the Father confirming the sonship, both then and now a second time: This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased: hear ye him. For he who hears him, hears me; and he who is ashamed of him and his words, I also shall be ashamed of him in the glory of my Father and of the holy angels. Hear him without simulation and wickedness, incircumscriptibly, seeking with faith, not lying with the tongue; receiving with faith, not weighing the Word with words. For already Paul the orator, restraining the curious and teaching all things without doubt, cries out: 0 the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are his judgments, and his ways past finding out! (Rom. XI, 33). To him be glory for ever and ever. Amen.
On Palm Sunday
A Now the spiritual gifts of the celebration shine forth; now the signs of the most famous feast run before; now the tokens of the immaterial bridegroom run before; now Lazarus, having obtained the pledge of the universal resurrection, reclines with the Lord; now the gift of the ointment fills those who run to baptism with a good odor; now the faithful guardians of the king have occupied this great city; now the faithful people, coming to meet the Lord, cry out saying, Hosanna in the highest, as you have just heard: Blessed is he that cometh in the name of the Lord, the King of Israel (Matt. XXI, 9). Blessed is he that cometh, who always comes, who is with us, and never absent from the faithful. Truly that crowd knew the royal power and entry. B For just as in the present time, when a worldly king wages war against a tyrant and returns after victory, all the citizens go out of the city to meet him, weaving praises, bearing flowers, binding up laudations, and celebrating the victory, not moved by love of glory but by the desire to celebrate the victory: in the same way the whole crowd declared Christ, as a triumphant king, to be the victor coming, or rather, as God known to them. For to God alone belong the words then uttered, which uncover divine mysteries to the prudent, Hosanna in the highest; that is, Save, I beseech, in the highest; for so that Hebrew C expression, Hosanna in the highest, is explained; that salvation may be from above, and kindness from below. O the divine knowledge of the crowd, partaking of the angelic ministry! They trod the earth, and walked in heaven, clothed in bodies, and handling incorporeal things: Jews in name, and Christians in reality; of this world in the form of life, and apostolic in confession: these, like Peter, had received a revelation from above. For just as the coryphaeus of the apostles, not from his own meditation, but from divine revelation, said to the Lord: Thou art the Son of the living God (Matt. XVI, 16); and the Lord, showing that he had not received D it from his own thought, but from the revelation of the Father, pronounced him blessed, Blessed art thou, Simon Bar-jona: for flesh and blood hath not revealed it unto thee, but my Father which is in heaven (Ibid. v. 17): in the same way the crowd, having received a revelation from above, cried out to the Lord saying: Hosanna in the highest; blessed is he that cometh in the name of the Lord, the King of Israel. That is certainly very probable. Whence, however, is it proven that this Jewish crowd received a revelation from above? Whence, then, shall I prove it? From the very words of the Lord. For, he says, when the chief priests and scribes saw the children crying in the temple, and saying, Hosanna to the Son of David, they were indignant and said to Jesus: Hearest thou what these say? And Jesus says to them: Yea; have ye never read, Out of the mouth of babes and sucklings thou hast perfected praise (Matt. XXI, 15, 16)? And not only from the words of the Lord, but it is also asserted from the stupendous movement and encounter of the crowds and from their deeds: for not only did they cry out, but they also cut branches of olives and palms and carried them in their hands, and spread their garments, and called the Savior and Lord a king: whence it is plain to anyone that they received a revelation from above. Unless they had received it from heaven, whence would the crowd have known the Lord to be a king? He did not wear the diadem of this world's king, he was not clothed in purple, no army accompanied him, no horsemen ran before him, no chariots, no shields covered in gold, nor was he carried in a chariot spread with purple, but sat upon a borrowed foal, leading only twelve disciples. Whence, therefore, did the crowd know him to be a king, if not from a revelation from above? And thus they did not seek a common diadem in the Lord; for they knew him to reign without beginning: they did not seek purple; for they saw him clothed with light as with a garment: they did not look around for a troop of soldiers, obeying the prophet who says: Ten thousand times ten thousand ministered unto him, and thousand thousands of archangels stood before him (Dan. VII, 10). They did not seek horsemen and chariots; for they knew him to be the one who took up Elijah in a chariot of fire: for they knew the evangelists to follow him like horses, believing the prophet, namely Zechariah, who says: After him came white horses, and red, and spotted, and grizzled (Zech. VI, 2, 3). The white horse is Matthew, who described those things which pertain to the incarnation of the Lord more clearly: the grizzled horse is Mark, who wrote the gospel more brightly: the spotted horse is Luke, because he narrated the deeds of Christ with a more elegant and varied discourse: the red horse is John, who declared the divinity of Christ, shining forth among the apostles like a fiery lightning-bolt: In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God (John I, 