OF OUR HOLY FATHER JOHN CHRYSOSTOM ARCHBISHOP OF CONSTANTINOPLE COMPLETE WORKS.
ON PSALM III
Psalm of David, when he fled from the face of Absalom his son. Lord, why are they multiplied that afflict me? (v. 1, 2)A Kings set up triumphal statues for generals who have achieved victory; but princes raise images and columns for charioteers and athletes as witnesses of their victory, and by an inscription, just as if by a mouth, they cause the material to proclaim the victory. Others, in turn, describe the praise of the victors in books and writings, wishing to show that their own powers in lauding are greater than those of the men being lauded. Painters, certainly, statuaries, sculptors, peoples, princes, cities, and provinces admire the victors; but no one has described an image of a fugitive, and of him who has not waged war, as David is now described. For there is B a Psalm of David, when he fled from the face of Absalom his son. And when is he who flees worthy of praise? When is he deemed worthy to have his name inscribed? Men pursue fugitives with written letters; they do not honor them with inscriptions.
But learn, O brother, the cause of the inscription, and place your soul in safety; let the narration of history be a correction of your own life; let the persecution of the righteous be a support for your mind. Learn why Absalom was pursuing David, so that when you have found the foundation of the matter, you may be built up in the fear of the Lord. For just as a building is invalid and feeble without a foundation, so, unless the purpose and intent are discovered, Scripture is useless.
C It is proved by various sayings and examples of Holy Scripture that God uses domestic quarrels, the rebellion of creatures, and all evils for the punishment of sin. — This was the purpose of the blessed David in the proposed Psalm, to establish and chastise his life, so that he might never do anything evil, nor despise the laws of God, nor might those things which happened to him happen to a sinner. David was fleeing his son, because he had fled from chastity; he was fleeing his son, because he had violated a chaste marriage; he was fleeing his son, because he had fled from the law of God which says: You shall not kill, you shall not commit adultery (Exod. 20:13, 14). For because he had introduced a strange lamb into his house, and had slaughtered its shepherd, he who was a lamb from his own house was threatening the shepherd with his horn. He brought war upon a strange house, and from his own house war was raised against him. This is not my thought; it is the utterance of God himself: and where God is the one interpreting, there is no one who can contradict. For that his son had risen up against David because he killed Uriah and took his wife, hear God speaking to David through Nathan the prophet: I anointed thee king over Israel, and I delivered thee out of the hand of Saul. And I gave thee all that belonged to thy master, and the house of Saul and Juda: and if these things be little, I shall add far greater things unto thee. Why therefore hast thou despised the Lord, to do evil in my sight? Thou hast killed Uriah the Hettite with the sword, and hast taken his wife to be thy wife. And now the sword shall not depart from thy house for ever (2 Kings 12:7-11). Thou didst divide a strange house with the sword: I will forge a sword against thee in thy house. Behold, I will raise up evil against thee out of thy house: not from elsewhere, nor from outside, but out of thy house. From where there is the source of sin, from there is the blow of punishment. Because, therefore, he had been a fugitive and an exile from the commandment of the Lord, for that reason he was fleeing his son. Psalm of David when he fled from the face of Absalom his son. The cause of the war undertaken is better than the narration of the war, so that when we see the fall of the righteous, we may take heed lest we fall, and flee such punishment. For many, even unto this day, have wars in their houses; and one is attacked by his wife, another is besieged by his son, another by his brother, and another is tamed by his servant; and each one is tormented and afflicted, fights, wages war, and is vexed by war; and no one, having drawn a conclusion, reflects within himself that, had he not sown sins, it would never be the case that thorns and thistles would sprout in his house, nor, had he not hidden the sparks of sins, would the house have been set on fire. For that the fruits of sins are one's own evils, and that God has chosen domestic lictors for sinners, the Scripture is witness, than which there is nothing more valid for producing faith. Your wife wages war with you, she encounters you as a wild beast upon entering, she sharpens her tongue as a sword? A matter indeed very grievous, that she who should be a helper has become an adversary: yet examine yourself, whether in your youth you attempted anything against a woman, and that the wound inflicted by you upon a woman might be cured through a woman, and your own wife, performing the office of a surgeon, might heal the strange ulcer. Although she who cuts may be ignorant, yet God the physician knows. For He himself has used her as iron against you: and just as iron does not know what it is doing, but the physician knows the future healing through the iron, so also, although the wife who strikes and the husband who is struck may be ignorant of the cause of the blow, God, however, as a physician, knows what He is conferring. That a wicked woman is the scourge of sins, witness is the Holy Scripture, even if the woman who strikes is ignorant of…
