because he did not foretell future things, but pointed out Christ as present and showed Him with his finger. Therefore he himself was more than a prophet, as Christ says in Matthew 11.

Jn 1:22“They said therefore to him, ‘Who are you, that we may give an answer to those who sent us? What do you say about yourself?’”
Jn 1:23 “He said, ‘I am the voice of one crying in the wilderness, “Make straight the way of the Lord,” as Isaiah the prophet said’” (Isaiah 40:3). I have explained that passage elsewhere. Hear how the Fathers interpret it. “I am a servant,” says Theophylact, “and I prepare the ways for the Lord—your hearts.” “I come,” says Cyril, “to say that He who is awaited is already at the doors, so that you may be ready to set out wherever He commands.” Finally, Saint Augustine says: “Does it not seem to you to be the role of a herald to say, ‘Go out, make ready the way’?”

Jn 1:24 “And those who had been sent were Pharisees.”
John adds this to suggest the reason why they questioned John the Baptist about baptism, namely, that these envoys sent to John were Pharisees, and therefore well versed in Scripture, yet crafty, subtle, and captious. They knew from Scripture that the Messiah would baptize for the remission of sins, because this had been foretold by Ezekiel (36:25–27) and Zechariah (13:1). But they had not read in Scripture that other prophets or saints would baptize. Therefore they questioned John, asking by what authority he had taken baptism upon himself, especially since he denied that he was either the Christ or a prophet.

Jn 1:25 “And they questioned him and said to him, ‘Why then do you baptize, if you are not the Christ, nor Elijah, nor the Prophet?’”
These Pharisees, says Saint Cyril, spoke out of arrogance to John, as if saying: Neither Elijah nor Elisha nor the other prophets dared to arrogate to themselves the office of baptizing. With what face, with what audacity, do you—who are not a prophet—usurp this and arrogate it to yourself? Saint Augustine says the same.

Saint Cyril gives the deeper reason: the Pharisees were accustomed always, out of insolence, to despise those who were present, while feigning honor for the one who was to come. Since they themselves were great among the Jews and amassed immense riches, they suffered no one but themselves to be honored.

Jn 1:26 “John answered them, saying, ‘I baptize with water.’”
That is: God has sent me to baptize with water so that I may stir you to repentance and tears, by which I may dispose you for the baptism of Christ. For He Himself will baptize you with the Holy Spirit for the remission of sins, as the other three Evangelists explicitly state. Therefore John here implies and omits this.

“In your midst stands one whom you do not know.”
That is: Christ is present among you, yet you do not know Him—that is, you do not acknowledge Him as the Messiah, but think Him to be Jesus, that is, a mere man, poor and insignificant.

John chose this place for baptism because of the abundance of waters, because it was near the desert in which he dwelt, because of the memory of Israel’s ancient crossing that took place there, and because, on account of the crossing, there was a great concourse of people. Hence even today, says Saint Jerome in The Hebrew Places, many of the brethren—that is, of the believers—desire to be reborn there in the life-giving stream, in memory of Christ who was baptized there by John.

This place on the Jordan is distant from the Dead Sea, or Lake Asphaltites, by four leagues or hours. Note that Christ was baptized by John on the sixth day of January. From that day of baptism, says Saint Epiphanius (Panarion, heresy 51), on the first day of March, John bore this testimony to Jesus while He was absent, that He Himself was the Messiah, that is, the Christ. On the following day, namely the second of March, Jesus stood present before John, and John again bore testimony to Him, saying, “Behold the Lamb of God.” Hence what follows. 

Jn 1:27 “He is the one who is coming after me,” who will preach and baptize, “who was before me,” that is, was preferred and set above me, as I said in verse 15. He will come after me baptizing you, so that by His baptism He may perfect mine, wash the penitent, and justify them. As Cyril says: “I prepare and wash with water those defiled by sins, unto the beginning of repentance, and in this way I prepare you from lesser things to higher ones. But the dispenser of greater realities and of supreme perfection will come after me.” As if to say: My baptism is only a disposition and preparation for the baptism of Christ, as Saint Chrysostom teaches. Mine is watery and bodily; Christ’s is fiery and spiritual.

“Whose sandal strap I am not worthy to untie.”
As if he said: I do not deserve even to be numbered among the lowest servants of Christ, because of the greatness of the divinity considered in Him, as Euthymius explains. For to loosen sandals was the task of the most lowly servant, as Saint Chrysostom notes. See what is said in Matthew 3:11.

Jn 1:28 “These things took place in Bethany beyond the Jordan, where John was baptizing.”
“Bethany” is the reading found in the Roman, Syriac, and Arabic Bibles, and in many Greek manuscripts, including the Vatican, as well as in Bede, Alcuin, the Gloss, and Lyra. But Origen, Saint Chrysostom, Theophylact, Euthymius, Saint Epiphanius, and Saint Jerome in The Hebrew Places read Bethabara instead of Bethany, where Gideon defeated the Midianites.

I reply with Toledo that the place is one and the same, or at least that Bethany and Bethabara were very near one another, or opposite each other on the Jordan. This was the place where the Hebrews, coming from Egypt under Joshua, first crossed the Jordan to enter the land of Canaan promised to them by God. Bethabara or Bethany in Hebrew means “house of crossing” or “house of passage.” For beth means “house,” and the remainder signifies “crossing” or “boat,” since boats were prepared at this place for travelers to cross the Jordan. Hence this Bethany is distinct from the Bethany of Martha and Lazarus.

John chose this place for baptism because of the abundance of waters, because it was near the desert in which he dwelt, because of the memory of Israel’s ancient crossing that took place there, and because, on account of the crossing, there was a great concourse of people. Hence even today, says Saint Jerome in The Hebrew Places, many of the brethren—that is, of the believers—desire to be reborn there in the life-giving stream, in memory of Christ who was baptized there by John.

This place on the Jordan is distant from the Dead Sea, or Lake Asphaltites, by four leagues or hours. Note that Christ was baptized by John on the sixth day of January. From that day of baptism, says Saint Epiphanius (Panarion, heresy 51), on the first day of March, John bore this testimony to Jesus while He was absent, that He Himself was the Messiah, that is, the Christ. On the following day, namely the second of March, Jesus stood present before John, and John again bore testimony to Him, saying, “Behold the Lamb of God.” Hence what follows.