Matthew 16:21

Seeing Peter had confessed Him to be Christ the Son of the living God, because He would not have them preach this in the mean time, He adds, "Then charged he his disciples that they should tell no man, that he was Jesus the Christ."

When then above He sends His disciples to preach, and commands them to proclaim His advent, this seems contrary to His command here, that they should not say that He is Jesus the Christ. To me it seems that it is one thing to preach Christ, and another to preach Jesus the Christ. Christ is a common title of dignity, Jesus the proper name of the Saviour.

Or they then spake of Him in lowly words, as only a great and wonderful man, but as yet proclaimed Him not as the Christ. Yet if any will have it that He was even at the first proclaimed to be Christ, be may say that now He chose that first short announcement of His name to be left in silence and not repeated, that little which they had heard concerning Christ might be digested into their minds. Or the difficulty may be solved thus: that the fairer relation concerning their preaching Christ does not belong to the time before His Resurrection, but to the time that should be after the Resurrection; and that the command now given is meant for the time present; for it were of no use to preach Him, and to be silent conceiving His cross. Moreover, He commanded them that they should tell no man that He was the Christ, and prepared them that they should afterwards say that He was Christ who was crucified, and who rose again from the dead.

But that none should suppose that this is only any explanation, and not an evangelic interpretation, what follows explains the reasons of His forbidding them to preach Him at that time; "Then began Jesus to shew unto his disciples that he must needs go unto Jerusalem, and suffer many things of the elders and Scribes, and Chief Priests, and be put to death, and rise again the third day." The meaning is; Then preach Me when I shall have suffered these things, for it will be of no avail that Christ be preached publicly, and His Majesty spread abroad among the people, when after a little time they shall see Him scourged and crucified.

For what having once had root has afterwards been torn up, if it is again planted, is with difficulty retained among the multitude; but what having been once rooted has continued ever after unmoved, is easily brought on to a further growth. He therefore dwells on these sorrowful things, and repeats His discourse upon them, that He may open the minds of His disciples.

And observe that it is not said, "He began to say," or "to teach," but "to shew;" for as things are said to be shewn to the sense, so the things which Christ spake are said to be shewn by Him. Nor indeed do I think, that to those who saw Him suffering many things in the flesh, were those things which they saw so shewn as this representation in words shewed to the disciples the mystery of the passion and resurrection of Christ. At that time, indeed, He only "began to shew them," and afterwards when they were more able to receive it, He shewed them more fully; for all that Jesus began to do, that He accomplished. He must needs go to Jerusalem, to be put to death indeed in the Jerusalem which is below, but to rise again and reign in the heavenly Jerusalem. But when Christ rose again, and others were risen with Him, they no longer sought the Jerusalem which is beneath, or the house of prayer in it, but that which is above. He suffers many things from the elders of the earthly Jerusalem, that He may be glorified by those heavenly elders who receive His mercies. He rose again from the dead on the third day, that He may deliver from the evil one, and purchase for such as are so delivered this gift, that they be baptized in spirit, soul, and body, in the name of the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit, who are three days perpetually present to those that through them have been made children of light.

“Then what follows, ‘But Thou, the praise of Israel, inhabitest the holy place’, declared that He is to do something worthy of praise and wonderment, being about to rise again from the dead on the third day after the crucifixion; and this He has obtained from the Father. For I have showed already that Christ is called both Jacob and Israel; and I have proved that it is not in the blessing of Joseph and Judah alone that what relates to Him was proclaimed mysteriously, but also in the Gospel it is written that He said: ‘All things are delivered unto me by My Father;’ and, ‘No man knoweth the Father but the Son; nor the Son but the Father, and they to whom the Son will reveal Him.’ Accordingly He revealed to us all that we have perceived by His grace out of the Scriptures, so that we know Him to be the first-begotten of God, and to be before all creatures; likewise to be the Son of the patr …

4. The Lord Himself, too, makes it evident who it was that suffered; for when He asked the disciples, “Who do men say that I, the Son of man, am?” and when Peter had replied, “Thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God;” and when he had been commended by Him [in these words], “That flesh and blood had not revealed it to him, but the Father who is in heaven,” He made it clear that He, the Son of man, is Christ the Son of the living God. “For from that time forth,” it is said, “He began to show to His disciples, how that He must go unto Jerusalem, and suffer many things of the priests, and be rejected, and crucified, and rise again the third day.” He who was acknowledged by Peter as Christ, who pronounced him blessed because the Father had revealed the Son of the living God to him, said that He must Himself suffer many things, and be crucified; and then He rebuked Peter, who imagined t …

How could it be said that He who suffered is one, and He who suffered not another, when the Lord Himself says, “The Son of man must suffer many things, and be killed, and be raised again the third day from the dead;” and again, “When ye see the Son of man sitting on the right hand of the Father;” and again, “When the Son of man cometh in the glory of His Father?”

