"May God make you as Ephraim and as Manasseh"; and he placed Ephraim before Manasseh. You may appropriately use this text regarding standing the more honorable person before one in prayer. "Having bowed, he lay down as a lion, and as a cub." By the words "he lay down," he signifies the death which happened by way of dispensation. Christ is a lion to those who have been perfectly "beast-like" [in strength/courage], but to those who are still beginners, he is a cub.
It is inquired, furthermore, what manner of shape one must conceive the ark to have. I think, he says, that it is pyramidal, beginning from a length of 300 cubits and a width of 50 cubits, and narrowing toward the height of 30 cubits, so that the top comes to be one cubit in length and width. Let its lower parts, which have been called "lower chambers," be two stories, and those above the two stories, toward the higher part, be three stories. Symmachus also set this forth clearly by saying: "You shall make it with two-storied and three-storied chambers." Let it be understood that on each story, places are marked off so that the unlike animals may be separated—which he calls "nests," while Symmachus calls them "cells." Let the timbers be square, first so that much time is not consumed in their division, and then, which is truer, so that being made from whole timbers it might happen to be more secure; for it was about to approach mountains and undergo no small storm, against which it would not have held out unless it had been constructed of whole timbers. The nests both separated the animals and provided a bond for the structure. And so that it might not have an incursion of water, let it be smeared with pitch both outside and inside. A B C D
ORIGEN ON GENESIS: HOMILIES
HOMILY ONE
On the origin of the world and the things that are in the world.
"In the beginning God created heaven and earth." What is the beginning of all things, if not our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, the first-born of all creation? In this beginning, therefore, that is, in his own Word, God made heaven and earth: just as the evangelist John points out in the beginning of his Gospel, saying: "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. This was in the beginning with God. All things were made through him, and without him nothing was made." He does not, therefore, speak of any temporal beginning: but says that in the beginning, that is, in the Savior, heaven and earth and all things were made. The earth was "invisible and unformed, and darkness was upon the abyss, and the Spirit of God was borne upon the waters." How can the earth be "invisible and unformed" before God said, "Let there be light," and before he divided between light and darkness, according to the order of the discourse? But since in the things which follow he commands, and this he calls "heaven," when we arrive at that place, the reason for the difference between the heaven and the firmament will be stated, why the firmament also is called heaven. But now he asks: "And darkness was upon the abyss"? What is this abyss in which the devil and his angels will be? Indeed, this is most clearly designated in the Gospel, when it is said of the Savior that the demons, whom he was casting out, begged him not to order them to go into the abyss. Therefore, the Savior dissolves the darkness, Scripture saying: "And God said: Let there be light; and there was light. And God saw the light, that it is good, and God divided between the middle of the light and the middle of the darkness. And God called the light day; and the darkness he called night. And there was evening, and there was morning, one day." According to the letter, God calls the light day, and the darkness night. But according to the spiritual understanding, we see what it is, that God in that beginning, as we said above, made heaven and earth, said also that light should be, and divided between the middle of the light and the middle of the darkness, and called the light day. And…
it was evening, and it was morning: He did not say the first day, but said one day. Because time did not yet exist before the world was. But time began to be from the subsequent days; for the second day, and the third day, and the fourth, and all the rest begin to designate time.
2. And God said: Let there be a firmament in the midst of the waters, and let it divide between water and water. And it was so. And God made the firmament. Since God had already made heaven before, now He makes a firmament. For He made heaven first, of which He says: Heaven is My throne. But after that He makes the firmament, that is, the corporeal heaven. For every body is without doubt firm and solid; and this is what divides between the water which is above the heaven, and the water which is under the heaven. For since the things which God was about to make consisted of spirit and body, for this reason in the beginning, and before all things, heaven is said to have been made, that is, the whole spiritual substance A over which, as if on a certain throne and seat, God rests. But this heaven, that is the firmament, is corporeal. And therefore that primary heaven, which we called spiritual, is our mind, which itself also is spirit, that is, our interior spiritual man, who sees and perceives God. But this corporeal heaven, which is called the firmament, is our exterior man, who looks on corporally. Therefore, as the firmament is called heaven from the fact that it divides between those waters which are above it and those which are under it: so also the man who is placed in the body, if he can divide and discern which are the waters that are superior above the firmament, and which are under the firmament, he himself also will be called heaven, that is, the celestial man, according to the opinion of the Apostle Paul saying: Our conversation, however, is in heaven. Thus therefore the words of Scripture itself are contained: And God made the firmament, and divided between the middle of the water which is above the firmament, and between the middle of the water which is below the firmament. And God called the firmament heaven. And God saw that it was good, and it was evening, and it was morning, the second day.
Let each one of us therefore strive to be a divider B of the waters above from those which are beneath: so that, taking the understanding of the spiritual water and the beginning of that which is above the firmament, he may pour forth from his belly rivers of living water leaping up into life eternal, segregated without doubt and separated from that water which is below, that is, the water of the abyss, in which darkness is said to be, in which the prince of this world and his adversary the dragon and his angels dwell, as was indicated above. Therefore, by the participation of that supernal water which is said to be above the heavens, every one of the faithful becomes celestial, that is, when he has his mind in high and exalted things, thinking nothing of the earth but all things of heavenly realities, seeking those things which are above, where Christ is at the right hand of God the Father. For then even he himself will be held worthy of that praise by God which is written here when it is said: And God saw that it was good. Finally, even those things which are described in the following concerning the third day agree with this same understanding. For He says: And God said: Let the water which is under the heaven be gathered into one gathering, and let the dry land appear. And it was so. Let us therefore labor to gather the water which is under the heaven and to cast it away from us, so that, when this has been done, the dry land may appear, which are our works performed in the flesh, so that men, seeing our good works, may glorify our Father who is in heaven. For if we have not separated those waters which are under the heaven from ourselves, that is, the sins and vices of our body, our dry land C will not be able to appear, nor have the confidence to proceed to the light. For everyone who does evil hates the light, and does not come to the light, so that his works may not be manifested and seen if they are done in God. Which confidence, indeed, will not be given otherwise than if we cast away the waters from ourselves and segregate the vices of the body, which are the matter of sins. This being done, our dry land will no longer remain dry, as is shown from the following. For it says: And the water which is under the heaven was gathered into its gatherings, and the dry land appeared. And God called the dry land earth, and the gatherings of the waters He called seas. Therefore, just as this dry land, with the water segregated from it, as we said above, no longer remained dry, but is now called earth: in this way also D our dry land [is named].
A continues, if this segregation from them takes place, our bodies will no longer remain dry, but will be called earth, for the reason that they will now be able to bring forth fruit unto God. For God indeed in the beginning made heaven and earth: but afterwards He made the firmament and the dry land. And the firmament He called heaven, bestowing upon it the name of that heaven which He had created before. But the dry land He called earth, for the reason that He granted it the power of bearing fruit. If, therefore, anyone by his own fault remains dry and brings forth no fruit, 54 but bears thorns and thistles, carrying them as food for the fire, in accordance with the things which he has brought forth from himself, he himself also becomes food for the fire. But if by his effort and diligence he has segregated from himself the waters of the abyss, which are the senses of the demons, and has shown himself a fruitful earth, he ought to hope for similar things: that he himself also will be introduced by God into the land flowing with milk and honey.
3. Let us see, moreover, from the consequences, what are the fruits which God commands the earth itself to produce, to which He Himself granted this name. And God saw, He says, 83 that it was good, and God said: Let the earth bring forth the grass of hay, seeding seed according to its kind and according to its likeness, and the fruit-bearing tree making fruit, whose seed is in itself according to its likeness upon the earth: and it was so. According to the letter, those are manifest fruits which the non-dry earth brings forth. But let us refer this again to ourselves. If we have now become earth, if we are no longer dry, let us bring forth fruitful and diverse fruits unto God, that we also may be blessed by the Father, who says: 84 Behold, the smell of my son is as the smell of a full field, which the Lord has blessed; and that which the Apostle says may be fulfilled in us: 85 For the earth, drinking in the rain that comes often upon it, and bringing forth herbs useful to those by whom it is cultivated, receives blessings from God. But that which brings forth thorns and thistles is reprobate, and near to a curse, whose end is unto burning.
4. And the earth brought forth the grass of hay, seeding seed according to its kind and according to its likeness, and the fruit-bearing tree making fruit, whose seed is in itself, making fruit according to its kind upon the earth. And God saw that it was good, and it was evening, and it was morning, the third day. 86 Not only does He command the earth to bring forth the grass of hay, but also to bring forth seed, so that it may always be able to bring forth fruit. And not only does He command the fruit-bearing tree, but also that which makes seed, whose seed is in it, according to its kind, that is, that it may always reach C forth fruit from these seeds which it has in itself. And so we also ought both to bring forth fruit and to have the seeds within ourselves, that is, to contain the seeds of all good works and of all virtues in our heart: so that, having these fixed in our minds, we may now perform, in accordance with justice, all the actions that occur to us. For these are the fruits of that seed, our actions which are brought forth from the good treasure of our heart. 60 But if we hear the word, and from the hearing our earth immediately brings forth grass, and this grass withers before it reaches maturity or fruit, our earth will be called stony. If, however, those things which are spoken rest upon deeper roots in our heart, so that they bring forth both the fruit of works and have in themselves the seeds of future things, then indeed the earth of each one of us brings forth fruit according to its power, one a hundredfold, another sixtyfold, another thirtyfold. 87 But we have also deemed it necessary to admonish that our fruit should nowhere have tares, that is, nowhere have darnel: so that our fruit may not be beside the way, but be sown in the way itself, in that which says, I am the way, so that in it the birds of the air may not eat our fruits, nor our vineyard. If, however, anyone of us has deserved to be a vineyard, let him see to it that he does not bring forth thorns instead of grapes; and because of this it will no longer be pruned, nor dug, nor will it be commanded to the clouds to rain rain upon it: but on the contrary, it will be left desert, that thorns may grow upon it.
5. But these things now deserve to be adorned by the luminaries also. For God says: 89 Let there be luminaries in the firmament of the heaven, to shine upon the earth, and to divide between day and night. Just as in this firmament which had already been called heaven, God commands luminaries to be made, to divide between the midst of the day and of the night: so it can also come to pass in us: if at least we strive that we ourselves also be called and become heaven: we shall have luminaries within us, which may illuminate us, Christ and His Church. For He Himself is the light of the world, who also illuminates the Church with His own light. For just as the moon is said to receive light from the sun, so that through it even the night may be able to be illuminated; so also the Church, having received the light of Christ, illuminates all who dwell in the night of ignorance. But if anyone makes progress in this, so that he is now made a son of God, so that he may walk honestly in the day, as a son of God, and a son of light: he is illuminated by Christ Himself just as the day by the sun.
6. And let them be for signs and for seasons, and for days and for years: and let them be for illuminating in the firmament of the heaven, to shine upon the earth. And it was so. 90 Just as those luminaries of heaven, which we see, are placed for signs and for seasons, and days and years, that they may shine from the firmament of the heaven to those who are upon the earth: in this way also Christ, illuminating His Church, gives signs through His precepts: so that one may know how, having accepted the sign, he may flee from the wrath to come, so that that day may not overtake him as a thief: but that rather he may be able to reach the acceptable year of the Lord. Christ, therefore, is the true light which illuminates every man coming into this world; 91 from whose light the Church, having been illuminated, itself becomes the light of the world, illuminating those who in darkness...
are: just as Christ himself testifies to his disciples, saying: *You are the light of the world.* From which it is shown A that Christ indeed is the light of the apostles, but the apostles the light of the world. For they themselves are those having no spot or wrinkle, or anything of the sort, the true Church, just as the Apostle also says: *That he might present to himself a glorious Church, not having spot, or wrinkle, or any such thing.*
7. *And God made two great luminaries: the greater luminary for the rule of the day, and the lesser luminary for the rule of the night, and the stars. And God placed them in the firmament of heaven,* that they might shine upon the earth and have power over the day and the night, and divide between light and between darkness. *And God saw that it was good: and there was evening, and there was morning the fourth day.* Just as the sun and moon are said to be great luminaries in the firmament of heaven, so also in us are Christ and the Church. But since God also set stars in the firmament, let us see what these stars are in us, that is, in the heaven of our heart. Moses is a star in us, who shines and illuminates us by his deeds. And Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, and Isaiah, and Jeremiah, and Ezekiel, and David, and Daniel, and all to whom holy Scripture bore witness that they were pleasing to God. For just as star differs from star in brightness, so also each one of the saints according to his own magnitude pours his light into us. But just as the sun and moon illuminate our bodies, so also our minds are illuminated by Christ and the Church. Yet we are illuminated in this way only if we are not blind in our minds. For just as the sun and moon, however much they may illuminate, cannot be received by those blind in their bodily eyes; so also Christ offers his light to our minds, but he will illuminate us eventually only if the blindness of the mind does not prevent it. And even if this happens at first, it behooves those who are blind to follow Christ, saying and crying out: *Have mercy on us, Son of David,* that receiving sight from him, they may be able subsequently to be radiated by the splendor of his light. Truly, not all who see are illuminated equally by Christ, but each is illuminated according to that measure by which they are able to receive the force of the light. And just as the eyes of our body are not illuminated equally by the sun, but the more someone has ascended to higher places, and contemplated the sunrise with the gaze of a higher lookout, the more he will perceive the force of its splendor and heat: so also our mind, the higher and more loftily it has approached Christ, and has set itself closer to the splendor of his light, the more magnificently and clearly will it be radiated by his light, just as he himself says through the prophet: *Draw near to me, and I will draw near to you,* says the Lord. And again he says: *I am a God drawing near, and not a God from afar.* Yet we do not all come to him in the same way, but each B according to his own virtue. For either when we come to him with the crowds, he refreshes us with parables, for this reason alone that we may not faint on the way from long fasts: or certainly we always and incessantly sit at his feet, being empty for this purpose alone, that we may hear his word, not in any way troubled regarding much ministry, but choosing the better part, which will not be taken away from us. And certainly those who approach him in this way obtain much more from his light. But if, like the apostles, we are never moved from him at all, but always remain with him in all his tribulations, then he explains to us in secret the things he had spoken to the crowds, and solves them, and illuminates us much more clearly. But if someone is even such that he can ascend into the mountain with him, like Peter, and James, and John, this one will be illuminated not only by the light of Christ, but even by the voice of the Father himself.
8. *And God said: Let the waters bring forth crawling creatures of living souls, and birds flying above the earth under the firmament of heaven. And it was so.* According to the letter, by the command of God, crawling creatures and birds are produced from the waters, and we know by whom these things which we see were made. But let us see how these same things happen also according to our firmament of heaven, that is, the solidity of our mind or heart. I think that if our mind has been illuminated by our sun, Christ, it is subsequently ordered to produce from those waters which are in it crawling creatures and birds flying—that is, to bring forth into the light good or bad thoughts—so that there may be a discernment of good from evil, which certainly both proceed from the heart. For from our heart, as if from waters, both good and bad thoughts are produced. But let us bring forth both by the word and command of God to the sight and judgment of God, so that with his own illumination we may be able to discern what is evil from what is good; that is, that we may separate from ourselves those things which crawl upon the earth and carry on earthly anxieties; but those things which are better, that is, the birds, we may allow to fly not only above the earth, but also according to the firmament of heaven; that is, that we may examine in ourselves the sense and reason of both earthly and celestial things, so that we may also be able to understand what things are in us harmful from among the crawling creatures. If we see a woman to lust after her, that is a poisonous C reptile in us. But if there is in us a sense of sobriety, even if the Egyptian mistress has tempted us, we become birds, and leaving the Egyptian garments in her hands, we will escape from her obscene snares. If there is in us a sense provoking us to steal, that is a most wicked reptile. But if there is in us a sense that, even if we have two mites, we offer these very things for mercy as a gift to God, this sense is a bird, thinking nothing of earthly things, but tending with its flights to the firmament of heaven. If a sense comes to us...
[LATIN COLUMN]
to Westphal, “The Lutherans are brute men who retain not even a drop of decent shame, nor do they care greatly for the judgment of God or of angels, full of furious impulse, of trifling levity, of blind temerity, of canine wickedness, of diabolical pride, fierce, stripped of all humanity, vertiginous; Cyclopes, a proud faction of Giants, barkers, phrenetic, insolent, beasts.” The same, in the book against Heshusius, calls the Lutherans “wicked men, rods, slaves of Satan, whom the devil has fascinated in a horrible way.” Likewise, “dogs, profligates, and impure spirits.” Beza, “The minister of the Lutherans, Heshusius, with his followers, is a Polyphemus, an ape, a masked player, a very large and capped ass, a dog in the bath, a most asinine sophist, an impudent profligate, an impudent sycophant, a beast, a ghost, a biped ass, a stage-player, a monster mixed from the species of apes and wild asses, a flesh-eating animal, a Cyclops, raging and worthy of hanging from a lime tree.” Bullinger, in the *Repetition concerning the Eucharist*, calls Brentius, a disciple of Luther, “a Calydonian boar who overturns the vineyard of the Lord.” Starnius, in his *Palinodia* to Lucas Osiander, holds him for “Caius Caligula, and a descendant of Ulysses.” Johannes Lascens complains that he has experienced “the Baltic Lutherans, far crueler and more inhumane than the Turks.” Erasmus, in the *Defense of the Diatribe*, writes that “Luther could not be satisfied by any bitterness of speech, was more insane than Orestes, maddened by hatred, drunk with self-love.” Schlusselburgius, from the writings of the Calvinists, reports that these call the Lutheran doctrine “a fabrication of men, a coarse delirium suggested by the devil, an absurd and monstrous dogma, the excrement of Satan, and that Satan himself should fear it.” They proclaim, indeed, that the Lutherans are heretics, asses, blinded by the devil’s enchantment, moved by the spirit of Satan, and devils themselves. Jezlerus the Sacramentarian, in his book *On the Diuturnity of the Eucharistic War*, page 95, confesses that the propagators of his own sect call the Lutherans everywhere “Anthropophagi, blood-drinkers, Thyesteans, Christ-killers, bread-worshippers, worshippers of an impanated God, deniers of the redemption wrought through Christ, etc.” Are they not, therefore, far worse than the heathens? But let the same Jezlerus say how the Calvinists and Sacramentarians are to be held by the judgment of Luther and his followers: “When these things,” he says, “came to the ears of the Lutherans, they uttered far harsher words against their adversaries, asserting that they are liars, forgers, destroyers of the sacrament, corrupters of the testament of Christ, possessed by demons; on every side, before, behind, above, below, within, and without, obsessed by the devil, martyrs of the devil; to be numbered with the Nestorians, Arians, Turks, and the dregs of all mortals whom the earth has ever sustained.” Luther himself, in his *Disputation on the Eucharist*, calls the same Sacramentarians “pigs, dogs, idolaters, irrational asses, darkling conspirators, ghosts of the devil, wretched Swermers, insane and phrenetic fools, offspring of vipers, murderers of souls, enemies of the Son of God, thieves of bodies and souls, rapacious wolves, infernal hounds, German Turks, worse even than the Turks themselves, diabolical and infernal wolves, sent and obsessed by Satan, proposing the devil in place of God, making Christ less than Arius and Mahomet did, whom the devil directs against Christ and goads with spurs.” Beza, another of the prelates of these men, is called by Schlusselburgius “an atheist, a beast, a trifler, an impudent brawling lawyer, a devil incarnate, Beelzebub”; by Heshusius, “a prostitute, a harlot”; by Daniel Hoffmann, “a juggler, a slanderer, of no conscience, a blasphemous caviler, a perverse and detestable violator of the divine Word.” Schlusselburgius again affirms that the Calvinistic spirit is the spirit of darkness, that Satan speaks through the Calvinists as through his own instruments, that Beza composed his *Creophagia* at the devil’s dictation; finally, that Calvinism, Arianism, and Mahometanism are brothers, sisters, and three breeches of the same cloth. By Georgius Richen, a Rostochian minister, “the Sacramentarians are devils damned to eternal hell.” Zarnovius deems the same to be antichrists, deceivers of the world, who make the Lord of glory a stage-player, enemies of the Son of God, taught by Satan, children of Balaam, and Mahometans. Johannes Schutz, in the *Preface to the Book of Causes*, says: “Sacramentarianism is a certain quagmire into which many heresies flow, the final wrath of the devil, which, driven by fury, he exercises against Christ and his Church. He who follows the party of the Sacramentarians (he adds), is a manifest and perjured enemy of God, and having forgotten the faith which he gave in the baptism of Christ, etc.” It is manifest, therefore, by the manifold judgment of the Lutheran ministers, that the Sacramentarians utterly surpass all the impiety of the heathens. What, furthermore, of the fact that each of these heresiarchs openly testifies that their own listeners, disciples, and followers have become worse than all pagans and Turks since they received this new Gospel? Luther surely indicates this sufficiently regarding how much the Wittembergers had professedly changed in a few years: “From the Gospel,” namely the Lutheran one, “men have become so unbridled that they think whatever they please is permitted. They are not afraid of hell, etc. Under the Pope the name of Christ remained; but our ingratitude and security will deserve that Christ will not be named, and that word will be fulfilled, ‘The Son of Man when he cometh, think you he will find faith?’” “In the whole parish of Wittemberg there is only one brute who is exhorted to the Word of God and the catechism. All the rest go straight to the devil.” Also, in the *Table Talk* collected by his guest Aurifaber, he complains that “his disciples for the most part are Epicureans; and they seek this in their conversions, that they may have good days; they are called reformed, when in reality they seem rather to be incarnate demons: scarcely among pagans, Jews, Turks, or other infidel men can such contumacious people be found, among whom all honesty and whatever constitutes virtue has utterly perished, and not the slightest account of sin is taken, etc.” Who, however, would not believe Luther about his own disciples and listeners? Spangenberg, who was also a friend of Luther, testifies that his Lutherans “are men so wild that they no longer wish to acknowledge God, nor have any reason for him; but do whatever the devil and the flesh suggest.” Furthermore, with these testifying so constantly concerning themselves and their own, who would not hold it for true? But perhaps Calvin confirms that the professors and disciples of his doctrine are somewhat better. Indeed, he compares them with the damned in hell and with demons, prescribing to them that when they are about to receive the supper, they should seriously profess “that they are fit for no good; but are prone to every evil, and are perpetual breakers and contemners of divine precepts”; which, indeed, is proper to devils and the lost. Furthermore, concerning himself and his fellow ministers, his satellites, elders, and deacons, he writes: “We do not look upon Christ except with the eyes of the flesh, whence it happens that nothing magnificent appears in him. With our vicious sense, we distort whatever is in him and his doctrine. We seize upon false mutations, which partly cause the contempt of the Gospel.” And again: “Experience itself teaches us that we are utterly averse from God, full of and infected by his hatred.”
A For this reason, my mind is intent upon that which John writes in the Apocalypse regarding this people who believe in Christ. For he says that from the tribe of Reuben twelve thousand, from the tribe of Simeon twelve thousand, and likewise from each of the several tribes twelve thousand—whom he says altogether are one hundred and forty-four thousand—who have not defiled themselves with women but have remained virgins. B Now when this is said, there can surely be no suspicion, however inept, that this cannot be referred back to those tribes of the Jews, Simeon and Levi and the others who trace their lineage from Jacob. To which fathers, therefore, this number of virgins is to be referred—a number so equal, so entire, so ordered, that no one is counted as greater or lesser than another—I for my part do not dare to pursue further by inquiry, and even until now I walk with some trepidation. The Apostle, however, has set forth certain suspicions for those who can look more deeply, when he says: “For this cause I bow my knees unto the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, of whom the whole family in heaven C and earth is named.” And indeed, regarding earthly families, the understanding does not seem difficult: for the fathers of tribes or houses, to whom the succession of posterity is referred, are all called the whole family. But in heaven, what he says—how or in what manner there are fathers, or for what posterities the heavenly family is named—it is his alone to know, whose “heaven is heaven, but the earth he hath given to the children of men.” D Simeon, Levi, every man with all his house. How is one to explain this, that they entered into Egypt with all their house? To which it is added: “And all, he says, the souls that came out of the loins of Jacob were seventy-five.” Here, by naming souls, the prophetic discourse had almost stripped bare the mystery which it had wrapped everywhere, so that it might reveal that he speaks these things not of bodies, but of souls. Nevertheless, it still has its veil. For it is believed to be in usage that souls are called for men. “In the meantime, seventy-five souls went down with Jacob into Egypt. These are the souls which Jacob begat.” I do not think that any man can beget a soul, unless perhaps one be such as he who said: “For though you have ten thousand instructors in Christ, yet have you not many fathers; for in Christ Jesus I have begotten you through the Gospel.” Such are those who beget souls and bring them forth in labor, just as he says elsewhere: “My little children, of whom I travail in birth again until Christ be formed in you.” For others do not want, or are unable, to have the care of such a generation. Finally, what does Adam himself say? “This is now bone of my bones, and flesh of my flesh,” yet he did not add, “And soul of my soul.” But I would like you to tell me, O Adam, if you recognized bone of your bones and felt flesh of your flesh, why did you not also understand that the soul proceeded from your soul? For if you transmitted everything that was in you, why do you not also make mention of the soul along with the rest, which is the better part of the entire man? But it seems that by these things he gives an indication to those who understand, that when he says, “Bone of my bones, and flesh of my flesh,” he professes that those things which are of the earth are his, but because he knows that which is not of the earth, he does not dare to call it his own. But Laban also, when he says to Jacob, “You are my bone and my flesh,” he too does not seem to dare to call anything more his, except for what he acknowledges as an earthly consanguinity. For there is another kinship of souls, which is associated with Jacob descending into Egypt, or is ascribed to the rest of the patriarchs and saints under the enumeration of a mystical posterity. But we who had arranged to hold our course close to the shore of the earth, and in a way to graze the very edge of the coast, are being carried into the deep by I know not what more violent surge of the waves. Let us return, therefore, to those things which are added subsequently. “And his brothers, and all that generation. And the children of Israel were fruitful, and increased abundantly, and multiplied, and waxed exceeding mighty; and the land multiplied them.” So long as Joseph was alive, it is not reported that the children of Israel were multiplied, nor is anything at all mentioned of an increase or numbers among them. Believing in the words of my Lord Jesus Christ, that in the Law and the Prophets not one jot or one tittle is empty of mysteries, and that nothing of these can pass away until all be fulfilled, yet because we are of small capacity, let us now only knock at those things by which we may walk more broadly. Before our Joseph died—he who was sold for thirty pieces of silver by one of his brothers, Judas—the children of Israel were very few. But when he tasted death for all, through which he destroyed him who had power over death, that is, the devil, the people of the faithful were multiplied, and the children of Israel were spread abroad, and the land multiplied them, and they increased exceeding mightily. For unless, as he himself said, the grain of wheat had fallen into the ground and died, the Church of the whole world would not have brought forth this much fruit. Therefore, after the grain fell into the earth and died, all this harvest of the faithful grew up from it, and
the image of someone, he looks at him whose image it is; so also through the Word of God, who is the image of God, does one see God. And thus it will be true what He said: "He who sees me, sees the Father also." A Man, therefore, was made in the likeness of this image, and for this reason our Savior, who is the image of God, moved by mercy for the man who had been created in His likeness, seeing him having put off his own image and put on the image of the evil one, was himself moved by mercy, and assuming the image of man, came to him, as the Apostle testifies, saying: "Who, being in the form of God, thought it not robbery to be equal with God; but emptied himself, taking the form of a servant, being made in the likeness of men, and in habit found as a man, he humbled himself unto death." Whoever, therefore, comes to Him, and strives to become participants of the rational image, are renewed daily through their progress according to the B inner man to the image of Him who created them; so that they may be able to be made conformed to the body of His glory, yet each according to his own strength. The Apostles reformed themselves to His likeness to such a degree that He himself said of them: "I go to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God." But He himself had already prayed to the Father for His disciples, that the original likeness might be restored to them, when He said: "Father, that as I and Thou are one, so also they may be one in us." Let us, therefore, always contemplate that image of God, so that we may be able to be reformed to His likeness. For if man, made in the image of God, by looking contrary to nature at the image of the devil through sin has become like him, much more, by looking at the image of God, in whose likeness he was created by God, through His Word and His power will he receive that form which had been given to him by nature. But let no one despair, seeing his likeness to be more with the devil than with God, that he can recover again the form of the image of God, because the Savior did not come to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance. Matthew was a tax collector, and certainly his likeness was like the devil, but by coming to our Lord and Savior, the image of God, and following Him, he was transformed to the likeness of the image of God. Jacob, the son of Zebedee, and John his brother were fishermen and unlettered men, who certainly then bore a likeness more to the image of the devil, C but they too, following the image of God, became like Him, just as the other apostles did. Paul was a persecutor of the image of God itself. But when he was able to behold His beauty and splendor, once he had seen it, he was reformed to His likeness to such a degree that he said: "Do you seek a proof of Christ who speaks in me?"
14. "And God created them saying: Increase and multiply, and fill the earth, and have dominion over it." It seems worthy in this place to inquire according to the letter, how, since the woman had not yet been created, Scripture says: "He created them male and female." Perhaps, as I think, because of the blessing with which He blessed them, saying: "Increase and multiply, and fill the earth," anticipating what was to be, He says: "He created them male and female," since indeed man could not increase and multiply otherwise than with a woman. In order, therefore, that His blessing might be believed without doubt to be going to happen, He says: "He created them male and female." For in this way, seeing the consequence of increasing and multiplying to be from the fact that a woman was joined to him, man could bear a more certain hope in the divine blessing. For if Scripture had said: "Increase and multiply and fill the earth, and have dominion over it," without adding this, that He created them male and female, he would surely have been incredulous of the divine blessing, just as Mary said to that blessing with which she was being blessed by the angel: "How shall this be? since I know not man." Or perhaps because all things that were made by God are said to be joined and compacted together, as heaven and earth, and sun and moon; so also that it might be shown that man too is the work of God, and was not brought forth without harmony or fitting conjunction, for that reason, anticipating, it says: "He created them male and female." These things are said to that question which can be posed according to the letter.
15. Let us, however, see also through allegory how man is made male and female in the image of God. Our inner man consists of spirit and soul. The spirit is called the male, the soul can be called the female. If these have harmony and consensus between them, they grow and multiply in themselves, and generate good thoughts of the senses, and useful understandings or reflections, through which they fill the earth and have dominion over it; this is, they convert the sense of the flesh, which is subject to them, to better institutions, and have dominion over them, namely when the flesh in no way grows insolent against the will of the spirit. But now, if the soul when joined to the spirit, and united, so to speak, in marriage to it, declines D at times to bodily pleasures, and inclines its sense toward carnal delights, and sometimes seems to obey the saving admonitions of the spirit, but at other times yields to carnal vices, such a soul, as if stained by the adultery of the body, is said neither to grow nor to multiply legitimately, since indeed Scripture designates the children of adulterers as imperfect. For such a soul, which, deserted by the conjunction of the spirit, prostrates itself entirely to the sense of the flesh and bodily desires, as if turned away from God.
impudently, shall hear, "Because the face of the harlot has been made to you, you have become without shame before all." Therefore, like a harlot she shall be punished, and her children are ordered to be prepared for slaughter. A
16. *And have dominion over the fish of the sea, and the birds of the sky, and the cattle, and all things that are upon the earth, and the creeping things that creep upon the earth.* Now these things have been interpreted according to the letter, when we were saying what God says: *Let us make man*, and the rest, where it says: *And let him have dominion over the fish of the sea, and the birds of the sky*, and the rest. According to the allegory, however, in the fish, and birds, or animals and creeping things of the earth, there appear to me to be indicated those things which we have nevertheless mentioned above, that is, either those things which proceed from the sense of the soul and the thought of the heart, or those which are brought forth from bodily desires and the motions of the flesh; of which all the holy ones, keeping the blessing of God within themselves, exercise dominion, directing the whole man according to the will of the spirit. But to sinners, those things which are brought forth from the vices of the flesh and the pleasures of the body have more dominion.
The man who had seen a person of the nation of the harlot clinging to an Israelite man in the sight of all in impure embraces, filled with the fire of divine zeal, snatched up a sword and drove it through the breast of both. Which act was reckoned to him by God as righteousness, the Lord saying: "Phinees has appeased my wrath, and it will be reckoned to him as righteousness." This earthly food of anger, therefore, becomes our food when we use it reasonably for righteousness. But if anger is acted upon irrationally, either punishing the innocent or boiling over against those who transgress nothing, this food will be that of the beasts of the field, and of the serpents of the earth, and of the birds of the sky. For by these foods are the demons nourished, who are fed and encouraged by our evil acts. For an indication of this work is Cain, who through the anger of envy deceived his innocent brother. Similarly, one must consider also concerning concupiscence B and concerning each of the affections of this kind. For when our soul desires and falls short of the living God, our food is concupiscence. But when we see either another man's wife to desire her, or we desire any of our neighbor's things, concupiscence becomes a beastly food. Just as a proof of this can be the concupiscence of Achab, and the deed of Jezabel regarding the vineyard of Nabuthe the Jezraelite.
