Nicene and Post-Nicene Church Fathers Series 2 - The Still Small ...

He could not say what is false Who said “All things that the Father hath are Mine,” 2989
but one of the things which the Father hath is knowledge of that day and of that hour. In
the passage in Matthew, then, the Lord made no mention of His own Person, as a matter
beyond controversy, and said that the angels knew not and that His Father alone knew, tacitly
asserting the knowledge of His Father to be His own knowledge too, because of what He
had said elsewhere, “as the Father knoweth me even so know I the Father,” 2990 and if the
Father has complete knowledge of the Son, nothing excepted, so that He knows all knowledge
to dwell in Him, He will clearly be known as fully by the Son with all His inherent wisdom
and all His knowledge of things to come. This modification, I think, may be given to the
words of Matthew, “but my Father only.” Now as to the words of Mark, who appears distinctly
to exclude the Son from the knowledge, my opinion is this. No man knoweth, neither
the angels of God; nor yet the Son would have known unless the Father had known: that
is, the cause of the Son’s knowing comes from the Father. To a fair hearer there is no violence
in this interpretation, because the word “only” is not added as it is in Matthew. Mark’s
sense, then, is as follows: of that day and of that hour knoweth no man, nor the angels of
God; but even the Son would not have known if the Father had not known, for the knowledge
naturally His was given by the Father. This is very decorous and becoming the divine nature
to say of the Son, because He has, His knowledge and His being, beheld in all the wisdom
and glory which become His Godhead, from Him with Whom He is consubstantial.
3. As to Jeconias, whom the prophet Jeremiah declares in these words to have been rejected
from the land of Judah, “Jeconias was dishonoured like a vessel for which there is no
more use; and because he was cast out he and his seed; and none shall rise from his seed
sitting upon the throne of David and ruling in Judah,” 2991 the matter is plain and clear. On
the destruction of Jerusalem by Nebuchadnezzar, the kingdom had been destroyed, and
there was no longer an hereditary succession of reigns as before. Nevertheless, at that time,
the deposed descendants of David were living in captivity. On the return of Salathiel and
Zerubbabel the supreme government rested to a greater degree with the people, and the
sovereignty was afterwards transferred to the priesthood, on account of the intermingling
of the priestly and royal tribes; whence the Lord, in things pertaining to God, is both King
and High Priest. Moreover, the royal tribe did not fail until the coming of the Christ; nevertheless,
the seed of Jeconias sat no longer upon the throne of David. Plainly it is the royal
dignity which is described by the term “throne.” You remember the history, how all Judæa,
Idumæa, Moab, both the neighbouring regions of Syria and the further countries up to
Mesopotamia, and the country on the other side as far as the river of Egypt, were all tributary
2989 John xvi. 15.
2990 John x. 15.
2991 Jer. xxii. 28–30, LXX.
To the same Amphilochius.
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