48. On hearing these statements, the multitudes assembled were greatly moved, as if they felt that these reasonings gave the correct account of the truth, and that Archelaus could have nothing to urge against them; for this was indicated by the commotion which arose among them. But when the crowd of auditors became quiet again, Archelaus made answer in the following manner: No one, truly, shall ever be able to prove himself mightier than the voice of our Lord Jesus Christ, neither is there found any name equal to His, as it is written: “Wherefore God hath exalted Him, and given Him a name which is above every name.” Nor, again, in the matter of testimony can any one ever be equal to Him; and accordingly I shall simply adduce the testimonies of His own voice in answer to you, first of all, indeed, with the view of solving those difficulties which have been enunciated by you, so that you m …

And likewise he who holds that the fact that He was Christ had been formerly proclaimed by the Apostles when they heard the saying, “What I tell you in the darkness, speak ye in the light, and what ye hear in the ear proclaim on the housetops,” will say, that He wished first to give catechetical instruction as it were to those of the Apostles who were to hear the name of Christ, then to permit this, so to speak, to be digested in the minds of the hearers, that, after there had been a period of silence in the proclamation of something of this kind about Him, at a more seasonable time there might be built up upon the former rudiments “Christ Jesus crucified and raised from the dead,” which at the beginning not even the Apostles knew; for it is written in the passage now under consideration, “From that time began Jesus to show unto His disciples that He must go unto Jerusalem” and suffer th …

But he who holds that the things spoken to the Twelve refer to the times subsequent to this, and that the Apostles had not as yet announced to their hearers that He was the Christ, will say that He wished the conception of the Christ which was involved in the name of Jesus to be reserved for that preaching which was more perfect, and which brought salvation, such as Paul knew of when he said to the Corinthians, “I determined not to know anything among you save Jesus Christ and Him crucified.” Wherefore, formerly they proclaimed Jesus as the doer of certain things, and the teacher of certain things; but now when Peter confesses that He was the Christ, the Son of the living God, as He did not wish it to be proclaimed already that He was the Christ, in order that He might be proclaimed at a more suitable time, and that as crucified, He commands His disciples that they should tell no man tha …

It is necessary, therefore, to the proclamation of Jesus as Christ, that He should be proclaimed as crucified; and the proclamation that Jesus was the Christ does not seem to me so defective when any of His other miracles is passed over in silence, as when the fact of His crucifixion is passed over. Wherefore, reserving the more perfect proclamation of the things concerning Him by the Apostles, He commanded His disciples that they should tell no man that He was the Christ; and He prepared them to say that He was the Christ crucified and risen from the dead, “when He began” not only to say, nor even to advance to the point of teaching merely, but “to show” to His disciples that He must go to Jerusalem, etc.; for attend to the expression “show”; because just as sensible things are said to be shown so the things spoken by Him to His disciples are said to be shown by Jesus. …

“ Then began He to show;” and probably afterwards when they were able to receive it He shewed more clearly, no longer beginning to show as to those who were learning the introduction, but already also advancing in the showing; and if it is reasonable to conceive that Jesus altogether completed what He began, then, some time, He altogether completed that which He began to show to His disciples about the necessity of His suffering the things which are written. For, when any one apprehends from the Word the perfect knowledge of these things, then it must be said that, from a rational exhibition (the mind seeing the things which are shown) the exhibition becomes complete for him who has the will and the power to contemplate these things, and does contemplate them. …

“ And while they abode in Galilee, Jesus said unto them, The Son of man shall be delivered into the hands of men. ” And these things will appear to be of the same effect as those, “that Jesus began to show unto His disciples that He must go unto Jerusalem, and suffer many things of the elders and chief priests and scribes.” But it is not so; for it is not the same thing “to show unto the disciples that He must go unto Jerusalem, and suffer many things of the elders and chief priests and scribes,” and, after suffering, “be killed,” and, after being killed, “be raised up on the third day,” as that which was said to them, when they were in Galilee, which we did not learn before, that the Son of man “would be delivered up;” for the being delivered up was not mentioned above, but now also it is said that “He is to be delivered up into the hands of men.” As for these matters let us inquire by …

Sometimes, however, a man in the goodness of his will desires something that God does not desire, even though God’s will is also good, nay, much more fully and more surely good (for His will never can be evil): for example, if a good son is anxious that his father should live, when it is God’s good will that he should die. Again, it is possible for a man with evil will to desire what God wills in His goodness: for example, if a bad son wishes his father to die, when this is also the will of God. It is plain that the former wishes what God does not wish, and that the latter wishes what God does wish; and yet the filial love of the former is more in harmony with the good will of God, though its desire is different from God’s, than the want of filial affection of the latter, though its desire is the same as God’s. …

110. Matthew proceeds in the following strain: “Then charged He His disciples that they should tell no man that He was Jesus the Christ. From that time forth began Jesus to show unto His disciples how that He must go into Jerusalem, and suffer many things of the elders, and chief priests, and scribes;” and so on, down to where we read, “Thou savourest not the things that be of God, but those that be of men.” Mark and Luke add these passages in the same order. Only Luke says nothing about the opposition which Peter expressed to the passion of Christ.

8. And now see how the disciples were terrified at His words. “The disciples say unto Him, Master, the Jews of late sought to stone Thee, and goest Thou thither again? Jesus answered, Are there not twelve hours in the day? “What means such an answer? They said to Him, “The Jews of late sought to stone Thee, and goest Thou thither again” to be stoned? And the Lord, “Are there not twelve hours in the day? if any man walk in the day, he stumbleth not, because he seeth the light of this world: but if he walk in the night, he stumbleth, because there is no light in him.” He spoke indeed of the day, but to our understanding as if it were still the night. Let us call upon the Day to chase away the night, and illuminate our hearts with the light. …