17. *And God said: Behold, I have given you every seed-bearing plant that sows seed, which is upon all the earth, and every tree that has in itself the fruit of seed-bearing seed, to you it shall be for food, and to all the beasts of the earth, and to all the birds of the sky, and to all the creeping things that creep upon the earth, which have in themselves the breath of life.* The intent of this history indeed manifestly indicates that the use of food was granted by God at first from herbs, that is, from vegetables and the fruits of trees. But finally, C when the covenant was made with Noe after the deluge, the power of eating meats was given to men. For what reasons this is so will be more rightly explained in their own places. According to the allegory, however, the herb of the earth and its fruit, which is granted to men for food, can be understood concerning bodily affections. For example: Anger and concupiscence is the shoot of the body. The fruit of this shoot, that is, the work, is common to us rational beings and to the beasts of the earth. For when we are angry for righteousness, that is, for the correction of a transgressor and the amendment of his salvation, we eat of this fruit of the earth, and our food becomes bodily irascibility, by which we repress sin and restore righteousness. And lest we appear to you to bring these things forth from our own mind rather than from the authority of Divine Scripture, return to the book of Numbers, and remember what Phinees the priest did, who with the Madianitic D caution in the reason of words of Holy Scripture is also to be observed, which, when it had spoken about men, because God said: *Behold I have given to you every seed-bearing seed which is upon the earth, and every tree which is upon the earth, it shall be for food to you*, it did not say concerning the beasts, "I have given to them all these things for food," but, *It shall be for them for food*; so that according to the spiritual reason which we have expounded, those affections are understood to be granted to man indeed by God, yet it is foretold by God that they will also be for food to the beasts of the earth. Therefore, most cautiously did Divine Scripture use the word, which says that God speaks to men: *I have given these to you for food.* But where it comes to the beasts, it signifies by the sense not of one commanding, but as of one predicting, that these will be for food also to the beasts and the birds and the serpents. But let us, according to the sentiment of the apostle Paul, attend to the reading, so that we may be able, as he himself says, to receive the sense of Christ and to know the things which are given to us by God; and the things which have been given to us for food, let us not make into the food of pigs or dogs, but let us prepare them in us such that it may be worthy for the Word and Son of God to be received into the lodging of our heart, He who comes with His Father, and who wishes to make a mansion among us in the Holy Spirit, whose temple we first...
B must exist in holiness. To Him be glory unto ages of ages. Amen.
HOMILY II.
On the structure of the ark, and of those things which are therein.
Beginning to discourse on the ark, which was constructed by Noah according to the command of God, let us first of all see what is reported of it according to the letter; and proposing the questions that are wont to be raised by many, let us also seek their solutions from those things which have been handed down to us by the ancients, so that, when we have laid foundations of this kind, we may be able to ascend from the text of history to the mystical and allegorical sense of spiritual understanding, and to open whatever mystery is contained in them, while the Lord reveals to us the knowledge of His Word. First, therefore, these C things, He says, the Lord spoke to Noah: "The time of every man has come before me, because the earth is filled with iniquities by them, and behold I will destroy them with the earth. Make therefore for yourself an ark of squared timbers; you shall make nests in the ark, and you shall daub it inside and outside with bitumen, and thus you shall make the ark. Three hundred cubits the length of the ark, and fifty cubits the breadth, and thirty cubits its height you shall make the ark, gathering it, and in a cubit you shall finish it at the top. But the door of the ark you shall make from the side, with lower double-chambered and upper triple-chambered structures." And after a few words He adds: "And Noah did," he says, "all things which the Lord God commanded him, so he did."
D First, therefore, it is asked in what manner the habit itself and the form of the ark ought to be understood. Which I think, insofar as it appears from those things that are described, to have arisen from four corners from the bottom and, being gradually pulled in toward the top, to have been gathered into a space of one cubit. For it is reported thus, that in its foundations three hundred cubits in length and fifty in breadth were placed, but thirty were built up in height. But it was gathered into a narrow vertex, so that it might be a cubit in width and length. Now, indeed, regarding the interior, those things which are called its lower parts are set as double-chambered, that is, containing a double habitation. But the upper parts are triple-chambered, just as if we were to say built with triple platforms. But these distinctions of habitations seem to have been made to this end, that the diverse kinds of animals or beasts might be more easily separated into individual lodgings, and that the tame and gentle might be separated from the wild beasts. These distinctions of habitations, therefore, are called nests. And the timbers are reported to have been square, so that one could be more easily fitted to another, and the whole incursion of waters might be warded off when the flood inundated, when the joint was fortified with bitumen smeared inside and out. It has indeed been handed down to us, and not without plausibility, that the lower parts, which we have said above were constructed doubly, and which are separately called double-chambered, except for the superior parts which are called triple-chambered, [NEW VERSION] to be understood in this manner.
We must ask in what way the form of the ark ought to be understood. I think that it was built in the likeness of a pyramid, and was at the beginning three hundred cubits in length, fifty in breadth, and thirty in height, so that the vertex was of the length and breadth of one cubit simultaneously. Moreover, let it be supposed that its lowest part, which are called the lower parts, consisted of two stories: but those which were above those two stories, of three stories. For Symmachus clearly explained this, saying: "You shall make it with double and triple stories." Let it also be considered that in individual stories separate places existed, so that animals of different species might be segregated; and those separate places are called "nests," or, as Symmachus turns it, *kaliai*. And after a few words interposed: "They say, therefore, that the lowest of all, which was at the bottom, was assigned to dung and manure: the one next above this, to receiving the food of the animals; so that the carnivores would have a supply of flesh, because other animals besides those which were brought in to preserve the species had been introduced into the ark for the food of others; but those which were tame had food prepared suitable for them." Let these things be said concerning the lowest stories. From the three other stories, which…
are said to be in the upper part of the ark, around the third level, he had the other animals under his control. It is probable, moreover, that the side concerning which it has been spoken—namely, that you shall make the door of the ark on the sides—was in the lowest first story, so that the animals having entered from there might go to the places assigned to them. And this seems to us a better thing to say concerning it than to think that, from above, the animals would descend to their proper places with great difficulty. The security of this door, when shut, required some diviner power, since no man was any longer able to secure it from the outside, so that water might not force its way in. Therefore the Lord God shut it behind Noah, and thus the flood came to pass.
[The text continues discussing the lower parts, which are called two-storied, and the upper parts intended for the habitation of beasts, or animals. In these, the lower ones provided a dwelling for wild and fierce beasts, or serpents, while the places contiguous to these in the upper parts were stables for the milder animals. Above all, however, the seat for humans was located on high, as they excel all things in both honor and reason; so that, just as man is said to hold the primacy over all things that are on the earth by reason and wisdom, so also he was placed higher in location and above all the animals that are in the ark. It is further said that the door, which is said to have been made in the side, was in that place so that it would have the lower parts, which he called two-storied, beneath it, and the parts he called three-storied were called the upper parts from the location of the door; so that having entered from there, all the animals might be separated into their own places, as we said above, by a suitable division. B But the fastening of the door itself is no longer completed by human reason. For how, after it was shut and there was no human outside the ark, could the door have been smeared with bitumen from the outside, unless it was without doubt the work of divine power, so that water might not enter through an opening which no human hand had secured? Therefore, Scripture, when it had said of all other things that Noah made the ark, and brought in the animals, and his sons, and their wives, did not say of the door that Noah shut the door of the ark: but it says that the Lord God shut the door of the ark from the outside, and thus the flood was made. It must be noted, however, that after the flood it is not said that Noah opened the door, but the window, when he sent forth the raven to see whether the water had ceased upon the earth. But as to Noah bringing food into the ark for all the animals and the beasts that entered with him, hear from those things which the Lord says to Noah: "Take," He says, "for yourself of all the foods that are eaten, and you shall gather them to yourself, and they shall be for you and them to eat." But as to Noah doing those things which the Lord commanded him, hear Scripture saying: "And Noah," it says, "did all things which the Lord God commanded him, so he did." Indeed, regarding the places which we said were separated for the dung of the animals, Scripture has reported nothing, but tradition holds it; it will seem opportune to have maintained silence on this, about which the reason of its own consequence would sufficiently teach. And because it could less worthily be adapted to spiritual understanding, Scripture deservedly remained silent about this, as it adapts its narrations more to allegorical intellects. Nevertheless, as far as the necessity of the rains and the flood is concerned, no species of ark could have been given that was so convenient and suitable as that which, from the summit, as if from a certain roof drawn up to a narrow peak, would pour off the ruins of the rain, and, remaining in water with a square stability, could neither be tilted nor submerged by the impulse of the winds, nor the force of the waves, nor the restlessness of the animals that were inside.
2. But to all these things C some raise questions, and especially Apelles, as to whether such an ark could hold even the smallest fraction of all the animals that are on the earth. D [alt-version omitted] ... [The text proceeds in this fashion, noting that the lowest floor was assigned to animals with their individual nests, the upper floor to cattle and other tame animals, and the topmost floor to man, the prince of all, to keep the others under his hand. The door was likely at the lowest level so animals could walk straight to their nests rather than descending from the top. Its closing required divine power, as there was no man left outside to apply the bitumen. Some doubted if the ark could hold even a small part of all the animals on earth.]
A And especially Apelles, who was an acquaintance of Marcion and later became the founder of a heresy other than his, wishing to reject the writings of Moses as not holy, raised this objection and added: "The story is therefore false; the Scripture is therefore not from God, since it did not understand of what kind the three hundred cubits were, and of what kind the fifty, and how large the thirty, which the Scripture named regarding the construction of the ark." We, however, have learned from one of those reputable among the Hebrews that the three hundred cubits were named as what geometers call the power of that which is from the square of thirty; so that our cubits of length in the lower plane are ninety thousand; and likewise for the width, two thousand five hundred, and for the height, nine hundred 76. B For indeed it would be quite absurd that a man educated in all the wisdom of the Egyptians—who are most of all geometricians—and reared in a king's house, should not have seen that the three hundred of length, and fifty of width, and thirty of height, understood in a common way, would perhaps not even hold four elephants, along with their food for a year, since God commanded two by two of the unclean animals to enter the ark. If it is necessary, regarding...
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...animals, and especially Apelles, who was among the familiars of Marcion and the author of another heresy. He, in order to traduce the Scripture of Moses as not at all holy, brought forward an objection in the manner of one doubting: "This narrative is mendacious and fabulous, therefore this Scripture is not from God," not understanding of what measure the Holy Scripture named those three hundred cubits, whose fifty, whose thirty, in the construction of the ark. We, however, learned from one of the more skilled Hebrews that the three hundred cubits were said to be equal to those which geometers call the power of a square taken from thirty, so that in one deck there were ninety thousand of our cubits, C and similarly in the width two thousand five hundred, and in the height nine hundred. For it would be most absurd that someone who had been educated in all the wisdom of the Egyptians—the most skilled of men in geometry—and who had been brought up in royal houses, had not seen that three hundred cubits of length, fifty of width, and thirty of height, if accepted in the common manner, could not have held even four elephants with food sufficient for a year, seeing that God commanded that two by two of the unclean animals should go into the ark. But if, so that it may be understood more clearly, that saying: "You shall gradually make the ark narrow, and terminate it in a cubit," is to be explained according to the architect's manner of the ark's form, come, let us explain it thus. Imagine for me the lowest length of the ark, according to the power mentioned above, to be three hundred cubits, and the width... 76 D ...to be a matter of the amanuenses. For its meaning is either the power of a square, if the numbers are multiplied by themselves. Furthermore, if the three hundred cubits of the ark's length were multiplied by the same number, three hundred, and the fifty cubits of width by the number fifty, and the thirty cubits of height by the number thirty, they will give 90,000 cubits of length, width, and height, which Origen himself clearly expresses in both contexts. These things having been set forth in this way, it is easily understood how Origen said the structure of the ark was like a very large city. Indeed, such an ample city has never existed anywhere. For put the cubit as consisting of only eighteen inches (which, however, the Reverend Father Lami teaches to have consisted of twenty inches among the Jews), 90,000 cubits of length will constitute an ark 135,000 of our feet long, or 27,000 geometric paces, namely nine leagues consisting of three thousand geometric paces each. Which, of course, is not even verisimilar. But Origen seemed to have had enough if he responded in some way to Celsus and Apelles mocking the ark. This observation was provided to us by the Reverend Fathers of the Society of Jesus in their *Diarium Trevoltiense* for the month of December of the year 1740, page 2355. (77) "And seven and seven." These things which were omitted in the previous editions are supplied from the manuscripts.
A To understand more clearly the instruction, "Gathering, you shall make the ark, and you shall finish it to a cubit from above," come, let us set forth the architectural principle concerning the ark, as it has occurred to us and as we have learned it. Consider for me the three hundred cubits mentioned, according to what is called the power [of the number], to be the length of the ark at the bottom, and fifty to be the width; then, for every cubit as one draws it together, ten cubits of the length and one and two-thirds of the width [are to be reduced]; so that the thirtieth cubit of the height becomes ten cubits in length and one and two-thirds in width; then, after this, the gathering is completed to a cubit. And if the thirtieth cubit, being the first from the top/height, seems forced to anyone, let him pay attention to the wording which says, "And of thirty cubits its height, gathering you shall make the ark, and finish it to a cubit." For I think that after the phrase, "and of thirty cubits the height," the first and thirtieth cubit are signified by the words, "and you shall finish it to a cubit from above."
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Fifty; then for each individual cubit the ark is to be reduced in length by ten cubits, and in width by one cubit and two-thirds, so that at the top the thirtieth cubit is ten in length and one and two-thirds in width; and then the ark, thus reduced, ends in a cubit. If, however, the thirtieth cubit which was at the top seems to anyone to be forced, let him attend to this reading: "And the height of it [is] thirty cubits"; you will gradually reduce the ark to a narrow space and bring it to completion in a cubit. For I think it is declared, after that, "and the height of it [is] thirty cubits," that first cubit which was the thirtieth, by these words: "And you shall finish it to a cubit from above."
3. Now, however, praying that He who alone can remove the veil from the reading of the Old Testament may be with us, let us attempt to inquire what this magnificent construction of the ark also contains of spiritual edification. I believe, therefore (as far as I can attain to it by the smallness of my understanding), that that flood, by which a finish was then almost given to the world, holds the form of that end of the world which is truly to come. And this the Lord Himself proclaimed, saying: "For as in the days of Noah they were eating, drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, and the flood came and destroyed them all, so shall the coming of the Son of Man be." In which it is clearly signaled that one and the same form belongs to the flood that preceded and the end of the world which He says is to come. As therefore it was then said to that Noah to make an ark and to bring into it with him not only his sons and his near ones, but also animals of diverse kinds: so also it was said C by the Father to our Noah—who is indeed the only just and only perfect one, our Lord Jesus Christ—in the consummation of the ages, that He should make for Himself an ark out of square timbers, and give it measurements filled with heavenly sacraments. For this is signified in the Psalm where He says: "Ask of me, and I will give thee the nations for thine inheritance, and the uttermost parts of the earth for thy possession." He builds an ark, therefore, and makes nests in it, that is, certain storehouses in which animals of diverse kinds may be received. Of which the prophet also says: "Go, my people, enter into thy chambers, shut thy doors about thee, hide thyself for a little moment, until the indignation be overpast."
D It is for the whole people here who are saved in the Church—whether human beings or animals which are saved in the ark. But because not everyone has the same merit, nor one and the same progress in faith, for that reason even that ark does not provide one single dwelling for all, but the lower parts are two-storied, and the upper parts are three-storied, and nests are distinguished in it: so as to show that even in the Church, although all are contained within one faith and are cleansed by one baptism, nevertheless there is not one and the same progress for all, but each one in his own order. Those, indeed, who live according to rational knowledge and are fit not only to govern themselves but also to teach others—since very few are found, the few who are saved with Noah himself, and who are joined to him in close proximity—hold the figure: just as also our Lord, the true Noah, Christ Jesus, has few close ones, few sons and kinsmen, who are partakers of His word and capable of wisdom. And these are they who are placed in the highest degree and are stationed at the summit of the ark. But the multitude of irrational animals, or even of beasts, is held in the lower places, and these are mostly those whose savage ferocity the sweetness of faith has not softened. Those who are slightly higher than these are those who, although [possessing] less intelligence, nevertheless maintain the greatest simplicity and innocence. And thus by individual degrees of habitations, to those ascending, one arrives at Noah himself, who is interpreted as "rest," or "just," which is Jesus Christ. For it does not befit that Noah that which occurs...
Lamech, his father, says: "For this one," he says, "shall give us rest from our works and from the sorrows of our hands, and from the ground which the Lord God has cursed." For how will it be true that that Noah gave rest to that Lamech, or to the people who were then upon the earth, or how was the curse removed from the earth which the Lord had given, when God's wrath is shown to be greater, and it is reported that God says: A "It repents me that I have made man upon the earth"? And again He says: "I shall destroy all flesh that is upon the earth." And above all, the indication of the supreme offense is given by the destruction of the living. But if you look to our Lord Jesus Christ, of whom it is said: "Behold the Lamb of God, behold Him who takes away the sins of the world"; again, of whom it is said: "Having become a curse for us, that He might redeem us from the curse of the law"; again, when He says: "Come unto me, all you who labor and are burdened, and I will refresh you, and you shall find rest for your souls": you shall find Him to be the one who truly gave rest to mankind, and delivered the earth from the curse wherewith the Lord God had cursed it. To this spiritual Noah, therefore, who gave rest to mankind and took away the sin of the world, it is said: "You shall make for yourself an ark of square timbers."
4. Let us see, therefore, what square timbers are. A square is that which wavers not on any side, but in whichever way you turn it, it stands with a steadfast and solid stability. These are the timbers that bear all the weight either of the animals within or of the currents from without. These I consider to be the teachers in the Church, and masters and zealots of the faith, who both console the peoples situated within by the word of admonition and the grace of doctrine, and withstand those who attack from without—whether Gentiles or heretics—and those who stir up the waves and storms of disputatious contentions by the power of the word and the wisdom of reason. But do you want to see that divine Scripture knows of rational timbers? Let us review what is written in the prophet Ezekiel: "And it happened," he says, "in the eleventh year, in the third month, on the first day of the month, the word of the Lord came to me saying: Son of man, say to Pharaoh king of Egypt, and to his, multitude: To whom do you liken yourself in your exaltation? Behold, Assur was a cypress in Lebanon, beautiful in branches, and with dense D shade, and high in stature. Between the midst of the clouds its top was made, the water nourished it, and the abyss exalted it, and it brought all its rivers round about it, and its congregations to all the trees of the field. Therefore its height was exalted above all the trees of the field." And after a little it says: "Many cypresses in the paradise of God, and the pines were not equal to its branches, and the firs were not like it. Every tree in the paradise of God was not assimilated to it, and all the trees of the paradise of delights of God envied it." Do you notice of what or what kind of timbers the prophet speaks, how he describes the cypress of Lebanon, to which all the timbers that are in the paradise of God could not be compared? And he added even this at the end, that all the trees which are in the paradise of God envied it, clearly showing, according to spiritual understanding, that the trees which are in the paradise of God are called rational: since in them he describes a certain envy toward those trees which are in Lebanon. Whence, so that we may say even this in passing, consider whether perhaps also that which is written, that everyone who hangs on a tree is cursed by God, ought to be understood just as that which is said elsewhere: "Cursed is the man who trusts in man." For we ought to trust in God alone, and in no other, even if one be said to proceed from the paradise of God, just as Paul also says: "Even if we, or an angel from heaven, B should preach to you otherwise than we have preached to you, let him be anathema." But enough of this for now. Meanwhile, you have seen what the square timbers are which, as a certain wall and defense for those who are within, are placed by the spiritual Noah against the waves that come upon them from without: which timbers are smeared with bitumen within and without. For the architect of the Church, Christ, wants you not to be like those who appear to men just from those without, but within are sepulchers of the dead. But He wants you to be holy in your body from without, and pure in your heart from within, cautious on all sides, and fortified by the virtue of chastity and innocence, which is to be covered with bitumen inside and out.
5. After this, [the ark's] length, and breadth, and height are mentioned, and numbers are placed in these which are consecrated to great mysteries. But before we discuss the numbers, let us see what that which it says, "length, and breadth, and height," might be. The Apostle in a certain place, when he was speaking more sacredly about the mystery of the cross, says this: "That you may know what is the length, and breadth, and height, and depth." Now depth and height signify the same thing, except that height is seen to measure the space from the lower parts to the upper, but depth...
A from the upper parts to the lower. Consequently, therefore, the Spirit of God declares the figures of great mysteries both through Moses and through Paul. For Paul, because he was preaching the mystery of Christ’s descent, called it "depth," as if it were from the higher to the lower. But Moses, because he designates the restoration of those who, through Christ, are called back from the ruin and destruction of the world—just as if from the slaughter of the flood—from the lower parts to the higher and celestial ones, in the measure of the ark does not mention "depth," but "height," as if it were a place where one ascends from earthly and low things to celestial and exalted things. Numbers also are set down: three hundred cubits of length, fifty of breadth, thirty of height. Three hundred are three times one hundred. But the number one hundred is shown to be full and perfect in all things, and containing the mystery of the entire rational creature: just as we read in the Gospels, where it says that a man having one hundred sheep, when one had perished, leaving the ninety-nine in the mountains, went down to seek that which had perished, and placed it with those ninety-nine which had not perished. Here, B therefore, the centenary number is the number of the entire rational creature, since it does not subsist from itself, but descends from the Trinity, and has received the length of life—that is, the grace of immortality—from the Father through the Son and the Holy Spirit; for this reason it is placed tripled, as it were, because it is increased to perfection through the grace of the Trinity, and restores to three hundred those who had fallen from the centenary by ignorance, through the acknowledgement of the Trinity. Breadth holds the number fifty. This number is consecrated to remission and indulgence. For according to the law, in the fiftieth year, there was a remission; that is, if anyone had alienated his possession, he would recover it; if any free man had come into servitude, he would recover his freedom; the debtor would receive indulgence; the exile would return home. Therefore, the spiritual C Noah, Christ, in His ark—in which He frees the human race from ruin, that is, in His Church—placed this fifty-fold number of remission in the breadth. For if He had not granted the remission of sins to the believers, the breadth of the Church would not have been diffused throughout the orbit of the earth. But the number of thirty in height contains a mystery similar to that of the three hundred. For what the hundreds are there, the tens multiplied by three do here. But the sum is recalled to the one number of the whole construction, because "one God the Father, from whom are all things," and "one Lord," and "one faith of the Church," "one baptism," "one body," and "one Spirit," and all things hasten to the one end of God’s perfection. But you, too, who hear these things, if you apply yourself to the holy Scriptures at your leisure, you will find D that the deeds of great things are contained under either the thirtyfold or the fiftyfold number. Joseph is led forth from prison at the age of thirty, and receives the principate of all Egypt, so that he may ward off the impending destruction of the famine by divine providence. Jesus is reported to be thirty years old when He came to baptism and saw the heavens parted and the Spirit of God descending upon Him in the form of a dove: where also the mystery of the Trinity first began to be revealed, and you will find many similar things to these. But you will also find the fiftieth day as a feast in the consecration of new fruits, and the fiftieth part from the spoils of the Madianites is offered to the Lord. With three hundred, however, you will find both Abraham conquering the Sodomites and Gideon overcoming the Madianites with the three hundred who lapped water with their tongues. The door, naturally, which is placed not at the front, nor from above, but at the side and crosswise, is because it is a time of divine wrath: "For the day of the Lord is a day of wrath and fury," as it is written: for although some may seem to be saved, yet many, whom their own merits condemn, are wiped out and perish; the door is placed crosswise so that it may show that which is said by the prophet: that "if you walk perversely with me, I also will walk with you in perverse wrath." After these things, let us examine also concerning that which says separately "lower" two-storied, and "upper" three-storied; lest by these it be indicated that which the Apostle said, that "in the name of Jesus every knee should bend, of those in heaven, and of those on earth, and of those under the earth"; and in the ark may be signified that the "lower" are indeed those which the Apostle calls "under the earth," but the "upper" adjacent to them are those on "the earth," but the "three-storied upper" rooms are those which he says are all together "celestial," but in them the merits of those are distinguished who are able, according to the Apostle Paul, to ascend as far as the third heaven. The nests and nests, because there are many in the ark, indicate that there are many "mansions" with the Father. But concerning the animals, and beasts, and cattle, and other diverse living creatures, what other figure is to be preserved for us than that which even Isaiah shows, when he says that in the kingdom of Christ the wolf shall go with the lamb, the leopard with the kid, the lion and the ox together to the pasture, and their offspring shall feed on straw together, and furthermore that in the cavern of asps, a little boy—such without doubt as the Savior meant when He said, "Unless you are converted and become as this little child, you shall not enter into the kingdom of God"—shall put his hand and nothing shall be harmed; or even that figure which Peter now teaches to be held in the Church, when he reports that he saw a vision in which all the quadrupeds, and beasts of the earth, and fowls of the air were contained within one linen sheet of faith, bound by the beginnings of the four Gospels?
But because the ark which we are attempting to describe is commanded by God to be built not only with two stories but with three, let us also endeavor to join to this twofold exposition which has preceded, a third one according to the precept of God. The first, which preceded, is historical, placed as it were as a foundation in the lower parts. This second one was mystical, higher and more exalted. Let us try to add the third, the moral one: although the very fact that he did not simply say "two-storied" and remain silent, nor stop at "three-storied," but after saying "two-storied," added also "three-storied," would seem to contain a mystery even apart from this very exposition which we are examining. For the three stories signify this threefold interpretation. But because in the divine Scriptures the historical sequence cannot always hold, but sometimes fails—as, for example, when it is said: *Thorns will grow in the hand of the drunkard*; and when, regarding the temple built by Solomon, it is said: *The sound of hammer and axe was not heard in the house of God*; and again in Leviticus, when the leprosy of the wall and of the skin and of the thread is ordered to be inspected and cleansed by the priests—because of these and similar things, the ark is constructed not only three-storied but also two-storied, so that we may know that in the divine Scriptures there is not always a threefold meaning, because we do not always follow the history, but sometimes the sense of a twofold exposition is inserted. Let us therefore try to discourse also on the third exposition, according to the moral place. B If there is anyone who, when evils grow and vices abound, can turn himself from fleeting, perishing, and falling things, and hear the word of God and the heavenly precepts: he builds an ark of salvation within his heart, and consecrates within himself, if I may so speak, a library of the divine word, placing in it length, breadth, and height; faith, hope, and charity. He extends the faith of the Trinity to the length of immortality of life. 66 He founds the breadth of charity with the affection of indulgence and kindness. By the height of hope he raises himself to heavenly and exalted things. For while walking on earth, he has his conversation in heaven. He refers the sum of his actions to one point. For he knows that *all indeed run, but one receives the prize*, namely, he who has not been made manifold by the variety of thoughts and the instability of the mind. D But he builds this library not of rough and unpolished wood, but of square timber, aligned according to the line of equity; that is, not from the volumes of secular authors, but from the prophetic and apostolic books. For they are the ones which, planed by various temptations, with all vices cut away and excised, contain life and are balanced on every side. For the authors of secular books can indeed be called tall trees and shady trees. For under every tall and leafy tree Israel is accused of having committed fornication: because they indeed speak of exalted things and use flowery eloquence, yet they did not act as they spoke; and therefore they cannot be called square logs, because life and speech are in no way balanced in them. Do you, therefore, if you are making an ark, if you are gathering a library, gather it from the prophetic and apostolic sermons or from those who have followed them with the straight lines of faith; make it two-storied and three-storied; learn historical narrations from it, and recognize the great mystery which is fulfilled in Christ and the Church. Learn also from it to amend morals, to cut away vices, to cleanse the soul, and to understand how to strip it of every bond of captivity, placing nests in it, and nests of various virtues and progress. You shall surely bitumen it within and without, bearing faith in your heart, proffering confession with your mouth: having knowledge within, works without: being pure in heart within, and walking chaste in body without. Into this ark, therefore, whether we place it as the library of divine books or as the faithful soul according to the moral place for the time being, you must also introduce animals of every kind, not only the clean, but also the unclean. But we can easily say that the clean animals are memory, learning, intellect, the examination and judgment of those things which we read, and other things similar to these. But it is difficult to pronounce upon the unclean, which are named in pairs. Nevertheless, as far as we can dare in such difficult places, I think that concupiscence and anger, because they are present 90 in every soul, are necessarily called unclean in that they serve man for the sake of sinning, but they are called necessary and to be preserved in that neither is the succession of posterity restored without concupiscence, nor can any amendment or discipline consist without anger. And although these things may seem to be discussed not by a moral but by a natural reason, nevertheless we have treated them for edification as far as things were able to occur to us for the present. If anyone, indeed, is able to take the time to compare divine Scripture with itself and to fit spiritual things to spiritual things, we are not unaware that he will find many secrets of a deep and arcane mystery in this place, which we cannot now bring into the open, either for the brevity of time or for the labor of the listeners. Let us, however, pray for the mercy of the almighty God, who may make us not only hearers of his word, but also doers 88; and may he bring the flood of his water upon our souls as well, and blot out in us…
those things which he knows are to be destroyed, and may he give life to those things which he judges to be deserving of life, through Christ our Lord, and through his holy Spirit. To him be glory in the eternal ages of ages. Amen.
HOMILY III. Concerning the circumcision of Abraham.
1. Since in many places of holy Scripture we read that God speaks to men, and on account of this, some of the Jews, and indeed not a few of our own people, have thought that God must be understood as a man—that is, distinct in human members and appearance—while the philosophers, on the other hand, despise these things as fabulous and formed according to the likeness of poetic fictions: it seems to me that we should first discourse a little upon these matters, and then pass on to the things which have been read. Let our discourse, therefore, be directed first to those who, standing outside, arrogantly clamor around us, saying that it does not befit an exalted and invisible and incorporeal God to use human affections. B If, they say, you give him the use of speech, you will without doubt give him a mouth and a tongue and the rest of the members by which the office of speaking is performed. And if this be so, there is a departure from an invisible and incorporeal God; and by connecting many things similar to these, they exhaust us. To these objections, therefore, if we are aided by your prayers, we shall, as the Lord grants, briefly offer a defense.
2. Just as we profess that God is incorporeal and almighty and invisible, so do we profess with a certain and immovable dogma that he cares for mortal things and that nothing is done without his providence, neither in heaven nor on earth. Remember that we have said nothing is done without his providence—not, however, without his will. For many things are done without his will, but nothing without his providence. For providence is that by which he cares for, and dispenses, and foresees what is done. But will is that by which he desires something or does not desire it. But more on these matters elsewhere, for this discourse is longer and more diffuse. According to this, therefore, in that we profess God to be the provider of all things and the dispenser, it follows that he must indicate what he wills C or what is expedient for men. For if he does not indicate it, he will neither be the provider of man, nor will it be believed that he cares for mortal things. God, therefore, in indicating to men what he wills them to do, by what affection, most of all, must he be said to indicate it? Is it not by that which is in use and known to men? For if, for the sake of argument, we say that God is silent—which is believed to be in keeping with his nature—how could it be thought that anything has been indicated by him through silence? Now, however, he is said to have spoken for the reason that men, knowing that by this ministry one person’s will is made known to another, might recognize that the things brought to them through the prophets are the indications of God’s will. In which, indeed, A the will of God is seen to be contained, unless it be said that he has spoken; for his will can never be felt or understood among men to be indicated through silence. Yet we say this again not according to the error of the Jews, or even of some of ours who err with them, to the extent that, since human frailty cannot hear of God otherwise than as the thing itself and the words are known to it, we therefore think that God acts with these members and human appearance similar to ours. This is foreign to the faith of the Church. But God is said to have spoken to man in that very thing which either breathes in the heart of each of the saints, or causes the sound of a voice to reach his ears. Likewise, when he indicates that he knows things which each one either says or does, he is said to have heard; and when he indicates that something unjust is done by us, he is said to be angry; when he reproves us for being ungrateful for his benefits, he is said to repent: indicating these things indeed by those affections which are in use among men, yet not ministering them with those members which belong to a corporeal nature. For that substance is simple, and is composed neither of any members, nor of joinings, nor of affections; but whatever is done by divine virtues is, in order that men might be able to understand it, either brought forth by the appellation of human members, or is announced by common and known affections. D And in this way God is said to be angry, or to hear, or to speak. For if human voice is defined as struck air—that is, air struck by the tongue—the voice of God can also be called struck air, whether by power or by divine will. And hence it is that if at any time a voice is given divinely, it does not glide to the ears of all, but to the ears of those whom it concerns, so that you may recognize the sound as not returned by the striking of the tongue (otherwise it would be a common sound), but governed by the guidance of a heavenly nod. Although it is also reported that for the prophets and patriarchs and the rest of the saints, the word of God has come even without the sound of a voice, as we are abundantly taught from all the sacred volumes. In which, to speak briefly, the mind is illumined and formed into words by the Spirit of God. And therefore, whether in this or in that way which we have spoken of above, when he indicates his will, God is said to have spoken. According to this sense, therefore, some things, but not all, are referred to one and the same person. For some things are referred to Abram, and some to Abraham—that is, some after the changing of the name, and some while he was still reckoned by his original name. And indeed, first that oracle is brought from God to Abram before the changing of the name in which he said: 出 from thy land, and from thy father’s house, and from the kindred…
your land, and from your father's house, and from your kindred, etc. But there is nothing in this about the covenant of God, nothing is commanded concerning circumcision. For he could not, while he was still Abram and bore the name of his carnal birth, receive the covenant of God and the sign of circumcision. But when he went out from his land and from his kindred, then more sacred responses were delivered to him. And first it is said to him that he shall not be called Abram, but Abraham shall be thy name. Then he now received the covenant of God, and received circumcision as a seal of faith, which he could not receive while he was in his father's house, and in carnal consanguinity, and while he was still called Abram. But neither was he himself, or his wife, called an elder A until he was in his father's house and dwelt with flesh and blood; but after he departed from there, he merited to be called both Abraham and an elder. For they were both, he says, elders, that is, old, Abraham namely, and his admirable wife, and advanced in their days. How many before them lived life for longer spans of years, for nine hundred and more years, some living not much less until the flood; and none of them were called elders. For by this name was not designated in Abraham the old age of the body, but the maturity of his heart. So too the Lord said to Moses: Choose for thyself elders, whom thou thyself knowest to be elders. Let us therefore look more diligently at the voice of the Lord, what is intended by this addition where He says, whom thou thyself knowest to be elders. Was not he who bore the senile age of the body C obvious to the eyes of all to be an elder, that is, an old man? Why therefore is this special inspection commanded to Moses alone, such a great and such a prophet, that those should be chosen whom other men do not know, whom the ignorant mob does not recognize, but whom the prophet, full of God, might choose? For the judgment regarding them is not of the body, nor of age, but of the mind. Such therefore were these blessed elders, Abraham and Sarah. And first of all, their genuine names, which carnal origin had given, are changed. For when Abraham was ninety-nine years old, God appeared to him and said: I am God, be pleasing before me, and be blameless, and I will place my covenant between me and thee. And Abraham fell upon his face and worshipped God, and God spoke to him saying: I am; behold my covenant is with thee, and thou shalt be the father of a multitude of nations, and in thee shall all nations be blessed, and thy name shall no longer be called Abram, but thy name shall be Abraham. And when He had given this name, He immediately subjoins: And I will place my covenant between me and thee, and between thy seed after thee, and this is the covenant which thou shalt keep between me and thee, and between thy seed after thee. And after these things He adds: Every male of yours shall be circumcised, and you shall circumcise the flesh of your foreskin.
