Tractates on the Gospel of John

¹⁰ The man did this, and the Jews were offended. For they saw a man carrying his bed on the Sabbath day, and they did not blame the Lord for healing him on the Sabbath, that He should be able to answer them, that if any of them had a beast fallen into a well, he would surely draw it out on the Sabbath day, and save his beast; and so, now they did not object to Him that a man was made whole on the Sabbath day, but that the man was carrying his bed. But if the healing was not to be deferred, should a work also have been commanded? “It is not lawful for you,” say they, to do what you are doing, “to take up your bed.” And he, in defence, put the author of his healing before his censors, saying, “He that made me whole, the same said unto me, Take up your bed, and walk.” Should I not take injunction from him from whom I received healing? And they said, “Who is the man that said unto you, Take up your bed, and walk?”

11. “But he that was made whole knew not who it was” that had said this to him. “For Jesus,” when He had done this, and given him this order, “turned away from him in the crowd.” See how this also is fulfilled. We bear our neighbor, and walk towards God; but Him, to whom we are walking, we do not yet see: for that reason also, that man did not yet know Jesus. The mystery herein intimated to us is, that we believe in Him whom we do not yet see; and that He may not be seen, He turns aside in the crowd. It is difficult in a crowd to see Christ: a certain solitude is necessary for our mind; it is by a certain solitude of contemplation that God is seen. A crowd has noise; this seeing requires secrecy. “Take up your bed”— being yourself borne, bear your neighbor; “and walk,” that you may come to the goal. Do not seek Christ in a crowd: He is not as one of a crowd; He excels all crowd. That great fish first ascended from the sea, and He sits in heaven making intercession for us: as the great high priest He entered alone into that within the veil; the crowd stands without. Do thou walk, bearing your neighbor: if you have learned to bear, you, who were wont to be borne. In a word, even now as yet you know not Jesus, not yet see Jesus: what follows thereafter? Since that man desisted not from taking up his bed and walking, “Jesus sees him afterwards in the temple.” He did not see Jesus in the crowd, he saw Him in the temple. The Lord Jesus, indeed, saw him both in the crowd and in the temple; but the impotent man does not know Jesus in the crowd, but he knows Him in the temple. The man came then to the Lord: saw Him in the temple, saw Him in a consecrated, saw Him in a holy place. And what does the Lord say to him? “Behold, you are made whole; sin no more, lest some worse thing befall you.”