A V. But the Prophet, wishing also to show the fruit of this shepherd’s coming, says: *Excite your power, and come to save us.* For the appearing of the Savior is the fountain of all benefit. The Redeemer of the whole world therefore appeared, taking all things upon Himself for the sake of the goodness befitting Him. For when He had seen that all things among men had fallen into decay—both the priesthood which He had given in Israel, and the prophecy, and all these prerogative gifts—He Himself renews His own gifts through Himself. And how? Listen.
VI. He became a prophet, after prophecy had been adulterated by the unworthy, according to what is written: *A prophet will the Lord our God raise up for you from among your brethren, like me.* He became an apostle, according to what is said: *Consider the high priest and apostle of our calling, Jesus.* He became also a priest, as the Hymnographer says: *You are a priest forever according to the order of Melchisedec.* He became also a deacon, as the noble Paul says: *For I say that Christ has been made a deacon of circumcision for the truth of God, to fulfill the promises of the fathers.* Therefore He passes through every order. He became B yet again a reader; for taking up Isaiah He read it, as the Gospel declares, that He might both confirm the voices of the prophet, and honor the ecclesiastical ranks. He became also King, the King of kings; as Nathanael says: *You are the Son of God; you are the king of Israel.*
VII. But perhaps some one of the bystanders will say: "What then is it to me, a secular man, if Christ put on prophecy and apostleship and the high priesthood? What is it to me who am settled in a secular state?" But most of all for the sake of all men did that most loving God become man. But if you wish to see Him also undergoing a lay state for your sake, reflect with yourself and consider what must now be said. Without controversy, is not he who baptizes in the priestly order, and is not he who is baptized established in a lay rank? Attend, therefore, to John baptizing in the rank of a priest, and Christ baptized in a lay state. For today, brethren, C today He underwent the dispensation of the waters: not being sanctified by the waters, but pouring sanctification into the waters. John was fulfilling the priestly character; the Redeemer of the world approaches the one baptizing—He who illumines by the Spirit, the King Himself to the forerunner, God Himself to the prophet. John, brethren, did not ignore His dignity on account of the state of human dispensation; the habit of the body did not deceive him; the appearing flesh did not mislead him; but rather the hidden virtue, which he preached even to those who were ignorant of it, shone around Him. For that D admirable man was a holy lamp: a lamp of whom it had been predicted through the Prophet: *I have prepared a lamp for my Christ.* Now John is named the lamp...
A not because the Word of God, the Light of truth, had need of the addition of a lamp—for He was the Sun of Justice—but because He was making known the Lord hidden in the flesh, as in the night of the Judaic dispensation, illuminating the lamp of the divine Word. He is called a lamp, therefore, deservedly.
VIII. See further, brothers, an admirable thing. When the Lord, who conversed with us, proceeded to the dispensation of the Incarnation, becoming man out of the most benign humanity, it was a stupendous miracle: God dwelling among men, the Lord among slaves, the Creator among creatures, the Sanctifier among the sanctified. Then John preaches His dignity, and it was possible to see a phenomenon beyond all estimation; it was possible, I say, to see the lamp receiving the Sun of Justice, Jesus. For a man who stood in need of redemption was baptizing the Lord, the Redeemer of all—not embarking upon the matter with rash daring, but serving by command. Then indeed, then two prophetic voices converged: *The voice of one crying in the desert* [Isai. XL, 3], and, *The voice of the Lord is upon the waters* [Ps. XXVIII, 3]. The herald of truth was crying out, and the God of majesty thundered. And there was present the adorable Trinity, making its own glory shine forth. The Father from above proclaiming the Son; the Son below fulfilling the dispensation; the Holy Spirit, as it were, confirming with His seal the institution worthy of God. And the voice became so great, with the Father bearing witness from above to His only-begotten Son, that the heavens were opened from above. For, *When Jesus had ascended from the water,* it says, *the heavens were opened* [Matth. III, 16]. For they could not bear the voice of such a testimony, having a dread of the divine dispensation. B
IX. But note the prodigy. This voice cleft the heavens, and yet it did not strike the heretics: *This is my beloved Son, listen to Him* [Matth. XVII, 5]. Because the Law had anticipated it, proclaiming, and the prophets, evangelizing, that no one, following the former institution of Jewish worship, should reject the yoke of evangelical grace, the divine voice distinguished the dignity of the Master from that of the servant. *Listen to Him,* that is to say, to Christ. For *Christ is the fullness of the Law* [Rom. XIII, 10]; *Christ is the fullness of good things.* For although blessings had gone before in the Mosaic Law, they were not complete, awaiting our Lord, of whom Paul says: *Christ is the fullness of the Law.* And do you wish that I should demonstrate to you from a clear fact the truth as a guarantor of these things? Consider carefully. Moses the lawgiver commands that the twelve tribes of Israel be divided, and he leads six tribes to Mount Gebal, and the remaining six to Mount Garizin, and he commands that the one group should bless, and the other should curse. Let those who keep the law bless; let those who transgress it curse. What then? In all the curses there was, as it were, a certain seal imposed: For the Levites shall say, *Cursed is he who shall desert the law,* and all the people shall say, *Amen.* *Cursed is he who worships alien gods,* and all the people shall say, *Amen* [Deut. XXVII, 26, 15]. C And so upon every precept hangs the *Amen* for the transgressors. But in the blessings, he says, the Levites shall say: *Blessed...* D
is he who keeps the law of the Lord; blessed in the field, blessed in the city*; and nowhere does *Amen* appear in any of the blessings. Why, then, do the curses receive the seal, while the blessings do not receive this seal? What does this signal signify? What does this riddle interpret? The law was the fulfiller of its own sentences, but Christ is the confirmer of the blessings. And because it was necessary that what belongs to the law be assigned to the law, and that what is proper to evangelical grace be reserved for grace, the blessings therefore remained waiting for the *Amen* hereafter.