4. Therefore, since we have arrived at this place, I wish to inquire whether Almighty God, who holds dominion over heaven and earth, wishing to place a covenant with a holy man, placed the sum of so great a business in this, that the prepuce of his flesh and that of the offspring to come from him should be circumcised. For, He says, my covenant shall be upon your flesh. Was this what the Lord of heaven and earth was conferring by the gift of an eternal covenant upon him whom alone He had chosen from all mortals? For these are the only things in which the teachers and doctors of the Synagogue place the glory of the saints. But the Church of Christ, which had said through the Prophet: But to me Thy friends are sufficiently honored, O God, let them come, if it seems right, and hear how He honors the friends of His spouse, and how great glory He confers upon them, when He revolves their deeds. We, therefore, imbued through the apostle Paul, say that just as many other things were done in figure and in an image of a future truth, so also that carnal circumcision bore the form of spiritual circumcision. Concerning which it was also worthy and fitting for God to give precepts of majesty to mortals. Hear, therefore, how Paul, the teacher of the Gentiles, teaches the Church of Christ in faith and in the truth concerning the mystery of circumcision. See, he says, the circumcision (speaking of the Jews who are circumcised in the flesh). For we are, he says, the circumcision, who serve God in spirit and have no confidence in the flesh. This is one statement of Paul concerning circumcision. Hear also another: For not he who is a Jew in the manifest is one, nor that which is circumcision manifest in the flesh, but he who is a Jew in the hidden, by the circumcision of the heart, in spirit, not in the letter. Does it not seem to you more worthy for such a circumcision to be spoken of in the saints, and the friends of God, than the cutting off of flesh? But the novelty of the discourse might perhaps deter not only Jews, but also some of our own brothers. For it seems to them that Paul presumes impossible things when he introduces the circumcision of the heart. For how can it be possible that the member be circumcised which is covered by internal viscera and lies hidden even from the very sights of men? Let us return therefore to the prophetic voices, so that to you who are praying, these things about which we inquire may become clear from them. The prophet Ezekiel says: Every foreigner uncircumcised in heart and uncircumcised in flesh shall not enter into my holy places. And likewise elsewhere, the prophet, no less reproving, says: All foreigners are uncircumcised in flesh, but the sons of Israel are uncircumcised in heart. It is designated, therefore, that unless one shall have been circumcised in heart and circumcised in flesh, he will not enter into the holy places of God.
5. But I seem to myself to be captured by my own evidence. For the Jew will immediately bind me with the testimony of the prophet and will say: Behold the prophet designates both circumcisions, that of the flesh and that of the heart. The prophet continues to bind me with his testimony, and to say: Behold the prophet says that every [foreigner] uncircumcised in heart and uncircumcised in flesh shall not enter into the holy places of God. But I seem to myself, etc.
A if you help me with your prayers, that the word of the living God may deign to be present at the opening of our mouth, that we shall be able, with Him as our guide, to emerge from this narrow path of inquiry into the wide expanse of truth; because it is not only the carnal Jews who must be refuted by us regarding the circumcision of the flesh, but also some of those who seem to have taken upon themselves the name of Christ, and yet think that carnal circumcision must be received, like the Ebionites, and if there are any who stray with a similar poverty B of understanding. Let us therefore use the testimonies of the Old Testament, in which they willingly indulge. For it is written in the prophet Jeremiah, "Behold, this people is uncircumcised in ears." Hear, O Israel, the prophetic voice; a great reproach is brought upon you, a great blame is cast upon you. Your accusation is brought forward, that you are uncircumcised in ears. And why, hearing this, did you not apply the iron to your ears, and cut them off? For you are blamed by God, and condemned, because you do not have circumcised ears. For I do not permit you to take refuge in our allegories, which Paul taught. Why do you hesitate to circumcise? Cut off your ears; sever the members which God created for the utility of the senses and for the adornment of the human condition. For this is how you interpret divine words. But I shall offer you yet another thing, which you cannot contradict. In Exodus, where we have written in the books of the Church, Moses answering the Lord and saying: "Provide, O Lord, another whom you may send. For I am of a slender voice, and slow of tongue," but you have in the Hebrew exemplars: "I am uncircumcised in lips." Behold, you have the circumcision of the lips, according to your exemplars which you claim are truer. If, therefore, according to you, Moses still says that he is unworthy because he is not circumcised in lips, it is certain that this indicates that he is more worthy and holier who is circumcised in lips. Apply the sickle, therefore, also to your lips, and cut away the coverings of your mouth, since such an interpretation pleases you in divine letters. But if you call back the circumcision of the lips to allegory, and yet you say that the circumcision of the ears is nonetheless allegorical and figurative, how is it that you do not seek an allegory in the circumcision of the foreskin? But let us set aside those who, in the manner of idols, have ears and do not hear, and have eyes and do not see. But you are the people of God, and a people chosen to declare the virtues of the Lord, receive C the worthy circumcision of the word of God in your ears, and in your lips, and in your heart, and in the foreskin of your flesh, and in all your members whatsoever. For let your ears be circumcised according to the word of God, so that they may not receive the voice of the detractor, so that they may not hear the words of the cursed and the blasphemous, so that they may not lie open to false accusations and lies. Let them be blocked and closed, lest they hear the judgment of blood, or lie open to unchaste songs and theatrical sounds. Let them receive nothing obscene, but let them be turned away from all the filth of corruption. This is the circumcision by which the Church of Christ circumcises the ears of her infants. These, I believe, are the ears which He was seeking in His hearers, saying: He that has ears to hear, let him hear. For no one can hear the clean words of wisdom and truth with uncircumcised and unclean ears. Let us come, if you will, also to the circumcision of the lips. I think that he is uncircumcised in lips who has not yet ceased from foolish talk, from buffoonery, who disparages good men, who accuses his neighbors, who stirs up quarrels, who moves calumnies, who sets brothers against each other by speaking falsely, who utters vain, inept, worldly, unchaste, foul, injurious, insolent, blasphemous things, and the rest that are unworthy of a Christian's mouth. But if anyone keeps his mouth from all these things, and arranges his words with judgment, represses verbosity, tempers his tongue, and moderates his words, he is deservedly called circumcised in lips. But also those who speak iniquity in the Height, and extend their tongue into heaven, as the heretics do, are to be called uncircumcised and unclean in lips. But he is circumcised and clean who always speaks the word of God, and brings forth sound doctrine fortified by evangelical and apostolic rules. In this way, therefore, also the circumcision of the lips is given in the Church of God. D 6. Now, let us see, according to our promise, how the circumcision of the flesh also ought to be received. There is no one who doubts that this member, in which the foreskin is seen to be, serves the natural functions of intercourse and generation. If, therefore, anyone is not immoderate regarding movements of this kind, nor exceeds the limits established by laws, nor knows any woman other than his legitimate spouse, and in her too acts only for the sake of posterity at certain and legitimate times, he is considered circumcised.
A And he who breaks forth into every sort of wantonness, and hangs about everywhere in diverse and illicit embraces, and is carried off unbridled into every whirlpool of lust, he is uncircumcised in the foreskin of his flesh. But the Church of Christ, strengthened by the grace of Him who was crucified for her, tempers herself not only from illicit and nefarious beds but even from permitted and lawful ones, flourishing now as the virgin spouse of Christ, for the chaste and modest virgins, in whom the true circumcision of the flesh’s foreskin has been made, and in whose circumcised flesh the true testament of God and the everlasting testament is eternally kept. It remains for us also to designate the circumcision of the heart. If there is anyone who burns with obscene desires and foul cravings, and, to speak briefly, who commits adultery in his heart, he is uncircumcised in heart. And he who fosters heretical sentiments in his mind and arranges blasphemous assertions against the knowledge of Christ in his heart, he is uncircumcised in heart. But he who keeps a pure faith in the sincerity of his conscience, he is circumcised in heart. Of whom it can be said: Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God. But I myself dare to add to these prophetic words from a similar line of reasoning, because as it is necessary that our ears, and lips, and heart, and the foreskin of the flesh be circumcised, according to what we have said above: so perhaps our hands, and feet, and sight, and smell, and touch also require circumcision. For that the man of God may be perfect in all things, all members must be circumcised: the hands, indeed, away from rapine, theft, and murders, and to be opened only for the works of God. The feet must be circumcised, B lest they be swift to shed blood, and lest they enter into the counsel of the ungodly, but usefully to circulate only for the commandments of God. Let the eyes also be circumcised, lest they covet what is another’s, or look upon a woman to lust after her. For he who wanders with a wanton and curious gaze toward the forms of women, he is uncircumcised in his eyes. And if anyone, whether he drinks or eats, as the Apostle has commanded, eats and drinks for the glory of God, he is circumcised in taste. But he whose god is his belly, and who serves the pleasures of the palate, I would say his taste is uncircumcised. If anyone receives the good fragrance of Christ and seeks the fragrance of sweetness in the works of mercy, his sense of smell is circumcised. But he who walks about anointed with the first ointments, he is to be called uncircumcised in smell. But also, if each and every member serves the duties of the commandments of God, they are to be called circumcised. But if they luxuriate beyond the bounds prescribed for them by God, they are to be judged as uncircumcised. And I think this is what the Apostle says: As you have presented your members to serve iniquity unto iniquity, so now present your members to serve justice unto sanctification. For when your members served iniquity, they were not circumcised, nor was the testament of God in them. But when they have begun to serve justice unto sanctification, the promise which was made to Abraham is fulfilled in them. For then the law of God and His testament is signed in them. And this is truly the sign of faith, which contains the pact of the eternal covenant between God and man. This is the circumcision which is given to the people of God through Jesus by stone knives. But what is the stone knife, and what is the sword by which the people of God is circumcised? Hear the Apostle saying: For the word of God is living and effectual, and more piercing than any two-edged sword, reaching unto the division of the soul and the spirit, of the joints also and the marrow: and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart. This, therefore, is the sword by which we are commanded to be circumcised, C concerning which Jesus the Lord says: I came not to send peace upon earth, but the sword. Does it not seem to you that this is a more worthy circumcision, in which the testament of God ought to be placed? Compare, if you please, these things of ours with your Jewish fables and foul narrations, and see if it is in those fables of yours, or in these things which are preached in the Church of Christ, that circumcision is divinely observed: if you do not even yourself feel and understand that this circumcision of the Church is honest, holy, and worthy of God, while that of yours is base, foul, deformed, and even in its very habit and aspect presenting a cacophemous appearance. And it will be, says God to Abraham, that my circumcision and my covenant shall be upon your flesh. If, therefore, our life be such, so squared and composed in all its members, that all our movements are directed according to the laws of God, the testament of God will truly be upon our flesh. These things, indeed, have been briefly run through by us concerning the Old Testament, to refute those who trust in the circumcision of the flesh, and at the same time to build up the Church of the Lord.
7. But I come also to the New Testament in which is the fullness of all things, and from there I wish to show how we also can have the new testament of our Lord Jesus Christ upon our flesh. For it does not suffice that these things be said by name and word alone, but they must be fulfilled in deeds. For the Apostle John says: Every spirit that confesseth that Jesus is come in the flesh is of God. What then? If anyone, while sinning D and not acting rightly, confesses that Jesus is come in the flesh,
will he be seen to confess it in the Spirit of God? It is not this that is said, that he has the testament of God in the flesh, but in word. Therefore it is said to him immediately: "You err, O man; the kingdom of God is not in word, but in power." A How, then, will the testament of Christ be upon my flesh, I ask? If I have mortified my members, which are upon the earth, I have the testament of Christ upon my flesh. If I always carry about the death of Christ in my body, the testament of Christ is in my body, because "if we suffer, we shall also reign with him." If I have been planted together in the likeness of his death, I show his testament to be upon my flesh. For what does it profit if I say that Christ came only in that flesh which he took from Mary, and do not show that he came also in this flesh of mine? I show it, however, only if, just as I previously offered my members to serve iniquity unto iniquity, I now convert them and offer them to serve righteousness unto sanctification. B I show the testament of God to be in my flesh if I can say according to Paul, "I am crucified with Christ, yet I live, but not I, but Christ liveth in me"; and if I can say as he himself said: "I bear the marks of the Lord Jesus Christ in my body." Indeed, he truly showed the testament of God to be upon his flesh who said: "Who shall separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus? Tribulation? Or distress? Or danger? Or the sword?" For if we confess the Lord Jesus by word only, and do not show his testament to be upon our flesh, according to these things which we have set forth above, we will be seen to be doing something similar to the Jews, who think they confess God with the mere sign of circumcision, but deny him by their deeds. But may the Lord grant us to believe with the heart, to confess with the mouth, and to prove by our works that the testament of God is upon our flesh, so that men, seeing our good works, "may glorify our Father who is in heaven," through Jesus Christ our Lord, to whom is glory for ever and ever. Amen. 71
HOMILY IV.
C on that which is written (11): The Lord appeared to Abraham, etc. 1. Another vision of God to Abraham has been recited to us, in this way: "The Lord," he says, "appeared to Abraham as he sat at the door of his tent at clear midday. And behold, three men stood above him, and looking with his eyes, Abraham saw, and went out to meet them, etc." Let us compare this vision, if it seems right, with that which was done to Lot. Three men come to Abraham and stand above him; to Lot two come, and they sit in the street. See if it is not by the dispensation of the Holy Spirit that things are done according to merit. For Lot was far inferior to Abraham. For if he had not been inferior, he would not have been separated from Abraham, nor would he have said to him: "If you go to the right, I will go to the left; if you go to the left, I will go to the right." And if he had not been inferior, the land and habitation of Sodom would not have pleased him. D Therefore three men come to Abraham at midday, to Lot two come at evening. For Lot could not grasp the magnitude of the midday light. But Abraham was capable of receiving the full radiance of the light. Let us see now how Abraham received those who came, and how Lot did, and let us compare the preparation of hospitality of both. First, however, observe that with Abraham the Lord also was present with the two angels, but to Lot only two angels go. And what do they say? "The Lord has sent us to destroy the city, and to ruin it." Therefore he received those who were coming to destroy, he did not receive him who might save. But Abraham received both him who saves and those who destroy. Now let us see how each one receives. "Abraham," he says, "saw, and ran to meet them." Consider immediately the prompt and ready Abraham in his duties. He himself runs to meet them, and when he had met them: "Make haste," he says, "to the tent, and say to your wife: Make haste to the tent." See in each detail how great is the eagerness of the one receiving. There is haste in all things, all things are urged forward, nothing is done through leisure. "He said, therefore, to his wife Sarah: Make haste to the tent, and knead three measures of fine flour, and make ash-cakes." This is called in Greek *egkruphias*, which indicates secret or hidden loaves. But he himself "ran," he says, "to the oxen and took a calf." But what kind of a calf? Perhaps the one that was able to meet him first? Not so, but a good and tender calf. And although he might make haste in all things, he yet knows what are the best and great things to be offered to the Lord or the angels. Therefore he took or chose from the herd a good and tender calf, and delivered it to the boy. "The boy," he says, "made haste to prepare it." He runs, the wife makes haste, the boy accelerates. No one is lazy in the house of the wise man. He sets out, therefore, the calf, and together with it loaves, and fine flour, and also milk and butter. These are the works of the hospitality of Abraham and Sarah. Now let us see also what Lot does. He has neither fine flour, nor pure bread, but meal. Nor does he know of three measures of fine flour, nor is he able to offer *egkruphias*, that is, hidden and mystical loaves, to those who come. Abraham with the three men who stood above him. See what that is, that they come above him, not against him. For he had submitted himself to the will of God, and therefore God is said to stand above him. He sets out, therefore, breads with three measures of fine flour.Everything that is done is mystical, everything is filled with sacraments. A calf is set before them; behold another sacrament. The calf itself is not hard, but good and tender. And what is so tender, what so good, as He who humbled Himself for us even unto death and laid down His life for His friends? That fatted calf, which the Father slaughters for the penitent son who has been received. For God so loved this world that He gave His only Son for the life of this world. Yet it does not escape the wise man whom he received. He meets the three and worships the one, and speaks to the one saying: "Turn aside to your servant, and refresh yourself under the tree." But why does he add again, as if speaking to men: "Let water be taken, and let your feet be washed"?
Abraham, the father of nations and teacher, teaches you through these things how you ought to receive guests, and that you should wash the feet of your guests; yet this is said in mystery, too. For he knew that the Lord’s sacraments are only to be fulfilled in the washing of feet. Nor was the weight of that command, which is spoken by the Savior, hidden from him: "If anyone shall not receive you, shake off even the dust that has clung to your feet as a testimony against them. Amen I say to you, it shall be more tolerable for the land of Sodom and Gomorrah in the day of judgment than for that city." He wanted, therefore, to forestall and wash their feet, lest by any chance some dust might remain, which, having been shaken off as a testimony of unbelief, could be reserved for the day of judgment. Therefore, the wise Abraham says: "Let water be taken and let your feet be washed."
5. Let us see now what is said in the following. "And he will have a son, Sara your wife." Sara, however, was listening behind the door of her tent after Abraham. Let women learn from the example of the patriarchs; let them learn, I say, O women, to follow their husbands. For it is not without cause that it is written that Sara stood behind Abraham, but that it might be shown that if a husband precedes towards the Lord, the wife ought to follow. And what I say, that a woman ought to follow, I say this in the sense that if she sees her husband standing before God. Otherwise, let us ascend to a higher degree of understanding and say that the husband in us is the B rational sense, and the wife, who is joined to him as to a husband, is our flesh. Let the flesh, therefore, always follow the rational sense, and let it never come to a state of sloth, such that the rational sense, having been reduced to subjection, follows the flesh flowing in luxury and pleasures. Sara stood, therefore, behind Abraham. But we can also perceive something mystical in this place, if we see how, in Exodus, God went before in a pillar of fire by night and in a pillar of cloud by day, and the synagogue of the Lord followed after Him. Thus, therefore, I understand that Sara also followed, or stood behind Abraham.
What is said after these things? "And they were," he says, "both presbyters," that is, old and advanced in their days. As far as the age of the body is concerned, many before them had led their lives through more numerous years, yet no one was called a presbyter. Thus it appears that this name is not ascribed to the saints by reason of longevity, but of maturity.
But Sara was listening behind the door of her tent after Abraham. Let women learn from the example of the patriarchs; let them learn, I say, to follow their husbands. For it is not without cause that it is written that Sara stood behind Abraham, but that it might be shown that if a husband precedes towards the Lord, the wife ought to follow. When I say that a woman ought to follow, I mean it in the sense that she sees her husband standing before God. Otherwise, let us ascend to a higher degree of understanding and say that the husband within us is the rational sense, and the woman, who is joined to him as if to a husband, is our flesh. Let the flesh, therefore, always follow the rational sense, nor should it ever come to a state of sloth, such that the rational sense, when it has been reduced to submission, follows the flesh as it flows in luxury and pleasures. Sara stood, therefore, behind Abraham. But we can also perceive something mystical in this place, if we see how, in Exodus, God preceded in a pillar of fire by night, and in a pillar of cloud by day, and the synagogue of the Lord followed after Him. Thus, therefore, I understand that Sara too followed, or stood behind Abraham. What is said after these things? "And they were," he says, "both presbyters," that is, old and advanced in their days. As far as the age of the body is concerned, many before them had led their lives through more numerous years, yet no one was called a presbyter. Thus it appears that this name is not ascribed to the holy ones by reason of longevity, but of maturity.
5. What then, after such a banquet, is reported that Abraham exhibited to the Lord and the angels under the tree of vision? The guests set out. Abraham, however, was escorting them, he says, and walking with them. The Lord, however, said: "Shall I hide from Abraham my servant what I am about to do? But Abraham will become a great and numerous nation, and in him all the nations of the earth shall be blessed. For I know that he will command his children, and they shall keep the ways of the Lord, so that they may do justice and judgment, that the Lord may fulfill for Abraham what He has indicated to him. And He said: The cry of Sodom and Gomorrah is full, and their sins are very great. I have come down, therefore, to see if they are to be consumed according to their cry that has come to me. But if not, that I may know." These are the words of divine Scripture. Let us see, therefore, now what is worthy to be understood in these things. "I have come down," He says, "to see." When replies are carried to Abraham, God is not said to descend, but to stand above him, as we have explained above. "There stood," he says, "three men above him." But now, because the cause of the sins is being dealt with, God is said to descend. Take care lest you feel a local ascent and descent. For this is frequently found in divine writings, as in the prophet Micah: "Behold," he says, "the Lord shall come forth from His holy place, and shall descend, and shall walk upon the high places of the earth." God, therefore, is said to descend when He deems it worthy to have care for human frailty.
More specifically, we must have sentiments A regarding our Lord and Savior, who "did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied Himself, taking the form of a servant, being made in the likeness of men." Therefore He descends. For no one has ascended into heaven but He who descended from heaven, the Son of Man who is in heaven. The Lord descends, therefore, not only to care for, but also to bear, those things which are ours. For He took the form of a servant, and although He is invisible by nature, being equal to the Father, He nevertheless assumed a visible habit, and was found in habit as a man. But even when He descends, to some He is below, yet to others He ascends and is above. For to the chosen apostles He ascends into a high mountain, and there is transfigured before them. Therefore, to those whom He teaches about the mysteries of the kingdom of heaven, He is above; but to the crowds and the Pharisees, whom He rebukes for their sins, He is below, and there He is with them, where the "below" is. He could not, however, be transfigured below; rather, He ascends above with those who were able to follow Him, and there He is transfigured.
6. He descends, therefore, He says, so that "if I see according to their cry, which comes to Me, they may be consumed. But if not, that I may know." From this statement heretics are accustomed to attack my God, saying: "Behold, God did not know what was being done in Sodom, unless He had descended to see and had sent those who would learn." But let us, for whom it is commanded to fight the battles of the Lord, sharpen against them the sword of the word of God and meet them for battle. Let us stand in the line of battle, our loins girt in truth, and together holding up the shield of faith; let us catch their poisonous darts of argumentation and hurl them back, more carefully balanced, against them. For such are the battles of the Lord, which David and the other patriarchs fought. Let us stand against them for the sake of our brothers. For it is better for me to die than that some of my brothers should be seized and plundered, and that through the shrewd deceptions of words they should lead captive the little ones and the nursing infants in Christ. But with the perfect they will be able neither to engage nor will they dare to come into conflict. We, therefore, first supplicating the Lord and helped by your prayers, let us venture against them the battle of the word. We say, therefore, with confidence that, according to the Scriptures, God does not know all things. God does not know sin, and God does not know sinners; He is ignorant of those who are strangers to Him. Hear the Scripture saying: "The Lord knows those who are His, and let everyone who calls on the name of the Lord depart from iniquity." The Lord knows His own; but the wicked and the impious He does not know. Hear the Savior saying: "Depart from Me, all you workers of iniquity; I do not know you." And again Paul says: "If anyone among you is a prophet or spiritual, let him recognize what I write, that they are the Lord’s. But whoever is ignorant, shall be ignored." We say these things, however, not sensing anything blasphemous about God, as you do, nor attributing ignorance to Him, but we understand it in this way: that those whose deeds are unworthy of God are said to be unworthy even of the knowledge of God. For God does not deign to know him who is turned away from Him and is ignorant of Him. And therefore the Apostle says that "whoever is ignorant, shall be ignored." In such a manner, then, it is also said now concerning those who dwell in Sodom, that, if indeed their deeds are to be consumed according to the cry that ascends to the Lord, they may be judged unworthy of His recognition; but if there is any conversion in them, if even ten just men were found among them, thus at length would God know them. And therefore He said: "But if not, that I may know." He did not say: "That I may know what they are doing," but "that I may know them, and make them worthy of my knowledge, if I should find any just men among them, if I should find any penitent, if I should find any such ones as I ought to know." Finally, because no one who was penitent, no one who would be converted was found, except Lot, he alone is recognized, he alone is delivered from the conflagration. Neither his kin follow the warning, nor his neighbors, nor those near; no one wished to recognize the clemency of God, no one to flee to His mercy. For this reason, also, no one is recognized. These things, indeed, against those who speak iniquity against the Most High. But let us endeavor to make our deeds such, and our conduct such, that we may be deemed worthy of the knowledge of God, that He may deign to know us, that we may be deemed worthy of the knowledge of His Son Jesus Christ, of the knowledge of the Holy Spirit, so that, recognized by the Trinity, we may merit to know the sacrament of the Trinity fully, and integrally, and perfectly, as our Lord Jesus Christ reveals it to us, to whom is glory and dominion forever and ever. Amen.
HOMILY V. On Lot and his daughters.
1. The angels who were sent for the subversion of Sodom, when they were eager to hasten the task enjoined upon them, first took care of their host, Lot, so that they might rescue him from the imminent destruction of the fire, in consideration of his hospitality. Hear this, you who close your homes to strangers; hear this, you who avoid a guest as if he were an enemy. Lot resided in Sodom. We do not read of his other good deeds. Hospitality alone is remembered in him as something that was useful: he escapes the fires, he escapes the conflagration, because of this.
The angels entered his house for hospitality. The house had been closed to guests, but the fire entered the house. Let us see, therefore, what the angels say to their host regarding his acts of hospitality. A *To the mountain,* they say, *save your soul, lest you be caught.* Lot was indeed hospitable, he who (as Scripture bore witness for him) escaped destruction by receiving the angels. But he was not so perfect that he could immediately ascend the mountain when he left Sodom. For it is the way of the perfect to say: *I lifted up my eyes to the mountains, from whence help will come to me.* He, therefore, was neither such a man that he ought to have perished among the Sodomites, nor was he so great that he could dwell with Abraham in the higher places. For if he had been such, Abraham would never have said to him: *If you go to the right, I will go to the left; or if you go to the left, I will go to the right*; nor would Sodomite dwellings have pleased him. He was, therefore, a certain middle figure between the perfect and the lost. And knowing that it was not fitting for his strength to ascend the mountain, he religiously and humbly makes excuse, saying: *I cannot be saved in the mountain, but behold, this city is small, and I shall be saved there, is it not small?* Indeed, having entered Segor, a small city, he is saved there. And after these things, he ascends to the mountain with his daughters. For he could not have ascended the mountain from Sodom (21), although it is written of the land of Sodom, before it was overturned—at the time when Lot chose it for his habitation—that it was *like the garden of God* and *like the land of Egypt*. And yet (to use a small diversion), what kind of neighborhood is seen to be that of the garden of God and the land of Egypt, that Sodom should be compared to them equally? But I think that before Sodom sinned, when it still kept the simplicity of an undefiled life, it was like the garden of God; but when it began to be discolored and obscured by the stains of sins, it became like the land of Egypt. But we inquire also about that which the prophet says: that *your sister Sodom will be restored to her ancient state*; whether, indeed, her restoration will also receive this—that she should be like the garden of God—or whether she will be only like the land of Egypt. I, indeed, doubt whether the sins of the Sodomites can be so thoroughly decocted, and their crimes so purged, that their restoration will be so great that it is compared not only to the land of Egypt, but even to the garden of God. D Those who wish to confirm this urge us on with that word especially which seems to have been added to this promise: for it did not say that Sodom would be restored and stop; but it says: *Sodom will be restored to her ancient state.* And they assert that its ancient state was not like the land of Egypt, but like the garden of God.
2. Let us return to Lot, who, fleeing the destruction of the Sodomites with his wife and daughters, upon receiving the command from the angels not to look behind him, was heading to Segor. But his wife, B forgetful of the command, looks back, breaks the law that was laid down, and is turned into a statue of salt. Do we think that there was so much wickedness committed in this, that because the woman looked back, she fell into the destruction which she seemed to be escaping by divine benefit? For what great crime was it, if the woman’s anxious mind looked back to where she was terrified by the excessive clamor of the flames? But because the law is spiritual, and those things which happened to the ancients happened to them in a figure, let us see if, perhaps, Lot, who did not look behind him, might be the rational sense and the manly spirit, while the wife holds the image of the flesh here. The flesh is that which always looks back to vices; which, when the soul tends toward salvation, looks backward and seeks pleasures. Hence, finally, the Lord also said: *No one putting his hand to the plow and looking back is fit for the kingdom of God.* And he adds: *Remember Lot’s wife.* But that which becomes a statue of salt seems to be an exposition of her foolishness. For salt is set in the place of prudence, which she lacked. Lot, therefore, proceeds to Segor, and there, having collected his strength for a short while—which he could not have in Sodom—he ascends the mountain, and dwells there (as Scripture says), he and his two daughters with him.
3. After this, that famous story is already reported, in which it is written that his daughters stole the embrace of their father by trickery. In this, I do not know if anyone can excuse Lot so as to make him immune from sin. Nor, on the other hand, do I think he should be accused so that he must be held guilty of so grave an incest. For I do not find that he lay in wait, or violently snatched away the chastity of his daughters, but rather that he suffered being ensnared and was circumscribed by craft. But neither, again, would he have been circumvented by the girls, had he not been able to be made drunk. Whence he appears to me to be found partly culpable, and partly excusable. For he can be excused because he is free from the crime of lust and pleasure, and because he is not argued to have desired it himself, nor to have consented to those desiring it. But he is subject to blame, in that he could be deceived, and in that he indulged too much in wine, and did this not once, but twice. For Scripture itself seems to satisfy for him in a way, when it says: *For he did not know when he slept with them, and when he arose.* It is not said of the daughters, who deceive their father with study and craft. Yet he was so lulled by wine that he did not know he had slept with the elder daughter, nor with the younger daughter. Hear what drunkenness does; hear how much crime intemperance brings together. Hear and be wary, you for whom this evil is not a crime, but a habit. Drunkenness deceives the man whom Sodom did not deceive. He is burned by the flames of women, whom the sulfurous flame did not burn. Lot, therefore, was deceived by craft, not by will. Therefore, he is a certain middle figure between sinners and the just: in that he descended from the lineage of Abraham, yet had dwelt in Sodom. For even this, that he escaped from Sodom (as D Scripture indicates), is more to the honor of Abraham than...
to the merit of Lot. For thus it says A: And it came to pass, it says, when God destroyed the cities of the Sodomites, that God remembered Abraham, and cast out Lot from that land.
