Original Douay–Rheims AnnotationsJohn 1
English College of Douai–Rheims
Read John 1 in the BibleJohn 1:3
By him.
Again, by this he signifieth the eternity, divinity, omnipotency, and equality of the Word or Son, ◦ with God the Father, because by him all things were created. All thins he saith, both visible of this world: and invisible, as Angels and all spiritual creatures. Whereupon it is evident also, that himself is no creature, being the creator of all: neither is sin of his creation, being a defect of a thing, rather than a thing itself, and therefore neither of nor by him.
- ◦ The WORD not a creature but the creator.
John 1:12
He gave them power.
Free will to receive or acknowledge Christ, & power given to men, if they will, ◦ to be made by Christ the sons of God: but not forced or drawn thereunto by any necessity.
- ◦ Free-will.
John 1:14
The Word made flesh.
This is the high and divine testimony of Christ's incarnation and that he vouchsaved to become man, For the acknowledging of which inexplicable benefit and giving humble thanks for the same, all Christian people in the world by tradition of the Fathers prostrate themselves or kneel down, ◦ when they hear it sung or said at the holy Mass, either in this Gospel: or in the Creed by these words, Et Homo Factus Est.
- ◦ Humble kneeling at the solemn words of Christ's incarnation.
John 1:18
No man hath seen.
Never man in this mortality saw God in the very shape and natural form of the divine essence, but men see him only in the shape of visible creatures, ◦ in or by which it pleaseth him to shew himself unto many diversly in this world: but never in such sort as when he shewed himself in the person of the son of God, being made truly man and conversing with men.
- ◦ How mortal men see God.
John 1:32
The Spirit.
Here is an evident testimony of the third Person in Trinity, ◦ which is the Holy Ghost: so that in this one Chapter we find expressly against all Heretics, Jews, & Pagans, set forth the truth of the Church's doctrine concerning the whole Trinity.
- ◦ The B. Trinity.
John 1:42
Looking upon him.
This beholding of Simon, insinuateth Christ's designment and preferring of him to be the chief Apostle, the Rock of the Church, [1] and his Vicar, and therefore upon that Divine providence and intention he accordingly changeth his name, calling him for Simon, Cephas, [2] which is a Syriake word, as much to say as, Rock or Stone. And S. Paul commonly calleth him by this name Cephas, whereas other both Greeks and Latins call him altogether by the Greek word, Peter, which signifieth the self same thing. whereof S. Cyril saith, [3] that our Saviour by fortelling that his name should no more now be Simon, but Peter, did by the word itself aptly signify, that on him, as on a rock and stone most firm, he would build his Church.
- 1 Peter by his new name designed to be the Rock of the Church.
- 2 Cephas. Petrus.
- 3 Li. 2. c. 12. in Ioan.
Original Douay–Rheims Annotations — English College of Douai–Rheims. CC0 1.0
John 1:1
Was the word.
The second Person in Trinity which is the natural, only, and eternal Son of God the Father, is called the Word: [1] not as the holy Scriptures or speeches of the Prophets and Apostles (written and spoken by God's commandment for the uttering of his divine will towards man) be called his word, but in a more divine, eminent, and ineffable sort, to express unto us in a sort, by a term agreeable to our capacity, that the Son of God so is, and so from everlasting is born of God the Father, as our prime concept (which is our internal and mental word) is and issueth out of our intelligence & mind. This Word then, Son, or second Person in the holy Trinity, was and had his being then already, when other creatures (of what sort so ever) had but their beginning, and therefore cannot be a creature, as many Heretics before the writing of this Gospel thought, and as the Arrians after taught. And this first sentence of the Gospel not only the faithful, [2] but the Platonics did so admire (as S. Augustine writeth) [3] that they wished it to be written in gold.
With God.
Because a man might say, If the Word were before any thing was created, where or how could he be? The Evangelist preventing that carnal concept, saith first, that the was with God, [1] whose bing dependeth not upon time, place, space, or any other creatures, all which were made by him. Secondly, he giveth us to understand, that the Word had his proper substance or personality distinct from God the Father, whereby Sabellius the old Heretic is refuted. Thirdly, here is insinuated the order of these two persons, one towards the other, to wit, that the Son is with and of the Father, and not the Father of the Son. Fourthly, you may confute here the blasphemy of Calvin, [2] holding the second Person to be God, not as of God the Father, but as of himself. And yet such are the books that our youth now read commonly in England, and that by commandment.
God was the word.
Lest any man upon the premises, which set forth the relation and distinction of the second Person from the first, might think that the Father only were God, the Evangelist expressly teacheth, the Word to be God. [1] For though the words seem to lie otherwise (because we have of purpose so owed the elegancy which the Evangelist himself observed in placing them so, and therefore they stand so both in Greek and Latin) yet indeed the construction is thus, The Word was God, [2] and (as in his first Epistle the same Apostle writeth) true God: lest any might say (as the Arians did) that he was God indeed, but not truly and naturally, but by common adoption or calling, as good men in the Church be called the sons of God. What wonderful wrangling and tergiversation the Arians used to avoid the evidence of this place, we see in S. Augustine li. 3. de Doct. Christ. c. 2. even such as the Protestants do, [3] to avoid the like words, This is my body, concerning the B. Sacrament.