the cause of the blow, and the man who is struck is similarly ignorant. For hear what it says: "A wicked woman shall be given to a sinful man." She is given to him as a bitter antidote, consuming the humors of his sins. That to be besieged by one's own children is likewise a trial for sins, witness is David, who was attacked by his son Absalom because of his unlawful bed, as the discourse has shown. That brothers have also warred against brothers because of sins, witness is the Book of Judges. For when the members of the tribe of Benjamin committed fornication with the traveler's concubine, and she, unable to bear the immeasurable outrage, died, the eleven tribes made war against the one; and because the eleven tribes had departed from God, and had committed fornication into idolatry, the eleven were defeated by the one tribe, and after having been defeated multiple times by the one, they finally defeated it once, and brothers made war against brothers, because God, on account of their sins, had removed the partition wall of iniquity. Since, moreover, the one tribe had committed fornication with the woman, but the eleven tribes had committed fornication into idolatry, both these and those were destroyed by God, as it is written: "You have destroyed everyone who commits fornication away from You." Thus, brothers have made war against brothers on account of sins. When you are attacked by brothers, do not groan as much against them as you account for yourself, and examine yourself, seeking for what sins your brothers are your enemies. Not that all are attacked by brothers because of sins; for Joseph was attacked by his brothers, and not at all because of sins; and Job was plotted against by his wife, and not at all because of sins; but because the majority of men have domestic enemies on account of sins. At times, even friends are turned into enemies because of sins, and those who once loved [them] hate and turn away, as God casts such hatred [upon them] for reasons He knows. For so it is written in the one-hundred-and-fourth Psalm concerning the Egyptians: "He turned their heart to hate His people." Yet the hatred would not have been given by God if they had not first socialized evil. For those to whom friendship is the agent of destruction, to them is hatred the subject of virtue.
A Furthermore, even the enslaved and subject bodies often rise up against their mastery because of sins. Behold Adam, not yet having sinned, and having the beasts as slaves and subjects, and calling them by names as if they were slaves. But when he soiled his countenance with sin, then the beasts did not recognize him, and the slaves became enemies against him. And as the dog in the house serves him who feeds him, and fears him and stands in awe; but if suddenly he sees him having a soot-stained face, or wearing a strange mask upon his face, he attacks him as a stranger and wishes to rend him: so too, as long as Adam preserved the countenance according to the image of God pure, the beasts were subject to him as slaves; but when he soiled his countenance by disobedience, not recognizing the master, they felt enmity as toward a stranger. Thus, even the insurrection of slaves is an antidote for sins. B Daniel was righteous, and the lions recognized his mastery; they saw him untasted by sin, and left him free of punishment. A prophet sinned by lying, and the lion found him in the way, and put him to death. He was soot-stained by the lie, and the lion did not recognize him. If it had seen a prophet like Daniel, it would have honored him; it found a false prophet, and attacked him as a stranger. The master lied, and the slave denied his mastery. And why do I speak concerning domestic evils, when even our body itself, which is most intimate and dear to us of all, often wars against us as we sin, defending itself through fevers and diseases and pains, and the slave-body lashes the mistress-soul that has sinned, not that it wishes this, but that it is commanded to do this? And witness is Christ saying to the healed paralytic: "Behold, you have become whole; sin no more, lest something worse happen to you." Having learned, therefore, brothers, that domestic and kindred and servile wars, and the diseases of the body, for the most part happen on account of sins, let us restrain sin, the source of evils, and if the torrents of the passions do not flow, the rivers of the waters of God shall gladden the soul.
C Since, therefore, David also took the married woman as a foreign kingdom (for a like-minded wife is a kingdom to every man, and not so much does a king love the purple and the diadem, as a man loves his wife); for this reason, the son from his wife rose up as a tyrant, wishing to seize the kingdom of his father. By force he seized, and force he suffered; and he who sinned in secret, was triumphantly exposed in public; and he who was wounded in secret, was treated by the surgeon before all because of God who said: "You did it in secret, but I will do it in the open, and before the face of this sun." Nevertheless, the works of wickedness did not proceed to the end for Absalom; and justly, so that parricides might not have the act as a law of parricide. Having served as an executioner, he was put to death as a convict; and just as the beasts in the theaters attack some, but are killed by others: so too Absalom, having attacked David, was put to death by Joab. And he was hanging upon a high tree, he who was exalting himself against his father; D he was held by a plant, he who was fighting against the root, and the branch was bound by the branch, being severed from familial affection; and he was held by his head, he who was hastening to take the head of his begetter; and he hung as a fruit from the plant, he who wished to cut down the husbandman of nature; and he was shot in the heart, being put to death there where he plotted the murder. And it was possible to see then a wondrous spectacle. For as he was riding upon the mule, he was held by the hair of his head, by the hair of the tree, and the hair was holding the hair of the tyrant, lashing him there where he was eager to wear the paternal diadem. It was therefore possible to behold Absalom hanging between heaven and earth; heaven did not receive him; for if it cast out the first rebel, the devil, how would it have received the second rebel?