4. But I think the purpose of his daughters must be considered more diligently, lest perhaps even they themselves deserve not as much blame as is generally thought. For Scripture reports that they said to one another: Our father, they say, is old, and there is no one on the earth who enters unto us, as is fitting for the whole earth. Come, let us make our father drink wine, and let us sleep with him, and let us raise up seed from our father. As far as regards those things which Scripture says about this, it seems even to satisfy something on their behalf. For it appears that the daughters of Lot had learned something about the consummation of the world, which would be impending by fire, but as young girls they had not learned it perfectly and completely; they did not know that, although the Sodomite regions were devastated by fire, much of the world still remained intact. They had heard that at the end of the age the earth and all elements were to be consumed by the ardor of fire. They saw the fire, they saw the sulphurous flames, they saw everything being devastated. They also saw that their mother was not saved, and they suspected that something like this had occurred, such as they had heard of in the times of Noah, and that they alone were saved with their parent for the sake of restoring the posterity of mortals. They take up, therefore, B the desire to recover the human race, and they opine that the beginning of restoring the age must be given from themselves. And although the theft of their father's bed seemed to them a great crime, nevertheless the impiety seemed greater to them if, by maintaining their virginity, they should destroy the hope of human posterity, as they thought. For this reason, therefore, they enter upon a plan—less, as I judge, in guilt, but greater in hope and argument; they soften and dissolve the father’s sadness, or his rigor, with wine. Having entered on separate nights, each C conceives from the ignorant one. They do not repeat, they do not seek it further. Where is the guilt of lust here; where is the crime of incest argued? How shall that be imputed as a vice which is not repeated in the act? I fear to speak what I feel; I fear, I say, lest the incest of these women might have been chaster than the modesty of many. Let women placed in marriages examine themselves and inquire if they approach husbands for this reason alone, that they may conceive children, and if they desist after conception. For these women, who seem to be argued of incest, as soon as they obtained conception, did not again approach the bed of the man. But some women—for we do not mark all alike, but there are some—who, like animals, without any discretion, serve lust incessantly, whom I would not even compare to mute cattle. For cattle themselves know, when they have conceived, not to indulge males with access to them. Divine Scripture also marks such when it says: Do not become like horse and mule, which have no intellect. And again: They have become fed horses. But you, O people of God, who love Christ in incorruption, understand the Apostle’s sermon where he says D: Whether you eat, or drink, or do anything else, do all to the glory of God. For that he says after eating and drinking: Or whatever else you do, he signified the immodest activities of marriage with a modest term, showing that even these are done to the glory of God, if they are procured solely with the contemplation of posterity. We have followed, as we were able, both the faults of Lot and his daughters, and again their excuses.
5. But I know that some, as far as the allegory is concerned, hold that Lot pulled toward the person of the Lord and his daughters toward the two Testaments. But I do not know if one who knows what Scripture says about the Ammonites and Moabites, who descend from the lineage of Lot, would willingly accept these things. For how will it be able to suit Christ, that those who are generated from his seed even unto the third and fourth generation...
and not into the tenth, are not to enter into the Church of Christ, nor into the third generation regarding the Trinity, nor into the fourth regarding the Gospels, nor into the age, unless perhaps when the present age has passed, when the fullness of the Gentiles has entered in, and so all of Israel shall have been saved? These things, as we were able, we have chiseled out according to an allegorical understanding of Lot and his wife and his daughters, in no way prejudicing those who might be able to feel something more sacred concerning this.
6. But indeed, in the moral sense, we have drawn Lot himself to a rational sense and to the soul, and his wife, who looked back, to the flesh given over to concupiscences and pleasures; not neglecting these, listener, take heed. For you ought to observe that, perhaps, even when you have fled the flames of the age, and have escaped the fire of the flesh, even when you have escaped to the little and not little city of Segor, which is a certain middle and civil progress, and have reached the height of knowledge, as though climbing to the summits — do not imagine that these two daughters do not cling to you, who lead you not away, but follow you even as you ascend the mountain, and it is vain glory, and greater is its pride. See that these daughters do not find you sleeping and dormant, while you do not even seem to perceive them, while they bind you with their embraces. Which is why they are called daughters, because they do not supervene upon us from the outside, but proceed from us and from our acts, whatever they are. Therefore, watch as much as you are able, and take care that there are no sons from these; because whosoever shall be born of these, C will not enter into the Church of the Lord. You, however, if you wish to generate, generate in the Spirit, because he who sows in the spirit, from the spirit shall reap eternal life. If you wish to embrace, embrace wisdom and say that wisdom is your sister, and let Wisdom say of you: “He who has done the will of my Father who is in heaven, he is my brother, and sister, and mother.” For that Wisdom is Jesus Christ our Lord, to whom be glory and empire for ever and ever. Amen.
HOMILY VI
Of Abimelech the king of the Philistines, how he wished to take Sarah into matrimony
The history of the book of Genesis is reported to us, where it is recounted how, after the vision of the three men, after the subversion of the Sodomites, and after Lot had been saved by the merit of hospitality or of kinship with Abraham, he set out and came to the king of the Philistines. It is reported that he made a pact with the wife Sarah, so that she would not say she was the wife of Abraham, but rather his sister; and that when Abimelech took her, God entered into Abimelech D at night, and said to him: “Since you have not touched her, you shall not go in to the Church of the Lord.”
After this, Abimelech returned her to her husband and at the same time rebuked Abraham as to why he had not confessed the truth to him. It is further reported that Abraham, like a prophet, prayed for Abimelech and his wife and his handmaids, and the Lord healed Abimelech and his wife and his handmaids. And why was it a concern to the almighty God to heal even the handmaids of Abimelech? Because, as it says, He had A closed up their wombs so that they could not bear. Now, they began to bear because of the prayer of Abraham. If anyone wishes to hear and understand these things only according to the letter, he ought to have his audience with the Jews rather than with Christians. But if he wishes to be a Christian and a disciple of Paul, let him hear him saying that the law is spiritual. And when he was speaking of Abraham and his wife and his sons, he declares that these things are allegorical. And although it is not easy for any of us to find out what kind of allegories these ought to be, one must nonetheless pray that the veil be removed from his heart, if there is anyone who strives to turn to the Lord; for the Lord is the Spirit, so that He Himself may remove the veil of the letter and open the light of the Spirit, and we may be able to say that, with unveiled face, beholding the glory of the Lord, we are transformed into the same image B from glory to glory as by the Spirit of the Lord. I think, therefore, that Sarah, who is interpreted as “princess” or one exercising principality, holds the form of virtue, which is the virtue of the soul. This virtue, then, is joined to and coheres with the wise and faithful man, just as that wise man said concerning wisdom: “I sought to bring her to be my bride.” Therefore, it is said by God to Abraham: “Everything that Sarah says to you, listen to her voice.” This, of course, does not fit in bodily marriage. For it has been said, when that sentence was divinely pronounced which says to the woman concerning her husband: “Your turning shall be to him, and he shall rule over you.” If, therefore, the husband is said to be the lord of the wife, how then could it be said again to the husband: “Everything that Sarah says to you, listen C to her voice”? If, therefore, someone has taken virtue to himself in marriage, let him listen to her voice in everything in which she offers him counsel. Therefore, Abraham does not want virtue to be called his wife any longer. For as long as virtue is called a wife, it is private, and it can be shared with no one. And it is fitting that, until we come to perfection, virtue should be within us in the soul and be private. But when we have come to perfection, so that we are capable of teaching others also, then we should not enclose virtue within our bosom like a wife, but we should share her as a sister even with others who wish to be joined to her. Finally, to those who are perfect, the divine word says: “Say that wisdom is your sister.” According to this, therefore, Abraham said that Sarah was his sister. He allows, then, as one who is now perfect, that he who wishes should have virtue.
2. Yet Pharaoh also once wished to take Sarah, but he did not wish it with a pure heart, and virtue cannot be joined except with purity of heart. Therefore, Scripture reports that the Lord afflicted Pharaoh with great and terrible afflictions. For virtue could not dwell with the “exterminator” (for this is what Pharaoh is interpreted as meaning in our language). But let us see what Abimelech said to the Lord. “You know, Lord,” he said, “that I did this with a pure heart.” This Abimelech acts far differently than Pharaoh. He is not so ignorant and defiled, but knows D that a heart must be made pure to prepare for virtue. And because he wished to receive virtue with a pure heart, for that reason, when God heals, He does it through the prayer of Abraham for him. And He heals not only him, but his handmaids as well. But what is it that Scripture adds, “And the Lord,” it says, “did not permit him to touch her”? If Sarah holds the form of virtue, and Abimelech wished to receive virtue with a pure heart, why is it said that the Lord did not permit him to touch her? Abimelech is interpreted as “my father is king.” And it seems to me, therefore, that this Abimelech holds the form of the students and wise men of this world, who, while applying themselves to philosophy, even if they have not attained the whole and perfect rule of piety, have nevertheless sensed that God is the Father and King of all, that is, that He who has generated all things also rules them. These, therefore, as far as ethics, that is, moral philosophy, is concerned, are proven to have applied themselves somewhat to the purity of the heart, and with all their soul and all their zeal to have sought the inspiration of divine virtue. But God did not permit them to touch her. For this grace was being prepared for the nations not through Abraham, who, although he was great, was nevertheless a servant, but through Christ. Therefore, although Abraham was hastening for it to be fulfilled through him and in him—that which was said to him, that “in you all nations shall be blessed”—nevertheless, the promise is posited for him in Isaac, that is, in Christ, just as the Apostle says: “He did not say, ‘and to seeds,’ as in many, but as in one, ‘and to your seed,’ which is Christ.” Nevertheless, the Lord heals Abimelech, and his wife, and his handmaids.
5. Yet it does not seem to me otiose that there is mention not only of the wife, but also of the handmaids of Abimelech.
A For as much as we are able to perceive in such difficult places, we think that the wife of Abimelech can be called "natural philosophy," and his handmaids the diverse and vain conjectures of dialectic according to the quality of the sects. Meanwhile, Abraham desires to impart the gift of divine virtue even to the nations, but the time B has not yet arrived for the grace of God to pass over from the former people to the nations. For the Apostle also, although under another species and other figure, says nevertheless that a woman is bound to the law as long as her husband lives. But if her husband has died, she is freed from the law of the husband, so that she is no longer an adulteress if she has been with another man. Therefore, the law of the letter must die first, so that the soul, now finally free, may marry the Spirit and be betrothed to the marriage of the New Testament.
But this time in which we now are is the time of the calling of the nations and of the death of the law, whereby free souls, now loosed from the law of the husband, can marry the new husband, Christ. But if you wish to be instructed on how the law is dead, consider and see: where are now the sacrifices, where now the altar, where the temple, where the purifications, where the solemnity of the Passover? Is not the law dead in all these things? Or if those friends and defenders of the letter can, let them keep the letter of the law. According to this order of allegory, then, Pharaoh, who is an unclean man and an exterminator, could not receive Sarah, that is, virtue, at all. Furthermore, Abimelech—that is, he who lived cleanly and philosophically—could indeed receive her, because he sought in a clean heart, but the time had not yet arrived. Therefore, virtue remains with Abraham, remains in circumcision, until the time comes that, in Christ Jesus our Lord, in whom dwells all the fullness of the godhead bodily, C integral and perfect virtue may pass over to the Church of the nations. Then, therefore, both the house of Abimelech and his handmaids, whom the Lord healed, will bear the children of the Church. For this is the time when the barren one brings forth, and when there are many children of the desolate one, more than of her who has a husband. For the Lord opened the womb of the barren one, and she was made fruitful, so that she brings forth a nation at once. But also the saints cry out and say: *Lord, in your fear we have conceived in the womb and have brought forth; we have made the spirit of your salvation upon the earth.* Whence Paul also says similarly: *My little children, of whom I am in labor again, until Christ is formed in you.* Such, therefore, does the whole Church of God bring forth, and such children does she generate. For *he who sows in the flesh, will reap corruption from the flesh.* But these are the children of the spirit, of whom likewise the Apostle says: *A woman will be saved through the procreation of children, if she has remained in faith and chastity.* Let the Church of God, therefore, so understand the prepared things, so receive the generations, so interpret the beautiful and honest deeds of the fathers, D that it may not obscure the words of the Holy Spirit with inept and Jewish fables, but may assign to them the fullness of honesty and the fullness of virtue and utility. Otherwise, what edification will there be for us as we read that Abraham, the great patriarch, not only lied to King Abimelech but also betrayed the chastity of his wife? What does the wife of such a great patriarch edify for us if she is thought to have been exposed to contaminations through marital connivance? Let the Jews think these things, and whoever among them are friends of the letter, not of the Spirit; but let us, comparing spiritual things with spiritual, be made spiritual in act and intellect in Christ Jesus our Lord, to whom is glory and power forever and ever. Amen.
Homily VII.
Concerning the Nativity of Isaac, and that he was weaned.
1. Moses is read to us in the Church. Let us beseech the Lord that, according to the word of the Apostle, since Moses is read among us, a veil may not be set over our heart. For it was read that Abraham had begotten a son, Isaac, when he was one hundred years old. And Sarah said: *Who, she says, will herald to Abraham that Sarah gives suck to a child?* And then, it says, Abraham circumcised the child on the eighth day. Abraham does not celebrate the birthday of this child, but he celebrates the day of his being weaned from milk, and makes a great banquet. What? Do we think that it is the intention of the Holy Spirit to write histories, and to narrate that the child was weaned from milk, and a banquet was made, and how he played, and did other childish things? Or is it to be thought that through these things He wishes to instruct us in something divine, and that which the human race is worthy to learn from the words of God? Isaac is interpreted as "laughter" or "joy." Who, then, is he who begets such a son? Undoubtedly he who was saying concerning those whom he had begotten through the Gospel: *For you are my joy and the crown of the glory of God.* Concerning children of this kind, when they have been weaned from milk, a banquet and great joy are made, concerning those who no longer need milk, but strong food, who by the possibility of taking it have senses exercised for the *discerning of both good and evil.* Over such as these, when they are weaned from milk, a great banquet is made. But over those concerning whom the Apostle says, *I gave you milk to drink, not meat; for you were not yet able, but neither are you able even yet,* a banquet cannot be displayed, nor joy had. And I could not speak to you as to spiritual, but as to carnal, as to infants in Christ. Let those among us who wish the divine Scriptures to be understood simply tell us: what is, *I could not speak to you as to spiritual, but as to carnal, as to infants in Christ, I gave you milk to drink, not meat?* Can these things be taken simply?
2. In the meantime, let us return to that from which we digressed...
for that is the Spirit of God. For to him it is foolishness, and he cannot understand it, because it is spiritually discerned.* And you, if you have the fruit of the Spirit of God, which is love, joy, peace, patience,* you might be Isaac, not born according to the flesh, but according to the promise; and even if you are a son of the free woman, you can, nevertheless, say with Paul:* In the flesh we walk, but we do not war according to the flesh. For the weapons of our warfare are not carnal, but powerful in God for the destruction of fortresses, casting down imaginations, and every (56) height that exalts itself against the knowledge of God. And if you are such a one, A you are rightly fitted for the sentence of the Apostle also, who said:* But you are not in the flesh, but in the spirit, if the Spirit of God dwells in you; and if you are such, you are not born according to the flesh, but according to the spirit by promise, and you are the heir of the promise, according to that which is said:* They are the heirs of God, but co-heirs of Christ. You are not his co-heirs, who is born according to the flesh, but co-heirs of Christ, because although we have known Christ according to the flesh, yet now we know him no longer.*
3. And yet, according to those things which are written, I do not see what moved Sarah, that she commanded the son of the handmaid to be cast out. He was playing with his son Isaac. What had he harmed, or what harm was he doing, if he played? As if it were not a pleasing thing at that age that he should have played, that the son B of the handmaid played with the son of the free woman. Then, however, I marvel at the Apostle, who announced this play as a persecution, saying:* As then he who was born according to the flesh (57) persecuted him who was born according to the spirit, so also now, when there is clearly no persecution of Ishmael against Isaac, unless this be only that he is an infant. But let us see what Paul understood by this play, and what could have moved Sarah. Having already set forth the spiritual interpretation above, we situated the virtues in Sarah. If, therefore, the flesh, whose person Ishmael bears, which is born according to the flesh, fawns upon the spirit, which is Isaac, and deals with it through deceits, and entices it by pleasure, and softens it by voluptuousness, this kind of play of the flesh with the spirit, Sarah especially, who is virtue, C resents, and Paul judges this kind of flattery an extremely harsh persecution. And you, therefore, O listener, do not think that he drives you only to persecute by the fury of the Gentiles unto sacrificing to idols: but if perchance that pleasure of the flesh entices you with any allurement, this, if you are a son of virtue, flee as the greatest persecution. For therefore the Apostle says:* Flee fornication. But if you take this in the injustice of power (58), and you bear the grace of it wrongly, you ought to understand that you are passing a wrong judgment. Because D this is the nature of the flesh: that it always resists the spirit, not only when it is overtly violent, but also when it flatters and fawns. For it seeks to deceive the soul with sweetness and to soothe it with the blandishments of pleasure, so that, lulled to sleep by these, it may be rendered incapable of spiritual struggle. Beware, therefore, of Ishmael, that is, of the flesh, even when it is playing, not only when it is raging against you. For both are a persecution of Isaac.
A Having been born of Sarah, let us see. She casts out the handmaid and her son, but yet she gives to her a skin of water. For his mother did not have a well of living water, nor could the boy draw water from a well. Isaac had wells, for which he even suffers conflicts against the Philistines. Ishmael, however, drinks water from a skin, but this skin, as it were, fails, and therefore he thirsts. But you, who are a son of the promise, like Isaac, drink waters from your own fountains and from your own wells; let your waters not flow out abroad, but let your waters run within in your streets. Truly, he who is born according to the flesh drinks water from a skin, and the water itself fails him, and it fails in many things. The skin of the Law is the letter, from which that carnal people drinks, and from it takes understanding: which letter frequently fails him, and cannot explain itself. For in many things historical intelligence suffers a defect. But the Church drinks from the evangelical and apostolic fountains, which never fail, but run through its streets, because in the breadth of spiritual interpretation they always abound and flow. It drinks also from the wells when it draws forth and examines whatever things are deeper from the Law. Through this, I think, the mystery also which our Lord B and Savior was saying to the Samaritan woman, where it is as if He were speaking with Agar herself, he said: Everyone who drinks of this water will thirst again; but whoever drinks of the water which I shall give him will not thirst forever. And she says to the Savior: Give me, Lord, this water, that I may not thirst, nor come here to draw. After these things, the Lord says to her: He who believes, He says, in me, there shall become in him a fountain of water springing up into life eternal.
6. Agar was wandering through the desert with the boy, and the boy was weeping, and Agar cast him away, saying, Let me not see the death of my son. After these things, when he had already been cast away as if about to die, and had wept, the angel of the Lord is present to her, and opened the eyes of Agar, and she saw a well of living water. How can these things be referred to history? For where do we find that Agar had closed eyes, and they were opened afterward? Is not the spiritual and mystical intelligence clearer than light in these matters—that he who is the people according to the flesh is cast away, and lies so long in famine and thirst, not enduring the famine of bread, C nor the thirst for water, but the thirst for the word of God, until the eyes of the synagogue are opened? This is what the Apostle says is the mystery: That blindness has happened in part to Israel, until the fullness of the Gentiles should come in, and then all Israel should be saved. This, therefore, is the blindness in which Israel has fallen.
Agar, who gave birth according to the flesh: who remains in it A for so long, until the veil of the letter is removed through the Gospel of God, and she sees the living water. For now the Jews lie around that same well, but their eyes are closed; and they cannot drink from the well of the Law and the Prophets. But let us also beware, because we too often lie around the well of living water, that is, around the divine Scriptures, and we wander in them. We hold the books and read them, but we do not grasp the spiritual sense. And therefore it is necessary to ask with tears and incessant prayers that the Lord may open our eyes; for even those blind men who sat in Jericho, if they had not cried out to the Lord, their eyes would not have been opened. And why do I say, "that our eyes may be opened"? For they are already opened. For Jesus came to open the eyes of the blind. Our eyes, therefore, are opened, and the veil has been removed from the letter of the law. But I fear lest we ourselves close them again in a deeper sleep, while we do not watch in spiritual understanding, nor are we anxious to shake off the sleep from our eyes, and contemplate the things that are spiritual, so that we do not wander with the carnal people positioned around the water itself; but rather let us watch, and let us say with the Prophet: If I give sleep to mine eyes, and slumber to mine eyelids, or rest to my temples, until I find a place for the Lord, a tabernacle for the God of Jacob. To Him be glory and power for ever and ever. Amen.
HOMILY VIII. On the fact that Abraham offered his son Isaac.
1. Apply your ears hither, you who believe yourselves to be faithful, and consider more diligently how the faith of the faithful is proven by these things which have been read to us. *And it came to pass*, he says, *after these words, that God tempted Abraham, and said to him: Abraham, Abraham. And he said: Behold, here am I.* Observe each thing that is written. For in each, if one knows how to dig deep, he will find a treasure; and perhaps even where it is not suspected, there lie the precious necklaces of the mysteries. This man was previously called Abram, and we nowhere read that God called him by this name, or said to him, "Abram, Abram." For he could not be called by God by a name that was to be destroyed, but he calls him by this name which He Himself bestowed, and not only does he call him by this name, but he doubles it. And when he had answered: *Behold, here am I*, He says to him: *Take thy most dear son whom thou lovest, Isaac, and offer him to me.* Go, He says, *into the high land, and there thou shalt offer him as a burnt offering upon one of the mountains which I will show thee.* B The reason, indeed, why God gave him this name, and called him Abraham, He Himself interpreted, because "I have made thee," He says, "a father of many nations." This promise God gave him when he already had his son Ishmael, but the promise is to be fulfilled in the son who was to be born of Sara. His soul, therefore, had been kindled for the love of the son, not only for the sake of posterity, but also by the hope of the promises. But this son, in whom these great and wonderful promises were placed for him—this son, I say, in whom his name was called Abraham—he is commanded to offer as a burnt offering to the Lord on one of the mountains. What do you say to these things, O Abraham? What and what kind of thoughts are stirred in your heart? A voice has been uttered by God, which may sift and put to the test your faith. What do you say to this? What do you think? What do you reflect upon? Do you perchance turn it over in your heart that, if the promise was given to me in Isaac, but I am now offering him as a burnt offering, it remains that no promise is to be expected? Or do you rather reflect on those things and say that it is impossible for Him who promised to lie; whatever that may be, the promise will remain? But I, because I am the least, am not able to scrutinize the thoughts of so great a patriarch, nor can I know what thoughts the voice of God which had proceeded to tempt him stirred in him, or what state of mind he brought when he was commanded to slaughter his only son. But since the spirit of the prophets is subject to the prophets, the Apostle Paul, who by the Spirit, I believe, had learned the state of mind and the counsel that Abraham held, pointed it out, saying: *By faith Abraham, when he was put to the test, offered up his only son, in whom he had received the promises, considering that God is able to raise him up even from the dead.* The Apostle has therefore revealed to us the thoughts of the faithful man, that the faith of the resurrection had already begun to be held in the case of Isaac. Abraham, therefore, hoped that Isaac would rise again, and believed that to be in the future, which had not yet been done. How then are they sons of Abraham, who do not believe in Christ that what he believed would be in the future, for Isaac, actually happened? Nay, to speak more openly, Abraham knew that the image of the future truth was being prefigured in him, he knew that Christ was to be born of his seed, who was both to be offered up as the truer sacrifice of the whole world, and was to rise from the dead.
2. But now meanwhile He tempted, he says, Abraham and says to him: *Take thy most dear son whom thou lovest.* For it had not sufficed to have said "son," but "most dear" is added. Let it be even so: what is yet added, "and whom thou lovest"? But look at the weight of the temptation. By dear and sweet appellations repeated again and again, fatherly affections are stirred up, so that as the memory of love awakens, the fatherly right hand might be retarded from immolating the son, and the whole militia of the flesh might fight against the faith of the mind; there is added at the time of the temptation: *Take, he says, therefore thy most dear son, whom thou lovest, Isaac.* Be it so, Lord, since you remind the father of his son, you add also "most dear," whom you command to be slaughtered. Let this suffice for the punishment of a father. You add again, "and whom thou lovest."
But why is this added in time? So that Abraham might remember that you had said to him, "In Isaac shall seed be called for thee," and that "in Isaac there shall be promises for thee." A commemoration of the name is also made, so that despair might seize him regarding the promises which were made under this name. But all these things [happen], because God was testing Abraham.
A 3. What after this? "Go," he says, "into the high land, to one of the mountains which I shall show thee, and there thou shalt offer him as a burnt offering." Observe, through each detail, how the increments of the testing come about. "Go into the high land." Could Abraham not have been led first with the boy to that high land, and have been placed first upon whatever mountain the Lord had chosen, and there be told to offer his son? But first it is said to him that he ought to offer his son, and then he is commanded to go into the high land and to ascend the mountain. To what does this point? So that while he walks, while he makes the journey, he may be torn throughout the whole way by his thoughts, so that, being tortured on the one hand by the task pressing upon him, and on the other hand by his affection for his only son struggling against it. For this reason, therefore, the journey is also enjoined, and the ascent of the mountain as well, so that in all these things his affection and faith, the love of God and the love of the flesh, the grace of present things and the expectation of future things, might receive a space for the struggle. He is sent, therefore, into the high land, and it does not suffice for the patriarch, who is about to perform so great a task for the Lord, to have [merely] the high land, but he is commanded to ascend the mountain also, namely, so that, lifted up by faith, he might abandon earthly things and ascend to those above.
B 4. *Abraham, therefore, rose in the morning, and he split the wood for the burnt offering. And he took his son Isaac, and two servants, and arrived at the place which God had told him on the third day.* Abraham rose in the morning. By adding "in the morning," he perhaps wanted to show that the beginning of light was shining in his heart. He saddled his donkey, prepared the wood, [and] took his son. He does not deliberate, he does not delay, he does not share his plan with any man, but immediately he occupies the road. And he arrived, he says, at the place which the Lord had told him on the third day. I omit for now what mystery the third day contains; I gaze upon the wisdom and counsel of the One testing him. Thus there was no mountain nearby, although the whole event took place on mountains, but the journey is extended over three days, so that throughout the whole three days, with cares recurring, the father's vitals might be tormented, and during all this space so long, the father might gaze upon his son, take food with him, [and wonder how] for so many nights the boy might hang in the embraces of his father, cling to his breast, sleep in his bosom? See to what extent the testing is accumulated. The third day, however, is always made suitable for mysteries. For even when the people had gone out of Egypt, on the third day they offered sacrifice to God, and on the third day they were purified. And the resurrection of the Lord is on the third day; and many other mysteries are concluded within this day.
5. *Looking forth,* he says, *Abraham saw the place from afar, and said to his servants: Sit here with the donkey, but I and the boy will go as far as that, and when we have worshipped, we will return to you.* He dismisses the servants. For the servants could not ascend with Abraham to the place of the burnt offering which God had shown. "You, [then]," he says, "sit [here]; but I and the infant will go, and when we have worshipped, we will return to you." Tell me, Abraham, are you speaking the truth to the servants, that you will worship and return with the infant, or are you deceiving them? If you speak the truth, then you will not make him a burnt offering. If you are deceiving them, it is not fitting for the patriarch to deceive. For what state of mind does this speech of yours indicate? "I speak the truth," he says, "and I offer the boy as a burnt offering. For that reason I carry the wood with me, and I return with him to you. For I believe, and this is my faith, that God is able to raise him up even from the dead."
C 6. *After these things,* he says, *Abraham took the wood for the burnt offering, and placed it upon his son Isaac, and he took fire in his hands, and a sword, and they went both together.* That Isaac carries the wood for the burnt offering for himself, that is a figure [of the fact] that Christ also carried His own cross, and yet it is the duty of the priest to carry the wood for the burnt offering. He becomes, therefore, both victim and priest. But that which is added, "and they went both together," is referred to this: that when Abraham, as if about to sacrifice, carried the fire and the knife, Isaac does not walk behind him, but with him, so that it might be shown that he performs the priesthood equally with him. What after this? *Isaac,* he says, *said to Abraham his father: Father.* And this cry, uttered by the son at this time, is one of temptation. For how, do you think, did the son, through this voice, strike the paternal vitals about to be sacrificed? And although Abraham was more rigid for the sake of faith, yet he himself also returns a voice of affection, and answered: "What is it, my son?" But he: "Behold," he says, "the fire and the wood, where is the sheep for the burnt offering?" To this Abraham answered: "God will provide for Himself a sheep for a burnt offering, my son." The sufficiently diligent and cautious answer of Abraham moves me. I know not what he saw in spirit, because he speaks not of the present, but of the future: "God will Himself provide for Himself a sheep"; for the future he answered the son who was asking about present things. For the Lord Himself was providing for Himself a sheep in Christ, because even Wisdom built a house for herself, and He humbled Himself even unto death; and whatever you read about Christ, you will find were done not by necessity, but of His own free will.
7. *They went, therefore, both together, and arrived at the place which God had told him.* When Moses had come to the place which God showed him, he is not permitted to ascend, but it is told him beforehand: *Loose the latchet from off thy feet.* To Abraham D you will prefer none of these things over God, [but rather...]
nor will it be acknowledged that you fear God, nor will it be said of you, "Now I know that you fear God." And yet it must be considered that it is an angel who is reported to have spoken these things to Abraham, and that in what follows this angel is evidently shown to be the Lord. Whence I think that, just as He was found among us humans in the guise of a man, so also He was found among the angels in the guise of an angel. And following His example, the angels in heaven rejoice over one sinner who repents, and they glory in the advancements of men. For they hold as it were the guardianship of our souls, to whom, while we are still as little children, we are entrusted as guardians and stewards until the time appointed by the Father. And they, therefore, also say now regarding the progress of each one of us, "Now I know that thou fearest God." For instance, I have the intention of martyrdom; the angel cannot say to me from this alone, "Now I know that thou fearest God." For to God alone is the intention of the mind known. But if I proceed to the struggle, if I bring forward a good confession, and if I steadfastly receive all the things that are brought against me, then the angel can say, as if confirming and strengthening me: "Now I know that thou fearest God." But these things were spoken to Abraham so that it might be declared that he feared God. Why? Because he did not spare his own son. But let us compare these things with the words of the Apostle, where he says of God: "He who did not spare his own Son, but delivered Him up for us all." See God vying with men in magnificent generosity. Abraham offered to God a mortal son who was not to die; God delivered the immortal Son to death for all. What shall we say to these things? What shall we return to the Lord for all that He has returned to us? God the Father did not spare His own Son for our sake. Which of you, do you suppose, will one day hear the voice of the angel saying, "Now I know that thou fearest God, because thou hast not spared thy son or thy daughter, or thy wife, or hast not spared money, or the honors of the age, and the ambitions of the world, but hast despised all things and counted them all as dung, so that thou mightest gain Christ, and hast sold all things and given to the poor, and hast followed the Word of God?" Which of you, do you suppose, will hear such a voice from the angels? Abraham hears this voice again, and it is said to him, because you did not spare your beloved son for my sake.
9. And looking up, it says, Abraham saw, D and behold a ram caught by its horns in the thicket of Sabek. We have said, I think, in the preceding pages that Isaac bore the form of Christ, but this ram also, nonetheless, seems to bear the form of Christ. But how both are fitting for Christ—both Isaac, who was not slaughtered, and the ram, who was slaughtered—is worth the effort to discover.
is to know. Christ is the Word of God, but the Word was made flesh. There is, therefore, in Christ one thing from the things above, A another assumed from human nature and a virginal womb. Christ suffers, therefore, but in the flesh; and he endured death, but in the flesh, of which this ram is a figure, just as John also said: Behold the Lamb of God, behold him who taketh away the sins of the world. The Word, however, remained in incorruption, which is Christ according to the spirit, whose image is Isaac. Therefore he is himself both the host and the high priest according to the spirit. For he who offers the host to the Father according to the flesh is himself offered upon the altar of the cross, because, just as it was said concerning him: Behold the Lamb of God, behold him who taketh away the sin of the world; so it was said concerning him: Thou art a priest forever according to the order of Melchizedek. The ram, therefore, is held by its horns in the thicket of Sabech.
10. And he took, it says, the ram, and offered it as a holocaust instead of Isaac his son, and Abraham called the name of that place, The Lord seeth. To those who know how to hear these things, the path of spiritual understanding is clearly opened. For all things that have been done reach out toward a vision. For it is said that the Lord seeth. But the vision which the Lord saw is in the spirit, so that you too may see these things which are written in the spirit; and just as in the Lord there is nothing corporeal, so also may you feel nothing corporeal in all these things; but in the spirit you may also beget the son Isaac, when you have begun to have the fruit of the spirit, joy, peace. Yet you will beget this son only if, as it is written concerning Sara, that the ways of women had ceased for Sara, and then she brought forth Isaac, so too the ways of women may cease in your soul, so that B you may have nothing womanish and effeminate in your soul, but act in a manly way, and gird up your loins in a manly way; if your breast be fortified with the breastplate of justice, if you be girded with the helmet of salvation and the sword of the spirit. If, therefore, the ways of women cease in your soul, you beget a son from your spouse through virtue and wisdom, joy and gladness. Moreover, you beget joy if you have deemed it all joy when you have fallen into various temptations, and you offer this joy as a sacrifice to God. For when you have approached God joyfully, he returns to you what you have offered, and says to you that you will see me again, and your heart will rejoice, and no one will take your joy from you. Thus, therefore, the things which you offer to God, you will receive multiplied. D Something of this kind, though through another figure, is related in the Gospels, when it is said through a parable that someone received a mina so that he might trade and seek the money of the householder. But if you have brought five multiplied into ten, they are given to you yourself, they are conceded to you. For hear what he says: Take away, he says, the mina from him, and give it to him who has ten minas. Thus, therefore, we seem indeed to trade for the Lord, but the gains of the trading accrue to us: and we seem to offer hosts to the Lord, A but those things which we offer are returned to us. For God needs nothing, but wishes us to be rich, he desires our progress through every individual thing. This figure is shown to us even in those things which were done regarding Job. For he too, when he was rich, lost all things for the sake of God. But because he endured the struggles of patience well, and was magnanimous in all the things he suffered, and said: The Lord gave, the Lord hath taken away: as it hath pleased the Lord, so is it done, blessed be the name of the Lord: see at the end what is written concerning him: He received, it says, all things twofold that he had lost. You see what it is to lose something for God, this is to receive multiplied things for yourself. And the Gospels promise something more, they promise you a hundredfold, and in addition eternal life, in Christ Jesus our Lord, to whom is glory and power for ever and ever. Amen.