1). But the prophet Habakkuk called the apostles swift horses carrying the gospel into all the earth, saying: And thou didst lead thy horses into the sea (Hab. III, 15): calling the whole world the sea in a tropical sense. They did not seek for the Lord a chariot joined together with gems, spread with purple, equipped with royal arms; for they knew that the Cherubim and Seraphim, the six-winged lanterns, adorn the chariot, because they believed in him who had said: Thou that sittest upon the Cherubim, manifest thyself (Ps. LXXIX, 2). That faithful Jerusalem crowd, therefore, having received a revelation from God, was not offended by the base foal, but was strengthened by the coming of the Lord. Wherefore, when they saw the Lord sitting upon the foal, immediately impelled by prophetic predictions, having taken palm branches, they said to one another: What are we waiting for, why do we not go to meet him with a spiritual palm, equipped with palm branches? Its fruit is full of immortality; its leaves are for the healing of the world; its trunk, that is, the wood of the cross, is the salvation of the whole world, and a trophy of the victory won against the devil. We have heard our Church in the Song of Songs crying out: I will go up to the palm tree, I will take hold of the boughs thereof (Cant. VII, 8). Let us anticipate the Church from the Gentiles, and let us greet him as a spiritual palm and as a mighty king. While the crowds were saying these things, and doing these things, and celebrating the Lord, the chief priests and the Pharisees, being exceedingly exasperated, rebuked the crowds, saying: What are you doing? Why do you utter vain things, most impudent ones? Do you approach the son of a carpenter as if to the Son of God, holding palm branches? Do you call him Lord, who has not where to lay his head? Do you utter royal voices to him who rides upon the foal of an ass?
A Do you hear and remain stiff-necked? Are we mistaken in offering palm branches to the Lord? Is he not the palm of righteousness? Has not the prophet cried out concerning him, "The righteous shall flourish like a palm tree" (Ps. XCII, 12)? Did he not bloom in restoring sight to the blind? Did he not grant to the lame a course without hindrance? Did he not make the paralytic carry the bed that had carried him? Did he not raise the four-day-dead Lazarus from the grave? Is it for this that you wish to kill Lazarus again? Did you yourselves not roll away the stone, and are you not hardened like stones in your unbelief? Did he not permit you to untie the grave-clothes, so that, as with the man born blind, you might not falsely claim he had jumped from another tomb? You are always envious of good deeds, O Pharisees, and you oppose the multitude who believe. For this reason you have again planned to put Lazarus to death, that you might cut off the faith of the crowd. But if you kill Lazarus, what then? Is he not able to raise him up again? Let us see who will be overcome, you who slay, or he who raises? You kill with labor and toil, he raises with a word. Who is more fatigued? Is not the word of the one who acts easier? Are we mistaken, O Pharisees, because we have approached the Lord as to a king? Behold, we were strengthened all the more when we saw the foal. Therefore we know him to be a mighty king, and we have the Scripture at hand, that you might learn wisely that it is not we who are mistaken, but you who are led astray. You have the prophet Zechariah; unfold his words; fear the sickle of his vengeance; for from many ages ago, announcing the good news to the Jews, he cried out, "Rejoice greatly, O daughter of Zion; behold, your King comes to you, meek and lowly, sitting upon a foal of an ass, the son of a beast of burden" (Zach. IX, 9). Are we mistaken in reading the Scripture, and acknowledging the King, and doing good to ourselves, and turning back those who are in doubt? You possess the prophet, and yet you do not wish to understand the one who was prophesied! Stand back, therefore, O Pharisees. The more you press upon us, the more you arouse our longing and our zeal. Therefore we are not led astray when we cry out, "Hosanna in the highest; blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord." We acknowledge the name, O Pharisees; this is the name which delivered us from Egypt, and made the sea passable for us, and fed us in the wilderness, and settled us in a land flowing with milk and honey; it is what prepared the prophet to cry: "Let them know that your name is the Lord; you alone are the Most High over all the earth" (Ps. LXXXIII, 18). That the crowd is obedient, while the chief priests are disobedient, hear from the evangelist: "The chief priests consulted that they might kill Lazarus also, because many of the Jews were going away on his account and believing in Jesus" (Joann. XII, 10). Do you see the madness of the chief priests? To cut off the faith of the multitude, they sought to kill Lazarus also, saying to themselves: "If we kill Jesus alone, but leave Lazarus alive, we gain nothing; for seeing him, they believe in the other. B So that he may not become a stumbling block to us even after death, preventing some from believing in Jesus, let us kill Lazarus, that we may utterly blot out his memory." These things and others the chief priests said, as men of empty mind, not understanding that the Lord, being about to accept a voluntary death for the immortality of the world, was not going to leave to the world only Lazarus and his resurrection as a memorial, but also the invincible cross, which they would be able neither to destroy, nor to hide, nor to render vain, as it reveals the power of his energy through the whole inhabited world. For what house is there that does not