John 21:12
Jesus saith to them: Come, and dine. And none of them who were at meat, durst ask him: Who art thou? knowing that it was the Lord.
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- Vulgate (Clementine)
- Dicit eis Jesus : Venite, prandete. Et nemo audebat discumbentium interrogare eum : Tu quis es ? scientes, quia Dominus est.
- Greek New Testament (SBLGNT)
- λέγει αὐτοῖς ὁ Ἰησοῦς· Δεῦτε ἀριστήσατε. οὐδεὶς δὲ ἐτόλμα τῶν μαθητῶν ἐξετάσαι αὐτόν· Σὺ τίς εἶ; εἰδότες ὅτι ὁ κύριός ἐστιν.
Haydock's commentary
And none of them who were at meat, durst ask him, who art thou? knowing that it was the Lord. It is likely he appeared to them with a countenance different, and brighter than before his death; yet they were presently so convinced it was Jesus, that they were ashamed to ask or doubt of it. (Witham)
From Haydock's Catholic Bible Commentary, 1859, in the transcription made by Todd Easton and kept online by John Paul Wohlschied at johnblood.gitlab.io/haydock.
The Fathers on this verse
St Augustine Catena Aurea on verses 12-14
The fishing being over, our Lord invites them to dine: Jesus says to them, Come and dine.
St John Chrysostom Catena Aurea on verses 12-14
John does not say that He ate with them, but Luke does. He ate however not to satisfy the wants of nature, but to show the reality of His resurrection.
St Augustine Catena Aurea on verses 12-14
The bodies of the just, when they rise again, shall need neither the word of life that they die not of disease, or old age, nor any bodily nourishment to prevent hunger and thirst. For they shall be endowed with a sure and inviolable gift of immortality, that they shall not eat of necessity, but only be able to eat if they will. Not the power, but the need of eating and drinking shall be taken away from them; in like manner as our Savior after His resurrection took meat and drink with His disciples, with spiritual but still real flesh, not for the sake of nourishment, but in exercise of a power. And none of His disciples dare ask Him, who are you? knowing that it was the Lord.
St Augustine Catena Aurea on verses 12-14
No one dared to doubt that it was He, much less deny it; so evident was it. Had any one doubted, he would have asked.
St John Chrysostom Catena Aurea on verses 12-14
He means that they had not confidence to talk to Him, as before, but sat looking at Him in silence and awe, absorbed in regarding His altered and now supernatural form, and unwilling to ask any question. Knowing that it was the Lord, they were in fear, and only ate what, in exercise of His great power, He had created. He again does not look up to heaven, or do anything after a human sort, thus strewing that His former acts of that kind were done only in condescension: Jesus then comes, and takes bread, and gives them, and fish likewise.
St Augustine Catena Aurea on verses 12-14
Mystically, the fried fish is Christ Who suffered. And He is the bread that came down from heaven. To Him the Church is united to His body for participation of eternal bliss. Wherefore He says, Bring of the fishes which you have now caught; to signify that all of us who have this hope, and are in that septenary number of disciples, which represents the universal Church here, partake of this great sacrament, and are admitted to this bliss.
St Gregory the Great Catena Aurea on verses 12-14
By holding this last feast with seven disciples, he declares that they only who are full of the sevenfold grace of the Holy Spirit, shall be with Him in the eternal feast. Time also is reckoned by periods of seven days, and perfection is often designated by the number seven. They therefore feast upon the presence of the Truth in that last banquet, who now strive for perfection.
St John Chrysostom Catena Aurea on verses 12-14
Inasmuch, however, as He did not converse with them regularly, or in the same way as before, the Evangelist adds, This is now the third time that Jesus showed Himself to His disciples, after that He was risen from the dead.
St Augustine Catena Aurea on verses 12-14
Which has reference not to manifestations, but to days; i.e. the first day after He had risen, eight days after that, when Thomas saw and believed, and this day at the draught of fishes; and thenceforward as often as He sew them, up to the time of His ascension.
St Augustine Catena Aurea on verses 12-14
We find in the four Evangelists then occasions mentioned; on which our Lord was seen after His resurrection: one at the sepulcher by the women; a second by the one omen returning from the sepulcher; a third by Peter; a fourth by the two going to Emmaus; a fifth in Jerusalem, when Thomas was not present; a sixth when Thomas saw Him; a seventh at the sea of Tiberias; an eighth by all the eleven on a mountain of Galilee, mentioned by Matthew; a ninth when for the last time He sat at meat with the disciples; a tenth when He was seen no longer upon earth, but high up on a cloud.
St John Chrysostom The Homilies of St. John Chrysostom on the Gospel of St. John, John 20.24,25
Ver. 12 . “Come,” He saith, “dine.” “And none of them durst ask Him.” For they no longer had the same boldness, nor were they so confident, nor did they now approach Him with speech, but with silence and great fear and reverence, sat down giving heed to Him. “For they knew that it was the Lord.”
St Jerome To Pammachius against John of Jerusalem
35. And how was it, you will say, that they did not recognize Him on the road if He had the same body which He had before? Let me recall what Scripture says:“Their eyes were holden, that they might not know Him.” And again, “Their eyes were opened, and they knew Him.” Was He one person when He was not known, and another when He was known? He was surely one and the same. Whether, therefore, they knew Him, or not, depended on their sight; it did not depend upon Him Who was seen; and yet it did depend on Him in this sense, that He held their eyes that they might not know Him. …