HOMILY IX.
Concerning the second promises made to Abraham.
1. As much as we progress in reading, so much the heap of mysteries increases for us. And just as if someone, carried in a small ship, should enter the sea, as long as he is near land, he fears less: but when he has progressed gradually into the deep, and with the waves swelling, he begins either to be lifted on high or to be led down into the depths by those selfsame falling waves; there indeed a huge dread and fear strikes the mind, that he has trusted a small raft to such immense billows: so we too seem to suffer, who, small in merits and thin in talent, dare to enter such a vast sea of mysteries. But if, C as you pray, the Lord deigns to give us a prosperous breeze of his Holy Spirit, we shall enter the harbor of salvation by the second course of the word. Let us see, therefore, now what these things are which have been read to us. And, it says, the angel of the Lord called to Abraham from heaven the second time, saying: By my own self I have sworn, saith the Lord: because thou hast done this word, and hast not spared thy beloved son for my sake, I will bless thee, and I will multiply thee, and thy seed shall be as the stars of heaven in multitude, and as the sand of the sea, which cannot be numbered, etc. These things require a thoughtful and attentive listener. For it is new that it says: And the angel of the Lord called to Abraham from heaven the second time. What, however, it adds, is not new. For I will surely bless thee has been said before; and I will multiply thee has been promised before; and thy seed shall be as the stars of heaven, and as the sand of the sea, had been announced before. What therefore is there now more that is shouted a second time from heaven? What new thing is added to the old promises? What greater reward is given in that which it says: Because thou hast done this word, that is, because thou hast offered thy son, because thou hast not spared thine only son? nothing
A else do I see added, and the same things are repeated which had been promised before. Will it therefore seem superfluous that these things are retracted so often? No, it is necessary. For in the sacraments all things that are done have their reasons. If Abraham had lived only according to the flesh, and had been the father of one people alone whom he begot according to the flesh, a single promise would suffice. But now, in order to show that he was first to be the father of those who are circumcised according to the flesh, the promise is given to him at the time of his circumcision, which was to pertain to the people of the circumcision. Secondly, because he was also to be the father of those who are of faith, and who come to the inheritance through the passion of Christ, the promise is renewed nonetheless at the time of Isaac’s passion, a promise which should pertain to that people who are saved by the passion and resurrection of Christ. And although the same things seem to be repeated, they are far different. For those things which were said before, and which pertain to the former people, were said on earth. For thus Scripture says: And he led him forth, from the tent, that is, and said to him: Look up to the heavens, if they can be numbered by the multitude. And he added: So shall thy seed be. But where the promise is repeated a second time, it designates that He spoke to him from heaven, and the first promise is of earth, the second of heaven. Does it not seem to clearly designate here what the Apostle says: The first man is of the earth, earthly; the second man is from heaven, heavenly? Therefore this promise, which pertains to the faithful people, is from heaven; that one was of the earth. In that one there was only speech, but here an oath is interposed, which the holy Apostle, writing to the Hebrews, interprets in this way, saying: Wishing, he says, that God show to the heirs of the promise the immobility of His counsel, He interposed an oath. And again: Men, he says, swear by what is greater than themselves, but because God had no one greater by whom He could swear, by Himself I swear, says the Lord. Not that the necessity of an oath compelled God. For who would exact a sacrament from Him? But as the Apostle Paul has interpreted, in order by this to designate the immobility of His counsel to the worshippers. Thus also it is said elsewhere through the Prophet: The Lord has sworn, and He will not repent, thou art a priest forever after the order of Melchisedech. B Then, next, in the first promise there is no reason given for why the promise was made, except only that He led him forth and, he says, showed him the stars of heaven, and said, So shall thy seed be. Now, however, He adds the reason for which He confirms by an oath that the promise will remain firm. He says, in fact: Because thou hast done this word, and hast not spared thy son. He shows, therefore, that because of the offering or the passion of the son, the promise is firm: clearly signifying that because of the passion of Christ, the promise remains firm for the people from the Gentiles, who are of the faith of Abraham. And are the second things firmer than the first in this alone? In many things of this kind you will find sacraments adumbrated. Moses shattered the first tablets of the Law in the letter and cast them away; he received the second law in the spirit, and the second ones are firmer than the first. Again, the same person, when he had comprised the whole law in four books, wrote Deuteronomy, which is called the second law. Ishmael is the first, Isaac the second, and in the second the form of the preference is preserved. This you will find adumbrated in the same way in Esau and in Jacob, in Ephraim and in Manasseh, and in a thousand others.
2. But let us now return to ourselves, and let us treat the place for each individual. The Apostle says, as we have already remembered above: The first man is of the earth, earthly; the second man is from heaven, heavenly. Such as is the earthly, such also are the earthly; and such as the heavenly, such also are the heavenly. As we have borne the image of the earthly, let us bear also the image of the heavenly. You see what he shows, that if you remain in that which is first, which is of the earth, you will be rejected unless you change yourself, unless you are converted, unless, having become heavenly, you receive the image of the heavenly. This is the same thing that he says elsewhere: Putting off C you the old man with his deeds, and putting on the new, who has been created according to God. He writes the same thing also in another place: Behold, the old things have passed away, all things have become new. Therefore, God renews His promises, that He may show you that you also must be renewed. He does not remain in the old things, lest you also remain an old man. He speaks of heaven, that you also may receive the image of the heavenly. For what does it profit you if God renews the promises, and you are not renewed? If He speaks from heaven, and you hear from the earth? What does it profit you if God binds by an oath, and you pass over these things as if you were hearing a common fable? Why do you not consider that because of you God embraces even those things which seem in no way suitable to His nature? God is said to swear, so that you, hearing, may fear and tremble, and, struck with fear, may inquire what that is so great for which God is said to swear. These things happen, therefore, so that you may become attentive and solicitous, and, hearing that a promise is prepared for you in the heavens, you may watch and seek out how you might show yourself worthy of divine promises. Nevertheless, the Apostle also interprets this passage, saying, that God promised to Abraham, and to his seed: he did not say, and to seeds, as if of many, but as of one, and D your seed, who is Christ. Therefore, regarding Christ, he says...
it is said A: I will multiply your seed as the stars of heaven in number, and as the sand which is on the seashore. Who now needs an explanation to know how the seed of Christ is multiplied, when he sees the preaching of the Gospel propagated from the ends of the earth to the ends of the earth, and that there is almost no place by now which has not received the seed of the Word? For this was prefigured even at the beginnings of the world, when it was said to Adam: Increase and multiply. This is what the Apostle himself says applies to Christ and to the Church. But as to what he said: As the stars of heaven in number, and added, as the sand which is on the seashore innumerable, perhaps someone might say that the figure of the celestial number refers to the Christian people, and that of the sand of the sea refers to the Jewish people. But I think rather that both examples can be applied to both peoples. For even in that former people there were many just men and prophets, to whom the example of the stars of heaven is deservedly compared; and in our people there are many who relish earthly things, and whose foolishness is heavier than the sand of the sea; among whom I believe the crowds of heretics should especially be reckoned. But let us not be secure ourselves; for until any one of us puts off the image of the earthly and puts on the image of the celestial, he is compared to earthly examples. Whence also the Apostle, moved—as I think—by these things, forms an image of the resurrection in celestial and terrestrial bodies, saying: There is one glory of the celestial, and another of the terrestrial. And star differs from star in brightness, so also will be the resurrection of the dead. But the Lord also, when he says: Let your light so shine before men, that seeing your good works men may glorify your Father who is in heaven, warns the same thing to him who knows how to listen.
3. But that Christ is the seed of Abraham and the son of Abraham, if you wish to learn more clearly from the words of Scripture, hear how it is written in the Gospel: The book, it says, of the generation of Jesus Christ, the son of David, the son of Abraham. In this, therefore, is fulfilled that saying which he speaks: Your seed shall inherit the cities of his adversaries. How did Christ inherit the cities of the adversaries? Without doubt, because their sound has gone out into all the earth, and their words to the ends of the world. Whence also those angels were aroused to anger who held every nation under power B. For when the Most High divided the nations according to the number of the angels of God, then Jacob became His portion, and Israel the cord of His inheritance. For Christ, to whom the Father had said: Ask of me, and I will give you the nations as your inheritance, and the ends of the earth as your possession; C removing those angels from the power and dominion which they held over the nations, provoked them to anger. And therefore it says, that the kings of the earth stood up, and the princes gathered together in one, against the Lord, and against His Christ. And therefore they also oppose us, and stir up battles and struggles against us. Hence also the Apostle of Christ: Our wrestling, he says, is not against flesh and blood, but against principalities and powers, and the rulers of this world. Therefore, we must be vigilant and act with care, because our adversary, like a roaring lion, goes about, seeking whom he might devour. To whom, if we do not resist, being strong in the faith, he will again call us back into captivity. And if this should befall us, we will make his work ungrateful—he who affixed principalities and powers to his cross, D triumphing over them with confidence in himself, and who came to let the captives go in remission. But rather, let us, following the faith of Christ who triumphed over them, break their chains with which they bound us to their power. The chains, indeed, with which they constrain us, are our passions and vices, with which we are bound for so long, until we crucify our flesh with its vices and concupiscences, and thus at last break their chains and cast off their yoke from us. Therefore, the seed of Abraham, that is, the seed of the Word—which is the preaching of the Gospel and the faith of Christ—has occupied the cities of the adversaries. But I say: Has the Lord used iniquity, that He snatched the nations from the power of the adversaries, and called them back to His faith and dominion? By no means. For Israel was at one time a portion of the Lord, but they made Israel sin against their God, and because of their sins God said to them: Behold, you are scattered by your sins, and because of your sins you are dispersed under the whole heaven. But He says to them again: If your dispersion be from the end of heaven even to its end, thence will I gather you, says the Lord. Because, therefore, the princes of this world had invaded the portion of the Lord, it was necessary for the good shepherd, having left the ninety-nine in the heavenly regions, to descend to the earth and seek the one sheep that had perished, and, having found it and carried it on his shoulders, to call it back to the heavenly fold of perfection. But what does it profit me if the seed of Abraham, which is Christ, inherits the cities of the adversaries, and does not possess my city? If in my city—that is, in my soul, which is the city of the great King—neither His laws nor his institutions are kept? What does it profit me that He has subjected the whole world and possesses the cities of the adversaries, if He does not also conquer His adversaries in me, if He does not destroy the law which is in my members fighting against the law of my mind, and leads me captive...
to the law of sin? So, therefore, let each one of us strive sufficiently so that, both in his soul and in his body, Christ may conquer His adversaries, and by subduing and triumphing over them, may also possess the city of his soul. For in this way we are made a part of Him, the better part which is as the stars of heaven in brightness, so that we too may be able to receive the blessing of Abraham, through Christ our Lord, to whom is honor and glory in the ages of ages. Amen.
HOMILY X. On Rebecca, when she had gone out to draw water, and the servant of Abraham had met her.
1. Isaac, the Scripture says, was growing and being strengthened, that is, the joy of Abraham was growing, as he looked not to those things which are seen, but to those which are not seen. For Abraham did not rejoice in present things, nor in the riches of the world and the deeds of the age. But do you wish to hear whence Abraham rejoiced? Hear the Lord saying to the Jews: Abraham your father desired to see my day, and he saw it, and was glad. By this, therefore, was Isaac growing, by which that vision of Abraham, in which he saw Christ's day, and the hope which is in Him, was accumulating joys. And I would that you might also become Isaacs and be the joy of your mother, the Church! But I fear that the Church still brings forth children in sadness and groaning. Is there not sadness and groaning for her, when you do not assemble A to hear the word of God, and scarcely proceed to church on feast days, and this not so much out of a desire for the Word, as out of a zeal for the solemnity and, in a certain way, under the pretext of a public remission? What then am I to do, to whom the dispensation of the Word has been entrusted? For though I am an unprofitable servant, I have nevertheless received from the Lord the measure of wheat to be distributed to the Lord's family. But see what the sermon of the Lord adds: To be distributed, He says, in time, the measure of wheat. What then shall I do? Where or when shall I find your time? You spend much of this—nay, almost the whole time—in worldly occupations in the forum; you consume another part in business; one is free for the field, another for lawsuits, and for hearing the word of God no one, or very few, are free. But why do I blame you for occupations? Why do I complain about those who are absent? Even those who are present and placed in the Church are not intent, but spend time on common fables, and turn your backs on the word of God or divine readings. I fear lest it be said to you B by the Lord that which was spoken through the prophet: They turned their backs to me, and not their faces. What then shall I do, to whom the ministry of the word of God is entrusted? The things which are read are mystical, they must be explained in allegorical sacraments. Can I force the pearls of the word of God upon deaf and averted ears? The Apostle did not act in this way. For see what he says: You who read the law, he says, you do not hear the law. For Abraham indeed had two sons, and the C rest, to which he adds: Which are allegorical. Did he reveal the sacraments of the law to them who neither hear nor read the law? But he was speaking to those who were reading the law: You have not heard the law. How then shall I be able to open and disclose the mysteries of the law and the allegories, which we have been taught by the Apostle, to those for whom both the hearing and the reading of the law is unknown? Perhaps I seem too harsh to you, but I cannot smooth over a wall that is falling. For I fear that which is written: My people, they who bless you, seduce you, and confuse the paths of your feet; like most dear children I admonish you. I am astonished if the way of Christ is not yet known to you: if you have not even heard this, that it is not the broad and spacious, but the narrow and constrained way that leads to life. Do you, therefore, enter through the narrow gate; leave the breadth to those who are perishing. The night is far spent, and the day is at hand; walk, therefore, as children of light. The time is short; it remains that those who have wives be as though they had none, and those who use this world, as though they did not use it. The Apostle commands to pray without ceasing. You who do not assemble for prayers, how do you fulfill [what is] without ceasing, which you always omit? But the Lord also commands: Watch and pray, lest you enter into temptation. But if they, watching and D praying, and always clinging to the word of God, nevertheless in no way escaped temptation, what are they doing, those who assemble at church only on solemn days? If the just man shall scarcely be saved, where shall the sinner and the ungodly appear? It grieves me to say anything from those things which have been read. For the Apostle also says of such discourses, that they are difficult to explain for speaking; because you, he says, have become dull of hearing.
2. Let us see, however, this which has now been recited to us. Rebecca, he says, was coming with the daughters of the city to draw water from the well. Rebecca was coming daily to the wells, daily she was drawing water. And because she was free daily for the wells, therefore she could be found by the servant of Abraham, and be joined in matrimony to Isaac. Do you think these are fables, and that the Holy Spirit narrates histories in the Scriptures? This is an education of souls, and a spiritual doctrine, which instructs you, and teaches you to come daily to the wells of the Scriptures, to the waters of the Holy Spirit, and to always carry back to the house a full vessel, just as the holy Rebecca did, who could not otherwise have been joined to so great a patriarch, Isaac, who was born from the promise, unless by drawing waters; and by drawing to such an extent, that not only could she give to drink to those who were at home, but also to the servant of Abraham; and not only to the servant, but she abounded in the waters which she drew from the wells so much, that she could also water the camels, until they ceased.
“They drank,” it says 26. All things that are written are mysteries; Christ wishes to espouse you to Himself: for He speaks to you through the prophet, saying: *I will espouse you to me forever, and I will espouse you to me in faith and mercy, and you shall know the Lord* 27. Since, therefore, Christ wishes to betroth (65) you to Himself, that is, to espouse you, He sends this servant ahead to you. This servant is the prophetic word, which, unless you first receive, you cannot be wed to Christ. Know, however, that no one who is untrained and unskilled receives the prophetic word, but rather he who knows how to draw water from the bottom of the well, and he who knows how to draw so much that it suffices even for those who seem irrational and perverse, whose figure the camels hold: so that he himself can say: *I am debtor to the wise and the unwise* 28. Finally, this servant had said in his heart: *Of those maidens*, he says 27, *who come to the water, whoever shall say to me: Drink you, and I will water your camels, she shall be the spouse of my lord*. Thus, therefore, Rebecca, who is interpreted as patience (66), when she saw the servant and looked upon the prophetic word, she takes down the pitcher from her shoulder. For she puts down the arrogance of Greek eloquence, and inclining herself to such a humble and such a simple prophetic word, she says: Drink you, and I will water your camels. B 3. But you say perhaps, if she holds the figure of the prophetic word, how is she watered by Rebecca, whom she herself ought rather to water? See, therefore, lest perhaps, just as the Lord Jesus, although He Himself is the bread of life, and He Himself feeds hungry souls, He Himself confesses in turn that He is hungry when He says 28: *I was hungry, and you gave me to eat*, and again, although He Himself is living water and gives drink to all who thirst, He Himself in turn says to the Samaritan woman 29: *Give me to drink*; so also the prophetic word, although it gives drink to those who thirst, nonetheless is said to be watered by them when it receives the exercises and vigilance of the studious. Such a soul, therefore, which does all things patiently, which is so prompt and supported by such great erudition, which has been accustomed to draw from the depths the streams of knowledge, is able to be coupled to the nuptials of Christ. Therefore, unless you come daily to the wells, unless you draw waters daily, not only will you not be able to water others, but you yourself also will suffer the thirst of the word of God. Hear also the Lord saying in the Gospels 30: *If any man thirst, let him come to me and drink*. But you, as I see, neither hunger nor thirst for justice, and how will you be able to say 31: *As the hart panteth after the fountains of water, so my soul panteth after you, O God. My soul hath thirsted after the living God* (67): *when shall I come and appear before the presence of him?* I beseech you who always attend the auditorium of the Word, accept patiently, until I remind those who are a little negligent and slothful. Have patience, because it is a sermon about Rebecca for us, that is, about patience. And it is necessary for us to correct with a little patience those who neglect the gathering and turn away from hearing the word of God, who do not desire the bread of life, nor the living water, who do not go out from the camp, nor proceed from the muddy houses, so that they may gather manna for themselves, who do not come to the rock, that they may drink from the spiritual rock. For the rock is Christ, as the Apostle says 32. Have patience, I say, a little. For our sermon is to the negligent and to those who are ill. *For they that are whole need not the physician, but they that are sick* 33. Tell me, you (68) who only on feast days gather at the church, are the other days not feast days? Are they not days of the Lord? It is for the Jews to observe certain and rare solemn days. And therefore God says to them 34: *Your new moons, and your sabbaths, and the great day, I will not abide. Your fasts, and your holidays, and your feast days, my soul hateth*. God hates, therefore, those who think only one day is the feast day of the Lord. Christians eat the flesh of the lamb every day, that is, they take the flesh of the Word daily. *For Christ our pasch is sacrificed* 35. And because the law of the Pasch is such that it is eaten in the evening, for that reason the Lord suffered in the evening of the world, so that you always eat of the flesh of the Word, because you are always in the evening, until the morning comes. And if in this evening you have been solicitous, and have led a life in weeping and fasts, and in all the labor of justice, you also will be able to say 36: *In the evening weeping shall have place, and in the morning gladness*. C For you shall rejoice in the morning, that is, in the future age, if in this age you gather the fruit of justice in weeping and labor. Come, therefore, and you, while there is time, let us drink from the well of vision where Isaac walked, and where he goes forth to exercise. Observe how many things are done at the waters. And you are invited daily to come to the waters of the word of God, and to attend his wells, just as Rebecca did, of whom it is said 37: *She was a virgin very beautiful, and a man had not known her*. And she, he says, went out in the evening to draw water. 4. Nor is it written in vain regarding her. But it moves me, what is it that is said: *She was a virgin, a man had not known her*; as if truly a virgin were anything else than one whom a man has not touched (69)? And what does the addition regarding the virgin seem to mean, that it is said because a man had not known her? Is there, then, any virgin whom a man has touched? I have often said already that in these accounts no history is narrated, but mysteries are woven together. I think, therefore, that something of this sort is indicated in this. As Christ is called the man of the soul, to whom the soul is wed when it comes to the faith: so also contrary to this is that man to whom the soul is wed when it declines to perfidy. That very one who is also the enemy...
of the human race is called a man, when the tares grow high above the wheat. It is not sufficient, therefore, for the soul to be chaste in body; it is needful that this most wicked man should not have known her. For it can happen that someone may possess virginity in body, but by knowing that most wicked man, the devil, and by receiving into her heart the darts of concupiscence from him, she has lost the chastity of her soul. Since, therefore, Rebecca was a virgin holy in body and in spirit, for that reason [the Scripture] doubles her praise and says: She was a virgin, and no man had known her. She came, therefore, in the evening to the waters. Concerning the evening, we have spoken above. But observe the prudence of the servant; he does not wish to take a bride for his master Isaac unless he finds a virgin who is of elegant and beautiful appearance, and not only a virgin, but one whom no man has touched; and unless he finds her drawing water, he does not wish to betroth any other to his master, nor does he give her ornaments unless she is such a one. He does not give earrings, he does not give bracelets. She remains unadorned, uninstructed, unkept. Do we think that the father of Rebecca, a wealthy man, did not possess bracelets and earrings which he could put upon his daughter? Was his negligence so great, or his avarice, that he would not give ornaments to his daughter? But Rebecca does not wish to be adorned with the gold of Bathuel. The ornaments of a barbarian and ignorant man are not worthy of her. From the house of Abraham she seeks necklaces, because patience is adorned by the house of the wise man. Therefore the ears of Rebecca could not receive their beauty unless the servant of Abraham came and adorned them himself. Nor do her hands accept ornaments unless those which Isaac sent. For she wishes to receive golden words in her ears, and to have golden deeds in her hands. But she could not have received these things previously, nor deserved them, had she not come to the wells to draw water. You, who do not wish to come to the waters, who do not wish to receive in your ears the golden words of the prophets, how can you be adorned in doctrine, adorned in deeds, adorned in morals? A 5. But let us not omit many things, for there is not time now for debating, but for building up the Church of God, and for provoking the slower and lazier hearers by the examples of the holy and by mystical explanations. Rebecca followed the servant and came to Isaac. For the Church, having followed the prophetic word, has come to Christ. And where does she find him? At the well, he says, of the one swearing, as he was walking. One never departs from the wells, one never ceases from the waters. Rebecca is found at the well. Again Rebecca finds Isaac at the well. There she contemplates his first appearance, there she leaps down from the camels, B and there she sees Isaac, who had been pointed out to her by the servant. Do you think these things are related only concerning wells? Jacob also came to a well, and there he found Rachel, and there Rachel becomes known to him, good in her eyes and beautiful in appearance. And Moses also found the daughter of Jethro at the well. Are you not yet moved to understand these things spiritually? Or do you think it is always by chance that the patriarchs come to wells and at the waters obtain their marriages? He who thinks of these things in this way is a soulish man, and does not perceive the things that are of the Spirit of God. But he who wishes, let him remain C in these things, let him remain a soulish man: I, following the apostle Paul, say that these things are allegorical, and I say that the marriage of the saints is the conjunction of the soul with the Word of God. For he who joins himself to the Lord, is one spirit. But it is certain that this conjunction of the soul with the Word cannot come to pass in any other way than through the instruction of the divine books, which are figuratively called wells. To which if anyone comes, and draws water from them—that is, by meditating upon them—and perceives a higher sense and intellect, he will find a marriage worthy of God. For his soul is conjoined with God. He leaps down also from the camels, that is, he departs from vices, he casts away D irrational senses, and is conjoined to Isaac. For it is fitting that Isaac should pass from strength to strength. He who is the son of Sarah's virtue is now joined and associated with patience, which is Rebecca. And this is to pass from virtue to virtue, and from faith to faith. But let us also come to the Gospels. The Lord himself, when he had become weary from his journey, let us see where he seeks rest. He came, he says, to the well, and sat upon it. You see everywhere that the mysteries agree for him, you see the harmonious shapes of the New and Old Testament. There one comes to the wells and to the waters, that brides may be found, and the Church is conjoined to Christ in the washing of water. You see how great a heap of sacraments presses upon us, how great are the things that occur, that we cannot explain; at least these things should incite you to listen, to come together, so that even if we pass over some things for the sake of brevity, when you yourself re-read and inquire, you also examine and find, or at least remain in the inquiry of these things, so that the Word of God, finding you, may take you to the water and join you to himself, that you may be made with him one spirit in Christ Jesus our Lord, to whom is glory and dominion for ever and ever. Amen.
HOMILY XI. Concerning the fact that Abraham took Keturah as his wife, and that Isaac dwelt at the well of the vision.
1. The holy apostle Paul again provides us with occasions for spiritual intelligence, and although they are few in number, he nevertheless points out necessary indicators to those who study, by which it may be recognized in all things that the law is spiritual. He therefore, disputing in a certain place concerning Abraham and Sarah, says: He did not weaken in faith, he says, when he considered his own body which was as good as dead, since he was about a hundred years old, and the deadness of Sarah's womb. Therefore, the one whom he calls...
A dead in the centennial number of years, and whom he says Isaac begat more by the power of faith than by the fruitfulness of the body, the Scripture now relates to have taken a wife named Keturah, and to have begotten many children from her, when he was nearly a hundred and thirty-seven years old. Now Sarah is written as being ten years younger than him, who died in her hundred and twenty-seventh year, which indicates that Abraham was a hundred and seven years old when he took Keturah to wife. What then? Do we think that in such a great patriarch, the incitement of the flesh was strong for the same length of time? And that he who is said to have been long dead to natural impulses, was now, as it were, made alive again to lust? Or, as we have already said, do these matrimonial unions signify some mystical sacrament? As even he who said of wisdom B: "I intended to take her for my wife." Perhaps Abraham also intended something similar, and although he was wise, he knew by this very thing that there is no end to wisdom, nor does it impose a limit on learning. For what he was accustomed to seek in this way in marriage, by which we indicated his own superiority, is to have virtue in marriage, when it can cease in such a way. For Sarah’s sleep is to be understood as the consummation of virtue. For whoever is of consummated and perfect virtue, it is always necessary that he be occupied in some learning. What education is, his discourse calls her spouse. Second, I think that one who is in marriage is subject to the curse and is sterile. For it says: "Cursed be he who has not left seed in Israel." But if these things are said concerning carnal seed, all the virgins of the Church will appear to be under the curse. And what C do I say about the virgins of the Church? John himself, than whom "there has not arisen greater among those born of women," and many other saints have not left seed according to the flesh, since they are not even referred to as having entered into matrimony. But it is certain that they left spiritual children, and that each one had a wise spouse, just as Paul was generating children through the Gospel. Therefore, the old man Abraham, already dead in body, accepted Keturah as his wife. I think that according to this, by the reason we explained above, it is better that a wife is taken when the body is already dead, when the members are mortified. For there is greater capacity in us for wisdom when there is a mortification of our mortal body. Finally, Keturah, whom now the old man Abraham takes in marriage, D is interpreted as "incense," or "the sweet odor." And he himself was saying, as Paul said, that we are the sweet odor of Christ. How, however, this sweet odor of Christ is produced, let us see. Sin is a fetid thing. Finally, sinners are compared to pigs, who wallow in sins as if in fetid dung. And David, in the person of the penitent sinner, says: "My scars have rotted." 2. If, therefore, there is anyone among you in whom the odor of sin no longer exists, but the odor of mercy; if there is anyone who, praying without ceasing, offers to the Lord always incense, and says: "Let my prayer be directed as incense in your sight, the lifting up of my hands as an evening sacrifice," he has taken Keturah as his wife. Therefore, I judge that it is worthy to interpret the nuptials of the patriarchs in this final and exhausted age of marriage in such a way, that we may deem the necessary procreation of children to be counted. For as for these nuptials and offspring of this kind, not all young men or old men are fit. For whoever is more exhausted by the flesh will be more robust in spirit, and more apt for the embraces of wisdom. So also, he who is in the Scriptures relates that the just man Elkanah had two wives at the same time, of whom one was called Peninnah, and another was called Anna, that is, conversion and grace. And first, indeed, it is said that Peninnah had received children, that is, of conversion, and afterwards Anna, which is grace. For the Scripture figuratively designates the progress of the saints through marriages. Whence you also can, if you wish, be a husband of such a marriage; if you freely practice hospitality, you will see that you have taken this one to wife. If to this you add the care of the poor, you will see that you have obtained a second wife. And if you join patience to yourself, and meekness, and other virtues, you will be seen to have taken as many wives as you enjoy virtues. Hence, because the Scripture commemorates that some of the patriarchs had several wives at the same time, and others took some after the previous ones had died, it is figuratively indicated that some were able to exercise several virtues at the same time, while others could not begin to follow those that follow until they had brought the previous ones to perfection. Hence finally, Solomon is reported to have had several wives at once, to whom the Lord had said: "There has not been one wise before you, and after you there will not be." Because, therefore, the Lord had given him a multitude of prudence, like the sand of the sea, so that he might judge his people in wisdom, for that reason he was able to exercise several virtues at once. Indeed, besides this, whatever we are taught from the law of God, if we also derive from these the training which seems to be from outside in the world, some things we touch upon; for instance, as there is the learning of letters, or of the art of grammar, or as there is geometric doctrine, or the ratio of numbers, or dialectic discipline; and all these things, which are sought from outside, we bring into the assertion of our own law, and see.
A Indeed, even those who have taken foreigners into marriage, or even concubines, if we are able, by disputing and discussing such unions, and by refuting those who oppose us, to convert some to the faith, and if, overcoming them with their own reasons and arts, we have persuaded them to accept the true philosophy of Christ and the true piety of God: then, by means of dialectic or rhetoric, we shall seem to have begotten children, as it were, from a foreigner or a concubine. Therefore, for such marriages, or for the begetting of children of this type, no one is excluded by old age; indeed, this chaste offspring is more fitting for a mature age. Just as now, Abraham, very old and, as Scripture says, old and full of days, takes Keturah as his wife. But this, too, should not escape our notice, from those things which are recounted through history—what and of what kind the generations are that are propagated from her. For if we remember these things, we shall be able to recognize more easily the diverse nations which are mentioned in the Scriptures: for instance, when it is said that Moses took as wife the daughter of Jethro, the priest of Midian, who is found to have been the son of Keturah and Abraham. We acknowledge, therefore, that the wife of Moses was from the seed of Abraham, and was not a foreigner. But even when the queen of Cedar is written of, it must nevertheless be known that Cedar also descends from the very lineage of Keturah and Abraham. And even in the generations of Ishmael you will find similar things. If you look upon these things diligently, you will discover very many histories in those things that are hidden from others. But, for the time being, remitting these to another time, let us hasten to those things which have been recited in what follows.
3. And it happened, it says, after Abraham was dead, God blessed Isaac his son, and he dwelt near the well of the vision. What more is to be said to us concerning the death of Abraham, than what the word of the Lord in the Gospels contains, saying: "But concerning the resurrection of the dead, have you not read how he says in the bush, I am the God of Abraham, and the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob? God, however, is not the God of the dead, but of the living. For all of them live unto him." Let us therefore also desire such a death, as the Apostle also says, that we may die to sin, yet live unto God. For such is the death of Abraham to be understood, which so dilated his bosom that all the saints who come from the four D parts of the earth are carried by the angels into the bosom of Abraham. But let us see now how, after his death, the Lord blessed his son Isaac, and what this blessing is. He blessed, it says, the Lord Isaac, and he dwelt near the well of the vision. For this is the whole blessing with which the Lord blessed Isaac, that he might dwell near the well of the vision. To those who understand, this is a great blessing. Would that the Lord might grant me A also this blessing, that I might deserve to dwell near the well of the vision! Who can know and understand what is the vision that Isaiah the son of Amoz saw? Who can know what is the vision of Nahum? Who can understand what is contained in that vision which Jacob saw in Bethel, when he was going into Mesopotamia, where he said, "This is the house of God, and the gate of heaven?" And if any one can know and understand each and every vision, whether those which are in the Law, or those which are in the Prophets, he dwells near the well of the vision. But consider this also diligently, that Isaac deserved to receive such a great blessing from the Lord, that he should dwell near the well of the vision. But as for us, when shall we be able to deserve enough that we might perhaps happen to have a passage through the well of the vision? He, however, deserved to remain in the vision and B to dwell there; we, hardly being illuminated at all by the mercy of God, can scarcely feel or suspect anything about each individual vision. If, however, I shall be able to feel some one understanding concerning the visions of God, I shall seem to have spent one day by the well of the vision. If, however, I am able to attain not only to the letter, but also something according to the spirit, I shall seem to have spent two days by the well of the vision. And if I touch on a moral place, I shall have made it three days; or certainly, even if I cannot understand everything, provided I sit by the divine Scriptures, and meditate in the law of God day and night, and never cease at all, by inquiring, discussing, treating, and—what is greatest—by praying to God and asking of him the understanding, which teaches man knowledge, I shall seem, even I, to dwell near the well of the vision. But if I am negligent and do not exercise myself at home in the word of God, nor frequently enter the church to hear the word of God, as I see some among you who come to church only on solemn days, those who are of such a kind do not dwell near the well of the vision. But I fear lest those who are so negligent, even when they come to church, do not drink from the well of life, and are not refreshed, but are occupied with the concerns of their own heart and the thoughts which they bring with them, and depart nevertheless from the wells of the Scriptures thirsting. Hurry, therefore, you, and do enough that this blessing of the Lord may come to you, by which you may be able to dwell near the well of the vision, so that the Lord may open your eyes, and you may see the well of the vision, and receive from it living water, which may become in you a fountain of water leaping up into eternal life. If, however, one rarely comes to church, rarely drinks from the fountains of the Scriptures, and, departing straightway, omits what he hears, being occupied with other business, this man does not dwell near the well of the vision. Do you want me to show you who it is that never departs from the well of the vision? The Apostle Paul, who said C
that "with unveiled face we all behold the glory of the Lord." And so, if you always search out prophetic visions, if you always inquire, if you always desire to learn, if you meditate on these things and remain in them, you too will receive a blessing from the Lord, and you will dwell by the well of the vision. For to you also the Lord Jesus will appear on the way and will open the Scriptures to you, so that you may say: "Was not our heart burning within us, while he opened to us the Scriptures?" He appears, however, to those who think about him, and meditate on him, and occupy themselves in his law day and night. To him be glory and power for ever and ever. Amen.
