Tractates on the Gospel of John

¹¹ “Therefore they sought to apprehend Him.” Would they had apprehended by faith and understanding, not in wrath and murder! For now, my brethren, when I speak thus, it is the weak one wishing to apprehend what is strong, the small what is great, the fragile what is solid; and it is we ourselves— both you who are of the same matter as I am, and I myself who speak to you— who all wish to apprehend Christ. And what is it to apprehend Him? [If] you have understood, you have apprehended. But not as did the Jews: you have apprehended in order to possess, they wished to apprehend in order to make away with Him. And because this was the kind of apprehension they desired, what did He do to them? “He escaped out of their hands.” They failed to apprehend Him, because they lacked the hand of faith. The Word was made flesh; but it was no great task to the Word to rescue His own flesh from fleshy hands. To apprehend the Word in the mind, is the right apprehension of Christ.