X. And that our discourse might not appear forced to anyone, but rather that it might have testimony from the truth itself, hear Paul saying: *For our Lord Jesus Christ, who was preached among you by us... was not yes and no, but in him was yes. For all the promises of God in him are yes; and through him is the Amen, to the glory of God* [II Cor. I, 19-20]. From this, it is possible to understand again what was said by the Apostle: *And you, being dead in your sins and the uncircumcision of your flesh, he has quickened together with him, having forgiven you all trespasses, blotting out the handwriting of the ordinance that was against us* [Col. II, 13-14]. What kind of handwriting? Here you have the demonstration of the matter. For when the law recited the curses, the *Amen* of the people was a certain subscription of those listening. For Jesus was the plenitude of blessings, who appeared at the Jordan, who fulfilled the prophecy of Isaiah in himself. For Isaiah said: *The deserts of the Jordan shall rejoice, because the glory of Lebanon has been given to it, and the honor of Carmel* [Isai. XXXV, 1-2]. The saying is indeed obscure, which is nevertheless clarified through grace.
XI. Scripture calls Jerusalem the Lebanon of that time. And do not think this interpretation forced. Ezekiel testifies concerning King Nebuchadnezzar. For he said: *A great eagle with great wings, which has long wings and is full of claws, came to Lebanon, and took the chosen of the cedars of Lebanon, and brought them to Babylon* [Ezech. XVII, 3-4]. But what are the *chosen*? Since he led away bound King Zedekiah, and Jehoiachin, and the high priests: these were the *chosen of Lebanon* which he brought to Babylon. What, then, is that: *And the glory of Lebanon has been given to it*? Because the priesthood of Jerusalem and the entire prophecy migrated to John, and all Jerusalem, having abandoned the altar, was going out to receive the baptism of John, the prophet anticipates speaking about the desert of the Jordan, saying: *The glory of Lebanon has been given to it, and the honor of Carmel*. But what is the *honor*? Hear, as if in passing. Elijah the prophet was the *honor of Carmel*. For Elijah was on Carmel. Since, therefore, John came forth in the spirit and power of Elijah, for that reason he says that the honor of Carmel was given to the desert, of whom the Savior says: *And if you will receive it, this is Elijah, who is to come* [Matt. XI, 14].5 Since, therefore, Elijah sometimes
once inhabited Carmel, and now John the desert, he rightly says: *The glory of Lebanon was given unto it, and the honor of Carmel*. B
XII. But now, brothers, that glory has filled not only the desert, but the entire world. For today, throughout the whole earth, hymns and discourses concerning God have stood from evening until this hour, and men have overcome sleep with hymns; grace was appearing, and nature was not being gainsaid. And rightly so. For just as iron, having been for a long time in fire, that which it was is no longer visible, and it has put on what it was not—not putting off its nature, but receiving brightness to its nature—so also we, having been deemed worthy of the Holy B Spirit, have denied the weakness of the body and have put on the efficacy of the Spirit. The Church stood shining throughout, and that word is fulfilled in it: *And there was evening, and there was morning, one day* [Gen. I, 5]. The night had no darkness, being illuminated by the theology. The night had no darkness; for it was being illuminated by the divine Word, according to that which was spoken by David: *And the night is light in my pleasure; for darkness shall not be darkened from thee, and the night shall be illuminated as the day* [Ps. CXXXVIII, 11, 12]. Such light, such beauty beams around the Church. May it happen to us, brothers, that by divine grace, being always illuminated, we may send up glory to the all-holy God; to whom belongs glory and honor unto the ages. Amen.
NOTICE CONCERNING THE FOLLOWING HOMILY
(Mai, Spicil. Rom. X, p. 221.)In an ancient Sessorian manuscript, as observed by Father Amator, and also in another copy, there exists a homily *On the Calends of January*, to which the name of Saint Severianus is inscribed. By making a collation, I discovered this sermon to be different from the sermons spoken during the same Calends by: 1. St. Augustine, serm. XCVII and XCVIII; 2. St. Peter Chrysologus, serm. CLV; 3. St. Ambrose, serm. VII; 4. St. Asterius of Amaseia in Combefis, *Nov. auct.* t. I, p. 65 (Patrol. Gr. t. XL); 5. St. Maximus of Turin, serm. XVI; 6. Atto of Vercelli, serm. 111, in my *Scrip. vet.* t. VI, part II, p. 13. What was I to do? Should I believe that I had searched sufficiently regarding this writing, or should I still suspect it to be published somewhere, whether under the name of Severianus or under that of someone else? Certainly I thought one could hardly think of Severianus, the bishop of Gabala, for the Latin diction is such that it does not appear to flow from a Greek source. Should I rather judge that the name of Severinus lies hidden under Severianus, a substitution which in fact happens in some manuscripts, where some sermons of St. Peter Chrysologus are inscribed now to Severinus, now to Severianus? Nevertheless, no sermon of Bishop Severinus exists, as far as I know. For those maxims of Severinus published by Sirmond (Opp. t. II) and by Pez (*Thesaur. anecd.* t. IV) as unpublished, and repeated (though he later acknowledged his error), have nothing that could be referred to this sermon. Yet, lest I waste the precious time of fleeting life longer on this meditation, I have decreed to place this learned little sermon here as if in the corner of a book, about which more leisurely and curious men may inquire and judge according to their own diligence.