HOMILY XII. On the conception of Rebecca and her delivery.
1. Regarding each of the readings as it is recited, we must pray to the Father of the Word, that He may fulfill in us also that which is written in the Psalm: "Open my eyes, and I will consider wondrous things from thy law." For unless He Himself opens our eyes, how shall we be able to see such great things, which are formed as mysteries in the patriarchs, which are figured now in wells, now in nuptials, now in parturitions, even now in barrenness? For the present reading relates that Isaac prayed to God for Rebecca his wife, because she was barren, and God heard him, and she conceived, and the boys, it says, were leaping in her womb. Consider first of all what this is, that very many holy women are reported in the Scriptures to have been barren, just as Sarah herself, and behold, now Rebecca. But Rachel also, the beloved of Israel, was barren. Anna, the mother of Samuel, is also written of as barren. But it is also mentioned in the Gospels that Elisabeth was barren. B In all these cases, however, one title is signified, that after barrenness they all brought forth a holy birth. So, therefore, this Rebecca also is now said to have been barren: but "Isaac prayed," it says, "for her to the Lord, and He heard him, and she conceived, and the boys were leaping in her womb." Behold what this barren woman conceived. The children of the barren woman leap before they are born, and she who had despaired of offspring carries nations and peoples in her womb. For it says thus: "Rebecca went," it says, "to inquire of the Lord, and the Lord said to her: Two nations are in thy womb, and two peoples shall be separated from thy belly." It is a long matter if we should wish now to examine the leaping of the boys while they were still dwelling in the womb. It is a long matter if we should bring forth from these the interpretations and riddles which the Apostle writes, as to what mystery, what causes they contain, why, before the children are born, or do anything in this age of good or evil, it is said of them that "the people shall overcome the people, and the greater shall serve the less"; why, before they proceeded from the mother's womb, it is said through the prophet, "Jacob I have loved, but Esau I have hated." These things are above our language and above your hearing.
2. Now, meanwhile, let us see what it is that is said: "Rebecca went to inquire of the Lord." She went. To what place did she go? From that place in which the Lord was not, did she go to that place in which He was? For this seems to be indicated when it is said: "She went to inquire of the Lord." Is not God everywhere? Did He not Himself say: "I fill heaven and earth, says the Lord"? Where, therefore, did Rebecca go? I think that she did not go from place to place, but from life to life, from act to act; she passed from good to better things, she proceeded from useful to more useful things, she hastened from holy to holier things. For it is absurd if we think that Rebecca was so ignorant and unlearned—having been instructed in the house of the wise Abraham under the most learned man, Isaac—as to have thought that the Lord was enclosed within some place, and that she went there to ask what C she was to see. Do you wish to see that this comes to holy people as a custom, that when they see something is being shown to them by God, they say they are "going" or "passing over"? Moses, when he had seen the bush burning and not being consumed, marveled at the sight and said: "I will pass over and see this sight." He certainly did not signify that he himself was going to cross some space of ground, nor scale mountains, nor depart across the precipices of valleys. The vision was near him, in his mouth and in his eyes. But he says "I will pass over," to show that he was moved by the heavenly vision to ascend to a higher life, to pass from those things in which he was to better things. So, therefore, it is also related now of Rebecca, that she went to inquire of the Lord: who, as we have said, must be thought to have gone not by the steps of her feet, but by the progress of her mind. And you, therefore, if you begin to look not at those things which are seen, but at those which are not seen—that is, not at carnal things, but at spiritual, not at the present, but at the future—you will be said to have gone to inquire of the Lord. If you shake yourself free from your old way of life, and from the company of those with whom you had lived basely and notably, and join yourself to honest and religious acts; when you are sought among your companions in base living and are nowhere found in the crowds of the wicked, it will be said of you too that you have gone to inquire of the Lord. Thus, therefore, the saints go not from place to place, but from life to life, from first institutions to better institutions.
3. The Lord therefore said: "Two nations are in thy womb, and two peoples shall be separated from thy belly. And the people shall overcome the people, and the greater shall serve the less." How the people overcame the people—that is, the Church the Synagogue—and how the greater shall serve the less, is known even to the Jews themselves, though they do not believe. I think it superfluous, therefore, to speak of these things which are open and very familiar to everyone. Let us add this, if you please, which may edify and instruct each one of us who hears these things. I think that this can also be said of each of us individually, that two nations and two peoples are within us. For there is a people of virtues within us, and no less a people of vices within us. For from our heart D
proceed evil thoughts, adulteries, thefts, false A testimonies, deceits, contentions, heresies, envies, carousings, and the like. Do you see how vast a people of evils is within us? But if we merit to say that word to the Holy Spirit: From Thy fear, O Lord, we have conceived in the womb and brought forth; we have made the spirit of Thy salvation upon the earth; then another people is found within us, generated in the Spirit. For the fruit of the Spirit is charity, joy, peace, patience, humility, gentleness, continence, chastity, and the like. You see another people which is also within us: but this one is smaller, the other greater. For there are always more who are evil than who are good, and vices are more numerous than virtues. But if we are such as Rebecca was, and merit to have a conception from Isaac—that is, from the Word of God—then in us too the people will overcome the people, and the greater will serve the lesser: for the flesh will serve the Spirit, and vices will yield to virtues. And her days were fulfilled, he says, that she should give birth, and there were twins in her womb. This saying—that her days were fulfilled that she should give birth—is almost never written except concerning holy women. For this was said of Rebecca, and of Elisabeth the mother of John, and of Mary the mother of our Lord Jesus Christ. Whence it seems to me to show something exceptional, and beyond other men, in such a birth, and that the fulfillment of the days indicates the rising of a perfect offspring.
4. And the first came out, red, and all as if a hairy skin. And he called his name Esau. And afterward his brother came out, and his hand was wreathed about the C heel of Esau, and he called his name Jacob. Another scripture reports of these that Jacob supplanted his brother in the womb, and that the token of this affair was that his hand was wreathed about the heel of his brother Esau. This Esau, then, proceeded from his mother’s womb hairy, all as if a skin, but Jacob was smooth and simple. Whence Jacob also received his name from struggling. But Esau, as those who interpret Hebrew names say, seems to be called either from redness, or from the earth—that is, red or earthly—or, as it has seemed to others, [he is called] a thing made. But what the privileges of this birth are, or why he supplanted his brother, and [the other] was born smooth and simple, when nevertheless, as the Apostle says, both sons were conceived from one father, our Isaac; or why he [Esau] was all hairy and rough, and, so to speak, surrounded by the squalor of sin and wickedness—it is not for me to discuss. For if I wish to dig into the deep and open the hidden veins of living water, the Philistines will immediately arrive and contend with me, and will provoke quarrels and D calumnies against me there, and will begin to fill my wells with earth. For certainly, if these Philistines would allow it, I too wanted to approach my most patient Lord Jesus, who says that he who comes to me I do not repel: I wanted to approach, and just as the disciples said to Him: Lord, who has sinned, this man or his parents, that he should be born blind? So I too wanted to ask Him and say: Lord, who has sinned, this Esau or his parents, that he should be born all hairy and rough, that he should be supplanted in the womb by his brother? But if I wish to ask about these things from the Word of God, and to inquire, the Philistines immediately move quarrels and calumnies against me. And therefore, leaving this well and calling it "enmities," let us dig another, and find a hundredfold. And the Lord blessed him, and the man was magnified and grew greater by progress, until he became very great. What is this, that Isaac sowed barley, and not wheat, and is blessed in that he sows barley, and is magnified until he becomes great? It appears, therefore, that he was not yet great; but after he sowed barley and gathered a hundredfold, then he became very great. Barley is mostly the food of beasts of burden, or of rustic servants. For it is of a rougher species, and one that seems to irritate the one coming into contact with it as if with certain points. Isaac is the Word of God, which Word sows barley in the Law, and wheat in the Gospels. For He prepares the former food for the more perfect and spiritual ones, and the latter for the more unskilled and animal-like: because it is written: Thou wilt preserve men and beasts, O Lord. Isaac, the Word of the Law, sows barley, and yet in the barley itself he finds the hundredth fruit. For you find even in the Law the martyrs, whose fruit is the hundredth. But our Lord also in the Gospels was Isaac; He spoke more perfect things to the apostles, but plebeian and common things to the crowds. But do you want to see that He exhibited the food of barley even to those who are beginners? It is written in the Gospels that He fed the crowds a second time. But those whom He feeds first—that is, the beginners—He feeds with barley loaves. But afterwards, when they had already progressed in word and doctrine, He exhibited wheaten loaves to them. But after this, he says, the Lord blessed Isaac, and he became very great. Isaac was small in the Law, but by the progress of time he becomes great. He becomes great by the progress of time in the prophets. For in the Law alone he is not yet great, inasmuch as it is also covered by a veil. He grows, therefore, even in the prophets. But when he has arrived at this point, that he also casts off the veil, then he will be very great. When the letter of the Law begins, like chaff, [alt-version omitted]
to be separated, and it appears that the law is spiritual, then Isaac will be magnified and will become very great. For see how the Lord in the Gospels also breaks a few loaves, and how he refreshes thousands of the populace, and how many baskets of fragments remain. As long as the loaves are whole, no one is satisfied, no one is refreshed, nor do the loaves themselves appear to be multiplied. Consider then now how we break a few loaves; how from the divine Scriptures we take a few words, and thousands of men are satisfied. But unless these loaves were broken, unless they were crumbles into parts by the disciples—that is, unless the letter had been discussed and broken bit by bit—its meaning could not reach everyone. But when we begin to treat and discuss each individual thing, then the crowds indeed take as much as they can. But what they cannot take must be gathered up and reserved, so that nothing perishes. Therefore, we also preserve whatever the crowd cannot grasp, and we collect it in baskets and hampers. Finally, when a little while ago we had broken the bread concerning Jacob and Esau, how many fragments of that bread remained which we diligently collected so they would not perish, and we store them in hampers or baskets, until we see what the Lord himself commands to be done with them. But now, as much as possible, let us either eat of the loaves or draw from the wells. Let us also attempt to do what Wisdom admonishes, saying: "Drink waters from your own fountains, and from your own wells, and let your fountain be your own." Try, therefore, O listener, to have your own well and your own fountain; so that you too, when you have taken up the book of the Scriptures, may begin to bring forth some understanding from your own mind, and according to those things which you have learned in the Church, try also yourself to drink from the fountain of your own intellect. There is within you a nature of living water, there are perennial veins and irrigating streams of rational meaning, provided only that they are not filled with earth and rubble. But take care to dig your earth, and to purge the filth—that is, to remove the sluggishness of your intellect, and to shake off the torpor of your heart. For hear what Scripture says: "Prick an eye, and it brings forth a tear; prick a heart, and it brings forth understanding." Purge, therefore, your own intellect, that at some time you may also drink from your own fountains, and draw living water from your own wells. For if you have received the Word of God within you, if you have received living water from Jesus and have received it faithfully, there will become within you a fountain of water springing up into eternal life, in Jesus Christ himself our Lord, to whom is glory and dominion for ever and ever. Amen.
94 HOMILY XIII. Concerning the wells which Isaac dug, and which were filled up by the Philistines.
A We come to the exercises. For behold, the Scripture relates that Isaac, after the Lord had blessed him and he was magnified exceedingly, undertook a great work. And he began, it says, to dig wells, the wells which his servants had dug in the time of his father Abraham, but the Philistines had stopped them up, and had filled them with earth. Therefore, he first dwelt near the well of vision, and being illuminated by the well of vision, he sets out to open other wells. And not first new wells, but those which his father Abraham had dug. And when he had dug the first well, the Philistines, it says, envied him. But he was not deterred by their envy, nor did he yield to their malice; but again, it says, he dug the wells which the servants of his father Abraham had dug, and which the Philistines had stopped up after the death of Abraham his father; and he gave them names according to the names which his father had given. He dug, therefore, those wells which his father had dug, and which because of the malice of the Philistines had been filled with earth. He also dug other new ones in the valley of Gerar, not indeed he himself, but his servants: and he found, it says, there a well of living water. But the shepherds of Gerar strove with the shepherds of Isaac, saying it was their water, and he called the name of the well Iniquity. For they had acted iniquitously toward him. But Isaac withdrew from their malice, and dug again another well, and for it also they nevertheless, it says, strove, and he called its name Enmity. And he departed from there, and dug again another well, and they did not strive over it. Therefore he also called its name Amplitude, saying, "Because now the Lord has dilated us, and has increased us over the earth." Rightly in a certain place does the holy Apostle, considering the magnitude of the mysteries, say: "And for these things who is sufficient?" In a similar way, or rather in a far different way, inasmuch as we are far inferior to him, even we, seeing such great depth C in the mysteries of the wells, say: "And for these things who is sufficient?" For who may worthily be able to explain either the sacraments of such great wells, or the things that are related as having been done for the sake of the wells, unless we invoke the Father of the living Word, so that he himself might deign to grant the word in our mouth, that we may be able, for you who are thirsty, to draw a little living water from these so copious and manifold wells?
2. There are, therefore, the wells which Abraham’s servants had dug, but which the Philistines filled with earth. Isaac sets out first to cleanse these. The Philistines D hated the waters, they love the earth. Isaac loves the waters, he always seeks the wells, he cleanses the old, he opens the new. Behold our Isaac, who was offered for us as a sacrifice, coming into the valley of Gerar, which they interpret as "a wall," or "a hedge"; coming, I say, to dissolve the middle wall of partition—the enmities in his flesh—coming to remove the wall, that is, the sin which separates us from God.
which is the wall that stands between us and the heavenly virtues, so that he may make both one, and may carry the sheep that had wandered back upon his own shoulders to the mountains, and restore it to the other ninety-nine which did not wander. A This Isaac, my Savior, when he had come into that valley of Gerar, desired first of all to dig those wells which the servants of his Father had dug; he wished, namely, to restore the wells of the Law and the prophets, which the Philistines had filled with earth. Who are these who fill the wells with earth? Without doubt, they are those who place a worldly and carnal understanding in the Law, and exclude the spiritual and mystical, so that they neither drink themselves, nor permit others to drink. Hear Isaac, our Lord Jesus Christ, B in the Gospels saying: "Woe unto you, Scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites, for you have taken away the key of knowledge; and you yourselves have not entered, nor have you permitted those who were willing to enter." These, therefore, are the ones who have filled with earth the wells which the servants of Abraham had dug, who teach the Law carnally, and defile the waters of the holy Spirit. They have these wells not to bring forth water, but to put in earth. Isaac, therefore, sets out to dig these wells. And let us see how he digs them. When the servants of Isaac, who are the apostles of our Lord, passing through, he says, the cornfields on the Sabbath, were plucking ears of corn and rubbing them with their hands and eating. Then, therefore, those who had filled the wells of his father with earth were saying to him: "Behold, thy disciples do that which is not lawful on the Sabbath." He, in order to dig out their carnal understanding, says to them: "Have you not read what David did when he hungered, he and those who were with him, how he entered into the house of God and did eat the loaves of proposition, which it was not lawful to eat except for the priests only?" And he added to this: "If you knew what this means, I desire mercy and not sacrifice, you would never have condemned the innocent." But what do they reply to these things? They disputed with his servants and said: "This man is not from God, who does not keep the Sabbath." C In this way, therefore, Isaac digs the wells which the servants of his father had dug. The servant of his father was Moses, who had dug the well of the Law. The servants of his father were David and Solomon, and the prophets, and whoever else there are who had written the books of the Old Testament, which the earthly and sordid understanding of the Jews had filled. And when Isaac wished to purge these, and to show that whatever the Law and the prophets said, they said concerning him, the Philistines disputed with him. But he departs from them. For he cannot be with those who do not wish to have water in the wells, but earth. And he says to them: "Behold, your house will be left to you desolate." Isaac, therefore, and the boys of Isaac, nay, the servants of Isaac, dig new wells. The servants of Isaac are Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. His servant is also the apostle Paul, who all dig the wells of the New Testament. But even for these, those who savor of earthly things dispute, nor do they suffer the new to be stored, nor the old to be purged. They contradict the evangelical wells, they oppose the apostolic ones. And because they contradict in all things, they litigate in all things; it is said to them: "Since you have made yourselves unworthy of the grace of God, lo, now we turn to the Gentiles." D He called the name of that place "Amplitudo," saying that now the Lord has dilated us, and has increased us over the earth. For truly Isaac has been dilated, and his name has been increased over the earth, when he fulfilled in us the knowledge of the Trinity. For then God was known only in Judea, and his name was great in Israel; but now "their sound has gone out into all the earth, and their words unto the ends of the world." For the servants of Isaac, going through the whole world, dug the wells and showed living water to all, baptizing all nations in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the holy Spirit. For the earth is the Lord's, and the fullness thereof. But also each one of us, who ministers the word of God, digs a well and seeks living water, from which he may refresh his hearers. If, therefore, I too begin to discuss the sayings of the ancients, and to seek the spiritual sense in them, if I have endeavored to remove the veil of the Law, and to show that the things which are written are allegorical, I indeed dig wells; but immediately the friends of the letter will provoke calumnies against me, and will lie in wait for me, and will immediately prepare enmities and persecutions, denying that the truth can stand unless it is upon the earth. But if we are the servants of Isaac, let us love the wells and fountains of living water, and let us withdraw from the litigious and the calumniators, and let us leave them in the earth which they love. We, however, let us never cease from digging the wells of living water, and by discussing now the old, now also the new, let us be made like unto that evangelical scribe of whom the Lord spoke, that he brings forth from his treasury things new and old. But also if any of them, who knows secular literature, now hears me arguing, he says perhaps: "These things which you say are ours, and the erudition of our art is theirs; these very things which you argue and teach are our eloquence." And he moves quarrels against me like some Philistine, saying that I have dug the well on his soil, and he will seem to himself to rightly claim what belongs to his own earth. Truly, to these I shall reply that every earth has water, but he who is a Philistine, and savors of earthly things, knows not how to find water in every earth, knows not.
that there can be found in every soul a rational sense and the A image of God. What use is it to you to possess erudition and not know how to make use of it, or to have speech and not know how to speak? This work is properly that of the boys of Isaac, who dig wells of living water in every earth—that is, they speak the Word of God to every soul, and they find produce. Or do you wish to see how many wells one boy of Isaac dug in the land of the aliens? Look at Paul, who from Jerusalem and round about even unto Illyricum filled it with the Gospel of God. But for each of these wells he suffered the persecutions of the Philistines. Hear him saying: How many things befell me in Iconium, in Lystra, how many in Ephesus? How often was he beaten, and how often stoned? How often did he fight against beasts? Yet he persevered until he went forth into the breadth—that is, until he set up Churches in the breadth of the whole wide world. Thus, therefore, the wells which Abraham dug—that is, the Scriptures of the Old Testament—were filled with earth by the Philistines, whether by evil teachers, Scribes and Pharisees, or even by adverse powers; and their veins were stopped up, so that they might not provide drink to those who are of Abraham. For that people cannot drink of the Scriptures, but suffers a thirst for the Word of God until Isaac comes and opens them so that his boys may drink. Grace, therefore, to the Son of Abraham, Christ, of whom it is written: The book of the generation of Jesus Christ, the son of David, the son of Abraham, who came and opened the wells for us. For he was opening them for those who were saying: Was not our heart burning within us when he was opening the Scriptures to us? He opened, therefore, these wells, and he called them, it says, just as Abraham his father had called them. For he did not change the names of the wells. And it is a remarkable thing that Moses is called Moses even among us, and the prophets are each called by their own name. For Christ did not change the names in them, but the understanding. He did change it in this, so that we might no longer attend to Jewish fables and endless genealogies, because they turn away the hearing from the truth, but are turned aside to fables. He opened the wells, therefore, and taught us so that we do not seek God in any place, but know that in every earth an offering is made to his name. For now is that time when true worshipers worship the Father, neither in Jerusalem nor on Mount Gerizim, but in spirit and truth. Not in a place, therefore, nor in the earth does God dwell, but he dwells in the heart. And if you seek the place of God, a clean heart is his place. For in this place he says he dwells, when he says through the prophet: I will dwell in them, and I will walk; and they shall be my people, and I will be their God, says the Lord. See, therefore, that perhaps even in the soul of each one of us there is a well of living water, there is a certain heavenly sense, B the hidden image of God, and the Philistines, that is, the adverse powers, have filled this well with earth. What kind of earth? With carnal senses and with earthly thoughts, and therefore we have borne the image of the earthly. When, therefore, we were bearing the image of the earthly, the Philistines filled our wells with earth. But now, since our Isaac has come, let us welcome his advent, and let us dig our wells, and let us cast the earth out of them; let us purge them of all filth and of all muddy and earthly thoughts, and we shall find in them living water, that of which the Lord C says: He who believes in me, from his belly shall flow rivers of living water. See how great is the liberality of the Lord. The Philistines filled the wells, and they grudged us the meager and thin veins of waters, yet instead of these, fountains and rivers are rendered to us.
4. If, therefore, you also today, hearing these things faithfully, perceive the message, Isaac works also in you; he purges your hearts of earthly senses, and seeing that such great mysteries lie hidden in the divine Scriptures, you will progress in understanding, and you will progress in spiritual senses. You yourselves will also begin to be teachers, and out of you will flow rivers of living water. For the Word of God is present, and this is now his operation, that he may remove the earth from the soul of each one of us, and open the living fountain. For it is inside you, and it does not come from outside, just as the kingdom of God is within you. And that woman who had lost the drachma did not find it outside, but in her own house, after she had lit a lamp and cleansed the house of the silt and filth which the sloth and stupidity of a long time had heaped up, and there she found the drachma. And you, therefore, if you light the lamp, if you apply to yourself the illumination of the Holy Spirit, and in his light you see light, you will find the drachma inside you. For inside you is placed the image of the heavenly King. For when God made man from the beginning, he made him according to his image and likeness; and this image he placed not outside, but inside him. This could not be seen in you as long as your house was dirty, filled with filth and rubbish. This fountain of knowledge was situated inside you, but it could not flow, because the Philistines had filled it with earth, and had made the image of the earthly in you. But though you indeed bore the image of the earthly at that time, now, however, having heard these things, purged of all that mass and earthly oppression by the Word of God, see to it that the image of the heavenly shines forth in you. This, therefore, is the image of which the Father was speaking to the Son: Let us make man in our image and likeness. The Son of God is the painter of this image. And because the painter is such and so great, the image can be obscured through neglect, but it cannot be destroyed through malice. For the image of God remains always in you, even if you yourself superimpose upon yourself the image of the earthly. D
A And especially Apelles, the acquaintance of Marcion and father of another heresy besides his, wishing to reject the writings of Moses as not being holy, brought forward this objection, saying: "The myth is therefore false; the scripture is therefore not from God," not understanding of what sort the three hundred cubits, and of what sort the fifty, and of what size the thirty were that the scripture named concerning the construction of the ark. But we learned from one of the learned men among the Hebrews that the cubits were named as what is called by geometers the power of the square of three hundred, so that the cubits of length in the lower plane are nine myriad; and so also two thousand five hundred for the breadth, and nine hundred for the height. For it would be most absurd that he who was instructed in all the wisdom of the Egyptians, who are the most geometrical of all, and who was reared in the king’s house, did not perceive that those more commonly understood three hundred of length, and fifty of breadth, and thirty of height would perhaps not have contained even the elephants, let alone their food for a year [concerning which God commanded two by two of the unclean animals to enter into the ark]. But if it is necessary to understand more clearly the statement:
A truth in the Law and the Prophets. Truly, it teaches the beginners in the Law, and the perfect in the Gospels. And so Isaac now holds the form of the Word, which is in the Law or the Prophets.
2. Therefore, Isaac went up to the Well of the Oath, and the Lord appeared11 to him. We have already said before that the ascension of the Law is the adornment of the temple, and of those things which were divinely performed therein. The ascension of the Law can also be called the growth of the prophets: and perhaps for this reason he is said to have gone up to the Well of the Oath, and the Lord appeared to him there. For by the prophets the Lord has sworn B, and will not repent, that he himself is a priest forever according to the order of Melchizedek. Therefore, at the Well of the Oath, God was seen by him, confirming in him the things promised. And Isaac built an altar there, and called upon the name of the Lord, and pitched his tent there. Moreover, the servants of Isaac dug a well there. Isaac indeed builds an altar in the Law, and pitches his tent. In the Gospels, however, he does not pitch a tent, but builds a house, and lays a foundation. For hear Wisdom saying concerning the Church: *Wisdom*, she says, *has built herself a house, and has set under it seven pillars*. Hear also Paul saying concerning this: *For no one can lay any foundation other than that which is laid, which is Jesus Christ*. Where, therefore, there is a tent, even if it be pitched, without doubt it must be taken down; but where there are foundations, and the house is built upon a rock, that house is never taken down. For it is founded upon a rock. Isaac, however, also dug a well there, nor does he ever cease from digging wells, until a fountain of living water arises, and the stream's rush gladdens the city of God.
3. And Abimelech, he whom Abraham had formerly honored, comes now with his friends C from Gerar to Isaac: *And Isaac says to them: Why have you come to me? For you hate me, and have cast me out from you*. To these they reply: *Seeing, they say, we have seen that the Lord is with you, and we said: Let there be a covenant between us and you, and let us make a pact with you, that you may not do us evil, etc.* This Abimelech, as I see it, does not always have peace with Isaac, but sometimes dissents, sometimes seeks peace. If you remember how we said in the previous sections concerning Abimelech, that he holds the character of the followers of the studies and wisdom of this age, who through the erudition of philosophy have grasped much even of the truth; you can understand how here he is with Isaac, who holds the figure of the Word of God which is in the Law, and can neither always be in dissension, nor always in peace. For philosophy is neither in all things contrary to the Law of God, nor in all things in harmony. For many of the philosophers write that God created all things. In this they agree with the law of God. Some have even added this, that God both made and governs all things through his Word, and that this is the Word of God, by which all things are moderated. In this they write things consonant not only to the Law, but also to the Gospels. D Moral and physical philosophy, as it is called, holds opinions on almost all things that are ours. They dissent from us, however, when they say that matter is co-eternal with God. They dissent when they deny that God cares for mortal things, but that His providence is contained above the spaces of the lunar sphere. They dissent from us when they hang the lives of the newly born from the courses of the stars. They dissent when they say this world is everlasting, and must not be ended by any end. But there are also very many other things in which they either dissent from us or agree. And for this reason Abimelech, according to this figure, is described as sometimes being at peace with Isaac, and sometimes dissenting. But I do not think that it was a matter of idle concern for the Holy Spirit, who writes these things, to include that two others came with Abimelech, that is, Ochozath his son-in-law, and Phicol the commander of his army. Moreover, Ochozath is interpreted as 'holding', and Phicol as 'the mouth of all'. Abimelech himself is 'my father the king'. These three, as I judge, hold the image of all philosophy, which among them is divided into three parts: logic, physics, ethics, that is, the rational, the natural, the moral. The rational is that which confesses God as the Father of all, just as Abimelech. The natural is that which is fixed, and holds all things, as if relying on the very powers of nature, which Ochozath, who is said to be 'holding', professes. The moral is that which is in the mouth of all, and pertains to all, and by the common similarity of precepts, is turned in the mouth of all, which this Phicol, who is interpreted as 'the mouth of all', designates. All these, therefore, having been instructed in such learning, come to the Law of God, and say: *Seeing we have seen that the Lord is with you, and we said: Let there be a joining of oaths between us and you, and let us make a pact with you, that you may not do us evil, but just as we have not cursed you, so also may you be blessed by the Lord*. These three indeed, who seek peace from the Word of God, and wish to forestall his friendship by a pact, can hold the figure of the magi, who come from the parts of the East instructed in paternal books, and the institutions of the ancients, and say: *For seeing we have seen the king born, and we have seen that God is with him, and we have come to adore him*. But even if there is anyone who, having been instructed in such erudition, seeing that God was in Christ, reconciling the world to Himself, and admiring the majesty of His works, might say: *Seeing we have seen that the Lord is with you, and we have said: Let there be a joining of oaths between us and you*.
A For he who approaches the law of God necessarily says: *I have sworn and have determined that I will keep thy judgments.*
4. But, they ask, what are you doing to us? If we have not cursed you, will you be blessed by the Lord? It seems to me that they are asking for the remission of sins through these things, so that they might not receive evils. They ask for a blessing, not retaliation. Finally, see what follows: *And Isaac made them a great feast*, it says, *and they ate and drank.* For it is certain that he who ministers the word is a debtor both to the wise and the unwise. Because, therefore, he offers a feast to the wise, it is said that he made not a small, but a great feast. And you, if you are not yet a little child and do not need milk, but have well-exercised senses, and having been provided with much instruction, come more capable to the understanding of the word of God, a great feast is made for you as well. Not the potherbs of the weak will be set before you as food, nor will you be nourished with milk, with which little ones are nourished, but the minister of the word will make a great feast for you. He will speak to you of the wisdom which is uttered among the perfect; he will set forth to you the wisdom of God hidden in a mystery, which none of the princes of this world have known. He will reveal to you Christ, according to this, that in Him all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge are hidden. He will therefore make a great feast for you, and He Himself will feast with you—if He does not find you to be such that He must say to you: *I could not speak to you as to spiritual ones, but as to carnal; as unto little ones in Christ I gave you milk to drink, not meat.* He says this to the Corinthians, to whom he also adds: *For since there are contentions and dissensions among you, are you not carnal, and do you not walk according to man?* Paul did not make a great feast for these, inasmuch as, while he was with them and in need, he was a burden to no one, nor did he eat bread from anyone for free; but he ministered to himself B and to all who were with him, working night and day with his own hands. So far, therefore, were the Corinthians, for whom a great feast might have been made, from being ready, that the preacher of the word of God could not have even the smallest, or meager, feast among them. But to those who know how to listen more perfectly, who bring learned and exercised senses to the hearing of the word of God, to these a great feast is made; with these Isaac feasts, and not only does he feast, but rising up, he promises them peace concerning future things with an oath.
Let us, therefore, also approach the hearing of the word of God with such a mind and such faith, that He may deign to make a great feast for us. For *Wisdom has killed her victims, she has mingled her wine in a cup, and has sent forth her servants*, that they may bring all whomsoever they find to her banquet. It is a great thing, that we, having entered into the banquet of Wisdom, should not again carry with us the garments of folly, should not be clothed in the vestments of faithlessness, nor should we C be defiled with the stains of sins: but in simplicity and purity of heart let us embrace the Word, and let us serve divine Wisdom, who is Christ Jesus our Lord, to whom is glory and dominion for ever and ever. Amen.
HOMILY XV.