have the sign of the cross, a trophy against demons and a guardian of souls? What ship is there not steered by the cross? What city not having the cross as its fortress? What king is not bound by the cross? What virgin not having the cross as her staff? What Church is not fortified by the cross? The cross shines in the night and gives light in the day; it knows how to call winter summers—even spring—and it binds together marriage, increases friendship, and rules over all good things. C What then of the evangelist? For it is good to explore the head of the whole discourse. You heard just now the evangelist saying, "Six days before the Passover, Jesus came to Bethany, where Lazarus was, whom he had raised from the dead" (Joann. XII, 1). And what is this day six days before? What is this? It is the present day, which characterizes John the forerunner. For just as John ran before the Lord, so also this day ran before the resurrection; and as John, pointing with his finger, said, "Behold, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world" (Id. I, 29), so also this day, pointing to the coming Sunday, cried out, saying: "Behold, the mother of those who are to be reborn." "Six days before the Passover." Hear the day; for it is not written "Six days before the Passover" simply, but that you might learn to cleanse yourself from every defilement of flesh and spirit. For this day is a pre-purification, that you may cleanse yourself from every stain, that you may loosen enmity and stop anger, that you may quench slander, that you may bind fast love, that you may broaden your love for the poor, so that not only you might celebrate the feast, but also the needy one might celebrate with you. For if you do not share with the one in need, and he mourns while you celebrate, watch that the retribution of that rich man does not come upon you, who, feasting sumptuously every day, did not share even the crumbs with Lazarus. Share, then, of your table with the one in need, and do good to those in want, so that you too may feast at all times, and the poor man may feast together with you. For if you do not do good to your fellow-believer, the poor man who is in need of comfort, and he, not being helped by you due to necessity, approaches a heretic, and that one comforts him, that man has become more philanthropic than you. For every heretic barks against the shepherd. What then of the evangelist? "Six days before the Passover Jesus came to Bethany, where Lazarus was, whom he had raised from the dead." He of the Lord's wisdom raised Lazarus, that he might provoke the devil. D Hear in brief: as the devil saw the Lord crying out, "Lazarus, come out," and all the underworld shattered, and the powers below unable to hold on, and that it was as if a royal command had been sent down, or rather as if a divine will were acting: the hairs of Lazarus were rooting themselves from above, the dissolutions of the nerves were being tightened, the diminutions of the flesh were being replenished, the separation of the bones was being joined together, the streams of the humors were being held back, the vital spirit was entering in, and the lady soul was taking hold of its former and ancient dwelling-place—as he saw these things and those similar to them happening, he, being disturbed and becoming anxious, ordered his own powers, saying: "Resist, be strengthened, do not betray my kingdom. What have I suffered? The power of death, which I gained through sin, is being destroyed! Him whom I had kept for four days, I am now giving back? I have fallen into a great calamity! I have begun to vomit up whom I had swallowed! It is not for Lazarus alone that I weep, but I fear that I may also lose the others, whom I have held from Adam until now. I need haste and much strength. If I do not forestall the one who by a word is plundering me, he will show me empty of all my substance. I have found what I shall do, I have known what I shall perform: I have the Jews as my confederates; I am hiring Judas; he always serves me well; for being a lover of money, when the woman approached, he appraised the ointment at three hundred denarii, bringing troubles upon her; and the ointment he appraised at three hundred denarii, but the Master of the ointment he sold for thirty denarii. I have, therefore, great need of haste to prepare a cross. He has taken my Lazarus, but I will drag him down here, and I will number him among the dead, that he may learn not to wage war against a greater one." But the powers below say to him: "Do you wish to drag the whole Jesus down here? See that you do not labor against yourself; you have experience of him; you wrestled him in the desert; did you not approach him a third time, and three times fall? If he comes down, what do you intend to do?" Having deliberated these things and those similar to them, the devil stirred the Jews to greater envy, and provoked them to put to death the one who had raised Lazarus from the dead, and to prepare a cross for the Lord, so that the curse might become a blessing, and the wood of the cross salvation for all. For through the resurrection of Lazarus, the devil was troubled, the Pharisees were confounded, Martha was fully assured, Mary was glorified, the resurrection was heralded, the disciples became stronger, and many of the Jews who believed in our Lord Jesus Christ met him with branches and palms.
sured, Mary was glorified, the resurrection was heralded, the disciples became stronger, and many of the Jews who believed in our Lord Jesus Christ met him with branches and palms, crying out and saying: Hosanna in the highest; blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord, the King of Israel: to him be glory and power for ever and ever. Amen.