Church Fathers Commentary John 5:30

"I can of myself do nothing: as I hear, I judge: and my judgment is righteous; because I seek not mine own will, but the will of him that sent me." — John 5:30 (ASV)

St. Augustine of Hippo: We were about to ask Christ, “You will judge, and the Father will not judge? Will you not then judge according to the Father?” He anticipates us by saying, I can of my own self do nothing.

St. John Chrysostom: That is, you will see me do nothing that departs from or is unlike what the Father wishes; instead, as I hear, I judge. He is only showing that it was impossible for him ever to wish for anything other than what the Father wished. His meaning is, “I judge as if it were my Father who judged.”

St. Augustine of Hippo: When he spoke of the resurrection of the soul, he did not say, “Hear,” but “See.” “Hear” implies a command issuing from the Father. He speaks as a man, who is subordinate to the Father.

The phrase As I hear, I judge is said with reference either to his human subordination as the Son of Man or to the immutable and simple nature of his Sonship derived from the Father, in which nature hearing and seeing are identical with being. Therefore, as he hears, he judges. The Word is begotten as one with the Father and therefore judges according to truth.

It follows, And my judgment is just, because I seek not my own will, but the will of the Father which has sent me. This is intended to take us back to the man who, by seeking his own will and not the will of him who made him, did not judge himself justly but had a just judgment pronounced on him.

He did not believe that he would die by doing his own will instead of God’s. So he did his own will and died, because the judgment of God is just. This is the judgment the Son of God executes by not seeking his own will—that is, his will as the Son of Man. This does not mean he has no will in judging, but that his will is not his own in the sense of being different from the Father’s.

Therefore, I do not seek my own will—that is, the will of the Son of Man—in opposition to God. For men do their own will, not God’s, when they violate God’s commands to do what they wish. But when they do what they wish in such a way that they are also following the will of God, they are not doing their “own” will. Alternatively, “I do not seek my own will” means this: “because I am not of myself, but of the Father.”

St. John Chrysostom: He shows that the Father’s will is not different from his own, but one and the same, using this as a defense. Do not be surprised that, having been considered until now as a mere man, he defends himself in a somewhat human way. He shows his judgment to be just on the same grounds that any other person would use: namely, that a person who seeks his own ends may be suspected of injustice, but one who does not cannot be.

St. Augustine of Hippo: The only Son says, “I do not seek my own will,” and yet men wish to do their own will. Let us do the will of the Father, Christ, and the Holy Spirit, for these three have one will, power, and majesty.