Concerning what is written: *And they went up out of Egypt, and came into the land of Chanaan, unto Jacob their father, and told him, saying: That Joseph thy son is alive, and he is ruler of all the land of Egypt.*
1. It is to be observed by us who read the holy Scriptures, how in each and every place "going up" and "going down" is posited. For if we consider more diligently, we shall find that almost never is anyone said to have gone down into a holy place, nor is it recorded that he went up to a blameworthy one. Which observations show that divine Scripture is not, as it appears to most, composed in unlearned and rustic speech, but is adapted according to the discipline of divine erudition, and serves not so much the historical narratives as it does mystical matters and senses. You will find it written, therefore, that those who are born from the seed of Abraham went down into Egypt, and again the sons of Israel went up out of Egypt. Finally, it is said even of Abraham himself in this way: *And Abraham went up out of Egypt, he and his wife, and all that he had, and Lot with him, into the desert.* Then afterwards it is said of Isaac, that the Lord appeared to him and said: *Do not go down into Egypt.* But even the Ishmaelites, who were carrying aromata, and resin, and stacte—and they also were from the seed of Abraham—are reported to have gone down into Egypt, with whom Joseph is said to have gone down into Egypt. But also after these things: *Seeing*, he says, *that there is a trade of corn in Egypt, he said to his sons: Why are you idle? Behold I hear that there is corn in Egypt, go down thither, and buy us victuals, that we may live, and not die.* And a little later: *Joseph’s brethren went down into Egypt to buy corn.* Indeed, when Simeon had been detained in Egypt, and his nine brothers, having been sent away, returned to their father, it is not written that they went up out of Egypt; but, he says, *loading corn upon their asses, they departed.* For they could not rightly be said to go up, with whom D their brother was held bound in Egypt, and with whom they themselves were tortured, bound as if by certain chains of charity in mind and spirit. But when, after the brother had been received and Joseph recognized, and Benjamin also presented to his eyes, they returned with joy, then it is said that they went up out of Egypt, and came into the land of Chanaan unto Jacob their father. And then also, when they say to the father that Joseph thy son is alive, and he is ruler of all the land of Egypt. For it is necessary that from the lowest and most humble,
471 ORIGENIS 472 rational. And then, he says, he put the oracle upon him, which is the breastplate, and he put upon the oracle manifestation and truth, and he put a miter upon his head. But let us see what the oracle, which is the breastplate, signifies. After the nakedness has been covered, and the shame veiled by garments, after he has been fortified by works and strengthened by both girdles, then the oracle, that is, the breastplate, is handed over to him. The oracle is a sign of wisdom, because wisdom consists in reason. But he shows what the virtue of this wisdom and reason is. For he puts upon the breastplate manifestation and truth. For it is not enough for the high priest to have wisdom and to know the reason for everything, unless he can also manifest to the people what he knows. Therefore, manifestation is put upon the breastplate so that he might be able to answer everyone who asks him for the reason concerning faith and truth. And truth is also placed upon it, so that he might not construct those things which he can devise by his own wit, but those things which truth holds; nor should he ever depart from truth, so that truth may always remain in every word of his. This, therefore, is what it means to have laid manifestation and truth upon the breastplate. How unhappy are those who, reading these things, pour out all their understanding toward the sense of a bodily garment! Let them tell us what sort of garment of manifestation or what sort of clothing of truth it is. If anyone has ever seen, if anyone has ever heard that manifestation and truth are called garments, let them tell us which women wove these things, in what workshop these were ever finished. But if you wish to hear the truth, it is wisdom that weaves garments of this kind for you. She is the manifestation of hidden things, she covers the truth of all things. Let us therefore pray to the Lord that we may be worthy to receive it, and she herself will wrap us in such garments. But observe also how holy and how wondrous the order of things is. Not before the oracle, and afterwards the shoulder-piece, because wisdom is not before works, but works must be had first, and afterwards wisdom is to be sought. Then further, not before manifestation comes the oracle; for [the priest] must also receive the crown. Therefore, he first receives the *cidaris*, which is a kind of head covering or ornament. And after this the miter is placed upon him. Making it in front, that is, on the forehead of the high priest, is the sanctified golden plate, in which it is said that the name of God is engraved. But this ornament of the head, where the name of God is said to have been placed, is put on over all the things with which the lower members of the body had been adorned. In which it seems to me to be indicated that, above all things that can be perceived or understood concerning the world or other creatures, the knowledge of God—the creator of all—is more eminent. And because He Himself is the head of all, therefore this ornament is placed upon the head over all things. For nothing is added to the head of the high priest after this. And therefore miserable are those of whom the Apostle says that they do not hold the head, from whom the whole body, joined and knit together, grows with a growth that is from God in the spirit. But if we have well understood what the ornament of the priest is, and what the honor of his head is above all things, probing the depths of the divine mysteries, let us desire not only to know and hear these things, but also to fulfill and do them, because it is not the hearers of the law who will be justified before God, but the doers. For you, too, can—as we have often said already—if you have prepared for yourself garments of this kind in your studies and vigils, if the word of the law has washed you and made you clean, and the anointing of chrism and the grace of baptism has endured in you uncontaminated, if you have been clothed in double garments of letter and spirit, if you are also doubly girded, so that you are chaste in flesh and soul, if you are adorned with the shoulder-piece of works and the breastplate of wisdom, if also the miter and the golden plate, the fullness of the knowledge of God, crowns your head, know that even if you are hidden and unknown among men, you are nevertheless acting before God.
A Meditating upon these things, and calling them to mind day and night, and being instant in prayer and vigilant therein, let us beseech the Lord that He Himself may deign to reveal to us the knowledge of these things which we read, and to show us how we may observe the spiritual law, not only in our understanding but also in our actions, so that we may merit to obtain spiritual grace, being enlightened through the law of the Holy Spirit, in Christ Jesus our Lord, to whom is glory and dominion unto ages of ages. Amen.
HOMILY VII. Concerning that which was commanded to Aaron and his sons, that they should not drink wine and strong drink when they enter into the tabernacle of the testimony, or when they approach the altar; and of the breastplate of the setting, and of the arm of separation, and of clean and unclean animals, or foods.
Many things indeed were read in the previous lesson, from which, constrained by the brevity of time, we have said very few. For we are performing the ministry not now of expounding the Scriptures, but of edifying the Churches, although even from those things which have been treated by us before, any prudent listener can find clear paths for understanding. And therefore, from these things also which have now been read, since we cannot cover everything, we shall gather at least some small flowers, which may edify the listeners, like a field full of grain which the Lord has blessed.
Let us see, therefore, what that is which has now been read to us: "And the Lord spoke to Aaron, saying: You and your sons with you shall not drink wine and strong drink, when you enter into the tabernacle of the testimony, or when you approach the altar, and you shall not die. An eternal statute throughout your generations, to discern between the holy and the profane, and between the unclean and the clean, and to teach the children of Israel all the statutes which the Lord has spoken to them by the hand of Moses."
A clear law is given, both to the priests and to the high priest, that when they approach the altar, they should abstain from wine and from every drink that can inebriate, which it is the custom of the divine Scriptures, in the vernacular, to call "strong drink." The divine word wants the priests of the Lord to be sober in all things, as those who, approaching the altar of God, ought to pray for the people and intercede for the offenses of others; they who have no portion on earth, but the Lord Himself is their portion. For thus says the Scripture concerning them: B "To the sons of Levi you shall not give a part in the midst of their brethren, because I, the Lord their God, am their portion." He wishes, therefore, that those to whom the Lord Himself is the portion should be sober, fasting, and vigilant at all times, but especially when they are present at the altars to entreat the Lord and to offer sacrifice in His sight. Which mandates maintain their force to such an extent, and are to be kept with every observance, that the Apostle also confirms these same things by the laws of the New Testament. In which, similarly, the priest also—putting forth the law for them—says that they ought not to be "enslaved to much wine," but to be sober. For sobriety is the mother of all virtues, just as, on the contrary, drunkenness is the mother of all vices. C For the Apostle openly declared it, saying: "Wine, in which is luxury," in order to show that from drunkenness, as it were, a firstborn daughter is generated—luxury. Then, moreover, the Savior also, by the authority of the Lord and King, constituting laws and rights for the priests and the people together: "Take heed," he says, "lest your hearts be weighed down in drunkenness and gluttony and the anxieties of the world, and sudden destruction come upon you."
You have heard the edict of the eternal King, and you have learned of the lamentable end of drunkenness or gluttony. If any skilled and wise physician were to instruct you with these very words, and were to say, "Take heed to yourselves, lest anyone, for example, take greedily of the juice of this or that herb; for if he does, sudden destruction will come upon him," I do not doubt that each one, out of regard for his own salvation, would keep the precepts of the warning physician. But now the physician of souls and bodies, and at the same time the Lord, commands that the herb of drunkenness and gluttony be avoided, and likewise that the juices of worldly anxieties, as if they were deadly, be avoided. And I do not know if any of us is not consumed by these, so as not to say wounded.
Drunkenness of wine is therefore pernicious in all things, for it is the only thing which, at the same time with the body, renders the soul weak. For in other things it may happen that, according to the Apostle, "when the body is weak, then the spirit is more powerful," and where "he who is the man without is corrupted, he who is within is renewed." D In the sickness of drunkenness, however, the body and the soul are corrupted at the same time, and the spirit is vitiated along with the flesh. It weakens all the members, it loosens the foot, the hand, the tongue; it darkens the eyes, and oblivion veils the mind, so that he does not know or feel that he is a man.
This, therefore, is the first thing that drunkenness of the body has of disgrace; yet if we examine in how many ways the human mind is inebriated, we will find that even those who seem sober to themselves are drunk. Anger inebriates the soul, but fury makes it more than drunk, if indeed there can be anything more than drunkenness. Cupidity and avarice render a man not only drunk, but rabid—and so on. Just as the scenes of concupiscence inebriate the soul, on the contrary, holy desires also inebriate it, but with the holy inebriation of which one of the saints was saying: "And how glorious is thy cup which inebriates!" But afterwards we shall see concerning the diversity of drunkenness; now, in the meantime, see how many things there are that inebriate the soul. Fear inebriates it, and vain suspicion. Envy and malice, however, wear it down above every drunkenness. But they cannot be numbered, how many things there are that affect the unhappy soul with the vice of drunkenness. Now, in the meantime, concerning the priests—
A led forth to the labors and troubles of the world, a conflict is set before them with the serpent, when it is said: *You shall watch his head, and he shall watch your heel*; and again, when it is said to the woman: *I will put enmity between you and him, and between your seed and his seed*. Nor, however, does God forsake them when set in this conflict, but He is always with them. He is well-pleased in Abel, He corrects Cain. When He is invoked, He is present to Enoch. He commands Noah to build an ark of salvation in the flood. He leads Abraham away from his father’s house and from his kin. He blesses Isaac and Jacob; He leads the children of Israel out of Egypt. Through Moses He writes the law in letters, through the prophets He fulfills what was lacking—this is to be with them in Egypt. But what is said: *I will lead you down there into the end*, this is, I think, as we said above, that at the end of the ages His only-begotten Son descended even into the lower world for the salvation of the world, and thence He called back the first-formed man. For what He said to the thief: *Today you shall be with me in Paradise*, know that this was said not to him alone, but to all the saints, for whose sake He had descended into the lower world. In this, therefore, it will be fulfilled more truly than in Jacob, that which was said, that *I will lead you down there into the end*.
6. But each one of us enters into Egypt and the struggles B by the same order and by the same path, and if he deserves that God should always remain with him, He will make him a great nation. For a great nation is a multitude of virtues and a throng of righteousness, in which all the holy are said to be multiplied and to increase. In this is also fulfilled what was said, that *I will lead you down there into the end*. For the end is placed as the perfection of things and of virtues, the consummation. For this reason, finally, another of the saints said: *Do not lead me back in the midst of my days*. And again, the Scripture bears witness to the great patriarch Abraham, that Abraham died full of days. This, therefore, is what is meant: *I will lead you down there into the end*; as if He were to say: Since you have fought the good fight, you have kept the faith, you have finished the course, I will already lead you down from this world to the future blessedness, to the perfection of eternal life, to the crown of righteousness, which the Lord will render at the end of the ages to all who love Him.
7. But let us see also what is to be thought of what is said: *And Joseph shall place his hands upon your eyes*. C I think that many mysteries of secret knowledge are hidden within the veil of this discourse, which it belongs to another time to touch upon and knock at. In the meantime, now it will not seem to have been said without reason—what has seemed so to certain of our predecessors—that a certain prophecy appears to be signified in this: because, indeed, from the tribe of Joseph was Jeroboam, he who made the two golden calves, in order to lead the people to worship them, and through this, as it were, by laying on his hands, blinded and closed the eyes of Israel so that they should not see their impiety, concerning which it is said: *Because of the impiety of Jacob all these things, and because of the sin of the house of Israel*. But what is the impiety of Jacob? Is it not Samaria? But if perhaps someone denies that those things which were spoken by God under the appearance of pi- D ety should be bent toward a reproachable part, we shall say that the true Joseph, our Lord and Savior, just as He placed His physical hand upon the eyes of the blind man, and restored to him the sight he had lost; so also He placed His spiritual hands upon the eyes of the Law, which had been blinded through the physical understanding of the Scribes and Pharisees, and restored sight to them, so that to those for whom the Lord opens the Scriptures, He might open the spiritual sight and understanding in the Law. And would that the Lord Jesus might place His hands upon our eyes, that we too might begin to look not at the things which are seen, but at the things which are not seen; and that He might open for us those eyes which do not contemplate the present, but the future, and reveal to us the sight of the heart, by which God is seen in the spirit, through the same Lord Jesus Christ, to whom is the glory and the power for ever and ever. Amen.
HOMILY XVI
De eo quod scriptum est: *Et acquisivit Joseph omnem terram Ægyptiorum Pharaoni...*
1. According to the faith of the Scripture, no Egyptian is free. For Pharaoh reduced the people to servitude for himself, and left no one free within the borders of the Egyptians, but in all the land of Egypt freedom was taken away. And perhaps for that reason it is written: *I am the Lord your God who led you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery*. Egypt, therefore, became a house of slavery, and, what is more wretched, a house of voluntary slavery; for although it is referred of the Hebrews that they were reduced to servitude, and that they bore the yoke of domination when their liberty was taken away, yet they are recorded as having been driven to this by force. For it is written that the Egyptians loathed the children of Israel, and through power the Egyptians oppressed the children of Israel by force, and afflicted their life with hard works, in clay and brick, and in all the works which were in the fields, in all of which they reduced them to servitude with violence. Understand therefore more diligently how the Hebrews are written as having been reduced to servitude by violence, for whom there was an innate liberty, which was not easily extorted from them either by any deception, but with force. But Pharaoh easily reduced the Egyptian people to servitude for himself, and it is not written that he did this by force. For the Egyptians are prone to degenerate.
A In which case, surely, no one would say that Paul acted harshly, he who cast the man out of the Church and delivered him to Satan. But without doubt the blame is referred to him who by his deeds did not merit having a place in the Church, but deserved to be joined to the companionship of Satan. So also Joseph, even though he had foreseen nothing of Hebrew liberty or of Israelite nobility in Egypt, joined worthy servitude to worthy lordship. But I say even more. You may find even in divine dispensations some such event, in that which Moses says: B *When the Most High divided the nations and separated the bounds of the nations, according to the number of the angels of God He set them, and the part of the Lord became Jacob, the cord of His inheritance Israel.* You see, therefore, that according to the merits of each nation a principality of angels is established, but the part of the Lord becomes Israel (8).
3. After this follows: *They sold,* he says, *their land to Pharaoh; for famine prevailed over them.* Here, too, it seems to be a reproach, and in this, the Egyptians are contained. For it is not easy to find it written of the Hebrews that famine prevailed over them. For although it is written that famine C was severe over the earth, yet it is not written that famine prevailed over Jacob, or his sons, as it is said of the Egyptians that it prevailed over them. For although famine may come even upon the righteous, yet it does not "prevail" over them; because of which they even glory in it, as Paul strives to glory in such suffering, when he says: *In hunger, and thirst, and cold, and nakedness.* What is therefore an exercise of virtue for the righteous, is an accounting of sin for the unjust. Indeed, it is even written in the times of Abraham, D that famine was grievous upon the earth, and Abraham went down into Egypt to dwell there, because the famine was grievous upon the earth. And indeed, as some think, if the discourse of divine Scripture were composed incautiously and unskilfully, it could have been said that Abraham went down into Egypt to dwell there, because the famine was grievous upon him. But observe with what distinction divine discourse uses care. When it refers to the saints, it says the famine was "grievous" upon the earth; when it speaks of the unjust, it says they were "seized" by the famine. Therefore, neither Abraham, nor Jacob, nor their sons were seized by the famine. But it was only grievous upon the earth; it is said to have been grievous. And in the times of Isaac, it is likewise written, that the famine was grievous upon the earth, besides the former famine that was in the time of Abraham. But it cannot be said that it "seized" Isaac, since the Lord says to him: *Do not go down into Egypt, but dwell in the land which I shall tell you, and in it*
A *dwell, and I will be with you.* According to this, as I believe, the Prophet was observing something long after these times when he said: *I have been young, and now am old, yet I have not seen the righteous forsaken, nor his seed begging bread.* And elsewhere: *The Lord will not slay the soul of the righteous with famine.* From all these things, it is declared that while the earth can suffer famine, and those who attend to earthly things, nevertheless those whose food is this—that they may do the will of the Father who is in heaven, and whose soul is fed by that bread which descended from heaven—can never suffer from the starvation of famine. Therefore, divine Scripture does not observe that those are seized by famine whom it knows to possess the knowledge of God and to be provided with the food of heavenly wisdom. But you will also find, in the third book of Kings, that a similar precaution was taken regarding the report of a famine, where, when famine had prevailed over the land, you hear Elijah saying to Ahab: *The Lord God of hosts, the God of Israel, liveth, before whom I stand, there shall not be dew or rain these years upon the earth, except by the word of my mouth.* And after this, it is commanded by the Lord to the ravens that they should feed the prophet, and that he should drink water from the torrent of Cherith. And again in Sarepta of Sidon, it is commanded to a widow woman to feed the prophet, so that to one who had no more than a single day’s provision, it might, by giving, become unending, and the exhausted store might multiply and abound. For the jar of flour and the flask of oil, according to the word of the Lord, did not fail while feeding the prophet. You will also find similar things in the times of Elisha, when Benhadad, king of Syria, went up against Samaria and besieged it: *And there was,* he says, C *a great famine in Samaria, until the head of an ass was worth fifty shekels of silver, and the fourth part of a kab of dove's dung for five pieces of silver.* But suddenly, through the word of the prophet, a wondrous change occurs, as he says: *Hear the word of the Lord. Thus says the Lord God: At this hour tomorrow, a measure of fine flour will be for one shekel, and two measures of barley for one shekel in the gates of Samaria.* Do you see, then, what is gathered from all these things, that when famine seizes the earth, it not only does not seize the righteous, but rather a remedy for the impending disaster is brought through them.
B What famine is it that prevails over the earth? For those who are of the earth and savor earthly things, and who cannot perceive the things of the Spirit of God, suffer a famine of the word of God; they do not hear the commandments of the law, they do not know the rebukes of the prophets, they are ignorant of the apostolic consolations, and they do not feel the medicine of the Gospel. And therefore it is deservedly said of them that famine has prevailed over them. But for the righteous, and those who meditate on the law of the Lord day and night, wisdom prepares her table, slaughters her victims, mixes her wine in the bowl, and calls out with a loud voice—not that all may come, not that the affluent, not that the rich, nor that the wise of this world may turn to her, but if there are any, she says, who are "destitute in mind," let them come to me—that is, if there are any who are humble in heart, who have learned from Christ to be "meek and humble in heart," who are called elsewhere "poor in spirit," but are rich in faith, let these come to the banquets of wisdom, and being refreshed by her dainties, drive away the famine that prevails over the earth. See, therefore, lest you also should happen to be found an Egyptian, and famine seize you; lest, being occupied with the affairs of the age, or bound by the chains of avarice, or dissolved in the profusion of luxury, you become a stranger to the foods of wisdom, which are always exhibited in the churches of God. For if you turn your hearing away from those things which are either read in the church or discussed, you will undoubtedly suffer a famine of the word of God. But if you descend from the stock of Abraham and preserve the nobility of the Israelite race, the law feeds you always, the prophets feed you, and the apostles offer you rich banquets. In the bosoms also of Abraham, and Isaac, and Jacob, the Gospels will invite you to recline in the kingdom of the Father, so that there you may eat of the tree of life and drink wine from the true vine, new wine with Christ in the kingdom of his Father. For from these foods the sons of the bridegroom cannot fast, nor suffer famine, as long as the bridegroom is with them.
5. Furthermore, in the subsequent matters, that the land of the priests of the Egyptians was not reduced into slavery to Pharaoh, nor did they sell themselves with the rest of the Egyptians; but what they received from outside, whether grain or gifts, they received not from Joseph, but from Pharaoh himself; and on this account, they are not recorded as having sold their land to Pharaoh as the others, who were more familiar than the rest; but through this, they are shown to be more wicked than all the rest, who, because of the excessive familiarity that existed between them and Pharaoh, receive no change, but remain in their evil possession; and just as to those who had progressed in faith and holiness, the Lord says: *I no longer call you servants, but friends,* so Pharaoh also says to them, as those who have ascended to the highest degree of wickedness and to the priesthood of perdition: *I no longer call you servants, but friends.* Finally, do you wish to know the difference between the priests of God and...
those of Pharaoh? Pharaoh grants lands to his priests, but the Lord grants no portion in the land to his own priests, saying to them: *I am your portion.* Observe then, you who read these things, all the priests of the Lord, and see what the difference between priests is, lest perhaps those who have a portion in the land and are occupied with earthly pursuits and studies should appear to be priests not of the Lord, but of Pharaoh. For he is one who wishes his priests to have possessions of lands, and to exercise the cultivation of fields, and not the soul; to pay attention to the countryside and not the law. But let us hear what Christ our Lord commanded his priests: *Whoever,* he says, *does not renounce all that he possesses, cannot be my disciple.* I tremble saying this. I myself, I say, am the first to be accused by my own words, I speak my own condemnations. Christ denies that he is his disciple whom he sees possessing anything, and him who does not renounce all that he possesses. And what are we doing? How do we either read these things ourselves or explain them to the people, when we not only do not renounce the things we possess, but even wish to acquire those things which we never had before we came to Christ? Is it because our conscience convicts us that we are able to hide and not bring forward the things which are written? I do not want to be guilty of a double crime. I confess, and with the people A listening, I confess that these things are written, even if I know that I have not yet fulfilled them. But let us at least be admonished by this and hasten to fulfill them; let us hasten to cross over from the priests of Pharaoh, to whom earthly possession belongs, to the priests of the Lord, to whom there is no portion on earth, to whom the Lord is the portion. For such was he who said: *As though poor, yet making many rich; as having nothing, yet possessing all things.* Paul is the one who boasts in such things. Do you wish to hear what Peter also pronounced about himself? Hear him together with John professing and saying: *Silver and gold I have none, but what I have I give to you. In the name of Jesus Christ, arise and walk.* You see the riches of Christ's priests, you see how, having nothing, they bestow such great and such things. Earthly possession cannot bestow such riches.
7. Let us see the difference between the people of the Egyptians and the people of Israel; and, examining yourself, discern of which, people you are, and whose order of priesthood you hold. If you still serve carnal senses, if you still pay your tax in the number of five, and look to things which are visible and temporal, and do not look to those things B which are invisible and eternal, recognize yourself as being of the people of Egypt. But if you have the Decalogue of the Law, and the decadence of the New Testament which we explained above, always before your eyes, and offer tithes from these, and sacrifice the first-fruits of your mind in faith to the *firstborn from the dead*, and refer your first-fruits to the *beginning of all things*, you are a true Israelite, in whom there is no guile. But even the priests of the Lord, if they examine themselves and are free from earthly actions and mundane possession, can truly say to the Lord: *Behold, we have left all things, and have followed you*; and hear from him: *That you who have followed me, in the regeneration, when the Son of Man shall sit in his kingdom, you also shall sit upon twelve thrones, judging the twelve tribes of Israel.*
7. After this, let us see what Moses says: *And Israel dwelt, he says, in Egypt, in the land of Gessen.* Now Gessen is interpreted as nearness, or proximity. Through this it is shown that even if Israel dwells in Egypt, he is not yet far from God, but is near to him and joined to him, just as he himself says: *For I will go down with you into Egypt, and I will be with you.* And so we too, even if we seem to have gone down into Egypt, and even if, placed in the flesh, we endure the struggles and contests of this world, even if we dwell C among those who serve Pharaoh, yet if we be near to God, if we occupy ourselves in the meditation of his commandments, and seek out his precepts and judgments (for this is to be near to God: always to think on the things of God, to seek the things of God), then God will always be with us through Jesus Christ. D
HOMILY XVII.
On the blessings of the patriarchs.
1. It must first be known that in the various places where Scripture commemorates the twelve patriarchs, there is a great diversity in the order of their recording. One order is written down in their very birth; another when they are reported to enter the land of Egypt together with their father Israel and the offspring of their descendants. Another order exists now when they receive the blessings of their dying parent; another when the tribes are mentioned as having departed from Egypt, or when they are mentioned as acting in some way in the desert, or when, having entered the land of promise, they are positioned on Mount Ebal for blessings and curses. Yet another is found when they receive the division of the inheritance of the land by lot. And this order is so varied that sometimes some of them are not even found listed by number. It is certain that this variation is not without some reason, and that there exist probable causes for which one is preferred in one place, and another in another. But it is not our purpose now to speak of these things, except only to explain, as God shall grant, those things which are contained in the blessings they receive at the time of death. A These blessings perhaps could be called such only from the fact that it is said in the final passage: *And their father spoke to them and blessed them; each one according to his blessing he blessed them.* But in the beginning, when the father summons them, he does not summon them as if for a blessing, but it is written: *Jacob called his sons and said: Gather together that I may announce to you what will happen to you in the last days.* This signifies a prophecy more than anything else, through which those things that are to come upon them are foreshadowed. In the body and series of the words themselves, however, it is not just the blessings or the mere prediction of future events that are noted, but rather their character, their purpose, or even certain things done by them are notably rebuked. This matter provides us with a threefold subject of explanation, as we have done elsewhere: so that the blessings keep the place of history, the prophecy the mystical and dogmatic sense, and the correction of morals and reproof directs the moral style.
2. *Ruben*, he says, *my firstborn, my strength and the beginning of my children, hard in conversation, hard and temerarious, you have brought insults. As water, may you not boil over. You have ascended upon your father's bed. You have polluted the couch where you ascended.* The story of the incest is hidden from no one, B how Ruben boiled over with the flame of lust against his father's concubine and stained the paternal bed. But the fact that in the beginning he seems to ascribe some praise to him, saying: *You are my strength*, is the reason it is noted more gravely as a crime that he, who was considered the strength of his father and the beginning of his children, did not know how to keep reverence for his father. Such is that which is said through the prophet: *I planted you a fruitful vine, all true; how have you turned into the bitterness of a strange vine?* According to the spiritual understanding, it seems to me that Ruben can represent the person of the former Jewish people, who is both the firstborn and the beginning of children, as the prophet says: *Israel is my firstborn.* For to them were first given the oracles of God. But that this people was hard and temerarious, C the Scriptures denounce. For the prophet says of them: *Everything that this people speaks is hard.* And again elsewhere he says of them: *You are always stiff-necked and uncircumcised in heart.* And they brought injuries upon their father God, when they turned to Him their back and not their face. He polluted the couch of the concubine upon whom he ascended, that is, the law of the Old Testament which he often stained by prevaricating. And that the law of the Old Testament is placed in the person of the concubine, Paul taught, saying: *Abraham had two sons, one by a bondwoman and one by a freewoman. These things are two testaments.* In which Hagar, who was a concubine, is placed as a type of the Old Testament. For the Church was one perfect dove, the Queen, who through the Gospel is joined to Christ the bridegroom. But the moral place will be treated by us here in this way. D Ruben, interpreted by the elders, is *the son who is seen*, that is, the visible and carnal one, he himself, I believe, of whom the Apostle says: *The first man is of the earth, earthly.* And elsewhere: *For if our man who is seen is corrupted, but he who is within is renewed;* calling this same one who is seen the "outer man." And again he says: *that is not first which is spiritual, but that which is animal.* Therefore, every man first lives in this world carnally and is moved according to the flesh. And the first carnal motion is in the desire of lust, which, when it occupies the time of early youth, renders the young man hard and temerarious at the same time and lascivious, ascending even upon the bed of his father and polluting the paternal couch, that is, the precepts and admonitions of the natural law, which is in us and is now called the paternal couch, that he may prevaricate. For there is within us a certain natural law which argues everyone who sins and suggests that what he does is evil. Therefore, the couch of the law...
A is defiled by one who is carried headlong and unrestrained toward vices.
5. *Simeon and Levi brought about the iniquity of their will. Into their counsel let not my soul enter, and in their congregation let not my heart be stirred, for in their anger they slew men, and in their desire they hamstrung a bull. Cursed be their fury, because it is rash, and their anger because it is hardened. I will divide them in Jacob, and I will scatter them in Israel.* As far as the history is concerned, it seems to blame that deed of theirs, because they slew with fraud and circumvention Emmor the son of Sichem, who after the defilement of their sister had wished to be joined to the family of Israel, and they destroyed all his people; when Israel their father too said to them, that they had made him hateful in this world; he invokes a curse upon their fury and willfulness and protests that they are to be divided among the people of Israel, seeing that the Levites and future priests were to come from them, who had no land of their own as an inheritance. But a spiritual explanation of these things seems to me to be able to be applied to the effect that Simeon and Levi can represent the person of the Scribes and Pharisees of the Jewish people, concerning whom it is said: *The Scribes and Pharisees took counsel to arrest Jesus*, concerning which counsel the saint who saw God in his mind B says: *Into their counsel let not my soul enter.* With false witnesses produced, they were condemning Jesus. *Let not*, he says, *my heart be stirred in their counsel.* Does this not seem to say to you: I am innocent of the blood of this just man, I am innocent of the sentence which you decree against the innocent? For *in their anger*, he says, *they slew men, and in their desire they hamstrung a bull.* I ask what men they slew, since it is certain that before the Passion of the Lord none of the believers was punished, unless perhaps one ascribes to them even the blood of the prophets; because, as the Lord says, *from the blood of Abel the just, to the blood of Zacharias, all the blood of the just which has been shed is required from this generation.* But let us see if perhaps they also killed those men whom they persuaded to shout: *His blood is upon us and upon our children.* *And in their desire they hamstrung a bull.* We read that the Son of God is called a bull in the figures of the Scriptures, indeed in the Gospel, where it is written from the person of the elder son saying to the father: *I have always been with you, and I have never passed over your commandment, and you never gave me a kid that I might feast with my friends. But when this son of yours, who has wasted all his substance, arrived, you killed for him the fattened calf.* Therefore, the Scribes and Pharisees are said to have hamstrung this bull or calf by their counsel; whose C *cursed fury, because it is rash, and their anger because it is hardened. I will divide them in Jacob, and I will scatter them in Israel.* It must be seen whether perhaps this division which is commemorated here is such as that also of which it is said in the Gospel, that when the lord of that servant comes, *he will divide him, and appoint his portion with the unbelievers*, or certainly, as I heard a certain one of the holy Fathers discoursing, that it is called both division and dispersion, for the reason that some of them believed in the Lord, and others remained in infidelity, and those who are separated from them and come to the faith are called divided, and those whose country and temple are scattered among the unbelieving race of the world are called dispersed. It seems also that this tripart movement of the whole soul is signified by them. In these, Ruben preserves the first mark of blood, with the stain of one poured out. Simeon holds the second species of anger or fury, who also is himself shown by the disgrace of his fury. Levi holds the third form of irrational movement, since it is even permitted for him to guard the law. It seems to me, therefore, that every soul that comes into this world acts in a blameworthy way in these three species by its primary movements, until, weighed down by the vices of sins and weary from association with evils, it can reach the place of repentance. For Judas follows after these, who purges the sins of confession, because Judas is interpreted as confession in the Hebrew tongue.
4. It therefore says: *Juda, let your brothers praise you, your hands upon the back of your enemies.* This can be referred either to Judas himself, or to those who are seen to be of his progeny, who, administering the kingdom of that race, tamed the backs of their enemies. But it is also aptly received in Christ, who is deservedly praised by his brothers, that is, by the apostles whom he himself named brothers in the Gospel: his enemies, Truly, upon whose backs his hand is, are understood as those whom the Father promises he will place under his feet, saying: *Sit at my right hand, until I make your enemies your footstool.* They are, therefore, enemies as long as they are unbelieving and faithless, and therefore they are struck on the back, who, after they have been converted, are made brothers, and praise him who called them into the adoption of the Father, and made them co-heirs and brothers. But he well said that the backs of the enemies are struck by Christ. For all who worshiped idols turned their backs to God: just as the Lord also reproaches through the prophet, saying: *Who have turned their backs to me and not their face.* Therefore, he strikes these backs, so that, having been converted at some time, they might turn their backs to idols, and raise their face to God, and do that which is written in the following: *And may the sons of your father worship you.* For then they worship him, when they have been made sons of the Father,
and have received the Spirit of adoption, in whom they cry: Abba, Father. For no one says "Lord Jesus" except in the Holy Spirit. This saying is applied with some difficulty to Judah, unless we speak broadly, saying that the sons of Judah were worshipped as if they were kings by their brothers, that is, by the other fellow tribesmen.
5. *He lay down and slept as a lion, and as a lion’s whelp. Who shall stir him up?* In these verses, we are not now restricted, but almost excluded: for if we suppose the lion’s whelp to be Judah, we can account for his virtue in battle, but how is it explained that he is said to have ascended from his sprout? Now "sprout" is termed *blastos* in Greek, which is more correctly interpreted as a shoot or branch, which is accustomed to spring forth from the root or from the very strength of the tree. From what sprout, then, or from what branch is Judah said to have ascended? Or how, as he lay down, did he sleep as a lion and as a lion’s whelp, such that one might ask who would wake him? Unless perhaps someone, forcing the issue, might wish to assert that Judah proceeded from the sprout—that is, as we said above, either from the shoot or the branch—which signifies the very strength and virtue of the father, who, in the confidence of his strength, lies down and rests like a lion and a lion’s whelp, and no one has dared to stir him up, because, on account of the magnitude of his powers and the strength of his fighters, no one would dare to stir him up to battle.
