About this, that of that day
and that hour knoweth no man, etc., we will say this first, that we must
not understand the Holy Scriptures according to their outward sound; but when
it says that our God is a consuming fire; is He therefore a consumer, and a
destroyer, and not a preserver and a vivifier? and is He corporeal, and
composed of various substances? and is He subject to innumerable passions, and
is angry, and sleeps, and awakes, and repents, and is grieved, and errs, and
does not know, and searches with a candle, etc.? and like this, whosoever is
not born, etc. Behold, many have conquered in the strife of the passions, and
have not been baptized; and even the Thief entered Paradise, when he had not a
portion in the grace of Baptism; and no one can say that Jesus is Lord, except,
etc.; and behold, Manichaeans and Marcionites and others use this expression,
and even Heathens and Jews, and if they wish to, can use this expression,
without the grace of the Spirit, and like they have all gone aside together;
and all of them who came are thieves and robbers, and other such like; thus
also this, that of that day and that hour He knoweth not; which heretics
apply as an expression about God; and otherwise, how did the Apostle say that
in Him are hid and the treasures of wisdom and knowledge? and how did our Lord
Himself say, that no man knoweth the Father but the Son, nor the Son, but the
Father? and if He knoweth the Father, it is evident that [He knoweth] also all
His knowledge. Now the Father knoweth of that day and of that hour, and of
necessity the Son knoweth like Him; and if it is not so, the Father also is
seen not to know the day; or how is His knowledge of that day in any way
greater than the knowledge about the Father and about His knowledge? and if He
is the Maker of all as it is said, how does He not know His work? or is that
day not reckoned among His works? or is it not even reckoned in the number of
the days of the year, and if they tell us thus, of what does it consist or its
place? for every day consists of a night and a day, and the hours are couriers
of its variations; but an hour, according to wise men, does not exist at all,
inasmuch as the one that is past, does not exist, and the one that is to come
is not yet. Again, if his, that He knows not the day, and this, that
"He said to the foolish ones, I know you not," and this, that "I
never knew you," which He said to the Heretics, is to be understood as an
outward occurrence, therefore also many things like these which are said about
the Father; like this that "God remembered Noah," as if He really had
forgotten him; and like this, "I will go down and see whether they have
done according to the cry which is come unto Me, and if not, I will know";
and like this, that they have done something which I commanded them, neither
came it upon My heart; and like this, "Where art thou, Adam?" and
"Where is Abel thy brother?" etc.; and if these voices of weakness
pursue after the Father, who has not been clothed with weak flesh, how much
more may we speak weakly of Him who did wear the weak flesh? and just as a tree
which is far away and hidden and distant, is known by its fruits which are
manifest and near, thus also our Lord is known by His signs and deeds, and the
prophecies about Him; and now from weak voices, even though He clothed Himself
in weak flesh. There are people who deny His birth from a woman, and [say] that
He is not the Son of the Creator; but the son of strangers, and that He was a
hallucination and a phantasy, etc.; how much more if weak voices had not been
heard about Him, either in the Old Testament or in the New? therefore this,
that He knows not the day is not that He does not know, but that He does
not wish to reveal [it], because it would have been no profit that it should be
known to them or to others, because many were slack in cultivating virtue,
until that time; but now, because the coming of the Judge is hidden from us, we
stand in fear every hour.
Again, for it was fitting for God,
that knowing, He should be silent, and not reveal; but [it was fitting] to man
that He should do this, which was mercy; therefore, because he was still
believed to be Man only, it was not hateful that He should hide from them the
day; but if He had confessed to them that He knew, but that He had not revealed
[it], He would have been thought evil and invidious; and if He had revealed it,
slackness would have come in.
The more powerful therefore was
what He added after this; Watch therefore, for ye know not the day, nor the
time when your Lord cometh. We have expounded this matter at length in
Matthew. Form this, We have expounded this matter at length in Matthew. (The
Commentaries of Isho'dad of Merv, 3 vols. [trans. Margaret Dunlop Gibson;
Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1911], 1:138-40)