his own offspring. For if he devoured Dathan, who had spoken against Moses, and opened his mouth against him who had wickedly opened his mouth A, how could he have borne with feet running against a parent? When, then, he was hanging aloft in the tree, Joab, the commander of the army, came upon him and fixed three darts in the heart of the heart, striking him there, where was the receptacle of iniquity; and as he hung high upon the tree, David sang a beautiful epitaph for him: "I have seen the impious one being superexalted and raised up like the cedars of Lebanon; and I passed by, and behold, he was not" (Ps. 36:35). A Psalm of David, when he fled from the face of Absalom his son. He fled indeed, not as one afraid, but as one who was cautious of killing his son; for he spared him as a son, but those who were with him did not spare him as a rebel. Whence David, while his son was pursuing him and Semei was dogging him with curses on his account, himself indeed used patience; but since many were being scandalized against him, and especially those who were rising up with Absalom, and were henceforth rising against him as if destitute of divine providence, saying: "David is now deserted and altogether without help; now God has departed from him, as He did at one time from Saul; for just as He then departed from Saul and was with David, so now He has departed from David and is with Absalom; let us arise, let us invade, there is no salvation for him in God." Since, I say, they were saying these things, David, bearing these things more indignantly than the insults of his son, asks of God: 2. "O Lord, why are they multiplied that afflict me?" I am surrounded by trials, I am encompassed by the torrents of evils, a dangerous rain has descended, the rivers of the enemies have come, the winds of the evil spirits have breathed, they have broken into my house, wishing to move my soul away from Thee, but founded upon the rock of faith, I do not fall, but I bow down, that I may learn: "O Lord, why are they multiplied that afflict me?" The one who was born of me is against me, but Thou art for me. My own bowels wage war against me; my people are being armed against me after Absalom. My sheep have become wolves, and lions are lambs, and dogs mad with rage are little lambs, and bulls butting with horns are rams: I am not affected with sadness on my own account, but I grieve for the destruction of these.
EXPOSITION ON PSALM IV
"When I called, the God of my justice heard me" (v. 2). B Not so that we may learn simply that he was heard, does the Prophet utter these things, but that we may learn how we too, when calling upon God, shall be able to be heard quickly, and to obtain what is asked before the end of the prayer. For he did not say: "After I called, He heard me," but, "When I called." For such a promise belongs to God Himself, when He says somewhere to him who calls: "While you are yet speaking, I will say: Behold, I am present" (Is. 58:9). For it is not the multitude of words that is accustomed to persuade God, but a pure soul and the demonstration of good works. Therefore, to those who indeed live wickedly, but who think they appease Him with the prolixity of their words, see what He says: "When you multiply prayer, I will not hear you. If you stretch forth your hands, I will turn away my eyes from you" (Is. 1:15). Before all other things, therefore, it behooves him who prays to have confidence, and he will altogether obtain what is asked. And for this reason the Prophet did not say, "He heard me," but "my justice," showing his confidence in God, and that he always approaches Him with it. Nor let anyone suppose that he is boasting while he says these things. For he does not say these things to exalt himself, but to bring forward a certain doctrine and a common admonition that is very useful. For let no one say: "That man was heard because he was David, but I shall not be heard because I am small and abject"; he shows that God neither hears that man in any manner whatsoever, nor does He not hear you rashly and led by no reason, but that He always contemplates matters and deeds exactly. If you possess these, and are able to use their patronage, you shall be heard entirely. Just as if you do not possess them, not even if you were David, will you be able to appease God. And just as the covetous look neither at dignity nor at anything else, unless it be only at those who possess money, and they approach them as if they will effect everything; C so also, because God is a lover of justice, whoever has approached Him with it will not depart empty; just as he who lacks it, and is defiled by things that are contrary to it, however much he may pray and entreat, will not effect anything more, since he lacks the power to persuade. Therefore, if you wish to effect anything before God, having received it, proceed. But do not think that justice is a part of virtue, but the whole and the entire. Thus also was Job just, as one who possessed all human virtue, not one who indeed refrained from this evil but held onto that one. Thus also we say that a just pair of scales is that which is equal on every side: not if it can indeed balance gold, but otherwise lead, but that which exhibits equity in any material whatever; and again a measure, which is equal on every side. Thus also was Job just, being equitable from every side. For he did not preserve that equity in money only, but also in all other things, never exceeding the limit. Nor could anyone say that he loved equity in money indeed, but in his meeting and conversation with his neighbors exceeded the limit, as one who was proud and arrogant. For he was fleeing this with the greatest zeal. And for this reason he said: "What if I even despised the judgment of my servant or my handmaid, when they were litigating with me? Or did they not, even as I was, exist themselves?" (Job 31:13). And this, therefore, is also injustice, to be proud and arrogant. D
3'. Just as we call a covetous man [one who desires to take of the things of others...]