But a mystical exposition will be 108 much more conveniently fitted to this passage, in which the lion’s whelp, Christ, is designated not only figuratively, but also physically: for the Physiologus writes concerning the lion’s whelp that when he has been born, he sleeps for three days and three nights, until subsequently the father’s roaring or bellowing, as if he were terrified, causes the place of the lair to stir up the sleeping whelp. This whelp, therefore, ascends from a sprout: for he was born of a Virgin. Christ is born not of seed, but of a Virgin without the intercourse of a man, and without natural seed, like a shoot or a branch. In which the truth of the flesh assumed from the Virgin is most manifestly declared in the most holy sprout, and is freed from the contagion of human and carnal seed. *You lay down and slept as a lion, and as a lion’s whelp.* That he laid down and slept is most clearly said regarding the passion of death A which is shown. But let us see why he is compared to a lion and a lion’s whelp. Indeed, concerning the sleep of the whelp, it has already been said above that it is very fittingly adapted to Christ, who, buried in the heart of the earth for three days and three nights, fulfilled the sleep of death. But I think the lion ought to be understood in this way: the death of Christ was an oppression and a triumph of the demons. For this lion—the contrary one—had snatched up every prey while man lay prostrate and dejected, but this Lion plucked it back. Finally, returning from the underworld and ascending on high, he led captivity captive. In this way, therefore, even in his sleep, the Lion was overcoming and vanquishing all things, and he destroyed him who had power over death, and like a lion’s whelp, he is raised on the third day. *Who shall stir him up?* The prophet’s discourse expresses the persona of one rightfully inquiring as to who raised Christ. For the Apostle says: *Because God who raised him from the dead will also raise your mortal bodies because of his Spirit who dwells in you.* And again Christ says in the Gospels: *Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up*: but he was saying this concerning the temple of his body. Since, therefore, he himself says that he raises his temple, and God is said to have raised him, B the prophet, awestruck at the magnitude of the unity and inseparable nature of the Father and the Son, rightly says: *Who shall stir him up?*
6. *A prince shall not fail from Judah, nor a leader from his thighs, until those things that are stored up for him come*, or, as it is had in other copies, *until he comes to whom it is stored up; and he shall be the expectation of the nations.* This passage is clearly referred to Judah: for it is certain that until the birth of Christ, princes did not fail from the tribe of Judah, nor leaders from his thighs, until Herod the king, who, according to the historical truth that Josephus writes, was a foreigner and is said to have crept into the kingdom of the Jews through ambition; therefore, as soon as this had been done, and the leader had failed from the thighs of Judah, he arrived for whom the kingdom was stored up. As to how the nations hope in him, the faith of the Gospel and the propagation of the Churches teach. Now, those things are called "stored up" which are to be brought forth at an opportune time. Just as it is said that Christ arrived at the end of the ages C and D as regards *he who is stored up* (if the text is taken as *hō apokeitai*), rather than *those things that are stored up for him*. In the Hebrew it is written: *until Shiloh comes*. Jerome translates it: *until he comes who is to be sent*. As if he had read *shilloh*, or *shelloh*, deceived by the similarity of the letters, *t* and *h*. But that Jerome’s reading was faulty is apparent from the fact that the ancient translators, the Septuagint and Aquila, read not *shilloh* but *shelloh*. Aquila translates *hō apokeitai* ("to whom it is stored up"), the Septuagint *ta apokeimena autō* ("the things stored up for him"), as if by interpreting the *vav*, that is "to whom" or "which things," looking at the *vav* with the vowel *e*—and *ei*—having placed *t* for *i*, indeed *h* for *i*; for the letters are permutable. Therefore, they divided the word into *shel* and *loh* ("which to him," adding "are stored up"). Thus, in Ezekiel 21: *Until he comes to whom belongs the judgment.*
A That shows that those who believe in him imitate the deeds performed by Christ in the flesh. For the branch is understood as that which is connected to the tree and is strengthened against falling; relying on this support, it scorns and rejects winds and storms, and it signifies the hope of future blessings—because all the faithful wait for the future consummation of salvation, not only in what they do, but also in what they hope and believe. In this, as if joined and confirmed to a certain tree of patience by hope, they endure the gales and storms of temptations. My reason sees no way to allow this to be interpreted regarding the historical Judah, unless, by yielding to Jewish fables, we suppose it can be understood in this way: because they say that the portion of the tribe of Judah, which it received in the inheritance of the land, was so filled with vineyards that, as if no other kind of plant existed, there appeared to be such an abundance of vines that not even an animal could be given the opportunity to be tied to another kind of tree. But these things, as we have said, will seem to be rather Jewish inventions; to us, however, the mystical exposition—and even more, the fact that it is the only one—is pleasing.
7. *Binding his foal to the vine, and his ass’s colt to the choice vine.* This is said of Christ both properly and singularly; for he himself bound his foal to the vine who said: "I am the true vine." B To this vine he bound his foal, and to the branch he bound his ass. The foal is the people from the Gentiles, upon whom, to be sure, the burden of the Law had never yet been imposed, and upon whom no one had sat except Christ himself. But the foal of the ass are those who were chosen from the former people, who are now called by the figure of an ass, unto salvation, of whom the prophet says: "If the sons of Israel were as the sand of the sea, a remnant shall be saved." Therefore, the ass, which preferred to carry the burden of the Law in unbelief, being rejected, the foal born from it is chosen—that is, the new people from the old are gathered by faith and joined to the people from the Gentiles. Christ is therefore called the vine in that respect in which he took on human nature, to which God the Word binds his foal—that is, joins his people—and unites it to the manner of life which he himself practiced in the flesh, so that by imitating him, the foal, which is bound to him, may be made with him both a son of God and a co-heir of Christ. C But as for the branch, concerning which we did not explain at the beginning what it might signify, we can understand it in this way: the faith that is in Christ both holds the rule of the present life and provides the assurance of future hope.
8. *He will wash his robe in wine, and his garment in the blood of the grape.* These things will also seem to signify, as far as the historical exposition is concerned, a field fertile in vines and an abundance of wine. But our mystical exposition produces a nobler sense. For the robe of Christ which is washed in wine is rightly understood as the Church, which he himself cleansed for himself by his own blood, "not having spot or wrinkle." For, says the Apostle, "you were redeemed not with silver or gold, but with the precious blood of the Only-Begotten of God." D For in the wine of this blood—that is, in the laver of regeneration—the Church is washed by Christ. For we are "buried with him through baptism into death," and we are baptized in his blood—that is, in his death. But how he washed his garment in the blood of the grape is to be seen. A garment is seen to be a covering closer or more secret to the body than a robe. Therefore, those who have first been made his robe by washing in the laver, after they have attained to the sacrament of the blood of the grape, are made partakers of a more interior and secret mystery, and are said to be his garment. For the soul is also washed in the blood of the grape when it begins to grasp the reason of this sacrament. For once the power of the blood of the Word of God is recognized and understood, the more capable the soul becomes, the purer it is made and is daily washed unto the progress of knowledge, and by joining itself to God it will become not only his garment, but now even one spirit with him. Contrary to this was that garment of the people of Israel, in which, to designate the shamelessness of the nation, he called it not so much a garment as a loincloth. Which Jeremiah circum-
- A Super eos qui lacte aluntur, dentes ejus sunt candidi: B that is, those who are able to take and eat perfect food are above those who are like infants, still in need of milk. Finally, even in the Law, those animals which ruminate and bring back again the food they have taken to their teeth, which they then grind finely and bit by bit deliver for the sustenance of the body, are designated as clean. Most aptly, then, does he also speak of his teeth as white. For all who are perfect, and who, while explaining the food of the Scriptures with worthy and competent interpretations, supply the subtle and fine intellect, which is called spiritual, to the body of the Church, must be white and pure, and free from every evil, lest it be said to them: "You who teach others, do you not teach yourself?" Because, however, divine Scripture must contain not only the knowledge of sacraments, but also must inform the morals and deeds of those who learn; for thus also does Wisdom say through Solomon: "Describe these things to yourself doubly and triply in your heart," and the ark which was being built by Noah is ordered to be made with two and three decks; let us also, after we have described these things in a two-fold manner, as we have been able to perceive—that is, according to the history and according to the mystical intellect—now, insofar as the place allows, attempt to discuss the moral discourse concerning it so that students of Scripture might be taught not only what has been done in others or by others, but also what they themselves ought to practice within themselves. C It is interpreted as the confession of Judah. Whoever therefore either confesses his own sins and behaves with penitence, or confesses Christ before men in persecution, is praised by his brothers. For "there is joy and gladness among the angels in heaven over one sinner who repents." By them, therefore, as by brothers (for humans and angels alike are children of one Creator and Father), they are praised. But he who confesses the Lord Jesus, because he confesses in the Holy Spirit, his hands are made over the back of his enemies. For he who had before exhibited his members to serve iniquity unto iniquity, now exhibiting them to serve righteousness unto sanctification, already vexes and strikes the backs of his fleeing enemies, that is, of the demons. For thus he fights, not as one beating the air, but as one putting demons to flight; and he who, on account of his immense progress, already has in himself a participation of God, is even said to be adored by the children of his Father. By the children of his Father, we can understand, in a moral sense, the faithful of lesser merit, who in this adore those who are greater and more perfect, D because they venerate and praise the works of those who are humble and subject; whence it is said to the Church: "They shall adore the footprints of your feet."
9. "His eyes are pleasing from wine, and his teeth are whiter than milk." You see how he especially cuts off and removes the historical interpretation toward the end. For if, acting more contentiously, we wish to say that the eyes of Judah are pleasing because of wine, on account of the abundance, as we said above, of wine and the abundance of cups, what shall we answer regarding the white teeth, which are preferred to the quality of milk? In this, one must not act shamelessly against the truth, but, excluded by the interruption of historical understanding, let us return to the order of spiritual exposition. "Pleasing," he says, "are his eyes from wine." We showed above, by apostolic authority, that every worthy member of the faithful is called a member of Christ, and different members are named individually, because each one provides a service to the entire body of the Church. For there will be feet of Christ, who run to make peace, who proceed to provide aid to those placed in necessity. There will be hands of Christ, which are extended toward mercy, which bring aid to the needy, which are offered to the weak for support. So, too, will there be eyes of Christ, which provide the light of knowledge to the entire body. Just as it is written in the Gospel: "The lamp of your body is your eye." These eyes, therefore, are pleasing: for the word of knowledge is seasoned with salt, so that it may provide grace to those who hear. It is not, therefore, called pleasing only because it ministers the word of knowledge, but because it produces grace in itself. For, says the Wise One, after these things have been heard, the wise man will be wiser. His eyes, therefore, are pleasing from wine, because there is nothing watery in the word of knowledge, nothing fluid, nothing cold, but the wine which gladdens the heart of man, and which is poured into the wounds of him who fell among robbers, whereby, clearly, the wounds of the sins of those who listen are not only mitigated by the gentleness of oil, but are also purged by the austerity of wine. And who, says the Apostle, is it that gladdens me, if not he who is saddened by me? "His teeth are white above milk." We have spoken often already regarding the order and reason of the members of Christ, and it seems absurd to repeat the same things frequently in these places. Therefore, his teeth that are white above milk will be those who are able to chew and grind the strong and solid food of the word of God to the greatest subtlety with their teeth; about whom the Apostle says in the Epistle to the Hebrews: "But solid food is for the perfect, for those who, through habit, have their senses trained to discern between good and evil." But of the imperfect Corinthians he says: "I gave you milk to drink, not food, for you were not yet able."
A other solemnities are observed. On the first day of the month, the new moon of trumpets, as it is said in the Psalm [Ps. LXXX, 4]: "Blow the trumpet at the beginning of the month." But the tenth day of the seventh month is the solemnity of propitiation. On this day alone the high priest is clothed in all the pontifical vestments; then he is clothed with manifestation and truth; then he enters into those inaccessible places, where it is permitted to enter only once a year, that is, into the Holy of Holies. For once a year the high priest, leaving the people, enters into that place where the propitiatory is, and above the propitiatory the cherubim, where also is the ark of the covenant, and the altar of incense [cf. Lev. XVI, 12], into which it is lawful for no one to enter, except the high priest alone.
If, therefore, I consider my true High Priest, the Lord Jesus Christ, how He, having been placed in the flesh, was with the people through the whole year—that year of which He himself says [Isa. LXI, 1 et 2]: "He sent me to preach glad tidings to the poor, and to call the acceptable year of the Lord, and the day of requital"—observe how once in this year, on the day of propitiation, He enters into the Holy of Holies, that is, when, the dispensation having been fulfilled, He penetrates the heavens and enters to the Father, that He may make Him propitious to the human race, and pray for all who believe in Him. Knowing this propitiation of His, by which He makes the Father propitious to men, the Apostle John says [I John II, 1, 2]: "My little children, these things I write to you, that you may not sin. But if any man sin, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the just, and He himself is the propitiation for our sins." But Paul also similarly commemorates this propitiation when he says B concerning Christ [Rom. III, 25]: "Whom God has set forth as a propitiator (62) in His blood through faith."
Therefore, the day of propitiation remains for us until the sun sets, that is, until the world receives its end. For we stand before the doors, awaiting our High Priest remaining within the Holy of Holies, that is, with the Father, and praying for the sins of those who wait for Him, not praying for the sins of all. For He does not pray for those who come into the lot of that goat which is sent into the desert. He prays only for those who are the lot of the Lord, who await Him before the doors, who do not depart from the temple, being occupied with fasts and prayers. Do you think, you who scarcely come to church on feast days, nor are intent upon hearing the divine words, nor give effort to fulfilling the commandments, that the lot of the Lord can come upon you? We hope, however, that even by hearing these things you will take pains not only to hear the words of God in church, but also to exercise yourselves in your homes and meditate on the law of the Lord day and night, for Christ is there also, and He is everywhere present to those who seek Him. For this reason, it is commanded in the law that we should meditate upon it when we walk by the way, and when we sit in the house, and lie in our bed, and rise; and this is truly waiting for the High Priest before the doors.
Do not let the reader suppose that "lot" is a word such as is usually used among men for what happens by chance and not by judgment. The lot of the Lord is to be taken as if it were said the "choice" of the Lord, or the "portion" of the Lord; and again, the lot of him who is sent into the wilderness is to be taken as that portion which, on account of its unworthiness, is spurned and rejected by the Lord. For the Greek word *apopompaios* even contains a significance of abandonment, rejection, and refusal. C From this we can also understand that, for example, if an evil thought ascends into your heart, the concupiscence of another's wife, or of a neighbor's property, understand immediately that this is of the lot of the *apopompaios*; cast it out immediately and expel it from your heart. How do you cast it out? If you have with you the hand of a prepared man—that is, if divine reading is in your hands, and the precepts of God are held before your eyes—then you will truly be found prepared to cast out and repel those things which are of the alien lot. But even if anger ascends into your heart, if zeal, if envy, if malice to supplant a brother, be prepared to cast them out, and expel them, and send them into the wilderness. If, however, there ascends into your heart the thinking of those things which are of God—concerning mercy, concerning justice, concerning piety, concerning peace—these are of the lot of the Lord, these are offered to the altar, these the High Priest accepts, and in these He reconciles God to you. D Therefore, he who casts out him in whom is the lot of the *apopompaios*—that is, evil thoughts, evil desires—is not a slothful man, nor one occupied with worldly business, but is prepared, and prompt, and vigilant; who, even if he seems to become soiled from the fact that he has touched the unclean, will immediately wash his garments and will be clean.
What we can understand as far as each of us is concerned, according to the moral sense, is that a man to be prepared is the reason itself which is within us, through which there is for us a discernment of good and evil, which even if it appears to be soiled while it discerns and examines the things that are evil; yet if it casts them out, and expels them from the heart, and drives them far away, then, as if purified and cleansed by better thoughts, the rational mind will appear clean. Nor should you wonder that we have drawn to the person of the Savior even this one who casts out the goat and expels it into the wilderness, because it is said that he washes his garments and becomes clean, on account of that which we read in the prophet concerning the Lord, as we said above [Zach. III, 1]: "And I saw Jesus the great priest clothed in filthy garments." But if it is understood piously that this is said for the assumption of flesh, that figure can be preserved here also in the washing of the garments (63). [He] says: "And he shall take," it says [cf. Lev. XVI, 12], "a full censer..."
A For if the one who distributes to each according to their worth is just, and by assigning to those who have become better or worse through their own cause what each deserves to obtain, how is He just if He becomes the cause of a worse sin for Pharaoh? And not simply a cause, but, insofar as they understood it, one who cooperated so that he became most unjust. For by not referring the hardening of Pharaoh’s heart to anything worthy of the choice of a just God, I do not know how they are able to demonstrate, even if they wish to explain it as they do, that the One who hardens Pharaoh’s heart is a just God. B Hence, we must press them regarding the matters at hand, so that they either demonstrate how the Just One hardens, or dare to say that since He hardens, the Creator is evil; or, if they are unable to provide proofs that the Just One is the cause of any hardening, and do not dare to utter such an impiety regarding the Creator—that He is evil—they must flee to another path, an interpretive one regarding the [words], "The Lord hardened the heart of Pharaoh," departing from the [practice] of thinking they understand the literal sense, which [only] destroys their own conceptions regarding a just God. And the final [point].
Even if one were to wonder A what is the reason for the account 55, these things shall be examined regarding the problem before us. Since, however, we have come to the topic concerning nature 56, and certain people, borrowing from the construction [of this argument], believe that some things have come into being for destruction, and they bring these forward, saying that it is signified by what is taught: "I have hardened the heart of Pharaoh," come, let us ask these people: He who was created for destruction, would he not be able to do something better, of the nature inherent in him that is fighting against him toward good things? What need is there, then, for Pharaoh, being, as you say, a son of destruction, to be hardened by God, in order that he might let the people go? B For he did not harden him, but he sent him away. Let them answer concerning this, saying: What would Pharaoh have done if he had not been hardened? For if he were to have let them go without being hardened, his nature was not ruined; but if he did not let them go, there was no need for his being hardened—for he would not have let them go, even if not hardened. But by what action and by what force did He harden his sovereign power, and how does He accuse him, saying, "Because you do not obey me, behold, I will kill your firstborn, and all the Egyptians shall know, for," He says, "that I am the Lord"—as if on account of this those things thought to be grievous were being brought upon them, that they might know God?
But in the Maccabees, something of this sort is said: C "I exhort those who come across this book not to be discouraged by the calamities, but to consider that what is happening is not for destruction, but for the instruction of our race. For it is a sign of a great benefit that those who act impiously are not left alone for a long time, but immediately fall under chastisements. For the Master does not wait, being long-suffering, as in the case of other nations, as if they were abandoned for the end of their sins, so that He might later take vengeance on them; He has judged likewise for us, and being instructed with calamity, He does not abandon His own people." For if falling under chastisements on account of sins is a sign of a great benefit, [consider] Pharaoh also being chastised after his heart had been hardened, and being punished along with his people; see whether he has not been chastised to some purpose, D and not for his own 58 ill. Like one becoming an imitator of God [as is appropriate] to the times, David commands...
concerning Joab that Solomon should punish him for the sins committed against Abner, the son of Ner, and kill him for his failures; then he adds: “And you shall bring down his gray hairs in peace to Hades.” It is clear that, as the Hebrew has also declared to us, the fact that he was to be put to sleep in peace—through his being punished here—meant that there was no longer any punishment or torture owed to him, since he had already received it here, after his departure from this life. Thus do we also receive every threat, both from the Holy Scriptures and from the efficacy according to the magnitude and order of the works of God, who created the things that are seen and the things that are not seen, the temporal and the eternal; as He is one and the same in all things, [being] the Father of our Lord and Savior, good, just, and wise. We struggle to lead the Scriptures to that goal, in order to show that all things belong to the good, just, and wise God, and that we might not be thought to fall away from them, even in the slightest degree, so far as those who have understanding are concerned; but rather, that we may be in need of God the Savior to determine whether or not what is said B aligns with His goodness, justice, and wisdom. Such, then, is what we intuit regarding the phrase: “The Lord God hardened the heart of Pharaoh.” The Word of God is a physician of the soul, using ways of healing that are most varied and appropriate to those who are in a bad state, and most timely. Of these ways of healing, some produce more pain and torment in those being led toward health, while others produce less; again, the remedies vary, at times appearing strange, at others not so, and again, acting more quickly or more slowly, and [occurring] after one has indulged in sin, or after one has, so to speak, merely touched upon it. Every inspired Scripture is full of such testimonies for each case, in which harsher or more difficult remedies are recorded as having been applied to the people, and as having served for their conversion and reformation, whether in greater or lesser wars, or in more protracted or shorter famines. It appears strange, however, in the passage: C “I will not visit your daughters when they play the whore, and your daughters-in-law when they commit adultery.” For perhaps He leaves souls that crave too much the things that are thought to be bodily and pleasant, until, having been sated, they turn away from the things they desire, as if desiring to vomit them up, and would not quickly return to the same things, having been—being sated, of course, and exercised by the most grievous punishments—worn down. Those who had despised the chance to recover quickly from their evils are healed more slowly, for they succumb to the same things a second time. But the technician, God, knows the dispositions of each, and as it befits Him, He alone is able to apply the medicine skillfully and to administer what is appropriate for each, and when. And just as in certain diseases of the body, if the ailment has penetrated to the depths, so to speak, the physician applies medications to the outermost surface to draw out the matter, D causing more troublesome inflammations, swellings, and pains than those the patient was suffering before he was treated (as is customary in those who have been bitten by a mad dog, and in certain others who are afflicted with such evils), so I think God deals with the hidden malice that has penetrated to the inner soul. Just as the physician says of such a patient: “I will cause inflammation in the place of the wound, and I will make this or that part swell, so that I may create a more serious abscess,”
and since even the more skilled physician B (43) says this—not that he is accused, but rather that he is even praised for appearing to threaten such things—if someone says that it is foreign to the medical profession to do what is necessary [(44)], namely to cause inflammation and abscesses, so too I think God says, “I will harden Pharaoh’s heart.” And when these things are written, the one who hears them as the oracles of God accepts the dignity of the speaker, and seeking, he finds, and in these things he perceives the goodness of God [(45)]—being manifested more clearly for the salvation of the people, being confirmed through many miracles; and secondly, regarding the Egyptians, those who were about to be terrified and follow the Hebrews: “For,” it says, “a mixed multitude of Egyptians went up with them.” C But this is perhaps deeper: in order for Pharaoh to be benefited, and no longer hide the evil and keep the disposition, but to draw it out and bring it into the light, so that by doing it he might exhaust the evil that is present, and having accomplished the destruction of the evil-producing tree, he might later, perhaps, be without it, drying up at the end, when they are drowned—not, as one might think, that he is wholly destroyed, but that he is relieved by casting off his sins, and perhaps he might have peace after such a great war of the soul, before descending to Hades. But it is likely that my readers will find it difficult to accept as plausible the violent and foreign notion that it was useful for Pharaoh himself to be hardened, and for the sake of his own benefit, all the things that are recorded were done right up to his submersion. Now, see if from this, without any doubt, we can prove what I was saying. “Many,” says David [(46)], “are the scourges of the sinner;” and his son teaches that God, whom he loves and approves, he chastises with scourges. Furthermore, David himself, prophesying the promise concerning Christ and those who believe in Him, says [(47)]: “If his children forsake my law, and walk not in my judgments; if they violate my statutes, and do not keep my commandments, I will visit their transgressions with a rod, and their iniquities with scourges; D but my mercy I will not take away from them.” Therefore, it is a grace of God that the lawless are visited by a rod, and the sinner by scourges. And in as much as the one who sins is not scourged, he is not yet subject to correction and amendment. For this reason, God also threatens, if the sins of those inhabiting Judea become great, “No longer to visit their daughters when they commit whoredom, and their daughters-in-law when they commit adultery.” And elsewhere He says [(48)]: “Because I have cleansed thee and thou wast not cleansed, I will not be angry with thee anymore, nor will I be jealous over thee anymore.” Therefore, to those who are sinning and toward whom He is not angry—so to speak, angry when provoked—He is not angry. But one must also note regarding the prophetic threats against the many, that it follows:
"If his sons forsake my law, and walk not in my judgments; if they profane my statutes, and do not keep my commandments, A I will visit their iniquities with a rod, and their sins with a whip. Yet my mercy will I not utterly take from him." Is it not therefore by the grace of God that the lawless one 48 is visited with a rod, and the sinner is whipped? And in so far as the sinner is whipped, he is directed and is not entirely given up; wherefore God even threatens, if things become too great: "The sins of those who inhabit Judea, no longer visiting upon their daughters when they commit fornication, and upon their daughters-in-law when they commit adultery." And elsewhere He says, "Since I cleansed you 49 and you were not cleansed, I will no longer be angry with you, nor will I be jealous towards you still." Therefore, those with whom He is angry are the ones sinning, so that, if I may say so, He is angry while feeling indignation. Note that in these prophetic threats against many, it is further added, "And you shall know that I am the Lord." And He threatens not only the Israelites, but also the Egyptians 50, and others, the enemies of the people. This is also what is written in Exodus at the end of many supposed threats. For does He harden the hard man? It is clear that He does not harden the hard, but changes from B hardness into hardness through softness; and a soft heart is praised according to Scripture, as we have observed in many places. Let them say, then, whether Pharaoh was made evil from good; and if God rebuked Pharaoh, does He rebuke unjustly? If so, how is He wise and just? But if not unjustly, he was the cause of his own sins through his disobedience; and he was caused by himself, not by his nature, which perishes. But this also must be believed, because the Apostle makes use of the aforementioned words to say 80: "Therefore, whom He wills He has mercy, and whom He wills He hardens." You will say to me then, "Why does He still find fault? For who can resist His will?" and who is it that He hardens? For it is not the case that another is hardened by Him and another is shown mercy, according to the apostolic voice, but that it is the same person. Therefore, those who receive mercy in God are those who have their heart hardened by Pharaoh; and another God, or a good one, is fashioned C for them in vain. According to them, God is not only merciful, but also hardening, and He could no longer be good, as they suppose. We have examined all these things more fully and on purpose for those who unexaminedly grant themselves the power to understand, and who trample upon the simplicity of our own, opposing us and showing that neither the things they assume about God, nor the things they dogmatize about nature, contribute to them—as they suppose—the argument now being examined. We, however, being persuaded from many sides, consider even the pain and punishment brought about by God to happen never against those who suffer, but always for their sake. And indeed, the harshest names thought to be applied to God, "wrath" and "anger," are said to rebuke and to discipline in the passage: "O Lord, do not rebuke me in your wrath, nor discipline me in your anger," the one praying these things being in need of not needing the rebuke of God through wrath, and the discipline through His anger, as if some are to be rebuked by the wrath of God and to be disciplined by His anger. D
A For in order that we may the rather be persuaded by what is said, and from similar passages in the New Testament, where the Savior says: "I have come to cast fire upon the earth, and how I wish it were already kindled," for it was not because the fire of the Savior was not salvific that He came to cast it upon the earth, and upon those who were to be saved, that the Son of God said these things. But Peter, by his word, punishing Ananias and Sapphira, who had sinned by lying not to men but to the Lord, B was not only concerned for the edification of those who were to become, by seeing this, more religious, but also for those who were dying; wishing to free them, through their sudden death and apart from the expectation of the body, from the punishment that awaited them, having—as they did—the needs of those in want as half of their possessions. And Paul, being with the proconsul Sergius Paulus, blinded the sorcerer, C through sufferings turning him to piety, saying to him: "O full of all deceit and all knavery, you son of the devil, you enemy of all righteousness, will you not cease to pervert the straight ways of the Lord?" And of what time [does he speak]? Of that time when, having been rebuked and tormented for his sins, he was about to become worthy, through repentance, to see the sun both in soul and in body, in order that the divine power might be proclaimed at the restoration of his sight; and [to see it] according to the soul, when he was about to believe and be benefited by piety. But also Demas and Hermogenes, whom he delivered to Satan, that they might be disciplined not to blaspheme, have suffered something similar to those mentioned before. D And he who in Corinth had his father’s wife, he too is delivered to Satan for the destruction of the flesh, that the spirit might be saved in the day of the Lord. It is not surprising, therefore, if the things concerning Pharaoh, who was hardened and at the end surrounded by such punishments, are also managed by the goodness of God. Let these things, then, as they have occurred to me for the present, be said concerning the passage, "The Lord hardened the heart of Pharaoh." But if anyone, while maintaining reverence toward God, finds better explanations, and such as in no way touch upon impiety, along with testimonies from the divine Scriptures, then one should rather make use of those. And in other places concerning the same subject.
A Just as physicians, drawing out the poison of those bitten by a mad dog onto the surface, lest it consume the man while festering within, cause more severe afflictions and inflammations; so too God draws out to the exterior through His own medicine the wickedness hidden and lurking in the depths of the soul, so that it might become manifest and clearer, in order that He may bring upon it the subsequent cure. I believe that those things written in Deuteronomy are of such a kind, having this manner: "And you shall remember all the way which the Lord your God led you these forty years in the desert, so that He might afflict you, and test you, and that it might be known (59) what was in your heart, whether you would keep His commandments or not. And He afflicted you, and caused you to hunger (60), and fed you with manna, which you did not know, nor did your ancestors know; so that He might declare to you that man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word proceeding through the mouth of God shall man live." Observe in these things that God afflicts and tests, so that what is in the heart of each one might be known, as things that are indeed present, but stored away in the depths, and as those things coming into the open through hardships. Such is also that which in the book of Job is declared B by the Lord through a whirlwind and clouds (61) to Job, in this way: "Do you think that I have spoken to you for any other reason than that you might appear just?" For He did not say, "Become just," but "that you might appear," being such even before the trials, but appearing as such in the things that have happened. And again in another volume in the same notes on Exodus (62). Someone among our own, soothing what is sought after by means of common usage, used to say that often good masters, being patient with the offenses of their servants, are accustomed to say, "I have ruined you," and, "I have made you wicked," indicating by this demeanor that their kindness and patience seems to have become the pretext for further wickedness. C Just as, therefore, with these things being said, someone can cavil, saying that the master confessed to having made the servant wicked; so too the things that proceeded from the goodness of God, having become a pretext for the hardness of Pharaoh, are recorded to have hardened the heart of Pharaoh. But this one will be soothed (64) by the apostolic sayings, which he has understood to say: "Or do you despise the riches of His kindness and forbearance and patience, not knowing that the kindness of God leads you to repentance? But because of your hardness, and unrepentant heart, you are storing up for yourself wrath in the day of wrath, and revelation, and the justice of God, who will render to each according to his works." The same Apostle, then, in the Epistle to the Romans D says: "But if God, willing to show his wrath, and to make his power known,
A he brought in much patience the vessels of wrath fitted for destruction," as if his patience had borne the vessels of wrath and, in a manner, had given them birth. For if, because he was gentle and patient, not punishing sinners but showing mercy, those vessels increased, he in a way bore the vessels of wrath by his patience, and, if I may say so, he himself made all things vessels of wrath, and in this respect, he himself hardened their heart. For when, after so many signs and wonders had been performed, Pharaoh does not obey, but, after such things, resists, how is he not proven harder and more unbelieving? since such hardness and unbelief would seem to have been able to arise from those portents.
Similar also is that which is in the Gospel: "For judgment I came into this world." For the Savior did not set out to come for judgment, but it followed from his having come, that he came for the judgment of those who, after the miracles, did not believe in him; but he also came for their fall.
B And after other things, in this manner: The signs performed were a mercy for those who accepted and believed, as in the case of those of mixed race among the Egyptians who had gone out with the people; but they brought hardness of heart upon those who did not believe. Moreover, from the Gospel, other things similar to these can be brought forward, which seem to some to speak of the Savior as the author of evils: "Woe to you, region of Zin, woe to you, Bethsaida, for if the signs had been done in Tyre and Sidon which have been done in you, they would have long ago sat in sackcloth and ashes and repented. But I say to you, it shall be more tolerable for Tyre and Sidon than for you," and the rest. For since the Savior was the foreknower of the unbelief of those in the region of Zin, and of those in Bethsaida, and of those in Capernaum, and that it becomes more tolerable for the land of Sodom in the day of judgment than for them, why did he perform miracles in the region of Zin and in Bethsaida, seeing that because of this it becomes more tolerable in the day of judgment for the Tyrians and Sidonians than for these?
And after other things: "But you shall say to Pharaoh: Thus says the Lord: Israel is my firstborn son. And I said to you: Let my people go, that they may serve me. But if you do not wish to let him go, behold, I will kill your firstborn son." C It must, therefore, be said to those who believe that these things are from a just God, and who suppose, according to the superficial sense of the words, that the heart of Pharaoh the king was hardened so that he would not let his people go: How is he just, who hardened the heart, and threatens, if he does not release them, to kill his firstborn son? For if they are pressed, they will confess him to be evil. Then again, other things will turn them away from this and lead them to the point where they do not cling to the literal phrasing, which in their opinion cannot defend the justice of the Creator. Finally, if they are now once compelled to weigh these things, D that